BeeOverlay

BeeOverlay visualizes RedLocustBees spatial checks for practicing the Bee AI Break glitch.

Compatibility

• Lethal Company v81 (2026-04-17 UTC, Manifest ID: 6423525044216269478)
  • Test environment
    • BepInExPack v5.4.2305 (2026-03-17 UTC)
    • LethalCompany InputUtils v0.7.13 (2026-03-31 UTC)

Screenshots

These screenshots were captured with a development build of v0.2.0.

Overview: Bee, hive, player, and known-hive spatial checks

Use case: Blocked bee-to-hive and bee-to-known-hive Sight checks

Bee AI Break glitch

Bee AI Break is the community name for a glitch in which players move a hive away from Circuit Bees without the bees recognizing that it is missing, which can make hive collection safer.

When the glitch is active, the bees stay calm. They do not become defensive merely because a player is nearby; they must also see that player inside the hive's defense radius.

While a Circuit Bee is near its hive, it leaves its calm behavior when either condition is met:

• Hive defense.
  • The bee sees a player within 16 units of the bee.
  • The player is within 10 units of the hive.
• Missing hive.
  • The bee-to-known-hive probe reaches the known-hive position:
    • The bee is less than 4 units away.
    • The bee is less than 8 units away with a clear probe line.

For Bee AI Break to work, both conditions must remain false while the hive is carried away. NavMesh boundaries or terrain features can sometimes make these conditions possible.

While carrying the hive away:

• Keep the player carrying the hive outside the bee's 16-unit sight range or block the bee-to-player sight line.
• Do not hold the hive while the bee is less than 4 units from its known-hive position.
• When the bee is 4 to less than 8 units from its known-hive position, block the probe line with solid cover.
• When the bee is 8 units or more from its known-hive position, it does not notice that a held hive is missing, but the 16-unit sight condition must still remain false.

BeeOverlay shows the relevant ranges, marker, and probe line without changing game behavior. See the Bee AI Break documentation for technical details.

What it does

• Displays HUD details for one selected RedLocustBees.
• Draws the bee, hive, known-hive position, and local-player spatial guides for one selected bee.
• Shows relevant sight, distance, and line-of-sight conditions without changing game behavior.

Who needs to install

Lobby hosts must install BeeOverlay. This prevents non-host players from using BeeOverlay's diagnostic features in a lobby without the host's knowledge.

Non-host players only need to install BeeOverlay when they want to use its diagnostic overlay. Their overlay remains disabled unless the lobby host has also installed BeeOverlay.

Usage

BeeOverlay starts with no bee selected, so it shows nothing.

Press Select Next Bee (B by default) to select bee:1, then bee:2, and so on. Pressing it after the last bee returns to no selection.

The binding can be changed through InputUtils in the in-game keybind menu.

Configuration

BepInEx creates BepInEx/config/com.aoirint.BeeOverlay.cfg after the first launch.

Setting	Default	Behavior
General.Enabled	true	Set to false to disable all BeeOverlay functionality.
General.AllowGuestEnabled	true	When hosting, allows non-host players to use BeeOverlay.
Overlay.Enabled	true	Shows BeeOverlay elements.
Overlay.HudEnabled	true	Shows the HUD status text.
Overlay.BeeMarkerEnabled	true	Shows bee markers.
Overlay.HiveMarkerEnabled	true	Shows hive markers.
Overlay.KnownHiveMarkerEnabled	true	Shows known-hive markers.
Overlay.PlayerMarkerEnabled	true	Shows local-player markers.
Overlay.PlayerSightLineEnabled	true	Shows bee-to-player sight lines.
Overlay.BeeSightRangeSphereEnabled	true	Shows bee 16-unit sight-range spheres.
Overlay.HiveDefenseSphereEnabled	true	Shows hive defense-range spheres.
Overlay.KnownHiveNearSphereEnabled	true	Shows known-hive 4-unit spheres.
Overlay.KnownHiveLineOfSightSphereEnabled	true	Shows known-hive 8-unit line-of-sight spheres.
Overlay.KnownHiveProbeLineEnabled	true	Shows bee-to-known-hive probe lines.
Overlay.HivePickupSightLineEnabled	true	Shows bee-to-hive pickup-proxy sight lines.

Changes made through a BepInEx configuration UI apply on the next HUD update. BeeOverlay does not watch direct edits to the generated configuration file.

AI Disclosure

Some parts of this project were developed with AI tools based on large language models (LLMs), including agent-based tools. The project maintainer reviews the code. This disclosure is made in compliance with Thunderstore and community policies.