Jump to content
The Dark Mod Forums

AI reacting to doors opening or closing.


Professor Paul1290

Recommended Posts

Sneak?

 

Holding down Sneak or Run while frobbing for a slow door movement would still not alleviate the issue of it swinging and having to stop it, so if you don't get it right, you have to rinse and repeat until you do. So it doesn't really address the core annoyance.

 

Also, why put the time and energy in to doing anything with it if it would only be a stop-gap solution.

 

Its been the way it is for years I'm guessing as I've only played the Mod for a few months so shelving the idea until there is time to address it properly wouldn't be a big deal anyway.

 

If anything's worth doing, its worth doing right. Of course that's just my opinion. :\

Edited by Lux
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Slow door opening was in Splinter Cell and it really made you feel like a super agent! ;) Of course, games with direct mouse to object control (Penumbra series, Amnesia series) also had that as a side feature and it worked wonderfuly. A system like that was actually also in the scope for TDM. It had been posted somewhere in the "I want to help"-section a couple of years back.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Maybe holding the "slow walk" key could slow door opening and closing, which might fit more intuitively than crouching.

...

Actually, if you wanted to it could make sense do this with run as well. If doors opened faster while you held run then that would make the door match your desired movement speed better.

I think it would be really hard to convey to the player that these "Player-movement-ONLY modifier keys" also for some other reason modify frobs. It's an unexpected use of that key, and some players might think it's a bug during gameplay. I don't know about you, but I do an awful lot of crouch-running, and I don't want doors slamming open.

 

The reason that method seemed to work in Penumbra was because of the intimate tie between player movement and world physics. Grabbing a heavy door and backpedalling/walking forward to open it made the player feel the weight of the door, because grabbing the door modified his movement encumbrance. It wasn't unexpected because all other physics interactions worked the same way: grabbing a crate to slide it along the ground also made you feel encumbered in Penumbra. TDM has no such intimate system.

 

Holding down Sneak or Run while frobbing for a slow door movement would still not alleviate the issue of it swinging and having to stop it, so if you don't get it right, you have to rinse and repeat until you do. So it doesn't really address the core annoyance.

I don't find it particularly difficult to just double-click the frob button for a partially-open door-peek. In a pinch, from there, I can frob it once to close the door again.

 

Another possibility would be to tack the frobbing-endurance into consideration. A short frob (like *click*) opens/closes the door normally while keeping the frob button pressed gives you full control.

 

Unfortunately I didn't found the time to work on this yesterday evening, hopefully today.

This sounds like a much better idea to me. "Accidental" tactile feedback. The feeling of holding down frob would feel akin to holding your hand on a doorknob, and releasing frob would feel akin to releasing control of the doorknob.

yay seuss crease touss dome in ouss nose tair

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I think the original idea was to set it up so that if you held frob down on a door, the mouse wheel would control opening and closing it. This is somewhat similar to junk objects, where the mouse wheel pushes/pulls them. A quick frob would open/stop/close the door as normal, so nothing changes unless you want it to.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Springheel -

I think the original idea was to set it up so that if you held frob down on a door, the mouse wheel would control opening and closing it. This is somewhat similar to junk objects, where the mouse wheel pushes/pulls them. A quick frob would open/stop/close the door as normal, so nothing changes unless you want it to.

 

Love this idea as well and it accomplishes it without a separate keybind to enact slow frob.

 

I'm for any of the solutions that have been mentioned that provide more tactile feedback to the player. I'm just not a fan of the the click/stop/click/stop/click/stop personally and besides the point its all a rather minor niggle on an otherwise fantastic mod.

 

And STiFU, Pnenumbra was an awesome series. So happy I picked it up and what an experience. Amnesia was great too....waiting on A Machine for Pigs. :)

Edited by Lux
Link to comment
Share on other sites

I really loved that function in Raven Shield, though in that game I used it more for carefully popping flashbangs into rooms than for stealth. :laugh:

 

Same here :D

"Einen giftigen Trank aus Kräutern und Wurzeln für die närrischen Städter wollen wir brauen." - Text aus einem verlassenen Heidenlager

Link to comment
Share on other sites

As long as it doesn't conflict with existing behavior then the mouse wheel behavior would be more ideal.

 

I really loved that function in Raven Shield, though in that game I used it more for carefully popping flashbangs into rooms than for stealth. :laugh:

Replace the flashbangs with flashbombs and the ak-47 with a bow and you get the same result :smile:

FM's: Builder Roads, Old Habits, Old Habits Rebuild

Mapping and Scripting: Apples and Peaches

Sculptris Models and Tutorials: Obsttortes Models

My wiki articles: Obstipedia

Texture Blending in DR: DR ASE Blend Exporter

Link to comment
Share on other sites

As long as it doesn't conflict with existing behavior then the mouse wheel behavior would be more ideal.

 

I really loved that function in Raven Shield, though in that game I used it more for carefully popping flashbangs into rooms than for stealth. :laugh:

 

Flashbangs or cracking the door open and scanning the room through the crack down the sights, then open a bit further and repeat.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I loved the large and wide open maps and the ability of the game to spawn the enemies on random places.

That's kinda like the random patrouls in TDM I guess.

 

And of course instead of playing police it's playing the person it tries to catch in TDM, haha! :laugh:

Edited by SeriousToni

"Einen giftigen Trank aus Kräutern und Wurzeln für die närrischen Städter wollen wir brauen." - Text aus einem verlassenen Heidenlager

Link to comment
Share on other sites

My 2 cents, for what it's worth. It seems to me, the realistic behavior would be:

 

The AI sees a door swing open, by any amount (fully open or just a crack.) If they didn't see someone open it, they watch to see if anyone comes through.

