Game Mechanics: Sneak pulling

[Raev]

So there was a long thread on the TAKP forums recently about sneak. In short Lazie wanted P99 sneak and the devs pushed back pretty hard. http://www.takproject.net/forums/ind...-any-type.7066 After reading everything, including the Safehouse threads and Autumn's guide I had two ideas:

Theory #1: NPCs in classic EQ had three attack modes:

• initial engage: Every server tick the NPC would check for KOS PCs in it's aggro range and attack them. Sneak eliminates this check while behind the NPC and reduces it in front.
• call for help: When an NPC is first engaged/engages a PC, it immediately calls for help to nearby NPCs who respond if it is inside their assist radius. Sneak eliminates this check while behind the NPC and reduces it in front.
• assist: Every server tick the NPC checks for engaged NPCs in it's assist radius and assists them. Sneak does NOT affect this check.

So if you tag a NPC with sneak, you'll get a single pull if it gets out of the unmodified assist range of its comrades before the server tick, but otherwise not. This explanation has a number of advantages: it explains why sneak pulling was so inconsistent, why it seemed to depend on level and situation, why some people would swear by it and others would put up 10K rewards and refuse to pay out, why it seems to work better when NPCs are pathing back, etc.

Theory #2: we had long threads on invis pulling here and I believe the conclusion was that mobs should not reaggro indifferent players on the FD list. I'm guessing Verant simply didn't have a IsFeigned() function and used IsIndifferent() instead. However, it should not actually clear the FD memory list. If you look at classic screenshots monks don't even have Sneak on their hotbar

However, almost certainly sneak should not clear the FD memory list, and Sneak should drop on ranged attack. Monking on Project 1999 is 100% trivial. You send in a holgresh eye while FD, draw the mobs out, stand with sneak, and tag the last one on the way back. I can pull HOT on Raev solo with 0.0 risk to myself, which is nowhere near classic. Instead Monks should get added to the FD memory list when the eye is engaged, sneak should drop on ranged attack, and sneak shouldn't provide this guaranteed single pull.

Anyway these are just theories; I'd trust whatever Daldaen and Maurice come up with.

[pasi]

Originally Posted by Raev [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

Theory #1: NPCs in classic EQ had three attack modes:

• initial engage: Every server tick the NPC would check for KOS PCs in it's aggro range and attack them. Sneak eliminates this check while behind the NPC and reduces it in front.
• call for help: When an NPC is first engaged/engages a PC, it immediately calls for help to nearby NPCs who respond if it is inside their assist radius. Sneak eliminates this check while behind the NPC and reduces it in front.
• assist: Every server tick the NPC checks for engaged NPCs in it's assist radius and assists them. Sneak does NOT affect this check.

And here comes my pal Lor to tackle the higher fruit.

This mostly matches my experiences. I've bolded the parts that I'm not sure of (or disagree with).

A couple minor bits though. More looking to address the mechanics of NPC aggro versus discuss specifically sneak here. Sneak is obviously more complicated than invis, but invis's simplicity gives us a cleaner look to start with.

I think part 1 of this theory is spot on. I'm not sure if the aggro tick is on the same sever tick interval (ie when HP/mana regen) or if it is 6 seconds. But a common scenario of running past see-invis mobs and often times either the mob wouldnt aggro or someone other than the first person to run through would pull aggro. The best evidence for aggro being on some sort of a server side tick is the existence of circlet of shadow shenanigans.

In terms of #2, I agree that when a mob is aggroed, it immediately calls for help.
When doing this with invis on live, anything in the initial assist radius would aggro if it were social. Didn't matter if you were invis or not. Range to target was a factor. I.E you could have nearby mobs not assist on initial aggro if you were firing at max range with a Doomshade Bow. But that's another thread entirely.

Part #3 is where I have the most issue. I obviously agree with mobs periodically calling for assistance outside the initial aggro. However, this is where I believe con-changes like invis or sneak function. On live, you could pull a mob, be invis, and parade it through social mobs who would not assist unless they saw through invis.
I look at sneak functioning the same as a positional invisibility for these mechanics. Could be definitely be wrong on sneak functioning like this though.

