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Post by Redfiend on Oct 28, 2023 12:41:26 GMT -5
Has anyone else felt like the AI have been toned down?
I've felt it the most on the low rungs. Where previously, the AI had over-leveled gear, with epic/legendary pilots (SP that would be drastically higher than a player loadout) now they run either or. Gear that is on par by level/rank with pilots OR gear that is at a higher rank, but no pilot.
On the other end of the spectrum (7.3k SP) there seem to be less AI with fully decked out legendary implants on 6.7 pilots.
Before, I had the sneaking suspicion that the MM for the bots didn't account for their pilots. As in, the player's MM SP was what would be used as bot hangar's base mech+weapon SP, with their pilots stapled on to them after their hangars were generated.
If that was true, that would explain why bots always seemed stronger than player hangars(unless the player was maxed with all legendary implants).
If this is actually fixed, it's kind of a big deal in terms of player retention, as matches should be less lopsided overall, and mid-game players will not run into getting shreked by AI mechs that would be worth $300+ to replicate because of their pilots and implants
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Post by Danny Linguini on Oct 28, 2023 13:44:58 GMT -5
I’ve been getting a lot more kills the last few days, like around 12-15 per game when there’s only one other human (or none), fewer if there’s a lot of humans. So there might be something to it. Of course I still get the occasional pasting where the bots all target me, or the humans have hangars full of magic mechs. Don’t say it too loud or they’ll surely crank them up again.
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Post by Redfiend on Oct 28, 2023 15:56:51 GMT -5
I’ve been getting a lot more kills the last few days, like around 12-15 per game when there’s only one other human (or none), fewer if there’s a lot of humans. So there might be something to it. Of course I still get the occasional pasting where the bots all target me, or the humans have hangars full of magic mechs. Don’t say it too loud or they’ll surely crank them up again. They've already proven they aren't listening to us. It's why I'm sure the AI being that much stronger SP wise, was actually just an oversight in the MM coding when they introduced pilots. They were just playing it off as it being "just the way it is" because it pushed sales and took work to fix. For some reason, the AI is now capable of running R3 epic weapons(Nades, Cryonades, ember, quantum guns). So I'm guessing whatever they had to do to update the AI loadouts, and whatever changed the player rating from SP to inventory power, fixed it. The introduction of pilots was really the bullet that made AI untenable, it just got worse/more pronounced with Railgun 12 introduced, miniguns, and the EM rifles taking up most of the AI's possible loadouts. Pilots scale with loadouts, so there really was no way in hell certain loadouts were AI viable (from "hilarious slow grind" thread to now) WITHOUT the MM being situated in a way where AI pilots weren't calculated into their power scores. Loadouts like Myna+Shotgun8 Paragon, Archangel+LA8/12 have disappeared from the lower brackets. The SP of those loadouts were easily double the SP of R2 mechs with R2/ weapons and rare pilots. The kind of hangar I'm currently running while building up T3/4 items. |
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deviant
Destrier
Posts: 93
Karma: 76
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Post by deviant on Oct 28, 2023 17:41:28 GMT -5
Not sure if it is related, but I have seen a few bots with pilots that don't have all their implant slots filled (as seen when a bot kills me). It might be some evidence of an SP cap on bot hangars that is being applied.
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Post by Redfiend on Oct 28, 2023 18:56:39 GMT -5
Not sure if it is related, but I have seen a few bots with pilots that don't have all their implant slots filled (as seen when a bot kills me). It might be some evidence of an SP cap on bot hangars that is being applied. Yea, that just adds to what I think was happening before, where the AI SPs didn't include their pilots. There were always brackets and cutoffs for what the AI spawns at different SP ranges. Before this update, the power ratings of their mech/weapon loadouts(without pilots) would be in line with player SP(including everything), but then the majority of their pilots would be jacked. For example, R3 mechs with R3 weapons, with a rare pilot would be around 500SP each. AI would have R4 mechs with R3 weapons(or vice versa, which would also come out to around 500SP WITHOUT pilots, but would then have epic and legendary pilots with epic and legendary implants. I'm currently treating every 2 teirs as completely different games. I've imposed the limit of T1 and 2 to R2 mechs and R3 weapons, because those are the highest base ranks available. 2.7 mechs with 3.7 weapons+ rare pilots(700ish SP) are now facing completely different opposition than they used to. Higher rank AI mechs have gutted, or no pilots, where they used to be "all in". I have another hangar for T3+4(R3mechs, R3/4 weapons, 12-1500SP), and the BS AI loadouts that used to have some AI pub stomp others are gone. The worst offenders used to be Frag Gun AI with Myna and epic+ upgrades. Their base SP without the pilot would be the strongest thing players facing it would have with the player having a pilot. |
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Post by S1E1 on Oct 29, 2023 0:48:38 GMT -5
Not for end-game tier. Folks definitely have been talking about it. Way more variety in weapon load outs so you can't predict what you'll be facing. Lots of instakill sniper set ups. And now they've added Eclipse and Nomad to the mix in addition to Hemlock. Nomad is even worse than Eclipse. That extra health makes it a tough little bugger. Keep expecting to have killed it, but stays alive and turns the tables quick. They have it loaded with all kinds of set ups, including 3 different sniper combos: EMRs, RGs, and split. And the way they move seems human half the time.
