Summoning Pet Balls, Animal Form, and Pets

[Guest]

Just read through the whole thread and there really are some good points made.

Al Thorin said something once or twice which has stuck firmly in my mind (and after a brain trauma in the last six months, that some stuff is sticking is decidedly reassuring!).

Addressing the matter of pet summoning balls should be a two-pronged approach which includes not just choosing a cool down period but also improving pet responsiveness/obedience (auto-defend, bah!) as well as improving pet AI to something at least approaching wild/monster AI (eg, following around obstacles/terrain)

I think pet summoning balls should be considered a tool in the arsenal of a pvp tamer. As it stands, the tool is a little too sharp by comparison to tools wielded by other templates.

So, cool down time...how about the same as the skill delay time period? No reveal, no words of power (eg, "d00d Kill me while I'm summoning f1D0"), just frozen as if spellcasting. The time between being able to use certain skills is, what, 5 or 6 seconds or thereabouts?

While anyone familiar with cycling should fairly quickly become comfortable with it, 5 or 6 seconds in a pvp scenario often means the difference between a kill & a dirt sandwich. This has the effect of retaining pet summoning balls as a viable pvp (tamer) tool, yet bringing that tool more into line with other tools.

No summoning of pets whilst in ninja form was another good idea. "You can't summon a pet in this form" type message.

Good thread, a positive one.

I really hope you'll keep a special eye on how this will affect Siege, too. Early days, I know, but maybe even a special one off, Siege mirror Test Centre for this alongside the usual prodo Test Centre?


Eggs


Hatchlings


Dragons

 

[Guest]

<blockquote><hr>

well, its a pity atlantic is not the only shard huh?

[/ QUOTE ]
I'd like to hear more about which shard is being overrun with stealth tamers.

 

[Kurgan]

I can still see this one abused..
But I see people summoning their pet, then going into animal form.
If they are going to make this change. It should also not let you go into animal form for a 20-30sec period after you summon your pet.

 

[imported_Fran Fury]

Don't worry..I understand what your saying and agree.
Having animal form take a control slot would solve nothing.

 

[Sir Ha-ward]

<blockquote><hr>

all these sound like good ideas i would like to add one "thy pet can not flee in the heat of battle" when flagged for two min so we can kill them

[/ QUOTE ]


Love it

 

[Sir Ha-ward]

Just to bring your attention to it Leurocian theres also an exploit with the tamers turning their pets blue in town after they key on you, and causing a red to get guardwhacked that could use some looking into

 

[UncleSham]

first id like to thank you for taking the time to adress this issue .

i do have some ideas considering ive been a tamer for many years on both siege and prodo shards.


first and formost , pets are dumb as rocks. (stupid dog, ya made me look bad)
we need to be able to pull them back when they deside it would be wise to leave their healer and go play with 20 hostiles.

i dont know how many times ive hollered all kill / all follow me till im blue in the face , run back to find my pet with his nose in a corner, trying to kill something ON THE OTHER SIDE OF A WALL .

these pets get hung up on every tree or stairstep ... they have to go kill every mongbat that gets within sight ... god , i swear , sometimes i damn near have to e bolt them just to get their attention. (oh ive done it . hehe, better get that invis off quick)
and yes even being 3 time legendary ... you'd think they'd listen... *sigh*


add that to the fact that the new dragons are slow as pack horses (and about as nimble) you really shouldnt have a problem outrunning them . the issue comes in when someone spams a petball . (a simple 5 or 10 seccond delay would fix this)


if pets werent so stupid , we wouldnt need petballs , but they are , and we do . so please dont just remove our petballs . you want to put a short delay on them, fine . . but we pvmers need them (even in fel)

i dont believe its a problem with any of the skills mentioned . its the combination of all of these . (poeple using legal game mechanics to their best advantage) and THEN using petballs and auto stable as they were never intended.

noone wants to speak up to defend the class being nerfed till its your turn with the nerf stick ... then who will speak up for you ?

i agree with Goron . if you put a visual warning on the petball or put in a 3 minuit timer , your gonna kill the entire stealth idea .theres no need to kill them off completely . just tone them down a bit .
and put the limit on the character not the ball rather like a skill timer.

i do agree putting the pets in the stable has its drawbacks . i actually like krystals idea of the no autostable when flagged agressor .maybe if it is flagged aggressor then put it in the stable. i believe this would solve the immediate problem and it wouldnt affect honest tamers.

id love to see some improved pet ai , but apparently thats asking too much coding. they've been dumb as hell forever .
"BAD dragon" *smacks dragon* ... *counts fingers*

 

[Guest]

<blockquote><hr>


Just to bring your attention to it Leurocian theres also an exploit with the tamers turning their pets blue in town after they key on you, and causing a red to get guardwhacked that could use some looking into

[/ QUOTE ]

Not exactly an exploit, that's a bug in the pet ball itself. When the pet is summoned back it is no flagged to anyone, turning it "blue?". If you're quick enough you can figure how to use that knowledge to your advantage.

