Azone Patch
 

Here is a patch to fix some issues with the version of azone distributed with the server source:

http://www.rama.demon.co.uk/azone.patch

The differences against the stock code are:

Fixes a couple of instances where polys are missed out of a facelist, leaving 'holes' in the ground.
Handles the different size of the Vertex struct in V3 EQGs
Handles all the Titanium EQGs without the need for manual offset hacking
Includes geometry up to Z=3000 rather than Z=620 (Using Z=620 misses the higher parts of zones such
as Frontier Mountains and Dreadlands).

It was mentioned to me that the fear code had some issues in the EQG versions of TutorialB and Lavastorm,
so I generated some new ones with this patch applied and did some testing in those two zones and didn't
see any instances of feared mobs disappearing through walls (although my testing was limited).

Works well, even on some maps that have been problematic in the past such as east wastes.

I'd say this is a pretty major fix, I can't find anything walking through hills or walls anymore.
Rest of the "hoppers" are gone too.

Thanks Derision!

I'd have to agree, this patch works very well.

I don't fully understand what that does, so my question is; Does this replace the need for .map files for each and every zone to have LoS? Or is that something completely different? And if this does effect LoS, does that mean that using this will allow the newer Titanium zones like DoD and DoN to work with proper LoS so they can finally be populated and used?

If so, then that is AMAZING lol!

Thanks, and sorry for my ignorance. I haven't read much on the subject of azone, eqg, or .map files to know much of what they do other than I am pretty sure .maps tell the server the 3D layout of the zone for LoS on spells and mob agro.

Or, is this patch just for pathing? Even still, it sounds great and I will be checking it out for sure! I love major breakthroughs like this :D

Azone is the utility that produces the .map files. Currently it has some issues with some maps, even some older ones but especially with some newer ones that this addresses.

I've always been interested in this little app. I got it to compile with the patch on Linux (FC8) but when I run it on draniksewersa.eqg, it just says unable to open draniksewersa.eqg or s3d. So just to test, I copied over an older zone (dreadlands.s3d) and this one started the Loading dreadlands.s3d, then failed with a Segmentation fault.

Anyone care to give us a refresher course on how this works? Seems a few of you got it to work with no problem. So I must be missing something.

Thanks,
-J

I'm not really sure on the mechanics of running it under a unix system. I actually wasted a day porting it to windows(hooray that was ... fun). Quite simply azone [zonename]. It will add the ext on it's own so it would be azone tutorialb and not azone tutorialb.eqg for example. Beyond that I'm not sure what would cause any such problems, perhaps someone else can comment.

On Linux it is just a case of make & run.

Are you using binary mode in ftp when copying the files over to your Linux box ?
Just on a hunch I copied one over using ftp and didn't specify binary mode and I get a segfault in S3d_Init:

If you are using an ftp command line client, always enter the 'bin' command before using put or get.

Ahh ok, I'll try again. Using FileZilla and I think it's set to automatic.

I'll report back if I just noob'd it. :) Thanks both.

Nah oh well, still gives me the Segmentation fault on dreadlands.s3d using Binary in FileZilla and Windoze command line FTP. I'll mess with it on a few other zone files later.

Ok the 5 minute rule is a little ridiculous. Sorry about the spam.

Following your commands, here's my simulation;


Oh shit. I just remembered this was a 64-bit OS. Is that a problem? :)

I made a new map pack and am uploading it to Rathe Forums downloads area. it has all the updated map zone files from the Titanium expansion - it is a large file so it takes a while, I'll post here when its ready.

I've not used 64-bit Linux, but it wouldn't surprise me if that is the problem, e.g. the code makes assumptions that certain data types are a given size (e.g. a long integer is 32 bits). If the size or alignment of data types is different for code generated by 64-bit GCC, then that would break things.

The files are posted at Legacy of the Rathe "general files" in "downloads". You have to be a member in order to see the downloads area - called "New updated Map pack". I also dumped the water maps from Titanium, in case the original dump I got elsewhere was incomplete (posted under "Latest WaterMaps").

Ok, sorry for not mentioning that. I forgot, myself... that VM is so old. I'll make a new FC8 x86 VM and try it again.

Thanks, Angelox!

I wanted to note that you will have to register on his site before you will be able to see the download.

Also, I was wondering if you redid all of them, or only certain ones?

I made a GIANT batch file and in it are all s3d zone files i could find in the Titanium edition directory. I figured that's all we really need for this - it must have been around one gig of sd3s when I finally got them all cropped out. I pretty much covered them all. The water maps might have more maps too. What I had before was a mixture of maps I made and downloaded, but now I'm pretty sure I got them all covered with this package, what you see in this package is what I re-did.

John tells me there's still 100+ zones not in the package - I see Azone does eqg files too now, so I'll do them and post also in a while.

