Bug: bullets hit own cover

[D13]

In this situation, my bullet hit the concrete block right in front of the merc. Yes, the result is the same as a simple miss, but it feels infinitely more frustrating. Even more so because the rifle is clearly above the concrete, with its end protruding, and I was as close to the concrete block as the game would let me. And to be clear, I hit the concrete, not those metal prongs (they are not in the way anyway)

This is not simply a visual issue. Here a merc is firing from the edge of a roof, only for the bullet to destroy the roof, causing the merc to fall down into the building:

 

During THQ Nordic's release stream last Friday, they wanted to show how to fire from the roof of the pub in Ernie village. They aimed at an enemy below, and the bullet went right into the brick wall on top of the roof. If it happens even to a developer then I don't think I'm doing anything wrong, but I'm open to suggestions. Besides, it's also occasionally happening to enemies when they shoot from behind cover.

[Uncle Nick]

 

Nice flanking bonus perk! Did your Kalyna aim down the sights upto 10AP? How's the condition of the gun 90%-100%? Kalyna is s a very reliable shot; but the mercs do miss once in awhile, put it down to 'human error'. Buns always says something funny when she misses like "Let's pretend you didn't see that" or something along those lines.  

 

 

[Grim]

AFAIK, you missed, and the random deviation made your weapon hit the concrete cover.
If the body part you shoot is clear (as the head in your example), a success on the hit roll will garantee you hit that body part. If you hit something else, it was a miss.

[Uncle Nick]

Yes, game devs knew exactly what they were doing, and were screwing around with us. 

They put the merc deploy areas here:

1> Building on the right, on top of the flimsy tin rooftop.

2> Building on the left with the solid balcony, deploys on the ground level near the building.

3> Next to the Machine Gun emplacement.

 

So naturally, we are going to deploy snipers on top of the flimsy tin rooftop. What happens? Enemy shoots thru ceiling, hits Buns. Wounded Buns shoots back down at the enemy thru the flimsy tin roof. Bullet makes a big hole in the roof, roof hole gets bigger and collapses, Buns falls thru the big hole down onto ground floor level. 

 

YES GAME DEVS, YOU GOT ME! Ha Ha HA.   

[D13]

I'm totally fine with missing, but in a situation like that, the bullet should never hit the concrete block (nor should it make the roof collapse in the video). No matter how bad the merc, aim, and gun condition (maybe if the entire gun blows up). But yes, max aim and gun condition above 90%. Hitting my own cover robbed me of the small chance of hitting another enemy, or a landmine (or at least Herman  😇).

It's hard to imagine Kalyna was sneezing because of the rich Grand Chien vegetation 🤧 or that she had sweaty palms because of Igor and then dropped the rifle while firing 🥰

[Uncle Nick]

Both our Kalyna are in similar postions, but my Kalyna hit her targets and got the kills. What are the blue colour torso icons in the info description in your screenshot? Mine were the standard usual block shot and graze icons.  

[D13]

Blue color torso means risk of friendly fire (usually own merc or NPC/civilian in line of fire, in this case Herman).

If I reload my savegame I can also get other outcomes, from normal miss to headshot.

[BossWeapons]

The same has happened in my game too, on many occasions. Instead, to me it's happened multiple times when my snipers are prone behind sandbags or some such very low cover obstacle. The aim indicator says no parts of my target are obstructed. Groin, arms, torso and head, legs, everything's in the open. With full aim the sandbag just eats the bullet.

I don't think it's just random deviation and if it is, then my game must be cursed. The devs have said there is a full bullet simulation taking place once a shot is made. I'd vager there's just some funkyness happening with the collision and/or physics calculations for the bullet. Or perhaps the LoS is not displayed entirely accurately in all cases.

[D13]

On 7/17/2023 at 5:53 PM, BossWeapons said:

to me it's happened multiple times when my snipers are prone behind sandbags or some such very low cover obstacle. The aim indicator says no parts of my target are obstructed. Groin, arms, torso and head, legs, everything's in the open.

