Oolite Bulletins

I'm reluctant to post this as a bug but I just got attacked by a Mamba, but it didn't fire at me. I prodded at it with my laser for several minutes. I even set my ship to a complete stop, it could have easily attack me, instead it would just fly at me, turn around and fly away, then return to attack me if I fired my laser, but never once did it fire a laser.

Is it possible that ships can be spawned without lasers, or front lasers at least (I don't know how the AI handles multiple laser placements)? Or was this just the most pathetic pirate I've even seen in my life?

Sometimes, if you come to a dead stop, a bandit will not attack… it’ll just fly around you a bit, zoom off and come back again.
Even when prodded, occasionly it won’t fire until you start to move at it.

I’ve never come across one without a laser, though... maybe it was just being 'flash'... did you let it go?

Of course not! I blew that pathetic little excuse for a pirate from here to kingdom come! Naturally, I killed it slowly though. I little it whimper around a little, sparks a-flying, before I erased it from the Galcop databanks.

This odd behaviour has indeed been noticed by us dev types some time ago, and in trunk npcs should now attack you mercilessly if you're standing still, as opposed to giving you a break...

Kaks wrote:

in trunk npcs should now attack you mercilessly if you're standing still, as opposed to giving you a break...

Good... although it was handy for taking screenshots.

Very odd. I fight being stopped most of the time, and I never noticed a lack of attacks by the NPCs. Distance may play a role, though.

I often fight when stopped as well, but only if there are plenty of bandits.
The odd behaviour only seems to occur with a lone bandit, and if hostilities have not yet begun.

El Viejo wrote:

I often fight when stopped as well, but only if there are plenty of bandits.
The odd behaviour only seems to occur with a lone bandit, and if hostilities have not yet begun.

Assassin spoiler alert:


Playing through the assassin missions I've noticed a number of times (crazy 88, cat sisters) that standing still or even flying very slowly mostly keeps them occupied flying towards you and going away again. Only sometimes when they come towards you do they fire and only sometimes when they fire do they hit... They behave even worse when you have a cloaking device and use it: they just stop and let you fire a full round at them. They only start moving again when you either decloak or when they get low on energy.