Transform.position returns local position

Try another camera follow script?

 public Transform target;
     public float distance = 10.0f;
     public float height = 3.0f;
     public float heightDamping = 2.0f;
     public float rotationDamping = 3.0f;
  
     void LateUpdate () {
        if (!target)
          return;
  
        Debug.Log(distance.ToString());
        float wantedRotationAngle = target.eulerAngles.y;
       float wantedHeight = target.position.y + height;
  
        float currentRotationAngle = transform.eulerAngles.y;
       float currentHeight = transform.position.y;
  
        currentRotationAngle = Mathf.LerpAngle (currentRotationAngle, wantedRotationAngle, rotationDamping * Time.deltaTime);
  
        currentHeight = Mathf.Lerp (currentHeight, wantedHeight, heightDamping * Time.deltaTime);
  
        Quaternion currentRotation = Quaternion.Euler (0, currentRotationAngle, 0);
  
        transform.position = target.position;
        transform.position -= currentRotation * Vector3.forward * distance;
        Vector3 temp = transform.position;
        temp.y = currentHeight; 
        transform.position = temp;
  
        transform.LookAt (target);
     }

I basically used GameObject.Find("Parent").transform.Find("Child").position to work around what I believe to be a similar issue.

My similar, strange problem is that a prefab ("Boss") contains a child ("CameraAnchor") and GameObject.Find("CameraAnchor") would sometimes, every now and then, return (0,4.5,0) as transform.position, which is actually the localPosition. It seemed to happen sometimes when restarting the scene, but not reliably. Usually transform.position would return the expected global position of (230, 4.5, 0)

I was able to work around this strange problem by grabbing GameObject.Find("Boss"), and then using transform.Find("CameraAnchor")

Here is my mess of a function I eventually cobbled together. Most code probably can't use "x > 1" as a "valid" position, but it works for me because a Boss is never at the beginning of a level :)

  public void LockCamera(Vector2 lockPosition)
     {
         // This is normal, everything is fine
         if (lockPosition.x >= 1)
         {
             _isPositionLocked = true;
             _lockPosition = lockPosition;
             return;
         }
 
         // Uh oh, Unity done goofed and gave us the localPosition for some reason...
         Debug.Log("INVALID CameraScript.LockCamera(lockPosition = " + lockPosition);
         GameObject bossObject = GameObject.Find("Boss");
         // Serious problem here
         if (bossObject == null)
         {
             Debug.Log("Unable to Find Boss object, aborting LockCamera");
             return;
         }
         Debug.Log("Boss at " + bossObject.transform.position);
         _lockPosition = bossObject.transform.position;
         if (_lockPosition.x >= 1)
         {
             _isPositionLocked = true;
         }
 
         // We can try to get the CameraAnchor ourselves
         Transform cameraAnchorObjectTransform = bossObject.transform.Find("CameraAnchor");
         if (cameraAnchorObjectTransform == null)
         {
             // Well, we tried.
             Debug.Log("Unable to Find CameraAnchor, using Boss if able");
             return;
         }
         else if (cameraAnchorObjectTransform.position.x >= 1)
         {
             Debug.Log("Found CameraAnchor at " + cameraAnchorObjectTransform.position);
             _lockPosition = cameraAnchorObjectTransform.position;
             _isPositionLocked = true;
             return;
         }
 
         Debug.Log("Found CameraAnchor at INVALID, using Boss if able " + cameraAnchorObjectTransform.position);
     }