Ptarmigans swimming in the snow

[xanna]

6 hours ago, AdamvR said:

That I had too, it was a regular wolf in (u)PV. It died on a slope, so I attributed it to that, but could be a general error. That is I believe different from the ptarmigans hiding in the snow, which I think is deliberate. [It seems consistent in every area where I see these guys, it makes sense to me, and I just cannot imagine that during the 100s of hours of the development and addition of them to the game nobody had asked themselves: "Hm..., shouldn't these guys be walking on top of the snow, instead of just a bit under it, so that only their heads stick out when they sit down?"]

see also:

they are actively hiding in the snow, on purpose, and HTL did a great job in adapting that IRL behavior to the game.
source.: googling ptarmigan in snow

They make little holes to hide inside, this is what remains after they leave:

Amazing! These snowy lil guys are so darn cute

 

6 hours ago, AdamvR said:

the ptarmigans hiding in the snow, which I think is deliberate. [It seems consistent in every area where I see these guys,

I had assumed it wasn't deliberate because this was the first time I'd seen it, despite many many hours in the game since they were first fixed to be on Custom, and because it was two nests both in the same region, one I'd not visited since before ptarmigans were introduced. But if you're saying that this is something that ptarmigans do all over and I just didn't notice till now - very plausible! - then yes it could be deliberate for sure. The coincidence of consistent clipping in the snow but only of an animal that clips under the snow IRL is quite a big one. They look just the same!

I'm now fascinated to know if it was deliberate or not. Shall we ask @Admin?

[UpUpAway95]

21 hours ago, artmunki said:

While I do love the idea of snow depth becoming a thing in the game, and I too have seen ptarmigan, rabbits, deer and wolves clipping into the snow layer (don't think I've seen bears or moose do it yet), I've also seen several rabbits, deer and even one or two wolves clip up to a few feet above the snow lately too in various regions around the island - just cavorting along quite happily in the air as if it was perfectly normal - so I don't think for one second that it's intentional. I kinda suspect it might be a little artefact of whatever they're tweaking behind the scenes to prepare for the upcoming wildlife refresh, but obviously that's just a guess on my part.

I wasn't really suggesting that this exact current behavior is completely intentional, but that HL might be experimenting with the idea of giving the snow some depth and that might be what's resulting in the current glitchiness of it all.  Survival mode used to be the platform where they would introduce and experiment with things they were thinking about putting into Wintermute; and they might (maybe) be carrying on with some of that process even though they have technically split the two apart as separate games.

[artmunki]

44 minutes ago, UpUpAway95 said:

I wasn't really suggesting that this exact current behavior is completely intentional, but that HL might be experimenting with the idea of giving the snow some depth and that might be what's resulting in the current glitchiness of it all.  Survival mode used to be the platform where they would introduce and experiment with things they were thinking about putting into Wintermute; and they might (maybe) be carrying on with some of that process even though they have technically split the two apart as separate games.

That does make sense, and I haven't been playing TLD for long enough to have experienced earlier experimentation. There's definitely something going on to make this happen, as I've been seeing animals above or below the ground level all over the island, but only in the past coupla months (that I remember anyway).

I can't help but think that adding snow depth would be a pretty massive change to the game tho, especially considering that the current effort seems to be towards essentially tying off sometime next year after the end of Wintermute, and Hinterland already have a pretty full plate to get to that point, with three more regions (2 announced for the Far Territories, plus Perseverance Mills presumably), and a bunch more new features still in the pipeline too. The rebuilding of the entire island's maps that would be required to add snow depth seems like a pretty colossal undertaking at this point. The graphical representation alone would require a huge shift in how the landscape is modeled, not to mention the game physics required both to show deep snow and to walk through it. And then throw in snow shoes to walk on top, which would quickly become the loudest demand from players, and maybe digging through snowdrifts to get into cars/buildings/etc. I have played one or two games with that sort of snow physics, and it would be amazing to see something similar in this incredible game, but it would be such a huge leap from what we have now that I just can't see it happening. I would dearly love to be proven wrong tho!

[Admin]

This behaviour is not intentional, but we do know what's causing it and it should be addressed in the next patch (Part 4). Let us know if it persists beyond that point, it could be caused by something else we're not aware of. Thanks!

[xanna]

13 minutes ago, Admin said:

This behaviour is not intentional, but we do know what's causing it and it should be addressed in the next patch (Part 4). Let us know if it persists beyond that point, it could be caused by something else we're not aware of. Thanks!

Patch notes:
 · Fixed bug where ptarmigan behaviour was too closely mimicking real ptarmigan behaviour

@Admin Are you sure the ptarmigan code hasn't gained sentience and evolved into a more accurate ptarmigan?

[AdamvR]

I was wrong then:)
Thank you @Admin, for clearing this up.

[Smellyfries]

Yeah, whilst it is cute that the ptarmigans are surfing through the snow, I've had some issues with hunting them like this. Because their entire body is in the ground most of the time, I can only really go for headshots, and headshots are extremely difficult when using rocks in the early game, so where I would have hit their body, and stunned them, I often just hurt the snow, and scare the entire flock away. Even then, if they are really sunken into the snow, I've stunned them with a rock, and they just completely sink beneath it, and I can't grab them whilst they are stunned. 

So, whilst it's cute, definitely brings more problems that make hunting them a bit frustrating. 

[xanna]

@Smellyfries Ah, yeah that sounds frustrating. I only used my bow on them, and that worked fine if I aimed through the snow to where I knew the body was.