Do followers have weapon perks?

[llamaRCA]

Never seen any companion just attack a wall when there's no enemy in the direction. However

 

A) the AI of ALL NPCs will occasionally get confused about exactly how "opaque" an obstacle is to weapon fire. I think that goes all the way back to FO3 and the projectile setting that they can pass through small transparent obstacles (such as chainlink). If a wall piece is at all containing transparent parts, I think any NPCs will get confused and try to shoot through it.

 

B) ALL NPCs will try to lay suppression fire by shooting in the general direction of the enemy, especially if they don't have a line of sight.

 

Basically, much as I'd like to believe that Curie or Piper are better or worse than everyone else, realistically it's the same AI.

 

Right. But, and I'm not arguing this is the case with the FO4 companions, you can modify individual NPC behavior via combat style, packages, scripting, etc. so that they will behave differently from one another in similar circumstances.Two of the FO4 companions strike me as a bit different from the others, and either I'm imagining it, which is possible, or they have something different in their builds.

 

So, in interiors in FO3 and NV, companions will run off to fight aggroed NPCs, they don't normally shoot through solid walls at them. They might be on alert, weapons unholstered and refuse to walk away from a wall they are staring down, but that's usually the extent of what they do. I don't remember mage followers in Skyrim doing it either.

 

Is it rational to single Piper out for the failure because she did do it? No? Maybe? Dogmeat handled the interior correctly. I think Piper's behavior was a glitch, which I would have simply noted as odd, had everything else about her had been satisfactory, but it was one more thing on top of the others she'd done that puzzled or annoyed me.

 

Also, If my favorite companion fought with a wall once, I'd notice it. If it happened again I'd probably stop travelling with him, because although I have a high tolerance for their many stupid behaviors, seriously engaging in combat with inanimate objects is too stupid even for me to overlook.

[Moraelin]

You are correct, in that the NPC AI in FO3, NV and Skyrim was a bit more straightforward. They didn't try to take cover or lay suppression fire. They just stood there and shot at the enemy.

 

There also weren't as many things and walls that are basically partial cover. Now most vanilla wooden walls are only partial cover, and that flag actually counts.

 

I wasn't saying they did the same in FO3 and later, just that the setting was there, and now you're seeing it actually used.

 

AND they're destructible too, which again is something that FO3, NV and Skyrim never really had. You couldn't shoot fireballs at a fence in Skyrim until it breaks. Here lots of walls and fences do get destroyed. Shoot at them enough, and the boards go flying. Same for crates, etc.

 

It also didn't have overpenetration or shooting through thin cover. Now it does. You CAN actually shoot some enemies right through a thin wall.

 

FO4 tries to be a bit smarter, and mostly succeeds, but it does occasionally do sillier things because of that. You can probably see how trying to juggle that many factors and possibilities isn't exactly easy, so, yeah, I'm not very surprised when the AI isn't exactly a genius, to say the least.

 

And I'd expect things to get even funnier for modded walls and such for the settlements. It only takes one to have the flags set wrong, for the AI to basically react very wrong to it.

 

Basically my best guess is that Piper just was in the wrong place at the wrong time, nothing more. The other NPCs just weren't in the exact same place and situation, so their AI didn't brainfart in the same way.