23 May pathing updates

[Mike]

Updated on 23 May 2106
> You're no longer immune to freezing if you're already following someone
> You can now run to pick up items in the middle of combat again
> You no longer lose run energy when following someone at walking speed
> Fixed the bug where you would be unable to click or attack an NPC if you're currently already attacking or following an NPC or player
> As of now, if you use ranged attacks or autocast magic on another player and then right-click and 'Follow' the player, you'll walk up to them and follow them while you keep attacking them.
> You can now attack an enemy who's standing on top of you, but only if you're frozen and can't move. If you're not frozen, you'll walk one square to the side and then start attacking them

[Amount]

.

For your knowledge;

You cannot move to pick up loot while in combat, as you could before
You lose run energy at 99 agility when following people

Immune to freeze while following:

Spoiler: show

Unable to follow while attacking:

Spoiler: show

Brief pause after person you're following walks within one square of you:

Spoiler: show

Npc will follow you to it's aggro boundary and get stuck there:

Spoiler: show

The NPC will not move from that location until the player it is targeting runs about 20-30 squares away.
edit: If a second player comes into the NPC boundaries, it will not be aggressive to that player if it is still targeting the first player.

Unable to attack someone while standing under them:

Spoiler: show

When you attack someone, you should take one step out and hit them.

[Couches123]

.

For your knowledge;

You cannot move to pick up loot while in combat, as you could before
You lose run energy at 99 agility when following people

Immune to freeze while following:

Spoiler: show

Unable to follow while attacking:

Spoiler: show

Brief pause after person you're following walks within one square of you:

Spoiler: show

Npc will follow you to it's aggro boundary and get stuck there:

Spoiler: show

The NPC will not move from that location until the player it is targeting runs about 20-30 squares away.
edit: If a second player comes into the NPC boundaries, it will not be aggressive to that player if it is still targeting the first player.

Unable to attack someone while standing under them:

Spoiler: show

When you attack someone, you should take one step out and hit them.

True, The follow bug can be very annoying, hope its fixed.

[Mike]

You cannot move to pick up loot while in combat, as you could before
You lose run energy at 99 agility when following people

Fixed both

Immune to freeze while following:

Fixed

Unable to follow while attacking:

Fixed

Brief pause after person you're following walks within one square of you:

That was my work in progress on the test server, was already fixed when I released it in production

Npc will follow you to it's aggro boundary and get stuck there:
The NPC will not move from that location until the player it is targeting runs about 20-30 squares away.
edit: If a second player comes into the NPC boundaries, it will not be aggressive to that player if it is still targeting the first player.

Not sure about this, I'll have to test this one some more.

Unable to attack someone while standing under them:
When you attack someone, you should take one step out and hit them.

I can only assume that the player who was attacking, was frozen. Because the game code already provides a way to take one sidestep and attack. Either that, or it was part of a bug I already fixed by now.


Thanks a lot for the input, let me know if there's other bugs or annoyances that need to be looked after.


[Edit] It seems like my earlier fix to prevent taking 1 - 2 steps back has lead to some noclipping issues, so I may have to reverse that particular improvement. Don't worry, it doesn't affect following or any of the other pathing improvements of 20 and 23 May, it just means the 'stepping back' glitch isn't fixed yet.

For those interested in the technical details: if you're walking/running around, there is always some latency between where the server thinks you are and where the client thinks you are. If you click somewhere while you're already moving around, your client will calculate a path from where it thinks you are, which can be 1 step behind the server (because the server hadn't passed on your latest position yet). That's the cause of the stepping back - a desynchronization of server and client character position.

To fix it, I had simply made the server cut off a small part of the beginning of your path when it detects a desynchronization, to prevent this 'stepping back', but I should have known that doing so might result in some noclipping issues, especially when running around corners. I had hoped the server-sided noclipping checks and simplified pathing algorithm would prevent this, but that doesn't seem to be the case.

Back to the drawing board for this one.

[B0rnt0b3pk]

Special thanks for Chris for figuring out how this works.

If you spam the minimap in diffrent locations, your characther will disregard any walls and noclip.

[Ain]

[Mike]

<3


@B0rnt0b3pk, see viewtopic.php?f=10&t=57291&p=531588#p531533 (bottom text) for why this is happening. I know the precise nature and cause of the bug, just need to find a way to fix the 'stepping back' glitch without causing noclipping

[Errobbie]

> You can now attack an enemy who's standing on top of you, but only if you're frozen and can't move. If you're not frozen, you'll walk one square to the side and then start attacking them

I really don't get this one to be honest.

You shouldn't be able to attack someone that is under you when you are frozen whatsoever.

[B0rnt0b3pk]

<3


@B0rnt0b3pk, see viewtopic.php?f=10&t=57291&p=531588#p531533 (bottom text) for why this is happening. I know the precise nature and cause of the bug, just need to find a way to fix the 'stepping back' glitch without causing noclipping

Interesting, didn't know it worked like that. As I'm not a coder or have any sort of experience with it, I need to ask a few questions. Isn't there a possibility to make it know exactly where you are by delaying the calculation process of where you actually stand or would that make it more laggy/glitchy? Becuase what I get from it is the server and client directs you to the best possible route by probability of where you might actually stand. What I have in mind is something like this If client and server have the same location of your character, it directs you to the route where you're going. If there's latency between server and client, there would be some sort of pause to make the server and client have the same location of your character then give a route based of where you're clicking? Again, I have no idea how it works, just want some insight.

[Migetmanz]

I love it ... personally have not experience much of that stuff but will defiantly make this server better