 

[Guest]

I think the idea of a timer is a decent idea although there are times when hunting it is gonna end up with me and a dead wyrm. *chuckles* Sometimes all I can do to get the wyrm out of harm's way from a monster trying to eat it is to run and keep clicking my ball because otherwise he doesn't listen and tries to go back and gnaw on whatever is about to kill him. Yes, 120 lore, effectively 115+ taming, I just have a wyrm that was probably the runt of the whelping.

As far as no pet balls in animal form: I'd hate to see it completely limited from use in animal form due to the role-playing impact. We have several people in our rp community who rp lycans and summon other wolves using pet balls while "howling" in emotes. I've seen my fellow rpers come up with some really creative methods of explaining stuff that doesn't happen in game mechanics.

I do pvp and I agree something has to be done. I just hate to see a solution that might take away more from the rp communities and the ability to be creative to enrich the depth of immersion.

 

[Guest]

<blockquote><hr>


first and formost , pets are dumb as rocks. (stupid dog, ya made me look bad)
we need to be able to pull them back when they deside it would be wise to leave their healer and go play with 20 hostiles.

i dont know how many times ive hollered all kill / all follow me till im blue in the face , run back to find my pet with his nose in a corner, trying to kill something ON THE OTHER SIDE OF A WALL .

these pets get hung up on every tree or stairstep ... they have to go kill every mongbat that gets within sight ... god , i swear , sometimes i damn near have to e bolt them just to get their attention. (oh ive done it . hehe, better get that invis off quick)
and yes even being 3 time legendary ... you'd think they'd listen... *sigh*


[/ QUOTE ]

WELL SAID. I've had my wyrm since before pets could be bonded... you'd think when I said you're gonna get your tail kicked, he'd listen. I've totally targeted my own pet just to get them to move *laughs* I'm glad I'm not the only one.

 

[Guest]

My 2gp worth...

Use of a summoning ball should reveal the user.
There should be a delay - rather like magery without any FC/FCR in place - before the pet actually appears.
There should be a delay between uses of the pet ball.
Use of the pet ball should have a price (beyond just solen powder) in terms of stamina. Think about it. YOU try dragging a dragon halfway across a swamp in under 1 second!
No using while in ANY form other than plain human/elf. Just so the ninjas don't suffer from necro envy.

Now, I'm off to bed. Good night, all.

*vanishes by means of an inverted pet ball*

 

[Shelleybean]

I don't pvp at all. I do use pet summoning balls frequently. There are many times when pets "warp" off the screen to kill something I didn't want it to kill. I have to use the pet summoning ball repeatedly to keep the pet with me. A timer on the pet summoning ball means certain death for my pets. I would only support a timer if it could only be applied to pvp situations.

 

[Fayled Dhreams]

*wheeze* Don't over look WHERE the "timer is" ... multiple pet balls should NOT be an option for work around

 

[imported_revenant2]

Hi Leurocian!!

Thanks for making this thread and for being around to pay attention to things. It's wonderful that runic-crafted recipe bows got looked at btw!!!

I read through this thread and had three points, one of which is to expand upon something that another poster gave a brief mention to.


*********************
Wenchy brought up one basic behavior of pet ball summoning that you may wish to look at while you are fixing pet ball issues.

There is, right now, a flagging system in place that prevents aggressor-flagged players from running into a player house to save their own asses. Aggressor-flagged players are locked out of the house for a while, unable to walk onto the steps (and they also cannot recall or gate away). This would be to force aggressors to actually fight as opposed with start something and then be a -insert rude unmentionable term here- by running into a house for safety.

Pet ball behavior right now appears to allow tamers to bypass the nature of this flagging to an extent. I think I watched a group of tamers do this for some hours the other night. They stay in a house and then have their pets run out of the house to attack people, and then they ball the pets all the way back into the house at will.

