What causes an AI state machine flickering between states?

Both states transition on the same threshold value, so when the input hovers right at that value the FSM flips back and forth every frame.

How do I catch this when it only happens for some players?

Capture it automatically from the player's device with the full stack trace, the device and OS, the build, and a breadcrumb trail of what they did. That turns a vague complaint into a specific, reproducible issue you can fix without owning the hardware it happens on.

How to Fix an AI State Machine Flickering Between States

Quick answer: Use two separate thresholds (enter and exit) so the transition has a dead band, and add a minimum dwell time in each state.

An enemy that snaps between Chase and Idle while the player stands at exactly the detection range is suffering from threshold flicker. Splitting the enter and exit distances stops the toggling. Here is how.

How to fix it

1. Add hysteresis with two thresholds

Enter Chase when the player is within 10 m but only leave Chase when they exceed 13 m. The gap between enter and exit prevents single-frame flips at one boundary.

2. Require a minimum dwell time

Block transitions for a short period after entering a state so the FSM cannot bounce out the same frame it bounced in.

3. Smooth the input signal

Filter the distance or perception value over a few frames before comparing it, so a momentary spike does not trigger a transition.

Catching the ones you can't reproduce

The hardest version of this to fix is the one you can't reproduce — it only happens on a player's hardware, OS, driver, or save state, under conditions that simply aren't present on your machine. A report that says “it crashed” or “it froze” gives you nothing to act on, so the bug survives release after release while quietly costing you players.

Automatic error capture closes that gap. Each failure arrives with its full stack trace, the device and OS, the build number, and a breadcrumb trail of what the player did right before it broke, so even a failure you have never seen becomes a specific, reproducible issue. Fold identical failures into one signature ranked by how many players each hits, and your worklist sorts itself worst-first instead of arriving as a stream of vague complaints.

This is where a tool like Bugnet earns its place. Its SDK captures every error automatically with the full stack trace plus device, OS, memory, build, and game-state context, folds duplicates into one grouped issue with an occurrence count, and ties each to the build it first appeared on — so you fix the problem that hurts the most players first and confirm it is gone when its signature disappears from the next release.

The bug you can't reproduce isn't gone — it's just invisible until you capture it from the player's device.