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A discussion of the lesser known game mechanicsFollow

#1 Jun 23 2004 at 11:57 AM Rating: Excellent
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Often, while leading or planning raids, I have to experiment with new ideas, and utilize game mechanics in an interesting (if non exploitive) way. It often surprises me when I say to do things a certain way, so many players aren't aware how the fundamental mechanics behind some of the plans I try to implement work. Specifically, there's a few areas that are poorly understood, but can make the difference between a successful raid and an outright failure, and I see even extremely experienced players make the same mistakes.

1. Proc versus cast from mobs.

This is probably the single most confused thing I see from players that start raiding new with me, and I even see very old raiders sometimes not make the distinction. It's an important one, at least from a raid leader's point of view though.

A cast from a mob is differentiated from a process most simply by the mob always giving a cast message for it. So and so casts a spell is required for any cast, and absent from any actual proc. That's a good way to distinguish them, but what are the differences that actually matter? Well, first off, a cast is restricted by recast recycle from a mob. Let's take for example Trakanon's ae, Poison Breath. It has a recast of 35 seconds, 0 cast time, 0 mana cost, and it's flagged interruptable. What happens is every 35 seconds as the spell refreshes, Traknon's AI will check. If he's not busy doing something else, he'll cast it (0 sec cast, so it goes off pretty much instanteously from his cast). Him being oom doesn't matter, because it has no mana cost. It's possible he could cast a little slower than 35 seconds, since he might be in the middle of casting some other spell, or the AI could be otherwise 'busy'. So you sometimes see a few second delay after what the recast of a spell would be. Also worth noting is his cast is marked interruptable. The chance of interrupting a 0 cast time spell is immeasureably low, because only stuns and melee during the exact same timestamp of the cast is checked, a fraction of a second. However, a lucky air pet cast stun sometimes will do it, and if you are fighting 0 second cast spells that are for some reason marked interruptable (a lot of older content is, while newer is not), you might find it to your benefit to use as many air pets as possible.

Now, a process checks on every swing of the mob for a chance to fire, like a player would. Recast time for spells on a process don't do anything, there's no check against them. Now, one important thing to note is even spells that are naturally AE's aren't necessarily an AE when put as a process on a mob. They can either be marked as single or marked as AE, and AE processes are (thankfully) VERY rare. There's only about a half dozen mobs in the game that have true AE processes, and generally a lot before were bugs. There's a good reason for that. Today's raid mobs generally attack several times a second, usually with delays around 4. This means often they could swing 12-13 times in a single second (counting kick/bash), or around a hundred times in the space of a CH. Now, if every chance of a swing can yield a 3k point AE, you are looking at tens of thousands of AE damage in the space of most heals. Very, very few mobs have AE damage processes.

But single player targetted processes are pretty common. Take Deadly Lifetap, from many mobs from Venril Sathir up to nameds in City of Decay. An excruciatingly popular proc as many raid leaders will become well aware. Often, you'll find with procs like this 1500 point lifetap proc that the taps are more dangerous than the actuall melee of the mob. A few important notes- there's 2 types of procs from a mob. Ones targetted on a single -player- need to actually do damage to fire. The explaination for this is actually kind of a roleplaying reason- the original dev team didn't want snakes in east commons or rabid animals procing rabies or poison on people that actually didn't get hit. So unlike players, runes, misses, and dodge/parry/blocks all prevent (most) of them. For example, originally on venril sathir when most warriors had all of 4k or so buffed and a couple procs back to back would flatline them, it was pretty popular for us just to send in someone using riposte disc instead of defensive. But you should note not all procs that fire in melee have to be targetted on a player. Procs targetting self -never- have a check for damage on the target in melee. A painful example of this is the Divine Aura procing hammer wielded by that mob in Grieg. No, he doesn't need a successful hit to proc DA on himself... again and again.

Lastly, yes, mob procs can fire from ripostes. On an npc that procs for 3k, it's a very, very bad idea to have all melee fighting from the front.

