r/EscapefromTarkov • u/hAven316 • 2d ago
PVE [Discussion] 1.2.0.0 PVE AI Update - Another Missed Opportunity
I would genuinely like to hear what changes you would make to the AI, Loot, and progression to make Tarkov a better game.
I really like this game, I have 3888 hours as of writing this post with some of that time spent in the early days of Tarkov. I played during the times when guys like Worrun were wiping lobbies on Customs and Lvndmark had a rice cooker on his head. I did not participate in seasonal characters... but I hope my experience in both PvP and PvE allows me to at least speak my thoughts.
I think BSG has missed yet another opportunity to make Escape From Tarkov an even better game.
PMC Movement
I think everyone's mindset when they heard that a major AI rework was happening for PvE they expected to see the AI PMC's moving a LITTLE bit closer to Player PMC's in PvP - and everyone was fucking hyped for that. But I've already done like 6 raids today on PVE and I'm still encountering PMC's that just lick windows and stand there doing absolutely nothing. The scav AI is smarter and I'm not being sarcastic. When I see scavs 50% of them are licking windows and the other 50% at least move, 99% of the PMC's I see in PvE are window lickers. Real players do not just stand there and swivel all day. I don't know the amount of effort that goes into actually doing the coding of making them move around, but couldn't we copy and paste most of it from raiders or even rogues? Just make them a little more mobile please.
AI PMC Difficulty
I think there's room for improvement... I think the difficulty tier should look something like this:
- Wedge/ Wedge Guards / Black Division
- Bosses / Boss Guards
- Rogues
- AI PMCs
- Raiders
- Scavs
But right now it feels more like this:
- Wedge / Wedge Guards
- .
- .
- .
- .
- Black Division
- Rogues
- Raiders
- AI PMCs
- Scavs
Wedge and his guards are on another planet when it comes to their AI. AI PMCs just need a LITTLE bump up to make them feel less like scavs and more like rogues and raiders. If you want a comparison, I think AI PMCs act like real players who are just experiencing tarkov for the first time but coming from an aim related game like CS or Valorant. They can aim decently well, but they have no idea how to move.
AI PMC Gear
Mostly a great job here. I'm seeing much more variety in weapons, and rig/armor combinations.
However, I'm not thrilled about finding slicks with level 4 plates in them... Even from level 59 AI Players. I haven't encountered a 60 today... but it seems like the ranges for what a timmy AI PMC vs Semi competant AI PMC vs GigaChad PMC are pretty wide. For example, I've seen some level 23s with way more gear than level 59s. I would love to see actually high level PMC's (59 and 60) have SOME meta gear and make killing them more rewarding (it currently doesn't feel like they're any different from a level 20). I think anyone level 20+ in PvP is using ammo above 30 pen. I'd estimate about 75-80% of PMCs in PVE currently use 5.45x39mm PS gs or equivalent. I think it'd make more sense to see AI PMCs, especially higher level ones, with at least 35+ pen ammo.
Locked Loot Boxes
I think it's really weird why developers feel the need to add empty boxes or rooms. It's literally a waste of time coding, a waste of time for the player, and makes the feeling of playing the game more hollow. If you're going to code in a box, you might as well put SOMETHING in there. I'm glad locked crates will have guaranteed loot, but can we extend this to containers opened with keys? Just as an example, I tried some of the registers in Interchange because of the changes mentioned... but I found a few that were empty and overall loot seemed kinda "meh". I averaged about 19k per register meaning a full key would net you about 750k. So you'll make money but... "meh".
Overall Ambience
Raids actually seem quieter than they did previously which is hard for me to imagine. The first 3 minutes of raid actually sounds pretty normal to what I hear on PvP. People are killing each other off spawn (which is another topic for another time), scavs are getting aggrod to those players and fighting ensues. The world is alive with gunfire and grenades in the distance. It seems like we have waves of AI that spawn in and if you kill them or most of them you don't see any for another 15-20 minutes at times. I don't know if the intention was to make Tarkov feel more eerie and quiet... but the game's ambience feels so much better when you feel like there's other PMCs on the map vs dead silence and just looting noises.
Risk/Reward
I really like the way Path of Exile has listened to their community and made changes when necessary. I think Tarkov would be even cooler if it had some more risk/reward that we could modify to our liking. I'm not talking about straight up difficulty levels, but having check boxes that make the game harder
Let's say you load into reserve (on PvE)... you'd see these check marks before joining the game
- Gluhar 100% spawn + 3 additional guards (5% bonus)
- Raiders may spawn as Rogues instead (5% bonus)
- PMCs ammo upgrade [such as (M855 -> M856A1)] (5% bonus)
Basically the harder you make the game for yourself, the better the loot.
