The system for critters and cliffs is probably the best that can be done. It is a good balance between scampering up cliffs at top speed (as has been the case for years) and the situation for a while after launch where they would congregate at the bottom of waterfalls and dead end canyons.

Where I noticed the new behavior was in a fight with a cat near the base of a cliff. The cat tried to flee up the cliff and I managed to finish it in the first meter or so where I could still walk. Other critters were ascending the same cliff, but very slowly. So slowly that in some cases a character could go to a spot where the slope could be traversed and meet them at the top. Ranged combat could pick them off easily.