Personally I think it is an improvement. All the heavy bots are still in the mix, but now there's less of them. Was boring before and annoying how much you get boxed in by big bots or have your shots blocked. But the intensity has definitely gone up a notch.
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Post by Koalabear on Oct 30, 2023 7:44:15 GMT -5
On the contrary, for me the AI has been getting way more aggressive. Things like being sniped from across the map while under cloak is the norm. I even get one shot killed from across the map in mid dash in my KS before I could dash into prime JR/HR position.
I do see fewer Hemlocks now which is great and I see more maxed AI Eclipses as a result - which I don't really mind cause I see those as a challenge that I can't resist. When I see one under cloak, I get that "SQUIRREL!" impulse and must chase it down - especially if I'm also in my Eclipse.
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Post by Danny Linguini on Oct 30, 2023 13:59:46 GMT -5
Whatever you said was going on with AI, it’s the exact opposite now. I’m getting Eclipses all over the place, on both human and bots. Ridiculously aggressive AI outscoring red humans. Between yesterday and today, I’m getting mech’d out almost every game. That almost never happens. Like I said, don’t utter any good news too loudly, because guaranteed those lunks will turn it all back with a vengeance.
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Post by Danny Linguini on Oct 30, 2023 14:08:36 GMT -5
And then after I’ve been beat down enough, we have the other extreme. That was all Lancer with JR6’s on Patterson Station.  |
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Post by S1E1 on Oct 30, 2023 14:40:37 GMT -5
So I have been looking at AI pilots in end-game tier more in the last couple of days and interestingly some don't have all their implant slots filled. There's a whole set that will have a gold pilot, 2 gold implants maxed, and two empty slots. There's also some AI pilots that will have the last rank unleveled on 1 or 2 of their implants. Mostly all gold pilots, but a few more purple ones in the mix as well. Implants are almost always gold unless that's not possible, but think I may have seen one or two purple Ability Cooldown implants. I'm not sure though that cooldown implants were in the AI mix before, vs mech-specific ones, so that actually ramps up difficulty regardless.
AI is definitely in terminator mode with pinpoint accuracy. I wish I had video of some of the 2v2 matches I had yesterday. Multiple AIs weaving through columns like a slalom skier while coming right for me. Had one Nomad, starts near one end of the map, dashes to midpoint and bounces off my teammate, then double dashes to right beside me on the other the end of the map in a long obtuse triangle and then just lights me up. Man it was a beautiful move, or it would have been if I had done it versus getting splattered.