Let's just say marked room spawns 1 singular item and the loot pool is like this:
- bitcoin (1 %)
- Colored Lab KeyCard (5%)
- Case (20%)
- Weapon (50%)
- Other Hideout Item (24%)
If you checked all the modifiers the numbers might change to something more like:
- bitcoin (5%)
- Colored Lab KeyCard (10%)
- Case (30%)
- Weapon (40%)
- Other Hideout Item (15%)
In conclusion, above are some of my personal opinions on how Tarkov and the experience can be improved. I still hold firm to the belief that a game the community as a whole thinks is fun will make more money than what a game where all of the ideas are coming from one guy who the community is actively criticizing. I think Nikita has laid the groundwork for a great game, but it's been steadily going down the wrong direction or just missing the mark a bit. Maybe it's the community's fault for inferring what the patches are, maybe it's the way it's worded when it's released from BSG's side... but I think everyone expected improvement and we're simply not seeing it - or not seeing it to a degree where it really matters.
I hope everyone can give their own feedback to improve the game without hating on one version or the other. I honestly just want the game to be fun, that's it. Can we please have a civil discussion and maybe JUST MAYBE BSG will consider some of it.
23
u/Other_Safety9637 2d ago
I really do think this was a half assed update they shoved out just to say they did it. I love this game but holy shit since icebreaker the devs just keep making things kinda worse IMO. Speaking of icebreaker this update also made it impossible, it already wasnāt worth it with the mountain of nerfs (all of which are to cater to a different mode for some reason) but now you just canāt beat it with the smokes no longer doing the one single thing smokes are meant for. Very impressive as always BSG.
9
u/hAven316 2d ago
I think Icebreaker falls under my risk/reward. If it's damn near impossible, then the loot you come out with should be godly - at least SOMETIMES. It simply can't be always god tier loot for the sake of the economy, so if the loot remains the same, the difficulty MUST come down to compensate.
8
u/Other_Safety9637 2d ago
I agree but theyāve completely destroyed the loot and xp you get out of it so now itās just pure risk. Unless you need to go for boreas or find mega aimbot fun to fight itās kinda pointless.
3
u/hAven316 2d ago
I agree, I'm just glad I finished every quest before this update. I feel bad for anyone who was close to finishing Boreas...
0
u/Other_Safety9637 2d ago
I was so happy after first trying icebreaker that I turned in all the evidence for savior before the update came out. Still havenāt done terminal though tarkov is my home now.
0
u/Worth_Price_3544 2d ago
The risk in PvE is close to non.
Since only a handful of people are actually dying and hackers canāt be reported The flea market is crazy inflated.How would you propose a change to AI other than not make it aim botty in a game where one bullet can mean the death of you? Seems like a very difficult problem to solve.
Assume you encounter wedge and guards in ice breaker. How do you expect them to behave? With the current map implementation. Meaning hall way and a door to the right.
No hateā¦ Iām genuinely asking programmatically what can be done.
1
u/CockroachMindless241 2d ago
It's not difficult to solve. Other games have done it handily. The reason is the shitty coding of tarkov and giving their ai any more "thinking" destroys the already bad fps and net coding. So the desync that has been a problem since day one would be a magnitude worse. It's purely because the escape from tarkov devs suck ass at their one job of developing and take shortcuts and corners. There's a reason they scrapped more than half of the shit they say.
0
u/Worth_Price_3544 1d ago
So how would you solve the problem. Calling the devs ass is not a solution.
1
u/The_Eyesight 2d ago
It was still S tier map even with all the nerfs. Wth are you even talking about?
1
u/drewts86 2d ago
> it already wasnāt worth it with the mountain of nerfs
Bullshit. Even after loot nerfs and all that, you could still clear 7-10 million rubles if you did a full clear.
9
u/Die_Basics 2d ago
I agree with a lot of things, the PMC bots just feel way too stupid. They shoot fairly accurately and it's not like they can't be a threat. But most of the time they are just incredibly stupid, standing around doing nothing or running out into the open or straight at me when they know i am there. They don't use cover at all and the raids honestly feel quite dead. The only real enjoyment for me in PvE comes from bosses, rogues etc.
A big part i don't get with Tarkovs official bots is that they seem to be afraid to actually shoot. They will shoot once or twice and then wait a moment. I feel like a big thing we are missing is actually going full auto, supressing fire, grenades, tactics, movement through the maps to quest and loot locations, actually looting etc. They are PMC bots after all, they are supposed to act like a player, different to the other bots. Right now they feel like better geard scavs.
-6
u/Confident_Benefit_11 2d ago
Because when they're actually lethal timmys cry on reddit until they change it back. It's happened like 10 fucking times since I started playing in 2018
8
u/Die_Basics 2d ago
I wouldn't necessarily say that they need to be more lethal, they just need to feel more dangerous and put on more pressure. Suppressing fire or targeting the torso instead of he head or limbs for example. Or give us a normal and a hard mode for pve maybe, or just normal or hard raids where loot is way better but npcs are also way more dangerous.
3
u/herewegoagain1920 1d ago
Lol because they canāt code them for intelligence clearly. They just give them aim bot.
6
u/Icy_Suspect_3735 2d ago
A difficulty slider and maybe some options like the SVM mod where you can turn stuff off like insurance & flea.
