The AI fill in for missing human players is something AH should look into IMO
Eagler
It will be interesting to see how it works out. I will reserve judgment until I’ve had a chance to play it.
Currently when you log into a server it can be configured in two ways, if there are not enough players they can either prevent the game from starting until more players join (which is kind of annoying for someone who only has a limited amount of time to play); or allow the game to start immediately with insufficient number of players and then it becomes a jogging simulator as you run and run and run and run around looking for someone in an empty map. Kind of like flying around on auto pilot looking for a fight.
The new design will be to start the game immediately and backfill with AI players until a sufficient number of human players arrive at which point the AI are replaced by human players. That way someone could just at least spawn and run around and kill AI while they’re waiting for people. The alternative is to sit in the lobby waiting to be allowed to play or running around a deserted arena killing time shooting at lamp posts and truck tires.
Personally I suspect the AI players will be the better trade-off until live players arrive. However, I assume that will be a server configuration, so I assume they will be custom servers that I have that disabled. The people that prefer holding in the lobby waiting for more players, or running around an empty world shooting at rocks on the ground can find a server to accommodate them.
No doubt, A server fully populated by humans is far superior. Until that number of players show up, I prefer to at least be allowed to start and shoot up some AI rather than sit in the lobby blocked from playing, or spawn into an empty ghost town and run around with nothing to do. To each their own.