If I correctly understood what I was seeing the other night, timers on pet balls won't significantly affect the tamers who do this. The tamer in the house will wait in complete safety until the timer is up, and then launch his pets out again. As it is now, they wait a bit already as a natural course of things, it wouldn't even be an inconvenience.

I'd like to suggest that when you put the pet ball changes through, you also make sure that pets end up locked out of player houses based upon the pet owner's aggro flag.

Several ways to handle this come to mind....

One way is that if the pet owner is flagged out of a house, but yet is standing in a house, the pet ball won't work at all for the duration of the aggro flag + being in the house. Effectively, the aggro-flagged player would have to walk out of the house for the ball to begin working again.

A harsher and perhaps more fun thing for the non-tamers would be for the aggro-flagged tamer to be kicked out of the house if he uses a ball to summon a pet, kinda like how you can get kicked out of a castle if you are aggro flagged and step into the grassy areas. And once the kick-out happens and he's standing under the sign, unable to get back in, the tamer would get his pet delivered to him, as requested!

In addition to something like the above that disallows using a petball to basically bypass the aggro-flag rules for houses, the pets must not be able to walk into a player house while the player is aggro-flagged. The pets need to in all cases be stuck outside just like the tamer himself would have been. So, if the player is standing in a house with an aggro flag and calls his pets via a command, the pets would get stuck at the stairs, just like people do.

A thing I have never tested but should be considered is that log-out and log-in while aggro-flagged on a player should also not cause the pets to be succesfully retrieved into the house. Assuming that right now the pets do get delivered to the player in the house, two possible behaviors for this would be to make the auto-stable simply not work for a tamer that is aggro-flagged on a player, or in the absence of that capability, it would be helpful to cause the pets to be kicked out of the house (right under the sign, presumably) upon the log-in. Once again, I do not know the actual behavior of this right now.

...... having said all of that, if this behavior is already accounted for and I just dont realize it, disregard what I just wrote... heh. Maybe all those people outside the tamer's little house had already flagged on him, but from what Wenchy wrote, I will guess not. I am not sure because I personally did flag on the lame, house-fighting tamers. I've never used such tactics with my own tamer so I have a limited base of direct experience with it.


****************************
Second point: Pets repeatedly engage monsters in a way that functions as pet disobedience. You tell the pet to all follow me, and then something does damage to the pet (new attack, or poison damage, or bleed damage, or strangle, or so on). The pet then charges after the thing that did damage to it despite your recent "all follow me" command. As things are now, one uses a pet ball to attempt to deal with that and a timer on the pet ball will be frustrating in these circumstances.

In light of this, you may wish to make delay or timer changes to pet balls apply just to Felucca, if it's not a serious pain in the ass. UO will sorta sidestep a bees nest of annoyed 'trammies' who aren't necessarily reading these boards if it's done that way. I believe that the 'trammies' would prefer to keep their non-timer pet balls and just accept that things work differently if they happen to go to Fel.

Another thing would be to tie the pet ball delay to the tamer's aggro flag on another player BUT this has some possibly-unwanted side effects. For one, it will make the tamer class more powerful on the defensive side than the offense. This could be good or bad from a balance standpoint, I don't know. Another thing is that some tamers will abuse quirks and bugs in the flagging system to cause someone to flag on them without the person actually intending to flag, thus causing an inappropriate lack of pet ball delay to be applied to the situation.


*********************************
Third point: As a tamer I really appreciate the auto-stable thing when you lose connection or log out, not only as a tactic to save my pets (which I do use it for). I can tell that this behavior prevents lots of incidents where tamers would end up losing their bonded pets. If changes to this seem called for, hopefully it can be done in a way where it's tied to the tamer being aggro-flagged on a player, and then once that flag had expired, the pet would indeed be collected and put into the stable.

Once again, thanks for listening and being there!!

 

[Guest]

If we remove any warning for a player that said tamer is about to call pets, what is to stop gimp tamers in pairs or worse, stealthing and super ganking victims? Reminds me of the crazy guys I once saw, who loaded up on explo pots and self detonated beside a player heh. Kaboom! WTF?!!! [insert expletives]

If we just put in a delay on re-use or something like that, I would see the gimps grouping up, perhaps with stealth archers to sneak up and pulverise players.

I don't want to ask for more nerfing than absolutely necessary, but that's the kind of workaround I'd expect the gimps to use. That's assuming pet balls are fixed so they don't work in animal form and have a delay before a tamer gets back into form again. Otherwise add fast moving tamers to the above problem. Ick....

