So uh, Command Missions...

My experience in Brayflox as the tank. Oh no.

For some bizarre reason, the AI of the healer went full freaky right before the second boss. I pulled the second boss, DPS followed but she... LITERALLY... STOOD... OUTSIDE... AND WATCHED ME FOR THE WHOLE 30 SECONDS. Then the room locked. The poor ACN tried to keep me up but it was no use. Wipe.
After killing Hellbender and opening the chest, the healer did a 180 and ran back at an unpulled group of mobs and started attacking them - forcing me to go back and get her...
Finally, because the AI is never targeted by AoEs in any of the dungeons - I was hit by every single poison puddle as the tank. And derpy healer apparently never wanted to cleanse until I had 4 stacks of poison.

I'm not particularly sure why this happened, as it was just the healer doing these really strange things. The DPS did no such things so I'm left scratching my head, positive it wasn't because I hit engage or disengage.

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Originally Posted by Tsumdere

STUFF

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I found this hilarious. If only it could be posted in the venting thread for instances. :D

That might be worth trying to reproduce. That pre-boss room is a bit awkward in its size and mob positions; seems odd that you would've picked up aggro without noticing, though (and anything would've chased you anyway). Theory, healer was last of the group, and while you told the squad to engage Hellbender, something just managed to get line of sight on the healer, and caused some crossed wires.

I'm starting to see that this Squad stuff is best played as a healer.

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Originally Posted by Ranulf

It's like being in Duty Finder!

Healers and DPS pull before the tank, tanks can't hold hate worth beans, DPS have weird buff uptime and rotations, healers focus on DPSing over healing.

Awesome, lol.

Save yourself the headache and go healer or tank if you have them.

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you have to manage your squad mates, i saw my g/f do one as her drk in halatali.. no npc pulled for her. the healer kept her alive. the npc do not take damage from traps as far as i saw (they sat in the thunderwater and didn't take damage) the healer cured her as long as the healer was getting damaged.

you have to micromange your team till they learn. you train them up. think ff12 gambit system

Personally, it's all I'll use it for, for now. It's come at perfect timing for me to work up DRK/AST/MCH after getting to HW. Tanking is fairly easy and not so stressful anymore, DPS even more so, but AST isn't a job I'm ready to take out. This makes for a nice practice zone to get a feel for how to handle it.

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Originally Posted by Hasrat

Personally, it's all I'll use it for, for now. It's come at perfect timing for me to work up DRK/AST/MCH after getting to HW. Tanking is fairly easy and not so stressful anymore, DPS even more so, but AST isn't a job I'm ready to take out. This makes for a nice practice zone to get a feel for how to handle it.

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Yeah, I was thinking it might be a good way to get some tanking practice in without joining the salty finder.

I did Command Mission Halitali as a MCH tonight. Was... interesting. I took an ARC for the DPS, which was probably a mistake, because he would attack at range before the GLA tank could Shield Lob. But I will say the tank used Flash immediately to get hate back and held it decently well. Wasn't taking a lot of damage, either. Maybe because he's 50? Not sure if it matters. And their damage was better than PUGs. They were blowing through trash mobs.

The weird things I experienced were: on the first boss, the flame, the tank kept running off to fight the adds. On the second boss, the electric pool, they all just stood in the pool and took the hits, and neither DPS nor healer went after the adds. They completely ignored them. The tank would run over, attack one, then run back to the pool to hit the boss for no damage. So that kill was slow, since I basically had to solo all the adds with minimal help.

The only main aggro issue I've seen is that even if you have the squaddies pull, everything that isn't tagged by the shield lob/tomahawk will go straight for you and not the character who pulled.

The tank NPCs seem good about picking up aggro if you start getting hit by other enemies, but that initial moment on the pull can be a bit awkward.

I tried doing brayflox and went healer for safety. Overall, they were ok I guess but the AI didn't account for any mechanics what-so-ever. Several times my archer was pulling hate at the initial pull and sometimes the tank even ignored this outright not even trying to get the hate from him, although I will say that he was generally ok about picking up any stray mobs that went for me or a DPS, but there were several times where he didn't.... During the second boss, I got put in a bubble and the tank ran over to me immediately; I thought "Oh, cool! They're actually gonna break me out!" But nope. Tank just planted himself next to me and DPS ignored me. My heals were totally stifled and because the tank came close to me, I was getting hit by things from the boss. Not cool.