Aye, I couldn't connect here for a while so I hit you up on your site :)

You could get fancy and use a "for" loop if you wanted to just go through all zone files. But I guess more than zones have the extension s3d and eqg... If you are doing this on linux, I am not sure of the bash command similar to DOS "for / do"

Thanks so much Angelox! I will be waiting for these impatiently :D

I only have limited space at the Rathe Forums, and I guess i used it up with the maps package. I'm waiting for Leara to open me up some more for the eqg package. Meanwhile, here's a temporary spot where you can grab it.
When you de-compress this one and unload them into your /Maps be careful what you overwrite! You may already have the proper maps from the s3d dump. I left out Lavastorm and Nektulos since we already have the good ones from the sd3.
But Bazaar and a few more are there and I use the original.
I noticed many more maps that got made (i didn't have) in this one.
If anyone sees any other map they want made, post and i'll do it.

Thanx Angelox!

I have setup a mirror for the map archives.

eqg_maps.tar.gz
NewMaps.tar.gz
NewWaterMaps.tar.gz

Great work Derision, and thanks for the hosting and mirrors, Angelox and Erde :)

Nice work, Angelox. Thanks for doing this. I'll test them out today. I am a little confused by what you mean by "we already have good ones from s3d". Aren't the eqg's newer zone formats? I know no one likes the Titanium Nektulos (gods, please let me use the one from the Live Progression servers!) but I do not so much mind Lavastorm or Bazaar as it is in Titanium.

Maybe you can make a smaller pack with just the dupe zones in it? Then the admin can decide what to apply.

Well, it's not what we like, but what we got - for example, Lavastorm is already spawned with the old sd3 , so if you go to eqg update, you have to respawn and redo everything.

I also noticed something I believe is new with these maps;
I've been working on all the boats these past weeks, since I added the new maps, boats would turn up in the air or under water - I guess what happened is, with the old Maps, boats used the Z coord from their spawnpoint, and ignored what ever Z coords that were in the grid waypoints. With the new maps, Z coord is now used in grids, so if you had a Z coord you made while setting the WPs too high, your boat will be headed there. What I did was, go back to the grids and set all the Z coords too the original spawn point of the boat (this is the way it should have been anyways). Anyways, when ever we finish the new AX_CLASSIC database update, all those fixes will be there.

I also just got the "eqg_maps.tar.gz" file posted at Rathe Forums.

WOOT! Those eqg maps work great! Unless I am wrong, I think we now FINALLY have full access to use all zones in Titanium!

Thanks a TON, Angelox and Derision!

I shouldn't be getting any credit for this, Derision is the man to thank , he's done some incredible things for this project; to me, he is a Developer, just like some of the others that have done good work here. I wonder if there are any plans to put this update in the source?
I know what it feels like to not have access to Azone, because either it doesn't compile, or have a windows server - Then, have to beg for weeks just to get some new map files.
This Emulator is still alpha right? even if it were beta, I think ALL reasonable fixes need to go in the source asap.

For ServerOps that want to continue using the original zones (nektulos, lavastorm, arena, oasis, sro, nro, etc) are there updated .map files of the old versions of these zones as well?

Thanks,
Dax

Yea, first unpack the eqg converted maps, then unpack the new (s3d) map pack on top , over write anything there. This will give you all the old zones with the updated maps.

That's probably both the funniest and scariest thing I've read in years.

This is a pretty damn long alpha, 0.7.0 for 2 years now? :)

At one time, I was thinking of pushing for Beta status - really, the game is totally playable now, no reason to keep it as an alpha.
But in reality, there are so few of the people that own the source, really care about anything at all, it's not worth the effort.
Best thing to do, is probably what we're dong now; post diffs and updates and we'll swap what we have. This is how my AX databases got started; I wasn't willing to wait for someone to make changes when they felt like it.

I don't want to take this thread off-topic, but to be fair to KLS, who is doing a great job as the main (only?) active Developer, I wouldn't commit this code to CVS either until it had been tested for more than a couple of days :)

Not the only one any more, for the record.

Getting back on topic - sort of - has anyone done a windows version of azone, or am I looking at an old version?

I didn't mean KLS or anyone else who is doing work on this project - on the topic of when to put new code into the source, You Derision, are a trusted coder, new code needs to be tested, the best way to test it, is to publicize it in the main source so we all can try it out, post feed back - Thats what this is all about. How will we ever know if we don't test it?
When I download new source, I don't expect it to be perfect, I understand it might have bugs, and the Devs might want feedback on that.
Someone just starting here with codefixes, you might want to watch - but you don't need that, what you need is for your code to be tested so you can fix the bugs, just like we did with the water codes and the mob hopping.

Really glad to have your help Scorpious2k, very appreciated and needed!

When I put this in source I have some changes that should make it *easier* to compile on windows as well.

Then I will wait and see what you have done. I had started doing the same thing.

It boggles my mind that it was only developed for nix in the first place, seems kind of ass backwards to me considering EQ is a windows app, it requires the eq client zone files, and most people do still use windows to at minimum play the game.