Forums » General Pantheon Discussion

Leashing or Deal With It?

    • 334 posts
    November 11, 2017 3:57 PM PST

    Evoras said:
    (https://www.pantheonmmo.com/content/forums/topic/7362/will-there-be-trains-of-mobs-in-pantheon/view/post_id/138344)
    (iv) King of Trolls:

    I like the complexity of that; would definatly add something extra to the game.
    Though "there is a chance (based on size of the Bounty placed) that some 'Bounty_Collectors' will spawn" sounds not only nasty and unfriendly to players you group with, but also unrealistic (how would they know you are there and they have travel time too).
    Though if you are fighting a Troll and it happen to know you are a Troll killah.. then, as support class, might get higher on the agro list, or the Troll might even be more entusiastic in the fight (up to a fair amount ofcourse for the other players). Maybe have it scream you name, or even try to flee fearing death or worse.

    • 65 posts
    November 11, 2017 3:58 PM PST

    Kilsin said:

    Do you prefer mob leashing or once you aggro a mob you either kill it, die or zone?

     

    Trains = fear of death = excitment = reward (if you live) = always be on your toes = no handholding = fun

    • 75 posts
    November 11, 2017 4:11 PM PST

    Demostorm said:

    Kilsin said:

    Do you prefer mob leashing or once you aggro a mob you either kill it, die or zone?

     

    Trains = fear of death = excitment = reward (if you live) = always be on your toes = no handholding = fun

     

    My thoughts exactly!

    • 2130 posts
    November 11, 2017 4:21 PM PST

    I'll repeat the same thing I said in the other thread. Trains are cool, exciting, etc. My only hope is that people who abuse the mechanic are dealt with by VR. Community intervention is insufficient, to say the least, in keeping this kind of behavior under control.

    • 1281 posts
    November 11, 2017 4:30 PM PST

    Liav said:

    I'll repeat the same thing I said in the other thread. Trains are cool, exciting, etc. My only hope is that people who abuse the mechanic are dealt with by VR. Community intervention is insufficient, to say the least, in keeping this kind of behavior under control.

    In EQ, public shunning was a very effectiver method of dealing with abusers.  Eventually they wouldn't be able to find groups or even guilds to join when they developed a bad enough rep.  I, personally, know a couple of people that ruined their rep and had to re-roll their characters to get past it once they saw the error of their ways.  That's one of the nice things about not being able to solo most/all of the content.  Without groups and/or guilds, they stopped making progression.

    • 7 posts
    November 11, 2017 4:41 PM PST

    Combination, should depend on the mob/AI

    • 2130 posts
    November 11, 2017 4:43 PM PST

    Unfortunately, in my experience, people who are willing to trample the entire server to get their way tend to band together. When you can form groups inside your own guild, you don't have to depend on PUGs whom you have a bad reputation with.

    You could be right, too. Either way, people who constantly train can seriously disrupt zones so I still think GM intervention should be a thing in extreme cases. I imagine it'll be pretty rare though. The majority of people aren't terrible people, so the outliers who overly disrupt things will be dealt with.

    • 1281 posts
    November 11, 2017 4:55 PM PST

    Liav said:

    Unfortunately, in my experience, people who are willing to trample the entire server to get their way tend to band together. When you can form groups inside your own guild, you don't have to depend on PUGs whom you have a bad reputation with.

    You could be right, too. Either way, people who constantly train can seriously disrupt zones so I still think GM intervention should be a thing in extreme cases. I imagine it'll be pretty rare though. The majority of people aren't terrible people, so the outliers who overly disrupt things will be dealt with.

    I agree that "Birds of a feather"....  Hopefully community policing will resolve a large percentage of that.  I also agree tha GM intervention should be a thing as well given that there are just somer people that want to watch the world burn.

    • 281 posts
    November 11, 2017 9:06 PM PST

    Liav said:

    I'll repeat the same thing I said in the other thread. Trains are cool, exciting, etc. My only hope is that people who abuse the mechanic are dealt with by VR. Community intervention is insufficient, to say the least, in keeping this kind of behavior under control.