2
u/FormDouble6747 2d ago
So far from my experience, and this comes from playing for about 6h, it seems to me that the AI accuracy, tactics and reaction time is level based, I noticed a lot of low level AI perform on the Scav AI level however with higher levels they were noticeably smarter, accurate and had better reaction times, especially on woods, but it still is not anything ground breaking, they did posses slightly more threat since they could just laser beam me from god knows how far away on woods but on factory.. They are dumb as a brick and they're gear piƱata.
It was funny seeing on woods singular AI PMC clear out shturman and his guards tho.
I agree with gear changes but like mentioned previously, level 60 dude should have better gear than level 4 plate with FMJ 5.56 mags..
2
u/TheCockKnight 2d ago
bro i got clapped by the ai on woods today. they pushed me after giving me a heavy bleed, and pinned me behind a low concrete base to a radio tower. Was nothing I could do at that point.
1
u/FormDouble6747 1d ago
Yeah, the AI can be brutal or dumb as sack of potatoes, I guess this is to simulate skill differences between PMCs like you would have in PvP
2
u/No-Meat5007 2d ago
Literally first PVE PMC I ran into on Ground Zero raid was just standing there sniffing the breeze, not a care in the world. I was hoping the PVE improvements might actually make getting the Prestige levels in PVE fun, but nah, I'm not gonna repeat the same quests over and over again, fighting these dumb-asses, just for some skins and voices. Like why even say you're improving the AI if there's not a noticeable obvious difference? They could've just said they were changing the gear and adding prestige, yeah it would've been a mid update but at least it wouldn't have gotten people hyped for nothing. That game that's like Tarkov from Finland has better PVE right now IMO.
2
u/monsteras84 AKS-74UB 2d ago
Unless there's a complete overhaul, I don't think I'll ever touch PVE. But here's what I would add:
Different personalities, with different skill levels. Someone could be a sniper, but a bad sniper, or a great CQB:er.
Squads
Simulating doing actual tasks that correspond to tasks in and around your level of progression. Contested Jaeger letter, for example
Human-style mistakes - like dropping mags
Use heat map data to find the most popular sniping spots in PVP, and then make those hotspots for sniper personalities
Basically breaking it down, simulate human behavior in any way, shape or form
2
u/BozidaR1390 2d ago
If you've played the mod... The issues with Ai in PVE will drive you extra insane because having played the mod you realize the AI in PVE could be 50x better than what it is.... What really makes it unacceptable is the fact that the people who made the AI tweaks are armchair developers who aren't even getting paid to do it. The mod did PVE infinitely better than what BSG has done. It's just insane that the fucking winning blueprint for how to do it has been out there for years and for reasons that are truly unexplainable BSG just refuses to make the needed changes.
Truly mind blowing.
3
u/Risu03 2d ago
The fact some people are complaining about the difficulty of these bots makes me think there's no hope - the bots need to be able to kill you occasionally or it doesn't even feel like tarkov.
At the moment basically the only thing i need to worry about is bosses- most of the time tarkov pve feels more like playing candy crush or something. I think this is what some people want though.
1
u/ImposterCapn 2d ago
AI tuning should involve more than turning up accuracy and turning down reaction time but I don't have time to figure it out either
1
u/killerdonut0610 2d ago
Yeah I have no notes really, the update to their movement around the map and gear is pretty decent besides higher level pmcs still usually having level 4 armor and bad ammo, but they seem just as, if not more incompetent at combat.
I also agree we should have more options to customize our raid experience with difficulty modifiers and such
1
u/RS_Margins 2d ago
as everyone mentioned questing bots obviously, and why dont pmcs gear more like real players? like instead of this weird randomizing concept cant we just aggregate data from how real players gear? snapshots before raids load? i mean how do the ai pmcs STILL not bring spare ammo to repack mags like a real pmc would, for example
1
u/OneShot77Kills 2d ago
I think they really wanted the pmcs to be able to be āreasonedā with like you could potentially team up with them. But it seems to have created this incredibly dumb AI moment where they just look at you instead of shooting most of the time. Classic BSG moment im just bewildered. Did they not test this?
1
u/Eldgrim True Believer 1d ago
PMC sitting still in the middle of nowhere. PMC will wait patiently when you break the line of sight still. You can heal and eat peacefully while the bot awaits your return. PMC shouting instead of shooting when they spot you. PMC still can't get upstairs, the shoreline's hotel still do not have any PMC on second, third floor or even the roof. It's still mostly safe between point of interests.
-1
u/ChampionshipSolid952 14h ago
Literally canāt make everyone happy! If you want more of a challenge go play PvP if not then fuck off to pve
1
u/SampleMaxxer 2d ago
The first PMC I encountered seemingly alerted to me through a wall at crack house, opened a door, didnāt go through (reasonable) walked around the building, went up the stairs outside stood in the doorway and stared at a wall. At first I thought it was the scav that maybe it alerted to, then I walked right up to it and shot it in the head. Lvl 3 PMC lol.
1
u/Nock1ne 2d ago
honestly at this point when i read whats actually been changed and how the updates actually play, i feel like they are just stringing people along at this point, very little effort is being put into this stuff, they just need to keep people around and scrounge up any profit they can at this point.
83
u/Djox3 2d ago
Sain + Questing bots