Visibility?

[Vertibird]

Hello, I have a few questions about visibility:
-Do animals have to see me physically in order to spot me? For example lets say I am standing up and there is a deer 20 meters away but there is something between us like a rock or a hill or large tree. Would the animal still spot me?
- Does animal viewing range diminish at night?
Thanks!

[yogisgoat]

Your visibility meter is under the health bar. If it's a full circle you are fully visible. Animals within 150m can see you easily. Half a circle means your outline is partially obscured. Animals can get quite close without seeing you, provided you don't move. If the meter is a horizontal line animals can get as close as 5m without seeing you, though they may smell you. And when the meter is blank I've actually had deer run into me before they saw me.

[DopaTrain]

I've often wondered this. It's hard to test since you don't really know if the animal has seen, heard or smelled you.

[Vertibird]

Originally posted by yogisgoat:

Your visibility meter is under the health bar. If it's a full circle you are fully visible. Animals within 150m can see you easily. Half a circle means your outline is partially obscured. Animals can get quite close without seeing you, provided you don't move. If the meter is a horizontal line animals can get as close as 5m without seeing you, though they may smell you. And when the meter is blank I've actually had deer run into me before they saw me.

So only visibility meter matters? They see through hills then.

[Geronimo]

What matters is that you try to be stealthy when you're hunting. You should be doing what you would do in a real life situation, not basing your action on game mechanics. It's supposed to be about immersion, not utilizing programming.

Yes, understanding the mechanics can make a huge difference in results, but my point is that if you are being stealthy, just like you would in real life, the mechanics are very in tune with the immersion.

For example, when stalking, don't worry so much about the visibility line and just focus more on using cover when you move, and staying out of the sunlight. Move intermittently so you're footsteps aren't announcing the repetitive sound of the human. Stopping every 40 yards or so to glass around will accomplish that break in your pace, while also allowing you to spot game.

It doesn't really matter whether or not the mechanics allow for animals to see through trees or rocks, if you're going to be using them as you naturally would anyway. Right? It's not like doing so is going to make it worse.

Think and act like you're engaged in a real hunt and the game will cooperate.

Now, other than when you're just stalking through an area trying to locate game, there are situations when understanding the mechanics does come into play, regardless of your efforts to be stealthy.

Once you've become aware of potential game nearby, your ability to use the mechanics to maintain your stealth is key to success. For example, if you've positioned yourself into a bush, or next to a tree, keeping an eye on that visibility meter ensures whether or not you can be spotted.

When that line is flat, you can't be seen, but you cannot take one step. You can turn, but you can't move in any direction.

If the line disappears, than you can move without being seen, but you have to watch for that line to reappear and stop immediately as it does. And in some cases, that radius of motion is only a step or two.

The same with being prone. You have to understand that an invisible line on that meter will change suddenly if you're moving, even when crawling.

You might be invisible when still, and might remain invisible when crawling slowly, but using that fast crawl pace can often change that visibility line.

Alot of players think that if they're crawling they can't be seen, but whenever that line is visible, you are also potentially visible.

Knowing which types of brush, bushes, and trees will actually get that line where you want it to be can be a great bonus to your success.

But it's basically about knowing when and where to go into full stealth mode as opposed to just trying to travel across terrain without alerting every animal in the forest as you go.

Yes, it matters how far away animals will spook, and whether or not mechanics are triggered in your favor, but it's not as much about exact numbers as it is about always being stealthy in the first place.

There's all sorts of estimates about how close you can get before spooking with the ATV or when running, but if you are determined to be stealthy, and really want to be successful, are you going to push all the way to that breaching point, or are you going to go stealthy a bit sooner.

Thinking this way will be what matters most. Not whether or not programming allows an animal to see you through a tree or a hill.

[SpidersInABirthdayCake]

Originally posted by Vertibird:

Originally posted by yogisgoat:

Your visibility meter is under the health bar. If it's a full circle you are fully visible. Animals within 150m can see you easily. Half a circle means your outline is partially obscured. Animals can get quite close without seeing you, provided you don't move. If the meter is a horizontal line animals can get as close as 5m without seeing you, though they may smell you. And when the meter is blank I've actually had deer run into me before they saw me.

So only visibility meter matters? They see through hills then.

They tend to hear you before they see you if you're going through vegetation. Visibility and sound are the two biggest factors. Try to always have the wind blowing in your face as well so the only animals that will smell you are behind you.

[Findus]

Originally posted by Vertibird:

So only visibility meter matters? They see through hills then.

Yes, they can see though hills, vegetation etc.

Originally posted by Geronimo:

For example, when stalking, don't worry so much about the visibility line and just focus more on using cover when you move, and staying out of the sunlight. [...] It doesn't really matter whether or not the mechanics allow for animals to see through trees or rocks, if you're going to be using them as you naturally would anyway. Right? It's not like doing so is going to make it worse.

That might be good advise for roleplaying, but you should mainly worry about the visibility line. In real life, you'd not go right through the vegetation and would try to break the line of sight by staying hidden behind a ridge or bushes. That doesn't work in the game and is also counterintuitive so it's worth pointing it out.
Also, it doesn't matter if you are in the sunlight or in shadow. We talked about that briefly in the past and I've tested it since then (with the usual caveat that I play with an older version of the game). Day or night doesn't seem to matter for animals as well. Cover behaves additively, so if you are between several trees, they might create the illusion of you being less visible because you are in "shadow".

Originally posted by Geronimo:

Move intermittently so you're footsteps aren't announcing the repetitive sound of the human. Stopping every 40 yards or so to glass around will accomplish that break in your pace, while also allowing you to spot game.

That's good advise. Also a good opportunity to listen for animal movement.
Basically, the attention meter of the animals is at least partly reset if the noise or visual stimulus stops. Imagine it like a glass of water with a small hole at the bottom. If nothing happens, the water level will slowly drop. The more intense and/or continuous a stimulus is, the quicker it will fill and finally overflow.

Originally posted by Geronimo:

When that line is flat, you can't be seen, but you cannot take one step.

This probably means that it won't be a line any longer, but just to clarify: In line with the advise above, you often can do one step, or one step several times as long as you pause between them. If the visibility or noise meter only goes up for a moment, you can usually get away with it, unless the attention meter of the animal is already close to being maxed out.

Originally posted by SpidersInABirthdayCake:

[
They tend to hear you before they see you if you're going through vegetation.

Probably true if you are crouching, not necessarily if you are walking, though. The biggest advantage animals have over you in dense vegetation or wherever the line of sight is blocked is vision (while it's the other way round in open terrain). Sound tends to be overestimated at times because so many animals are listed as having been scared by sound in the codex. This is mostly due to gunshots, though.
Of course, some of the species have rather poor eyesight.

One thing to look out for when moving through foliage are the particle effects (basically the equivalent to the animals throwing up particle when moving quickly through the underbrush. Not sure if they are just a symptom or are really noticed by animals directly, but it's a good indicator that you are moving too fast at the moment.

So it's a constant re-evaluation of the current situation. How fast do I want to move? Do I think an animal might be nearby? Do I care at the moment? Do I want to be as stealthy as possible, but for the price of seeing less myself? If the terrain is open enough, I find it often makes sense to opt for fast crouching but avoiding vegetation. That's for bushland. If the terrain is completely open, or open enough to see most of the surrounding, then running is obviously the most efficient choice. You'll see animals long before they notice you.