    In addition to Dev/GM action, some mechanics might help mitigate it somewhat as well.  As I said in the other thread:

    DragonFist said:

    An idea to mitigate the abuse of it might be to have mobs have a short period of being confused when they "lose" the one they are chasing (be it via FD or gating or Fade or zoning).  They could even say things like "what happen to him/her" or "where'd it go?" with animation to go along with it.  The period would be short, 5 or 10 seconds at most.  Whatever tests out as giving people some time to leave the area if they are paying attention but not so long as to remove all risk.  They then turn around and head back at a normal pace and anyone in their agro range is free game.

    It wouldn't adress all abuses but it might help lessen the main abuse, purposeful training by a class that can lose the agro near target players.  Obviously, a character getting killed by mobs chasing them wouldn't create this result. There could be a minimum distance from the mob's spawn point or path to trigger this so that it doesn't affect normal pulling, etc.

    • 690 posts
    November 12, 2017 12:45 AM PST

    Kilsin said:

    Do you prefer mob leashing or once you aggro a mob you either kill it, die or zone?

    No leashing! make mobs quickly run back to where they were so you can't exploit their return trip very easily. I'd suggest reducing aggro range while they enemies running back to their camp, (consider steadily increasing aggro range again as they get closer to their spot) so that they don't surprise too many players.

    Also, a self policing community + easily found applications to record your gameplay should severely limit intentional trainers.

    However, if it makes sense for a mob to have a leash by all means put one on, for example if you have mobs with a lazy demeanor.


    This post was edited by BeaverBiscuit at November 12, 2017 12:48 AM PST
    • 2752 posts
    November 12, 2017 1:38 AM PST

    Liav said:

    I'll repeat the same thing I said in the other thread. Trains are cool, exciting, etc. My only hope is that people who abuse the mechanic are dealt with by VR. Community intervention is insufficient, to say the least, in keeping this kind of behavior under control.

     

    This. I am strongly in favor of trains, the added danger to dungeons and awareness necessary was worthwhile and enriching. But purposefully training others should be considered harassment by VR and be a punishable offense. There is a lot of "the community can police itself" around here but this is one of those things that shouldn't be left up to them. Some servers might be just dandy and able to sort their own but others will not; camps will be trained and stolen leading to endless mud slinging with rivers of blood and tears. 

    • 159 posts
    November 12, 2017 2:26 AM PST

    I have to say I really like the intermediate option where mobs will chase you for varying distances depending on a number of factors. Still, I feel Evoras' suggestion errs on the side of too much leashing.

    As a rule of thumb, beasts should pretty much chase you really far away. Apart from situations like a beast protecting its den/nest, they would see red when they spot you and mindlessly chase you. The stamina thing seems like it would emulate a hard leash, so I'm not too sure that it would be a good thing. If you only have gradually decreasing aggro, you still can potentially evade the mob/train, but you can also do interesting things like if you pull a new enemy, aggro will be increased for the original chaser (sort of like an enrage thing, where the new mob encourages the old one to keep the chase).

    For sentient enemies, I guess it could be made to depend on their disposition or traits. I don't think it makes sense for a troll king or its royal guard to chase a puny player across an entire zone, but maybe sentinels and warriors in and around a camp would. Additionally, non-chasing mobs could be set as alarmists, so that other mobs would be called to give chase even though the original ones are known to return to their starting positions soon-ish.

     

     

    • 36 posts
    November 12, 2017 5:58 AM PST

    The deal with it side defintely adds an extra sense of danger in the world. It's odd that a seemingly minor change like a mob leash or not, can have a major effect on how a player approaches his play style. Going in the extreme one way or the other is usually not the way to go. I want to explore a dangerous world, so I'll go with the deal with it side with resonable conditions.

    • 58 posts
    November 12, 2017 11:48 AM PST

    Alot of opinions on the matter so far.  Figured I'd throw mine in too.  More of a middle ground between Yes and NO.

    In my opinion, training would be fine if aggro locked to the group unless damage/taunts happen. Outside parties might try to save the group running away. Healing/Proximity shouldn't count towards threat on trained mobs till engaged.  I'm not interested in worrying about my healer having to choose between casting a heal or not casting to keep a train from aggroing the group because one of you screwed up and are trying to dump your risk off on us.  Also with monks in play there really isn't a better class at dumping unwanted trash packs on others if there were no limitations on trains.

     

    I'm personally not for all the 'band-aid' fixes to solve all the abuse potential.

