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Scholar
Original Poster
#1 Old 31st Jul 2016 at 10:40 AM
Default Hoverbots are SLOWER than leg bots
So I kept reading all over the place stuff like "omg, hover bots move between lots at the same speed as a windcarver." Which sounded pretty good. So I made DAISY 2.0, my new main sim, with a hover-skirt thingie.

But being the empyrical kind, it occurs to me to TEST it. I mean, it's a testable prediction: a hover-bot should arrive at another lot faster than the same bot with legs. We can do the science thing and test it.

So I have DAISY 2.0 at the supplies store in China, pause and save the game. Each time quit, reload the game (so everything in memory is the same), tell her to go to the halls of the lost army via the star icon on the town view, so the destination point is always exactly the same. Unpause. It starts at 10:21 AM. Let's see at what time they stop.

This, BTW, being with a bot with 10 athletic and 10 future tech skill. You know, since the former affects running and the latter affects the windcarver.

Spoiler: no, hoverbots they flipping aren't faster. Au contraire. Here are the arrival times.

Hover Bot: 10:56 AM
Leg Bot: 10:54 AM
Hover Bot with Windcarver: 10:48 AM

Note that if the difference seems small, it's mostly because of the lots of stairs which the hover-bot and leg bot climb at the same speed, and aren't too fast to climb with a windcarver either. For the distance between the store stairs and tomb stairs, the speed difference is actually much larger. The hover-bot is actually significantly slower than a 10 athletic leg bot, and both are MUCH slower than a windcarver.

At a quick impression, the hoverbot actually seems on par with a fairy in a straight line. Which looks fast, but actually is slower than a 10 Athletic human running.

I'll probably run further tests on some longer routes, but I expect similar results.
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Mad Poster
#2 Old 31st Jul 2016 at 10:46 AM
Hoverbots are simply reskinned Sims, much like the normal legged bots. They actually just walk, but have no animated legs and therefore appear to float.

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Scholar
Original Poster
#3 Old 31st Jul 2016 at 11:32 AM Last edited by Moraelin : 31st Jul 2016 at 11:55 AM.
Not really, no. Well, ok, technically they ARE reskinned sims, but there are lots of sim animations to choose from, and they're not always the same as a plain human. In this case: When walking, yes. When running, no. Sorry.

You can check it by changing them from hover to legs while they're running from one place to another, e.g., using NRaas -> Master Controller -> Stylist. Then look at their legs. They're just hanging behind.

They're NOT just running, they're using something more like the fairy floating animation when "running." Hence, it CAN, and as measured it actually DOES, have a different speed than when using the running animation.

Essentially, yes, they're reskinned sims, but the floating ones are actually a reskinned fairy.
Mad Poster
#4 Old 1st Aug 2016 at 9:00 PM
Well IIRC different walking/running animations have different speeds so yes, they vary. But the Hoverbot, much like the Fairy, is simply a Sim with a different model, different animations and a filter that makes their voice sound synthesized.

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Scholar
Original Poster
#5 Old 1st Aug 2016 at 9:05 PM
Well, that IS true. And in the end everything is just skeleton animations and coordinate deltas anyway. But my point was a lot less philosophical than whether robots are really just sims like the rest of us or not It was merely which of the two animations gets them from point A to point B faster. A lot of people seem to assume that hoverbots would get there faster, especially on EA's boards. I just wanted to say that my measurements say otherwise.
Scholar
Original Poster
#6 Old 1st Aug 2016 at 10:05 PM
Ok, so I decided to try again, this time on a flat stretch of run between two quest dudes in Egypt. No stairs, no car ride stretches, no walking stretches, no pedestrians in the way, just RUN. In case it wasn't clear the first time, each time it's the same robot running alone, not two robots, so they don't get in each other's way. Game starts paused, queue the destination, unpause, pause again when the robot stops running.

Start Time: 11:26

Leg-Bot: 11:44
Hover-Bot: 11:49

The difference is 18 minutes vs 23 minutes, so basically the leg bot speed is almost 28% faster than the hover-bot speed. Within the accuracy limits of the game timer.

Still, it's a HUGE difference. I expected some difference, but not this huge.
Mad Poster
#7 Old 2nd Aug 2016 at 4:06 PM
Quote: Originally posted by Moraelin
The difference is 18 minutes vs 23 minutes, so basically the leg bot speed is almost 28% faster than the hover-bot speed. Within the accuracy limits of the game timer.

Just wondering, have you eliminated all other factors? Are they taking the exact same route, are they stopping or avoiding anything?

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Scholar
Original Poster
#8 Old 2nd Aug 2016 at 4:26 PM
Exact same route, nobody in the way, no stopping or avoiding anything. I also ran it some 3 times with the leg bot and twice with the hover-bot, and got identical results.
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