Fight or Flight?

[Carduus]

Okay, this is just silly.

I've now been stalked by at least three different kinds of herbivores after fleeing from combat with them. Being herbivores, I'm having trouble seeing the logic from their side as to why they'd want to finish me off. Besides being ego-deflating, it just sticks wrong in my craw. I could see many herbivores fighting if attacked, but if the attacker leaves, wouldn't they book it out of there, and not follow after him? It seems like the same hunting code used by predators was just pasted in to these creatures, and they just weren't given the auto-attack mobprog.

Am I wrong? If so, what have I left out that makes this make more sense, and gives justification for this coded behavior?

[Anonymous]

Maybe they are omnivores?

Everything in this game is at some stage of thirst, perhaps your blood, not your meat, is what they are after having tasted it.

Maybe they are defending their young?

At least with the way animal NPCs remember attackers now people don't have the chance to saunter in and use bash, sap, backstab or whatever other skill.

Bulls, wild mustangs, deer, moose, elk, elephants, rhinocerous....etc. All will jack your shit up if given the chance and all are herbivores..why would Zalanthas herbivores be any more docile?

just because something attacks you doesnt mean its going to eat you. they might view you as a threat.

my cat attacks me, doesnt mean its going to devour my flesh when Im dead.

Thats all!

[Carduus]

Dead Newbie- Yes, they will mess you up pretty bad. And that explains why, when you attack animals, they don't immediately flee in the middle of battle and stand and fight. I'm actually surprised that Vestrics and the like don't just book it after you hit them once. But for one to actively hunt down a predator goes against logic.

In regards to your list of animals, elephants only attack when you present a threat to their offspring, deer only attack cars that I know of, and bulls tend to work off of trained ferocity and a protective instinct, as do mustangs.

I agree that rhinoceri, moose, and elk seem to not mind beating the crap out of hunters, from what I've read. But there's a limit as to which they'll seek you out- basically, until you're out of sight. So rather than working on a hunting mobprog, why not just have them look in each direction, and if they can't see you, they stop charging? Rather than putting their nose to the ground and sniffing you out even though they can't see you.

Jenred- Does your cat chase you all over the house after you smack it with something hard? It might lash back as an immediate response, but if you hit it in a way that it knows you aren't playing, I'm pretty sure it's not going to keep attacking.

CRW- Those are fair enough points. I suppose that many of the animals involved were grazers, and I haven't known many grazing omnivores. Along with the blood thing, these are two factors that could simply be influenced by the Zalanthan ecosystem. But in regards to the young issue, I'd love to *see* the young or something. Pack mentality and young-defense mentality would be *awesome* things to see in mobprogs. But I never see packs of 'Toks that act like packs, like walking together and stuff. And one would know not to attack certain animals with young, knowing that mentality would kick in.

And I understand the issue about the code favoring the player if the animals *didn't* hunt. I guess I just don't see that as a good justification for irrational behavior. Wouldn't it be better to just craft smarter mobprogs, if there was an option?(And I guess I don't know whether there is an option) Make the animal flee when you came into the room if it was under 50% hp? Have it charge you if you re-entered the room after taking it under 50% hp? I'm not sure. It just seems like there could be a better solution.
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Eep. I'm really not trying to be as whiny as I'm coming off. It's been 5 years since I crafted mobprogs, maybe I could look back into it and offer alternatives rather than bitch and moan here.

[Meep]

my cat attacks me, doesnt mean its going to devour my flesh when Im dead.

You never know.

I was raised on a farm. Herbivores are mean. Deer will fight you, and I have seen them beat the crap of people who approached them, and chase them. There was one horse we had who was constantly trying to kill me. Others were just as bad. Bulls will attack you if the feel like it, not out of some protective instinct. Cows and horses will chase a dog if the dog breaks and runs for quite a distance. I've seen goats attack people (mostly male goats attacking female women) and I could go on and on. As for the vestrics, ever been around fighting roosters, they will fight to the death with larger beasts. Chinese chickens with the floppy feathers that look like hair will chase you until they can no longer see you. Well I guess my point is I have been around animals for years and I do not understand where your idea of them being so passive comes from? Maybe ones that are locked in small cages all day. What my parents always said to me is you never trust an animal.

