NPC AI issues

[GoldenDragon66]

I'm having some AI issues in my mod here: http://www.tesnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=30481

 

What's supposed to happen is that there should be some Mercenaries in the battle of Kvatch, the Bruma gate battle, the great gate battle, and the IC battle, as well as some pairs of NPCs patrolling the roads outside the city, enough so they're seen as frequently as the imperial guards on horseback. The problems i've been running into are:

 

1. Some NPCs don't show up when they should, namely in the Bruma gate battle. (I have the "initially disabled" box checked in the reference menu for them, so they wouldn't show up until the relevant quest stage started)

 

2. The patrols just stand at the places where they were placed in the editor, not moving. (The way I had the patrol AI set up was that one NPC would do the route, while the other would follow the NPC.

 

Does anyone know how I can fix this?

[Jenrai]

The AI scripts packaged in the CS are somewhat buggy, but one thing to check first - Make sure you used a compliant version of OBSE to launch the game if it was enabled in the lanucher. Even if you don't use ANY of OBSE's features when you make a mod, if it was active on the CS it will need to be active in your game or the scripting, even the vanilla Obi scripting, will go AWOL.

 

If thats not the issue, or you made the mod without using OBSE, whatever, try adding some shortened scripts (eat, harvest, talk, stuff like that) to your mercs, particularly the patrolling ones, before they are actually supposed to start to patrol... if they already have AI commands running, it seems easier for them to pick up the next command.

 

As for your guys at the battles - theres a helluva lot going on when those battles are starting. If your guys are supposed to appear at the onset of the fight, the problem might just be that theres too much happening and the game is overlooking them. (Far, far more technical than I'm making it sound, I know. Thats deliberate - mainly because I don't quite understand how it works anyways, so trying to explain it... well... blind leading the blind springs to mind. :D) Try making the guys a little camp that they can hang around in near by. Or a tower. Or whatever. Just don't have them appearing at the exact stage where its all kicking off. Make sure they are already in the game somewhere before then.

 

Hope it helps.

 

Jenrai

[Vagrant0]

The AI scripts packaged in the CS are somewhat buggy, but one thing to check first - Make sure you used a compliant version of OBSE to launch the game if it was enabled in the lanucher. Even if you don't use ANY of OBSE's features when you make a mod, if it was active on the CS it will need to be active in your game or the scripting, even the vanilla Obi scripting, will go AWOL.

Some things.

OBSE won't change anything about packages (can actually make them respond slower in rare cases). OBSE also won't change or improve the functionality of vanilla scripting. There are several things which can cause problems with actor enabling, and there are many more things that might prevent actors from moving around.

 

Offhand, I would first make sure that there are no processing problems at either of these times. Usually the best way to check this is to attack one of those mercenaries, and see where they're swinging their weapon when you are sidestepping around them. If they're just walking toward you without attacking, you have a severe processing issue. If they are moving and attacking, but are only moving to where you just were, you have a moderate processing issue. If they're attacking you where you are even when moving (almost anticipating it) then you have no processing issue.

 

I would then look at how their packages are setup and what conditions/times are used. Patrolling actors might be standing still simply because the conditions of their packages are not present, or they have a package which tells them to stay put which is placed higher on the list than the one you want them to use.

 

As far as the enabling guards goes, you should try adding some debug text (message or messagebox) to the script to notify you when that part of the script has run. Since you're working with a single use function that is based on a quest stage, you could also just hard-wire that part of the quest script to the quest stage (result script).

[GoldenDragon66]

Ugh, i've tried just about everything and it still won't cooperate. Maybe the next best course of action would be to hand this mod to someone who would be able to fix the AI issues that are present, if no one minds of course. :tongue: