Gripe re: "weapons" and AI of predators
Mr_Rieper7
South Africa Join Date: 2015-11-16 Member: 209299Members
South Africa Join Date: 2015-11-16 Member: 209299Members
Hi,
I have a minor gripe with the way the AI of predatory aliens react to the player and available "weapons".
I was exploring the mushroom forest and was attacked by a bone shark, nothing new here.
I hopped into my seamoth, charged my zapper and let him have it. It went reeling off screen while sparking.
Not even 2 minutes later it came back and tried to start something with me again.
So it got a face full of sparkly again, only I charged up to full power this time. It went reeling off screen while sparking, again.
Lo and behold, it came back a third time. Zap!
This time I followed it, it growled again after a bit and tried to charge... Zap!
I kept following at a distance... growl, charge... and that was it, I'd had enough.
Charge to full, ZZZAAAPPP! and the thing bellied up and died.
I'd have thought after the third good zap it would have learned it's lesson and stayed well away from me.
I get that bone sharks are supposed to be aggressive but at some point it's got to realize there is no reward for the effort it is putting into eating me.
I don't see bone sharks attacking electric eels and I'm pretty much acting like one so why do they remain hostile when so wounded?
They (creatures) should have a bit of code in their AI to stay away from sources of damage for a while that should increase as damage is applied repeatedly.
Maybe you could "train" more intelligent hostile creatures to stay away from you and the seamoth instead of having to kill anything/everything.
This way you eliminate the need for actual weapons.
I'd include the propulsion cannon in the list of things to stay away from. (Bone shark, meet sea-bed! )
Anyone agree?
I have a minor gripe with the way the AI of predatory aliens react to the player and available "weapons".
I was exploring the mushroom forest and was attacked by a bone shark, nothing new here.
I hopped into my seamoth, charged my zapper and let him have it. It went reeling off screen while sparking.
Not even 2 minutes later it came back and tried to start something with me again.
So it got a face full of sparkly again, only I charged up to full power this time. It went reeling off screen while sparking, again.
Lo and behold, it came back a third time. Zap!
This time I followed it, it growled again after a bit and tried to charge... Zap!
I kept following at a distance... growl, charge... and that was it, I'd had enough.
Charge to full, ZZZAAAPPP! and the thing bellied up and died.
I'd have thought after the third good zap it would have learned it's lesson and stayed well away from me.
I get that bone sharks are supposed to be aggressive but at some point it's got to realize there is no reward for the effort it is putting into eating me.
I don't see bone sharks attacking electric eels and I'm pretty much acting like one so why do they remain hostile when so wounded?
They (creatures) should have a bit of code in their AI to stay away from sources of damage for a while that should increase as damage is applied repeatedly.
Maybe you could "train" more intelligent hostile creatures to stay away from you and the seamoth instead of having to kill anything/everything.
This way you eliminate the need for actual weapons.
I'd include the propulsion cannon in the list of things to stay away from. (Bone shark, meet sea-bed! )
Anyone agree?
Comments
We are talking about them first being able to discern your handheld item currently equipped, then also to remember damage it has taken from weapons not currently held for a period of time.
Then you need something to scale this against such as hunger, territory trespassing and other modifiers.
Alternatively you could just say under a certain health threshold the creature retreats, but that will in reality just add to their current stupidity.
Personally I would prefer the first option but it's not easy to do and probably require some AI speacalists.
I'd prefer a scaling increase on repeated damage instances but a simple time limit on enough damage that prevents them from attacking would do.
It just seems counter-intuitive that they don't at least leave you alone for a while after you show them what-for.
I think you're overthinking this. We only need the appearance of intelligence, not the real thing.
Every individual creature would have an ID tag. The game would just need to have a process which remembers the ID of all creatures you've recently shocked and when you shocked them. If one of those creatures approaches you within a certain time, then the game should tell it to flee. Maybe that effect should decay gradually so after a while it only has a 75, 50, 25 percent chance to flee, then it's ID get deleted from the list and it behaves normally.
Fairly simple.
I'm a stickler for details so I do tend to overthink things.
The appearance of intelligence is often harder than straight up intelligence
Specifically in this case the stacking of "weapons" to make a creature permanently retreat from you.
How do you stop someone using a stasis rifle, Combat Knife, Propulsion Cannon, Electronic Perimeter Defense, and Typhoon Torpedoes to boost up the retreat chance to ridiculous levels?
Wrong. Double wink.
The OP's suggestion - which is sensible, realistic and would be easy to implement - is for creatures to "learn" a fear response to one thing in the game. The seamoth zapper.
So your question is really bizarre.
Because OP Isn't asking for them to learn fear of just one item. Furthermore he is effectively asking to train an entire species through a single individuals experience.
To eliminate the need for weapons.
Furthermore unless that fear response is part of a more overarching equation, the animals don't appear any smarter for it.
Like I originally said the full behaviour system for animals needs to be more in depth. Including things like hunger, confidence, territory infringement and potentially many more factors to make it more realistic.
