Why and when to use navmeshagent ? And why some of them stop moving along the waypoints ?

Unity Engine
1

I can make a simple waypoints script that move a transform between the waypoints and I can make a navmeshagent to move between the waypoints. It seems like navmeshagent have everything needed for waypoints system. But in many cases I see very long and many scripts with path finding and math and complicated scripts for waypoints.

Why not just using navmeshagent all the time ? In what cases should I use navmeshagent ? navmeshagent is only for kind of patrolling ?

I have a simple waypoints script: I turned the autobraking on set it to true since I want the agents to slow down when getting close to the waypoint/s:

using System.Collections;
using System.Collections.Generic;
using UnityEngine;
using UnityEngine.AI;
public class AgentControl : MonoBehaviour
{
    public List<Transform> points = new List<Transform>();
    private int destPoint = 0;
    private NavMeshAgent agent;
    void Start()
    {
        agent = GetComponent<NavMeshAgent>();
        var agentsDestionations = GameObject.FindGameObjectsWithTag("Waypoint");
        for (int i = 0; i < agentsDestionations.Length; i++)
        {
            points.Add(agentsDestionations[i].transform);
        }
        // Disabling auto-braking allows for continuous movement
        // between points (ie, the agent doesn't slow down as it
        // approaches a destination point).
        agent.autoBraking = true;
        agent.speed = Random.Range(10, 50);
        GotoNextPoint();
    }
    void GotoNextPoint()
    {
        // Returns if no points have been set up
        if (points.Count == 0)
            return;
        // Set the agent to go to the currently selected destination.
        agent.destination = points[destPoint].position;
        // Choose the next point in the array as the destination,
        // cycling to the start if necessary.
        destPoint = (destPoint + 1) % points.Count;
    }

    void Update()
    {
        // Choose the next destination point when the agent gets
        // close to the current one.
        if (!agent.pathPending && agent.remainingDistance < 0.5f)
            GotoNextPoint();
    }
}

I didn’t change any other properties on the NavMeshAgent but the autobraking.
For testing I tried with 500 agents and 500 waypoints or 10 agents and 10 waypoints in both cases some of the agents get stuck/staying on a waypoint and not moving to the next waypoint/s. I can’t figure out why.

The red are the agents the blue are the waypoints.
The close 4 agents stay on the blue waypoint while the other agents keep moving between the waypoints.

So I have two wonders: When and why to use navmeshagent in waypoints ? And why some of them stop at a waypoint and not continue ?

2

Are they colliding with each other and not being able to actually reach “close enough” to the waypoint to consider it reached so they just sit there mosh-pitting against each other endlessly?

2 Likes
3

Yes . They are getting to the waypoint but not rotating to the next one. Instead they are all as group colliding each other and move in circle on spot. Just like you described it.

4

What happened when you tried increasing the distance allowable from a waypoint?

1 Like
5

It seems like that each time im increasing the distance they are moving better. Now the distance is 10.

1 Like