PC Is there a reason behind Zombie digging & Matrix-esque abilities?

Ramethzer0 said:
I'll need some sort of proof other than because you say so, because it happens way to often to be explained away so simply.
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You're asking people to prove a negative; which is pretty difficult, could be called impossible for the general case. On the other hand, you can prove your side of it by getting a zombie to dodge you on a flat, obstacle-free area. You know, a single clip from a youtuber would basically suffice.

While I'm not able to provide you with proof of the opposite; I'll add my voice to the other side. I haven't seen a zed dodge a swing intentionally, just by happenstance timing with their weird WIP animations.

 
Roland said:
The most recent bug with the arrow slits was fixed in a matter of hours if not minutes.
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Given that it's been a thing since at least A17, I find referring to it as "the most recent bug" kind of disingenuous.  And the idea that fixing it was a matter of hours makes it seem kind of strange that it wasn't fixed ages ago.

Anyway, my only real gripes with the zombie ducking thing is that cops seems to be able to stand up and vomit, clipping through blocks, while crawling and that it's not a smooth transition from standing to crawling.  It's super annoying when a zombie instantly transitions from standing to crawling mid-swing and you miss because of their super speed.

 
Vaeliorin said:
Anyway, my only real gripes with the zombie ducking thing is that cops seems to be able to stand up and vomit, clipping through blocks, while crawling and that it's not a smooth transition from standing to crawling.  It's super annoying when a zombie instantly transitions from standing to crawling mid-swing and you miss because of their super speed.
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That's because they haven't gotten the proper animations for it yet.  Faatal mentioned that he has to use what they have at the time for this feature.  Proper animations are being worked on. 

 
BFT2020 said:
That's because they haven't gotten the proper animations for it yet.  Faatal mentioned that he has to use what they have at the time for this feature.  Proper animations are being worked on. 
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Seems like they should have finished the animations before putting it in the game, then.  It's not a huge deal, admittedly, just super annoying when I get hit because they ducked mid swing and hit me before I can swing again.

 
Vaeliorin said:
Seems like they should have finished the animations before putting it in the game, then.  It's not a huge deal, admittedly, just super annoying when I get hit because they ducked mid swing and hit me before I can swing again.
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It's part of being in development.  Sometimes you have all the gears ready and sometimes you don't.  In this case, putting it in prior to having the animations finished allowed them to evaluate the AI changes that faatal has been working on.  With it being live, faatal can get feedback on what works and what doesn't, and continue improving the system while the other parts of the changes (i.e. animations) are still being worked on.

This is actually a fairly common practice when developing new things.

 
Vaeliorin said:
Given that it's been a thing since at least A17, I find referring to it as "the most recent bug" kind of disingenuous.  And the idea that fixing it was a matter of hours makes it seem kind of strange that it wasn't fixed ages ago.
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Sorry. In my head I meant the most recently fixed bug involving blocks and zombie pathing. I wasn't trying to con people into thinking that the arrow slits problem was just a recent development. It has been around for awhile somewhere in the list of priorities to fix and very recently it was fixed and it didn't take long to do it. 

The devs have a whole smorgasbord of bugs and optimizations and changes they are working on and they choose what order they pull from the list whether or not that order makes sense to you or me. It actually shows that since the blocks have been exploited since A17 as you say, the devs obviously aren't foaming at the mouth to stop players from doing their strategies as some around here speculate. They knew about the blocks and put a pin in it for when they eventually were ready to fix it and they didn't care that players worked the bug into their horde night strategies.

Actually, I wonder if they broke again somehow because I seem to remember them fixing the arrow slit blocks at the same time they fixed the steep slope bug. I could be remembering wrong though.

Vaeliorin said:
Seems like they should have finished the animations before putting it in the game, then.  It's not a huge deal, admittedly, just super annoying when I get hit because they ducked mid swing and hit me before I can swing again.
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You may be standing too close to them for melee. I see people all the time standing way closer to zombies than they need to when doing melee combat.  You can really notice the distance at which you can stand by placing a block in a doorway to keep the zombies at a distance and then hitting them from afar. This was the same problem years back when people died while chopping trees back when a falling tree could kill you. They all stood super close to the trees while chopping.

Hope that doesn't come across as condescending-- just something that occurred to me. If you are already aware of the outer limits of melee combat range, forgive me, and maybe this will help someone else reading who needed the tip. :)

 
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Roland said:
You may be standing too close to them for melee. I see people all the time standing way closer to zombies than they need to when doing melee combat.  You can really notice the distance at which you can stand by placing a block in a doorway to keep the zombies at a distance and then hitting them from afar. This was the same problem years back when people died while chopping trees back when a falling tree could kill you. They all stood super close to the trees while chopping.

Hope that doesn't come across as condescending-- just something that occurred to me. If you are already aware of the outer limits of melee combat range, forgive me, and maybe this will help someone else reading who needed the tip. :)
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I mostly encounter it in POIs, not while outside, so it's not necessarily my choice that I'm standing so close to the zombies.  :)

Honestly, it mostly bothers me when they do it when there's not really anything nearby that makes it seem like they'd need to...it is almost like they're dodging (though I realize they're not.) 

 
theFlu said:
You're asking people to prove a negative; which is pretty difficult, could be called impossible for the general case. On the other hand, you can prove your side of it by getting a zombie to dodge you on a flat, obstacle-free area. You know, a single clip from a youtuber would basically suffice.