2. Mob AI, aggro logic.

There's so, so, so much confusion over mob aggro AI, and it's pretty annoying for a raid leader to sort it out.

Probably the most annoying myth is the belief all mobs aggro in the same way. This is pretty easily demonstrably false. What most players don't realize is very frequently raid mobs use almost as many aggro difference as an orc, a puma, and a skeleton use in east commonlands.

The puma hits sitters. The skeleton trains off and hits anyone. The orc doesn't care. So what does this have to do with raid mobs?

Most importantly, you can split mobs by knowing which aggro they have. For example, in one of the LDoN time level raids, there's the Rujarkian Experiments. Some nameds are behind some small rooms with about 40 or so guards, and presumably you are supposed to clear them out. A conventional split would be agonizing for the sheer amount of mobs involved and bad space to work with. But I noticed the guards had very poor awareness aggro versus their initial assist aggro. So I divine aura'd myself, ran through, aggro'd 40+ some mobs in a huge train, trained the name about 200 range from the range with all the mobs beating on me, an enchanter tashing the named (which peels off and goes running at the raid), then I move all 40+ trash mobs away and die. They reset, they don't aggro the raid. It surprised me that most of the players I played with were confused by why it worked, and I think it does merit an explaination.

Mobs carry a few different aggro settings on them. Firstly, mobs behave differently based on proximity. For example, the skeleton in east commons (or a raid mob with nearly identical AI, the Avatar of War). He constantly checks for the closest target and attacks, granting a massive hate modifier to anyone that stood underneath him. Now the -level- of this modifier is important. For example, AoW pretty much just hits whoever is meleeing him that's the closest, unless there's a huge gap in aggro. It follows that by degrees- for example, there's some dragon sized models where at 150 range you will more or less never get aggro unless all melee underneath it are dead. However, if say a cleric walks up underneath it, the dragon will immediately spin and one-round them, since they've dramatically increased their effective aggro by moving into range, pushing them above the tank on it. Positioning then, based on mob aggro, can be vital.

Next, how aware of 'assists' they are is also based on how proximity aggro they are. For example, giants in Kael Drakkel. Generally speaking, they don't recognize indirect aggro at a distance. A cleric buffing or healing a tank after he had time to build up aggro often won't be added to the aggro list whatsoever because it's such a low aggro check it just isn't added to the hatelist. It's so pronounced among some very proximity aggro mobs that healers and buffers will need to cast some offensive effect in order to guarantee they get faction hits, and friendly-faction type healers could easily exploit it, provided they are never hit. More importantly, staying at a range kept them from ever possibly getting aggro and dying, and you can frequently split proximity mobs because their 'assist' is so much lower than their initial aggro on someone they just don't add a person to the hatelist if you attack a second mob while they are aggro. On the flip side, there are some 'bouncey' mobs that really don't care much about proximity, and will fly off someone very easily based on aggro at a distance, or train towards someone that attacks a same faction mob while they are already aggro on someone. Usually one or two checks of mob AI will let you know if something is possible.

3. Dispel logic.

So, so many people don't understand how dispels work. Practically every thread you see on them complain about dispels being at 'random', which they are one of the most consistent, easily predictable mechanics around.

It's important to understand that buffs and debuffs are tracked by the level of the caster, and dispels go by their level plus a dispel factor (often listed in a spell, like Cancel magic being dispel (1) versus recant being dispel (9)).

Dispels work like this: Dispel strength added to level of the caster of dispel hits the target. It checks the top buff/debuff slot on the player, and the level of the debuff/buff (so a debuff by a level 80 dragon is not the same as a buff by a level 65 cleric). Makes a random roll, and if the dispel fails to beat the buff/debuff's strength, then it checks the next buff/debuff down from top. It keeps checking until a dispel succeeds, or it fails -all- of them. Very important, a multislot dispel only checks against the top buff multiple times if it runs out of other buffs to check, otherwise it continues down from last dispel.

So in practice, here's what happens: 2 players decide they want to have a level 70 mana drain debuff cured off them, and they are going to get hit by recant. Both clear their top buff slot, but player A clicks off all buffs, while player B just clicks off top one, and has 10 other buffs below it.

Recant fires at player A: First dispel check fails, second dispel check fails, third succeeds, fourth does nothing. His mana drain is dispelled. Recant fires at player B: First dispel check fails so it checks buff slot 2 and dispels that, second dispel check goes down a buff and checks buff slot 3 and dispels it, third dispel checks buff slot 4 and dispels it, forth dispel checks buff slot 5 and fails, then dispels buff slot 6. This is especially important with the short buff box for bard songs, since the choruses will absorb dispel attempts.

That's all I really have this second, feel free to add in criticisms and comments on things I overlooked or got horribly, horribly wrong.:)

Cal

#2 Jun 23 2004 at 1:06 PM Rating: Decent
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As informative as your post is it shows to me as clear as day why 90% of people who play EQ will never play the true high end game.

why would any but the most anally retentive would want to get absorbed into a game so much, as to know all that information?

I bow to your knowlage and respect you for it, but i can't help but think that maybe you need to get out more.

I think thats why you are completely out of touch with the points made about the gaping hole in the mid level game.

Like i say thats great info but usefull to maybe 1% of the most fanatic of players.
#3 Jun 23 2004 at 1:13 PM Rating: Good
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usefull to maybe 1% of the most fanatic of players
Explaining how Kunark era effects like Trak Breath and VS Lifetap work is useful to maybe 1% of the players? Varying types of mob aggro is only useful to 1% of players? How dispell works is only useful to 1% of players?

Don't get me wrong -- maybe YOU didn't find it useful, but it certainly has applications outside of the end game.
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#4 Jun 23 2004 at 1:14 PM Rating: Excellent
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tarv of the Seven Seas wrote:
why would any but the most anally retentive would want to get absorbed into a game so much, as to know all that information?

I bow to your knowlage and respect you for it, but i can't help but think that maybe you need to get out more.


Oh, every game I play I enjoy learning how it ticks. It's part of the fun for me really. I like knowing why something works, not just that it does. It's not **** so much as the joy of discovery- so obviously I drift towards extremely complex and involved games, and lose interesting in more simplistic ones.

Also, it's not nearly as time consuming as you might think. You observe something, you wonder why it works, and in a couple minutes you are able to test whether it works the way you think it does. Writing a post like that is far more time consuming than actually finding out the information I posted.
#5 Jun 23 2004 at 1:16 PM Rating: Decent
I disagree with you Tarv on the 1% of fanatic players statement. I play alot, more than I should at times, but I also get out quite often and I am aware of pretty much everything Calimyr wrote. Despite it seeming to be highend, it is not. It is from level 1 on up. And comes in quite useful even if you are a casual player.
#6 Jun 23 2004 at 1:50 PM Rating: Decent
Great write up!

What are your thoughts on Rampage? That is something that continues to confound me.

How does a monster decide what to rampage?

Oh and for AE procs, the giants in water wing seem to proc an AE... as do the forest giants in Storms (mana drain + AE). SOmetimes it will fire several times in a row 8)
#7 Jun 23 2004 at 1:53 PM Rating: Good
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I thought Rampage was strictly a function of the first X (8?) people on the mob's hate list. All i know is when I HoS too soon, I get on Rampage. And, if I Fade off of Rampage, some poor cleric usually winds up getting pasted Smiley: lol
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#8 Jun 23 2004 at 2:26 PM Rating: Excellent
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Jarlo wrote:
What are your thoughts on Rampage? That is something that continues to confound me.

How does a monster decide what to rampage?


Sure, I'm pretty sure it's been posted before here (which is why I didn't post it), but it bears repeating.

Rampage relies on two things: it's own rampage list (kept apart from the hatelist) and a proximity check.

