Any advices to make travel way less of a mess ?

[Elgodeorn]

I'm kinda new to the game so i'm probably missing something, but let me explain :

I tend to use travel from map a lot to try to multitask my characters and make the most out of my time.
That and the fact this is cutting so much time waiting for the game to load terrain.
But this feature seems kinda broken in a bad way. Characters just get stuck everywhere, slow down for whatever reasons, keeps getting into fight when travelling even with their insane speed (we're talking 70+ athletics + scout legs specialist or better, not over encumbered ie less than 10%, medium armor for a total of around 30+mph).
Combat wise they are really getting there, able to solo entire groups of low tier ennemies.
Yet they manage to get caught by 4 guys with wooden hoes and paper clothes going the speed of dying turtles and proceed to get mangled by them in less time that it takes me to click on them to see what's wrong.
Then if i reload the same fight watching them they proceed to turn whatever attacked them into mush without even taking damage.
Are the fights you're not directly watching biased in some way ?
Is there a way to say to my caracters to ignore everything even if an ennemy target them directly ?
Or am i simply missing something obvious here ?

[Synopse]

Kenshi has many dangers that can happen if you don't pay attention.
As a sandbox game, it offers a lot of freedom, but also leaves you alone with the consequences of your decisions.

In my opinion, traveling is the best part of the game. A lot can happen and it's great to watch the landscape. If you use the map to travel, you lose that part of the gaming experience.

Regarding combat: No, there is no bias. Still, it can be quite random from time to time. A few hard hits can be fatal.
You can toggle “passive” to allow a character to ignore combat.

[cdplayer906]

you should try one of the pathfinding mods. i started a new playthrough recently w/ vanilla pathfinding and idk how i played kenshi before. the zig zagging in open space, ugh!

some places are just rough on pathfinding regardless tho. like east borderzone and the grid.

[cougar206]

If you use the Follow command or Bodyguarding when traveling you are likely to get the problems you describe. Default actions such as Self Preservation or Protecting Allies take priority over Follow. Instead set all characters to match speeds, select them all and give a move order. They will not fight anyone along the way even when attacked, they will just keep running. They will run till they can no longer fulfill the move order, most likely by arriving at the destination.

If however you clicked on impassable terrain when they get close enough to realize it they will stop. This is an important point that most never realize. An example would be clicking on your base but the gates are closed. As soon as the characters get to that zone and know they cant move to where the click was they will stop.

If you are traveling with animals like garru or bulls they can get stuck at times but normal characters rarely will. To solve this you can go into the FCS and go to races/garru and set "pathfind footprint radius" to a lower number. I find that a setting of 5 works for me.

[bunny de fluff]

Always travel using the merchant mode instead of military mode. The military mode looks cool, but the wide formation just get people stuck beside the path.

[Hatsune Neko Gaming]

its part of the games core coding, something we can not access.
there is no way to improve it. this the best that we have gotten. it used to be much much worse.

best thing to do, is get a mod that shows you the road network. then click on the road parts, your less likely to run into pathing issues then, but you still will at times. there is just no getting around that part.

[Bomb Bloke]

Travelling by map does make it more likely that your people will randomly stop before reaching their destination. Long story short, the path finding mechanisms are a lot more reliable when the camera is present.

But as far as I've observed, the location of the camera doesn't affect combat at all.

My shot-in-the-dark guess is that your problems relate to water. Swimming makes you vulnerable to creatures, and wading leaves you exposed to pretty much everything.

[Capt.EO]

you need to nursemaid and keep an eye on your travelers using the map exclusively to move is a good way to get them mangled . even setting them to passive wont keep them completely out of trouble .

i usually put one super fast guy out in front as scout and let the others follow some distance behind if he gets into trouble the fast guy can lure the enemies away and double back to the main group after he loses them or just wait for them at a rally point somewhere .

but i watch them while they travel anything else is just asking to get eaten or whatever .

[Triple G]

Use jogging speed for the leader and the follow command for the rest at max speed. Caravan formation has the least issues because all follow a line. Even pack animals rarely get stuck with it.

Of course caravan formation doesn´t work well with really many people, but usually You´ll be around 10 with pack animals, so that works. With more You probably want military formation, so You have everyone in sight, while with that the pack animals go first after the leader, which can be anyone - with caravan formation they have the same order than the squad panel, so the leader needs to be the first one.

