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Some tactics examples

Débuté par Guest_werwulf222_* , juin 24 2010 07:06

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31 réponses à ce sujet

#26
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Posté 26 juin 2010 - 08:34

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Thanks for another great list, Cirerrek.
 
Although I've been playing for months, I've actually only made it through the game completely about 3 times.  Once as a rogue, once as an arcane warrior, and once as a sword and shield warrior.  I wasn't playing DiD games for those runs, but tried to minimize deaths just as a matter of good gameplay.  

I completed the games, but the hero had to use injury kits because I was still learning the game, just as I am now, but the group survived.   During those games, I didn't use nearly as much archery as I try to now, didn't use mods, didn't use Sten, only used Ohgren & Shale when absolutely necessary for a quest, and pretty much relied on Mori as the mage through the entire game. 

Anyway, by the time I completed the 3rd run through, I thought I had a pretty good handle on levelling, gear selection, battle tactics, combat tactics, spells, and general gameplay etc. so I decided to increase the challenge a little by doing 3 things.  

The first was to switch from normal level to hard level, and the second was to switch from normal play to DiD play.

The third thing I started to do was to vary the attributes each game for the hero more in an attempt to find a minimum necessary for the major attribute so as to allow the maximum for the other attributes.  

I understand that you basically pump STR for a 2 hander, DEX or CUN for a rogue, MAG and WIL for a mage, but the questions that always interested me were:  "What's the minimum necessary for the character's major attribute, or attributes to be able to complete the game?".  "What's the minimum level armor I need to complete the game?"  "What's the minimum level sword I need to complete the game?"  Etc.

That's what got me interested in tactics and lists, because I figured if I was going to play with less than optimum gear and stats, everything else would have to be optimized  as much as possible.

I play this game a lot, nearly every day, and I've found that this style of gameplay keeps everything fresh even or especially on the early levels which, I am sorry to say, I have been getting far more experience on than I would actually like.  

I also try to do the battles as much in real time as I can, which may actually be a little beyond my current game skills, but I like to watch the ebb and flow of battle as it progresses and I enjoy the special animations when they happen, and I don't really like to break the flow of battle by using the pause key, so I try to avoid using it unless absolutely necessary for survival.

In short, I play this way because it keeps the game interesting for me, even though I die a lot more than is necessary at this point, and a death causes a restart.  

But I've already explored the major plot points, seen most of the cutscenes, done most of the quests that I could find, etc. etc. so it's all grist for the mill.  I've already found ways successful enough to complete the game and I suppose it could still be fun to just basically repeat those ways with the different origins, but really, what's the point?  Once you know you're practically guaranteed to win by playing a certain way the game can get old fast if you just rinse & repeat.

Some people like to reach the point where they're invulnerable and if that's their style, more power to them, but it's not mine.  It's not like that in life, so why should it be so in a game that's simulating life?

By the time I reach the point where I can play any character in light armor with stock staffs, swords, and bows, and survive without using health and stam pots doing the battles in real time, I suppose I'll have had enough, but then there's Awakenings and the rest of the DLC to check out so I expect to be happily playing for quite some time to come, and there's always the hope for a sequel.

I basically consider Lothering the start of the game now having been through the beginning so often that things up to that point are not usually much of a challenge, but even the early portions of the game can be kept fresh by trying different approaches to battle or different mods should it become necessary to do so.

That's why I appreciate your tank list so much.  

With my tactics, it might not be possible to actually achieve the goals I've set without using a tank and now that I have some idea how to proceed with that in tactics, there's one more option available to me if my own ideas don't work out as well as I had hoped.  And if I ever do decide to use the tanking strategy, instead of having to proceed by trial and error from scratch, I'll have a strong base from which to begin.  Many thanks. 
 
My basic philosophy, at least for gaming is "whatever floats your boat".  

There are 10's if not 100's of different ways to play this game and each of us basically plays for our own enjoyment.  This style happens to be the way I've found that maximizes my own enjoyment, so that's the reason behind the gamestyle choices, and the reason for this long post.  It's also why I consider the tactics lists so important.

