Why do enemies come in groups?

reiwulf

I've always wondered about that, is it a DnD thing?
It makes things harder for us single target dps, and even though I know it won't be changed, I'd like to know if there's a specific reason this was decided.

kattefjaes

reiwulf wrote: »

I've always wondered about that, is it a DnD thing?
It makes things harder for us single target dps, and even though I know it won't be changed, I'd like to know if there's a specific reason this was decided.

Monsters get lonely too. It's a common trope in films, books and games. The hero usually only sees a single henchbeing when he wants to jump on one and steal his uniform.

cayapp

Well I want to know why when the first group comes...all the rest of their buddies that see you with ease do not join in?

qutsemnie

Group agro mechanics are a way to cover for the fact that nobody is scripting "behavior" into individual simulated mobs.

chemboy613

Well Jox, you know, they've done a good amount of change on this recently. I can't wait until i unlock the new content on my TR, personally.

Even so, back in the day when we weren't so stupid OP and before TRs were nerfed into the shadows, TR did great damage on main targets while team handled the adds. This worked great.

The problem is that we are too powerful for most of the content, so no need anymore, coupled with a ton of nerfs to TR.

That said, TR has their place. MC, ToD dungeons, TR is incredible.

nallif

It's dangerous to go alone.

rollingonit

“No one saves us but ourselves. No one can and no one may. We ourselves must walk the path."

Said someguy somewhere, I think I read in some buddhist teachings.

magiquepurse

qutsemnie wrote: »

Group agro mechanics are a way to cover for the fact that nobody is scripting "behavior" into individual simulated mobs.

That's about it. Power by numbers to obscure lack of mechanics.

In other MMOs, there are trash packs as well, true, but also extremely hard elites. To make them challenging, besides adding more HP, they receive all kinds of dangerous abilities that the player needs to react to with abilities of their own.

Since in this MMO you have lots of dodges and just 3-5 encounters, things can be a bit different to code I assume.

But overall the AI, especially in dungeon boss fights, is very rudimentary and lacking, and the character overall power way above the dungeon recommendations.

zebular

reiwulf wrote: »

I've always wondered about that, is it a DnD thing?

Even in PnP D&D, monsters are listed in a way in both their Monstrous Manual entries and Random Encounter tables for how many are encountered. Some monsters are, of course, solitary creatures and these are always indicated as such in MM entries and RE tables. So yes, it is a "D&D Thing," so-to-speak. Just as the minority of Monsters in PnP are solitary, the same holds true in Neverwinter Online also. In Neverwinter Online, there are a few monster types that spawn solo, but not many.

ikapamk

Part of it is scalable difficulty, part of it is D&D MM material, like Zebular said, but the real question is: Why do all higher-level mobs do AoE damage? It wreaks havok on TRs, melee HRs, and offensive GWFs who are all unable to find an optimal position to strike (esp Karru, FH, PK [for the pop-ups], and DV). It makes them hard to do a solo run, if one is so inclined, and generally obfusticates melee DPS. GFs remain unaffected and ranged classes are similarly unfazed. It just encourages ranged play (especially if the whole mob pulls AoEs or cones)

destinyknight

Its the lack of individual AI in the monsters. (which many mmorpg games lack. Cause its too much computing for a server to host, especially with the large amounts of monsters that can appear on screen at a time)

This is why all monsters only have at the most 3 abilities (default attack, Ability 1 and Ability 2 and rarely Ability 3 ) even for bosses and they all react the same way. And also why monster that heal just have a general radius heal thats based on the condition of thier own HP than thier allies.

If individual monsters had unique branching AI. It would make foundries a whole lot easier and more interesting to build as an adventure.

That is what makes true difficulty. As it is now Difficulty = Many monsters and/or Monsters with large HP pools and aoe abilities.

ambisinisterr

To expand on what Zeb said it has to do with what defines an encounter.

And encounter is a group of monsters similar to a party of adventurers. More or less if you attack one of them they will alert the rest of the encounter unless you inhibit the others from knowing about the situation (not applicable in Neverwinter)

As such if the developers lay an encounter and you attack one of a specific encounter then the rest of that encounter will follow suit.

However one more useful mechanic that Neverwinter sorely lacks which is a big time D&D thing is "perception." Perception checks are the likelyhood for both players and creatures to notice things in their surroundings either by seeing, hearing or feeling them. This mechanic does not exist in Neverwinter at all and is why you notice mobs right next to each other react to threats differently.