Also you are complaining that they chase you...they will only chase you if you are in the next room. Get a room buffer between you and you got away and then the NPC critters leave you alone until you come too close. That seems somewhat reasonable. They see you but do not bother to chase you because you are no longer a threat. They see you approaching they come and try and finish you off. They do not actively track you down as do others that do even when you are many rooms away. It seems to me you want the mobs to run away after you discover they are too mean for you.

I am not sure if hippos are omni or herbi, but they are considered very dangerous. Bull elephants have been known to attack without any "young" present. As far as I know anyway.

Overall the reason they chase you is because you pissed them off and despite what you may think an animal can learn to recognize individual people and hate them or if not hate just try and kill them from now on haha.

[HaiWolfe]

While it's true that many herbivores can be quite aggressive, as shown by all those examples people have posted above, I think the main point Carduus is trying to make is that these herbivores would rarely actively hunt down someone a league or more away.  

In-game, the problem crops up with the difference between indoor and outdoor rooms, which can represent anywhere from a couple of feet to a couple of leagues.  I can understand a charging bull chasing someone down a street, but I don't think that same bull is going to (or would even have the physical capacity to) track down someone by their scent or footprints over several miles of wildlands just because they have a vendetta against that person.

Some kind of code that checks whether the herbivore NPC is in an indoor or outdoor room before switching on the stalker script might be a solution to this.  Indoor would include the interior of cities, too.  

Come to think of it, though, there aren't that many situations where you'd be faced with an angry herbivore NPC inside a city, except mounts.  Heh.. it'd be pretty funny to see a pissed-off kank chasing someone down the streets, if that's not something that already can happen code-wise.   :lol:

To sum up, yes, herbivores can be nasty when provoked.  But no, it's unlikely that they would continue to hunt the provoker down if they are more than one outdoor room apart, representing a league or more of distance.

[creeper386]

I can understand a charging bull chasing someone down a street, but I don't think that same bull is going to (or would even have the physical capacity to) track down someone by their scent or footprints over several miles of wildlands just because they have a vendetta against that person.

So, under your opinion, typing flee should get you far enough away that the animal can't do anything? Or flee and then a few directions really quickly?

Now, I see people making similar complaints(Arguements? Shrug) about this type of thing. Both with NPCs and PCs and all sorts of things. Just because you use the flee command doesn't mean that NPC or that PC is sitting there inactively while you get several leagues away or even a few miles away or what not. Either they are chasing you or they aren't. Take that into account. Too often it seems like people think that NPCs or PCs should sit inactive while they run away along long ways.


Creeper who is going to say animals are mean, and deer DO attack people and they are acctually docile, and beleive deer acctually have a human death count per year.

[HaiWolfe]

Just because you use the flee command doesn't mean that NPC or that PC is sitting there inactively while you get several leagues away or even a few miles away or what not. Either they are chasing you or they aren't. Take that into account. Too often it seems like people think that NPCs or PCs should sit inactive while they run away along long ways.

Good point, and one I hadn't thought of.  

It depends on the mentality of the animal giving chase.  Some might be glad just to get you to run away and leave you alone after that, while others will continue to chase you over long distances.  I'm not sure how to work around that with the NPC code... maybe make a percent chance that the NPC will stalk you; higher chance for some and lower chance for others.  Highly territorial carru: 90%.  Skeet: 50%.  Those timid tregils and vestrics: 2%.  Just throwing out some ballpark figures there.

The downside to this is the amount of time it would take to go through all of the herbivore NPCs and setting their percentages, not to mention writing the chance code itself.

[John]

There are some scripts that stop NPCs from tracking you. There are some scripts that make NPCs track you within a given area. There are some scripts that make NPCs act in packs. There are some scripts that make NPCs only eat other things when hungry.

There's a problem with all of these different scripts. Trying to put more then one script together can SOMETIMES have bad side-effects. So AFAIK the Imms are actually working on making animals more realistic, but it's pretty slow going considering all the other things they do, and the bugs that crop up (IIRC they use JavaScript that can be VERY quirky at times, or behave exactly as it's suppose to. It's like an insane NPC ).

ALSO IIRC Sanvean said animals were given stock-skills which cause some of them to have the kick skill when they shouldn't or causes them to hunt when they shouldn't. If you think an NPC has skills they shouldn't then bug it.