I've been gaming since I got my first computer in the '80s and in all that time I've only found 2 games I consider to be classics.  

The first was a game called "Vangers" that was released during the '90s and it captured my imagination just like Dragon Age and I played it for years.  The second is this game, Dragon Age, which I also expect to be playing for many years to come.  Both games seem to fit my playstyle perfectly and that's why I made this thread.  

I am enjoying my adventures in Ferelden so much that I thought it would be fair to try and give something back to the community in return for the many hours of enjoyment I've experienced there.

My twitch skills are only average, my  RPG skills pretty basic, but I had spent a lot of time getting my lists to work correctly so I thought I would start this thread about lists in the hope that it would save some other gamers the hours of frustration I experienced just getting the damn things to work as I wanted them to.  

I also hoped that people would eventually contribute their own lists, as you have done, to

a) provide new ideas and new ways of approaching things, and 
B) to provide a resource for the community so that eventually people would simply be able to find a list that made their NPC's behave as they want without the necessity of having to do the complete learning curve.

There is a post somewhere on the forums from someone who was quitting the game because of frustration, and I think that's a shame, because it's so needless.  I'm not saying a few lists would have changed things in that case because obviously that person didn't get far enough along the learning curve to be able to enjoy the game, but who knows?  Maybe good party behaviour would have kept him alive long enough to be able to get into the game.


 

Modifié par werwulf222, 01 août 2010 - 09:20 .

#27
Guest_werwulf222_*
Posté 26 juin 2010 - 08:42

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Cirerrek, thanks for more great ideas.

#28
Guest_werwulf222_*
Posté 26 juin 2010 - 08:56

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 This is a copy of a post I made to another thread for Mori's tactics (with some changes) if she only has 10 slots available.  I decided to move it into this thread in case beginning players read this thread first.  This is an early game setup with spells she has available in the Deep Wilds.

This is the early setup I would use for Mori with 10 slots available

1 health < 50% hp lp( health poultice least powerful)
2 self surr by 2 mind blast
3 self attkd melee horror
(4 self attkd melee behaviour passive)
4 tgt sr to mr winter's grasp
5 tgt health <50% vul hex
6 tgt has vul hex or aff hex drain life
7 nmy using melee disorient
8 tgt health <30% lightning
9 nmy nv attack
10 nmy tgt of contol attack

As it's written, rule 10 will never fire unless it's jumped to.  This is to provide a spare slot that can be used for rule 3.5 if you have the mod, some other spell when it becomes available, or as a target of a jump when more slots become available.

I don't know if you've got the advanced tactics mod installed, or if you can use that mod, but if you can, it's worth it for the behaviour change commands. Just remember to switch her back manually to default before you go exploring, or she might not follow correctly.  If you can't use the advanced tactics mod, you can achieve the same behaviour for her by pausing, opening the tactics book, and changing her behaviour manually.

Using this list does the following:

She won't waste mana on mind blast unless she is surrounded, saving both mana and the spell itself for when it's really needed. She will cast horror on any melee attacker bothering her if it's not on cooldown. If you use the behaviour slot, she will switch to passive behaviour and try to avoid and evade melee attackers and if she has enchanter's boots on she's usually pretty good at it.

If you don't have the advanced tactics mod, it might improve your game a bit by opening the tactics book and switching her behaviour to passive if you notice she is being melee attacked. That will do the same thing as the command between 3 and 4 and by running away she significantly increases her survivability in melee battles. With passive behaviour enabled, she will still use her spells when she can, but she will not target enemies at longer ranges.

Rule 4 casts winter's grasp on a tgt between short and medium range. Winter's grasp is one of her best spells, relatively cheap with mana and a fast cooldown, so you want her to use it first as often as possible. Also, this will keep her from running too far out in front of the group when they are using ranged attacks against an enemy or group of enemies.

