Forum:Why does blinding bats work?

< Forum:Watercooler

Don't they use sonar? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Wingnut583 (talk • contribs)

I was thinking this same thing fairly recently! A tooled horn, bugle, etc. should "blind" them! Contrary to common belief, bats are not blind. Some species do not have terribly great vision, but most see just fine. Even during the day, they have rather good vision. So, they could be blinded by a flash of light. However, they should be able to use their sonar after being blind (in NetHack). Would be neat to see this implemented, and the only true way to blind a bat would be: a.) flash of light, then b.) loud noise. --User (talk) 02:23, 8 December 2021 (UTC)

Apparently in the biodiversity patch "gnomes and bats use echolocation", but I'm not sure precisely how this works. Tomsod (talk) 04:35, 8 December 2021 (UTC)

That was mine, and so long ago I don't remember exactly how it works (even glancing at the code) or even if I did then how I'd do it now. IIRC: Bats/gnomes had echolocation for both players and monsters. There was a distance restriction, and a line of sight restriction. Players saw a dark gray I, monsters detected like telepathy. Echolocation would work when blind, but not deaf. Wearing a towel as a blindfold blocks echolocation for the player. I started playing again this year, and that's one of the things I'd like to update/redo. --Lamarck (talk) 23:32, 21 December 2021 (UTC)

Bats have eyes for sight, it's just poor and not their primary tool of navigation. --Umbire the Phantom (talk) 00:29, 18 December 2021 (UTC)

This is incorrect and a common misconception/belief. As previously stated, there are a few species that have lesser eyesight, but even those see rather well—-even during the day. They use sonar at dusk to help them locate a lot of bugs that are more active at this time. --User (talk) 06:00, 18 December 2021 (UTC)

Right, right, misread. --Umbire the Phantom (talk) 08:30, 19 December 2021 (UTC)