Some Squadron Tweak Suggestion (Command Missions)

So, I don't know exactly when this was added (I took a couple month break from the game), but here are some suggestions as to how the system could work better:


1). The "Attack!" command should not generate enmity. For some weird reason, giving the Attack command, even if you stand way back, will instantly start you off with Red enmity on all enemies except for the one the tank uses the ranged attack on. This should not be happening, and it causes the tank to have to run around trying to round up mobs and by the time the tank does, you're half dead. The tank should gain enmity on the mobs like a normal player would if they were tanking.

2). The tank should not open with Ultimatum. I don't really understand why they do this, because every tanking class has AoE Enmity attacks as early as Lv16. Ultimatum should only be used when 2 or more enemies have more enmity towards other people than Flash/Unleash/Overpower would provide. Instead, the tank should be using 1-2 Flash/Unleash/Overpowers instead.

3). NPCs should respond to certain marks, for example, marking (1) on an enemy should make NPCs focus on that enemy and ignore others until it is dead. Marking an enemy with an the red circle with a line through it should place that enemy at the lowest priority that NPCs will only attack if it is the only thing to attack.

4). NPCs should ignore Invulnerable enemies. If an NPC attacks an enemy and it is invulnerable, they should immediately switch targets to something else if there is something else available.

This would keep NPCs having their own personalities, but yet give players some control over how they behave while still allowing for some randomness and feel that you are in a group with people who make their own decisions.

Yes, Ultimatum make no sense for the NPC tank. Instead of it the tank schould use his aoe enmity tool frequently.

Then, if yourself going in as tank, they don't respond to the range enmity tool. Your party will attack in 98% in all cases another enemy. Only workaround is press Engage after you pull or run in and use the aoe enmity tool (aka facepull).

Yeah, I discovered that pretty quickly, when I did one as a tank. IMO, I think the Command Missions are more for leveling my DPS jobs that have long queue times. Tanks and Heals, I can level those in dungeons with human players and get fast Qs, especially with that sweet Roulette bonus, or maybe even PotD with healers/RDM (I hate taking non-healers into POTD, because I keep getting 4x DPS groups that die often).

The dumb thing is that the AI does exactly the opposite thing I want it to do depending on what class I'm on.

If I'm a tank, I HAVE to use engage, otherwise it's guaranteed that the ARC will attack someone else. It's not a random thing, they will ALWAYS go for an alternate target in the same second my attack lands. This is especially noticable in Stone Vigil, where Ice Sprites will pop up, only for the ARC to pull one of them away out of my AoE.

However, if I'm a DPS, there's always a pregnant pause where the AI will sit and wait for a few seconds. Take the ice sprites I mentioned: when those spawn, the first 3 blizzards are guaranteed going to hit me, because the tank will not grab them until they start wailing on me. There's also how GLD (and potentially MRD) have very poor priorities on their attack combo threat. I've watched my GLD just sit their spamming Provoke and Flash to try and pull off the ARC, instead of using the Rage of Halone combo, which is overall worth more.

And then there's how MRD will use all of their cooldowns in a row if you hit re-engage while the boss is untargetable... I've run enough command missions to know where the AI needs improvements.

There is still plenty of room for development both for the commands and fixing stuff like this but even as they are now I find squadrons to be the game changer for leveling 20-50 for every job.
As you begin improving their stats (as i do, offense for dps, independent for healers,balanced or defensive for tanks) you will eventually won't have to do anything in dungeons except press the attack button.
First of all, you should have at least one archer in your group, as there is a rumour barrage gets spammed by the npc if you keep pressing the attack button. An offense 3 archer can easily take down 40-50% of hp of a trash mob with barrage. I haven't found another dps class which surpasses archer in terms of burst so far.
Second, i have both a gladiator and a marauder in my group. Gladiator with defensive 4 is fking immortal but i still haven't tested marauder although i have him on maxed balance.

The aggro issue can be fixed, as said above, only by fixing tanks to use flash,overpower immediately after pulling and then rotating cooldowns and not the opposite as it is now.

One more for squardon tanks: if engaded an enemy, the tank walk to the last known postion where the mob stands while pressing engage. If you have some range class (archers here), the enemy already walk to the archer because of autoattack, so the tank stand there for a while and doing nothing (often seen at boss). Maybe there should be some routine script for DD like "wait 3 seconds with attack" so the tank can successfull pull the enemy.

For arcanist: please delete Physic!

I like the ops mark idea. Mark a target as 1 and the squadron will focus it down. My biggest annoyance is when they go after worthless adds that can easily be ignored like rose tiny little flame adds in halitali it's just a waste of time to bother with them. So marking the flame boss as 1 for example should basically male the squadron ignore everything else

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Dzian

I like the ops mark idea. Mark a target as 1 and the squadron will focus it down. My biggest annoyance is when they go after worthless adds that can easily be ignored like rose tiny little flame adds in halitali it's just a waste of time to bother with them. So marking the flame boss as 1 for example should basically male the squadron ignore everything else

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But how would you handle situations where you want the tank to maintain threat while the DPS take care of adds? Just throwing Dusk Vigil out as a possible example: you really don't want the boss to be brought near the adds, because he gets a very significant buff if near them shortly after they spawn.

I will say that I like Marauder even more than Gladiator, because I've seen one survive half a boss fight without a healer, thanks to Thrill of Battle and Holmgang being class skills instead of job skills.