[Responded] Random Encounter quest NPC is dead

06/05/2020 00:10
Title: Random Encounter quest NPC is dead
Reproduction Rate: 50%
Blocker? yes/no
Details: The special Quest giver/item seller npc that shows up sometimes at the end of a random road encounter has been killed by aggressive npc.
This is an observation and may not be a bug but seems wrong. On the encounters that have " A great Threat" at the end. Typically one of the enemy npc's is the trigger that sends in the great threat, usually but not always the last enemy you kill. The special NPC comes in after you kill the threat. However, if the threat was triggered before all other aggressive npc's are killed the remaining npc's will attack and kill the special one when it arrives. This prevents you from getting the survey/slip/prayer card, or buying the stuff they would have sold you. So it is a blocker in that it prevents you from reaping the reward of that special NPC. And it is not a blocker to continued play but more of an annoyance. Since you have no choice but to fight the threat as it runs right up and attacks you , it is very difficult to defend the special NPC.
Steps to Reproduce: This situation is definitely repeatable under the above stated conditions.
User Specs:
OS: Windows 10 (10.0.0) 64bit
CPU: Intel(R) Core(TM) i5-6600K CPU @ 3.50GHz (4) System RAM: 16334
GPU: NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1070 Ti GPU RAM: 8079
SotA.Win.64.1229.Date.06.03.20
Area: RandomEncounter_Plains01_Road/HumanBandits
Area Display Name: Plains Road Encounter
Loc: (-45.0, 40.7, 9.4)
Debug: UmFuZG9tRW5jb3VudGVyX1BsYWluczAxX1JvYWR8SHVtYW5CYW5kaXRzfCgtNDUuMDI4LCA0MC42ODgsIDkuMzU5KXwoMCwgMC4xMjUsIDAsIDAuOTkyKXwtMzQwLjg1ODl8MzAuOTUwOTF8MTg=

 

Not really a bug. At least I don't think it is. You just need to be sure to kill all of the lower-level NPCs that might attack that quest/sales NPC before killing the higher-level NPCs. That quest/sales NPC won't spawn until the high-level ones are taken out.

You get the "hang" of doing that and it's pretty easy, actually.

 

Ordinarily I would agree. However, in this case in the random encounters the initial npcs are all relatively the same. ie. they are all low level. On many occasions the zombie or thug right next to the spawn in point is the trigger. The problem is that the special NPC like the bounty hunter comes is with stock statement you killed my ____. so here is you slip you eared it not me. They fight like a vanity pet. so die to anything they encounter. I believe that the intent is for them to come in when "the coast is clear" so to speak, but they are triggered by the death of the second wave "THREAT" npc and not absents of threat. As I said in my bug post it more of an annoyance that a true bug simply a procedural error. The special npc is meant to be a reward for clearing the encounter that you sometimes get and not something you have to defend.

 

This is intentional: https://www.shroudoftheavatar.com/f...efore-it-was-all-clear-and-was-killed.155941/

Just be sure to get rid of all the incidental (low level creatures) before triggering the wave battles.

 

The catch here is that it is killing the low-level creatures that is the trigger for the wave battle. However, in all of these encounters there is a main group that can almost always be left alone, while you circle around and take out the outliers. Those outliers will never (in my experience) trigger the wave and it is those outliers that have the greatest risk of killing the quest NPCs when they spawn. Just make sure you take out the outliers before engaging with the main group.

 

Yeah, if you didn’t know, for the overland Bandit encounters, kill all the bandits in the scene except the ones near the campfire. As soon as you kill that group is when the wave battle starts.

You can easily kill all the bandits in the scene by ignoring the ones by the campfire.

 

Same thing for the skeleton encounter; kill all of the skele's and zombies before taking out the cultists. In the Mistrendur elf encounter use the same tactic as the bandit encounter.

And of course "ignore" means ... avoid them because if they aggro on you you'll have to run to the far corner of the zone so they run back home; otherwise they will all attack you and then, well ... there you go.