NPCs need to get their shit straight

AI controlled allies has always been a funky thing to mess with. From a game-design perspective you do not want the computer AI to outshine the player and complete stuff for them, nor do you want them to be potato bag that does nothing. A large portion of maybe 30 years have been dedicated to finding that perfect balance and trying to make them someone you'd feel compassion over and a suitable ally but not something that can literally win the game for you. This is especially true in an MMO since you want your players to choose to interact with a human over the computer counter-part.

I'm bringing this up because the AIs in Phantasy Star are beyond atrocious, most of the cast are literally unplayable (mainly the rangers) and don't seem to upgrade their gear as you level up. This becomes incredibly obvious when you have Afin on your team and he hits for 2-6 damage max when you're hitting 100-500 damage and I'm only level 16 and I imagine this will get worse as time goes on. The other issue is they just seem to be complete douchebags in programming who won't do much unless they feel like it and just have a habit of running off and running back when it's convenient or doing things the classes shouldn't do. Like Maloo stops being adorable when she runs in to start hitting the enemy when she clearly has a full PP bar or will stare at me blankly when I am burning to death and won't heal until she gets a tiny scrape and only if I'm out of healing range. Or just (here we go again) Afin who just doesn't do anything.

Afin thank the lord you're here, I've been trying to hack into this mainframe and I need you to distract the enemies so they don't kill me while I finish. 

Afin? I thought you were getting my back I almost died, where are y-

Afin what are you doing... "lol just chilling."

Like how am I supposed to deal with that, I guess it's understandable they weren't the most intelligent after all this is an MMO, you're not supposed to just play with AI you should be building parties with players. My biggest issue is that there are missions that goes against this whole mindset and forces this AI partners on you, there are missions where you are forced to only have that one AI in your party and no one else. Even worse there are EMERGENCY: CODES that require you to protect an AI who is more then willing to 10/10 nose-dive into burning lava. I have yet to venture through many story related missions but I'm pretty sure AI is going to show up sooner or later and if the old quests from PSO are any indicator then I'm expecting a nightmare of a time.

For the most part this was just a rant that came up trying to deal with Afin's garbage in the 遺棄された惑星 quest. I really think the AI needs a complete overhaul, I don't want them to be good but at least competent.