Wenchy

 

[Guest]

<blockquote><hr>

*wheeze* Don't over look WHERE the "timer is" ... multiple pet balls should NOT be an option for work around

[/ QUOTE ]

Thanks for the reminder...forgot about that possibility. Tamers shouldn't be able to have multiple balls for the same pet in their pack. It's bad enough that tamers have their pets by the balls, nevermind the thought of them playing with their balls on the run

Wenchy

 

[Sergul'zan_SP]

Leurocian -

You're pretty much got it.

I would say a 30 minute re-use timer for *all* pet balls, not just the one you used. This re-use timer would *not* take effect when you sent your pet back to the stables, only if you tried to summon one a second time in that period.

Animal forms shouldn't be allowed to use pet balls at all. I personally feel you should restrict animal forms from using dismount (in any form) too, especially since they grant the speed of a mount.

Thanks for giving attention to this matter!

 

[Guest]

Right now i was 8 houers yew gate wtih litle rest between.
Fact is i was with dexxer and wtih tamer and i sow in this 8 houers only 3 more pvp tamer.So all in all 4 tamers together in about 8 houers if i count me two.
Fact is the tamers was dead all ofthn and me too becasue of luring away the greater dragon and gangign the tamer.The pk tamer with cu side live longer.
Im not so strong wtih dexxer but i surveied longer much longer becasue tamer have the pet but they are very weak by ganging.
you talking about pet bals becasue one or 2 pvp tamer and waht about the 5000 pve tamer loving their pet bals in trammel!
After these 8 houers yew gate i recognized that i feel much more save in felucca with dexxer then wtih my tamer.

 

[UncleSham]

well i think we should allow them one immediate pull and attack for the suprise affect .
otherwise your gonna kill the entire profile.
after that a short delay should allow them to remount. if they want to use multiple tamers , well, that is a little ustopable yes . but any time you go against multiple players your gonna have that , even if they are mages archers ... whatever.
i think the main issue here is stopping one guy from being unbeatable.

 

[Guest]

Sergul we have already a timer on evation.and enchanted aplles.Becasue the necromages wanted this!
Then we need a timere for bloodogh,striangel,pan strike and to make it no possile to overscros energyfeilds and stonewalls.
Now the necromages want to nerf tamers.

 

[UncleSham]

yes definately make it per character , not per ball.

altho a delay that long effectively kills that whole template . i dont think we need to kill them off completely . just tone them down .

and no i dont have a stealth tamer .. just trying to be fair and not wave the nerf bat with complete abandon

 

[imported_Lord GOD(GOD)]

The whole topic is getting kind of frustrating with people coming in late in to the discussion, not all realising why it's being discussed and jumping on one idea or another. The same points keep being gone over and re explained to people.

I use more than one of the animal forms in conjunction with my pvm tamers and adding a control slot to it to me would be nerfing ninjitsu to fix something else. Ninjitsu has had enough nerfs.

[Pet balls not working in animal form]
This would not hinder a pvmer using a ninja/tamer.
I don't see how it would hinder siege stealth tamers as you only have to pop out of animal form to summon your pet in to the area then you can reform if you want, all while still hidden.
As for what link said going in and out of animal form constantly is not instant even at 4/6 casting, there is also a lag when you come out, it would be enough to solve the problem.

 

[Guest]

<blockquote><hr>

<blockquote><hr>


Better to make animal forms take up a control slot isn't it?

[/ QUOTE ]

No. Not at all. Not even close. Gonna say it again...

Running while shifted into a ninja form does not, repeat: DOES NOT, make the tamed pets move toward their target or follow the tamer any faster...

PET BALLS DO IT!

It's real simple. The tamer "all kills" a target, then runs alongside the now fleeing target while repeatedly hitting his pet ball macro. Result: Dead Target.

If you do the same thing without a pet ball, it will result in a vulnerable tamer being alone on the field with his now enraged target and the pet(s) now several screens behind or stuck on a house or some other obstacle.

If animal form is made to take a control slot and pet balls are left alone, all that will happen is "PvP" tamers will go back to doing the same crap, but they will be using a rune beetle.

Are you understanding the situation now?

[/ QUOTE ]

T and I agree here. I just wanted to say, however, that I will go with two fully trained bake-kitsunes, tyvm

 

[Guest]

<blockquote><hr>

i think the main issue here is stopping one guy from being unbeatable.