I was quite nervous for the final boss, considering this. I wondered how he would fare against the poison and if he'd bother pulling the dragon out of it. I was certain the answer would be no, however I can't confirm that because, for a mercy, the dragon only ever spat poison at me and the archer, who were far enough away that the dragon wasn't standing in the poison. Should be noted that my archer never moved out of the poison pool though, but after I removed the poison debuff, he was fine so ...eh *shrugs*

Their general DPS was respectable though. They blew through most mobs and the bosses went down pretty quick. The first boss died right as the second set of adds spawned and this dungeon is comparable to their level (they are around 40).

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Originally Posted by SenorPatty

Its the job that gets even more flak than the tank.

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If tanks were constantly standing around doing nothing once they established aggro I'm sure there'd be more flak to them. And you'd better believe I'm telling DPS that have no idea what an AoE is that they should be slamming that in large packs.

And there's really not a lot of wiggle room on what a healer should/shouldn't be doing. Healer's priority is to make sure the tank isn't going to drop, and beyond that if they have nothing else to do with their MP they can toss in one of their many damage skills. Much like a tank's first priority is to keep aggro, and to also use their literal free mitigation skills. There's no argument against either aside from "I don't want to".

There's different skill levels and situations, for sure. And long as people seem like they're putting in an effort I've got no complaints. A tank pulling 3 groups at a time and you have to spam heals to keep them up? No worries. Setting yourself to /follow because selene can keep the tank alive, a bit rude.

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Originally Posted by Mikki

for a mercy, the dragon only ever spat poison at me and the archer

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That's actually really good to hear, that those sorts of attacks/mechanics might still target the NPCs.

You can't tell them where to stand, which results in the healer just standing there while the tonberry stalker stabs her to death. If the healer dies to that (she will), you can't tell it to release, and you can't raise it yourself unless you happen to be playing summoner. So you just wind up with a party full of NPCs watching the dead healer derp all over the ground until you finally give up and abandon the duty.

That's not a well-done AI, sorry not sorry.

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Originally Posted by Steel_Arrow

If the healer dies to that (she will), you can't tell it to release, and you can't raise it yourself unless you happen to be playing summoner.

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If i'm not mistaken, there's a use item that can revive squadron members. I got one as a reward from a mission, and I think you can buy them with seals, too.

Can't deny that the healer AI sucks, though.

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Originally Posted by Tsumdere

For some bizarre reason, the AI of the healer went full freaky right before the second boss. I pulled the second boss, DPS followed but she... LITERALLY... STOOD... OUTSIDE... AND WATCHED ME FOR THE WHOLE 30 SECONDS. Then the room locked. The poor ACN tried to keep me up but it was no use. Wipe.

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This reminds me of my first test run of Squadrons in Halatali as a tank and how a LNC randomly decided to run into frontal AoE, stand still and take the hit, and then run back behind the boss to continue DPS. I couldn't help but think that they really nailed the Lancer AI perfectly.

From my perspective: The game triggers react to players presence and it seems that it doesn't work on bots, which means that the player will be the one targeted by random boss attacks, this can be used to work around puddles and all, however it also means that mobs spawned by player presence will only react to us and not to passing squadron members which can be good or bad depending on the situation

In Halatali tonight and the tank ran back and forth between the lil fireball adds on first boss so when there were two lines of them coming out he ran back and forth between them, never reaching them.

They stood in the electrified water on second boss and didn't attack adds unless specifically told to and the healer died on boss because she stood in the fire circle around the boss as the tank ran circles around the arena confused by the fire sprites and balls everywhere and the dps just kept attacking an invincible boss. Even when I directed them to the fire sprites they just kept doing their thing.

I've been enjoying them so far, as with others my only issue has been the tank running around wildly collecting adds, wasn't an issue in halatali because you're meant to break off and kill them, but in wanderers palace you're not meant to do that, you're just supposed to let the tonberries come to you, and you're still not even meant to kill em. Would be nice if we could use focus target to make the squad engage specific enemies and not go off to attack other mobs unless you order it.