Rule 5 casts vul hex on an enemy that is at less than 50% health and rule 6 then casts drain life on the same target which gives you the spell combo "Improved drain", a 50% increase in the power of drain life, if I remember correctly. You can tweak the 50% trigger for that combo to your liking, but starting at 50% is usually enough to kill the target dead.

7 enemy using melee attack use disorient does two things. First it will target any of the enemies using a melee attack instead of just her target using a melee attack on her, and it will reset her target for one round to that enemy.
The next time the list resets, disorient will likely be on cooldown, so she will go back to attacking the nearest visible enemy. In this way, she will toggle between nearest visible enemy and enemy using melee attack to help out the party.

8 tgt health <30% lightning makes her use lightning on a low health target, and usually guarantees a kill. You can tweak the 30% trigger in your own game to make the spell even more effective and waste less mana, but that is a good starting point.

9 and 10 are default enemy commands that will set her initial target so that the target commands work properly for the rest of the battle if there is no melee attacker to use disorient on.

10 is actually overkill, but when you want her to attack the same enemy as the controlled character you can open the tactics book and grey out rule 9 and she will do so. Alternatively, if you don't think you'll need that behaviour, you could change it to your heal spell command and move it higher in the list.


Notice I didn't waste a slot for popping lyrium pots, with only 10 slots you can do that manually when you see her mana is low or hear her start using her staff for attacks.

Also, something I just learned the other day is that Custom 1,2 and 3 are for each individual character in the group, not the group as a whole, so you can actually have at least 3 sets of tactics for her and every other member of your party. One might be for attacking, like the list above, while another might focus on party support, while the 3rd might concentrate on healing.

Just remember that once you get your list to your liking, you must use the save preset button in the lower right hand of the tactics book to save the list, or it will be lost when you switch to another custom list. Also, you can't save the built in presets, except to custom 1,2 or 3. Finally, the above list is only a starting point. I didn't really look to see what spells you have available, but using the custom lists you will be able to find the combination that is right for your game and style of play.

If you set her behaviour to passive manually, remember to set it back to default when you go exploring, or she might not follow properly.

Hope this helps.

Modifié par werwulf222, 26 juin 2010 - 09:07 .

#29
Guest_werwulf222_*
Posté 27 juin 2010 - 10:46

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Taka, the Wardog

In my game last night, I decided to try to make dog even more intelligent that he usually is. I also 
decided to try to change my method of roughing out  rules and logic, in an effort to make list writing 
easier and more intuitive. It took a few hours, but this is what I came up with, and I also learned a 
few things.

The list at the bottom attempts to implement the pseudocode rules, structure and ideas for dog.  

With this list he is basically set up as a hero defender, but will defend an ally or two if he is 
not busy, depending how you use or change list rules 24/28.

FAFT = Fail and Fall Through.

I use the abbreviation to remind myself that a rule does not always fire, and if it does not, the list 
pointer will progress. It also seems to aid in setting up some of the logical structures.

It seems to me that the book is set to use IF/THEN/ELSE structure much more easily than 
anything else, so this new pseudocode reflects that.  I also haven't had much experience with pseudocode so please forgive any errors.


TAKA THE WARDOG pseudocode


(FIX HEALTH AND STAM)
IF health < 30% beh passive
IF health < 30% hp lp
IF stam <20% deep mush
(HEALTH OR STAM BAD)
IF health < 30% jmp list reset
FAFT
(HEALTH GOOD and STAM GOOD)
IF (health >30% AND stam >20%) THEN jmp somewhere ELSE
FAFT
IF (SELF BUSY)
IF (self being melee attkd) THEN jmp (SAVE SELF) ELSE 
FAFT

=====================================

MAIN:

IF(HEALTH OR STAM BAD) then (FIX HEALTH AND STAM)
IF (HEALTH OR STAM STILL BAD) THEN (FIX HEALTH AND STAM) ELSE
FAFT
IF (SELF BUSY) THEN jmp (SAVE SELF) ELSE
FAFT
SAVE HERO (jmp SAVE HERO) OR
FAFT
SAVE ALLY (jmp SAVE ALLY) OR
FAFT
TEST (HERO USING RANGED?) jmp (Hero using ranged attk)
FAFT
Self any jmp list reset