The first part to be rampaged is added onto the rampage list. If the rampage list is empty, this will be the SECOND person on hatelist the first time rampage fires as long as they are in proximity. If there's only one person the hatelist, the only person on hatelist will be added to the rampage list.

Provided that the top person on rampage list stays in proximity, the rampage list never changes. It will hit that person, every time, until they are no longer a valid target- they leave proximity, die, or are feigned. Divine Aura does -not- drop them off the rampage list, since it isn't hate related... if the only person on rampage list is a cleric, they can cycle divine auras to invul tank rampage just fine. There's no check preventing it.

So the key thing to remember is just making sure the person you want to tank rampage takes the first rampage. I usually do this by having paladins, shadowknights, or secondary warriors position the rampage mob where I want, then the main tank run in second. I do this with divine aura effects or no hit disciplines (fortitude for a warrior). Since the rampage tank runs in alone, rampage hits him as there are no valid targets, the main tank comes in and taunts off him, regular melee hits him, and rampage tank has rampage the entire fight as long as he doesn't move. I should note if you DON'T do this, and let the #2 person on hatelist whoever it might be get rampage, you are asking for trouble. For example, being the bard playing resists for the maintank that charges rydda'dar. Tough break bard. It's generally a pretty good idea to set up ahead of time who you want to get rampage, than let it fall where it may.

The most confusing part for people is where rampage changes. First, the proximity check. This can be set differently for every mob, and it isn't necessarily the size of the mob's melee box. Proximity can be set so low that rampage -can't- hit another person but the person who has aggro except under unusual circumstances. Some PoP bosses work this way (Mithaniel Marr, Xegony). In that case, rampage is basically a weaker flurry. But most rampage mobs have a very high rampage box, and will only switch off of you if you are well out of melee range.

When they do, bad things tend to happen. Because a second person (#2 on hatelist) is added to the next spot in the rampage list. Mercifully, there's a proximity check still so guys like wizards tend not to get it, but rogues and other fragile melee tend to get splattered. If your rampage tank dies, you could have a 2nd warrior ae taunt- which then shifts the old maintank to spot #2 on hatelist, and gets him page generally. But the timing is so hard to do when things go wrong I rarely see that happen except by guilds specifically watching for it, in which case the page tank doesn't die anyways.

People get confused by the proximity check and panic, ******** up rampage. For example, page tanking isn't set up, and warrior charges. Cleric #1 is in the 2nd spot on hatelist and eats a page. He backs off as melee charge. Rampage fires again, grabbing a rogue for page. Cleric sees he didn't eat rampage, and moves closer. Rampage list notes target #1 is backin range, and hits him. At the same time, rogue backs off. Cleric #1 dies, page hits a ranger. Rogue comes back in, and is hit by page, and the ranger thinks he 'lost' page, but really is just below another person on page list. So basically you have a lot of confused people, no one knows who has page really, and it's all on fragile people anyways so you don't stabilize. This is very bad on mobs with page nearly as bad as their main melee, like Magmaton, Archlich, etc.

By contrast, AE page is easy. Just everyone in the melee box is hit. That's that.:)

The only other thing to be aware of is that flurry and page on the same mobs are bugged. MOST mobs with both flurry and page have the messages -reversed- for them when they fire. When they flurry, they actually rampage, and when they rampage they flurry, and sometimes it's both. I think the game is incapable of giving a message for both flurry/page at same attack stamp, so it screws up. For you guys just getting into elemental, note the named castellans with both flurry and page, and random people dying as a flurry fires.
#9 Jun 23 2004 at 2:38 PM Rating: Decent
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You would be surprised how many people do not know that sitting near a KoS mob who cons green will attack you when previously he did not. This analysis is just a few steps (ok maybe 4 or 5) removed, but nevertheless useful.

Let's see, would that divine aura train pull be anything like when someone has half the Crushbone TR following them to the entrance, and you set up and grab Crush with Tash/Mez and wait for the train to pull into the station. You gank Crush away from the rest and avoid the backwash? Tash wouldn't aggro the train and you would have time to deal with the mob you just culled.

