Patrols are an author feature.

They allow the author to control where enemies go. Like having them walk along a hallway in a circle. Eventually, maybe have them change route based on things the player does or have mission contacts follow the player or walk from place to place.

One thing that occurs to me with patrols. Wasn't the Foundry changed forever ago so that enemies only spawn when the player gets close? And things out of range despawn?

What good is a patrol if it has to begin its route close to the player?

When NPC groups and contacts spawn hasn't changed since I've worked on the Foundry.

His point still remains. The group has to be within 100m of a player to be on the map and thus following their patrol.

If this number could be increased we could actually make NPCs that seem to respond to the current mission objectives by placing their patrols near the objective but if they have to start within 100m of the player an author cant take it for granted that a player will be close enough to trigger the NPCs so they can follow the new way point.

Edit: Also I don't mean this to slight this feature. I can still think of quite a few interesting uses and Im really glad were getting it.

Well, I was playing on my laptop so maybe I just didn't notice the beam-ins.

I could have sworn I used to be able to place a contact on a ledge, walk 200 yards away, and drop the contact off a cliff before the player returns. Whereas now they respawn/despawn.

Also was sure I used to be able to place enemies in an obscure corner of the map and use them as a "kill timer" for events in the mission.

My testing is sporadic so I'd be talking spring 2011 or maybe beta.

That would have been before you were a producer, I think, but you've been involved with the Foundry in some capacity longer than I have. So if I'm wrong, either I was exploiting bugs or I'm totally misremembering things.

My big concern is that there's a good chance the patrol will never even be a factor before the player enters combat, which makes the work with patrols a TON of work that would be wasted. I KNOW devs have spent months on this and if nobody notices it, then at best it's a placeholder for doing the same thing with friendly mobs, where it WOULD be noticed.

Assuming they don't just sporadically despawn when they get over 100m away.

Dare I ask how many more crashes that means?!

Props for use of "for realsies".

Could this be what has killed the in-game Voice Chat?

Nobody seems to have this capability right now. What's the scoop?

0.3 %

edited to remove the smilies that did not work

Since we can see the patrol movement in preview, does that mean we'll be able to see the wander movement in preview? If not, I may use patrols for friendlies instead of wander, as it may be easier to use. Patrols is definitely a great addition either way.