Patrol by a specific character?

[Ultimo]

So, I wanted to have an NPC hero patrolling in a zone in a mission I'm working on, but I'm having some difficulty figuring out how to make it happen.  My current method was to make him an Ally, with no guards (ie. I set it to "empty"), but despite setting it to empty, there are always guards, and he won't actually start patrolling until I go free him.

 

Is there a way to get him to patrol without my needing to free him first?

[cranebump]

Bad news. You can't set an ally to patrol. They'll remain there until freed, then they'll obey the command given them when freed (Follow, Do nothing, Run away, Run to nearest door, etc.).

 

As far as actual patrols go, you can only assign enemy groups to patrol, and the patrol will only spawn as members of the group. There is no single patrol member, afaik. I suppose you could try to create a patrol featuring something like an EB or higher, and hope it spawns a single member. But there's no guarantees. Best bet is to maintain the single ally spawn, have them announce they're remaining where they are to "patrol the area" (then use release command=Do nothing). It's either that, or have them spawn close to a door, and, then freed, they can say, I'll check out (insert area A here)., while you (insert area B here)! Then give them the Run _____________ text. They'll then run off somewhere, at least. Assuming they don't glitch and follow you everywhere (because that sh*t happens, man).:-)

[Ultimo]

I decided just to remove the character as an ally and made a patrol of heroes.  It sends out three elite bosses as the patrol, which is more than I really wanted, and selects them randomly, but the first mission is SUPPOSED to be easy, so it kind of doesn't matter.  The ally is really just there as window dressing.

[Ankylosaur]

There is a way to have an ally without guards - but he will not patrol. You can kind of do the reverse though.

• Set the ally AND the map to empty for him to spawn without guards.
  • Alternatively he could just be a friendly boss also set to empty if you don't want him to interact with the character.
  • You can manually populate the map with enemy bosses, patrols, defendable objects, etc
• If you populate with patrols, because he is already free (as he has no guards) I believe he will fight the patrols that stumble upon him.

 

I think that will work anyway - and may be the best you can do I think.

Edited December 1, 2023 by Ankylosaur