While I'm not able to provide you with proof of the opposite; I'll add my voice to the other side. I haven't seen a zed dodge a swing intentionally, just by happenstance timing with their weird WIP animations.
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Playing with my MP today.  Zombie fell out of a roof tile and landed right in front of me, and dodged my shotgun right away.  Is this what you mean with the animations?

 
Ramethzer0 said:
Zombie fell out of a roof tile and landed right in front of me, and dodged my shotgun right away.  Is this what you mean with the animations?
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Probably; sometimes when they get up after a fall they get confused on tables and such, causing them to crawl for a bit. I wasn't there thou, hard to say for sure.. :)

 
Ramethzer0 said:
Playing with my MP today.  Zombie fell out of a roof tile and landed right in front of me, and dodged my shotgun right away.  Is this what you mean with the animations?
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They have a variety of "landing" animations which are chosen at random. Sometimes they can land standing up, sometimes they stumble for a couple of steps, sometimes they fall flat on their butts. That random behavior was added in A19. But they don't "dodge" in the way you suggest. That is, the game doesn't start an animation on them at the moment you attack for the purpose of dodging damage.

Here is, I think, the relevant code for a melee swing. There is nothing in here which calls the zombie entity controller or animator. It just calculates the swing arc and applies damage if there is a hit. The AI/animator is doing its thing in the meantime, and a random animation might mess up your hit, for sure.

Physics.SphereCast(new Ray(new Vector3(this.m_Controller.Transform.position.x, this.m_Camera.Transform.position.y, this.m_Controller.Transform.position.z),

this.m_Camera.Transform.forward), this.DamageRadius, out hitInfo, this.DamageRange, -538750981);
        if ((Object) hitInfo.collider != (Object) null)
        {
          this.SpawnImpactFX(hitInfo);
          this.ApplyDamage(hitInfo);
          this.ApplyRecoil();
        }
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I definitely agree that the movements tend to be pretty janky and inconsistent at times, definitely far from realistic.  I've had zombies get knocked down, hit once while down and instantly be back on their feet hitting you after contact.   Other times they "incorrectly" think they need to crouch and go on all 4s instantly like they're playing football... then instantly (<1 sec) be back on their feet running.  (Which I'll admit is pretty terrifying when you see it, disregarding how fast they are on all 4s vs. on foot.)

I kind of wish there was a more consistent transition time between laying/standing/sitting/crouching across all animations.  It's definitely frustrating since it usually just results in you taking more damage or wasting stamina.

And that doesn't even cover how bouncy they are when attacking walls.  Bears move like they're in a strobe light and having seizures, which is frustrating since they're spinning/moving so fast despite their size and running/attacking into walls.

 
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IMHO, Good game dev. philosophy  gives players options and not limitations on how a player can play in the sandbox.

 
I remember back in the day the zombies were so predictable you could use a bow with stone arrows, and headshot everything on every shot.  It was pretty boring and frankly with the bow and arrow you were more lethal with than a lot of other weapons.  So they got jiggly lol and now they seem to dodge right when I shoot lol but I know it's just bad timing.

 
theFlu said:
You're asking people to prove a negative; which is pretty difficult, could be called impossible for the general case. On the other hand, you can prove your side of it by getting a zombie to dodge you on a flat, obstacle-free area. You know, a single clip from a youtuber would basically suffice.

While I'm not able to provide you with proof of the opposite; I'll add my voice to the other side. I haven't seen a zed dodge a swing intentionally, just by happenstance timing with their weird WIP animations.
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I'm watching this very closely now.  So far, they do in fact dodge me still - but there's always something like an obstacle involved, and those obstacles don't always do anything to really impact the combat.   But I can say I've seen first hand that its not always about squeezing through tight spaces.

 
Ramethzer0 said:
I'm watching this very closely now.  So far, they do in fact dodge me still - but there's always something like an obstacle involved, and those obstacles don't always do anything to really impact the combat.   But I can say I've seen first hand that its not always about squeezing through tight spaces.
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Excellent, embrace the dark side. Our perception colors our reality, once you get cynical enough, you'll see they're not dodging, just buggy AF... we do have cookies, but they're also just deadly, sugar and such .. :)

 
Ramethzer0 said:
I'm watching this very closely now.  So far, they do in fact dodge me still - but there's always something like an obstacle involved, and those obstacles don't always do anything to really impact the combat.   But I can say I've seen first hand that its not always about squeezing through tight spaces.
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Avoiding an obstacle IS avoiding a tight space and no, they are not dodging you. They are dodging blocks, be it building blocks or trash.

 
JCrook1028 said:
Avoiding an obstacle IS avoiding a tight space and no, they are not dodging you. They are dodging blocks, be it building blocks or trash.
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Fast Forward to 10:50 and watch this fight closely.  It is a tight space, but I am still not entirely convinced yet.

 
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