Bots and Mortars

[Michael Z Freeman]

I've been away from PR for a while. It's great to see so many maps with really well done Coop/AI support in the mod ! .

So I was surprised to be under mortar fire playing as the British on Al Basrah. I guess this is a deployable mortar kit on the other team ? Great to see mortar explosions again (well, as happy as you can ever be to see a mortar round :razz , I even thought for a moment that the commander artillery had been fixed and still wonder if there's a way to mod that into a single player game outside of the commander, but I guess that would interfere with Coop where a human player is often the commander and CAN send out artillery. But, anway, I don't think the British (or whatever side) bots can use the emplacement mortars to counter the deployable kit mortars that started firing on me. Is it impossible to make AI support for the mortar emplacements (the one's built by the Officer), or just something thats on a "to do" list somewhere. Cheers.

[Fastjack]

Its not a mortar kit.
The devs created a secondary kind of mortar for ai.
The camera is set really high in air (bird perspective) and the bots are able to use them against the other team.

[Michael Z Freeman]

Its not a mortar kit.
The devs created a secondary kind of mortar for ai.
The camera is set really high in air (bird perspective) and the bots are able to use them against the other team.

Right, yes. The same way Forgotten Hope does it, I see. I have noticed my side ... usually brits, USA, etc, mounting the mortars but they never fire which is why I was surprised I was getting mortar fire from the other side. So far could just be a fluke of the AI as I've only played a few rounds so far.

[Rabbit]

Yep, melon did a great job with this and it really adds a lot to coop.

[Scubbo]

its ruthless so you have to neutralize asap --- bloody good addition !

[Michael Z Freeman]

It's sure a good replacement for the now non-existent AI commander artillery (BTW this was never broken in the latest 2142 patch) ... so looks like a I need to be building mortars, 1. where there's a stream of bots that will mount them like they do with the MG position, and 2. so it's fairly near to enemies to fire upon that bots can see from the raised position.

[Madar_al_Fakar]

One thing that bothers me tough: The AI use the mortar against vehicles to destroy them tooooooooo quickly and wayyyyyyyyy too accurately! :/
Me and my friend were using a IFV when all the sudden we started to be hit by some explosions! we had no idea where they came from and they were super accurate and quick, so much as we were thinking it was an enemy attack helicopter but we knew they had no helicopters on that map! ;( Aaaand we weren't even standing in one spot we were moving around (on the highway overpass on Op Marlin) but were still being hit like crazy.
Please do something about this, reduce their accuracy against vehicles (that haven't been completely static) by 20 times.

[Michael Z Freeman]

Could be too accurate, but what is going on with these mortars. Has anyone else seen bots actually firing deployed mortars ? I thought I might need to give them a command through the binoculars but they just sit there ! Anone ?

[Fastjack]

They cannot use the deployable mortars spawned/placed by squadleaders! Those ones for human players.
The bots got their own mortars and they are not spawned by squadleaders. They got placed by the mapper or the guy who makes the coop layout (placing flags, vehicles, spawnpoints etc.).

[Michael Z Freeman]

They cannot use the deployable mortars spawned/placed by squadleaders! Those ones for human players.
The bots got their own mortars and they are not spawned by squadleaders. They got placed by the mapper or the guy who makes the coop layout (placing flags, vehicles, spawnpoints etc.).

I see. Thanks for that. I've seen them mounting pre placed mortars as well, but they never fired. Could the coop team add a new buildable item "AI mortar" in the Officer build list. Obviously we don't want to break the mortar system for human players in coop.

[Mats391]

Right now the bot mortars have no deviation. That probably makes them way too accurate. Next version fixes that.

[Madar_al_Fakar]

Right now the bot mortars have no deviation. That probably makes them way too accurate. Next version fixes that.

Beautiful. xD

[Michael Z Freeman]

Sounds good.

I started discovering pre-placed AI mortar positions using the UAV. I even found one in Brit base that I did not know about and saw the AI bot fire .

The other related thing is Area Attack. It's impossible to authorise in SP even when requesting and then switching to Commander. It's a request/authorise system but the request is never there to authorise once having switched to Commander. I know PR SP/Coop is training orientated so single player is maybe not the focus (yet the term is included in the forum title). But what about allowing a modification, as has been done with building, to allow use of Area Attack ? It could be as simple as allowing the human Commander to request and then authorise their own Area Attack by adding Area Attack in the usual place in the menu.

[reddog0000]

I for one want the AI 'mortar' reduced or removed completely, as SP is now foo bar because it's almost impossible to take an enemy flag as the 'mortar' kills your squad or vehicle before the flag can turn.

There needs to be a 'config file' so the player can set the following for each map:

1. Remove: yes / no
2.Frequency: minutes
3.Accuracy: 1 to 10 or a percentage %

woof

[Scubbo]

keep them in, they're great in COOP when people arent taking care of them !

just if possible make the badguys not spawn on them constantly, as you can sit there and kill mortar dudes all day they just keep reappearing (does it cost them tickets?)

[reddog0000]

keep them in, they're great in COOP when people arent taking care of them !

just if possible make the badguys not spawn on them constantly, as you can sit there and kill mortar dudes all day they just keep reappearing (does it cost them tickets?)

As far as I can make out, killing the AI mortar team has nothing to do with the enemy 'mortar' firing [I've also sat at the mortar and killed the AI to no avail] .. ops:

The enemy seems to have a permanent gods uav view of the map -- so as I previously posted, it would be nice to offer a configurations option.. then it's up to the server admin or single player to decide ...

woof

[Michael Z Freeman]

Now confirmed that my AI mortars are working if it was some fluke my end or a fix, or maybe the bots just feel more aggressive .

Right now the bot mortars have no deviation. That probably makes them way too accurate. Next version fixes that.

I'm seeing mortars deviating in 1.4.5.0 so I assume this has been fixed.

Thanks PR AI team for bot powered DEATH FROM ABOVE !

[Michael Z Freeman]

More handy bot controlled mortar facts: When bots enter the Officer placed mortar (NOT the special pre-placed mortars) they WILL fire if the enemy is in line of sight. I also had the range and angle set up on the target the bot fired on which might have helped. I saw this happen on Jabal Al Burj when I had an FOB setup near the MEC base. The bot mortar was able to fire across the water onto vehicles at the base of the dam. So mortars are actually useful in Coop games with bots or only a few human players as long as the placement is correct. Line of sight. They can't fire over the other side of hills and so forth.