E.G. Focus target tonberry king and press engage, they'll all attack the tonberry king and not break off unless you select a tonberry add and press engage, then they can run around killing adds until you press engage on the focus target again making them all focus on the king again.

I tried this out and it was fun, but weird at the same time. I did Wanderer's Palace as a Samurai with Gladiator, Arcanist & White Mage NPCs. I had a smooth run until King Tonberry with the same issue as everyone. Almost killed it, but died anyways. I abandoned and took them to Stone Vigil and that was a lot better. At the final boss they kept standing in the ice path, because they kept following the boss and ended up wiping. I then figured to use the disengage when it flies and that worked. They follow me away from AOEs, then re-engage and we beat it easily. I might have to give it a go as a tank and the try healer and see how that goes. Tank feels like that might be the way to go through this, though.

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Originally Posted by Cabalabob

E.G. Focus target tonberry king and press engage, they'll all attack the tonberry king and not break off unless you select a tonberry add and press engage, then they can run around killing adds until you press engage on the focus target again making them all focus on the king again.

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Ye I think that our use of the commands is the key, although I kinda wish there were more commands avaible to us

It's great fun but the tank AI is frankly shocking. I've gotten significant offence/defence upgrades for my DRG and CNJ so far, but I'm stuck with Independent IV for the GLD. The very first pull is significantly more challenging/annoying than anything else in WP, Tonberry King included.

Simply having the Tank more willing to allow adds to come to the group before charging them would fix the majority of the issues there (including the comical behaviour on the final boss).

People are complaining about the AI being a bit derp, and it is true. But I'm satisfied that I can clear Brayflox in a little over 15 minutes, as a DPS even. The NPCs have crazy high damage output and I havn't even unlocked the proper masteries (or ranked up the existing ones) yet.

I feel bad for the Gladiator I have pressed into tanking service, though, because the Archer keeps straight up ripping threat off her. <_<

I do question the choice to have Wanderer's Palace as the 50 dungeon though. I feel something like Haukke Hard or Amdapor Keep would have been a better choice.

They should add the following Orders.

"Go To A" "B" "C" "D" Basically the command with dis-engage and cause the allies to gather in one location

"Focus 1" "2" "3" "4" "5" Same as above but it will force the allies to engage the target with the proper number, if number is not active it will act just like the Order Button.

I think those basic changes would help when it comes to dealing with AOE. I'd rather take 30 second using waymarks and signs to better order the party then deal with the hassle of nearly wiping because of their derpiness lol.

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Originally Posted by Sebazy

It's great fun but the tank AI is frankly shocking. I've gotten significant offence/defence upgrades for my DRG and CNJ so far, but I'm stuck with Independent IV for the GLD. The very first pull is significantly more challenging/annoying than anything else in WP, Tonberry King included.

Simply having the Tank more willing to allow adds to come to the group before charging them would fix the majority of the issues there (including the comical behaviour on the final boss).

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I just engaged the first group and then ran to the second group (birds) and told the tank to engage them. That would make the tank drag the first group to the second giving some space between you and the big Tonberry. I did that throughout WP, because they're surprisingly good at chain pulling.

What I found amazing is that the tank can chain Ultimatums, which it does even more when you chain pull with it. It's actually seemingly better at AoE pulls than single target because I had to tank all the bosses.

Also you can have the tank pull the mobs back by simply engaging while having your character stay back, then tell them to disengage (they run back to your character) then re-engage. It sounds clunky but in practice the tank just shield lobs then pulls the mobs back then you fight them.

The last boss is just shenanigans though. There's no way to make the tank stay in the middle even just spamming engage on the boss.

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Originally Posted by Allyrion

What I found amazing is that the tank can chain Ultimatums,

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All of their abilities have FAR shorter cooldowns than the player versions. Bring an Archer along and watch their buffs, basically every other attack gets a Barrage.

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Originally Posted by Amenian

I don't know about that. I entered AV on an appropriately feared level 47 DRK last night and in the first pull had the healer gripe at me for not using a cool down in a three mob pull. Figured it wasn't worth fighting over and cycled cooldowns on tiny pulls from then on. Still ended up dying once because healer was too focused on dps.