1. Feeding behavior for everything, Stalker notwithstanding. Even smaller fish should nibble at algae or dig in the sand for unseen worms. Adding to this is a hunger mechanic (a timer, most likely, with perhaps a randomness to it. "Eat every 5-10 minutes") for fish. Stalkers should be after fish all the time, and neither should they be after the player when he is not invading their territory. Having animals be non-stop eating machines is silly and encourages needless cruelty. The only exception should be the Reaper Leviathan, who is large enough to merit eternal hunger.
2. More complex relationships. Maybe certain fish like to swim near reefbacks. Maybe small fish avoid Sand Sharks, whether the sand shark eats them or not. Maybe other fish act like pilot fish for sandsharks, attracting other larger prey near them so Sand Sharks can eat them and the pilot fish dine on the scraps. There should be a basic food web extending through most biomes save the absolutely most isolated ones, which simulates a flow of energy from the surface to the deep seafloor. Obviously not overly complex, but it should have the appearance of complexity.
3. More complex judgements of the player. Some should be curious, some should be fearful. And curious shouldn't always mean friendly. Maybe a certain animal "plays" with the player for a bit, like an orca with a seal, before outright attacking. It doesn't matter the specifics, but I'd much rather there be more variety than "hostile fish attack, non-hostile fish either do nothing or run away". Perhaps apart of this behavior can be learning to avoid shocks or knives, as the OP said. But I don't think this learning should be universal, but limited to canonically intelligent animals. After all, it's not like you can train a leech very easily, so why train a bleeder?
I don't say all this because I care about Subnautica becoming some uber realistic animal simulator. Rather, it's an exploration simulator. And it's very difficult for me to be the explorer I should be when I have to treat Sand Sharks and Bone Sharks as if they're the devil incarnate and not just animals trying to survive. Regular sharks can be approached by divers, so why not Subnautica predators? And in the same vein, smaller fish shouldn't just be ignored. When I go into the caves and see some new small fish, my first thought shouldn't be "does this have more nutritional value than a Reginald?" and then ignoring it when I find out it doesn't. I should be on the look out for new behavior from smaller fish, just from an exploratory standpoint. At this point in development, the Ocular is irrelevant to me and might as well not exist. DO SOMETHING WITH IT. I would much rather have existing NPCs have more complex behavior and see two different sets of behevior from two animals interact with each other (Like, I dunno, Sand and Bone shark territory fights) than have another little fish that I'm going to ignore or some giant animal that interacts with nothing, the player least of all. Giant animals are cool, I love reefbacks, but to be completely honest they're just a very large moving rock at this point. I don't mean to be rude, but it's the truth.
The Stalker is the ideal direction for me and I want to see more behavior like the Stalker. It goes into other biomes to hunt, collects scrap to make weird nests, and can be fed. The more animal with behavior comparable to the Stalker's the better. Kelp forests are my favorite biome because of them.
My absolute most hated animal is the bloodsucker, simply because of how overly hostile it is to the player. It doesn't act like a parasite, it acts like a homing missile. It's too artificial and it needs to have some complexity in its behavior, some variance. Maybe it can be distracted or baited away. It doesn't matter, add something to it. The hostility isn't the problem, it's rather how it acts hostile. Again, like a homing missile. Not like an animal.
tl;dr: More behavior like the Stalker, please.
That's not true. Some species of shark won't always attack a human on sight. Others most definitely will.
You wouldn't find too many divers approaching a great white or tiger shark. And more than a few other species besides.
It does look like they're adding some variability into the mix but I don't think it's unrealistic to have a few species which we'd be wise to leave alone.
https://trello.com/c/G2zAfOsk/5097-design-and-experiment-with-rare-master-mother-creature-specimens-for-many-more-incentives
My point was not that ALL sharks were harmless, just that some sharks can be approached and that they're not insane murder machines.
Reaper Leviathan, sure, that should be always aggressive. But maybe there should be a bone shark or two that isn't hungry at a particular moment and can be approached. Or maybe a sand shark is sleeping. Or whatever.
Point is, this is an exploration game. We shouldn't treat predators as enemies, but dangerous wildlife. And right now, they're just flat out enemies that you might as well kill in order to explore that area.
How much damage is needed (or how often) depends on the enemy. But it would make total sense.
Right now damaging any lifeform to not kill it, but make it bugger off, isnt really making it leave.
Which is where me and Halios are discussing more intelligent behaviour, so if a sand shark is particularly hungry because it hasn't eaten in 2 days, it'll be more likely to keep attacking you, since you will provide a lot more sustenance than a peeper.
Fair enough that's what you meant but it wasn't what you said. Well I suppose the thing is there's no such thing as a "regular shark".
Some species are insane murder machines. Others aren't.
Is it possible you're a bit miffed about only insane murder machines in this game getting a 'shark' label? That would be understandable.
I'm completely with you on treating predators as wildlife. I think that's central to the game's design. But I don't see how them being aggressive means we might as well kill them. I don't anyway. I'm just more careful around them.