Fists Doing No Damage To Wolves On Stalker

[xOEDragonx]

This is the first chance I've had to play since the new update was released, so I spent the better part of an hour figuring out the new UI and other new additons. I decided to test out rock throwing to deter wolves. I missed the wolf as it was approaching me and it attacked. As I didn't have any other weapons on me at the time, it defaulted to using my fist to fight the wolf. The fight duration was probably a solid 10 seconds and, despite nonstop mashing of the "A" button on my xbox controller, the damage/attack bar didn't budge once. Obviously I died, because I apparently wasn't doing the slightest bit to fight back whether I was button mashing or not. This left me a bit stupified, so I started another stalker game and ran to the first wolf I could find. It jumped on me, I button mashed for a second or two and drove it off with minimal damage to my condition, but the attack bar still never moved. When the wolf calmed down, I approached it again. The second confrontation lasted closer to 4-5 seconds, however this time the attack bar was filling as I button mashed, the way it used to before the update. I successfully fought the wolf off a second time, though my condition was pretty bad at that point. But now I'm questioning how these wolf attacks work now.


Is this how wolf fist fights are supposed to be in stalker difficulty now? Almost completely random whether or not you can get the wolf off of you? I'm mostly just confused why the attack bar only acted like it wanted to fill once out of those three encounters despite the same amount of button mashing in all of them. I'd wonder if stamina played a role, but I had zero stamina the second time the wolf jumped on me and the bar was filling up. Just wondering how this new system works!

[placidus33]

Here's my opinion. It's not tested.

1- The more you go up in experience mode, the less you do damage by every single click of mouse or push of button and the bar goes down faster.
2- Depending on the weapon you choose the quantity of damage changes. Fists do almost nothing.
3- Wolves are not all the same. Some are weak, other are stronger, some are the Schwarzenegger wolves/Alpha males of the pack.

If you by happenstance struggled with the Terminator wolf with bare hands and no protection of clothing it is likely you see the bar as if it never fills and you die in a bunch of seconds.

If you want to be sure it's not a bug, start a serie of test sandboxes in Pilgrim or Voyager and try some wolves until you die, using always fists and pushing your button not to survive but to check the behaviour of the bar.

In my experience it has happened in Loper more than once, in Stalker I'm not sure cause is easier and I always avoid engaging wolves barehanded and without protection. But you are not the first I read recently with this suspect, so maybe it's a little bug of the latest version of the game

[IFIYGD]

It's pretty much how wolf struggles are in all experience modes now.

Fist- used in desperation, better than nothing. Barely. Little to no damage, to a wolf with full HP, may scare off an aready injured, but don't count on it.

Knife- piercing/puncturing damage tothe wolf, fastest bleed out time for the wolf.

Hattchet- tearing or slashing damage, higher HP damage up front, but slower (standard) bleed out time for the wolf.

Prybar- blunt force to the wolf. no damag,e but usually makes the wolf scare off. Hammer is supposed to do this also, but some folks are reporting killing wolves with them. Haven;t had a chance to get a hammer and test it yet.

And all damge you do in a struggle is affected by your character's overall condition- HP, fatigue, hunger, thirst, coldness. If any of all of those are dropping or already low, your character is weakened, and does less damage in the fight, and may take higher levels of damage in return. Clothing with a higher protection (armor) rating will help lessen the recieved damage, but only to a point.

Fist fighting a crazed, savage neast with powerful jaws and sharp teeth is never a good idea. Until or unless you have a good condition weapon or 2 or 3, avoidance at all costs is the best idea. Even if it means you have to circle really wide to get around a wolf patrol area, sprinitning until exhausted if need be. You'll recover that condition loss faster then you will if you get chewed on by a wolf or 2 or 3 or 4 (in a row... yes, in a row...).

[EN16M471C]

Your stats also have impact on how fast you'll fend off a wolf. Hunger, fatigue, etc.

However it is weird how your struggle bar wasn't filling up in some cases.

[xOEDragonx]

I have now tested this a couple more times, and am still not sure what I think about it. Just to build on my initial post, the very first wolf struggle I already had picked up extra clothing and my stats were fine as I already had gathered food/water/etc. I was not in a bad place survival wise, or I would have waited to "test" the wolves. Perhaps it was a so-called terminator wolf because as I said, the struggle lasted a solid 10 seconds or so, as he dropped my condition from 100% to 0% and despite my button mashing, the attacking seemed to do literally nothing. As in, I could have never touched a button and had the exact same result. On that second spawn I mentioned, I sought out a wolf right away so I definitely had bare minimum clothing and full stats. Wolf jumped on me and was off me again in a second or two even though the bar, again, never moved. When it calmed down, I approached again, now with roughly 80% condition, stil high stats and possibly torn clothing. It attacked an it was what I'd call a "normal" stalker mode fight. The bar filled as I button mashed for a few seconds and when the bar was full, the wolf was shoved off me. My condition was now down to roughly 10%, as expected in a more normal encounter on stalker difficulty with an already lowered condition. So in those three encounters alone, there was a lot of inconsistently and that's what was bothering me. The first time, I was gun-ho and ready to fight, only to lay there while a wolf apparently ate me alive. The second time, I was straight from the spawn and fended a wolf off twice, once filling the bar and once not even moving it.