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Post by Redfiend on Oct 30, 2023 15:08:16 GMT -5
Whatever you said was going on with AI, it’s the exact opposite now. I’m getting Eclipses all over the place, on both human and bots. Ridiculously aggressive AI outscoring red humans. Between yesterday and today, I’m getting mech’d out almost every game. That almost never happens. Like I said, don’t utter any good news too loudly, because guaranteed those lunks will turn it all back with a vengeance. After opening up a 4th slot on one of my burners, it seems they've actually started averaging hangar SP regardless of slots opened. Before, total SP was being used to tally up AI, not an average of the entire hangar. Now that they've finally rigged it so 5 mechs averaging an arbitrary number is the same as 2 or 3 mechs with the same average, the carrot for artificially capping mech slots has been axed. With the way it was before, opening up all 5 hangar slots before having Rank 3 items on average was punished, because AI scores did not include their pilots, and AI using "total SP" had over leveled 3 mech hangars that could easily sweep the lower ranked player mechs across 5 slots. All that to say, if your average SP is that of R5 mechs and weapons, it doesn't matter how many mechs are being used to reach that average. Don't blame me, blame the player that stayed top 10 in seasonal ranking with only 2 mechs 😅 |
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Post by Redfiend on Oct 30, 2023 15:20:41 GMT -5
So I have been looking at AI pilots in end-game tier more in the last couple of days and interestingly some don't have all their implant slots filled. There's a whole set that will have a gold pilot, 2 gold implants maxed, and two empty slots. There's also some AI pilots that will have the last rank unleveled on 1 or 2 of their implants. Mostly all gold pilots, but a few more purple ones in the mix as well. Implants are almost always gold unless that's not possible, but think I may have seen one or two purple Ability Cooldown implants. I'm not sure though that cooldown implants were in the AI mix before, vs mech-specific ones, so that actually ramps up difficulty regardless. AI is definitely in terminator mode with pinpoint accuracy. I wish I had video of some of the 2v2 matches I had yesterday. Multiple AIs weaving through columns like a slalom skier while coming right for me. Had one Nomad, starts near one end of the map, dashes to midpoint and bounces off my teammate, then double dashes to right beside me on the other the end of the map in a long obtuse triangle and then just lights me up. Man it was a beautiful move, or it would have been if I had done it versus getting splattered. They seem to have made them smarter, and given them more weapons to work with(their mech/weapon pool was previously pretty limited), but have toned down their pilots at all levels of play. The predictability at end game was the only thing making it "easier" once getting over the max hangar milestone. The AI pilots being jacked is what made everything up until R6 (6k-ish SP) utterly unfair to play against. Realistically the game has stratified to the point where every 2 teirs can(and should) be treated like completely separate games. The way they "balance" around item grade has made it so. As with pilots, the numbers between epic and legendary aren't as much of a chasm as rare items(and below) are to epic grade items. From what you've said, sounds like AI have traded off high level Epic grade mechs/weapons with God-teir pilots, for Legendary grade mechs and weapons appearing at higher frequency, the power difference being in pilot implants. They did have access to the general ability implants before the update, it was just rare for them to spawn with them. |
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Post by BigBear on Oct 31, 2023 5:41:20 GMT -5
My opening 5 games today on CPC resulted in 5 straight losses with a combination of OP opponents and AI manipulation,all games had my team destroyed with just me left standing and my teammates mostly managing 1-5 thousand damage each and 0-1 beacons.
I raised my hanger strength to finish the 2v2 event yesterday but I'm dropping it straight back down,these high level games are no fun but using my newer low level bots and weapons is so much more enjoyable as a gaming experience.
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Post by Danny Linguini on Oct 31, 2023 8:09:06 GMT -5
My opening 5 games today on CPC resulted in 5 straight losses with a combination of OP opponents and AI manipulation,all games had my team destroyed with just me left standing and my teammates mostly managing 1-5 thousand damage each and 0-1 beacons. I raised my hanger strength to finish the 2v2 event yesterday but I'm dropping it straight back down,these high level games are no fun but using my newer low level bots and weapons is so much more enjoyable as a gaming experience. Don’t you just love days like that? Makes you want to jump right back in and keep playing, AND hand over all your hard-earned money for all those wonderful upgrades that keep needing more money to keep upgrading. Incredible player retention strategy they’ve developed. ‘Just slightly better than W R’ is only going to carry them so far. |
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Post by Redfiend on Oct 31, 2023 13:37:14 GMT -5
Update: Whatever they did must be SBMM based, because we're back to mandatory 50/50 or get stomped.
Where once were Guardians, Shadows, and Ares
There are now R3 Orions, Redeemers, Sentinels and Aegis.
Where once were Pulse cannons, there are now R3 Fusion cannons, chain guns and miniguns
Where once there were Gauss mechs, there are now R3 EM rifle AI.
🤦🏽♂️
I'm off to play Bropotato
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Post by BigBear on Oct 31, 2023 18:50:52 GMT -5
For me AI manipulation of a games outcome is the most frustrating aspect of this game at the moment. In a game advertised as a PvP it makes it pointless if nothing you do in the game makes any difference to the match outcome . Paylarium clearly can't or won't fix it and I'm sure we can all see when in a 1v1 match by the minute mark if we are going to win or lose, it's very rare you can drag a game back from the brink of a loss.
