Game Mechanics: /pet guard here & /pet guard me: different behaviour in early game

Dolalin · #1 01-01-2020, 03:12 PM

In early EQ, /pet guard me and /pet guard here put the pet into an aggressive mode where it would attack any NPC that wandered into its aggro radius:

Quote:

6 . "pets guarding"
Posted by Drakun on Jul-20-99 at 11:05 AM (EST)

They changed this A LONG time ago so that telling a pet to guard somewhere is just like the as you were command except they will return to that spot after killing whatever YOU command them to kill. And the guard me command is exactly like the follow me command. Because yes before it was a sure way to get yourself killed while walking through an area with your pet on guard and it picks a fight with everything around it. But that is not the reason they changed it, they changed it because people would sit their pet on a spawn sight with a 2H sword and go off somewhere and have their pet kill everything that spawned their getting exp or whatever. Example would be outside of BB in Qeynos Hills. In the early days I've seen a skeleton sitting there with a 2H sword killig the Gnoll over and over again but there was no Necro with him so the master was elsewhere collecting the faction and or exp.

Quote:

7 . "That was fun, yeah!"
Posted by Malbusia on Jul-21-99 at 06:43 PM (EST)

> Example would be outside of BB in Qeynos Hills. In the early days I've seen a skeleton sitting there with a 2H sword killig the Gnoll over and over again but there was no Necro with him so the master was elsewhere collecting the faction and or exp.

...probably down the street at Starbucks.

I would love to have that as an option, again. One time early on, just after getting my level 4 pet, I was in "the bowl" of Steamfont, and I fell asleep (wee hours, don't you know.) I woke up a some minutes later, and my pet had daisy-chained well over half the bowl. At level four, a top pet can kill anything in there, and is safe unless they run into a group of several spiders and attack one.

Let's face it, the real reason was to stop someone from camping their pet, not because pets attacked when going through a dangerous area. That is easily fixable.

It's too bad, too. I greatly enjoyed it, role-playing, to have my pet keep a death-zone of greenies around me when camping higher-level MOBs in a zone (not that I camp or anything.) Now those smarmy rats just waltz on by me, not a care in the world. When not meditating, I frequently have fun while sitting using F9 and targetting the greenies the hard way. This is a riot up on the Orc Trainer's hill, where nothing this side of the trainer himself can beat my pet in a one-on-one. I don't do it with lower-level parties around, though, since they like to fuss with the fleabags. Me, they're filthy creatures, those Orcs. Get thee away from me. Jebartik, kill.

Fortunately, the kobold runts and other scowling greens still attack while you're sitting. Pet psychically senses it's attacking me, and it's insta-dead before it can knock me out of my meditative slumber. Well, Ok, a Legionairre can sometimes make it far enough to konk me on the back of the head, but at that point it's best that I get up, anyway, since I don't want to be near the fleacloud kicked up as his dying body hits the ground.

http://web.archive.org/web/200010050.../howto/72.html

It seems it was changed June-ish 1999?:

Quote:

7/1/99

My elementals, using Guard Here have stopped
attacking everything unless I tell it to or until
something attacks me first. I think Verant has
changed this. My invis air elemental was set to
"guard here" when I went out looking for giant
skeletons. When I got back a Cyclops was standing
on my invis pet. Eventually it wandered off with
my pet sitting the contentedly until the skeleton
got in range (he had hit me earlier) and then
went beserk on the thing. I'd be dead if the
elemental attacked the cyclops. I've used guard
here in Nejana and Guk. Similar response. He
doesn't twitch, even when something spawns right
next to him. Even non-invis elementals do this.
I'd suggest trying pet guard here again. Verant
has changed it. I'm very happy now...

https://groups.google.com/d/msg/alt....k/GTXkrwRsVoEJ

Dolalin · #2 01-02-2020, 05:14 AM

More evidence, confirming it was still active in June 1999 and must have been changed in that month, given the post dates:

Quote:

6/8/99

"Doug Wolfe" <wo...@fmtc.net> sez:
>Hi there. Just made up a mew magician, and was wondering if there were any
>good Magician sites to look at? Also, any advice would be appreciated (I
>started in Freeport).
Forgot to mention:

There's an important distinction between /pet guard me and
/pet follow me:

/pet guard me tells your pet to stay near you and attack
anything dangerous that gets with a certain radius of you.

/pet follow me tells your pet to stay near you and only attack
things that attack you first.

Ever since I found this out, I've used /pet follow me
exclusively. Before that there were many instances where I'd be
sitting down regaining health and mana only to see something like
"Goner says 'Time to die, a grizzly bear!" Since I started using
follow instead of guard, that hasn't happened.

