Fights AI turtling

[moisterrific]

The AI gets tougher as your win streak gets higher in prize fights. If you want easier opponents, then you can lose a match on purpose when your streak gets high enough so you can face easier ones again.

If the difficulty was the same throughout and everyone could go on an endless win streak, then making it to the top ranks will just be a matter of who can grind prize fights the most – instead of it being more skill based like it is now.

I've won matches where the enemy team was all golds and had twice the FS of my all silver team. It's more skill based now than ever. because now you can't do the unlimited combo anymore, and you have to time every attack right. I managed to win in the end with just a tiny bit of HP left on my last standing fighter. Where if the AI difficulty was the same as 1.1.1 I'd probably have won with 2 fighter alive and at full HP while the point fighter barely took any damage cuz unlimited combo is OP.

 

[Maelwolf]

The problem I'm having with the AI right now is that since they're always blocking and it's impossible to do what you'd normally do in this situation and hit them from the angle that they aren't blocking, say someone is blocking high and you can hit their legs instead, you can't do that here. I'd love to be able to at least throw them but the problem is that the AI will constantly break your throw and you're back to square one, if you start hitting them to do chip damage you get nothing done unless you have a character that's a higher level. I feel like it's starting to be too reliant on your fighter's level. Sure it's an RPG but it's also gotta remain a fighting game at its core. Feels a little too constricted since there's nothing you can do to counter turtles other than grinding for hours for a higher leveled character, which is now harder since Quick Play is gone and Prize Fights use up so much energy, even then, I run into the same problem of infinite blocking in Prize Fights and its starting to feel less fun because of that. It's boiling down to praying and hoping that the AI doesn't break your block

That's a great point, if you could at least do leg sweeps to counter high blocks and high attacks to counter low blocks, the turtling wouldn't feel like it drained all the strategy out of the game as it currently does.

 

[moisterrific]

That's a great point, if you could at least do leg sweeps to counter high blocks and high attacks to counter low blocks, the turtling wouldn't feel like it drained all the strategy out of the game as it currently does.

If anything there's more strategy required now than before, back in 1.1.1 the hardest enemies rarely blocked anything. The new high difficulty AI being smart enough to block obvious attacks just makes it more challenging and you'd have to time attacks at the right time. When they attack, you block and wait for the right moment to hit them back, much more fun than beating up opponents that are slightly more reactive than training mode dummies.

 

[Joanie]

More strategy? Come on, it's the same strategy over and over. This current AI is repetative and boring (some fustrated and annoyed) for lots of players from what I've been reading. Repeating what I said: This game need needs more AI varieties; an overly defensive gameplay is challenging, sure but it's NOT FUN.

 

[moisterrific]

More strategy? Come on, it's the same strategy over and over. This current AI is repetative and boring (some fustrated and annoyed) for lots of players from what I've been reading. Repeating what I said: This game need needs more AI varieties; an overly defensive gameplay is challenging, sure but it's NOT FUN.

I've noticed a pattern with all these complaints about the new AI. Everything so far has been a generalization that "the new AI turtles and is annoying" but there haven't been any specific detail on the fighters used by players and their equipped moves and upgraded skill tree paths. Nor did any of the complaints explain which fights and modes they were having the trouble with the most.

AI behaviour is one thing, but you also need blockbusters and specials to win fights. If you are finding the AI to be too "unfair" it might be because you forgot to upgrade your fighters and moves.

Moves now are especially more useful than before because the unlimited combo exploit no longer works.

 

[Maelwolf]

More strategy? Come on, it's the same strategy over and over. This current AI is repetative and boring (some fustrated and annoyed) for lots of players from what I've been reading. Repeating what I said: This game need needs more AI varieties; an overly defensive gameplay is challenging, sure but it's NOT FUN.

Yeah, I actually found I was trying a lot more different strategies prior to this patch. There certainly was an issue where you could exploit the AI at times, but when I lost a match do to actually being out-comboed, I'd trying different character set-ups and different attack patterns. Now it feels extremely repetitive. The fights I win easily and the fights I struggle with don't really feel like they have a different flow to them. As I've said before, there are lots of ways to increase difficultly in a game, turtling was not a great choice for a fighting game.

 

[moisterrific]

Yeah, I actually found I was trying a lot more different strategies prior to this patch.

What different strategies were you trying? I'd love it hear about how other players perceive the fighting methods in this game.

 

[TeitoWolf]

I'm gonna throw my opinion here but I agree with moisterrific and cellsai that higher level enemies are much more fun and strategic than in all previous versions of the game. However, on the flip side I feel like the AI change being applied game-wide (Specifically in story and events) was a poor choice. The turtling complaints are valid for those who don't treat SGM as a traditional fighting game, I had recently got my wife and best friend into the game as witnessed as they both struggled immensely on the most basic fights in the beginning due to them not fully understand the concepts and mechanics yet to counter the defensive strategies of the Ai. In this aspect I do believe the game will suffer a bit in getting non-gamers and casuals into it, due to the Ai not being very newcomer friendly.

