Pathfinding? Here's one we used earlier . . . BUG
DecrepitDragon
Member Posts: 120
Firstly, Apologies for what may seem to be a re-post of a covered topic. In my defense however, most pathfinding issues I've seen to date are character/monster related, not FoW.
These next two pictures will hopefully explain my issue a little more easily than my words alone. In this first picture, you will see that I have cleared the Fog of War ( henceforth FoW ), in an almost complete map edge circumference, leaving one edge unexplored:-
I'm using this method as an extreme example of those occasions when exploring a map area, that the FoW is just a thin strip, but lengthy, between you and your destination. If you try to move directly to where you wish to be, by clicking beyond the FoW, you should just plunge through the blackness towards the already explored area. In the above example, I have moved from the top to the bottom of the map, and now wish to complete the "square" by simply moving my party directly north. In order to do so swiftly, I click on the destination and . . . .
. . . . I walk back along my previous route.
If I walked the party a single click at a time, incrementally up the side of the screen, everything works ok. But when asked to move to a location on the other side of FoW, the party will instead, walk around the FoW. Admittedly in the shortest possible fashion, but not directly to where I instructed.
I have messed around with the .ini, but neither increasing nor decreasing the search nodes makes any difference. There is also a terrain hugging feature that seems clever, but doesn't really help either.
Any suggestions guys?
These next two pictures will hopefully explain my issue a little more easily than my words alone. In this first picture, you will see that I have cleared the Fog of War ( henceforth FoW ), in an almost complete map edge circumference, leaving one edge unexplored:-
I'm using this method as an extreme example of those occasions when exploring a map area, that the FoW is just a thin strip, but lengthy, between you and your destination. If you try to move directly to where you wish to be, by clicking beyond the FoW, you should just plunge through the blackness towards the already explored area. In the above example, I have moved from the top to the bottom of the map, and now wish to complete the "square" by simply moving my party directly north. In order to do so swiftly, I click on the destination and . . . .
. . . . I walk back along my previous route.
If I walked the party a single click at a time, incrementally up the side of the screen, everything works ok. But when asked to move to a location on the other side of FoW, the party will instead, walk around the FoW. Admittedly in the shortest possible fashion, but not directly to where I instructed.
I have messed around with the .ini, but neither increasing nor decreasing the search nodes makes any difference. There is also a terrain hugging feature that seems clever, but doesn't really help either.
Any suggestions guys?
Post edited by Jalily on
1
Comments
that's all i can say..its doesn't detect any route inside fog of war like RTS genre games
I hope not though.
EDIT - Just to head off mis-understandings, I dont mean to imply that the party should move "under" the fog without revealing it - only that they should take the shortest route to the destination whether or not there is fog in the way.
I noticed the issue as well. With other versions you could click an uncovered area beyond the black and they would walk through the FoW, now they path around it. I agree with you that they should just walk into the FoW.
We are not suggesting clicking a spot in the FoW and have them walk, we're talking about pathing to a previously explored area. In his example, clicking the very top left, they should walk through the FoW along the west wall, but they path to the right to get back.
This brings me to another problem I have, which I've mentioned in another thread, the pathfinding in BG:EE is very erratic. Sometimes the pathing is very good, other times it's very poor. A good example is in the Firewine Dungeon. I've been able to click from one side of the map to the other and have everyone arrive on their dot. Other times they get stuck around only a few corners. I have no idea why it's so spotty. The same thing happens at the Gnoll Stronghold, sometimes they arrive at the bridge from the castle, other times party members take the high road and the low road.
I really hope pathfinding gets looked at because there's something funny going on.
I cant remember where I saw it, but I think I remember seeing @PhillipDaigle mention that they were aware of some "pathing issues" - but being as scatterbrained as I am, the details are sketchy.
EDIT - It could have been @TrentOster though. . . . ( I hope no-one notices the name dropping for attention here . . .)
How would you plan your path through unknown?
What if there is a wall in the fog?
If you don't like the fog of war, just type ExploreArea() after entering an area.
but they said they revamp it. So i assume it work as intended.
Unless they are going to change the algorithm again, or more people requesting it.
For me, it's fine as it is. The only thing that trouble me right now is companions keep blocking one and each other.
They really need to tweak a bit on that part.
The reason I ask is that some of the auto-pause functions would become less effective or used if the pathfinding was meant to be so proscribed. Also, I really feel that the point you make about obstructions is difficult to justify, since manually walking the party through the FoW would still reveal the obstruction in exactly the same way as the "leap-fogging" method that used to occur in the original games.
I certainly agree that not being able to blindly waltz through large sections of fog may be "realistic" in terms of how they might move around the countryside, but that this effect still occurs even if the band of fog is only an inch or two wide on the screen. This becomes less realistic, and more frustrating to have to specifically click to remove a single band of fog that couldn't possibly hide all that much anyway.
@junk11 - At the end of the day, we are really only discussing "ease of use" here. Yes, clicking seventeen times to move my party from point A to point B can be done, and yes its not that much trouble really when I'm exploring anyway. But if I want to go from point A to point B on a mostly explored map area, why should I end up walking around the odd bit of random fog left from my searches?
I have to say guys, I disagree most strongly that this is an intentional action. I for one would like it changed if it is, or repaired if it isn't.
The fog of war is there for a good reason. Type ExploreArea on the map if you don't like it.
Again I ask only so as to be in full grasp of the facts - there's no point arguing about it if thats what the team meant to design ( whether or not I like it that way
Also, I'm beginning to wonder if there has been some tweaking of the pathfinding in the recent update. . .
I've just tried to recreate the thin band fog wall issue, but the pathfinding seems a little more , er, determined, I think is the only way to describe it. Only marginally more successful, but still, more determined. Going back to my first picture above, and from there moving the party manually about a quarter of the way up the screen, I then tried to walk through the rest of the west sides fog, back to the top left corner. Here's how things ended up :-
As you can see, not the same as before. Three members of the party got to the inn at the bottom left, then bounced around off each other, turned around and got as far as the stable in the centre left of the screen.
If you look real close though, you can just make out Monty in the top centre, going the same way as always.
As I said, they seem a little more determined this time around . . .
I must confess that I could live with it either way really. I'm just feeling a bit nostalgic, and the map exploration was always more fun for me if I could just click and watch, not click,click,click,click . . . oooh shiny.
Nice one @Jalily.
Really the pathfinding needs a complete overhaul, as most reviews have pointed out. There's no concept of group movement so NPCs just bump against each other, causing them to re-path constantly, which in turn often causes them to move erratically and inefficiently. Some simple steering/flocking behaviors could be introduced to alleviate this issue.
Whether or not my specific issue could be classed as a bug or not is only one aspect of a more broken whole issue regarding clumsy movement and organisation between party members and NPC's.
So, @Avenger_teambg, all joking aside, even if my issue is "not a bug", I think its fair to say that pathfinding as a whole, still has bugs. I'll agree that its maybe not a priority bug, considering the amount of work it would take to fix, what is after all a largely functional, if clunky, movement system.
There's also a bug where your character is assigned to a spot, then they b-line the other direction, walking through walls and black area's of the map until they arrive at some arbitrary position. If that's not a bug I don't know what is.