Problems with the monster AI

Hello,

I got some issues with the AI of the BossMonsters.

My players just abuse the AI by building near the monsters or standing on a large rock (where the monsters with meele attacks cant find a path) and kill them safely because the monster doesnt move any more when it cant find a path.

I tried to fix this my giving the monster a large Attack Range Multiplier but then the problem is, that the monsters cast their abilities on EVERY player in its radius even when they are just afk inside their base. 

Tried to fix that with the "viewing vision cone" but that seems to have no effect any more when the monsters are already aggroed.

Another issue I found is, that even when I give a monster a fast running speed, it just runs up to the player (when the player tries to run from the monster), slows down without attacking and then catches up again to just slow doen again.

Is there somehow something in the config file  I missed to make the monster do as follows?

If the player is standing on a rock/small base and the AI cant find a patch for meele range, that the mosnter runs as close to the player as possible so it can attack him with its special abilities and when it catches up on a player at open fields that it attacks and not just slows down?

Thank you in advance!

Hello

If you want to take into account all these factors, you need to think carefully and try to set up bosses. In what area does this or that boss appear, where do you place him so that he appears, will players be able to find a place where the NPC cannot pass in this area and what his ability or weapon will control it. 

If you have given the bosses melee weapons, then you most likely need some short distances for this so that the boss is not on an open surface. Otherwise, it will be easy to shoot him from long distances while he is running to the goal. Or vice versa, if you give the boss a long-range weapon, such as a sniper rifle, then the terrain where he is located should correspond to him so that it is an open surface, and the boss is at a height so that it is more difficult to kill him. Let's say some kind of tower on the mountain and some garbage from below so that players can at least hide behind them to fight with him.

If you give the boss a shotgun, then this area must be something inside the building so that he can shoot at the target from a short distance and most effectively open up the possibilities of his weapon.

The best option is to create separate locations for each of the bosses and find the best weapons and abilities for him. If you use a procedural map, then you use monuments in Rust, this is not an ideal option, but at least something close to it.

Perhaps the boss has some kind of legend, make a location for it, give him the appropriate clothes, weapons with skins.

If you have a problem that players build houses and kill bosses from there, give the boss a rocket launcher, and he will then raid them.

If there is a problem with melee weapons, then update the NpcSpawn plugin, my last updates were aimed at improving the use of melee weapons by NPCs.

If you say that players use mountains, yes they will use it, you gave them this opportunity when you placed the boss near the mountain, because he will not be able to climb it. Players should not have such an opportunity, you need to calculate exactly what a player can do in the active boss zone, and exclude all options for using such controversial situations

Okay I see, I just wanted to let them roam around the map, spawn on random locations but I see that its better to give them fixed positions to spawn at.

Concerning the NPCSpawn plugin, I used the file you gave a link to in the readme. I purchased the plugin like a week ago, is this the latest version of NPCSpawn or do I need to use the link again and download a newer version?

Thank you very much!

 

/edit

I dont need to configure the NPCSpawn plugin right? Because I found no NPCSpawn file in the config folder nor in the data folder.

 

/edit

I just checked, the current version of NPCSpawn on my server is 2.0.7

Edited January 11, 2022 by Alexander Koroschetz

I gave you a link in the Readme file not to a file, but to a folder where the latest version of the plugin is always, now the latest version is 2.1.1

Ah okay!

Btw can you please tell me the correct writing if i want to add a monster to a monument?

I took the command you wrote down, got my coords but if i write the monuments name and (coords) i get an error message.

Hi, you need to set the boss's appearance type to 2, then use the command
/savepos <name> – saves to the configuration file a new position for the appearance of the NPC, depending on the type of appearance of the NPC

Changed Status from Pending to Closed