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I am Sorry for your bad experience.

But by "everywhere" I spoke about people posting off-topic just to call on non-DPS'ing healer, regardless of the situation. But I recognize that everyone - tanks in particular - have a plenty of bad experiences because other players who think themselves in the right to call on someone. But called him back because his profile says that he IS a tank.

Don't take thaumaturges as your dps. Their rotation is either proper but very slow (Fire3 - Fire - Fire... with 5 second pause between every Fire) or they suddenly start Break - Fire2 - Blizzard2 on a single target. Archers seem to do the highest amount of damage, but they rarely AOE.

Did a run of Wanderer's Palace late last night. Me as tank, healer, archer, and monk for the NPCs. They get gaffled by the wandering giant tonberries if you don't run & break line of sight. The king fight at the end was a bit of a close call as well, but overall they do great DPS. Fun stuff! Now to properly recruit a full harem of cat girls for my Roe to... teach.

I'm really impressed with the squads, there are a couple things I wish they'd adjust.

1) Have the healer open with Stone instead of Aero.
2) Have archers wait a few seconds before attacking.
3) Have the tanks flash/overpower more often.
4) Healers need to prioritize themselves a little better.

I went in on a melee DPS and the ranged/healer pulling is really annoying. The tank AI seems to be set up to Shield Lob/Tomahawk -> face away from party -> overpower/flash. When the other members pull the tank still runs to about where the mobs used to be before coming back to pick them up off the healer/bard. They also tend to lose aggro over time as they don't seem to use Flash/Overpower until they actually lose aggro.

I also noticed that the healer sometimes will heal the tank over themselves, even when the healer is significantly lower. I've had Cecily die on me more than once to a DoT because she insists on Esunaing/healing the tank that's at 75% even though she's at 10% herself. I've also seen her DPS instead of healing herself sub 25% and die as a result.

The DPS AI seems to be alright. I did notice my LCN member randomly using Doom Spike on one target, but I'm really glad they tend to stay on bosses. I can't imagine how awful it'd be to watch both the tank and melee run around chasing Tonberries in WP.

Reading a lot of comments about the AI of their squads, and I'm guessing many players just let them do their thing to see how smart they really are.

Interesting enough, managing squadron AI isn't much different than micro managing my fairy when playing SCH. The engage and disengage commands work similar to place and stay, and are important to use to keep them out of AoE and add phases during bosses.

I unlocked DRK and had a far easier time getting through instances when I tanked. Hell, I felt I was holding them up more than the other way around. I got my DRK to 32 so I could go into Brayflox and practice switching between offensive and defensive stances, and eventually got to 34.

It was a lot of fun and I felt like I learned a thing or two about tanking without the anxiety that I'm pissing everyone off. I have a lot more confidence queueing up for an instance with real players. Actually might be more relaxing not having to micro manage squadron AI.

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Originally Posted by hydralus

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Like to cry about it? Go to this topic and cry there. Let people discuss about command missions, ok?

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Originally Posted by miraidensetsu

I am Sorry for your bad experience.

But by "everywhere" I spoke about people posting off-topic just to call on non-DPS'ing healer, regardless of the situation. But I recognize that everyone - tanks in particular - have a plenty of bad experiences because other players who think themselves in the right to call on someone. But called him back because his profile says that he IS a tank.

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You must not peruse the forums here very often. There are posts that will call out tanks for not using defensive cooldowns and those posts are off topic to the thread in question.

There are also threads that have been created in the past month or two "calling out" tanks for not using CDs.

Also, the "Tales from Duty Finder: Some make you laugh, some make you cry. Let's vent." is full of posts calling out tanks not using CDs.

From what I have seen on the forums, people are not afraid for blaming tanks for their bad time and calling out tanks off topic. People are afraid of tanking, though.

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Originally Posted by Gemina

Reading a lot of comments about the AI of their squads, and I'm guessing many players just let them do their thing to see how smart they really are.

Interesting enough, managing squadron AI isn't much different than micro managing my fairy when playing SCH. The engage and disengage commands work similar to place and stay, and are important to use to keep them out of AoE and add phases during bosses.

