Gazelle chasing hints
Here are a few personal thoughts to complete and correct Safari wiki page.
First of all, the way gazelles react in atitd is completely predictable. I've learnt that it is possible to chase them down using a team of two people only, or even alone in the case of a favorable terrain ! Which can be very convenient when no one is available or willing to come and help you. That especially happens at the current state of the tale or when you happen to find a gazelle several thousand coordinates away from the nearest chariot stop.
general facts
Because of the way gazelles react, strong teamwork is, alas, not necessary preferable. Better have two people who place themselves in the right way than a dozen of them simply running after the animal.
A gazelle is in fact rather stupid, and i would compare it to a ball laying on a table :
- as long as you let the ball alone, it won't move : the gazelle too.
- when you push a ball using your finger, it will choose a direction and move. The gazelle will directly react by moving away in that direction when you approach it. That's why a whole team running behind a gazelle will never catch it.
- when the ball hits a wall, the ball rebounds against it and change direction. The gazelle never changes its direction once it has started to move, unless it hits a "wall" or someone.
Regular walls like compounds or hills don't affect gazelles. Gazelles can cross buildings and climb any hill, even those that a regular player can't climb. They only seem to be affected by people and wide lakes (they can cross most ponds).
Here is the behavior fomr the inside of the virtual brain of the animal :
- Hey, i can see something moving toward me. They're so dirty, I don't want to be touched !
- I've taken a 360° look and seen an empty path between two people there ! Let's go !
- I run straight - so fast that everyone around seems immobile - until i find a quiet place !
- I'm now quite far away from the group. I can stop moving now.
Each time a gazelle rebounds against someone or a lake, its tiredness level increases. A message is shown in the Main window of the person who caused the gazelle to rebound.
When the gazelle has been forced to rebounds a few times, it becomes really tired, and lay down. People then have less than 1 minute to tag the animal before it goes away and then disappear.
in summary : get the gazelle to rebounds against people or a lake a few times and the chase is over.
Advantages of small teams
I've learnt that it isn't more difficult to chase gazelles down using a small team than using a big one, so that if no one is willing to run the dozen thousand miles to come and help, that isn't a big deal at all. The chase should even be easier :
- easier to lead a small team than a big one. Less chance to have someone getting afk when the chase begins. Less people to chat during the chase (since some people pay attention to regional channel, other to main but this one has a low few coords range, and some others don't read messages at all :p)
- small team should be more reactive and more attentive
- only one player who keep running behind the animal (because of bad or no explanation(s)) can ruin the whole chase.
2 people strategy
No lake is required. Avoid steepy hills which may be difficult or impossible to climb. Player A stands on the left side of the gazelle ( a few coordinates away), player B on the right side.
One player runs (as a beater) and the other intercepts. Player A runs towards the gazelle until it rebounds against player B, which try to intercept the gazelle. Then the two players try to move in accordance with the general direction chosen by the gazelle (south in the example shown in the above picture). If the two players move fast enough, they can force the gazelle to rebound a few times.
Don't run together behind the gazelle ! If the gazelle runs away, stop and replace yourself correctly. You have time : gazelle's tiredness doesn't seem to reset even after a few minutes.
One people strategy
Strategy is identical, except that player B is replaced by a lake. As the lake can't run, you may have to stop running regularly and reposition yourself so that the gazelle rebounds a few times against you and the lake.
The only difficult part is to force the gazelle to run towards a lake if there aren't any nearby. In theory, a one person team can always tag the gazelle, but sometimes a wide enough lake is really far away and avoiding hills while forcing the animal to run towards may be quite difficult (baby steps take longer but can be more secure).
Hunting in group
When hunting in large groups (more than 3 or 4 peers), the most commonly chosen strategy is to circle the gazelle, standing in the distance, then running together toward the animal, as shown below :
The gazelle reacts by trying to evade from the circle. It will always try to find a path which prevents it to touch anyone. In practice, people don't tend to react quickly, since it's hard to sync many people, and the gazelle evades easily.
A much better group approach
Only one person needs to run towards the gazelle. His goal is to "push" the gazelle and force it to move and try to evade from the circle. Other people will then try to intercept the animal.
There is far less communication needed in the group : the leader only have to ask people to try to intercept the gazelle while he's the only one to run toward the animal. Everyone has only one role. Everyone must *stop* running as soon as the animal successfully evades from the circle. The gazelle may choose any "hole" in the circle as an escaping path, so everyone must be ready to react quickly.
The key is to always have people in front of the gazelle. Everyone running behind the animal, apart from being a funny Benny Hill like situation, doesn't help at all since you'll never catch it up. When that happens, everyone must stop and form another circle around the gazelle.