Also use roads as said above as waypoints. Jogging speed has the additional benefit, that You know when someone is threatened as the leader will then switch to max speed. If You run at max speed by default, You need to look constantly for spawns, and can´t enjoy the environment that much.

If You want to make 100% sure that the pack animals won´t get stuck while traveling at higher speed - You need to carry them. But with using roads, jogging speed and caravan formation i rarely have them stuck.

[Majorita]

I keep my travelling squads limited to small elite groups of 4-5 typically, and I usually spend 99% of my time focused on them unless I absolutely must look at my base, or my travellers are in a safe location (inside an abandoned house no patrol is ever going to go inside of, or a city).

On the move I just use the setting that makes your guys walk together at the speed of the slowest runner, and then use one of my guys to pick up the slowest guy, specifically if he is limping (3km/h). I don't do any bodyguarding/following etc.

I also second the motion to pick up a pathfinding mod, specifically this one...

https://www.nexusmods.com/kenshi/mods/602

[magne.moe]

Originally posted by Bomb Bloke:

Travelling by map does make it more likely that your people will randomly stop before reaching their destination. Long story short, the path finding mechanisms are a lot more reliable when the camera is present.

But as far as I've observed, the location of the camera doesn't affect combat at all.

My shot-in-the-dark guess is that your problems relate to water. Swimming makes you vulnerable to creatures, and wading leaves you exposed to pretty much everything.

This, you can even learn the stopping points. Border to the fog land is one, game find an path from scraphouse to Mongrel but then give up 3/4 of the way, and stop in an place with lots of HN patrols. From here you can not target Mongrel as you will not move, you have to target somewhere halfway and then you can target Mongrel.
In short path finding is a bit buggy

[Elgodeorn]

Thanks for all the advices, i'll try to sort it out using a bit of everything. I'll probably try on a pathfinding mod just to stop micromanaging walking into acid, can't hurt.
Overall i get that travelling is a part of the game and i should watch over it, but high speed travel is kinda anoying since i spend more time loading the game than walking with my potato computer.
Guess i'll just have to walk less fast and try to enjoy the journey more.

[Synopse]

Originally posted by Elgodeorn:

since i spend more time loading the game than walking with my potato computer.

Have a look at this performance mod and the other mods mentioned in its description:
https://www.nexusmods.com/kenshi/mods/1216

I use all of them (except Re:Kenshi) and it is a diffence like day and night.
I even removed "Less folliage and rocks" from my list because of the good performance I get.

[Hatsune Neko Gaming]

Originally posted by Elgodeorn:

Guess i'll just have to walk less fast and try to enjoy the journey more.

plus it will lower loading times as it will give the game more time to see ahead.
we also never recommend using anything other then normal speed when out in the wilderness as higher speeds can get you killed.
we do recommend higher speeds only when sleeping. except in the wild, that can get you killed too. second highest speed is not as bad.

over all, kenshi's engine is old. that's why it has issues. they started working on the game over 20 years ago. game engine's where single threaded mostly back then. and that's what causes many of the games current issues.
make sure the game is installed onto a SSD, and you have 16gb of ram or more. that will help as well.

[magne.moe]

Originally posted by Elgodeorn:

Thanks for all the advices, i'll try to sort it out using a bit of everything. I'll probably try on a pathfinding mod just to stop micromanaging walking into acid, can't hurt.
Overall i get that travelling is a part of the game and i should watch over it, but high speed travel is kinda anoying since i spend more time loading the game than walking with my potato computer.
Guess i'll just have to walk less fast and try to enjoy the journey more.

You want the fast legs, with them you can outrun beak things, groups of them are very dangerous. Switch to character who is in combat. She just pulled 20 beak things, with an group it would be hide and meat for everyone :)

Also In combat, just moving trough rebirth so ignore, with speed legs nothing can hurt you while moving.

[magne.moe]

Originally posted by Elgodeorn:

Thanks for all the advices, i'll try to sort it out using a bit of everything. I'll probably try on a pathfinding mod just to stop micromanaging walking into acid, can't hurt.
Overall i get that travelling is a part of the game and i should watch over it, but high speed travel is kinda anoying since i spend more time loading the game than walking with my potato computer.
Guess i'll just have to walk less fast and try to enjoy the journey more.

Being fast make you safe, traveler is in combat: wow that was an huge group of beak things, luckily I'm faster than them. 70+ athletics + scout legs make you very immune to danger even passing trough Bad teeth or Rebirth, you take no damage unless you stop.