So, basically, they don’t have any form of obstacle-avoiding pathing built-in to GM HTML5 (yet? ever? working as intended? not sure).
When I reported the various things that used to perform obstacle-avoidance as bugs, I was given a run-around that ended with “use grid pathing.”
However, the “grid pathing” basically just does “linear pathing” right now (the documentation doesn’t imply it’s going to change), which I don’t think should be called pathing at all. Paths have curves. “Linear pathing” is just a vector! And linear paths don’t curve around obstacles!
So I’m making my own pathing algorithm, it’s more like how I would navigate a non-magical labyrinth*, which is to put my hand on one wall and trace my way out. The basic idea, is when you hit an obstacle “hug the wall” until you get around it. More specifically, test two paths (hug the wall on your left and right), and if they eventually collide, you’re trapped and you should give up.
I know I could use an A* pathing algorithm, but it’s an exhaustive algorthim to find the shortest route, and I really would rather keep the frame-rate up than have really really really clever zombies that make great decisions to climb to you faster.
* I wouldn’t literally touch the wall of a magical labyrinth, probably has traps. My reflex save is bollocks.