[/ QUOTE ]

Agreed. I just don't want to hear "more nerfs!" too soon after this one lol

I'm also a bit unsettled about the power of that first hit. I know you're saying you can get away from it, but my pets have been known to take a large chunk off their victims in a hit. Without getting into a discussion about the armour of said victim and all the other variables, I guess what I need is reassurance that what you propose is fair on the victim.

As I'm sure you've gathered, my tamer's a stealther. I don't want her nerfed more than the next stealther. I would like a choice in using a pet bomb drop if I found a deserving target, but not if it was overpowered.

Wenchy

 

[Guest]

There is one real good solution here and it is to remove petballs totaly and instead put the same function in to herding.

At 50 herding you can start to use it as a command

50 herding is = 1 command every 90 sec
80 herding = 1 command every 60 sec
90 herding = 1 command every 30 sec
Gm herding = 1 command every 10 sec

Now we wont even need pet balls and instead make use of a skill. A pure tamer will get the skill becous it will be good, but a pvp,er cant afford it. if he spends points on it hes very weak.

 

[Guest]

What about a "casting time" that depends on the control slots of the pet? (so that calling a 1-slot mount would be quick, but a 4 or 5 slot tank of a pet would take a few seconds of helplessness)?

 

[imported_SavageSP]

Thank you for looking at this.

1. A 10-30 Second Timer between uses would keep the Tamer from spamming it on top of another Player, without hurting the PvMers.

2. Make Ninja Tamers only be able to use the Petball in Human Form, and possibly add a Timer after a Petball is used to be able to hit animal form again.

3. As suggested in other posts, a "message" That a pet is being Summoned, or the tamer going through a "spellcasting animation" like Earthquake to actually summon the pet.

4. Please Insure that multiple Petballs linked to the same pet couldnt be used to override the Timer, or any of the other Timer overiding bugs that weve had in the past.

5. Logging out to save a pet after it has been "All Killed" on a player should be looked at also, if they are gonna attack you with a pet, and you manage live, you should be able to Kill the Pet and make it take a Skill Loss at the very least before they pull it to safty without being on screen to command it.

 

[Guest]

Every time a pet dies it will lose 0,1 in all skills. The new dragons do not regain it fast because of the high skill.

 

[Fayled Dhreams]

back to the focus on Timers ... on petball usage ...
should be character based ... NOT on each pet ball

looks like there can be ...1 or 2 different timers
1) pause on the summons
2) pause between reuse
(both ON the character ... to prevent serial clicking/calling in a herd of rats)

1) for the tamer ... easy enough to "time" when to call the pet ... either in or out of an area
Whether there is ALSO an indication that the ball is in use, or the character is hidden, or frozen or in form or approaching combat or fleeing combat ...
THOSE issues are secondary to the size of the TIME delay of its use.

2)for the tamer ... again ... easy enough when the time "is known" ... to know when to "re-use" ... probably in an effort to LEAVE an area ...
whether in fleeing for their lives OR in active pursuit ...
Again:
Whether there is ALSO an indication that the ball is in use, or the character is hidden, or frozen or in form or approaching combat or fleeing combat ...
THOSE issues are secondary to the size of the TIME delay of its use.

For #1 ...there can also be 2 types of delay ...which can be "flagging" related ...at peace ... fresh out of the stable or corral .. that could be ... on a "first summons" ... shorter ... than a second use ... Which would LIKELY be in the heat of some form of combat (pvp-pvm) ... a second use could be Longer a delay (say a ten minute window ... slows down the "hop-scotch" pursuit)
IF only 1 timer is put in and IF it is on the summons side ONLY ...there could also be "two levels"

For #2 ... IF only 1 timer is put in again ... it could be not just one flat chunk of time ... it could grow and shrink in size as determined by USE.

Just saying ...Get one or the other or BOTH timers in on test ... (on the character) ... work it out how long how many how flexible ...
THEN
further refine the implementation (might not NEED to) ... as regards the Secondary issue/s:
indication that the ball is in use, or the character is hidden, or frozen or in form or approaching combat or fleeing combat how they're flagged whether or not Pvm or PvP or both and all the other flagging issues ...

well ... I would ...



.

 

[smile]

<blockquote><hr>

Hello Everyone,

Just letting you know we have been reading your feedback on summoning pet balls, animal form, and pets.

Some of the suggestions I've seen target reducing effectiveness of one or more of these three things.

