Sergeant slate assist radius too low

[Nirgon]

See:

http://web.archive.org/web/20010519173046/http://www.everlore.com/bestiary/beastdetails.asp?mode=show&BID=64111



"It seems when you pull him by being in KOS range, Slate tends to join the fight more often than not, no matter how long its been since slate left.(guards have a more advanced telepath than an average NPC)."


This observation is pretty close to how it actually worked and I camped these guards on 3 characters for xp on live.

If you are aggro to a guard, sergeant slate has an enormous aggro radius. A distance from where Tolus spawns to about halfway to the opposite wall (where Nektulos forest is) is about accurate.

This post also depicts that behavior:


He killed me at the ent to the tunnel in E Commons so he does get around. I did not even try to run.

[Nirgon]

Sergeant Slate was the bane of evil races in the common lands. Anyone who played a dark race in that era surely has a Sergeant Slate story, typically he "almost came outta nowhere".

He should also be very highly magic resistant. I recall spamming several roots even as a 50 wizard before one landed and not for a very substantial duration either.

The very high magic/spell resists should go for the North Ro guards as well.


A druid in his 40s or so obviously struggling to bring down the big man:

http://i50.tinypic.com/xombty.jpg

[koros]

What's with these threads with misinformation? Slate was a typical mob. He was just level 41.

That druid is level 42 based on the firestrike damage. Who knew how much mana he had to start, etc.

And just to test my memory... from alla:

not that hard
Quote
Reply
#Oct 07 2000 at 3:45 AMRating: Default
Anonymous
Anonymous
killed him with my 48 mage - didnt resist a single spell every one of them was for max damage, lotsa hps but not that impressive

[Nirgon]

This is not misinformation

[Nirgon]

The main issue is that aggro ranges on many things were far bigger than they are here.

Why is sergeant slate having an aggro radius that is too small a problem here again?

[koros]

the fuck are you talking about? i just said he wasn't more mr than a standard mob in this thread.

[Nirgon]

Ah but he did, as well as the North Ro guards.

As far as his resist... what do you think the druid's problem in the picture was? Casted too many fire nukes? Didn't engage with full mana?

The good sarge is at half health and I can't imagine this druid not engaging him at full hp, esp for the sake of a screenie. Must not have been the first time he tried to engage I'd think at least.

Pretty sure you can find other similar experiences on live and some of the dev staff may recall this as well.

[Lazortag]

Well Nirgon, you see, the higher a mob's level is relative to yours, the more often it resists your spells. A mob that's a level lower than you is basically an even con, it should resist a decent amount of the time. In your screenshot you show him resisting one spell. That isn't evidence of what you're asserting. You aren't some classic everquest sage.

[koros]

You seem to not understand what constitutes evidence. Additionally, you're remembering a whole fuck load of things wrong. You noticing a pattern about how everyone else in these threads agrees except you?

[Nirgon]

Young man, I have produced a screen shot and 2 posts. I put my thus far impeccable record of posting accurate bugs on the line and point to my signature (click my name) for proof of playing during this time period. The other characters I leveled or assisted in leveling were Trashuur (http://ralloszek.stephans.org/rz/playerhistory.php?player_name=Trashuur) and Ralmun (http://ralloszek.stephans.org/rz/playerhistory.php?player_name=Ralmun) who were both very twinked Shadowknights who leveled off these guards.

Further, this is an obvious one for a classic player who has sound memory of dealing with Slate.

You've voiced that you disagree with many of the points that I and other classic players I've spoken with prior to discussing would support.

This is up to Nilbog and Kanras to decide, go make a sandwich and cool out.

[Nirgon]

You aren't some classic everquest sage.

I am on some subjects sir and some mobs do have higher resists than others. For instance, the ancient cyclops in south ro was immune to fire which is not working here either. Another example, which I would debate if people would be having the same argument with me is the stone spider being immune to magic.

I didn't just use ice spear and draught of ice on the ancient cyclops in Velious because I felt like it, or didn't have sunstrike.

When we hash these out, I'll move on to other things on my check list in assisting this project.

In the meantime lazor, go spawn the stone spider and try magic on it... or try the same on a spite golem in plane of hate.

Class dismissed.

[nilbog]

If you are aggro to a guard, sergeant slate has an enormous aggro radius. A distance from where Tolus spawns to about halfway to the opposite wall (where Nektulos forest is) is about accurate.

Needs researching on eqmac or maybe even eqlive. We do have the ability to add different assist radii for npcs. For example, the dragoons in Overthere have a much larger assist radius than aggro radius. Perhaps this is a similar situation.

