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make mobs damageable during leashing

Discussion in 'Wishlist Requests' started by Ancev, Apr 9, 2022.

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  1. Ancev

    Ancev Avatar

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    OK the leashing feature of mobs gets pretty annoying, especially when you're about to finish the mob off in 1 or 2 hits then it leashes (runs/sprints) back to it's original position.

    If we were able to damage the mobs in this leashing state, we might be able to get those 1-2 hits off and kill the mob? or have them retain the damage when returning to their original position?
     
    Last edited: Apr 11, 2022
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  2. FBohler

    FBohler Avatar

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    Invulnerable mobs while leashing lead to some really broken gameplay loops. Especially in scenes like The Fall, where melee mobs tend to leash a lot in the elevator section.
    I 100% support this request, remove the invulnerability effect from the leash logic.
     
  3. Coswald_Dirthmire

    Coswald_Dirthmire Bug Hunter

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    Something would need to be done in Jotungrund or it would be free snarler tames/kills for all. They can spend several minutes leashing, and often do.
     
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  4. Adam Crow

    Adam Crow Avatar

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    I don't like this mechanic either, but allowing damage to leashed mobs would make combat more exploitable.

    It's pretty easy to learn where each mob leashes, and they cannot attack you when they are leashing. So you could just run back and forth, getting stuff to leash and you would hardly take damage. I use to play before they implemented this mechanic and it was really easy to perform this tactic.
     
  5. FBohler

    FBohler Avatar

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    It's not that hard to code in a criterion to detect whether or not the player is cheesing the system.
    E.g.: did it happen more than 3x in a row? Leash with invulnerability and recover HP.
     
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  6. Ancev

    Ancev Avatar

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    yeah or figure something else out, for me it's immersion breaking when I'm fighting a mob and it just sprints away like that, and it is frustrating having to track down the mob again and do it all over again for the same loot I should've had in the first place.
     
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  7. Katu

    Katu Avatar

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    Its there, because so many abused the system. If it gets changed, it will get abused again.
    It's same mechanism as in WoW and many others. If you cant fight the mob near the spawn, then you can't fight the mob.

    Learn to run around instead of straight line.
    My immersion flew out of window, when everyone was abusing ledges to fight at CP's etc.
     
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  8. FBohler

    FBohler Avatar

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    Agreed.
    The system punishes innocent players in order to prevent exploits they're not using.
     
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  9. Cora Cuz'avich

    Cora Cuz'avich Avatar

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    Maybe just making them heal slowly for say, 10-15 seconds, then have it ramp up after that. So five seconds of leashing doesn't erase five minutes of effort. Especially in a game where the mobs are so bad at pathing. I don't run away in a straight line until they leash, they get hung up on a rock or a tree while being kited, which triggers leashing. I mean, a dragon will chase you to any corner of a stag encounter, but they still leash sometimes, so it's clearly not because I'm luring them too far from where they spawn.
     
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  10. Katu

    Katu Avatar

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    There is really no middle ground for this. No matter how you try to solve this, it all results to possiblity of finding a spot, where you are safe and the mob just stupidly runs around you or gets stuck.
    You can then kill it and ignore the fact that you now can exploit the pathfinding issues or map geometry, but it is what it is. Exploit. This was what everyone and their mother was doing.

    I don't understand the scenerio of the problem here. I havent played for sometime now, but I am something like lvl 115 or 120. I have kited a few mobs and I know for a fact, that unleashing is not THAT big of a problem. If it happens every now and then, you just have to do it better. It is a safe guard and they will never lift it up, because of the history.

    Why run away from the mob anyway? To get a tiny edge over its AI.
    What would you do, if the mob got stuck on a tree? You are saying that even if it happened 1/5 only, you would leave it there and find an another? Right... Even if you somehow could do it, most of us would kill it, to get it to spawn again. See, you dont have to actively try to exploit it ie. always running to same spot that 100% causes issues, like jumping over some cap, where they cant follow you..
     
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  11. FBohler

    FBohler Avatar

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    You're implying that leashing will only occur when running away from mobs. This is false.