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Post by Redfiend on Oct 31, 2023 19:01:39 GMT -5
For me AI manipulation of a games outcome is the most frustrating aspect of this game at the moment. In a game advertised as a PvP it makes it pointless if nothing you do in the game makes any difference to the match outcome . Paylarium clearly can't or won't fix it and I'm sure we can all see when in a 1v1 match by the minute mark if we are going to win or lose, it's very rare you can drag a game back from the brink of a loss. They have outright said their "skill based matchmaking" is weighted towards keeping players at a 50/50 win rate. They've succeeded in making the AI perform like players, from barely literate, to whale lord. There's pretty much nothing left that makes this game any kind of reasonable. The AI deciding matches just points out how trash the monetization is. But even then, on lower rungs I'm running into players that have easily dumped $100 into the game ~that haven't even changed their username to something other than pilot########~ The discord mods are memes that think "beta players are spoiled because they earned a bunch of free stuff. If they're too poor to be good at the game it's a skill issue" Their forums are like their in game chat rooms. Getting bot bombed. Literally 90% of comments on their FB and YouTube posts are complaints of some kind. They've found their prime audience, and it's people that will run their credit card every few hours of play, without a second thought. |
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Post by S1E1 on Oct 31, 2023 19:10:45 GMT -5
For me AI manipulation of a games outcome is the most frustrating aspect of this game at the moment. In a game advertised as a PvP it makes it pointless if nothing you do in the game makes any difference to the match outcome . Paylarium clearly can't or won't fix it and I'm sure we can all see when in a 1v1 match by the minute mark if we are going to win or lose, it's very rare you can drag a game back from the brink of a loss. This is by far my biggest problem with the game. AI should have equal intelligence and abilities when humans face each other. We play all these bot matches just to face other human players and then AI determines who wins. It's just totally unnecessary and completely undermines the game. |
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Post by Redfiend on Oct 31, 2023 20:08:28 GMT -5
reconnectingYou have mentioned wanting to stick it out around 2500 SP. Just so you know, this is what that looks like, player wise, before factoring in AI tilt:  
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Post by Koalabear on Nov 1, 2023 7:20:32 GMT -5
Ok, yes, the AI is nerfed...but strangely enough, its only the blue AI that is nerfed - especially when I'm facing an opponent who has lower SP or IP than me. I wish I took a vid but in a 2v2 match, my AI team mate was literally bumping into walls while my opponent's AI team mate was popping in and out of cover like a human would.
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Post by Redfiend on Nov 1, 2023 10:16:01 GMT -5
Ok, yes, the AI is nerfed...but strangely enough, its only the blue AI that is nerfed - especially when I'm facing an opponent who has lower SP or IP than me. I wish I took a vid but in a 2v2 match, my AI team mate was literally bumping into walls while my opponent's AI team mate was popping in and out of cover like a human would. Red AI: will book it to cover the moment they know you're aiming their way, and will only come out when you try to aim at something else. Blue AI: running towards blue spawn instead of advancing. Turning their backs to the red side of the map when they're out of ammo. |
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Post by Danny Linguini on Nov 1, 2023 11:29:53 GMT -5
Ok, yes, the AI is nerfed...but strangely enough, its only the blue AI that is nerfed - especially when I'm facing an opponent who has lower SP or IP than me. I wish I took a vid but in a 2v2 match, my AI team mate was literally bumping into walls while my opponent's AI team mate was popping in and out of cover like a human would. Red AI: will book it to cover the moment they know you're aiming their way, and will only come out when you try to aim at something else. Blue AI: running towards blue spawn instead of advancing. Turning their backs to the red side of the map when they're out of ammo. Forgot to qualify that blue AI runs out of ammo from shooting at walls. |
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Post by Redfiend on Nov 1, 2023 12:30:17 GMT -5
Red AI: will book it to cover the moment they know you're aiming their way, and will only come out when you try to aim at something else. Blue AI: running towards blue spawn instead of advancing. Turning their backs to the red side of the map when they're out of ammo. Forgot to qualify that blue AI runs out of ammo from shooting at walls. Firing at a perfect 35° angle away from a target for several seconds before landing one or two shots, then empty, then presents their 「bum-bum」 for an enemy that's 100+M away to land a full gauss magazine or KO them with LAs/EMs |
