Is it just me or did brown bears become super sayan

[VanillaGorrilla]

I could have sworn they were a little slower in 1.20 or 1.19, I got clapped on my permadeath cause it was so fast lmao.
Is that recent or is it just my head playing tricks

[Michael Gates]

My understanding is that brown bears became about 5% faster in 1.22, so just running in a straight line works poorly. The ways I know to dodge bears are to run past trees right next to them (the bear has to go around), dig a 1-block-wide pit 3 blocks deep and stand at the bottom, or go up a 4-block-high nerdpole.

[LadyWYT]

Welcome to the forums!

10 hours ago, Michael Gates said:

My understanding is that brown bears became about 5% faster in 1.22, so just running in a straight line works poorly.

I believe they also have a bit more reach than black bears now, making them harder to escape or engage in combat.

[Pascaloubicou]

Yes brown bears two tap super fast now, in sp it's super hard, in mp i still can kill them by drawing circle and hit with flint spears... I feel like wolf are the same or like the animation is weird they jump on you miss and do an other bite animation that can get you. I do the same i turn in circles sprinting.

[Ceridith]

Bears have been getting a bit too over tuned to the point where it's becoming a realism versus gameplay issue. Are bears really deadly and fast in real life? Yes, of course. Does it feel unfair to have a stealth torpedo of furry inescapable death appear out of seemingly nowhere to chase you down and maul your character to death? Also very much yes.

Wolves will at least announce their presence in an area with their howls, which gives fair warning to players about their general direction and to have their guard up. Bears are basically silent even with the 'footstep sounds' that were recently added in 1.22, which are hard to hear over ingame music. If you're close enough to hear a bear's footsteps you're essentially within agro range and more than likely about to be attacked so it's not much of a warning as you can't outrun them. Which speaking of bear agro range, it feels like it was made further in the 1.22 pre/rc, or in the very least bears seem much more aggressive than they used to be and will attack unprovoked from much further away.

[LadyWYT]

19 minutes ago, Ceridith said:

Which speaking of bear agro range, it feels like it was made further in the 1.22 pre/rc, or in the very least bears seem much more aggressive than they used to be and will attack unprovoked from much further away.

Depends. I've been encountering more bears in 1.22, seemingly, and while some of them have seemed more aggressive, others have seemed less so. Yesterday I got swatted by a brown bear once and thought I was about to be "helped" back home, but for whatever reason the bear didn't give chase. I guess he was just angry at being woken up from a nap? There was also a black bear that started to chase me and then gave up after about 20 blocks. A few other bears, both black and brown, I've practically walked right by without them so much as giving me a funny look.

 

22 minutes ago, Ceridith said:

Wolves will at least announce their presence in an area with their howls, which gives fair warning to players about their general direction and to have their guard up.

Wolves I wouldn't mind seeing be a little more skittish when alone, and howling to summon packmates before attacking the player, if they're actually intent on hunting the player. If they're cornered or have pups, they should obviously be a little more aggressive anyway, but I do think the pack tactics would make them a little more interesting and dangerous as a predator.

 

23 minutes ago, Ceridith said:

Bears have been getting a bit too over tuned to the point where it's becoming a realism versus gameplay issue. Are bears really deadly and fast in real life? Yes, of course. Does it feel unfair to have a stealth torpedo of furry inescapable death appear out of seemingly nowhere to chase you down and maul your character to death? Also very much yes.

I think they're fine for what the game is right now, but I've been thinking a lot on how the status effect system could potentially change the game. One possibility that I think I would like to see, is removing the direct damage from certain things and replacing it with status effects instead. For example, poisonous mushrooms might no longer be listed as poisonous or directly damage the player when eaten, but may cause some unpleasant effects(including death) sometime later if the player eats them. A wolf bite might not immediately damage a player's health, but may inflict a bleed that will hurt the player over time if not tended, or become infected if not cleaned properly.

In those cases the penalties are technically heavier than just "you die, try again!", but I do think they lead to more interesting outcomes since the player has more opportunity to not only survive a dangerous situation, but ways to handle the consequences that result from said situation without having to resort to a death run.

[williams_482]

Bears aren't in a terrible place right now, but I wouldn't mind continued tuning of their behavior. 

Were it up to me, bears in "rampage mode" would make significantly more and louder roaring noises, alerting the player and waking up any animals which are sleeping nearby. The rest of the time, they would have a large (20-30 block) detection radius where they recognize the player and will either growl a warning, flee, or completely ignore them based on the inscrutable exhortations of their souls. They would also have a smaller radius, 10-15 blocks, where they will always growl a warning at an approaching player, and a smaller still radius (5-10 blocks with some random fuzz) where they will always attack a player who moves into that range and stays there for at least a second. 

That warning doesn't need to be a growl: I've had the dubious honor of coming within 100 yards of a black bear who did not want me around, and the deep roar/bark/grunt "HAROOF" sort of noise it made at me is distinctive (and carries quite a long ways, even through dense trees). 

Obviously all numbers are arbitrary and open to adjustment.

That's not very far off from how they behave right now, with the primary difference being that bears would be much easier to detect when in their most dangerous moods, and somewhat easier to detect and avoid when they are feeling relatively calm. The growl range and agro range distinction already exists for wolves, and bears may have some logic along those lines but without noises to announce themselves. 

[LadyWYT]

6 minutes ago, williams_482 said:

That's not very far off from how they behave right now, with the primary difference being that bears would be much easier to detect when in their most dangerous moods, and somewhat easier to detect and avoid when they are feeling relatively calm.

