[General] Melee AI Keeps Moving Toward a Strange Point and Never Stops ( No Trigger )

[nana7mi]

Hi everyone,


I'm working on a custom Warcraft 3 map and encountered a very strange issue with AI-controlled units. I’m not using any custom AI scripts or triggers to control them — just standard melee AI.


Here’s the problem:

• AI units repeatedly try to move toward a specific point on the map.
• That point appears visually reachable — units can walk there, and I’ve tested it by sending units manually with no problem.
• But AI units behave as if they never actually arrive. They keep trying to reach the same spot over and over, ignoring attacks and never stopping — even after reaching the visual destination.
• This isn’t a regular move order — it seems like the AI thinks it’s executing a goal it never completes.
• If I block off that point (e.g., with pathing blockers), the AI units just start bunching up around their base, again trying to go “somewhere” and never stopping.
• There are no hidden units, no regions placed there, and walkable. I’ve tested and ruled out:
  • Triggers (none are affecting AI movement)
  • Invisible or unreachable units
  • Custom AI scripts (none used)

I also tried:

• Sending units there manually — works fine.
• Using triggers to override their orders — also works, but they return to this weird behavior shortly after.
• Starting from a blank map — everything worked fine at first, but the issue came back halfway through building the terrain. I’m not sure exactly what change caused it.
• Once the issue appears, it seems even flattening or reworking the terrain doesn’t fix it — the only way to make it go away is to start a completely new map.

As shown in the screenshot, some footmen keep trying to move toward this one spot. They never stop, and do absolutely nothing else.

Has anyone encountered anything like this?

 

[Gnuoy]

Is that the player's start location? Sometimes they rally at the start location until they pick a new location / if they are able to.

 

[Chaosium]

Units clump up like this at the captain position - a captain is not actually an unit, it's like an invisible rally point where they gather, and you have the attack captain and the defense captain, by default both should be between the gold mine and the town center, sometimes it's near the first building placed in the editor when no TC is available, but yeah to me that sounds like "normal" behavior

When you make AI scripts you can specify the position of these captains so that they gather at positions that make sense to you

 

[nana7mi]

Thank you! I think you might be right — it could indeed be a captain position near the base. But I'm encountering a very tricky issue:


The AI is moving toward a point that has nothing to do with it, as if it's treating it like a “mandatory destination.”

Please see the attached images:

• The yellow-circled units are controlled by a trigger (red in-game).
• The red-circled units are standard melee AI (cyan in-game).

Image 1: The AI’s crypt fiend is walking toward a strange point (marked with a pentagram). Enemy units have noticed it and are moving toward AI, but the AI completely ignores them.
Image 2: The crypt fiend is already under attack but keeps twisting in place at that weird point.
Images 3, 4, 5: The AI hero also heads to that point. In image 4, again a crypt fiend tries to go there too. In image 5, despite many nearby enemies, the AI insists on reaching that spot.
Image 6: In the map editor, this spot has nothing special — no units, triggers, or regions.

After running a number of tests, I’ve found some patterns:

1. This spot is probably not caused by something local to that area — I deleted everything within a 2000 range of the strange point, but the issue persisted. Sometimes, the "target" spot even shifts to another location.
2. My map includes bridges, shallow/deep water, and two types of cliffs. While I suspect those might be related, I’ve never been able to reproduce the issue on a completely fresh map.
3. AMAI also exhibits the same behavior.

 

[UndeadImmortal]

Is that at the center of the map? At (0, 0)?

 

[raypack]

So you're using default melee AI script in a custom map?

 

[nana7mi]

Is that at the center of the map? At (0, 0)?

no, its a simple point, and if I delete or modify some pathing, the point sometimes seems to change — I’ve already seen it appear in three different point with nothing there.

So you're using default melee AI script in a custom map?

Yes, I combine them with some cus unit/tech triggers, they perform pretty well (except the path problem I guess
I like the feel that u can play a multiplayer map by your own, it’s entertaining and relaxing.

 

[raypack]

Well, melee AI should work if the correct conditions are met (as far as I know).
If you've created the map from scratch or altered an already existing melee map a lot, I don't know how much that can impact the AI's behaviour (given that all other conditions are met)

My suggestion is to write scripts for custom maps instead of using melee ones