NPC are falling from the ceiling!

[TheRealPherion]

Seriously. Every time i try to pot a damn NPC inside a house is an epic battle. Either he falls from the ceiling or falls in infinity. I build the house, then i decided to add some NPC to it, and they just keep falling. How do i stop this? I have to move the house up and downs to see if they don't fall. But some just keep falling! I'm using a house with 3 floors. I pot them on the third floor and when you enter the house, their on the first floor stuck in walls/floor or spawn under the house! Seriously, this is really annoying. I've tried everything that i can think of and nothing!

 

I would really appreciate some help with this thing.

[Genzel]

Is the NPC securely placed within the house when you save? As long as the NPC is not in any walls or outside the house, I can't imagine what the problem is. Is the house a vanilla house used in the game, or did you make it yourself? You might want to check the the NPC's AI, maybe he is being told to walk long distances?

[David Brasher]

You need to path-grid your house properly, because actors only spawn right on levels with correct path-gridding. Otherwise they might show up on the wrong level of the house, or out in the void at the bottom of the cell.

 

Check to make sure that the house model you are using has good collision and works properly in the game when your character interacts with it. (See if your characters falls through floors and walks through walls.)

[TheRealPherion]

What i did was, just selecting a house model, pot some furniture and NPC. How do i do that path grid thing?

[Striker879]

Providing you have Toolbars enabled in your CS View menu you'll see a button with what looks like small orange squares connected by yellow lines (Pathgrid button). With your room or building open in the Render window, click the Pathgrid button and you'll see any paths that were copied when you started the house. If none show you can create your own path grid. Here's an excerpt from the CS Wiki tutorial A beginner's guide, lesson 3 - The external world (with emphasis added on the way you add points):

 

Path Grids (simple)

 

Select the pathgrid icon or choose World/ Edit cell pathgrid

We will notice a series of red diamonds linked by yellow lines. These are the path grids for this small interior space. Why do we need pathgrids at all?

The Artificial Intelligence (AI) for NPCs are determined by a number of function-oriented packages. One set of packages determine how NPCs move around the world. All NPCs use a simple set of criteria to move.

The diamonds represent points, called nodes. You can think of these as waypoints. The yellow lines represent the path between any two waypoints. Suppose the NPC wants to move from the far side of the room near the original bed position if you’ve already altered the furniture position in your cell look in the safe mode version.

The program will workout which nodes give the shortest route to the door. Generally they choose any safe route. The colour of the diamonds mark the priority.

The diamonds are safe places on which an actor can stand. The lines are valid paths to travel between these points.

Blue Points: The preferred travel path. When determining the path to travel, actors prefer to use blue points. Red Points: Normal points, hand placed. Orange Points: Automatically generated points. They act just like red points.

If two or more NPCs or the player occupy the cell, the NPCs have a problem. They need to move from the bed to the door, but they can’t walk through another NPC. The game checks the intended move from node to node and if it conflicts with an NPC, it will look for an alternate route. The more choices available the easier it is for the NPC to move. If you’ve ever come across NPCs who are following you but seem to lag behind and stop at random moments it’s usually because the pathing it needs to use is blocked by either other NPCs or your character.

So far so good. However NPCs are dumb. They don’t recognise walls, etc. until the collision detection tells them it's there. They can even clip through walls as they move. We need to make sure that the path we set down does not go through objects. This means editing the pathgrid to suit our house. The Path nodes can be dragged just like any object. We can also delete nodes by selecting it. A yellow band appears around the node and then press Delete.

To add a grid point, right click on the location in the render window. The point will appear at that point. Pathgrid points are always placed on surface. They are never placed floating.

To move a grid point, select it with the left mouse button and drag it. You can then use the "F" key to make it "fall" to the ground if necessary.

To set a priority Point (blue) Hold the ALT key and right click.

To add or remove a link, select a point with the left mouse button. While holding down the Ctrl key, select another grid point. A link is made. If a link already exists, it is removed.

Grid points can also be added with a link automatically placed with the previous grid point by holding the Ctrl key and right clicking on the point where the grid point should appear.

Carefully change the pathing. Try to set up at least two alternative routes around the room to link key spaces like chests chairs and bed. Make sure you have at least three ways to approach door nodes.

Switch off the pathing grid.

Finally make a note of the type of door in your cottage. In this case the Farmhousedoor01.

We are now ready to return to the exterior world and link our spaces.