Olrox wrote:
@Rman: But won't droid frustration make the scavs blow up the buildings? I think it'd be much more interesting to leave opened entrances to let the scavs go out to defend their bases (otherwise, the player could just use mortars to harass them freely, until a wall blows up accidentally). But if that solution you've used really works and isn't compromised by droid frustration, I'll surely use it while the scav AI isn't improved, thanks for the suggestion!
~Olrox
Well there are a few different things going on here simultaneously that I will speak to briefly which puts the technique in a very specific, multi-dimensional context as I understand it. The degree to which this may be relevant to "The Lost River" is your purview, naturally.
The Player 7 Scav Droids won't auto attack to escape. Scav Droids controlled by a Human Player will auto attack to gain access.
What I'm doing with this technique is creating a Scav Outpost to guard a significant (& destructible) resource cache that Human Players will want / need and to attack with artillery or IF Weaps will surely destroy the cache, pinch the human player in that whoever succeeds will gain an upper hand, which is why it is constructed such that only a "surgical strike" will win you the reward.
Think of it more a Supply Depot than a Scav Fortress Outpost or FB. The Main Scav Base Fortress does not use this technique and so only if the Scav Supply Depot Droids are taking punishment will the Main Base Scav Droids deploy (very likely intercepting Human Players long before ever reaching the breached Scav Supply Depot ground access). But throughout any maneuver by the human players will first have to contend with Non-Mobile Scav Defenses before they can even reach the Scav Supply Depot entry - same deal with all the vital real estate, including the Scav's main base, "The Last Redoubt".
One of the net consequences of all the foregoing (& other created conditions like looming attrition) is to slant the tactics more in favor of Vtols, Borg Airlift & precision control over blunt, mass, armor deployment offensives. (Even scouting has to be done with a mindful attention that the stock game does NOT encourage, let alone reward.)
Overall my use of Scav Player 7 Droids is minimalist because I do not want to spam them as cannon fodder and yet - through a combination of canny topography, concealed defenses, & resource distribution, Scavs are essentially effecting the 4-Dimension of game play; the ebb and flow of a threatened attrition (as opposed to one that is concerted, firmly forced or entrenched, and thus draining the fun-factor which we have to guard against in the design). At least those are my operational concepts.
In the end, improving the scripts is I think the "cleaner" solution but who knows when that will be a done deal and I am determined to push ahead in spite of this and other current shortfalls. At least the way I'm working around it gives me a measure of control over the game play that is second only to precision CAM type scripting.
All of this is fundamentally quite experimental (what you are doing and what I'm doing) and without precedent when you think about how most maps have been made and still are being made. In a real sense these efforts all amount to writing a brand new chapter in the WZ map making book, charting heretofore uncharted waters which is what makes it especially interesting to create and to play, to be sure - the two melded as one.
- regards, RV
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), and then, after a while, the scavengers started to retreat - retreat to a neighboring base!