At the moment, I'm more inclined to look at the summoning pet balls first and see if we want to make any changes to it. One of the main suggestions I have seen that has possibilities is to require a reuse timer for the summoning pet balls, and perhaps don't allow them to be used while in animal form.

Let's try and only discuss pet summoning ball specific changes in this thread. I'd like to gather specific feedback on them.

Thanks all!

[/ QUOTE ]

With due respect, I also wish to stay on topic and help you with the fix. However, we need to identify the main source of problem before fixing something. Otherwise, you are not making full use of your precious time.

Why is there a nerf for petballs? The main reason i hear is because tamers would have the ability (together with bolas etc) to stick their pets on their hapless victims all the time, making even running away impossible. You see... we need to look beyond that.

We need to ask ourselves... why do ppl run when tamers stick their pets on them? As a pvper, I do not run the moment a mage utters some spell combos; nor do i run when a dexer come rushing at me with infectious strike ready.

The vast majority of pvpers do run when fighting pets, simply because pets are simply the most overpowered pvp weapon that can cause the most damage in the shortest possible time. That is also the reason why most tamers would try to bola you at the first opportunity, because they know fully well that you are dead the moment you are forced to stand toe-to-toe with their pets.

Before someone comment that pvpers should then learn to pvm, i need to highlight that while a tamed pet has reduced powers compared to its untamed counterpart, it still has more firepower than any template out there. In addition, it has the AI equivalent to the tamer. I have not even touch on the ability of the tamer to do further mischief in addition to what his/her pet is doing (cast spell combos, use specials, heal pets, DP with ninja stars etc etc). How many can survive against a 2/3 vs 1 situation?

Fixing petballs is a step towards nerfing the ninjitsu dismount tamers; i also see this as necessary to solve an immediate pressing problem. However, the fix on petballs needs to be look at concurrently with the issue on pvping with pets. Otherwise, I assure you that similar complaints on tamers would return in other forms and you would have to do some fixing again.

 

[UncleSham]

might i point out to you what i said in annother thread.
back in the magincia invasion i took a few different pets in and even if i could keep it from running off i had a hard time competing with some of the pumped up dexers . half the time i couldnt even grey the corpse if i had a dexer on it too.
i got frustrated and went and got my necro/sammy/fencer and had no problem greying corpses . (even if i came in late)
so you want to tell me the pets do more damage than a good dexer?

i dont believe you

 

[imported_SavageSP]

<blockquote><hr>

Every time a pet dies it will lose 0,1 in all skills. The new dragons do not regain it fast because of the high skill.

[/ QUOTE ]

Exactly, A Tamer that Siks his pet on you and runs and hides, should have some risk of loss.

Hes Gambling that his pet will kill you, and he can loot your Stuff(on Siege), when he sees his pet may die and lose some skill, he shouldnt be able to Log Out safely a few screens away to save his Pets Skills.

Im not Talking about PvM Tamers, only tamers that attack other Players by Flagging Aggressive on them with "All Kill", If the Tamer was attacked first, then he wouldnt be the Aggressor and shouldnt have a Timer to pull his pet back.

A 900 Hit Point Dragon isnt easy to kill anyways, it takes a little doing and a little time to kill one.

 

[smile]

<blockquote><hr>

might i point out to you what i said in annother thread.
back in the magincia invasion i took a few different pets in and even if i could keep it from running off i had a hard time competing with some of the pumped up dexers . half the time i couldnt even grey the corpse if i had a dexer on it too.
i got frustrated and went and got my necro/sammy/fencer and had no problem greying corpses . (even if i came in late)
so you want to tell me the pets do more damage than a good dexer?

i dont believe you

[/ QUOTE ]

my goodness... correct me if i am wrong. are you talking about pvm damage here? this is a pvp thread!! if your dexer is so uber, how are you faring against tamers in pvp? care to share how you do it?

if you do not still refuse to believe me, that's fine. but please take a look at the long list of feedback on the ability of pets. Warriors do make up a large portion of pvpers... but they do have their share of problems with stealth ninja tamers.

 

[fred252]

Awww c'mon. Do not bow down to the whiners on the boards. Leave the dragons and animal form alone.

I never use pet balls so you can take them out of the game for all I care.

 

[Fayled Dhreams]

<blockquote><hr>

my goodness... correct me if i am wrong. are you talking about pvm damage here? this is a pvp thread!! if your dexer is so uber, how are you faring against tamers in pvp? care to share how you do it?

