Troubleshoot conversation flow
Diagnose a dialogue state stuck on Idle, timing that feels wrong, and conflicts between conversation flow drivers in multi-character scenes.
Use this page when a character's dialogue state never changes, changes at the wrong pace, or a multi-character scene shows one character reacting to another's conversation. Start by entering Play mode and expanding the Live section on the ConvaiConversationFlowController component — most of the symptoms below are visible there directly.
Troubleshooting table
State stays Idle in the Live section even while the character is speaking
The character's ready signal never arrived — the ConvaiCharacter has not finished connecting, or events for it are not reaching this controller
Confirm the character finishes connecting before you expect embodiment behavior. If ConvaiConversationFlowController sits under a different GameObject than the ConvaiCharacter it should track, move it under the same hierarchy
State changes away from Idle once the character connects and the conversation starts
Character lingers in Thinking, Attending, or Settling far longer or shorter than expected
The assigned ConvaiConversationFlowProfile sets a longer or shorter hold than intended, or no profile is assigned and the built-in defaults do not match the pace you want
Open the assigned profile (or assign one) and check its Dialogue Beats fields against Conversation flow reference
Time In State in the Live section stops advancing past the tuned duration for that state
A ConvaiConversationFlowController appeared on a character you never added it to
Convai auto-provisioned it because another module needed a dialogue state and none existed — Body Animation with Auto Create Conversation Flow enabled, or Emotion once its listening lift, thinking look, or reaction accent strengths are raised above 0
Nothing to fix — this is expected. Configure the auto-added controller like any other, or turn off the setting that demanded it if you want to add the controller yourself
The Console logged the message quoted below once, naming the character
In a multi-character scene, one character's dialogue state reacts to another character's player speech
More than one ConvaiConversationFlowController is active at once; each driver scopes itself to its own character once it detects other active drivers, but a scene with no scoped conversation target can briefly share unscoped signals
Give each character's conversation flow driver a scoped conversation target instead of relying on unscoped player speech and transcript events
The Console warning quoted below stops appearing, and each character's State only changes for its own turns
State never leaves Idle
The state machine's first rule is unconditional: while the character is not ready, the reading stays Idle regardless of any other signal. "Ready" here means the character has connected and Convai has confirmed it, not merely that the GameObject is active in the scene.
If the character does become ready but State still does not move, confirm ConvaiConversationFlowController is on the same GameObject hierarchy as the ConvaiCharacter it is meant to track — a controller resolved against the wrong character never sees that character's speech and transcript events.
Timing feels wrong
Every hold, grace period, and delay the state machine uses comes from the assigned ConvaiConversationFlowProfile — or, if none is assigned, from the same values shown as defaults in Conversation flow reference. If the character replies too slowly, lower Thinking Max Hold; if it settles back to Idle too quickly during pauses, raise Idle Return Delay. Watch Time In State in the Live section while you tune a value to see the effect immediately in Play mode without needing to script anything.
One field pair is self-correcting rather than silently wrong: if Thinking Min Hold is set above Thinking Max Hold, the profile raises Thinking Max Hold to match the moment you edit it in the Inspector, so the two fields never disagree with what the character actually does.
Conversation flow appeared without being added
Convai adds ConvaiConversationFlowController automatically when a module on the character demands a dialogue state and none exists yet. Body Animation does this through its Auto Create Conversation Flow setting (enabled by default). Emotion does it too, but only once one of its dialogue-driven settings — Listening Reaction Strength, Thinking Reaction Strength, Reacting Accent Strength, or Interrupted Flinch Strength — is raised above 0, since all four ship off. The Console logs once, naming the character:
This is not an error. The auto-added controller behaves exactly like one you add yourself — see Configure conversation flow to assign it a profile.
Duplicate drivers in multi-character scenes
ConvaiConversationFlowController disallows more than one instance on the same GameObject, but a scene can still run several controllers at once — one per character. When more than one is active, each driver scopes player speech and transcript events to its own character so one character's Listening state does not leak into another's. Until a controller has a scoped conversation target, it logs a warning instead of silently ignoring the wrong signals:
Give each character a scoped conversation target so its driver only reacts to that character's own turns.
Next steps
Configure conversation flowConversation flow referenceTroubleshoot embodimentLast updated
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