[Nirgon]

If that counts as evidence for Slate, I'll see what I can get going.

I believe this should apply to all guards and the reason why it was very hard if not impossible in most areas on PvP servers to attack people in some parts of towns, whereas on EQemu I have been able to get away with murder pretty much anywhere.

[Palemoon]

Gonna have to agree, as a troll SK on rallos slate and guards in general killed me more times then I can count. Here, you can run between the troll guards flanking the tunnel leading to grobb and not get agro.

[Nirgon]

I'm going to dread setting up everything for EQ mac and grinding something (maybe a mage) to 24. Hopefully someone casting thorns in Unrest is ready to be pals.

I've spoken to people here and discovered slate is indeed light blue at level 60, so he's going to be a fun classic element to see returned :).

"Fuck! Slate!" (immediately begin strafe running and jumping)

Kaukaz, the warrior botb winner on Rallos, was the first player I saw xp on these guards. He did so with a PGT + bladed thulian claw =).

Slate was also notorious for "interrupting PvP" and saving the training robe of a many a newbie under a hail of fire bolts at inn 1.

The same goes for the resist rates on North Ro guards. It's gonna be hard to get a char to 50 I think on EQMac but maybe that will pay off in the future as I do research.

Gonna have to agree, as a troll SK on rallos slate and guards in general killed me more times then I can count. Here, you can run between the troll guards flanking the tunnel leading to grobb and not get agro.

Yes! These specific guards were solo'd by druids for quite some time. I had the SK twink I mentioned before and a shaman I played a while (Rubum (http://ralloszek.stephans.org/rz/playerhistory.php?player_name=Rubum) - his link is broken... damnit) make their starting money off looting their shields and necklaces, and even fine steel when the druid in question killed a last one and went to sell with full bags. Killing these troll guards was especially prevalent before the patch limiting damage done to kited NPCs by dots. In another patch, I noted that they are changed to be magic immune, regenerate insane hit points and receive a tremendous stat boost. Coming anywhere I'd say within... half of an offensive spell cast would cause the one you were closest to to aggro.. and then... well all of the ones on the left side came, sometimes even the ones on the right side under the other tent too iirc. Being able to walk right through them uninvis should jump off the page at some of you other old timers too.


Here is another mob I recall being extremely, extremely magic resistant regardless of level that isn't the stone spider or a spite golem:

Dorn in North Ro (http://web.archive.org/web/20010710192911/http://everlore.com/bestiary/beastdetails.asp?mode=show&BID=63214)

Try fighting him here with a lvl 21 rogue in about classic gear and see if he either completely murders you or if it's a close fight:


I am a level 21 Rogue. If you are below 24, DO NOT FIGHT THIS GUY ALONE! I undinged from 20 to 19, 4 seperate times! He conned green to me! Also, I undinged once from the dragoon guy in West Commons. These two guys share one thing in common.. They are members of the Indigo Brotherhood. I hate the Indigo Brotherhood. Mwaahaaahaahhaa...just wait Dorn...soon I will be 30 and you will stand no chance! hahaha!!!!
-Alkuhol
Rogue of the 21st degree, Master Pickpoket


More (http://web.archive.org/web/20010524125635/http://www.everlore.com/ShowScreenShot.asp?id=112784):

Ok, here's the scoop. This guy hits for 30+ almost everytime. He is also very hard to hit. A group of 5 lvl 12+ can take him pretty easily, but don't go rushing into things. If not done right he'll slaughter ur whole group in a matter of seconds.


Perhaps someone can test him and make an NPC mechanic thread for him as well? I don't have a 20-24 rogue here to try its luck... but GMs can /level themselves and summon gear!

Hopefully this has caused some of your classic EQ senses out there to tingle a bit. Sergeant Slate, like him, is what we called an "undercon".

[Nirgon]

Any update on making Dorn and Slate badass?

Upgrading Slate's aggro range?

[Nirgon]

Bump slate aggro range? Have evidence in OP:


"It seems when you pull him by being in KOS range, Slate tends to join the fight more often than not, no matter how long its been since slate left.(guards have a more advanced telepath than an average NPC)."



Also the guard assist radius is brought up here (bolded 4u).

[Potus]

Sergeant Slate was the bane of evil races in the common lands. Anyone who played a dark race in that era surely has a Sergeant Slate story, typically he "almost came outta nowhere".

He should also be very highly magic resistant. I recall spamming several roots even as a 50 wizard before one landed and not for a very substantial duration either.