I tested it again right after I posted this. I spawned, grabbed a crowbar that happened to be nearby and charged a wolf. It was another "normal" fight, with the bar filling as I button mashed. Unfortunately, the bar filled super slow, but this is realistic given the weapon I was using. I heard the hearbeat of low condition start just as I filled the bar. I heard the sound of the wolf being shoved off, but the screen was black with all the usual torn clothing/laceration/bleeding messages and the red condition bar. Ok, normally at this point it slowly fades back into the game as you come-to after the attack. My screen stayed black for about 5 seconds, and I was greeted with the "you bled to death etc" message." Ok, so I died and now the journal should pop up with my final stats. Nope, sat on a black screen that showed the red condition bar in the bottom left corner and stayed like that. After staring at it for a while to see if it'd do anything, I simply exited to the menu. So, I'm still rather stupified. I'm going to go back to my normal habit of just avoiding all wolves if possible, and I'll just assume encountering one will either be a death sentence or a buggy ending.

[Person of Interest]

Confirm hammer kill on wolf. No info on my condition nor wolf as it was a few days ago. Was pretty quick like < 5 seconds.

[placidus33]

I was curious to understand better the struggle mechanism, so I started 3 different sandboxes in Stalker in CH. In each one I went straight towards the first wolf in sight, barehanded and with initial clothes, trying as much as possible to be always regular in the frequency of mouse tapping (not at my maximum capability, let's say a medium-fast tap)

First one - Found Terminator wolf. It was so fast I had to press F12 2 times quickly before I blacked out and I died without reopening my eyes.
http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=949854589
http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=949854861

Second one - Found a weak wolf. Struggle very long. I was quite in good conditions after reopening my eyes.
http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=949855216
http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=949855485
http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=949855771
http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=949856061

Third one - Found a medium wolf.
http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=949858318
http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=949858587
http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=949858840
http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=949859097

In my opinion it works great!!! It's real, it's random, it's a new challenge every time. Wolves are different as much as I am different if compared to a body-builder or a street-fighter.

Except the first sandbox in which I died in about 3 seconds, I could have survived the wolf struggle in the second and third sandbox if I had bandages.
I don't think there is something wrong.

[IFIYGD]

Originally posted by placidus33:

I was curious to understand better the struggle mechanism, so I started 3 different sandboxes in Stalker in CH. In each one I went straight towards the first wolf in sight, barehanded and with initial clothes, trying as much as possible to be always regular in the frequency of mouse tapping (not at my maximum capability, let's say a medium-fast tap)

<snip>

In my opinion it works great!!! It's real, it's random, it's a new challenge every time. Wolves are different as much as I am different if compared to a body-builder or a street-fighter.

Except the first sandbox in which I died in about 3 seconds, I could have survived the wolf struggle in the second and third sandbox if I had bandages.
I don't think there is something wrong.

+1

That's hw I see it as well. RNJesus has a say in so many areasof the game, wolf struggles and bear maulings are no exception. Mitigating factors like HP, hunger, thirst, fatigue and coldness certainly play in as well, and seem to be added in at the start ff the struggle, when the wolf or bear first connects. Of course, we annot fight back against the bear, butin wolf struggles it adjusts the damage given and taken depending on the wolf's RNG as far as it's strength, and our RNG.

I have no issues with there being a good bit of RNJesus intervention. It feels more real to me.

[xOEDragonx]

But in all three of the encounters you posted screenshots of, the "Fight Back" bar did fill, even if only a little bit like on the Terminator wolf. That's what I'm referring to as a "normal" encounter. Not that the wolf killed you or only hurt you a bit, but whether the game acknowledged you were fighting back. Therein lies my original problem. I fought a wolf, button mashed rapidly for a solid 10 seconds, and the bar never moved once, not even a hair. It was as though I wasn't clicking at all. Since then, I have had about an equal number of encounters where the bar does move, and where it does not move at all. Most ended in me fending off the wolf, some did not. I'm not as concerned about the strength of the wolves or the strength variation, or RNJesus' role in how dangerous any single wolf is. I find this realistic and like it. I am concerned why sometimes the game acts as though I'm fighting back, while other times it doesn't. And note, this is all in reference to fists only, not with weapons.

Has anyone else experienced an issue with the "Fight Back" bar not moving AT ALL? Or as in my second post, the game acting odd/glitching out when you defeat a wolf but are on the verge of death?

