Wolves, still kinda borked.

[azuratte]

* Reduced the Wolf population along Coastal Highway. In general, areas with a high concentration of Supplies are balanced to present more of a risk to players.

This was a note out of the latest patch. Not sure if this makes sense, I don't see why wolves would be hanging around high "supplies" areas. Why the hell would a wolf be chilling around a bunch of socks and pants? Even if it was the weird world of after a massive disaster pants wouldn't be high on a wolves desire list.

Now, it does make sense if they're around the deer and bunny locations. Maybe by a stretch, places with a lot of bagged food.

Although, totally happy with the reduced wolf situation.

Az

[JErosion]

Im okay with the wolf population around the Coastal Town although it would make more sense if there were bodies of the former residents littering the streets. Although I have to say i keep getting in situations were Wolves are following me forever and or not caring about the flare Im waving around

[kbrownridge]

I've been trapped in various houses near the Quonset on far too many occasions.

Open door - killed by wolf.

LOAD

Open other door - killed by wolf.

LOAD

Wait an hour open door - run like hell - killed by wolf.

[ianwrecked]

Agreed. I was playing this game almost every weeknight. The new environment is outstanding, but the wolves are too much. There's not a single place in the world where wolves are that abundant. I'll be putting the game down for quite some time.

[Robin]

One of the nice things in this latest release is your ability to use weapons against the wolves. Just spam your right mouse button to stab, hack, or bonk them with your pry bar. Even just using your fists, the wolves will run away crying. Just remember to apply your bandage right away and antiseptic at some point! Give it a try, I think you'll have fun with it and maybe feel a bit sorry for the poor critters. : )

[EternityTide]

I have no mercy for wolves. If only there was a wolf hunter achievement. In one game, I bagged 11 individual wolves on the mystery lake map, 1 I killed bare handed, the others I killed with a rifle.

The bastards will have more from me yet.

[azuratte]

Yes, I do love the update, don't get me wrong. But I believe that if wolves are going to be the balancing of risk/reward. Wolves have to add more randoms in them.

Body locations.

I would say, have them pre-occupied with bodies frozen to the ground when you approach. Then, have randomize if they will closely guard their meal, decide to go for you or just run off. This would be a must if a person were to have them be in body loot locations.

House locations.

Have them preoccupied with digging at foundations, guarding the SINGLE house, make them chase you off, or again go after you.

Animal locations.

Simple guard behaviour, or chase. But in this case I would say add an ignore behaviour, the easier meal of a deer or bunny the wolf knows is easy would be much more appealing no matter what state a human would be in. Assuming these wolves are no longer accustomed to humans, up to the devs on that one.

Guarding has two options a dog will most notably do. Some will attempt to chase you off but others will very locally guard their kill/find. By this I mean physically stay over it and go vicious as possible chase away opponents.

I would say these would sadly become mandatory if the wolves are going to be a bigger picture in risk/reward. Simply because the rest of the game is going rather in depth on survival but a now growing wolf concern is staying very very simplified. I believe if this level was added to the wolves, wolf interactions would less become an... SON OF A BIT... occasion and more of a, I TOTALLY READ THAT RIGHT... occasion.

By that I mean, yes you attempted to get the jerky off the body but by reading the wolf (even simple animations and sounds) you realized the situation was going to be out of your ability. And walked away to fight it later.

At this time it's more like... RAAAAAAAAAAWWWWWWW... THWAK... AAArrrrrrgh.... Cough.... sooo much bloood... no one makes me bleed my own blood! Damn, out of bandages. Main menu.

Thanks for reading,

Az

(Impressions on how to implement. BODY GUARDING, digging animation, growling snorting and chewing with little success. DIGGING, simple digging animation repeated at random on a path around the house. GUARDING, simple sniffing and growling sounds while following a simple preset path around the house and snap to heightmap. CHASE OFF, animation and growling already implemented but with a much shorter follow range followed by a signal howl or snort/pant. CHASE CHOICE, same as always.)