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Post by reconnecting on Nov 1, 2023 13:29:19 GMT -5
reconnecting You have mentioned wanting to stick it out around 2500 SP. Just so you know, this is what that looks like, player wise, before factoring in AI tilt: I am doing pretty well with my hangars right now. Here are pics.   |
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Post by Redfiend on Nov 1, 2023 16:29:39 GMT -5
reconnecting Yea, being at 2kish power without having access to anything over t4 is pretty rough for me. I've been really put off of spending anything, the AI being given acces to R3 epic and legendary mechs/weapons feels like part of the headache intended to push sales. Gearhub, from a business standpoint, is their fiscal masterpiece. My opinion is that it's probably one of the most disgusting monetization tools I've seen in gaming. That might be because I quit War Robots during the Spectre/Inquisitor era, but it just feels like MA's stratification was too much, too fast. With War Robots, the gap from beginning to endgame happened over years of releases. With MA, it's been nothing but expanding already existing features(like item rank) in every way possibly monetizable, giving nothing back. The best parallel I can draw with my experience is MA was the time I spent playing Destiny. I bring up Destiny because it is "THE" "live service" looter shooter, and it's progressive path of over monetizing and pumping out barely passable content through the years has finally caught up to it this week. Knowing the costs of MA is precisely why I don't really have much incentive to spend anymore money on it. If the achievement hunting hangar progression that I've been playing since the "hilarious slow grind" thread had remained viable, without costing more than a WoW subscription to bring to it's next milestone, I wouldn't mind pitching in. Maybe if I get into a position where I can afford to go back to buying the season pass every month with the 3x weekly prodigy+500 coins offer, the game would be tenable. But right now that's the only kind of actual "progression" available that doesn't involve the amount of time Paylarium takes to introduce real money exclusive releases for in game currency.
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Post by BigBear on Nov 1, 2023 17:10:59 GMT -5
Another clue AI manipulation of the game is occurring is the extended time it takes for your destroyed AI to respawn, when your next getting beat down watch your respawn chart and see how much longer they each take. This allows the reds to cap beacons quicker or allows the enemy to reach your spawn area in 5V5.
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Post by Redfiend on Nov 1, 2023 17:16:10 GMT -5
Another clue AI manipulation of the game is occurring is the extended time it takes for your destroyed AI to respawn, when your next getting beat down watch your respawn chart and see how much longer they each take. This allows the reds to cap beacons quicker or allows the enemy to reach your spawn area in 5V5. See also, they wont spawn center on 3 CP maps, opting to spawn home. Not the beacon outside of home. Home. |
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Post by Koalabear on Nov 2, 2023 8:34:49 GMT -5
Not only that, if you spawn on a beacon that is contested, ie there's a red close by, they can kill you before you have a chance to react. On the flip side, if you try to rush a red beacon and a red spawns there, they get 2-3 seconds of invulnerability where neither weapons or abilities will affect them and they will wipe you out. The only success I've had in this situation is with Panther. They may walk through my Stasis Field without penalty, but if I put the field far enough away from the centre of the beacon, it'll at least block their shots. I think Aegis should be able to pull this off too, but with a risk of the spawning red overpowering the Aegis shield.
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Post by Redfiend on Nov 2, 2023 10:22:51 GMT -5
Not only that, if you spawn on a beacon that is contested, ie there's a red close by, they can kill you before you have a chance to react. On the flip side, if you try to rush a red beacon and a red spawns there, they get 2-3 seconds of invulnerability where neither weapons or abilities will affect them and they will wipe you out. The only success I've had in this situation is with Panther. They may walk through my Stasis Field without penalty, but if I put the field far enough away from the centre of the beacon, it'll at least block their shots. I think Aegis should be able to pull this off too, but with a risk of the spawning red overpowering the Aegis shield. Spawn immunity for players is bugged. Always select spawn location BEFORE choosing a mech. I used to pick mechs first, but picking location first seems to give a 50/50 of spawn protection actually working. There's also something funky with loading in, in general. |
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Post by Koalabear on Nov 2, 2023 10:48:40 GMT -5
Thanks, I'll try to remember that as I usually pick my mech before spawn location.
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