The very high magic/spell resists should go for the North Ro guards as well.


A druid in his 40s or so obviously struggling to bring down the big man:

http://i50.tinypic.com/xombty.jpg

Interesting how you use evidence that he was "the bane of evil races", yet you found absolutely none of that regarding Guard Ledshin instagibbing invis dark races at the WFP gatehouse.

Interesting. Very interesting.

[Nirgon]

Ew you again.

You'll be lucky to find anything sometimes out there.

This one's well known :).

Let's say that druid is lvl 42. Try killing slate with a 42 druid here nuking with fire strike... you'll see a big difference between that screen shot result and this one.

More to the point Slate absolutely and definitely had a huge assist radius if you were messing with one of the other guards, and his aggro radius even if you weren't was also rather large.

Guards were special npcs pal :).

[Nirgon]

Source (https://web.archive.org/web/20010519174918/http://www.everlore.com/bestiary/beastdetails.asp?mode=show&BID=250483)

I kinda hit to kill this guy, on my de mage. It seems that tolus is much easier of a kill than reskin, because reskin is kind of in the middle of where slate walks, and whenever i attack reskin slate usually chases me away from outta no where =( anywho, yah when he has a weapon it is fs, and my highest amount of money loot is 3pp 8 gp and 8 sp and some cp.




Just watch out for Slate...




so i just cast away at this guy and hope slate isnt anywhere near



Now messing with the other guard, source (https://web.archive.org/web/20010519181155/http://www.everlore.com/bestiary/beastdetails.asp?mode=show&BID=59672)


Sergent slate killed me SOO much, he could be all the way to the first inn and somehow knew I was killing his enlisted guard friend.


Almost every single post about Reskin and Tolus being killed mentions Slate having a huge assist radius.


Interesting. Very interesting.

[Potus]

Don't see anything here about aggro range being large. (http://web.archive.org/web/20020309182707/http://eqbeastiary.allakhazam.com/search.shtml?id=438)

Also your link has a guy saying he's easy to avoid. My guess is evils got stomped by him because he was a high level guard in a zone that most people auctioned in. Lots of people got trained by him to zoneline, that'd account for a lot of "man this guy hit me out of nowhere!"

[phacemeltar]

if it was truly classic, then slate would go to the tunnel. not just teleport/reset when he gets close. its very dumb that you can clear slate aggro by just running to the tunnel.

[Potus]

if it was truly classic, then slate would go to the tunnel. not just teleport/reset when he gets close. its very dumb that you can clear slate aggro by just running to the tunnel.

He doesn't run to the tunnel here? Do griffins?

Did the devs program this out so people would stop killing lowbies trying to auction?

[phacemeltar]

He doesn't run to the tunnel here? Do griffins?

Did the devs program this out so people would stop killing lowbies trying to auction?

yea i think so. every time i charm slate and run to the tunnel with him, it just clears him and resets him to spawn. its obviously some sort of dev implementation because it clears my aggro and removes him as my pet. disappointing, as this is the main reason i rolled enchanter.

EDIT: this is not the case with griffs or low level guards.

[phacemeltar]

this is actually very upsetting to me, as the same people who always cry about things being classic will then complain about how EC tunnel should be a safe spot. seems backwards to me, iirc classic EQ has no safe spots.

[Buellen]

Chello everyone


First of remember that everquest did go through many changes and it has been 15 years.


Memory is not proof for a reason, memory is biased.


Ok now that being said my personal experience from killing guards in east commons was that slate would charge me when i was killing guard in the middle inn one closest to the undead pillars where the ghouls and mummy skeleton would span.

I would always see him charge from over the hill as you look towards free port from this inn. He would also charge me form a good ways up the path heading toward west commons ,when i was kill the guard at inn1 one closest to Freeport.

Man people would probable not even notice at what distance slate got agro as they would not pay attention and so their memory is of sergeant slate just showing up and pummeling them into the ground while killing the guards.




Finally because of the many changes to guard killing sony implemented we will probably never have a consensus as to what determine classic. We probably are not going to find much information in swayback machine.

In the end the time and effort to get as close to classic (whatever that means to you )as we can is not worth it since we cannot ever get enough proof to convince the developers of this wonderful server.

[Theturtlehermit]

I never did do guards in east commons, but I do remember people bitching about his insane assist aggro radius. I remember people bitching about the dragoons in OT when kunark launched because they were like evil Sargent slates running at bard speed lol. thats why the guards in EC were almost never camped and the guards in WC tollbooth were perma camped with a line of people waiting

[Nirgon]

WC toll booth guards were higher level. After leveling off EC guards people'd find somewhere to go in between that and the WC ones.