Crude Explanation of Perception:
Spot and Listen are the main skill checks used in perception. Basically if a mob can see another mob and you fire an arrow into it then the mob would have to roll a perception check based on spot and/or listen. The closer the two mobs are to each other the more likely it is for the mob to see or hear the arrow strike it's ally. Alternately if a mob can not see an ally it will still roll a listen check to see if it hears its ally make noise when the arrow hits it.

Feeling is more of a common sense rule that is used at the DM's discretion. If you use a power like meteor swarm inside (bad idea) it is definitely going to cause some massive vibrations throughout the building. At that point the DM will put more enemies around or make sure the enemies are *looking* for the cause at their discretion.


That type of system would have been the preferred route and would have been a lot more realistic than being able to fight and kill enemies well within viewing range of their allies but alas that is not how Neverwinter is designed.

ironzerg79

That wouldn't work in an MMO. You'd then have to spread monsters out over such large distances so that packs of mobs wouldn't chain into each other, or else you'd run into situation where "perception checks" by the monsters were constantly pulling the entire zone down on one player. Either one would make the game significantly less fun.

In tabletop D&D, you don't normally venture across areas with monsters standing every few feet. In MMO's, you do. Mixing to two together would be a disaster.

If anything, you can think of the agro mechanic as being sort of analogous to a perception check.

Anyway, Neverwinter is a MMO with a D&D theme, inspired by the tabletop rules, but not dictated by them. If the team tried too hard to simulate the table top rules in the game, things would quickly fall apart.

nazghul22

reiwulf wrote: »

Why do enemies come in groups?

And in groups of three to five. Not the whole town against you like in zombie games.

ambisinisterr

ironzerg79 wrote: »

snip

The issue with everything you stated is that perception checks worked just fine in NWN 1 and 2. And the way monsters are laid out here and there compared to Neverwinter are in no way different. The mechanics of this game are different than NWN but the map layouts are very much similar albeit a bit more simplistic. Perception checks could very easilly be appllied to the game if the proper mechanics were implemented from day one.

And I mean very simply.

But the mechanics are different. And perception mechanics especially are a HUGE disconnect for players. A disconnect Neverwinter avoided due to D&D rules being applied with PnP perception checks translated exactly as they are written in the D&D Rule Books. If there's one thing that could very easily be translated from D&D to any MMO (D&D or not) it's perception mechanics.

destinyknight

I dont see how perception checks would be difficult to actually implement. Deception checks would be nothing but a string of probabilities through stats. That basically everything in the game goes through already.

The only difference being they arent straight like the rest of the actions in game. Action <a> checks out by variables x y and z, and follows by Action <b> as the outcome. We only see action A and B ingame but theres alot of x y and z's that happen under the hood. Perception would be similar but have behavior variables to play out instead of just math and UI feedback.

The difference here is for that has to apply for every single monster and there is other sub variables that has to be taken to account. Things have to account for distance, line of sight, allied creature's lineof sight, line of sight to thier allied creatures, individual engagement pattern, suspicion checks, suspicion reaction checks, allied creature comminications. An action cant just happen, the monster has to react (or not act) based on the check of an action. This means programming wider varied AI for each creature/monster. As it stands, every monster pretty much reacts the same in an encounter. They dont have individual AI's for themselves. Without that, perception checks cant happen anyway. And I dont know if they can change that, for as it seems its built into the core code of the game. (and many mmos dont really have that in the first place which I explained in a previous post).

To further elaborate, the behavior pattern of that of a werewolf would not be the same as the behavior pattern of a Golem or a spider. And the complex web of taking the difference into account would put alot of strain on it. And if there is no difference, then theres no point in putting it in the first place, for that would defeat the purpose.

It would be too many processes to have to run and would substantially slow down things not for the user side, for the server side which affects the users.

vortix44

You attack one foe and the whole group of foes attacks you.
It does not have to be like that. A much older MMO (Rappelz) uses the concept of linked mobs. Say you have a troll and a redcap, the redcap is linked to the troll but not the opposite. If you attack the troll, the redcap will attack you but if you attack the redcap, the troll won't move. This makes the fights more subtle than here. When the group of foes is too strong for a frontal attack, you can try to kill the linked mobs first. Here, whatever you attack, you get the whole kitchen at your head, all you can choose is which mob you want to see dead first.