An issue with Bosses/EBs/AVs, and allies.

[Ultimo]

So, I've had issues in the past trying to make missions with enemies that are balanced, so I often add allies to missions to help the players if they're being overwhelmed.  However, a problem has emerged, and I have a suggestion to correct it.

 

If I put an enemy in a mission of EB or AV rank, the game will 'downsize' them by one rank, depending on the player's difficulty settings (ie. if the player has so chosen, AVs would appear as AVs, but otherwise they would appear as EBs).  The problem is that the same does not happen with ALLIES.  So, suppose I make a mission with a custom AV, and I add Citadel to the mission.  The AV will spawn as an EB, but Citadel would remain an AV, meaning he'd stomp the supposed AV boss villain with no difficulty (trivializing the presence of the hero).

 

My suggestion is simply that the coding that reduces the power of AVs and EBs be applied to both Enemies and Allies.

[Defeat All Snakes]

Allies absolutely scale down between ranks, I just tested it to be absolutely sure. However, not all AVs are scalable. Some simply don't have an EB version, which seems to be the issue you're running into. See if there are multiple versions of the same AV, one of them might successfully downgrade.

[Ultimo]

5 hours ago, Defeat All Snakes said:

Allies absolutely scale down between ranks, I just tested it to be absolutely sure. However, not all AVs are scalable. Some simply don't have an EB version, which seems to be the issue you're running into. See if there are multiple versions of the same AV, one of them might successfully downgrade.

So there's a whole separate version of the AV?  I thought it just scaled down their abilities.  That would certainly explain why all my custom characters don't scale.

 

In that case, perhaps the best suggestion is to just scale the AVs and EBs back?  I don't relish the idea of making duplicates of all the characters I've made for AE... and they wouldn't appear in the missions properly in any case.

[Ultimo]

Just now, Ultimo said:

So there's a whole separate version of the AV?  I thought it just scaled down their abilities.  That would certainly explain why all my custom characters don't scale.

 

In that case, perhaps the best suggestion is to just scale the AVs and EBs back?  I don't relish the idea of making duplicates of all the characters I've made for AE... and they wouldn't appear in the missions properly in any case.

But wait...  Last night I played my WW2 story on the AE, and the enemy bosses (all custom characters) appeared as Bosses, even though I had created them as Elite Bosses... meanwhile the allied custom characters all appeared as Elite Bosses...

[Jiro Ito]

Snakes is correct.  Specific to your example of Citadel, there are two versions of him available in AE. 

 

 

 

The level 40-54 version of him is available to spawn as an Elite Boss:

 

 

 

But the level 53-53 version only spawns as a Hero (slash-Archvillain).  This is the version from LRSF that is locked at 53.

 

 

 

 

You'll see these multiple versions with all the Phalanx and Arachnos signature characters.

[Ultimo]

Hm.  In that case, what is going on with my custom characters?  As I said, they're all created as Elite Bosses, but they're appearing in missions as Bosses... unless they're cast as allies, in which case they appear as Elite Bosses.

[Ankylosaur]

It may be because you can set your difficulty to face Avs or not. If you choose not to - then it drops them by a difficulty (AVs become EBs, EBs become bosses, Bosses become LTS).

 

Or it could be that they are in a group with no other types to balance them and filling a role as a group, like around a boss or a patrol or guarding an ally. For example if you have a group of only Bosses, I think it will spawn them as a group of LTs if they are a patrol (for example)/

[Ultimo]

19 hours ago, Ankylosaur said:

It may be because you can set your difficulty to face Avs or not. If you choose not to - then it drops them by a difficulty (AVs become EBs, EBs become bosses, Bosses become LTS).

 

Or it could be that they are in a group with no other types to balance them and filling a role as a group, like around a boss or a patrol or guarding an ally. For example if you have a group of only Bosses, I think it will spawn them as a group of LTs if they are a patrol (for example)/

Ya, that's why I'm making this suggestion.  If it's going to drop enemy AVs to make them EBs, etc., then it should also drop ALLIED AVs so they're EBs as well.

 

Having groups of one more serious type hasn't had them appear as anything lower than they would appear on their own.  For example, I have a group of enemies for a WW2 story in which they're all created as EBs.  Whether they appear alone or as a patrol (for example), they appear as Bosses (since I have AVs and EBs turned off in my difficulty settings).  But again, that's my custom characters.  I haven't tried it with the game's own groups (I'm not sure there are any groups that are all AVs or EBs... perhaps the Freedom Phalanx?  I'll have to check that).

[Ankylosaur]

Gotcha. Sorry - missed that. 
 

I thought it did drop allies too but clearly my memory is fuzzy here. 
 

if you make a custom group of Standard AVs it makes them EBs if I recall correctly.