Just asking. (I have done this)
#10 Jun 23 2004 at 2:49 PM Rating: Good
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Quote:
I disagree with you Tarv on the 1% of fanatic players statement. I play alot, more than I should at times, but I also get out quite often and I am aware of pretty much everything Calimyr wrote. Despite it seeming to be highend, it is not. It is from level 1 on up. And comes in quite useful even if you are a casual player.
I think you're missing my point, this is the sort of infomation that guildleaders and raidleaders need to know, not what the average run of the mill raider, this is exactly the sort of infomation that is given out when setting out a raid.

My point is that in my experiance the guildleaders and most active members who lead raids are not your average player, they are the ones who will spend hours raiding finding the naunces that make a raid sucsessful.
In no way was i out to insult Calimyr, i repeatedly said how much i admired his knowlage, but as he said himself he tends towards the most complex games and situations because he wants to know this sort of information.

If i may use the Aggro lesson he gave, not many people are aware that aggro is different depending on the mob, why is this? As Cali said it is very obvious if you look closely at it.

It is precisely because people don't really want to know that level of information and do not take the time to learn it, the 1% of fanatic who do will be the guild/Raid leader that when initaiting a raid on said zone will say XXX Mob aggro's this way, to best control aggro you must Blah blah blah.

Another firm example of this is Pets moving mobs and controling the push so that the mob does not move around. Few people know how to achive it but Any good Raid leader will know how and position his troops in such a way and explain what he wants people to do in order to stop the mob getting shoved all over the place.

When you get a Raid full of this type of people you get an Uber guild.

of the 4000 ave people on a server maybe 200 are in uber guilds. The rest of us mortals do not need to know the majority of this information because we will rarely be in that situation and when we do we will have a player like Cali pointing us in the right direction.

I Quote 'As informative as your post is it shows to me as clear as day why 90% of people who play EQ will never play the true high end game.'

argue as you will but 90% will not make it to the high end game and that is a fact.

#11 Jun 23 2004 at 6:00 PM Rating: Good
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tarv of the Seven Seas wrote:
I think you're missing my point, this is the sort of infomation that guildleaders and raidleaders need to know, not what the average run of the mill raider, this is exactly the sort of infomation that is given out when setting out a raid.


Not really. I think the point Cal was making was that even a lot of experienced raiders don't really take the time to think about these game mechanics. It's the kind of information that *everyone* can benefit from. Not just top end raiders.


Quote:
If i may use the Aggro lesson he gave, not many people are aware that aggro is different depending on the mob, why is this? As Cali said it is very obvious if you look closely at it.

It is precisely because people don't really want to know that level of information and do not take the time to learn it, the 1% of fanatic who do will be the guild/Raid leader that when initaiting a raid on said zone will say XXX Mob aggro's this way, to best control aggro you must Blah blah blah.


I disagree completely on that. It's not that people don't want to know, it's that most people don't have the tools to figure it out. All of thise stuff is easy to figure out if you are the kind of person who looks at what happens and then tries to figure out *why* it happened. Sadly, the fast majority of people (in general, not just playing EQ) don't tend to do that.


What's funny is that nearly all of the effects Cal listed (the AE stuff excepted obviously) is stuff I figured out on my own at like 15th level just by contrasting the experience between playing my paladin and my wizard. He's right on that score. It's all obvious stuff *if* you take the time to think about it. When I first started playing my wiz, I immediately noticed the effect that distance had on agro. I also noticed that the agro value was constant, but distance was applied as a multiple when the mob did an agro check. So even if you cast that nuke at max range and then sometime later you ran forward, you'd get agro. I also noticed very early that different mobs behaved differently. Some cared about sitting more then other. Some cared about proximity more then others. Some cared about assist agro (buffing/healing people they were fighting). Some cared about "secondary agro" more then others (agro you generate on anoter mob they are social with).