[/ QUOTE ]

MIGHT be ...could be ... some will only ever see it as
PvP ..
NOT supposed to be exclusively PvP
OP:
Hello Everyone,

Just letting you know we have been reading your feedback on summoning pet balls, animal form, and pets.

Some of the suggestions I've seen target reducing effectiveness of one or more of these three things.

At the moment, I'm more inclined to look at the summoning pet balls <font color=red>first</font color=red> and see if we want to make any changes to it. One of the main suggestions I have seen that has possibilities is to require a reuse timer for the summoning pet balls, and perhaps don't allow them to be used while in animal form.

Let's try and <font color=red>only discuss pet summoning ball specific changes in this thread</font color=red>. I'd like to gather specific feedback on them.

Thanks all!

Everyone gets input ...

corrected

 

[Spree]

You should make the log in log out to retrive your pet use the same conditions that soul stones have. I hate it when you almost have a pet dead only for it to log out.

 

[Guest]

A good thread for the most part. And playing mostly a tamer wanted to toss in my 2 gold.

First, I am completely ok with a reuse timer. I am thinking in the range of 10 seconds - 2 minutes. If you are summoning your pet from one of those no win situations, then you should be far enough away that it won't immediately get back into trouble.

Second, I am against a cast timer of more than 1, MAYBE 2 seconds. Being able to instantly summon your pet to your side to save it from those situations when they are getting mauled is just to valuable.

Third, while the idea of animal forms taking up slots is an intrigueing one, what does it solve really? A fully trained Rune Beetle is just as dangerous as a dragon, and conbined with it's poison and speed, it is more so. If there is a restriction placed on it this way, I think that just limiting it to you cannot summon pets while in animal form is the way to handle it.

Finally, I would put the petball re-use timer on the character, not the ball. When you use a pet ball, it puts a 'buff' on you that prevents ANY petballs from being used for the timer.

So, in essance, I would:

Put a re-use timer on the per ball that is tied to the character, not the ball.
1-2 second cast time max.
Characters in Animal Form cannot summon (I like the idea of summoning a pet revealing you as well).

 

[Al Thorin]

The one idea someone presented that I am most fond of, is a similar route to Bags of Sending.

Petballs use charges according to the slots of the pet.

Otherwise, leave everything else be.

Far as I know, the idea is to limit the ability to constantly summon onto people, and that change would still allow it, but limit how much, both by simple charges, and by the cost.
If I feel summoning onto someone will get me the kill, I would like to, but costing 5 charges would make me think twice about dropping the bomb on a regular basis.


Plus, please remeber, the Trans power quest was adjusted not all that long ago, my personal stores of Trans powder are still strong, so I don't think we've seen how that quest change will filter through onto how pet balls are used.

 

[kentuckyjoe]

Simple solution......if you go into animal form or necro form, require that to take up 1 control slot.

Me and some guildmates were doing a spawn at Marble and got raided by some reds and they had 2 necro's in wraith form controlling the super dragons. In a choke point, with wither and the supers, its insane.

Fix this and the animal form problem both by making them both use 1 control slot to be in there forms. No super dragons that way. If they want to control the supers, they have to be in human/elf form.

 

[Coranthe]

Leurocian,

I read through half of this thread before throwing my hands up in disgust at the PvP crowd here trying to force the gameplay rules they want onto the PvM crowd.

A reasonable timer before reuse will not hurt PvM.

Non-use in animal form will not hurt PvM.

A so-called "casting" delay before the pet arrives DOES affect PvM and should not be part of this mix.

Please allow the PvMers to have at least this much say in the matter.

thank you

 

[fred252]

<blockquote><hr>

<blockquote><hr>

If a person is not moving, you know they're up to no good!

[/ QUOTE ]

Main reason I can see the message would be needed is to offset the stealth/tamer. A message could be coded to display even if the summoner is hidden. If just a delay were to be added nobody would know a stealther had summoned until the pet shows.

[/ QUOTE ]

No to words of power. That will negate my points I have in stealth and hiding (200 or more) just so you can know when I am siccing my pet on you? Trust me, you will KNOW when my pet is on you. No words needed.

Bunch of cry babies...just adapt. Dammit!

 

[Nerf-Herder]

RTLFC...

The more I read this thread (especially people defending PvP taming in general), the more I am reminded of all the times I have been absolutely cheesed by tamers in PvP. All of my characters are in factions (two of them are red as well) yet in spite of my lack of significant PvP skill, I don't run around worrying too much about running into a mage, or a dexxer. It is only running into a tamer that worries me. So many tamer battles, so many deaths. I get away sometimes, and on only two occasions was I able to actually thwart the attack and kill the tamer.

