The above mentioned variable ain't doing what it says on the tin. I set the variable to 80000 and the characters barely waited a second before appearing in the next room.
It's not vital to me that it gets fixed anymore but it has to be a bug.
are you using FollowCharacterEx(); ?
yes
80000 is rather extreme, it's possible that it doesn't work properly at such large values.
Try 400, for instance. That should leave about 10 seconds before they enter the room.