For those who play this as if a normal fighting game (using patience, finding openings in which to attack, and maximizing combos), I think there is alot to be gain as the AI really does put up a sufficient challenge especially on higher difficuties in prize fight. I do feel that the devs need to add in a mixture of the AI types, using the AI from v1.1 to introduce players to just the general feel of the game while slowly introducing the bots currently in v1.2.

 

[moisterrific]

I'm gonna throw my opinion here but I agree with moisterrific and cellsai that higher level enemies are much more fun and strategic than in all previous versions of the game. However, on the flip side I feel like the AI change being applied game-wide (Specifically in story and events) was a poor choice. The turtling complaints are valid for those who don't treat SGM as a traditional fighting game, I had recently got my wife and best friend into the game as witnessed as they both struggled immensely on the most basic fights in the beginning due to them not fully understand the concepts and mechanics yet to counter the defensive strategies of the Ai. In this aspect I do believe the game will suffer a bit in getting non-gamers and casuals into it, due to the Ai not being very newcomer friendly.

For those who play this as if a normal fighting game (using patience, finding openings in which to attack, and maximizing combos), I think there is alot to be gain as the AI really does put up a sufficient challenge especially on higher difficuties in prize fight. I do feel that the devs need to add in a mixture of the AI types, using the AI from v1.1 to introduce players to just the general feel of the game while slowly introducing the bots currently in v1.2.

Couldn't have said it any better myself, the AI should strike a good balance between making it fun for newcomers to get into and challenging for experienced players as well.

 

[Shenbet]

I'm gonna throw my opinion here but I agree with moisterrific and cellsai that higher level enemies are much more fun and strategic than in all previous versions of the game. However, on the flip side I feel like the AI change being applied game-wide (Specifically in story and events) was a poor choice. The turtling complaints are valid for those who don't treat SGM as a traditional fighting game, I had recently got my wife and best friend into the game as witnessed as they both struggled immensely on the most basic fights in the beginning due to them not fully understand the concepts and mechanics yet to counter the defensive strategies of the Ai. In this aspect I do believe the game will suffer a bit in getting non-gamers and casuals into it, due to the Ai not being very newcomer friendly.

For those who play this as if a normal fighting game (using patience, finding openings in which to attack, and maximizing combos), I think there is alot to be gain as the AI really does put up a sufficient challenge especially on higher difficuties in prize fight. I do feel that the devs need to add in a mixture of the AI types, using the AI from v1.1 to introduce players to just the general feel of the game while slowly introducing the bots currently in v1.2.

I once stood still to see what would happen and an enemy Parasoul just stood there, blocking until I moved. The problem is that they refuse to do anything besides block and if you throw they break it. If it was like normal Skullgirls you'd have a lot of options to deal with this, at the moment, Eliza's launcher can break a block I've noticed so she's really useful for a lot of situations.

 

[moisterrific]

I once stood still to see what would happen and an enemy Parasoul just stood there, blocking until I moved.

I've seen this happen occasionally as well, once a Valentine opponent just stayed in blocking mode for nearly a minute until I decided to use Egret Moto, she still blocked it but was no longer in "turtle mode". I noticed certain moves and blockbusters that count as throws usually will cause the AI to snap out of blocking.

 

[TeitoWolf]

I once stood still to see what would happen and an enemy Parasoul just stood there, blocking until I moved.

I have not seen this personally and I have tested about 10 or so matches right now. (5 on higher: 1000+ and 5 on lower scores) I have not see the stand still and the enemy perpetually blocks as of yet but that almost sounds like an bug in the ai (being stuck in a defensive ai state). Can you tell if it happens consistently?

 

[moisterrific]

I have not seen this personally and I have tested about 10 or so matches right now. (5 on higher: 1000+ and 5 on lower scores) I have not see the stand still and the enemy perpetually blocks as of yet but that almost sounds like an bug in the ai (being stuck in a defensive ai state). Can you tell if it happens consistently?

I've only seen it happen occasionally in expert daily mission fights and high win streak prize fights (I'm talking about like a >20 win streak). Seems to be pretty rare in lower difficulties.

 

[Joanie]

I've only seen it happen occasionally in expert daily mission fights and high win streak prize fights (I'm talking about like a >20 win streak). Seems to be pretty rare in lower difficulties.

Could also be that the AI is buggy? Or not working as intended.

 

[PsychotronTM]

The AI getting "stuck" in block is a bug we are aware of! If anyone has clear repro steps, please let us know. We'll hopefully have it fixed soon.

 

[moisterrific]

The AI getting "stuck" in block is a bug we are aware of! If anyone has clear repro steps, please let us know. We'll hopefully have it fixed soon.

I haven't noticed any significant patterns yet between different enemies being stuck in blocking. But I remember seeing it happen more frequently in high win streak and expert difficulty fights, especially when they're the last fighter standing. Anyway I'll keep an eye out for this now, this whole time I thought it was intended behaviour to make higher difficulty fights harder.

