I have a large plaza entrance area on a brand new zoo I'm just starting - no mods of any kind whatsoever. I have no habitats yet, the zoo isn't open, I'm just getting set up. I have staff hired and they are just wandering around, which is fine, but they are getting stuck - a lot. In some areas, I've used trash bins to try and prevent this because I figure if staff are getting stuck the crowds certainly will when the zoo opens. You can see 2 of these trash bins (used as planters) on the right of the pic. They seem to work, but this spot really has me puzzled because this is a table, which I think they should be walking around. There seems to be plenty of room for them. Why are they getting stuck like this? There are 4 of them jittering in a bunch here presumably stuck by the table. Does anyone have a workaround for this?
What causes staff to get stuck like this?
- Thread starter Imagin
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Is the path "on grid"? I get these stuck npcs, which seem to be dancing (turn right, turn down, turn left, turn up, turn right...) a lot on gridded paths. My theory: On a gridded path, when meeting other groups/npcs, the npc try to navigate around each other, but as they can only turn in right angles on a gridded path, they tend to get stuck at certain obstacles. Workaround: I don't build gridded plazas anymore, which is a shame, but seems to work.
"Dancing" guests
Since the southeast asia update there is the "dancing guests"-bug in gridded paths. Guests (and staffmembers) seem to build clusters hanging in a wayfinding bug. They move around themselves as if they are dancing and can't proceed on their way. Whereas guests "only" get all their needs reduced...
JWE has a completely different pathing system, way less complex and very basic. The guests are also nothing but mindless dummies walking around the park to fill it and act as dino food, should those escape, they don't have any thoughts or ever changing path finding like PZ or PC guests. They're generated by buildings and wander the paths where those are, nothing more and I never noticed any crowd building there unless you somehow managed tp block certain paths so they got trapped.
PC does have the same problem from what I remember. Guests used to get stuck and do the weird floppy dance they do in PZ as well. Those games do use the same pathing system however (even though we begged them to change that annoying thing for ages) so I sadly can't say I'm surprised they also share the same bugs.
Thanks, good to know. I bought JWE when it came out but I didn't like that I couldn't start in sandbox mode. I gave up on it pretty quickly. I understand in JWE 2 you can start with sandbox though. I'm not into any gameplay, I just play sandbox with the settings so that all people and animals are always happy. It's all about creativity for me. The mindless guests wouldn't bother me but I'm going to stick with PZ at least long enough to see the next update. I REALLY want to try the new walk-through thingie and experience my zoo as a guest would. Being able to tweak it from that perspective really is exciting to me
The remaining bugs are annoying and now that I know I won't be creating any more plazas.You can create plazas though - just don't do gridded ones. You can hide the plaza-path-thing below floor-items or you hide the "holes" in your plaza path with e.g. planters and/or other deco-elements. I saw some inspiring youtube video about creating no-grid plazas but sadly I can't remember by whom it was. Maybe someone else can remember. It's a technique where you go between the path angles and ad another pathing piece and delete it right afterwards by rightclick. Sorry, I am not good at describing things in english, because it is not my native language.
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I just now released 11 staff members who were stuck at 1 table for so long my exhibits got neglected to the point I got red alerts. I still don't even have any habitats and the zoo is still closed. I've been focusing on my entrance area for days and getting everything perfect, making a bunch of my own buildings, etc. I'm almost finished that so re-doing my plaza area to try your suggestion is going to be a huge amount of work.
I can't believe this problem exists on a game that is over 2 years old. I pre-ordered it and gave up after a month because it was in such bad shape at launch. I figured after 2 years surely they would have all the bugs worked out, and most of them do seem to be gone. I have to say it's MUCH better than when it first came out. I had to give up on my first new zoo because of issues I assumed were caused by a bad mod. So I uninstalled everything and started from scratch with a clean install just to be safe. Now I'm not so sure it was a bad mod. This plaza bug is very frustrating now after doing all that. At this point, I have to assume Frontier isn't capable of fixing it, or I'm sure it would be done.
Perhaps it doesn't happen if your grid plaza is empty - at least empty of tables, seatings and wastebins where the npcs can "stumble"? I don't know. It seems to be gridded plaza + bad luck. There are players who never encountered this bug. And I don't remember me having it before the aquatic update (I think it was the aquatic update). Perhaps bugs get fixed and return sometimes with a new update... Some things never change. It is a shame, yes - but it doesn't prevent me from playing the game and loving it. I just adapt to it and work around.
It's my kind of "challenge mode" in sandbox.
It's my kind of "challenge mode" in sandbox.
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It's not just the tables. Staff gets stuck on the large bathroom building and the entrance building that came with the Africa pack too.Perhaps it doesn't happen if your grid plaza is empty - at least empty of tables, seatings and wastebins where the npcs can "stumble"? I don't know. It seems to be gridded plaza + bad luck. There are players who never encountered this bug. And I don't remember me having it before the aquatic update (I think it was the aquatic update). Perhaps bugs get fixed and return sometimes with a new update... Some things never change. It is a shame, yes - but it doesn't prevent me from playing the game and loving it. I just adapt to it and work around.
It's my kind of "challenge mode" in sandbox.
Pathing has a life of its own.
Indeed it does and I'm familiar with most of it's quirks. But this plaza issue is so bad with this brand new zoo it almost doesn't make sense to continue. It just gets worse the more I build. I'm not sure I want to start over again. What other known bugs should I avoid besides gridded plazas?Pathing has a life of its own.
Hmmm, could be. Like how climbing frames, water and general traversable area randomly stops working at times...I really wish they'd fix this already.
