Please vote to determine what we should do about the current state of Pet Pulling. Comment your opinions here. Thread will be locked when Poll ends.
it was implemented to behave like Al'Kabor. see post http://www.takproject.net/forums/viewtopic.php?f=33&t=956&hilit=pet+pulling
the way it worked on AK was clearly an exploitable bug that would have been fixed if there were actually dedicated developers working on AK. i see that the "no" option is currently losing, but i wish more people would vote no. this trivializes so much if its in. don't we play EQ because its a challenging game? why take the challenge out?
Pet pulling does not trivialize content. You eliminate a pet's dps (because you have a green pet up) then you waste mana buffing it. And it doesn't work on every mob because some will 1 shot green pets. The only content I think it makes it OP is fennin ro event in PoF, but still sometimes the pet dies during that. IMO its not game breaking thats why they never dedicated resources to fixing it on AK *edit can we see who has voted (not what they voted for) but just a list of people who've voted
Not to mention pet pulling still wasn't fixed on live PC servers as far back as 2007-2008. I used it all the time on the original progression servers.
Pet Pulling's utility was pretty limited to be honest. It was at best a party trick. No where was it required or did it save exorbitant amounts of time where a decent duo of pullers couldn't do the same work. Vallon Zek was the location this probably saw the most use. Just cause of the clones, and people doing this with very small groups of characters. Never heard of it being used on Fennin Ro, we always just used monks to split that. I sort of liked it because it allows for smaller groups or raids that lack certain classes to be innovative and still kill mobs. I'm sure it could be used to pull fire or water minis if you cleared a decent amount of trash and practiced with it. But a skilled bard could do those in a fraction of the time with far less trash clearing. This isn't overpowering like Automating or PIt War is. Takes some skill and understanding of game mechanics to do. It isn't a free-pass-pull, it requires you have somewhere you can be non-invis and summon a pet, requires the pet lives until it gets back to you and if youre usin'g a mage/beast and that happens, you are almost guaranteed a train. It has a decent amount of risk built in without too much gain. Not game breaking enough to remove IMO.
I don't think this should even be put to a vote, yes will win in a landslide victory because people want to keep their sweet pet pulling (the majority of players right now are pet classes). This is pretty game breaking, part of the difficulty of many areas in EQ revolve around developing tactics for dealing with packs of mobs that social assist each other, pet pulling is a bug that circumvents that entirely and really it's not EQ anymore. -Karsa Orlong
The hell it doesn't trivialize content. It's trivializing the content with BIS drops RIGHT NOW. Let me explain to everybody what is happening, right now on this server. In Kithicor, there are high level mobs in a small cabin dropping BIS items for our era, because they were implemented in late Kunark. There are SEVEN (at least) NPCs that come together if pulled. On Live servers, these NPCs are very difficult to split, because they never stick around after feigns, and their aggro radius is somewhat large. Here, currently, all somebody has to do is pet pull and kill the single mob with a pet zerg and collect your BIS loot. I don't much care how long it was in game. It's very bad for the game. Furthermore it wasn't common knowledge back in the early years of EQ. This is NOT just making Vallon gimp. This is trivializing top end content.
Ahh sorry, it said no posting here when I first viewed, must have been edited. In that case, A yes vote for pet pulling is a vote for preserving the REAL Al'Kabor. It's how the Founding Fathers would have wanted it. Let Freedom and Liberty ring.
So how bout we keep the rune/druid AA DS exploit as well? I dont mind powerleveling with a 650 point DS...
Allowing this bug to exist would be very detrimental to the server, the people I play EQ all like the game because it is difficult. There are a handful of emu servers that allow trivialization of game content, some allow mq, showeq, 30-boxing, etc. What separates those servers from servers like this and p99 is that the game is difficult. Many parts of the game, especially in dungeons and other high risk areas are designed to require creative ways to defeat the encounter, such as the mobs in kithicor that are being farmed trivially with pet pulling. Allowing that to happen is a major game changer, it would be like letting mana classes drink water to rapidly increase mana regeneration. I speak for my pals and I and strongly support the dev team in making the hard, but correct, decisions in keeping this game EQ. -Karsa/Adaephon
Leave it in. Why is this even up for discussion? If youre recreating AK, then leave it in. Especially if youre keeping other bugs in like the "zone and lose buffs with low hp bug" (Rob said it was left in intentionally). Pet pulling wasnt a big deal on AK. The only thing it was used on that I recall being a major deal was Vallon zek. For most guilds he would be impossible to do without it.
I think sometimes its hard to draw the line on what to keep and what to fix. Personally if it's an easy fix, I am all for cleaning up bugs that were on Al'kabor that have a potential to trivialize content. If I wanted to collect easy pixels, I would go back to peq or make my own server and give myself pixels. I was doing DE's with the guild and while it's fun to have a higher chance of phatz, the content was definitely triviliazed for us with easier solo pulls. I think one part of the problem is that this might not be an issue that touches very many circumstances, and if there are other fixes that need working on that affect more areas, those should take priority. Pet pulling isn't going to make or break the server, but I think it's all about setting precedent on what will, and will not be fixed/allowed.
