Villager pathing AI

[Believe]

So I recently got rid of the brick fencing surrounding my town square and instead put a waterfall behind it. I noticed immediately that this changed the pathing of my villagers who often got stuck inside it and they are now walking around the perimeter a bit more, though they still seem to get stuck behind the waterfall at times? (Sometimes they just walk into a wall nonstop).

This made me think that maybe other parts of my island are seeing less activity because I essentially walled it off with either fencing or bushes outside of a small entrance. What are your thoughts on it? Currently I expanded some of these entrances from 2 tiles to 4 tiles and am hoping to see them use them a bit more~

 

[minimoon]

I have an orange grove with a hedge fence around it and only one square entrance, but my villagers are always hiding in there! They just love sitting under trees though.

 

[Sheep Villager]

Villager pathing is honestly kind of weird in this game. I have a few spots where the villagers will just walk in to a cliff wall when the ramp is right next to them.

I've also had a few animals start the day on an area that isn't connected to a bridge or a ramp. No way to get there without ladder or pole. They typically spend the entire day there, just stuck walking in circles.

I've heard animals walks more on paths (not custom ones, just the in-game premade ones), but I haven't tested if it would get them to properly use ramps and go in to certain areas. It's worth a shot if you haven't tried it yet.​

 

[Believe]

I have an orange grove with a hedge fence around it and only one square entrance, but my villagers are always hiding in there! They just love sitting under trees though.

Interesting.. do you know roughly how big your grove is by any chance?

Villager pathing is honestly kind of weird in this game. I have a few spots where the villagers will just walk in to a cliff wall when the ramp is right next to them.

I've also had a few animals start the day on an area that isn't connected to a bridge or a ramp. No way to get there without ladder or pole. They typically spend the entire day there, just stuck walking in circles.

I've heard animals walks more on paths (not custom ones, just the in-game premade ones), but I haven't tested if it would get them to properly use ramps and go in to certain areas. It's worth a shot if you haven't tried it yet.​

I find mine typically walk on premade paths, but then always avoid a certain crossway and just walk back and forth on the same ones. Most of mine properly go up ramps (I think?) or at least I find them on inclined areas.

 

[Miss Misty]

My villagers tend to stick to a fairly small area. There is a clifftop area with hybrids with no ramp (on the rare days it doesn't rain, I don't want to worry about them watering things that don't need watered), but that's basically it as far as places they can't access. They still never go to the left side of my island at all, and I rarely see them on the right side of the island past the bridge. Maybe it's because my residential area, RS, and shopping area are all close together, but they don't really wander very much.

 

[Uffe]

I mostly see my villagers just near their homes, at the town hall plaza, and near the rivers fishing. I don't really see them any other place. I have yet to see any actually go to the campsite. I have a dirt road that goes up, turn to the right, go down, then go right again. I've never seen them go through those paths. I also have fences around the area, and the roads I create are 2 x 2, which are open for walking on.

 

[minimoon]

Interesting.. do you know roughly how big your grove is by any chance?


I find mine typically walk on premade paths, but then always avoid a certain crossway and just walk back and forth on the same ones. Most of mine properly go up ramps (I think?) or at least I find them on inclined areas.

It's 5x7 not including the fence and it's right outside a row of houses, so that's probably why they're in there a lot. Although it's right next to a park with benches that they never sit on Daisy Mae likes to hide in there too.

 

[Rosch]

I had a park directly south of their neighborhood yet I've rarely seen my villagers in there. I have straight paths that go around my island but all they want is to plop down under the orange trees by the airport entrance or crowd around the Resident Services.

 

[Arrei]

My villagers definitely prefer following the roads. I've never witnessed them walking into walls or anything, and all of my inclines are nestled into a cliff instead of jutting out so they've never had issues using them. I can often catch them heading to a location of interest, either one of their neighborhoods, the plaza, or occasionally my player home plaza even.

They don't seem to go near the museum very often, though. I'd thought that would have been a point of interest because before we unlocked terraforming I'd seemed to see them loitering around it in its original location south of my plaza, but it's rare to ever see someone wander there. While there's a path there from the main road, it doesn't loop back around to my second residential zone, instead leading to an incline going down to the beach, so perhaps they simply don't see much purpose in going over there? Maybe I should try playing around with the paths there...

I'm curious about whether villagers will following stepping stone style pathways as well as they do solid ones?