Does Kenshi actually calculate its populations in real time?

[Water]

I had some questionable spawning situations occur, and i'm tempted to look under the hood to see how this game actually works.

How i want think it works:
The game handles squads and roaming individuals in real time. Or perhaps there are variables I.E. UC may spawn additional squads in my area if they are available and if i'm causing problems in that area. I hope that killing squads of factions actually has some kind of meaning and isn't just fluff. I like how the game keeps track of town residents, its the random squad spawning that bugs me (but is it really random?)

How i suspect it works (Unfortunately):
I get some state of decay vibes. In state of decay, NPC's are spawned at random around the player with certain areas being considered more likely to do so than others. In some cases, this means you could end up in a position where there are never ending waves of enemies. I kept a tally of how many paladins i killed in a short period of time, to the point of filling over 8 pack beasts with just their swords alone (to simply disarm them). And yet, they continue to be a problem until they're leader is killed.

Side notes:
-I notice that roaming squad population does change when i eliminate a squad
-I notice a reduction in the number of squads in an area if i remain in that area and continue killing (thank goodness)
-I notice that whenever spawns do occur, they tend to be aggressive in nature. I.E. If one UC spawn occurs, i can expect others to quickly follow

My biggest pet peeve is how sometimes i catch NPCS spawning within spitting distance of my character while im traveling. They just appear on the side of the road or something and sometimes they'll charge straight at my character. Skimmers do this a lot actually (which is annoying as hell! Why me!?)

[Hatsune Neko Gaming]

they are spawned in the active cells around the player.
as for them spawning right before you, that is known, but is an issue because the games engine can not keep up when your playing the game at max speed.

this is also an issue if your character is running at full speed with high athletics and sprint robotic legs. your character is running faster then the game can keep up with. so its akin to running the game at higher speeds.

having the game on a SSD reduces this issue as the SSD can keep up more then if the game is on a HDD.

Edit.
I get this same issue as I'm on a HDD and my character has the high athletics and speed legs. NPCs spawn right in front of me sometimes and by the time they fully loaded, I'm way past them already.

[Shidan]

There are two types of squads in the game. Persistent squads, and homeless squads.

Persistent squads are spawned from some town or camp, they are stored in the save data when you leave the area. And with the exception of gate guards, generally whatever happens to them is saved (i.e. Kill a shopkeeper, and they will stay dead and will not be replaced).

Homeless squads are spawned in the wild around the player. These are completely random, based on a frequency and spawn pool for each region. When these leave the loaded area, they are deleted. And they are infinite, with some of them having world state conditions to control whether they can spawn.

Most squads you see in the wilderness are homeless squads. Though there are quite a few persistent ones out there too. The persistent ones can make it feel like you have some impact on the world, but it's not possible to completely wipe out a faction just by killing patrols.

As for things spawning on top of you. It's generally pretty rare in my experience, though it can happen. I'd wager your skimmer cases are not that though. Skimmers can burrow into the sand to ambush people walking through. They are not completely invisible though, keep an eye out for their heads popping up from the sand.

[Asmodan]

I thought (and read elsewhere) Shopkeeper and Barkeepers respawn after a few Days? I never tested this, but it would be too bad if they remain dead.

[Shidan]

Nope, such NPCs will never respawn in vanilla. The only persistent NPCs that do are military population like gate guards, to stop towns form dying out so easily.

[magne.moe]

Originally posted by Shidan:

Nope, such NPCs will never respawn in vanilla. The only persistent NPCs that do are military population like gate guards, to stop towns form dying out so easily.

In my current game it was an civil war in core UC as in the desert between the samurais and the tech hunters who run the shops for unknown reasons as in not me.
Probably an TES 4 Oblivion style civil war: mages uses AOE who hit guards who is now hostile to mage guild.
So shops was unmanned but has later reopened, now it might be shopkeepers getting released from jail.

[Water]

Originally posted by Shidan:

There are two types of squads in the game. Persistent squads, and homeless squads.

Persistent squads are spawned from some town or camp, they are stored in the save data when you leave the area. And with the exception of gate guards, generally whatever happens to them is saved (i.e. Kill a shopkeeper, and they will stay dead and will not be replaced).

Homeless squads are spawned in the wild around the player. These are completely random, based on a frequency and spawn pool for each region. When these leave the loaded area, they are deleted. And they are infinite, with some of them having world state conditions to control whether they can spawn.

Most squads you see in the wilderness are homeless squads. Though there are quite a few persistent ones out there too. The persistent ones can make it feel like you have some impact on the world, but it's not possible to completely wipe out a faction just by killing patrols.

As for things spawning on top of you. It's generally pretty rare in my experience, though it can happen. I'd wager your skimmer cases are not that though. Skimmers can burrow into the sand to ambush people walking through. They are not completely invisible though, keep an eye out for their heads popping up from the sand.

Thanks for the reply. So in theory if i want the most persistent experience, i should turn down the squad frequency to its lowest number, as this will only change the homeless squad spawns, and not the persistent town squads.

Correct me if i'm wrong though

[Shidan]

Correct. Though it will not increase the amount of persistent squads to account for the change, so you may find the world a lot more empty.

But you could turn up nests/camps, as those are sources of persistent squads.

[Water]

Originally posted by Shidan:

Correct. Though it will not increase the amount of persistent squads to account for the change, so you may find the world a lot more empty.

But you could turn up nests/camps, as those are sources of persistent squads.

I like homeless spawns in regards to the early stage as it allows for more situations where the newer player can potentially succeed. But now that im in the mid game, theyre more of a nuisance than anything. I feel like im part of the world stage which is challenging in an of itself (hostile with nearly everything). And the last thing i need is some random out of no where spawn to throw of my conquest

[bunies]

Originally posted by Shidan:

There are two types of squads in the game. Persistent squads, and homeless squads.

Persistent squads are spawned from some town or camp, they are stored in the save data when you leave the area. And with the exception of gate guards, generally whatever happens to them is saved (i.e. Kill a shopkeeper, and they will stay dead and will not be replaced).

Homeless squads are spawned in the wild around the player. These are completely random, based on a frequency and spawn pool for each region. When these leave the loaded area, they are deleted. And they are infinite, with some of them having world state conditions to control whether they can spawn.

Most squads you see in the wilderness are homeless squads. Though there are quite a few persistent ones out there too. The persistent ones can make it feel like you have some impact on the world, but it's not possible to completely wipe out a faction just by killing patrols.

As for things spawning on top of you. It's generally pretty rare in my experience, though it can happen. I'd wager your skimmer cases are not that though. Skimmers can burrow into the sand to ambush people walking through. They are not completely invisible though, keep an eye out for their heads popping up from the sand.

and here i thought that skimmer thing was just a glitch and them clipping through terrain

[Graegar]

you think sand ninja's should use that same tactic as the skimmers :)