This !@#$ happens everyday on Siege Perilous and has been for years. It not only happens to relative noobs like me, but also to super experienced PvPers.

It is time for it to stop. It has gotten so far out of hand, it just madening to see all of that preparation and practice undone by some [censored] NOTO rubbing a ball and saying, "All kill".

So, on behalf of myself and the hundreds (maybe thousands) of Siege Perilous players that have been cheesed by tamers in the past, I hope the devs nerf pet balls, pet, and the taming skill in general so !@#$ing far into the ground that "PvP" tamers fall to their knees and cry.

Here's an idea... Any tamer commanding his pet to attack another player is instantly guardwhacked and sent to Buc's jail for a week.

Yes, I'm pissed... sue me.

 

[Al Thorin]

<blockquote><hr>

I can still see this one abused..
But I see people summoning their pet, then going into animal form.
If they are going to make this change. It should also not let you go into animal form for a 20-30sec period after you summon your pet.

[/ QUOTE ]
Goodness, is your goal to fix, or just make it impossibly hard to compete on a tamer at all?

That would accomplish -nothing- other than making it harder to get any kills.

There should be no limits to summoning initially, only chaining.

As far as I can tell, the single biggest issue -related- to pet balls is the ability to resummon your beast on top of your target. It's really no different the moving shot..

 

[Sir Ha-ward]

<blockquote><hr>

Awww c'mon. Do not bow down to the whiners on the boards. Leave the dragons and animal form alone.

I never use pet balls so you can take them out of the game for all I care.

[/ QUOTE ]

Yes because its always good business sense not to listen to the majority of your customers

 

[imported_SavageSP]

<blockquote><hr>

<blockquote><hr>

I can still see this one abused..
But I see people summoning their pet, then going into animal form.
If they are going to make this change. It should also not let you go into animal form for a 20-30sec period after you summon your pet.

[/ QUOTE ]
Goodness, is your goal to fix, or just make it impossibly hard to compete on a tamer at all?

That would accomplish -nothing- other than making it harder to get any kills.

There should be no limits to summoning initially, only chaining.

As far as I can tell, the single biggest issue -related- to pet balls is the ability to resummon your beast on top of your target. It's really no different the moving shot..

[/ QUOTE ]


Moving Shot Doesnt Bleed you, Dismount you, Poison you, Armor Corrupt you, or Flamestrike you.

 

[Guest]

*chuckles* I know I am waiting for a response to that one.

 

[imported_Ozymandies]

I play a PvM ninja/mage these days and animal form taking a follower slot nerfs me, so I vote no on that one. Also, not all forms are equal, so how many does each form take? Also, other skills change forms with other buffs, how are they discounted?

From just reading, it seems to me that no petball while in animal form makes some sense. I am not sure how quickly peeps can switch back and forth and circumvent this, though.

I also think Words of Power to reveal makes sense. Stealthers have complained I have seen, but you cannot cast any other spell w/o being revealed. Mage cannot summon Fire elly on you from stealth, for instance, and that costs mana, too.

Lastly, I suggested in the other thread about 1 charge per follower slot on the petball. Petballs weigh 10 stones, i think. You could just carry the powder with you to recharge, not sure how this would pan out. Still, the person that used it all the time would certainly go through some powder "Mr. Scott, . . . I . . . need . . . more . . . powder!" , "I'm giving you all I got, Captain"

I just really want to say no to animal form taking a follower slot. Thanx for listening.

OZ

 

[Guest]

You know... You can't even use a bandage and stay hidden.

 

[Guest]

If petballs are going to be as neutered as some people are suggesting, might I suggest a pet context menu for AI choices? As it is, someone gluing their finger to their attacklast key can effectively nullify a tamer in a field battle, petballs only partially solve this.

A context menu could offer choices such as "guard within 3 tiles" or "guard within one screen," or perhaps simply "stay put until told"

Of course, we would have to fix the huge flagging issues with the "guard" command...

 

[Al Thorin]

Does it matter? The fact of the matter is that it chases you beyond it's 'normal' pace.

Archers are suposed to wait a certain period before firing, moving shot bypasses that.
Animals generally move at a cerain rate, chaining a pet ball avoids that.
Similar, not the same.

I would also like I mention, I very specificially pointed out the petball/ninja form issue when these things were first found on TC1.