A post about bots. WARNINGS

So I was doing some testings, and I will once again bring up some points about the game A.I. on bots, nemesis zombies, knight thugs etc.

1: Ping: The game is giving bots a ping about player positions using THE EXACT POSITION of the player after an X time. Why this is a problem? Well, if you have played Doctor, you would know that he has an add-on that spawns "ghosts" looking at the survivor's exact location after x seconds. This is fine because it gives the killer and BBQ effect (kinda) showing your position.

I am not saying that nemesis zombies use the exact same code BUT they will randomly in a match do an 180 with the arms up going to your direction without spotting you, this will initiate a "zombie chase" that gives the survivor position to the killer like doctors ghosts, but it's specially unfair when you are the only survivor remaining.

Looping against bots has this problem too (see 3)

(fixes in the end)*

2: Priorities:

As a human you can prioritize your actions but what about the bot? Sometimes the bots prioritizes themselves before the humans, making the game a less enjoyable experience. For example, if someone is being camped and near second stage, the bots prefer to keep themselves hidden near the hooked survivor and not trading hook stages (we all know that according to the robotic laws human life should be a priority). A bot tying a rescue could be bad if they got grabbed, but the grab on hook will be removed.

If you are against a doctor and the bot rescues you from the hook at tier 3 madness, the bot will not HEAL THE HUMAN and will not let the HUMAN heal him until he gets out of the madness. Why this is bad, you ask? Well for balance measures bot cant hit all skill checks on a game because it would be unfair to the killer, so he will be forced to miss the madness test A LOT of times leaving both of you screwed and calling the killer for a full feast.

Terror radius also makes bots behave differently, making them hide and such, this is a problem in a couple of situations like if the killer is a wesker with distressing (any killer with high TR actually) the bot might turn into a coward hiding for no reason, doing nothing, not saving, canceling healing.

(fixes in the end)*

3:Looping:

You could say that chasing a bot is easy, but it depends. Long story short, they have a dynamic difficulty that changes accordingly to the killer "Profit". In an early game scenario, bots will be almost godlike (if the killer has high MMR) remember the ping problem? Well in some loops they will drop a pallet that is unsafe BUT the pallet is unsafe for HUMANS not bots. Since the A.I keep track of player position and walking direction (not the direction you are looking) they will safely drop pallets and force you to break it by reading your position from the other side of the wall. This error is exponentially increased if the bot has the HASTE effect. (actually it is a double edge sword, they waste a LOT of pallets but also makes you break all of them, gaining time).

Flashlights on bots is also something nuts, they will do a 4 click blind while running from you. (A 4 click blind is essentially what it says, they can keep 100% precision in their pathing to a pallet while doing curves and in the meantime Click the flashlight on your face for. X seconds and chaining the clicks for an INSTANT flashlight blind) The problem with that is that the blinding is so instant that you have to look down when you hear the first click, IDK if it's really faster than a normal blinding, but it seems so. And that action is almost impossible for a human to accomplish while running.

Flashlight saving is hard to happen (because of the TR thing) but in some occasions they can run "Horizontally" from the side of the killer screen while blinding and while moving maintaining the precision to a save, something that some streamers do but with a high skill ceiling. The problem is that they can do it 100% of the time with some perks like tactical player.

If some day you make a killer bot this problem will appear too (if you go against the tutorial trapper and hide in a locker, the game pings you to him, and he will come from across the entire map to your jungle gym and open your locker exactly.

4: Bots will throw the game on purpose:

Remember your Solo Q teammates that stop to appreciate the nature? well, the bots do that too. The worst part is that when it's a human you can "forgive" but a bot gives you the taste of knowing that he could be doing something.Examples:

"Killer underperforming" : If the killer underperforms and the gens are pretty much done the bot will start to "roam" crouching near a corner of the map to smell the flowers, or throwing themselves to the killer giving a free hook ("but Noir i am the god killer i downed the bot in 10 seconds, and you say they are good at looping in section 3") normally they will medium vault a loop for you to down them, it's a bone that the game gives you but in the end players do not save bots from the hook that often. The bot can rarely explode generators, but they tend not to when doing the gen COOP, instead they just go roam mode.

5: Possible fixes for BHVR:

Nemesis zombies should prioritize walking from gen to gen instead of walking to survivors pings, and in the end game between the middle of the map. This should reduce double zombies chasing, and free survivors locations, turning them into a timed slow-down, working against survivors awareness. After a chase initiates survivors could try to Juke them to miss a hit, if successful the zombie should patrol again (sometimes they just "think" a ping back again and again on the survivor location, which doesn't reward the risk play). Also the game should have an "distance walked" variable for each zombie and if in x seconds the zombie doesnt walk he should respawn with an haste effect to recover the time wasted from being stuck.

Bots should ALWAYS prioritize players lifes, so if someone is being face camped the bot should. A: if full health trade before the struggle. B: Ping an injured player and Heal him. C: Try to save while injured.

Bots skillchecks missing can be fixed by basing their "ability" using the players. For example: if the players hit 9/10 checks the bot will have a chance of 1/10 to miss, increasing as the match goes. We already know they will most likely not miss while doing a coop gen and they should be void of the possibility of a great skill check. (this also balances for matches against doctors and some niche builds).

Bots should be FEARLESS (sometimes) : imagine that you are hurt on a gen trying to finish it for an adrenaline and the bot that is repairing with you starts to walk away because of the TR. Bots should prioritize finishing the gen in this case, and tanking the hit for the human if not able to finish. Right now they just leave and you are forced to give up and get chased.

Bots should OBEY players, if the player do a calling gesture the bot should follow him for 20 seconds (can be overridden for an unhook). If the player points to an object, the bot should do that objective for at Least 20 seconds (works for totem and gens, can be overridden for an unhook if necessary). If the player crouches 3 times, the bot should heal him (the bot can only receive one command at a time. And can not be commanded for more than twice for each player).

Using this the bot logic will normally be: Rescue, Tank hits/ Heal a player, Obey, Gen, Hide.

Bots should be prone to fail, if you can't remove the bot pinging the killer while looping forcing the pallet break, you should at least be able to make a rule for him to leave that loop. The rule should be based in a quantity of times the bot looped the same structure or how many times he changed directions in x seconds during a chase.

If possible, please make the guards from the knight to follow the exact same path the survivor used, or the least distance path. Sometimes during a chase, the guard takes a turn and goes the exact way the killer was already going, or the guard just keeps doing a back and forward randomly in the structure. A predictability of the AI is better for both players, leaving room for a proper strategy to be established.