     

     

     

     

    • 399 posts
    November 12, 2017 12:17 PM PST

    I'm leaning towards minimal leashing, especially in dungeons, but in large, open zones, and you're running from one end to another at a much faster rate, mobs should lose interest in you, forget about you and you should lose agro.

    A zone like The Estate of Unrest in EQ1 was a zone from Level 10ish to level 35ish, trains happened.  All the time and everyday.  Those trains were unintended and awesome.  As long as you stayed out of the way, you were good.  People sitting at a zoneline can expect to be trained.  Don't sit at the zoneline. 

    Will people in a dungeon get trained?  You bet.  If there are many areas where groups are fighting and these groups are fighting on the main path, all of them might be trained unintentionally by the group who's furthest in wanting to escape. All part of the game.

    Continued intentional training, should be dealt with by VR like Sony did in (early) EQ1 .  Community policing and reputation only go so far.   For the worst cases, there should be severe consequences. The hardest part is proving it.  Or at least, it used to be hard. Now you can record it and submit to VR and let them deal with it. 

    No recording during the first few years in EQ. I remember as a guide knowing that one necro continuously trained people in Guk but as soon as a guide would log in, that person would be at his best behavior.  So I had to resort to making sure I was inviso, logged in before he did, and observe him (while still doing other stuff) and after about a week of this, I did catch him in the act and provided the proof  (with a slew of screen shots) to the GM and eventually the character got banned.

     

     

    • 22 posts
    November 12, 2017 12:50 PM PST

    I am partial to chaos in this respect.  Give NPCs dispositions on to whether they like to give chase and for how long.  It could be difficult to implement but it would be neat to have a loss of line of site result in the mob taking a wrong corner as well and effectively losing you.  If a mobs disposition is tireless and ends of the earth vindictive, and you lose them.. well they might just rampage around the dungeon killing everything they find until someone puts them down. ;)

    • 27 posts
    November 12, 2017 3:43 PM PST

    I realize I'm rather late to this particular party. And by what I've seen it seems like things may have settled in on the side of deal with it. While as a whole I actually agree with that, I do have a concern about that stance in combination with the reported expansive zone sizes. If normal zones are the size of one or more of the Karana's was in EQ, then that is a LONG way to run should a roaming high level agro you, and also a long way to run naked, should you not run fast enough the first time. So I would say that maybe set an extended leash range... maybe half a zone... long enough that you are clearly running, rather than pulling, but not so far that you're having to run across 75+ percent of a zone plus load times because you were crossing a zone and reached a bad spot and had to retreat back the way you came.

    Possibly if it is determined that it can be a varied setting. Maybe make creatures that are relatively high level in comparison (10+ lvls) leash, or leash a little sooner if it would leash normally. A sort of Get off my property chase down, but realizing the weaker intruder isn't worth the effort to chase down and kill.

    • 1281 posts
    November 12, 2017 3:49 PM PST

    Glorfendill said:

    I realize I'm rather late to this particular party. And by what I've seen it seems like things may have settled in on the side of deal with it. While as a whole I actually agree with that, I do have a concern about that stance in combination with the reported expansive zone sizes. If normal zones are the size of one or more of the Karana's was in EQ, then that is a LONG way to run should a roaming high level agro you, and also a long way to run naked, should you not run fast enough the first time. So I would say that maybe set an extended leash range... maybe half a zone... long enough that you are clearly running, rather than pulling, but not so far that you're having to run across 75+ percent of a zone plus load times because you were crossing a zone and reached a bad spot and had to retreat back the way you came.

    Possibly if it is determined that it can be a varied setting. Maybe make creatures that are relatively high level in comparison (10+ lvls) leash, or leash a little sooner if it would leash normally. A sort of Get off my property chase down, but realizing the weaker intruder isn't worth the effort to chase down and kill.

    The converse side of that is that it teaches you not to park out in the open and walk away rather than paying attention.  IIf someone is training mobs to you then you are near a zoneline somewhere and shouldn't have to run across 75% of the zone.  If you're way across the zone from a zone line and someone trains mobs to you, they're headed the wrong way....heheheh

    That said, depending on how binds work, that might not be an issue.

    • 3016 posts
    November 14, 2017 1:38 PM PST

    Kilsin said:

    Oxillion said:

    Isnt this considerd an exploit? 