Just happened to me on a FLAT surface (slight downhill slope towards a beach). Sniper shot into the ground right in front.

Then in the following turn this happened, I wonder if it could be related:
 

Above, burst fire can hit any body part.

But single shots to arms/torso/groin are somehow blocked:

[Melliores]

There is a simulation of bullet physics. The game takes into effect the penetration of the bullet and how hard any obstacles are along the way. For example shooting with an Anaconda with armor piercing rounds has a Heavy penetration rating. The shot interface said it was a clear shot and Barry was right next to a window. Next to the window there was parked car and the enemy was hiding just next to its trunk.

Barry produces the shot - the bullet goes through the wall, pierces the car and hits the enemy. The enemy is killed, the car explodes and the wall is no more. Barry is also slightly wounded due to the explosion.

Morale of the story - do not rely to heavily on the shooting interface and check your surroundings. Even if the bullet hits the target its trajectory can destroy your own cover or flooring. Also AP rounds can be really powerful in urban environments.

[Uncle Nick]

39 minutes ago, Melliores said:

1 hour ago, D13 said:

...Just happened to me on a FLAT surface (slight downhill slope towards a beach). Sniper shot into the ground right in front....

 

What gun was the sniper using? The aim reticle circle is so big, you could drive a bus thru that. 5AP is going to be a miss. 6AP probably hit in burst fire but will do little damage. IMO, if you use 8AP, that's not even enough for a sniper shot. You just don't have enough AP. See my screenshot, sniper is using 10AP to get good effect on targets.  

[sandman25dcsss]

19 minutes ago, Uncle Nick said:

What gun was the sniper using? The aim reticle circle is so big, you could drive a bus thru that. 5AP is going to be a miss. 6AP probably hit in burst fire but will do little damage. IMO, if you use 8AP, that's not even enough for a sniper shot. You just don't have enough AP. See my screenshot, sniper is using 10AP to get good effect on targets.  

The circle has nothing to do with chance to hit, it shows just spent AP for extra aiming. You can have 100% CtH at huge circle from 5AP and 10% CtH at small circle from 10AP. Bonus CtH from extra aiming greatly depends on dexterity.

Edited July 21, 2023 by sandman25dcsss

[Uncle Nick]

Yes thanks, this is why i don't use CtH. Did you guys fully aim your shots? Look at my screenshot, i fully aim my sniper shots. Not clear if these guys did or not. 

Edited July 21, 2023 by Uncle Nick

[sandman25dcsss]

6 minutes ago, Uncle Nick said:

Yes thanks, this is why i don't use CtH. Did you guys fully aim your shots? Look at my screenshot, i fully aim my sniper shots. Not clear if these guys did or not. 

It is fine to play without CtH mod of course, just don't play based on wrong assumptions. Having no assumptions is better than having wrong assumptions.

[BossWeapons]

7 hours ago, D13 said:

Just happened to me on a FLAT surface (slight downhill slope towards a beach). Sniper shot into the ground right in front.

Then in the following turn this happened, I wonder if it could be related:
 

Above, burst fire can hit any body part.

But single shots to arms/torso/groin are somehow blocked:

This is exactly what I was implying. The indicator for obstruction might not display properly for all shots you take. I'm willing to accept that there's always a slight chance for a 95% to miss and then the merc just blasts the cover object when that happens, but it's happened the way I described so many times that I simply refuse to believe my best sniper with 90+ marksmanship and a gun modded to the hell and back would be willing to just shoot the cover next to them that often.

Then again, maybe I've just gotten very many unlucky rolls. It's always a possibility and now my bias is skewed.

[D13]

6 hours ago, Uncle Nick said:

What gun was the sniper using? The aim reticle circle is so big, you could drive a bus thru that. 5AP is going to be a miss. 6AP probably hit in burst fire but will do little damage. IMO, if you use 8AP, that's not even enough for a sniper shot. You just don't have enough AP. See my screenshot, sniper is using 10AP to get good effect on targets.  