You know what else was on AK? Invis to Animals aggro. Items with that effect gave anybody near instant massive aggro on everything that had the user on its hate list. It would be insane to replicate. Quarm was unkillable on AK. Somehow I think most people would want him fixed. Perma pacing was on AK up until the end. If I had my way, buff removal on low-hp zoning would also not be recreated. However that's not game breaking, it's just needlessly obnoxious. Here is the big, big mistake people are making. This is NOT the case here. Pet pulling is being used (right now) on MANY things, including Kithicor and fire giants. This is not trivial content. Not only that, but pet pulling is worse on this server because of pet pathing. Pets walk right through walls like they aren't even there.
I don't care how you want me to pull it.....I can solo pull kith without pets and I can solo pull fg's without pets. Pick your poison, my means to an end will just slightly vary. I agree pet pulling is crap.....it just saves me time.
Then fix the pathing, mobs run through walls right now too. making it extremely difficult to pull anything because you are getting hit non stop.
For me... I really loved a lot of the bugs on Al'Kabor. Many of them were unique or I just didn't know about them when I played on my PC server in 2002-2003. Pet Pulling I can't say I ever personally used, I think I 1-grouped VZ with someone who used a mage to pet pull and one time doing insignia mobs with a mage again. That's about it. If you remove too much that made Al'Kabor special, you may as well just play a live Progression server. I'm all for difficulty. I experienced broken PoTime AEs and mechanics and many broken fights (made both easier or harder depending on the mob). I hope we recreate them exactly as they were on Al'Kabor. Xegony with it's broken adds, VZ (Time) with his ridiculous melee potential, And Quarm with his alpha AEs. Could even go alpha status with the Bertox whose AE ramp hit entire room, Fennin who reversed slow, Ginto who blurred every 5 seconds and Councilmen who didn't fleck if you want to go challenging. I didn't get to experience a few of those so I'd kind of like a shot at the emulated versions of these fights. I fail to understand why pet pulling DEs is a big deal. Pet zerging them, sure. It doesn't really take any real tank or healers. But pet pulling... A good bard/monk duo should be able to split those out easily or two monks etc. Them being in pre-Kunark is a pseudo issue but this server was always stated to have PoP endgame in mind. I don't really care if there's a few things from other eras floating around. It doesn't make or break the game IMO. Makes it a bit more interesting if nothing else.
I thought that the goal of this server is to recreate EQMac and then fix any bugs that were not fixed on the live server? To me, pet pulling was clearly a bug, just an exploitable one.
http://everquest.allakhazam.com/forum.h ... 0234606223 2006 post talking about how to pet pull EverQuest: The Planes of Power is the fourth expansion to EverQuest, a massively multiplayer online role-playing game. Wikipedia Initial release date: October 29, 2002 holy shit 4 years after PoP and pet pulling is still in EQ... pet pulling must have been a huge concern for EQ Live devs especially in the PoP era and below while were at fixing bugs that were implemented years after Al`Kabor's era we might as well get rid of tick pulling too... oh wait thats a popular EQ mechanic, which every monk/bard utilizes, I wonder if we will cherry pick this bug to fix too Same patch as pet pull removal
Really pet pulling isn't that big of a deal. I could care less about it. But I'd rather to lean to the side of keeping everything that was, rather than people trying to pick and choose what they think is best. Things that would've gotten you banned with GM presence/proper detection (automation and pit warring) should be nuked. Everything else should stay. Otherwise it becomes too custom.
To make myself more clear, its not just pet pathing its ALL NPC PATHING. please dont overlook the bigger picture
Equating the importance to this (or any bug) to when they get around to fixing it doesn't mean anything. SK swarming and mage beaming were in game for years before they nerfed them on PC side live. The Pally epic effect was nerfed like a year afterwards. The devs didn't care until it caused problems with the masses and everyone complained. It indeed was still a bug that needed to be fixed since events were designed without it in mind. I remember our guild occasionally using it, it definitely should not have existed.
I wasn't going to comment on this, but some of the people here are just insane. Pet pulling (IMO) is an exploit. Enough said really. Nobody cares when Sony did what on their server, this is about our server. Pit wars also still work on Live EQ, just as an example. I was also shocked that the buff stripping bug was RECREATED. That is just the pinnacle of stupid to me. I would have loved to see a poll on that, since it is not only annoying to lose your buffs, but also enables you to save your life by stripping yourself of lethal dots. If anything, leaving pet pulling in will continue to have a bad influence on this server, since it basically enables pet classes to solo even inside dungeons, making playing a melee character or puller even less viable. Especially with the pathing on this server already not favoring pullers in the first place. As for the insane notion that it trivializes content, maybe on a group basis. With the right pulling strat, you can pull anything without needing to rely on pet pulling, there are countless other ways to single pull the dark elves in Kithicor, or Giants in Sol B, for instance
Might want to host your own server because the broken potime fights that were on eqmac will never be like that on this server, including xegony without adds.
I didn't sign up to create an EZ-mode server. Fixes were promised. If at any point this server becomes a place I would no longer enjoy playing on, then working here becomes a job with no paycheck. Pet pulling making FD obsolete is bad enough, but recreating Xegony without adds and reimplementing IVA aggro, let alone pit wars, is so, so far away from where I'm willing to be-- the sooner we get this finalized, the better. Turning classic EQ into EZ server #2 just for the sake of nostalgia for a small percent of the userbase is dumb. Not everybody here is from AK.