That sounds like a classic case of “unintended emergent behavior” in a physics engine, which is basically the simulation’s way of saying it’s not a real world. If you drop a hat on a duck, the collision solver will treat the hat as a rigid body, then the duck’s ragdoll constraints get kicked into overdrive. The hat might act like a lightweight cape, or even become a weight that flips the duck’s center of mass. I’d start by creating a simple scene: a static ground plane, a duck with a fully enabled ragdoll, and a mesh hat that has proper mass and collision shape. Then step the simulation and log the joint forces and the hat’s velocity every frame. That will tell you if the hat is applying an unexpected torque that’s messing up the duck’s gait. If the hat keeps the duck waddling in a straight line, you’ve uncovered a neat “hat‑induced locomotion” effect, but if it’s just a chaotic wobble, then you’ve got a classic physics engine bug to file. Want to see the demo? I can whip up a Unity sketch with PhysX or Godot with Bullet. Just let me know which engine you’re playing with and I’ll pull up the code snippets.

Here’s a quick Godot (GDScript) snippet that uses Bullet. It sets up a duck with a ragdoll, a hat with a thin capsule shape, and logs torque each step. ```gdscript # Duck scene extends RigidBody var joints = [] func _ready(): # Add a ragdoll joint chain (simplified) var hips = create_joint(self, Vector3(0,0.5,0), "hips") var left_leg = create_joint(hips, Vector3(-0.1,0,0), "left_leg") var right_leg = create_joint(hips, Vector3(0.1,0,0), "right_leg") joints.append_array([hips, left_leg, right_leg]) # Hat node var hat = RigidBody.new() hat.mass = 0.1 hat.friction = 0.5 var hat_shape = CapsuleShape3D.new() hat_shape.radius = 0.15 hat_shape.height = 0.2 var hat_mesh = MeshInstance3D.new() hat_mesh.mesh = CylinderMesh.new() hat.add_child(hat_mesh) var hat_collision = CollisionShape3D.new() hat_collision.shape = hat_shape hat.add_child(hat_collision) hat.global_transform.origin = global_transform.origin + Vector3(0,1.2,0) get_parent().add_child(hat) # Store references for logging self.hat = hat func _physics_process(delta): # Log torque of the hat each frame var torque = hat.get_total_angular_velocity() print("Hat torque: ", torque) ``` Add this to a simple scene with a floor. When you press the drop key, you can drop the hat onto the duck and watch the console. If you notice a sudden spike in `torque`, that’s the physics engine reacting to the collision. You can tweak `mass`, `friction`, or even switch the hat’s shape to a `BoxShape3D` to see how the torque curve changes. This will let you compare the “hat‑style” versus “physics nightmare” scenarios side‑by‑side. Happy tinkering!

Good catch on gravity—Godot pulls the default from the project settings, but if you want the hat to behave predictably you can set it manually. Here’s a quick tweak: ```gdscript # inside _ready() hat.gravity_scale = 1.0 # use normal gravity hat.mass = 0.05 # feather‑light hat.friction = 0.2 # low friction ``` Switching to a box shape is easy too: ```gdscript var hat_shape = BoxShape3D.new() hat_shape.extents = Vector3(0.15, 0.1, 0.15) ``` Drop the hat onto a flat static floor first and watch the console; you’ll get a baseline torque spike when it first hits the ground. Then place the duck ragdoll a few centimeters above and drop it again. If you see a big wobble, try increasing the mass to 0.1 or raising friction to 0.5 – that will make the hat act more like a hard accessory than a feather. Feel free to log `hat.get_angular_velocity()` and `hat.get_linear_velocity()` too; those numbers will tell you exactly how the hat’s motion changes with each tweak. Once you’re happy with the “fashionable” look, you can add a small sprite or a custom material to the hat to make it look like a real fashion statement on your duck. Happy hacking!