Maybe I just never noticed it before but something new happened in my game. FYI: I'm using an unlimited companion mod so that's why I have more companions. Here's what happened.

We were going down some stairs towards some Fiends in a room. The bottom of the stairs had land mines. Boone, Arcade, Raul and ED-E were behind me; we were all in sneak mode. I heard gunfire and then saw the land mines explode before they all ran past me down the stairs. Only Boone and Raul had guns so it had to be either or both of them who shot the land mines. I was surprised because I had never seen a companion do that before to get at an enemy. Has anyone else seen a companion shoot a land mine?Or anything else like it? I still wonder which of them did it.

:fallout:

I've never seen an NPC shoot a landmine on purpose (as far as I could tell). Were the Firends near them? A bullet from Boone or Raul could have hit one from weapon spread type of thing.

No, it was that one building in the ruins where there was a tripwire on the top of the stairs and land mines at the bottom and the doorway was a left turn at the bottom of the stairs. So their perception made them aware of the enemy but they couldn't see or shoot at the enemy until they went to the bottom and entered the doorway. That's why it was so surprising.

And while you're here...thank you again...you know why.

raul has done it for me
i think its a part of his "good shot" role play

I think I know what building you're talking about. Zapp's Neon Lights, inside South Vegas ruins near Vault 3.

There's a Fiend named Duke inside, on top of the stairs guarding the office. The WIki says that he is scripted to shoot at landmines if you come close enough to them. If he can see the landmines at the bottom of your staircase, it is possible he can shoot at those.

It is also possible that the landmines are triggered by the Fiends trying to run upstairs towards you. They're dumb enough to sometimes try to shoot you through the walls, hence the gunfire.

That's the building. I looked at the Wiki and it's possible that's what happened with Duke. Since the companions were behind me and we weren't close enough to active the mines, I couldn't see who did the shooting and after the mines went off, they went down the stairs after the Fiends. It all happened pretty fast so I think I'll load an old save and run it through again, maybe a few times, to see what happens and record it with Fraps so I can tell. I am going to watch for the companions shooting frag mines though to see if it ever happens. I wish they would do that instead of stepping on them. Thanks all.

:fallout:

Thank you for the move to Spoilers, mod.

Zapp's Neon Signs had more frag mines and traps than I even knew. I did the run-through again a few times and left my companions outside the first time. I disabled the tripwire and frag bouquet and was sneaking down the stairs when I saw the frag mines and extinguisher at the bottom being shot at from the basemant room. When I ran it again, of course, the companions just run right over the frag mines...wish they wouldn't do that.

It got me to thinking about how that's how war really is. There's so much confusion, like Manny Vargas said, you're lucky you don't shoot your own guy.

Thank you again for helping me with this one.

Well, I don't know if he was being tactical or nutty-AI buggy, but Boone at least looked like he was using tactics yesterday. I don't know if they were the best tactics, but it was kinda funny.

Scenario: I had Boone on melee-setting (not ranged)...after he lobbed a few grenades at a lakelurk by a pier he crouched & waited for the lakelurk's buddies. As they get closer, Boone runs away from/behind me, rounds a wall and crouches behind it, as if he's luring the enemy to a better point. When the 1st lakelurk gets close, Boone dashes out and beats him up. It's not in my very short vid, but he repeated the 'strategy' by hiding behind a truck and coming out again. He was also, when I had him on ranged, almost intelligently switching between his service rifle and Pushy (would switch to Pushy when they got close and back to rifle if they backed up again) in what seemed a much more purposeful fashion than the usual twitchy-switch they sometimes do.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-Utjj6yfKY4

It does make you wonder what the script in the AI actually calls for, tho. I know how they behave in ranged, but companion-melee habits seems very strange/inconsistent in my game. Still seems like if they have a melee weapon that far outshines their ranged weapon, they'll do that switching thing a lot more often. And perhaps vice versa.

Veronica would switch between Pushy and Q-35 when I had her on melee mode. She'd start with Q-35 until they got close and then beat them to death with Pushy. I also liked how she would crouch and use cover.

That was completely tactical. It's like he's learning... Watch out for SkyNet.

The strange thing for me is Boone, when in melee mode, never switches to a ranged weapon. If I give him grenades, he'll use those, but he won't equip a rifle. And if I have him on ranged mode, once I give him a powerful rifle/gun, he won't use a melee weapon very often at all (vs. when he has a weaker rifle). He'll do that equip shuffle, where when he detects an enemy he may start out holding the melee weapon for 1 second but then switches to rifle every time.

Arcade very occasionally switches between pistol & rifle (if you give him both) as range may dictate. It just seems to make no consistent sense tho.

LC- You gave Boone Pushy??? Wouldn't be be better off with Knock Knock?

Yes, he'd be more accurate/powerful with Melee weapon vs. Unarmed. But in general he does just fine with it - cleared out Vault-11 by himself at lvl 7-8 or some such, way back when. Besides, it's what I had. Pushy's so easy to get even at clvl 1 or 2 + I find the knock back animation amusing.