Zombies are acting a little strange

i know they like to beat up on "loud" things like if you chop a tree mostly down a zombie might choose to attack the tree instead of you when it gets in range if you arent making noise. i just shrug it off as their eyeballs being goop at this point and them being on auto-pilot with how they interact with the world
 
murky water said:
i know they like to beat up on "loud" things like if you chop a tree mostly down a zombie might choose to attack the tree instead of you when it gets in range if you arent making noise.
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"loud" things, sound sources.. I don't think that's a thing. They'll attack a block that's in their way or a random block nearby if they can't find a path to you. But that's about it. The pathfinding loses its marbles quite often, so they'll attack whatever is around; in a forest that's trees .. :)
 
Samcharles said:
I like stand there and watch them attack a tree or post when I'm standing right in front of them.
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Had one last night walking next to a semi-truck, instead of turning left and walking towards me, it turned right and started smacking a streetlight for no reason lol got a good laugh from that one, I watched him for about 3 minutes until I got bored and killed it lol
 
Took a long break (1.4 i think) and when I started up a new world (2.2) this issue was bugging the hell out of me. Roamers would path near a POI i was cleaning out and they'd just start bashing the walls to get in when the front door was open. Wandering around town I would constantly hear zombies smacking blocks in the distance. Zombies in untouched POIs would break through loot and then walls trying to get out. Lumberjacks would randomly break down trees while chasing me. The list goes on.

So, after much searching, I think I've found the root of the issue and a fix for anyone interested. I only discovered it by reversing Purefyre's mod "Brain Dead Zed", so thank you to them. At whichever point the devs reduced "structural engineering zombie AI", they changed the default values to " <property name="AIPathCostScale" value=".15, .4"/> ". What I believe is happening is the pathfinding AI will willingly take less efficient route options the lower this value is, making them "break" the path if blocks are in it. I added one line in an entityclasses.xml mod, " <set xpath="/entity_classes/entity_class[contains(@name, 'zombie')]/property[@name='AIPathCostScale']/@value">0.9,1</set> " and all the issues I had stopped. This does make zeds go back to being structural engineers, but I prefer that to randomly destroying POIs and cars. You can also adjust this value to your liking, even using seperate commands for specific zombies if you want certain types to behave dumber or smarter. (Kool-aid man Hawaiians could be a thing)

Anywho, hope this helps someone.
 
Expendable said:
Roamers would path near a POI i was cleaning out and they'd just start bashing the walls to get in when the front door was open.
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That, in particular, is "good" zombie behavior from my perspective that they've always displayed because something -- a wall, a mannequin, whatever -- was in their way and the shortest distance between two points is a straight line. It's potentially unnerving to be going about your noisy business in a POI knowing that there are roaming zombies trying to get into the building and can potentially sneak up on you. They don't have to come through the door and probably better for that potential unnerving quality that they don't unless they happen to be near an open or closed door.

It was the zombies that strolled right past me to go banging on a light pole or something that I found hilarious. If they were following their noses and wanted to eat your brains, you'd think you'd be the most interesting target in the vacinity. But...no.

That's the behavior that changed between (I think it was) 1.0 and 2.0. There were no obstacles between the player and zombies in the scenarios of which I spoke initially. They just went off and did their own thing. Actually had to bash them in the skull to get their attention at times. I haven't noticed that particular behavior of late, though they will sometimes ignore open doors to bang on the window next to it or something, so maybe that particular issue has been fixed. Your fix might further help curb even more inexplicable zombie behavior.
 
InfiniteWarrior said:
It was the zombies that strolled right past me to go banging on a light pole or something that I found hilarious. If they were following their noses and wanted to eat your brains, you'd think you'd be the most interesting target in the vacinity. But...no.
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For a moment, put yourself in the zombie's shoes. You see someone wearing armor and carrying weapons. That person could be violent and a bit crazy. This is not exactly the kind of person you would ask if you could eat their brain. ;)
 
RipClaw said:
For a moment, put yourself in the zombie's shoes. You see someone wearing armor and carrying weapons. That person could be violent and a bit crazy. This is not exactly the kind of person you would ask if you could eat their brain. ;)
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This assumes Zs are rational. But then again, they do have MiT engineering :). Really I don't mind them occasionally beating the crap out of something else.
 
Consider that Zombie AI pathing doesn’t update continuously, it appears to work on a timer (or multiple timers based on distance or activity?).

This illustrates why zombies sometimes rush past you toward the spot where you were detected, seconds earlier. Once they reach that spot, they may switch into “destroy area” mode, smashing nearby objects until the next pathing cycle recalculates. Along the way, they might even interact with obstacles that line up with the path that was originally calculated when they detected you but don’t make sense for your current position.
 
I also see zombies trend back and forth on a spot of ground and just jump up in the air for no reason, even in this "released" 2.3 build.
 
Ripflex said:
I also see zombies trend back and forth on a spot of ground and just jump up in the air for no reason, even in this "released" 2.3 build.
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NPCs do stuff like that when you're at distance in every game I've ever seen. What else are they supposed to do but play when you're not in their immediate vacinity? It's not quite the same as watching your car fall out of the sky when you call it in Cyberpunk 2077 or maybe a mammoth off in the distance in Skyrim. You're not supposed to see or, at least, pay attention to stuff like that, but it happens and is positively hilarious when it does and you just so happen to be looking in the right direction. The video game magic can only go so far.

It's not a bug, iow. It's a feature.
 
I always thought that zombies jumping in distance were just ones that encounter some small block on the ground and were just trying to get over it.
 
InfiniteWarrior said:
NPCs do stuff like that when you're at distance in every game I've ever seen. What else are they supposed to do but play when you're not in their immediate vacinity?
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I'm not sure what the "back and forth" here means, sounds like 'wandering' which is ofc a feature. But the jumping is buggy, they'll keep jumping in place like it's calisthenics leg day.
 
theFlu said:
I'm not sure what the "back and forth" here means, sounds like 'wandering' which is ofc a feature. But the jumping is buggy, they'll keep jumping in place like it's calisthenics leg day.
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I enjoy it. They probably are just trying to jump over something and eventually do, but it looks like they're off in their own little world just having a little fun.
 
This is so strange. First, you see a lot of the old timers talking about how much better it was when the zombie AI wasn't 'all knowing' and acted more like zombies (alpha 15/16), then you see people wondering why the zombies would be acting 'strangely'. Don't you remember them running in circles for NO reason? Don't you remember how they'd beat on anything just because and run about all willy-nilly so getting a decent shot off was just awful? If they've put even a bit of that back into the zombie AI in preparation for using the current, 'engineering degree' AI for the bandits, then what may we expect the future AI to be like when Bandits are released? Go for it, TPF! Experiment on us with your AI fun! I won't complain, much, and I'm looking forward to what comes.
 
I kinda like it when there's a few brain dead zombies in the crowd.. last week I was gaming with the buddies, we got someone fairly new with us and we were out for a flight- disaster struck when he ran out of gas over a T5 and he totaled the copter in some military installation and needed emergency evac.. So fast forward to the part I break in and it hits the fan-wild-crazy gunfight breaks out Got greenies and orange boys flooding out from ahead of me, big time hangry and coming for my face.. and then like 4 blocks over on my flank, there's a biome feral just slapping on the fence 'cause he head something explode in there.
.. Don't change it. I love it when there's that one special zombie just doing its own thing.
 
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