 

[Maelwolf]

I'm gonna throw my opinion here but I agree with moisterrific and cellsai that higher level enemies are much more fun and strategic than in all previous versions of the game. However, on the flip side I feel like the AI change being applied game-wide (Specifically in story and events) was a poor choice. The turtling complaints are valid for those who don't treat SGM as a traditional fighting game, I had recently got my wife and best friend into the game as witnessed as they both struggled immensely on the most basic fights in the beginning due to them not fully understand the concepts and mechanics yet to counter the defensive strategies of the Ai. In this aspect I do believe the game will suffer a bit in getting non-gamers and casuals into it, due to the Ai not being very newcomer friendly.

For those who play this as if a normal fighting game (using patience, finding openings in which to attack, and maximizing combos), I think there is alot to be gain as the AI really does put up a sufficient challenge especially on higher difficuties in prize fight. I do feel that the devs need to add in a mixture of the AI types, using the AI from v1.1 to introduce players to just the general feel of the game while slowly introducing the bots currently in v1.2.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I don't recall anyone stating they didn't want a challenge in the game. The growing number of complaints about the current AI are generally more about how it's rather a dull way to increase difficulty. Heck you could increase AI characters health 2000% and it certainly would be harder, but it wouldn't particularly be more enjoyable. As someone who has played many "traditional" fighting games, I can't recall any popular ones I've played that had AI that turtles like this one does. I doubt Guilty Gear would have become known as a fast paced combo-centric fighter if opponents had simply hunkered down in a corner and countered attempts to draw them out.

The problem was that the AI pre-patch had some truely challenging moments, but these were overshadowed by the exploits that existing which could make otherwise hard fights trivial. Thus the AI should have been tweaked and ways to counter the exploits investigated. Instead, a week before world launch the previous AI was thrown out and a seemingly untested new AI was introduced to a generally negative reception.

I once stood still to see what would happen and an enemy Parasoul just stood there, blocking until I moved. The problem is that they refuse to do anything besides block and if you throw they break it. If it was like normal Skullgirls you'd have a lot of options to deal with this, at the moment, Eliza's launcher can break a block I've noticed so she's really useful for a lot of situations.

I've seen this. What I've noticed is that if you don't have timed charge moves equipped they will sometimes stay blocking until you move up and engage. Otherwise the AI will eventually take some initiative to approach you which prevents you from widdling their health away as the moves charge up.

 

[moisterrific]

The problem was that the AI pre-patch had some truely challenging moments, but these were overshadowed by the exploits that existing which could make otherwise hard fights trivial. Thus the AI should have been tweaked and ways to counter the exploits investigated. Instead, a week before world launch the previous AI was thrown out and a seemingly untested new AI was introduced to a generally negative reception.

There were no challenging moments with the previous AI, cuz there was very little difference in difficulty between the easiest basic story mode opponents and the hardest quick play ones.

Like I've said before, there have only been a few complaints about the new AI so it's a baseless assumption to think Hidden Variable didn't thoroughly test it and an exaggeration to say "generally negative reception."

Also please follow the forum rules and do not double post.

 

[Cellsai]

Like I've said before, there have only been a few complaints about the new AI so it's a baseless assumption to think Hidden Variable didn't thoroughly test it and an exaggeration to say "generally negative reception."

Actually, I've seen this reaction more and more on various websites since the game launched. I'm actually thinking it's starting to become a problem.

When we started playing in the soft launch the AI was so silly that it was basically like playing in Training Mode constantly - meaning all of us got really good at understanding how combos worked really quick. Now people are being thrown in with AI that blocks so much they're spending more time trying to figure out how to get even a single hit in that they don't know how to capitalize on that hit.

If you've never played a fighting game before it's very unintuitive to grasp that the first 5 hits of Valentine's tap combo can't be punished, but the launcher and sweep are punishable. Most people playing likely don't even know what a sweep and launcher are, or how to identify them because they get to practice combos so little.

I definitely feel the AI in the first story modes (even the Advanced versions) should be nerfed into the ground just so players get a feel of how to actually combo.

double post.

Re: Double posting, you can select a bunch of text in someone's post, then hit the 'Reply' button that pops up. It'll add all that text to the reply window at the bottom of the page. You can then go select more text in someone else's post and hit reply again. It'll add the new quote as a separate block into the same reply. You can reply to as many people as you want in a single post this way

 

[moisterrific]

@Cellsai If that's really the case then yeah by all means the story mode AI should be more forgiving to new players. I believe the AI behaviour in prize fights should remain the same though, otherwise there would be little challenge and everyone will go on an endless win streak.

I think you're taking this the wrong way a bit. I don't think anyone has said they need to remove the new block heavy AI entirely. Everyone has mentioned that they want it to be more forgiving in the early stages of play only.
Win streaks will still be limited, but it at least gives people more of a chance than they have now.
The early Prize Fight AI is notably weaker than the later ones already, but a lot of folks don't think it's weak enough - myself included.