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There's really not much to micro when the only commands are "Everyone attack this," which the tank ignores after getting one hit in, or "Do nothing." Microing pets is godlike compared to squadrons and the pet micro is atrocious in this game. Thankfully the AI is competent enough in general that it gets the job done, though I believe that it's mostly done through their massively overscaled stats and almost nonexistent cooldowns.

Maybe OP is just bad. Was able to clear all of them as RDM with like 1-2 annoying pulls each instance. My squad performs better than actual players.

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Originally Posted by Ranulf

It's like being in Duty Finder!

Healers and DPS pull before the tank, tanks can't hold hate worth beans, DPS have weird buff uptime and rotations, healers focus on DPSing over healing.

Awesome, lol.

Save yourself the headache and go healer or tank if you have them.

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Haha. Sorry not laughing at you. But I knew this would end up as shoddy as the EverQuest/EverQuest 2 mercenary system.

They were set up not to replace human players, but to add someone if you didn't have a full party of 4.

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Originally Posted by miraidensetsu

Like to cry about it? Go to this topic and cry there. Let people discuss about command missions, ok?

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The AI healers DPS in command missions so I brought it up.

As for my character being listed as a tank; my main class is a WHM first and foremost, so I have a lot of experience when it comes to putting out both healing and damage. Unless you have a tank with paper armor and/or pulling huge groups, you're going to have a lot of downtime. And even then, Holy provides loads of mitigation in the form of stuns.

I could go on and on but suffice to say you're not using your skillset properly if you aren't providing damage, akin to a monk not using positionals, a pld not using rampart, an AST not using cards. If it's a case of "I do not have the ability to handle this", then my condolences. If it's a case (most likely) of "I don't want to", it's a shame.

I'm enjoying the squadrons, actually. I'll probably never do Halatali again until they fix the AI there (attack the adds! stop standing in the bad!), but the other dungeons have been good. It's really nice to dictate the speed of a dungeon with a group that I know will keep up and stick to me. It was actually a pleasant surprise during Totorak when I never had to break the webs to let the squadron back in.

Plus, the wonky AI is pretty funny. My healer got himself locked out on purpose during the second boss of Brayflox -- at ten seconds in, he ran out of the boss room to get distance and just stood behind the barrier. He spawned back in, eventually.

After running all dungeons (Twice); swapping classes back and forth, I believe that x1 MRD + 2x ARC and the player (YOU) as a healer is the fastest way to go through these runs. Archers deal MASSIVE damage, it's insane. It also helps when you have wonky pulls or bosses that move around, as they don't have to run behind them or getting LoS'd. You as a healer can also help with the DPS or, if you're SCH, just afk in some bosses or trash pulls. Being doing 2 or 3 pulls of trash in some dungeons. No issues so far. Looking forward to an expansion of this system.

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Originally Posted by ilea

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This. This seems to be a reoccuring problem in Brayflox, as I've heard several people back up my claims that the healer will sometimes leave the second boss and lock themselves out (mine didn't come in and caused a wipe) AND they will turn around and pull more UNPULLED mobs after Hellbender.

tl;dr Brayflox is best done as a healer since AI healers will completely lose their minds in there.

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Originally Posted by Lilseph

After running all dungeons (Twice); swapping classes back and forth, I believe that x1 MRD + 2x ARC and the player (YOU) as a healer is the fastest way to go through these runs. Archers deal MASSIVE damage, it's insane. It also helps when you have wonky pulls or bosses that move around, as they don't have to run behind them or getting LoS'd. You as a healer can also help with the DPS or, if you're SCH, just afk in some bosses or trash pulls. Being doing 2 or 3 pulls of trash in some dungeons. No issues so far. Looking forward to an expansion of this system.

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If the behaviour ranks actually do impact their AI and not just their stats, then I think GLA could compete with MRD due to having Ring of Scorn access. In my current team where mine only has defensive rank 1 and I've yet to grind out the points, it is used very rarely however. If it becomes more common at higher ranks then I think it might beat MRD out, or at least tie in (especially owing to the extra defensive CDs it has).

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edit - RE Brayflox: I've run it three times and have yet to see any issues with squaddies acting weirdly. You are just clearing it normally and not trying to sneak past things right?