Pet AI v groups

Mordeed

Do pets know, does there ai tell them if they have a single target ie a boss encounter or if there is a group of monsters in the area or they are in combat with group ? 

if you put chiv + armour ignore + FWW or explosive goo on a pet would it still use the aoe attack against a single target therefore wasting mana? 

I have a few single target chiv+ai pets 
I have one aoe pet as poison+FFW+PB Naja 
I want to make a something inbetween 

Im thinking of a Fire Beetle with ai + FFW + explosive goo but was wondering when its fighting a single target it will carry on spewing out goo all the time ? 

Pawain

No. Pets do their AI.  The only thing I see them do at the correct time is cure or heal.  It's similar to mob AI but casting pets go to melee distance right away.  That was an early change because our magery Pets stood back and cast while the tamer got aggro.  Too bad we didn't think that one through.  Could make a tamer tank with a per that stood back to help.  Role reversal.

They do not use WoD at the correct time.

They turn on EoO and turn it off after 1 hit many times.

Seems they just use what they have.  That's why playerskill tells you to add the minimum. So they do a good thing at least.

Ahua

Yes they will cast the AoE on a single target, a little less often... in the case of close quarter AoE like FWW, the damage should add up all on the same mob, but in the case of Goo... will only proc once.

I made a magery master shadowmane recently, and it never uses heal (maybe once or twice per fight), it does cure, but sometimes only after 10-15 seconds. Did the same on another pet and it would heal twice as much. The mane if I let it go it can let itself die like it had absolutely 0 intelligence, will mana dump until nothing is left, and even at 30% health and less, it will try to fit another expensive damage spell over healing like it should.

I really think it depends on the pet type (and associated weights), but its still speculation at this point, and one thing is for sure, the AI is riddled with bugs and incomplete systems which kind of limit builds and thus ruin the the fun after you made a few top tier pets. I more often feel like I'm losing time testing builds, than finding new ones. This is why 90% use the same type of builds, and I think its really sad.

Pawain is right, sometimes you better have less choice on the pet, and less chances of it queuing bad combos or wrong order.

I think it should be a priority for the devs to look at these systems and maybe tweak a few things, will make a LOT of happy people in one single stroke. I know some might throw rocks at me for saying taming needs more love, but its the truth, any love given to pet AI means more challenging mobs and bosses, and I'm all for it.

One thing I would love to understand is why for example fighting a blood elem or mage, when they get low they will invis and heal like a machinegun... I have found no pet combination ever that does this.

They just let themselves die... even the chivalry healing pets I have, no real behavior change when they get low on HP, they will all let themselves die and try to fit in more damage. Behavior is more like a reptalon than an intelligent magic pet. There should be a clear difference between a pet build to hit hard in melee and a pet built to survive using magic.

Pawain

Pets will forget they have FWW. When at a dynamic spawn and the pet has many targets and you notice no FWW hits.  Call the pet back and tell it to attack.  It will do FWW again.

Ahua

just wish they didn't forget they had healing lol

Mordeed

I think being a tamer is great, I've had my tamer since the early days sitting near gates waiting for faction opponents to appear to a quick death via my greater dragon or white wyvern. There are issues with pet ai and abilities that don't work as they should. But my biggest ask would be to give us the opportunity to respec/reset our pets, or at least some safe guard against ruining a rare pet. My legacy nightmare worked out great, but I've still not finished my legacy white wyvern or juvenile Umbrascale in fear of doing something that  I cannot undo. One is sooooo rare and the other is no longer obtainable. 

Never been on the test centre, maybe that's the answer. 

Pawain

Mordeed said:

I think being a tamer is great, I've had my tamer since the early days sitting near gates waiting for faction opponents to appear to a quick death via my greater dragon or white wyvern. There are issues with pet ai and abilities that don't work as they should. But my biggest ask would be to give us the opportunity to respec/reset our pets, or at least some safe guard against ruining a rare pet. My legacy nightmare worked out great, but I've still not finished my legacy white wyvern or juvenile Umbrascale in fear of doing something that  I cannot undo. One is sooooo rare and the other is no longer obtainable. 

Never been on the test centre, maybe that's the answer. 

Players will think they can get the original numbers back.  So the devs are against it because of the chaos it will cause.

We have to let the devs know that the start stats are not why,  We would take a medium pet.  We want to fix messed up pets, and in my case remove all the scrolls from old pets that have better successors.