[placidus33]

Originally posted by xOEDragonx:

But in all three of the encounters you posted screenshots of, the "Fight Back" bar did fill, even if only a little bit like on the Terminator wolf. That's what I'm referring to as a "normal" encounter. Not that the wolf killed you or only hurt you a bit, but whether the game acknowledged you were fighting back. Therein lies my original problem. I fought a wolf, button mashed rapidly for a solid 10 seconds, and the bar never moved once, not even a hair. It was as though I wasn't clicking at all. Since then, I have had about an equal number of encounters where the bar does move, and where it does not move at all. Most ended in me fending off the wolf, some did not. I'm not as concerned about the strength of the wolves or the strength variation, or RNJesus' role in how dangerous any single wolf is. I find this realistic and like it. I am concerned why sometimes the game acts as though I'm fighting back, while other times it doesn't. And note, this is all in reference to fists only, not with weapons.

Has anyone else experienced an issue with the "Fight Back" bar not moving AT ALL? Or as in my second post, the game acting odd/glitching out when you defeat a wolf but are on the verge of death?

You're right. See the other discussion going along now "Wolf struggle help". You are not the only one with this suspicion. And it seems it's happening in this last days. I think it could be a bug in need of a hotfix.... even though I can't repeat it in my game. I don't seems to have any problem.

[xOEDragonx]

Originally posted by placidus33:

You're right. See the other discussion going along now "Wolf struggle help". You are not the only one with this suspicion. And it seems it's happening in this last days. I think it could be a bug in need of a hotfix.... even though I can't repeat it in my game. I don't seems to have any problem.

I just replied to this one actually. I totally overlooked it earlier when I skimmed for similar topics. In that thread, the OP even had a knife and experienced this issue, so it's not weapon specific. It may also be worth noting that's I play with a controller and he was using a mouse, so it's like not an input device issue either.

Like I said, this is the first time I've played since the newest update. That said, I'm not a new player to the game. I'm pretty confident that what I have experienced several times now does not feel like normal gameplay behavior.

[placidus33]

Originally posted by xOEDragonx:

Like I said, this is the first time I've played since the newest update. That said, I'm not a new player to the game. I'm pretty confident that what I have experienced several times now does not feel like normal gameplay behavior.

I began only 2 months ago to play TLD, but I played a lot in these 2 months and I subscribed for the test builds before the release of Faithful Cartographer. It is sure thing that the wolf struggle is harder, since the first T builds (maybe 15th of May... I don't recall). But this particular problem of the bar not filling seems related specifically to this version (426). The first "official" release of FC (v. 423) and the previous T versions were ok, I think. At least I didn't see in the discussion people describing the bar not filling up.
There were of course a lot of complains about wolves too strong in Stalker, but that is normal. It's in the human nature to find hard to adjust to changes.

I also have to say that from v.423, if not for testing purposes, I began to play HUDless, so I'm not in a good position to be objective about the bar, cause I don't see it anymore.
In my present stalker run I'm well protected and I engaged a big number of Wolves in CH, always with the intent to kill them, and always knife in hand, to test the dual binding with the Spacebar during the struggle. I couldn't see the bar, but I never died, even after engaging 2 wolves in a row, so I don't believe I have this bug (lucky me!!!).
From now on I'll re-enable the HUD for a while to check if I can repeat your problem on my computer, but probably the next hotfix will adjust everything, if it's a real bug. The devs are going really fast with the updates.

[IFIYGD]

The black death screen that never gives you a "You Faded Into The Long DarK is not normal, you are right about that. The struggle bar not filling up= the only time I have had it happen was with fists, and my character was almost exhausted.

If you think something is broken, you really should be reporting it in the Technical Issues subforum, where it is more likely to be read quickly and investigated by Hinterland Tech, instead of random players like me and others just offering subjextive opinions and comparisons. Hinterland Tech reads those diligently, but may or may not see this as it gets shuffled through the random general discussions threads.

[EN16M471C]

Here's the link for direct bug reports:
https://hinterlandgames.atlassian.net/projects/TLDP
(no need to make account just click on red "Create")

[placidus33]

Originally posted by EN16M471C:

Here's the link for direct bug reports:
https://hinterlandgames.atlassian.net/projects/TLDP
(no need to make account just click on red "Create")

Yep. That is absolutely the first place where Hinterland goes to check for bug reports. I filed a good number of bugs in the last month and in every hotfix they solved the most of them

[xOEDragonx]

The point of me posting here first was to see if anyone else experienced the problem. If only one person has a problem, the issue is likely not the game and is either hardware/software related or human error. As I've now noticed another thread on the same issue, I plan to report it when I'm on my computer again. Thank you for the direct link. That said, it's still not reassuring that only two people have experienced it while the overwhelming majority of others responding just believe it's difficulty related, which I'm not convinced it is. I will definitely plan to report it, just wish I had a way to record a video to show others what I'm seeing. Might look into this option later.

I also wasn't aware turning off the HUD was an option, as I've never had the desire to go so boldly into the night. But it might be an underlying problem that doesn't actually have to do with the bar itself and the bar is just a visual representation of it. I have now won and -horribly- lost wolf fights where the bar did and did not move.