Re: What makes you visible?

**=Sarc=** · 12-30-2008, 01:31 PM

Originally Posted by Morganan

Only you see your flashlight to begin with. The infected dont see it, your teammates dont see it, nobody else does but you. The flashlight is a dynamic light, and dynamic lights are only processed in this game on the client side and even that depends on your settings.

You can test it out yourself, go in a dark area that normally would require you to use a flashlight to see. Turn your flashlight off and try and use your teammates flashlights to see, you will notice rather quickly it doesnt work. You will see your teammates flashlight being on, but it will not give off any light for you to see by.

The infected on the other hand have their "flashlight" always on, but it doesn't use dynamic lights, it just increases ambient lighting in their viewing area. Infected players due to higher ambient lighting effects don't see flashlights at all.

Enjoy

I know this. However, even without the dynamic light from another player's flashlight it is still easy to tell whether the person is using a flashlight or not. Plus, I thought it affected the outline shown to infected players or affects the behaviour of regular zombies.

**Avs** · 12-30-2008, 05:16 PM

Originally Posted by Boot

This is great stuff. Now this said, it must not be that only outline alone is important when sneaking past the witch. I have startled the witch crouch walking past her on a couple occasions. Any comments?

She has a cone of visibility that starts at the direction she is facing and moves outwards of about 15 feet.

A flashlight on her will trigger spook + trigger her, especially if you shine it on her face (as opposed to on her back, which will spook her [thats what they say anyways]).

It does not matter how fast you move around her, as long as you are not moving near (3 feet of her back, or 15 feet of her front) her. This being said, its easy to avoid the witch if shes facing away from your team or the area you need to pass through. You can also run past her at close distances (3 feet), without spooking her since she needs to get up etc. This is based on three triggers, so if you all run past her as one group, it counts as 1 trigger instead of each person triggering her separately. The only problem is, any disturbance + infected hitting her will immediately switch her to "high alert", which will change her vision to 360 degrees and attack as soon as she spots a survivor (usually immediately if you guys are near and visible).

**TheFeniX** · 12-30-2008, 05:24 PM

Originally Posted by Boot

This is great stuff. Now this said, it must not be that only outline alone is important when sneaking past the witch. I have startled the witch crouch walking past her on a couple occasions. Any comments?

We're you looking at her? As in, was she visible on your screen?

**Boot** · 12-30-2008, 10:02 PM

Originally Posted by TheFeniX

We're you looking at her? As in, was she visible on your screen?

Sometimes yes and sometimes no. I see where you're going but I think Avs has it all in his post.

Originally Posted by Avs

She has a cone of visibility that starts at the direction she is facing and moves outwards of about 15 feet....

Ok, good explanation. I have been more successful waiting for her to go back to crying before trying to sneak past.

Originally Posted by Avs

any disturbance + infected hitting her will immediately switch her to "high alert", which will change her vision to 360 degrees and attack as soon as she spots a survivor (usually immediately if you guys are near and visible).

Yah, this has happened too... hunter jumped on me from right next to her. I was dead within seconds.

**twiddilywink** · 01-08-2009, 03:19 PM

I have noticed if you shine a flashlight in the face of a common infected, it does startle them and they rush, but you can look at them all you want with the flashlight off. So it still can be good if you can see.

Also on the witch issue, ive noticed that if lets say 2 of your guys are dead and its just 2 people left, or maybe 3 might work too, you can just run straight past the witch as long as you aren't too close, but she won't attack. But then you always has the independent thinker who shoots her, but you can be safe until then. Lol But that isn't smart either, and for some reason, if you crouch up on her, she freaks out still. So its mainly where she is that matters what you do

**Avs** · 01-08-2009, 06:26 PM

Originally Posted by twiddilywink

I have noticed if you shine a flashlight in the face of a common infected, it does startle them and they rush, but you can look at them all you want with the flashlight off. So it still can be good if you can see.

Also on the witch issue, ive noticed that if lets say 2 of your guys are dead and its just 2 people left, or maybe 3 might work too, you can just run straight past the witch as long as you aren't too close, but she won't attack. But then you always has the independent thinker who shoots her, but you can be safe until then. Lol But that isn't smart either, and for some reason, if you crouch up on her, she freaks out still. So its mainly where she is that matters what you do

Right. Flashlights might not matter for visibility, but this does attract infected.

In fact, sound, movement, visibility, etc all affect normal infected alert. There are also different alert levels for infected (at least thats what I want to say). What I mean is, an infected sleeping on the ground is less likely to get up and attack you compared to a zombie just standing in front of you. Part of this is because the zombie standing up isnt lying around on the ground, but this is also because it is "awake" (as compared to one that is resting by leaning on the side of a wall).

Anyways, the point is that when you move fast, shoot close to, or flash your light on normal infected, they might take notice of you (definitely if they are already facing your direction).

Witch:

It makes sense that the more people near her should stack the amount of disturbance caused in the general vicinity. However, this does not apply in L4D. You can run past her with all 4 people all at the same time if you really want to just get past her quickly (even if this has to be done in front of her, as long as no special infected are there to ruin your day). There is no difference in the speed that she will get up as long as everyone is in and then out of her radius.

**calavera999** · 07-04-2009, 07:36 PM

I never knew that you could take advantage of a feature like that... I feel quite stupid.

So you can enter a stealth mode which makes you harder to see? Does this effect general infected from seeing you or just purely something to exploit during Versus?

**WhiskeySix** · 07-05-2009, 09:45 AM

Just versus... you're outline disappears to those playing special infected.

In coop, turning off your flashlight makes you less noticable to common infected (i.e. you can get closer to them without them charging you)

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