All of those effects do matter. But many raidleaders just ignore them. They pretend that all mobs will agro socialy in all situations. They pretend that all mobs will prox agro in the same way. They pretend that all mobs care about healing agro in the same way. They pretend that all mobs care about distance agro in the same way. All Cal's pointing out is that by paying attention to the behavior of mobs, you can easily figure out which things a mob do care about the most. While, addmittedly, this doesn't matter much for exp mobs (who's going to keep a list of every exp mob and their agro behaviors?), it matters on all raid mobs at any level. You can learn their behaviors, and that can allow you to work up a strat that helps beat them. The concept is the same whether your target is Emp Crush, or Quarm.


It's still useful information, even for the "casual" player. If you don't care about it, then don't care about it. But a lot of other players probably do...
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#12 Jun 23 2004 at 6:11 PM Rating: Good
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Does sneak/hide also drop a rogue on the rampage list?
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#13 Jun 23 2004 at 6:18 PM Rating: Good
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I doubt it (but can't say for sure). Hide doesn't drop you off the aggro list list Fade or Feign Death does.
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#14 Jun 23 2004 at 7:20 PM Rating: Decent
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Hide doesn't drop you off the aggro list list Fade or Feign Death does.


So Evade just drops you lower on the hatelist? I ask because normally a successful evade allows the tank immediately to pick up aggro from me once I get it, if ever I get aggro.

If I constantly practice my evade during a fight, I never seem to pick up aggro and this is with a 13/21 weapon with two procs going off on top of the poison buff and Katta's Song of Sword Dancing song.

With all those along with Battlecry of the Vah Shir and Speed of the Brood, and my Chitin Hand Wraps, I was one proccing mother and still did not get aggro.

Was it because I was constantly using Evade to drop me lower on the list?
#15 Jun 23 2004 at 8:12 PM Rating: Good
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Evade drops you down on the list (I'm not sure exactly how much hate in numbers) but doesn't remove you. As an example, if a bard is soloing a mob and Fades (assuming no DoTs on the mob and that he turned off melee, naturally) the mob instantly stops attacking and will wander off, provided it doesn't see invis. If a monk feigns successfully, the mob should eventually forget the monk (give or take, this changes depending on where you are in the game). If a rogue Evades while soloing a mob though, it does nothing and the rogue continues to get beaten upon.
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#16 Jun 23 2004 at 8:57 PM Rating: Good
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To my knowledge, Evade will drop you down the hate list, but not down the Rampage list.

Great write-up, Cal, thanks.
#17 Jun 23 2004 at 10:10 PM Rating: Good
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To my knowledge, Evade will drop you down the hate list, but not down the Rampage list.

Great write-up, Cal, thanks.



That would be because *nothing* can drop you down on the rampage list. The rampage list is static. Once someone is added to that list, they remain in that list at that slot until the mob is killed.

Evade will help you get placed farther down that list because people get added based on where they are in the agro list. But it's important to note that someone *only* gets added to the ramp list if no one on the current ramp list is eligible to take a ramp hit.

So you can evade all day long, but if you are the highest agro person who isn't already on the ramp list when everyone who is on the ramp list is ineligible, you will be added to that next slot on the list and you will take the ramp damage.

The two biggest things that people don't understand about ramp damage is that the list is static unlike the agro list which changes constantly. Also, the order in which people are on the ramp list is not based on any set thing at any set time. The second one *really* screws people up.

For the most part, everyone involved in fighting a mob gets put on the agro list when they first take an agressive action (or just come into range). So if you've got 30 people fighting a mob, all 30 are on the agro list and all 30 people get adjusted contantly on that list as they take actions that the mob doesn't like.