    Ox

    Leashing and kiting are most definitely not exploits, they are developer created mechanics, both were in VG and played a vital part in gameplay.

     

    Kiting was an unintended result that the Devs didn't plan,  it is Emergent gameplay.  :)  And Aradune seems to appreciate emergent gameplay :)

    • 3016 posts
    November 14, 2017 1:40 PM PST

    What people mean by deal with it..is if the mob doesn't leash, and you aren't paying attention,  you can die.   If on the otherhand you are aware of your surroundings,  not asleep at a camp,  you could just save your character from dying.    There's no downside to learning how the game and AI works,  the more you play the better you get at it, and you won't be a danger to your group mates.  :P

    • 4 posts
    November 14, 2017 3:16 PM PST

    This is a slippery slope.

    To the people saying "deal with it", what is there to keep me, as an individual, from stealing a mob from your group, kiting it endlessly while you watch on, and then raking in the sweet sweet loot? To the people saying "leashing", what is there to keep me from taunting the mob or pulling agro on the mob to leash range and resetting the encounter? This is the problem that led to alternatives like instancing and mobs summoning players when they got too far. Additionally, community policing isn't enough to deter or prevent people from using such methods as described above. 

    I'm not a fan of instancing or being summoned underneath a boss to meet my doom, but I think the solution to these problems lies in good encounter design.

     

    • 1921 posts
    November 14, 2017 3:36 PM PST

    Khamodo said: ... Additionally, community policing isn't enough to deter or prevent people from using such methods as described above. ...

    Agreed.  I think EQ1 TLP has proven that repeatedly for the past 4+ years.  If it can be done, it will be done. And they have picks (multiple copies of open world zones) to try and alleviate overhunting pressure there, too, and people STILL do it.
    Whatever Visionary Realms comes up with, it needs to be attractive enough to a large enough demographic to keep the lights on.  I don't think this mechanic attracts more than it deters, but I could be wrong.

    Honestly, I have no issue with training in the larger scheme, provided the trainer dies most of the time, but being trained every time you try to get XP gets real old, real quick.  (and is what it will be, worst case, with Monks current FD mechanic, in Pantheon)  I mean, why wouldn't you?  The game permits it...  you want the camp, you take it, right? (mmm sarcasm, so tasty)

    They CAN fix it so that FD'ers run the risk of death if they try to intentionally/maliciously train another group.  They can.  Whether or not they will is going to be interesting to see.  If they leave it as is, then history says it will be used maliciously forever, just like EQ1.

    • 2130 posts
    November 14, 2017 3:39 PM PST

    Even if the mechanics require you to die in the process of forcing a group out of a camp, it's still a worthwhile trade depending on the circumstances.

    I kind of wish pulling was abandoned in general and FD didn't exist. Pulling is probably the dumbest of all of EQ's emergent gameplay.

    It seems bizarre to me that the quaternity is emphasized while trivial single pulling is also a core mechanic. CC basically exists as a happy afterthought when your puller screws up, at least in a group scenario.


    This post was edited by Liav at November 14, 2017 3:40 PM PST
    • 281 posts
    November 14, 2017 3:52 PM PST

    I like pulling.  Granted, I tended to be the puller, but I found it to be a fun activity when work was required, via various methods.

    I think trains add a dynamic to the game.  But I'm not blind to the potential abuse.  I'm not against efforts to mitigate that side of things as long as they don't break things or result in a lifeless game.

    • 1921 posts
    November 14, 2017 3:59 PM PST

    Liav said: ... CC basically exists as a happy afterthought when your puller screws up, at least in a group scenario.

    Yeah, I have had that debate on these forums repeatedly, but have lost every time. :)

    For group content, when you can pull singles no matter the encounter, CC is pointless.  It's why, on EQ1 TLP, pre-PoP, boxed Enchanters often show up out-of-group to refresh clarity & haste, and then a monk/bard continues to pull non-stop with 1 tank, 1 healer, and 3 DPS in the group.  It's not that it doesn't work, it's just.. you don't need CC on group content at all, with a Monk around.  And they don't have to be in-group, either.
    Heck, when I played my Monk alt, they just wanted me pulling non-stop.  As in, get mob, drop off the mob at the group, go get the next.  No waiting, no stopping, no fighting, no damage.  Just a Feign Death fetch-the-next-mob monk'ey. :|