I would like to see an exception for polar bears though, since those are known to deliberately stalk humans.

[HalfAxd]

I have not yet played 1.22 so I might be all wet, but...

I avoid dense forests and dig animal pits if I venture into one.  If I stumble on a bear/wolf, I lead them to the pit and trap them.

I have a habit of torching dense, limited line of sight, areas...  come back the next day (get away so frame rates are not an issue) and usually have a few surprises scattered around

I rarely die to bears and wolves.

[Ceridith]

1 hour ago, Tyron said:

Tweak: Bear seeking ranges reduced. Bear attack ranges are now shorter and different for different sizes of bear

We can all rest a little bit easier now. 

[Thorfinn]

I was pretty sure their seeking range had been increased. One suddenly turned on me that I think was beyond their range in earlier versions. They also seem to have (or maybe still have?) x-ray vision. While running upgrade to evade one brown, I crested the ridgeline only to have another brown on the other side immediately one-shot me, not even twitch was enough. (WS) Which suggests that his attack animation started before he could see me? First bear death in a couple versions. Nice find, @Ceridith. I take it that is for RC5?

Anyone noticing other changes in terms of pacing progression? In 4 games, I have had only 1 that I had the 20 copper on the first day. In one, I was still at 30-some on day 4. On the other hand, it is much easier to get linen sacks and an absolutely insane number of crop seeds. Mushrooms have overtaken berries as early food, since I'm having difficulty finding as many berries as I used to, but can still pick out mushrooms as well as ever. And I noticed that grain can be eaten raw again. When did that start? I've been just tossing the stuff the last several games because it wasn't useful until meals, so why carry it? 

[Ceridith]

30 minutes ago, Thorfinn said:

I was pretty sure their seeking range had been increased. One suddenly turned on me that I think was beyond their range in earlier versions. They also seem to have (or maybe still have?) x-ray vision. While running upgrade to evade one brown, I crested the ridgeline only to have another brown on the other side immediately one-shot me, not even twitch was enough. (WS) Which suggests that his attack animation started before he could see me? First bear death in a couple versions. Nice find, @Ceridith. I take it that is for RC5?

It's in the 1.22 RC5 patch notes, yes. And I was noticing similar behavior of bears agroing from fairly far away, even from behind hills and thick forest, so it's nice to see it toned down. I've only had a little bit of time on RC5 so I've yet to see exactly how the bear changes play out or if there's any lingering odd behavior.

32 minutes ago, Thorfinn said:

Anyone noticing other changes in terms of pacing progression? In 4 games, I have had only 1 that I had the 20 copper on the first day. In one, I was still at 30-some on day 4. On the other hand, it is much easier to get linen sacks and an absolutely insane number of crop seeds. Mushrooms have overtaken berries as early food, since I'm having difficulty finding as many berries as I used to, but can still pick out mushrooms as well as ever. And I noticed that grain can be eaten raw again. When did that start? I've been just tossing the stuff the last several games because it wasn't useful until meals, so why carry it? 

Pacing seems much quicker in the early game for me as well for surface bits. I'm not sure if I've just been extremely lucky, but in the playthrough I started in RC4 I was able to find enough copper and tin bits on the surface to completely skip the copper age right into tin bronze. I've also noticed the grain changes making it much easier to gather enough flax fibers to make bags in the early game before even being able to grow flax -- though that's also in part due to the crop nutrition issues slowing farming down in RC4. As for edible uncooked grain, I found it pretty useful in the very early game to survive as wild berry bushes don't seem quite as reliable for nutrition with the changes, but that could have also been related to RC bugs as it looks like the RC5 notes have some additional berry bush fixes.

That's not to say I'm complaining about apparent increased abundance, while certain things seem easier to find others seem as difficult if not a little more difficult so it balances out. It's rather removed a lot of the earlier game frustration about being unable to find certain resources like tin if you're unlucky. 

[LadyWYT]

1 hour ago, Thorfinn said:

Anyone noticing other changes in terms of pacing progression? In 4 games, I have had only 1 that I had the 20 copper on the first day. In one, I was still at 30-some on day 4. On the other hand, it is much easier to get linen sacks and an absolutely insane number of crop seeds. Mushrooms have overtaken berries as early food, since I'm having difficulty finding as many berries as I used to, but can still pick out mushrooms as well as ever. And I noticed that grain can be eaten raw again. When did that start? I've been just tossing the stuff the last several games because it wasn't useful until meals, so why carry it?

Yes and no. My progression has slowed down a bit mostly due to my own choice, since there is now more stuff to do in the early game so I stick around at the bronze level for a while before moving on to iron. Berries are still a solid early food source, though I typically shift to meat and mushroom stew as soon as I have a cookpot because Blackguards really like filling meals. Seeds I wish I could sell to traders, because I have way more than I need thanks to all the extra wild flax and other grains.

As for raw grain being edible again, I forgot exactly when it was fixed, but it was fixed in one of the early pre versions, so it's been edible for a while.

One thing I've been experimenting with--bronze lameller. I donned a full set of it with a bronze falx and crude shield in a light temporal storm and was quite successful at hunting the monsters. Still needed to duck inside to heal a couple of times, but I managed to kill a double-headed drifter and got a handful of rusty gears along with a couple of temporal gears for the effort. The rusty gears felt like a really good reward at this stage of the game, since there's resources to buy at the local traders to make progress easier(like lime).