Ramp is completely different. The size of the list is dependant on how big it needs to be. If the first person to engage the mob is the *only* person on the agro list (puller for example). He will be the only person on the ramp list as well. That list will only be updated when a rampage occurs. There will only be another person added to that list if everyone on the current list is ineligible for rampage. So if your puller comes back and the MT engages, and a ramp then goes off, the MT will *not* be on the ramp list since the puller is on the list and does not have the highest agro. If the puller is out of range for some reason, then whoever has the second most agro at that time will be added to the list and that person will take ramp damage. However, your ramp list would consists of two people: The puller(1), and other guy(2). As soon as the puller comes back in ramp range, he'll take ramp damage instead. If the puller stays out of range, and the poor slower who grabbed rampage on the last hit ran out of range as well, then the agro list will be checked again. Whoever is the second highest agro *right then* will be added to the list. This could be another melee character, a caster. Anyone. It's easy to see who the top of the agro list is. It's impossible to more then guess who the second guy is. And that's why rampage seems so random.

It's not random though. If you establish rampage early in the fight, you can control it. As long as you get the right person taking the damage from the start, and that person stays in range and stays alive the whole time, you should never have a ramp list that's more then 1 or 2 people long (MT may be on it if ramp went off when he was in prox agro range, but before he took agro from the puller). If you've got more then that, you probably did something wrong.

If you just pull and engage a ramp mob without thinking about rampage, you will have problems. As people move in and out of ramp range, your list will grow and seemingly random people will take hits. It's really best to plan for rampage and plan to have one person take the damage.
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#18 Jun 24 2004 at 12:15 AM Rating: Decent
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Wonderful info. Especially to have it concentrated like this. This is getting cute-and-patsied into my archive.

The point you're missing, Tarv is that this can be used at all levels. This was precisely the kind of thing that enabled FoS to raid above it's level in the early days.

Can I ask a couple of questions

Dispell:
You say:-
Quote:
It checks the top buff/debuff slot on the player, and the level of the debuff/buff


Is the "level of the buff" the level of the original caster of the buff, the level of the buffed player, or the spell level of the buff?

Presumably in here is a strat to "absorb" dispells if possible. If it is the level of the buffed player then I don't think there is much to be done. However if it is either the level of the buffer or the level of the spell then does getting a lower level to junk buff or just using lower level junk buffs "trap" the dispell away from your useful buffs?

Rampage:
I have "succeeded" in getting on Vindi's rampage list while healing from max range. What category of rampage and aggro do you place him in?


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#19 Jun 24 2004 at 3:28 AM Rating: Good
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Dispel goes off level of the caster, if I remember right. I think that when I powerleveled friends in places where mobs dispelled that they could never be stripped. I'm not positive on that, it's been a while.

As far as Vindi goes, his rampage is a normal single-target one. You just happened to be lucky enough to be high on the hatelist when his rampage list was constructed (on his first rampage, probably right after he arrived), and that put you on top of the rampage list. Or you were a few deep, and the people above you died. Also, a lot of times clerics or casters will be on the top of the rampage list, but will simply be out of rampage range - so it skips them. The moment they get too close, rampage will land on them. This can be confusing, because it causes people to think that rampage is random where it isn't at all. Aside from that, Vindicator is highly proximity/undead-type aggro, if I remember right. Very difficult for people to pull aggro on him from range.
#20 Jun 24 2004 at 6:37 AM Rating: Excellent
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2,272 posts
Evade (sneak/hide) will not affect Ramp at all.

Something I'm not sure a lot realize also is, just as higher Dex helps your procs, lowering a mobs Dex hinders their procs. Rampage is a "proc". Rogues go get that GMAS and Master Sketch and start cooking up the Rage of Incapacitation!

Edited, Thu Jun 24 07:37:25 2004 by OutcastNecro
#21 Jun 24 2004 at 7:07 AM Rating: Decent
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261 posts
Got to say that great as this post may be, I'm with tarv, this sort of post scares me off from playing EQ at all, and was why I asked Alla whether it would be worth me even starting.

As an opinion of a mere mortal (who simply likes playing games for fun sometimes) this sort of post ensures that I feel I'll always be a newbie, even if I've played 10 70th level characters.

But if it's good for you others, no worries, enjoy. :-)

Lance.





#22 Jun 24 2004 at 7:22 AM Rating: Good
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4,596 posts
Quote:
The rampage list is static. Once someone is added to that list, they remain in that list at that slot until the mob is killed.


