abuse of 'summon pet monster'

[scofield]

This is a spell that is being abused by folks in search of rings, scrolls, wands, etc... The uncontrolled casting of this over and over again for several minutes at a time, then killing the monsters, leaves a huge pile of treasure on the ground. If I understand correctly it is the identification of the mountains of treasure that causes incredible lag.
When one spends hours and hours building the experience of a character, it is extremely frustrating to have that character suddenly frozen due to lag caused by some fool trying to cheat the system. For a low level character it is forgivable, experience is relatively easy to regain. At a higher level (30+) it takes a substantial period of time to recoup that experience.
My suggestion (and i have no idea what it would involve from a techinical perspective) is to modify the spell so that the monsters that you create don't drop any equipment. This would prevent the abuse of that spell and the lag that accompanies it.
Just a suggestion that may decrease multi-player lag ... and OUR frustration.

[achost]

agreed, make summoned creatures "god given" and "god given" creatures dont drop anything.

or is the "god given" flag on the creatures already in use?

[Pathor]

The uncontrolled casting of this over and over again for several minutes at a time, then killing the monsters, leaves a huge pile of treasure on the ground. If I understand correctly it is the identification of the mountains of treasure that causes incredible lag.

I'm all against pets dropping things (hate to have my appartment or home town full of crappy arrows and whatnot), but I'm not so sure it is creating lag.

I identify a whole lot more treasure than can be gotten in this way after each raid (every 30 minute or so). My Luggage is full with staffs, wands, scrolls, books etc. It takes a couple of seconds for me to do all the different kinds of identification, but my GF playing over the same link to the same server have not complained about any lag, so I've only thought it was a client side issue, or perhaps a protocol Round-Trip-Time issue, not a server side issue. Changing summoned pets/cult monsters wouldn't change the real problem then. It would be better to limit how much you can identify per command instead. That way one would have to run sense_curse/sense_magic/thaumaturgy/etc a coupe of times and not taking too much server cpu time or bandwidth at the server side.

Besides, is this really a problem? If you just cast the spell, kill_pet (or whatever the command is called) and repeat that, you'll pretty quickly run out of spellpoints if you are low level. At higher levels you find better things (and have more fun finding them) in real maps and don't bother doing like this.

[Leaf]

The uncontrolled casting of this over and over again for several minutes at a time, then killing the monsters, leaves a huge pile of treasure on the ground. If I understand correctly it is the identification of the mountains of treasure that causes incredible lag.

Based off my testing, the animation and movment tracking of the summon pets can really eat up the resources. In this case, CPU.

I could see how this would lag other players, especially if they are in a map with several spellcasters.

On a side note:

I used the killpets command, grabbed everything they dropped (the equipment they were carrying when I summoned them.. not treasure they picked up for me while adventuring) Made a little over 1k in platinum (22 Charisma).

IMO, summoned pets should not start/load with any equipment.

[Pathor]

Based off my testing, the animation and movment tracking of the summon pets can really eat up the resources. In this case, CPU.

Normal monsters are animated and moving around too (and there is usualy a whole lot more of them). So why are summoned pets different? Or is it the initial placement of the summoned monster that is a problem?

/Sebastian

[Leaf]

Normal monsters are animated and moving around too (and there is usualy a whole lot more of them). So why are summoned pets different? Or is it the initial placement of the summoned monster that is a problem?

This is my observation and most part speculation...

What I noticed was everytime I moved my character, all the pets had to clear out of the way and then reassemble in formation around me. Plus, they move around in formation and switching places with one another.

Normal monsters do not exhibit this action - they just move towards you and surround you and either die (disappear), kill you, or attack & miss. Basically, very little additional movement.

I don't think it's the initial placement that is the problem, it is the movement behavior of the summon pets that take alot of calculating.

[Zortan]

Now that summoning pets causes lag, I don't think this would be a problem. As far as pets giving equipment, I don't see what's wrong with it.. Yes it's a way to make money, but at higher levels, do I care if I can make 100p off of a book that my pet drops? Not really.. Too much to carry and too cumbersome..

What DOES cause lag is people building killing machines (directors) and filling them up with comets and such..

[Zortan]

By the way.. since I'm on a rant.. summon pet monster is last of your worries.. as a summoner, this spell helps early on.. the equipment you're referring to (that the monsters drop) isn't all that good.. half of it is cursed, the other half is crap.. So I make 200-300pp on my summoned pets at level 10.. big whoop.. People raid everything and everyone and sell furniture, etc.. I have to sit with delay and summon...

By the way.. I don't use summon pet for equipment and easy cash.. I actually use them to make a "wall" between me and bad guys so I can finish off said bad guys with spells.. I COULD use summon earth/air/water elemental, or golem, but honestly, at level 10, those things hardly live long enough, and cost waaaay too much SP, compared to pet monster..

By the way.. is pp really worth anything now days? Everyone can get everything.. Not like someone having more pp than you will prevent you from getting something.. If there was a barter system.. people doing auctions and such.. well that'd be a different story..

[Leaf]

Now that summoning pets causes lag

Which server or server version?

I don't think this would be a problem. As far as pets giving equipment, I don't see what's wrong with it.. Yes it's a way to make money, but at higher levels, do I care if I can make 100p off of a book that my pet drops? Not really.. Too much to carry and too cumbersome..

It is/was a problem on metalforge.real-time.com

That's what started this post to begin with - the summoned pets lag (and possibly the item identification) would lag the server.

You would think that player's wouldn't want to be bothered with the annoyanace of summoning pets, slaying them through various means, and then selling their dropped treasure - but it did (does?) happen, and alot. Even at higher levels because it's very safe and easy to make mountains of coins this way. Especially when they use automated scripts.

What DOES cause lag is people building killing machines (directors) and filling them up with comets and such..

Yes, that it can. BTW, which server or server version did you observer this with?

I'm hoping that it's -NOT- the server crossfire.metalforge.net since that should be more then capable of handling such a resource consumption.

[Leaf]

By the way.. since I'm on a rant.. summon pet monster is last of your worries.. as a summoner, this spell helps early on.. the equipment you're referring to (that the monsters drop) isn't all that good.. half of it is cursed, the other half is crap.. So I make 200-300pp on my summoned pets at level 10.. big whoop.. People raid everything and everyone and sell furniture, etc.. I have to sit with delay and summon...

I'm not positive, but I think the equipment you not get from slain pets being "crap" is to inhibit people from using them as described in the original post.

By the way.. I don't use summon pet for equipment and easy cash.. I actually use them to make a "wall" between me and bad guys so I can finish off said bad guys with spells.. I COULD use summon earth/air/water elemental, or golem, but honestly, at level 10, those things hardly live long enough, and cost waaaay too much SP, compared to pet monster..

Well, that is probably their (summoned pets) intended use.

Some elementals are more effective against monsters then others. I also admit, some elementals are ineffective against certain monsters.

By the way.. is pp really worth anything now days?

Yes, it's worth ~10 gp and ~100 silver.

Everyone can get everything..

Care to elaborate on this?

Not like someone having more pp than you will prevent you from getting something.. If there was a barter system.. people doing auctions and such.. well that'd be a different story..

They can purchease the desired item and you'll have to wait for the map to reset. A stretch I know, but think of the Hero Ring in Lake Country.

There is nothing stopping people from conducting auctions. But, there is really nothing in place right now to make auctions easier, either.