Mobs warping on pulls?

[Chanus]

So, I'm running a private server and just sort of dinking around. I've come across a problem. When I pull a mob from range and they're running toward me, they run up, disappear, reappear closer from where they started but further from me, run up, disappear, reappear a little bit closer to me than last time, rinse, repeat, disappear, then appear in front of me.

The only solution I found when searching was this post: http://www.eqemulator.org/forums/archive/index.php/t-27234.html

I set the values it listed to true (only the last one was set to false by default), but that didn't change anything. I'm not sure if the map issue is still the case after almost two years, and I didn't use gentoo (that's a Linux thing isn't it?), so I'm kind of at a loss as to how to fix this.

Any ideas?

Thanks!

Oh, and no idea what info from my end would be pertinent, so let me know.

[Chanus]

If it helps, I'm in Greater Faydark, just outside Felwithe, pulling mobs up that big hill just outside the gate.

[joligario]

It sounds to me like the NPCs are either stuck in the world geometry or fell through the floor/ground.

[Chanus]

It seems like that may be the case, but I can't figure what I need to change to fix it.

[Derision]

Do you have a gfaydark.map in your server Maps directory ? I.e. if your world.exe/zone.exe are in c:\eqemu, then
you should have a c:\eqemu\Maps directory with a load of .map files, one of which should be gfaydark.map

You can check if it is being loaded as one of the zone logs in your logs directory should have output like:

Map header: 74981 faces, 2178 nodes, 107203 facelists
Loaded map: 224943 vertices, 74981 faces
Map BB: (-2693.16 -> 2766.28, -2803.81 -> 2717.22, -98.53 -> 801.81)
Map ./Maps/gfaydark.map loaded.


I am not sure which hill outside felwithe you mean, there appear to be a few.

A #loc of where you are standing when making the pull would help, along with the #loc of the mob you are pulling that exhibits this issue, as I just tried a few pulls while standing on a few hills outside Felwithe and all seemed fine.

[Chanus]

Ah, sorry. I'm standing at -2035, -2145, +44 (next to the big tree on the hill directly in front of the Felwithe gate)

The first mob I pull is standing at -2023, -2194, 50 (on the crest of the hill closest to Felwithe)

The mob seems to run past me and then reappears in front of me.

The other mob I've been testing is at -1873, -2053, 7

It will run about two-thirds of the way to me and warp back a bit, then all the way up to me and then warps back to about that two-thirds position, then runs past me and warps in front of me.

I don't know if it's a Z-axis thing or if it's a lag between the server and the client (though I'm running on the same computer and my ping is about 55ms at the low and 120ms at the high).

I found this error in my eqemu_error_zone_2300.log file:


---------------------------------------------
[12.04. - 13:24:22] Starting Log: logs/eqemu_error_zone_2300.log
[12.04. - 13:24:22] Path File ./Maps/gfaydark.path not found.


and indeed there is not gfaydark.path file in the Maps directory. Should that be included with the SVN?

I have a PEQ_MAPS directory with the SVN Commit set to http://eqemumaps.googlecode.com/svn/trunk/Maps that I update and then copy to eqemu/maps but neither seems to have a .path file for gfaydark even though it says the SVN is up to date (Revision 49).

[Chanus]

Oh, there are gfaydark.map and gfaydark.wtr in the Maps directory.

[Chanus]

I also don't see a log that has that output you posted or anything similar.

[Derision]

There are only .path files for some zones available on the SVN, but don't worry about that as it is not related to your problem.

The problem with Windows (as opposed to Linux) is that it doesn't flush the logs to disk very regularly, so sometimes you will only see the log messages after you
have shut the server down and the logs have been flushed to disk.

You can confirm if the .map has been loaded correctly by typing the GM command #bestz, it should give you a Z value very close to what /loc or #loc
reports. If the .map hasn't loaded, it will say so.

That being said, I tested pulling the two mobs you listed, from the location you specified, and everything worked fine.

I then deleted all rows relating to Maps from my rules_values table (and therefore used the hardcoded defaults) and tried again. This time the mobs hopped
vertically as they were running to me (but didn't disappear or warp backwards).

Some of the rules I am using seem different from the default values. These are the rules values that worked for me:


You say, '#rules values Map'
[Sat Dec 04 19:13:23 2010] Rules & values in category Map:
[Sat Dec 04 19:13:23 2010] Map:FindBestZHeightAdjust - 1
[Sat Dec 04 19:13:23 2010] Map:FixPathingZMaxDeltaMoving - 12.000000
[Sat Dec 04 19:13:23 2010] Map:FixPathingZMaxDeltaWaypoint - 20.000000
[Sat Dec 04 19:13:23 2010] Map:FixPathingZMaxDeltaSendTo - 45.000000
[Sat Dec 04 19:13:23 2010] Map:FixPathingZMaxDeltaLoading - 45.000000
[Sat Dec 04 19:13:23 2010] Map:FixPathingZWhenLoading - true
[Sat Dec 04 19:13:23 2010] Map:FixPathingZAtWaypoints - true
[Sat Dec 04 19:13:23 2010] Map:FixPathingZWhenMoving - true
[Sat Dec 04 19:13:23 2010] Map:FixPathingZOnSendTo - true
[Sat Dec 04 19:13:23 2010] Map:UseClosestZ - false


All the values are positive, the ' - ' there is just a separator. If you change them in your database you will need to either restart the server or do a #rules reload.

Other than that, I am out of ideas.

[Chanus]

That didn't seem to fix it.

I don't think it's a Z-Axis issue. I've been watching roaming mobs and they all seem to do it... They'll continue in a straight line and then warp back and then sometimes continue in that line or just be stopped where they warp back to.

It really looks like the client and server are out of synch for some reason. Like the client shows these mobs going in one direction and then the server sends and update like, "Nope, they're here, actually".

The other parts that's confusing, though, is the mobs should be reaching me on that first run up before they warp back, but I don't get any combat messages until they finally settle in front of me.

[Chanus]

Thanks for trying to help at least. Hopefully something will come up to solve this.

[Chanus]

Well, I think I've figured it out.

Apparently everything was working properly, it's just the computer I was using apparently couldn't run everything and keep the client updated.

I've installed on another computer with a lot more RAM and CPU/GPU power and everything seems to run fine, so I am going to assume that was the issue.

Thanks for the help, and at the very least I learned some things. :)