AI Bad Shots

[justinchan]

Just had an idea for future iterations of 2K that I haven't seen mentioned yet.

I noticed that on any difficulty level, the AI only: a) passes the ball around until they find somebody wide open b) dribbles around until they magically get past you and fake the sh*t out of you inside c) dribbles around, picks up their dribble and shoots with ~1sec left on the shot clock.

It's as if they WON'T shoot anything that's NOT wide open during their possessions and will only settle for jump shots when there's no time left to pass/dribble around.

My point is, why doesn't the AI ever settle for shots that aren't necessarily perfect but are good enough sometimes? You see certain players shooting early in the clock in real life even when they're not given much space. I think a 'bad shot' logic should be built into the AI. I think this is the main thing that's holding the AI back and makes the AI feel so artificial. There would be more variation and a better flow to the game if the AI took shots/attacked at different times in the clock with different players, while under all sorts of different type of pressure.

It would open the game up so much more, as compared to how clusterf*ck*d and the court gets with 2K12 when the AI refuses to shoot when you play great D on them, and are standing right in front of them for 3 entire seconds, but they pull up and drain a long contested jumper in your grill anyway (I think this is what gives the AI that 'scripted feel'). I guess it would make the game feel less artificial and CPU-like because the computer isn't necessarily ALWAYS looking for the OPTIMAL SHOT every time down the floor like a freaking robot. It's basically why JR Smith just isn't JR Smith in 2K12 for example.

Since there's a metric for Shot Quality built into the game now, perhaps they could just have ranges for the Shot Quality classifications that players tend to go for? For example Kobe might be A+ to D (he'll shoot anything from anywhere) as compared to say Jason Kidd who's old now and will only take wide open shots and might have a range of A+ to C+ for example. It would really help in differentiating stars as well since they will take and make all sorts of crazy shots, but in the flow of the offense. Also, there are 'black hole' type players like Corey Maggette in real life right? That should be captured somehow in 2K as well.

Anyway, I hope my post was comprehensible and I apologize for having to start an entire new thread for a Wishlist idea lol. Let me know what you think.

[Synchromesh]

Re: AI Bad Shots

I thought this thread was going to be a tribute thread to all the terrible shots Allen Iverson took in his career...

[SIZEqueen]

This can be helped a lot by roster edits. Coach profile changes and playbook changes will also make a huge difference.

Not to discredit any roster makers on OS but there is an OS member who goes by youALREADYknow (I'm almost positive that's how he spells it) and not unlike Tomba in years past he has some amazing edits. I've been doing huge edits based on a lot of what I've read in some threads and the difference is night and day.

Seriously dude, look up his posts on roster and playbook edits and you will think you're playing an entirely different game.

[TeddyKGB]

Re: AI Bad Shots

All you have to do is play against the cpu in Scrimmage mode to see the faults of the way the cpu offense is designed.

In Scrimmage mode, where there is no shot clock, the cpu will sometimes take up to TWO MINUTES to take a shot if you defend well. This is the problem with cpu's offensive logic. This is why you see so many last-second takes and makes against the shot clock in normal games. They are waaay too fussy (mechanical) about their shot selection and because of this, they run the shot clock down all the time and take a shot of lesser quality than could have been taken earlier in the possession. And the worst thing is, an artificial bump to the makeability of these shots is given to the cpu simply because they find themselves up against an expiring shot clock so often, and if they didn't score some of these buckets, it'd be a blowout every game.

[justinchan]

Re: AI Bad Shots

All you have to do is play against the cpu in Scrimmage mode to see the faults of the way the cpu offense is designed.

In Scrimmage mode, where there is no shot clock, the cpu will sometimes take up to TWO MINUTES to take a shot if you defend well. This is the problem with cpu's offensive logic. This is why you see so many last-second takes and makes against the shot clock in normal games. They are waaay too fussy (mechanical) about their shot selection and because of this, they run the shot clock down all the time and take a shot of lesser quality than could have been taken earlier in the possession. And the worst thing is, an artificial bump to the makeability of these shots is given to the cpu simply because they find themselves up against an expiring shot clock so often, and if they didn't score some of these buckets, it'd be a blowout every game.

THIS!!! Makes the game feel super cheap sometimes IMO. Can get ridiculous when you play good D and not jump on all of the AI's pump fakes and step throughs, only for them to make an awkward, artificial-looking shot over 2 or 3 defenders because they were forced to shoot with time running down - somehow, it seems like the CPU already pre-ordained that the shot should go in long before the shot is taken, regardless of the circumstances surrounding the possession. Especially on HoF, sometimes your only hope is to force a turnover or to block a shot.

As for roster edits - thanks for the suggestion, I will check them out. Just saying these things should ideally be good to go straight out of the box for future iterations.

[Slava Medvadenko]

Re: AI Bad Shots

...it seems like the CPU already pre-ordained that the shot should go in long before the shot is taken, regardless of the circumstances surrounding the possession.

Anyone see opponents get out of rebounding position when the shot goes up and just start trotting down the court? When that happens the ball magically goes in. They know whats up.