Going to try to re-install EQlive this week and fuck-around as this shit is a lot easier to demonstrate with a video than words.

[Lazie]

Originally Posted by Raev [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

So there was a long thread on the TAKP forums recently about sneak. In short Lazie wanted P99 sneak and the devs pushed back pretty hard.

You must have trouble reading if you think that is what I wanted. I simply wanted sneak to stop breaking on range attacks.

It turned into another discussion entirely after that. The change I wanted got made. I do not like the way sneak works on P99. It has never been entirely classic.

[Raev]

It's simply a theory and could easily be all wrong; I played a Magician on Live and quit in early Kunark so I don't have first hand experience with exactly how it worked. If you think Sneak mechanics haven't changed on Live it's easy enough to test: if my theory is correct there should be a short lag before NPCs assist on a sneak tag vs normal.

It seems to me that sneak must somehow affect that initial assist broadcast, albeit in an inconsistent manner that is highly dependent on level/geometry, or people would not be writing guides about how to sneak pull. Or maybe range/level is a factor; I don't think either are relevant on P99 except for greens sometimes not assisting. Reading the sneak guides it seems like level was a big factor.

Anyway, I'll be very curious to see what you come up with.

[Haynar]

On EQlive, I did some tests with sneak just now. I saw no reduction in aggro range, if sneak was up. If sneak was up, the indifferent mob I was behind, you could get right on top of them just about. And no aggro. They were indifferent.

If I body pulled, and they did not hit me. No adds. With the one aggro'd pulled right over the top of one i was behind.

[Ikon]

Originally Posted by Haynar [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

On EQlive, I did some tests with sneak just now. I saw no reduction in aggro range, if sneak was up. If sneak was up, the indifferent mob I was behind, you could get right on top of them just about. And no aggro. They were indifferent.

If I body pulled, and they did not hit me. No adds. With the one aggro'd pulled right over the top of one i was behind.

There wont be any reduction in aggro range from behind because of the LOS check. There's a definite reduction with sneak when a mob is in the arc though and you could always use that to sneak pull as long as any mobs you didnt want to pull were facing away or other mobs were outside of maximum sneak aggro range.

[paulgiamatti]

Originally Posted by Haynar [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

On EQlive, I did some tests with sneak just now. I saw no reduction in aggro range, if sneak was up. If sneak was up, the indifferent mob I was behind, you could get right on top of them just about. And no aggro. They were indifferent.

No one's saying that the sneak ability should work any differently than it currently does - we're talking about sneak pulling social aggro mechanics specifically. So it would be a totally separate thing - a second special aggro radius that appears the instant your projectile hits a mob while you're sneaking. Your standard sneak wouldn't break, meaning you could throw that projectile standing right next to another mob without it noticing.

Originally Posted by Haynar [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

If I body pulled, and they did not hit me. No adds. With the one aggro'd pulled right over the top of one i was behind.

Yeah I mean, I wouldn't be surprised if sneak pulling on current EQ live works a lot like it does here - the thing you guys need to be asking as developers who want to make this a true recreation is if lots of testimonials pulled from period-correct message board posts is more legitimate than the way it currently works on live. This issue might be too complicated and ambiguous to really run with anything though, so it's totally understandable to go the EQ live route.

[Phantasm]

Well thats unclear. Was he sneaking? Was it simply reduced mob aggro radius from sneak or a mob LoS check?

[paulgiamatti]

Originally Posted by Phantasm [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

Well thats unclear. Was he sneaking? Was it simply reduced mob aggro radius from sneak or a mob LoS check?

Hmm, actually on a second look he might not have been. It was posted in a thread where they were discussing sneak pulling though. Also, it was posted after they implemented the new aggro mechanic changes like lazy aggro, so that makes it even more unclear. I can only assume those changes affected sneak pulling in some way - I'd rather see the lazy aggro stuff get implemented on P99 first.

[Ikon]

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Basically this is sneak pulling from the front.

Normally any mob that you can hit that would normally be assisted will be well within the assist radius.

However with sneak the assist radius shrinks so that with skill you can pull mobs from the front that normally wouldn't be possible.