I don't think guards in towns had the kind of assist radius Slate did. He was a very special evil griefer.

Slate was definitely avoidable but you had to make sure he was extremely far away or you pulled Reskin to the tunnel to Nektulos if it was a class that couldn't just burst him down.

I tried to kill him with ice comet in full int (not resist, pvp server remember) gear and went completely oom trying at lvl 50. I came back in Kunark and tried with draught of fire, and was barely able to do so on some occasions but most times I'd go oom.

Aside:
I know the spots we were able to nuke people in the Neriak bank from (and subsequently where it would not work from) where guards would not aggro on live if we need to guestimate a better range for the ones in towns.

[Bamz4l]

this turtle guy is dropping the "classic" bombs all over the place today

[Nirgon]

Yes I like him and the woodwork he crawled out of :cool:

if it was truly classic, then slate would go to the tunnel. not just teleport/reset when he gets close. its very dumb that you can clear slate aggro by just running to the tunnel.

If it was truly classic we'd have 4-5 GMs (almost) always on and getting paid to do it to deal with people pulling him there to grief.

People would also be paying subs and losing a character they put ~100$ a year into for doing it.

[Theturtlehermit]

Thanks for the compliments guys lol

[YendorLootmonkey]

Pretty sure Slate and Rinna Lightblade work a little differently here due to Abacab's adventures pulling them everywhere to grief people in EC.

[SamwiseRed]

Yes I like him and the woodwork he crawled out of :cool:



If it was truly classic we'd have 4-5 GMs (almost) always on and getting paid to do it to deal with people pulling him there to grief.

People would also be paying subs and losing a character they put ~100$ a year into for doing it.

the amount of trains i did on live and got away with make me think there were less gms on at one time. i did it everyday after school for months and months. usually rhinna to ec tunnel or specs/sgs to oasis docks. after about 6 months i got 2 suspensions and finally a ban. best times of my life tho. did suck when i realized i had to buy another everquest w/ expansions.

[Nirgon]

Any interest for assist radius on slate? It was extremely high, much more so than other guards/npcs in the game.

Guards here don't aggro or assist from very far away in general here which I'm aware of.

That said, at least from an aggro perspective, NPCs in general don't aggro from far enough away here. That belongs in a separate thread where it can be measured on live because I don't believe its changed but worth bringing up in this context.

[Daldaen]

Yea Slate warps and memory blurs if he gets too close to the EC Tunnel. I understand why they did it, but the lack of classic in that makes me sad. Petitions about Slate should be auto ignored and he should be allowed to roam free.

If you want to make a mule in EC make him non KoS or put him outside of a train path.

[Nirgon]

https://web.archive.org/web/20021114180348/http://www.everlore.com/bestiary/beastdetails.asp?mode=show&BID=64111

https://web.archive.org/web/20030527142322/http://www.everlore.com/bestiary/beastdetails.asp?mode=show&BID=64111&pg=2&sortby=2#Comments

https://web.archive.org/web/20020128014942/http://www.everlore.com/bestiary/beastdetails.asp?BID=64111&mode=show&pg=3&sortby=2#Comments


just imagine walking through the desert area of EC....all of a sudden this helm pops up over the dune, witht he name Sargeant Slate above it. You're KOS to the militia...too late to run. Know what? Start thinking about the Godzilla music. The Japanese one...you know, when he comes rising out of the water? duuuuun, duh duh duh duh duuuuuuuh, dun dun duuuuh, duuuh duuuuh duuuh dun duuh dun duuh....you know how it goes =)


He deserves that theme, definitely my favorite NPC


^ dats what I want for this NPC (minus spelling errors). If you're solo'ing in the desert area, his aggro range should be about that big. I know its inconvenient for dark races but it is definitely classic. Personally, I think elements of danger and the scary/notorious NPCs of old are fun.


Pretty overwhelming consensus this guy had a HUGE assist radius and large aggro range :).

[Pringles]

bump.

Was comparing aggro ranges between live/here/takp and came across this old thing.

[gildor]

Slate is "custom" here due to griefing the tunnelquesters

[Nirgon]

GJ banning that Daldaen nuisance

honk

[Pringles]

Slate is "custom" here due to griefing the tunnelquesters

Warping/Mem blur mechanics are not mutually exclusive with the bug reported here.

[nilbog]

Sergeant Slate's assist radius is already set higher than a normal npc of his level. By more than 4x.

How is this working now? It can be increased