 

If they're walking and the door is non-suspicious, they look at it for as long as they can (when they can't twist their neck far enough any more, they look away.) If they're not walking or the door is suspicious, they stop and look at it for as long as it takes to determine what to do (see below.)

 

If someone they expect comes through the door (anyone other than the player, in most cases), they immediately continue what they were doing without taking any action (perhaps bark a greeting.) If it's the player, then the AI's actions are the same as any other time they spot the player.

 

If they don't see the person who opened the door or see someone come through the door within some short period of time (say 5 seconds), they investigate. If the door is suspicious, they draw weapons, otherwise they do not.

 

Does this sound reasonable? Here are a few scenarios:

 

The player opens a non-suspicious door a crack to peek through, then closes it again. A guard walking by inside sees the door open, and looks at it as he's walking. If he walks past the door and has to look away before 5 seconds is up, he'll disregard it as not important enough to warrant further attention. If he's stationary or his patrol is such that he's able to continue looking at it for 5 seconds, he will (why look away after it's grabbed his attention?) If after 5 seconds, still no one he knows has come through, then he'll go investigate. He won't draw his weapons, though - he's happened upon something out of the ordinary, but then again maybe someone accidentally bumped the door.

 

The player opens a suspicious door (such as the back door of the bank) a crack to peek through, then closes it. A guard walking by inside stops to watch. After 5 seconds, no one he knows has come through, so he draws his sword and goes to investigate. The player retreats back into the darkness as the guard comes through the door to look around. After a while, he doesn't find anything, so he puts his sword away and goes back inside to patrol again, on edge over the possibility of a thief.

 

A servant opens a door. A stationary guard on the other side can see the door but not the servant, so he starts watching. The servant walks through, the guard sees him, says "Evenin'", and turns in a different direction.

 

A servant opens a door. The player knocks something over in the room with the servant. The servant hears it and goes to investigate, leaving the door open. The stationary guard on the other side doesn't hear it or see the servant, but he sees the door open, and starts watching. 5 seconds later, he investigates.

 

The part that seems critical to me (which as far as I can tell is not included in 2.0) is the idea that the AI should start watching the door when it opens if they don't see the person who opened it, wait some period of time, and then base their response on whether or not they saw a friendly come through the door. If the period of time expires and still no friendly, they go to investigate. Of course, it's not the mere fact of the door opening that draws the AI's interest - doors open all the time for legitimate reasons. And of course they don't need to see the player to know something may be wrong. They only need to NOT see a legitimate reason for the door to have opened. Does that make sense?

Edited by eigenface
  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

is the idea that the AI should start watching the door when it opens if they don't see the person who opened it, wait some period of time, and then base their response on whether or not they saw a friendly come through the door

 

Yes, that's essentially how the behaviour works.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

This is how the system worked initially:

 

Each door keeps track of who used it last. This is either an AI or NULL (if it hasn't been used yet by AI, or the player was the last one to use it).

 

Let's say Tom used the door last, and Bill sees that the door is open.

 

Bill checks if there's LOS from him to Tom. There's no grace period. FOV and light level don't matter. If so, no suspicion. If not, Bill checks whether Tom is w/in 150 units of the door origin. If so, no suspicion.

 

If this fails, Bill checks for ANY AI near the door. If he finds someone, no suspicion. If he finds no one, the door is suspicious.

 

If the player was the last to use the door, or the door doesn't know who used it last, it's considered suspicious.

 

These additions were recently made:

 

 

AI will look for 2s at a door opening in their FOV, unless they’re in combat mode.

 

Tightened recognition of who might have opened a suspicious door.

 

Allow player to crack open a suspicious door to peek out w/o grabbing the attention of a nearby AI. After 5s, the AI will notice the cracked open door. Non-suspicious doors can be cracked open indefinitely w/o nearby AI noticing.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

AI will look for 2s at a door opening in their FOV, unless they’re in combat mode.

 

Tightened recognition of who might have opened a suspicious door.

 

Allow player to crack open a suspicious door to peek out w/o grabbing the attention of a nearby AI. After 5s, the AI will notice the cracked open door. Non-suspicious doors can be cracked open indefinitely w/o nearby AI noticing.

 

I like how this looks so far, but I feel this will greatly increase difficulty certain missions. To counterbalance this, I would suggest having a feature that would allow players to peek through keyholes, since footstep sounds may be confusing sometimes, if there's more than one guard in a room.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I like how this looks so far, but I feel this will greatly increase difficulty certain missions.

 

Why is that?

 

 

I would suggest having a feature that would allow players to peek through keyholes,

 

Players can crack open doors up to 20% to look through them without alerting AI; that should serve the same function.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

  • Recent Status Updates

    • Petike the Taffer

      I've finally managed to log in to The Dark Mod Wiki. I'm back in the saddle and before the holidays start in full, I'll be adding a few new FM articles and doing other updates. Written in Stone is already done.
      · 0 replies
    • nbohr1more

      TDM 15th Anniversary Contest is now active! Please declare your participation: https://forums.thedarkmod.com/index.php?/topic/22413-the-dark-mod-15th-anniversary-contest-entry-thread/
       
      · 0 replies
    • JackFarmer

      @TheUnbeholden
      You cannot receive PMs. Could you please be so kind and check your mailbox if it is full (or maybe you switched off the function)?
      · 1 reply
    • OrbWeaver

      I like the new frob highlight but it would nice if it was less "flickery" while moving over objects (especially barred metal doors).
      · 4 replies
    • nbohr1more

      Please vote in the 15th Anniversary Contest Theme Poll
       
      · 0 replies
×
×
  • Create New...