This is not a matter of aim level, weapon or merc stats. In the scenario I described, an unobstructed sniper rifle shot from a flat surface should never end up in the tile right front of the sniper.

Please also note that I'm describing two separate situations: first the one with the sniper on the flat surface. And then the one from behind a rock with different obstruction indicators depending on single/burst fire.

[D13]

1 hour ago, BossWeapons said:

Then again, maybe I've just gotten very many unlucky rolls. It's always a possibility and now my bias is skewed.

Yes, but even that would not explain why the obstruction indicator for single shots shows obstruction and the one for burst doesn't. If anything, bursts should be more likely to hit an object due to lower accuracy.

If this is not considered a bug then I guess we should consider ourselves lucky when a merc does not hit their own leg. 😄

What concerns me is that this issue was known for many months prior to release but not fixed. I hope that does not mean they cannot fix it.

[Skaldy]

On 7/17/2023 at 5:25 PM, Uncle Nick said:

Yes, game devs knew exactly what they were doing, and were screwing around with us. 

They put the merc deploy areas here:

1> Building on the right, on top of the flimsy tin rooftop.

2> Building on the left with the solid balcony, deploys on the ground level near the building.

3> Next to the Machine Gun emplacement.

 

So naturally, we are going to deploy snipers on top of the flimsy tin rooftop. What happens? Enemy shoots thru ceiling, hits Buns. Wounded Buns shoots back down at the enemy thru the flimsy tin roof. Bullet makes a big hole in the roof, roof hole gets bigger and collapses, Buns falls thru the big hole down onto ground floor level. 

 

YES GAME DEVS, YOU GOT ME! Ha Ha HA.   

Tbh it is your fault. There is a thing called situation awareness in military. Basically your evaluation of battleground and enemies. Sub categories cover topics like measuring distance, choosing cover etc. Flimsy rooftop are not preferable materials for example, unless you have nothing to work with. Real life military expect you to do that evaluation in few seconds during combat since we dont have turn based combat after 18th century.

[Xeth Nyrrow]

On 7/21/2023 at 12:18 AM, D13 said:

Just happened to me on a FLAT surface (slight downhill slope towards a beach).

Ooof. This might be difficult for them to fix because of how their game engine is modeling bullet physics but something needs to be done to prevent this. Best way it to probably make shooters ignore all obstacles 1 tile away from them. Only issue is that a target hiding on the other side of a wall would be blasted through it. Definitely needs to be addressed though.

[D13]

Today I fired from a balcony, and that single shot took out not only the enemy, but also my cover and the floor:

 

I reloaded and experimented a bit, and I believe this shows what the problem is:

Note how a) the rifle is sticking out of the wall and b) the line of fire for my target aligns with the bottom edge of the resulting wall damage:

While aiming, the rifle problem becomes more visible (but no LoF here).

I don't mind the graphical glitch at all, but here the tactical impact is just too much.

If the issue is LoF calculation based on the mercs' hands, then perhaps changing the LoF starting point to the eyes would help?

 

[StoProGratis]

Happens to me sometimes. Port Cacao docks my machine gunner on the container shot two bursts into the container not the enemy.

[qianye]

Yesterday, my three soldiers lying on the wooden roof on the slope to shoot. As a result, their fire shot crushed the roof under their own, and caused themselves to fall and suffered damage.
This is really funny. It is difficult to imagine their conversation if it is a real scene.
Hope to repair it as soon as possible.

[marcinl0]

maybe new patch helps with this bug

[D13]

Another approach to solving this issue might be for the game to internally simulate a dozen shots. If any one of the simulated bullets were to hit an object other than the intended target within the first 1-2 tiles, then the game would show the obstruction indicator (brick wall icon).

Now the player could decide whether to take the shot, adjust stance, or aim at a different body part.

This should also apply when setting up Overwatch - it is frustrating to cover an area with Overwatch, only to find that when the enemy steps into it, every single Overwatch shot is blocked by the merc's own cover.

Edited August 5, 2023 by D13