/pet sit down is a useful command for keeping your pet in one
spot. While this isn't important in the outdoor zones (pets will stay
in one spot automatically when you stop), it's vitally important in
dungeons. In dungeons, pets will pace around when you stop.
Sometimes they'll pace in front of a critter that wants to play. And
suddenly you've got a fight on your hands that you didn't need and
maybe can't win. /pet sit down keeps them from pacing.

Another useful trick with /pet sit down is crossing bridges.
If you stop on a bridge, your pet will begin to pace. If the bridge
is thin, your pet will drop off the side of the bridge and will have
to take the long way back to get to you. The long way back can often
mean passing up lots of MOBs. (This is called Pet Train Syndrome.
Nothing worse in a dungeon than seeing "Taunting Attacker Master" and
looking around and not being able to find your pet. A speedy exit from
the zone is recommended at that point.)

Unfortunately, some bridges can be tricky. The first bridge
you come to in Upper Guk, for instance, is a guaranteed Pet Train
generator. The bridge is very thin, and it curves in a couple of
places. So you can't take it at full speed. Which means your pet
comes up behind you, starts to pace, then falls off into the water.
Well, there are 2 guk guards and a gaz warrior in the water. Guess
what? They're about to make short work of your pet. Guess what
happens after that? They're coming after you. To avoid this, go
right up to the start of the bridge and use /pet sit down. Then cross
the bridge yourself. When you get to the opposite side, type /pet
follow me. The pet will sail across the bridge and the Pet Train will
have been avoided.

The downside to /pet sit down is that it's easy to forget that
you've told your pet to do this. When you give this command, your pet
will sit there until you tell it otherwise. There have been many
instances where I've run off into the depths of Blackburrow, looked
around and discovered that my pet was missing, ran back to the
Bleachers where my pet was still sitting, typed /pet follow me, ran
*back* off into the depths of Blackburrow, etc. The other problem is
that if your pet is in "sit" mode and you tell it to attack something,
it will become animated and will follow the MOB until it dies or the
pet does. As soon as the MOB dies, the pet will revert to its
previous command. If the previous command was /pet sit down, your pet
will stay right where it killed the MOB. This can lead to frustrating
searches for your parked pet unless you bothered to buy the Sense
Summoned spell.

Desdinova
Humble Erudite Conjurer of the 4th Circle
Innoruuk

https://groups.google.com/d/msg/alt....s/s-sLz51vmo4J

Dolalin · #3 01-03-2020, 06:56 AM

More from a May 1999 magician howto page capture on EQ Stratics:

Quote:

Pet Control

Let me take a moment before I end this to talk about controlling your pet. I'll start with the commands:

/Pet guard me --- the pet goes where you go and attacks anything that can be considered dangerous within the general area.

/Pet guard here --- the same as guard me only the pet sits in one spot and kills anything dangerous that walks by. A key tactic to changing your faction is using this. I wanted to become more liked by high elves again after killing some pixies so I took my pet to the orc village, found a nice spot and had it guard here. I then walked away and did some other stuff while he was busy racking in the faction points for me.

http://web.archive.org/web/199905081...s_mag_st.shtml

Palemoon · #4 01-03-2020, 10:51 AM

I remember this.

Traak · #5 01-03-2020, 11:06 AM

wasnt this removed to prevent afk mage farm.

otherwise two pet classes could afk their way to the top.

Dolalin · #6 01-03-2020, 11:14 AM

Devs might not choose to implement it but I'm documenting it nevertheless, since I found it while searching for other things.

Palemoon · #7 01-03-2020, 11:15 AM

maybe, I remember my little gnome using his lvl 4 fire pet in the mines of malfunction back when there were more mobs in there and it was like a mini-dungeon.

Actually, this MIGHT of been beta, back when the gnome necro GMs were still behind that false wall in the wiz guild.

But yes, I remember darting into a (crowded with noobs) mines of malfunction and parking a fire pet with /pet guard here and running back out and hoping for the best.

Dolalin · #8 01-03-2020, 11:44 AM

Mines of Malfunction in beta didn't have faction hits for skeletons etc so it was actually quite a neat newbie area. I read that in a post a few days ago. It was changed for final.

Puluin · #9 01-03-2020, 01:04 PM

The whole /pet guard here and /pet guard me are detailed in Prima kunark strategy guide as part of the main things to learn as a magician.

It was deffinately a lasting mechanic until close to velious.

Dolalin · #10 01-03-2020, 01:33 PM

I posted proof it was gone by July 1999.

Also the Prima guide was a joke [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]