You know what I mean :p AI still has the I in it meaning it has to appear intelligent and just a simply two line script that says:

if *being attacked* && *mage*
then *cast shield*

that's not intelligent when every mage everywhere does it.

Thanks guys. :D Now I am hopped up to get this game again after reading the many mostly positive posts. And the fact there are still guilds makes me very happy, and the difficulty scaling is better than horrible Oblivion, where if you didn't grind, the enemy would get harder and harder to fight as you progressed, making it easier to win as a level 1 char as opposed to a level 20. I don't know who thought that idea up as good. Anyways, don't know when, but I hope to be in Skyrim soon, tossing back some ale, before I make a snow-angel with a dragon I just slayed...cute...Gotta go though, GOG's are a calling me first. =D

On the other hand, any mage valuing their life WILL be casting some sort of shield whwn being attacked (unless, of course, they are nimble enough to dodge, which isn't likely given the physique of most stereotypical mages).

Strictly speaking all AI routines are based around if/then/and/or conditions. When people talk about sophisticated AI they just mean there are a lot of conditions that mimic intelligence. I don't think it's unreasonable that most mages will have <if attacked by melee then activate shield> and <if health <30 then activate heal> as that's what any real person would do.

True, but a mage has a gazillion spells - why do they always cast the same 3 spells? I don't always cast fire or shield - I cast minions for example. They cast fire or ice or create skeletons - that's all I've seen so far. It just reeks of very basic scripting.

For example - if I jump off a wall after having backstabbed a guard, he won't just pull his bow and pepper me with arrows - he'll try to find some stairs to chase after me with a blade. He won't jump - they never jump.

Maybe http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HbX_RahDESQ

NPC also often can't get around the current in rivers. It's possible to cause them a some grief by shooting them from the water. Someone goes down the bank, gets deep then carried away by a current, crawls out and runs up to you along the bank and tries again.

There was an article in PC Gamer a while back that talked about how good AI is not realistic AI, but AI that is the most fun to fight. I know from using some AI mods for Oblivion that enemies who constantly heal, run away all the time or act in other random or realistic ways are more annoying than impressive.

totally, we had enough with paladins in wow

Thanks! I actually walked in there by pure coincident right after I posted my question, lol.

Anyway, I touched that shrine and aferwards I became completely absorbed in various side quests, so much that now I've been awake for the last 24 hours, playing this game for the majority of the time (and I have barely even left Whiterun yet! Man this game is gonna eat my life.). Maybe I should go to bed :p

You can do a lot if you throw in weighted probabilities.

I wrote an AI once that tried to save its shots for when it had the best chances to hit you while trying to make it's self as hard to hit as possible. Even if you knew what it was going to do it was still hard to counter.

I don't think you guys get my point. Of course all AI is scripted - I'm talking about HOW the AI in Skyrim is scripted - it's too simplistic and shows no real signs of intelligence. It doesn't really act according to circumstances beyond changing weapons depending on distance and using heal & shield and they ALL act the same way. I mean - if you see someone with a bow firing arrows at you, since when do you go run towards him with a sword drawn?

Yes, making it too realistic and making them too hard would be bad too, but there's a nice middle ground.

There's a lot of improvement over Oblivion, but after an extended play session, several aspects of the game feel half-assed and poorly designed or balanced. Don't have too much time for the forums this morning, so I'll just quickfire some of my complaints to blow off a bit of steam:

EDIT: Discovered after posting this that Conjuration increases VERY quickly with the use of the spell Bound Sword. The mechanics of Conjuration in Skyrim appear significantly different from previous TES games. SV suggests that summoned creatures increase the Conjuration skill by an amount relative to the amount of damage they deal in combat. I'll leave my original comments below, but bear in mind the above when reading (and see later posts for more information).

Skills like Conjuration and Alchemy (for example) raise very slowly and require constant grinding to keep pace with other skills. That's not fun or "natural" (as some have called Skyrim leveling). If you don't grind these skills, most of the associated perk tree will be unavailable. Building effective characters seems to consist of grinding a particular set of skills and avoiding increases in other skills to maintain a balance of combat effectiveness and level. Perhaps it'd be better if perk requirements were level-based instead of skill-based, or if skills increased at better or more consistent rates, but as-is it feels poorly designed.

Starting skill levels are influenced only by race. Despite the influence of Fallout 3 on the game mechanics, there is no option to tag particular skills for better starting levels (a simple element that would have given a sense of actual character background).

Cooking might have been a useful subset of Alchemy if better implemented, but instead it seems to be a simpler version of Alchemy that produces health and stamina boosting meals but doesn't raise the Alchemy skill. Tanning and smelting don't seem to raise the blacksmith skill. Alchemy seems to net a disproportionate monetary gain compared to other skills. Enchanting and Smithing seem to require non-immersive grinding to be of any real use. Perhaps all three crafting skills activities could have been better implemented as perk trees with no associated skill (removing the grind aspect, unlocking better items to craft for each perk assigned, perhaps with level requirements for perks instead of skill requirements).

Marriage is simple (which is good... it's neat to be able to "decorate" your home with a spouse but unnecessary to implement "wine-and-dine") but seems half-assed in implementation: Rather than an open system scripted to check "can be married" and disposition variables and allow any available character to be courted, it seems that choice is limited to a small number of premade spouses.

Loot and shop items are still leveled. Need I say more?

Companions still aren't "essential" (not able to be killed) but are still suicidal and stupid.

Random quests ala Daggerfall are... well, let me just describe one: "Go brawl this guy into submission. Don't ask why, cuz there's no reason, no story. Just travel halfway across the world (or maybe just walk across the street, cuz it's random), beat the guy up, and come back for your prize." The mechanic might have been cool with complex scripting and interesting scenarios, and it might work better with other types of quests, perhaps... But it seems another half-assed implementation in my experiences so far.

I agree with most of the stuff even tough it does'nt affect how much I enjoy the game, regardless of being a fan of the franchise.

I have grinded Alchemy, enchanting, smithing and conjuration because I have a clear idea of what I want to achieve in end game but I can understand that ''profession'' based skills should be hard to raise because they are not required to successfuly fight your way through the game.

When you finally are able to craft a full set of dragonscale armor with approximately +25% one handed damage on every piece + an additional enchantement on each piece and that you will be able to refine these items with approximately 25-30% increase armor and damage on weapons, plus when you will have potions that increases stamina, health regen, and one hand damage, + potions that increases all your magicka resist and other important perks, you will be invulnerable... Tell me about the grind for these skills :).


So far I compare this to beating the ultimate weapons in FF7 or grinding the gold saucer for omnislash... It is a painful process but the reward deeply affects the mechanic of the game!

Yeah that's really what I wrote in my review above - there's a lot of imbalances due to not enough effort put into crafting.

Pickpocketing, for example, is EXTREMELY unbalanced:

a) you make tons of money this way
b) it's easy to get to 90% chance for just about anything
c) you level REALLY fast - 15-20 levels to get to 100 and in just a few hours
d) it's easy to do too since you just reload when you get caught
e) once you've reached the end, you can just sneak up on any enemy and plant poison on them and steal every weapon or armour they wear.

Heck, I don't mind any of those 5 points since it's a lot of fun, except for how fast it makes your character level + I wish you had to be hidden for it to work. Wasn't it so in Morrowind that you had to be hidden for picking pockets to work? There's no skill involved anymore now.

...
You mean, I didn't have to stay hidden for every attempt and stalk half of the game's cities? Aagh....

BTW, is planting poison useful? How does it work? Didn't take that perk.