Missing Files in SoF Install

[Zeice]

I don't know if anybody else has noticed this or not, I just happened to notice it the other day. It's only a few zones but they are missing their _chr.txt files and some are missing their environment emitter file.

The main one that I first noticed this on was Crystallos. I went to go check the _chr file to see what races were available to use in the zone, and to my surprise the file was missing. I had it in my eqlive folder though. I thought maybe the game didn't install correctly, so I uninstalled and reinstalled. I also tried installing to different directories and repairing the installations and that file was always missing. So I finally just moved the file from my eqlive folder. This added the races as well as all particle effects that go along with the zone.

I've noticed that these zones that are also like this:
Loping Plains
Dragonscale
Crypt of Shade
Bloodmoon
Guardian
Mansion
gyrospireb
gyrospirez
Hills of Shade
Mechanotus
Steam Factory
new steamfont mountains

I've probably missed one or two, but I have the files for these zones in my live folder, but not in my fresh SoF install folder. These things are sort of cosmetic, and it depends on if anybody even plans on using these zones in their development, but it sucks if a player zones into say Crystallos and sees nothing but human models. (except for the new global dragon models =P )

I think this problem also goes hand in hand with the default SoF spell file. It's obviously not finished, and these things were issues I'm sure were added in a really early patch once SoF was released. So that question is, how do we handle an issue like this for players who install SoF fresh and can't enjoy the zones we develop for them right out of the box? It's even a factor when developing for these zones because as a developer we can't see the race models. Obviously this can be fixed if you have eqlive patched up in a different directory, but some players are not going to be able to do that. By my count that's atleast 13 files that would have to be distributed if that's even legal for both the emitter and _chr files.

At any rate this is just a minor issue that may need some consideration, but isn't gamebreaking. Also it's possible that I just have a bogus set of DVDs and the files just aren't installing. So I was basically just bringing this up to people's attention to see if anybody else noticed this, and maybe I'm behind in the loop but I had not seen any posts about this anywhere yet.

[Cripp]

ya I spawned nro and sro w/ titanium and after I loaded SoF and went there most of my models were humans.. then I noticed SoF install didnt include the _chr txt files for those zones :(

[Zeice]

Hmm that's odd, I have the _chr files for the new south ro and north ro, even the old ones through SoF. It's mostly the new zones that were added with SoF that are missing the files for me.

[trevius]

Yeah, that is an unfortunate issue. I don't know about the legality of distributing the emitter files, but I wouldn't think that the _chr.txt files would be much of an issue. They are extremely simple .txt files that could easily be reproduced and require no reverse engineering, or changes of any kind.

SOE hosts their patch files individually on static links that anyone could download from. I don't see how their could be any legal issues about providing links for players to download those files directly from SOE. With that being the case, I don't really see much of an issue with hosting the .txt files yourself individually or in a .zip file or something.

It would be nice to have a solid universal solution for this issue. Like, maybe including the download links as part of the Playguide installation instructions. That way everyone would have them from the start.

Currently, my plan is to use the zones that do have those files for all of my lower to mid level exp zones. Then, maybe for higher level zones I would use some of the ones that might require the download. This should give players time to establish themselves on the server and give them time to become aware of the required downloads to see the special models.

I haven't looked into the spell file too deeply yet. I am not really aware of many issues with it other than many of the effects not being coded into the emu source yet (which is a problem on Titanium as well). But I do plan to try to figure out what the best route is for handling both clients on the same spell file.

[trevius]

I am curious what people's thoughts are on this idea:

Since the _chr.txt files are extremely simple to reproduce, I could create a .bat file that people can download that will automatically create all of the needed files for all SoF zone models to show up in the zones that are missing their files. IMO, this avoids distributing actual files that SOE could claim. Anything that could be done that easily with a simple batch file shouldn't (IMO) have any legal issues with it. Then, people would just need to run the batch file and copy the files into their EQ directory, or they could run it directly from their EQ directory and not have to move anything at all.

Here is an example of a possible (though fictional) .bat file that could do exactly what we need:

@echo off
> zonename_chr.txt echo 6
>> zonename_chr.txt echo gol,qeynos_chr
>> zonename_chr.txt echo gia,commons_chr
>> zonename_chr.txt echo bet,ecommons_chr
>> zonename_chr.txt echo spi,ecommons_chr
>> zonename_chr.txt echo gob,butcher_chr
>> zonename_chr.txt echo bimp,steamfont_chr
> zonename2_chr.txt echo 2
>> zonename2_chr.txt echo gol,qeynos_chr
>> zonename2_chr.txt echo gia,commons_chr
exit

I may need to figure out how to stop it from having a carriage return at the end, but other than that, this should be able to work perfectly.

The idea is that we could make something that would be acceptable to have a download link to from the wiki to make this an easy process.

[Zeice]

Sounds good to me.

What about just putting them all in a .zip file? I guess that might cross over into legality stuff? Even though they are measly files.