Do they get removed from the list if they zone?

Also thanks for the writeup Cal, I'm sure I will never be in a top end guild but I've learned allot from this thread.
____________________________
Nicroll 65 Assassin
Teltorid 52 Druid
Aude Sapere

Oh hell camp me all you want f**kers. I own this site and thus I own you. - Allakhazam
#23 Jun 24 2004 at 7:55 AM Rating: Decent
Very interesting and thank you all for sharing.

btw, evade is /attack off, /hide...nothing to do with sneak. I guess you could have sneak on there (the macro) if you wanted to, but I would not suggest it for pre-60 rogues where sneak affects your run speed.

and the AA escape removes you (a rogue) completely from the hate list. just seemed worth adding since the hate list was discussed.

My question is about proximity agro. As a rogue, and I imagine a wiz might have this concern with the line of sight required for some spells, anyway, there is nothing more annoying than a tank and pushes and turns the mob all over the place trying to get that one inch closer to the mob. (I am talking basic XP groups) My observation is mob's have an agro "ring". If he could see you, and you fell within the area of the ring, there would be a faction check and you'd be agro'd if KOS. But I figured if you were anywhere within that ring, close to the outter edge or standing on the mobs shoelaces, your "hate" score from that factor would be the same. Of course, you could be out of the ring, but then attack the mob (with a range item or a spell) and now you have built up some hate. If the hate increases past the PC's within melee range, the mob would come after you instead. And sitting withing the ring, or after getting on the hate list with a range attack (including a spell) would add to your hate score. If the tank and a firm grip on agro, you could sit safely. If the hate list is full of toons with the same score, sitting could cause your score to rise to the top and the mob to leave the tanks and attack the caster.

Those are my observations, please feel free to tell me where I have gone wrong. I'd like to know if I can tell the tank to stop inching closer and just hold still so we can all stop bouncign around.

Anything else I was supposed to notice by level 15 as some of you have claimed, I missed.
#24 Jun 24 2004 at 8:38 AM Rating: Good
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8,619 posts
Quote:
btw, evade is /attack off, /hide...nothing to do with sneak. I guess you could have sneak on there (the macro) if you wanted to, but I would not suggest it for pre-60 rogues where sneak affects your run speed.
throwing the sneak in causes zero halm and if you happen to be moving at the time it stops you from recieveing the 'You must remain absolutlely still to hid' message that would kill your evade.

/attack
/doability <sneak>
/doability <hide>
/attack

that is the hotkey i use.
#25 Jun 24 2004 at 9:01 AM Rating: Default
Quote:
throwing the sneak in causes zero halm and if you happen to be moving at the time it stops you from recieveing the 'You must remain absolutlely still to hid' message that would kill your evade.


I guess it causes no harm, (I assume that is what you meant) but how much good does it really do? To each his own, I guess. For a time I used it (the macro) to skill up other stuff, like disarm, (if I the evade didn't work, at least I'd get a skill check) or sense or disarm traps. But now a days, my macro just has /attack off, /doability # (hide) /pause 10 (to help make sure I drop aggro - a personal preference, not something I tout as the way to go) and /attack on. So sure, one line is free and you could throw /doability # for sneak, but it is not necessary to get the evade effect, as one might have concluded from the previous posts.

I have read "remaining absolutely still" helps BS damage. So quieting my keyboard before I evade (or BS) is something I do anyway.

If you are here for rogue macro information, I suggest you visit .
#26 Jun 24 2004 at 9:18 AM Rating: Decent
*head spinning*
Smiley: confused
Smiley: banghead

Great advice, i am glad when i go on raids i have someone like you Cal directing things, i would never handle leading raids myself, too many idiots IMO. too many people that dont know what they are doing, dont care, or are so pissed by the time the raid starts (after about 2-3 hours of sitting around) that they arent worth a damn on raids.

But if you have a good leader and some good chars, raids can be the best fun in the game.
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