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Rephath
January 24th, 2013, 02:16
So, I beat DK2. But I've been having an issue, and I was wondering why I was and how I solve it. My creatures are perpetually whining that they haven't been paid or are hungry, despite it being almost impossible to go more than 15 squares in any direction without hitting a hatchery or a treasury with money in it in my dungeon. Sometimes they're tiny one or two square deals, and sometimes I make bigger areas. This always happens later in the game too, when I've got several dozen monsters in my dungeons from portals, conversion, necromancy, etc...

So, is this my fault for poor dungeon design? Were the game programmers stupid? Is there a glitch somewhere in the process? Do the gods hate me specifically? What kind of dungeon design/patch/dark ritual would best circumvent this?

Metal Gear Rex
January 24th, 2013, 02:29
So, I beat DK2. But I've been having an issue, and I was wondering why I was and how I solve it. My creatures are perpetually whining that they haven't been paid or are hungry, despite it being almost impossible to go more than 15 squares in any direction without hitting a hatchery or a treasury with money in it in my dungeon. Sometimes they're tiny one or two square deals, and sometimes I make bigger areas. This always happens later in the game too, when I've got several dozen monsters in my dungeons from portals, conversion, necromancy, etc...

So, is this my fault for poor dungeon design? Were the game programmers stupid? Is there a glitch somewhere in the process? Do the gods hate me specifically? What kind of dungeon design/patch/dark ritual would best circumvent this?

Simple Answer: Bad AI.

Detailed Answer: The AI has a poor selection of priorities, and on top of that, once the creature gets hungry/whatever, it subtracts from their mood no matter what task they're doing. They could be trying to go to bed because they hit the max Time Awake for themselves, then become Unhappy due to a lack of Pay. The game also handles Unhappy and Angry Creatures poorly as well. An Unhappy/Angry Creature will often prioritize sulking/leaving respectively rather than making themselves happy by getting what they want, due to their Unhappy/Anger Job.

Additionally, when Unhappy/Angry, sometimes/often they will ignore the stun from a drop. This has problems on its own as the Creature AI only registers being dropped in a room once it gets up from a stun. (This also can be abused with lightning to imprison a Lord, Stone Knight, Skeleton, etc which are all normally uncapturable) As a result, if you have an Unhappy creature and if you try to drop them in a Treasury to pay them, they will still leave immediately to go sulk because they haven't been paid. You'll have to drop them multiple times to get around that.

In Short: DKII is retarded.

Rephath
January 24th, 2013, 02:50
I should probably take that account in Northland Iceland RP. Have one of my characters sitting in a hatchery whining about how hungry he is and trying to figure out what he should do about that.

I like DK2 better than DK1, in no small part because I can't get the sound not to suck on DK1. But I do feel like a babysitter in DK2. "A creature is angry because it hasn't been paid." "Where is it?" "The treasury, sulking."

"One of your diabolically evil killing machines is unhappy because it is in the company of creatures it does not like."

Metal Gear Rex
January 24th, 2013, 03:09
I should probably take that account in Northland Iceland RP. Have one of my characters sitting in a hatchery whining about how hungry he is and trying to figure out what he should do about that.

I hope you're joking about that, because I really can't tell. Tesonu will slap that creature upside the face for being retarded, like he did to Ortype.


I like DK2 better than DK1, in no small part because I can't get the sound not to suck on DK1. But I do feel like a babysitter in DK2. "A creature is angry because it hasn't been paid." "Where is it?" "The treasury, sulking."

Yeah, that is one of my problems with the game.

In my patch, I'm trying to fix stuff related to the moods as best I can, by using somewhat smaller values than before. I also take in consideration creature speed, so if a creature is slow, they will get less annoyance points for no Lair/Food/Pay compared to normal. No Pay annoyance points are also much lower than before. The Hungry Rate and Time Awake values have also been increased, so it's less likely for them to collide together like that. Hopefully that will solve the issue or at least help it considerably.

Rephath
January 24th, 2013, 06:42
What, you don't like rogues doing stupid stuff in your dungeon just to be annoying? Well, that turns everything I learned about you on its head.

Pelley
April 9th, 2015, 00:34
Simple Answer: Bad AI.

Detailed Answer: The AI has a poor selection of priorities, and on top of that, once the creature gets hungry/whatever, it subtracts from their mood no matter what task they're doing. They could be trying to go to bed because they hit the max Time Awake for themselves, then become Unhappy due to a lack of Pay. The game also handles Unhappy and Angry Creatures poorly as well. An Unhappy/Angry Creature will often prioritize sulking/leaving respectively rather than making themselves happy by getting what they want, due to their Unhappy/Anger Job.

Additionally, when Unhappy/Angry, sometimes/often they will ignore the stun from a drop. This has problems on its own as the Creature AI only registers being dropped in a room once it gets up from a stun. (This also can be abused with lightning to imprison a Lord, Stone Knight, Skeleton, etc which are all normally uncapturable) As a result, if you have an Unhappy creature and if you try to drop them in a Treasury to pay them, they will still leave immediately to go sulk because they haven't been paid. You'll have to drop them multiple times to get around that.

In Short: DKII is retarded.

This is an old post but I found that if a creature is leaving after being pissed off about something, I just drop a bag of gold on him which turns him into "celebrating". He still has the arrow showing he's leaving but does not leave the dungeon. I find I have to baby sit Bile Demons, Giants and Knights consistently. They will stand in the room mad because they can't acquire the items in the room they are standing in. Once I don't need manufacturing anymore I just let them leave or sacrifice them just so I don't have to hear about them anymore. Besides all they do is clog up the door ways keeping more useful creatures from advancing.

Metal Gear Rex
April 9th, 2015, 00:39
This is an old post but I found that if a creature is leaving after being pissed off about something, I just drop a bag of gold on him which turns him into "celebrating". He still has the arrow showing he's leaving but does not leave the dungeon. I find I have to baby sit Bile Demons, Giants and Knights consistently. They will stand in the room mad because they can't acquire the items in the room they are standing in. Once I don't need manufacturing anymore I just let them leave or sacrifice them just so I don't have to hear about them anymore. Besides all they do is clog up the door ways keeping more useful creatures from advancing.

Yeah there are a lot of ways to exploit the AI. Lot of the more experienced players know of these things.

Skarok
April 9th, 2015, 00:40
Well, this should do the exact same thing as casting CTA does. If the creature has already the "leaving" icon" over its head but if forced to stay due to these interruptions, they will stay in your dungeon but will not fight the enemy anymore and they also won't be attacked. They basically are nothing but something to clog up your creature maximum at that point. It is indeed better to just kill/sack/sacrifice them at that point.