(SAVE SELF)

IF self surr by 2 (Beh Passive AND use dread howl)
IF self attkd mel growl AND (IF health good AND stam good) THEN
(beh Aggressive AND attack nmy attacking dog) ELSE
(IF health low OR stam low) THEN (beh passive AND (fix health and stam))

(SAVE HERO)

IF (hero melee attacked OR hero surr by 2) THEN
IF (health good AND stam good) THEN
(beh AGG AND attack (NV enemy AND enemy using melee  AND enemy attacking hero) OR
(enemy using melee AND enemy attacking hero) OR
(enemy attacking hero)

nmy nv attack
nmy using melee attack attack
nmy attacking hero attack

ELSE
(fix health and stam)


(SAVE ALLY)

IF (self not busy) AND
IF (health and stam good) AND
IF self (surr by 0 AND not being attkd by melee) AND

IF (hero NOT being attkd by melee AND ally being  attacked by melee) 
THEN try to save ally by attacking NV enemy melee attacking ally.

(HERO USING RANGED ATTACK)

IF (hero using ranged attack AND tgt SR) THEN
(beh  aggressive AND attack nv enemy) ELSE IF
(enemies are MR to LR) THEN beh defensive
==========================================



TAKA THE WARDOG rules list

1 expl jmp 30
2 self health <30 beh passive
3 self health <30 hp lp
4 self stamina<20 deep mush
5 self attkd by melee jmp 8
6 hero attkd by melee jmp 14
7 ally attkd by melee jmp 18
8 self surr by 2 dread howl
9 self surr by 2 beh passive
10 self attkd by melee growl
11 self health <30 jmp 30
12 self health >=30 beh defensive
13 self attkd by melee jmp 26
14 self health <30 jmp 30
15 self health >=30 beh defensive
16 hero attkd by melee jmp 27
17 hero surr by 2 jmp 27
18 self health <30 jmp 30
19 self health >=30 beh defensive
20 self surr by 2 jmp 30
21 self attkd by melee jmp 30
22 hero attkd by melee jmp 30
23 Ali attkd by melee jmp 29
24 control attkd by melee jmp 28
25 nmy nv attack
26 nmy attacking dog attack
27 nmy attacking main chr attack
28 nmy attacking control attack
29 nmy attacking Alistair attack
30 expl behaviour default
===========================================

Rules 24/28 are a placeholder, in case you want dog to also guard another party member, or you can use 
them for something else and free up 2 slots.

With the addition of this list to the thread, all the early characters have at least 1 working list 
that a player can use, although some lists are better suited for some tasks than others.

In general, they just demonstrate behaviour switching  that works and for the human characters, weapon switching as well.  This list, Taka the Wardog, is my first attempt to implement intelligent AI behaviour in an NPC, meaning he checks something other than the state of the first rule to fire.  The others I posted were more or less just to get something that worked into the thread for the use of the community.

I suppose I'll clean up my own posts in the thread over time, but as it stands I think there are enough 
examples provided for any player to have a good resource available, either for working lists or a 
base for ideas of their own.

It has been fun, but I think that unless or until I get some really good AI rules going that I'm pretty much done with this thread except for cleanup.

Done.

Modifié par werwulf222, 05 août 2010 - 02:57 .

#30
Mordrill
Posté 31 juillet 2010 - 02:16

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Cirerrek I really liked the way you wrote out your tactics, nicely done. I was wondering if you have anything posted for Leliana or anyone else for that matter? I am running on a xbox so where werwulf222 post has been helpful I find your post a bit better. Bottom line I am stealing your ideas. Thanks man

#31
soteria
Posté 31 juillet 2010 - 02:55

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Good thread. I tagged this one a month ago to read it, but just now got around to actually doing it. For a while now I've been thinking of doing a "combat tactics" how-to video, but I'm still not quite sure how to go about it.

#32
Guest_werwulf222_*
Posté 31 juillet 2010 - 12:16

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And done.
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