    I'll name 3 instances where leashing may happen wildly:
    - The Fall and The Rise platform sections;
    - Cabalists in Sieges;
    - Upper levels in the Obsidian Panopticon.

    I believe that a mix of stiff logic and messy navmeshes lead to these scenarios.
     
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  12. Ancev

    Ancev Avatar

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    Maybe leashing only needs to be fixed in certain areas? The Fall is where I was having the problems. In some situations the Ebon Cultists leash on their own without me even being near them. They'd run a short distance then all of a sudden leash back to their spot. Other times I'd go into one of the rooms where the fire traps are and they'd sprint away while I was attacking them.. but I've seen some of the cultists walk all the way into where the small mushrooms are.. so maybe their leashing distance just needs to be adjusted in that map.

    I remember in UO the mobs would slowly wander back and heal up slowly as well.
     
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  13. Anpu

    Anpu Avatar

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    Was wondering if this actual wishlist is really a bug report about bad leashing in certain areas….
     
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  14. Ravalox

    Ravalox Chief Cook and Bottle Washer Moderator SOTA Developer

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    Thanks everyone for the input here...

    Mobs will not be made to take damage during a leash event. Allow the player to deliver damage to a leashing NPC/Mob would be an incredibly exploitable situation. While leashing, the Mob has no ability to continue it's attack, and therefore cannot defend itself against any attack the player may make.

    If there are Mobs that are leashing in too short a distance from their spawn point, then please report them as a bug; but please be ready to give detail. We will need the actual LOC for where the mob spawns from, as well as what the spawn was. Taking video and supplying a link in the report would be incredibly helpful in this scenario.
     
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  15. Sannio

    Sannio Lead Quest and Level Designer Moderator SOTA Developer

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    NPCs that have been attacking you will leash and return home when they believe you are no longer a viable target. (Reasons for NPC's leashing include they are too far from their "home," their target has left the area, or the target is no longer targetable by the NPC.) They cannot attack while leashing home. It's not reasonable for players (or other NPCs) to continue attacking such NPCs when they aren't in a position to defend themselves.
     
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  16. Sannio

    Sannio Lead Quest and Level Designer Moderator SOTA Developer

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    Just for fun, let's keep exploring this line of thinking. Using your example, we'll have the NPC unable to heal while it leashes. But to maintain balance, I'd think that the player(s) fighting that NPC should also be unable to heal and use skills for the same time frame. Thoughts?

    Disclaimer: We're not changing how leashing works. I'm just going though a fun design exercise.
     
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  17. Anpu

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    That probably would be a bug with the scene, can you bug report that location?
     
  18. Alley Oop

    Alley Oop Bug Hunter Bug Moderator

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    barugon has bugged his problems with jumping and leashing before and no one can verify it.
     
  19. Browncoat Jayson

    Browncoat Jayson Legend of the Hearth

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    A better behavior might be that they still take aggro, but remain unable to take damage. This would mean you could intercept them, and once they are able to defend themselves, you could continue fighting them. As it is now, they run back completely unhindered, with no way to recover from something like bad pathing. Leashing is a terrible mechanic.
     
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  20. Katu

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    Seriously, if this happens to you constantly ( addressing anyone and everyone ), you have to change your style.
    I had unleashing problems with the troll boss at the fort, I kept unleashing when doing stuff. I had to adapt and change tactics to overcome this issue and it turned to very rare problem.
    If this happens, you can either file a bug report and wait for the fix or learn from it and adapt.

    Unleashing has been used atleast since Wow vanilla and its super simple mechanic to understand ( however, problem is that it happens weirdly at times (( -> report it )), and it protects the game from lots of issues.

    If it would be allowed to continue fighting, it would allow "rubber banding" near the leashing point. As ranged, you could shoot it, then step just out of the leashing range and make the mob run away and just at the right moment, attack it within the good side of the leashing range. Continue that until mob dead.
    If you ment that the mob can wander anywhere from its spawn, it would allow gathering of all mobs in zone to BBQ festivals, around ring of fires, so... no.

    Bugs are bugs, but leashing saves from many exploitable spots and behaviours that no dev can figure out while planning scenery and/or skill mechanics.
     
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