Game Mechanics: ClassicQuest Find: See Invis mobs that don't really See Invis

[Rygar]

I came across an interesting find in my ClassicQuest journey, and I think it will answer a lot of questions as to what really saw invis and saw through Rogue Hide/Sneak.

https://web.archive.org/web/20010822...ve/arc54.shtml

Stealth Nerf?

I suspect that you may have been /coning a creature set to what we call "AggroPC", meaning that it attacks everyone without regard to faction. NPCs will only appear "Indifferent" in a /con if they have a reason that they wouldn't attack a player character. For instance, the guards in Neriak take faction into account when deciding whether or not they are going to attack, and would show "Indifferent" when invisible. NPCs that attack everyone, like hill giants for instance, show as "scowls" whether or not you are invisible.

Additional Corroboration:
https://web.archive.org/web/20010822...ve/arc69.shtml

Sneak & Hide Skills

[Quote from original post: I don't think that this is fair. If you guys don't want rogues to be invisble to everything, atleast make it so we are able to tell what is really scowling.]

Only creatures that have faction that determine what they will and will not attack give messages in /con indicating if they do or do not see you. Some things in the game will attack anyone, regardless of faction, and these things are always "scowling". If you check hill giants while invis you'll see the same issue. It's working as designed.

This mechanic is very interesting as, I think, it explains a lot as to the confusion players had as to whether or not a creature could see them (add some perceived danger to the world). It also opens up the debate as to if See Invis could really see a rogue hide/sneaking (I know some mobs could, but some posts saying they could 'see through their hide/sneak' may have just been this AggroPC mechanic and wouldn't agro).

I found additional confirmation this was working in Beholder's Maze on spectres and minotaurs here:

Some creatures still con aggresive when you are invisible, but they
won't react to your presence. Someone posted about this being the case
with Spectres. I will accept no responsability for the death of people
acting on this information, though... [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

This is correct.
The conning system will only tell you if they can't see through invis
not if they can.

If you cast camo and run through the Gorge and con a mino there, they
will always be ready to attack, but I can stand right next to them
without problems (until I see the red message telling me I'm about to
appear--at which point I pee my shorts and run as fast as I can
towards the zone... 8)

If something is indifferent, you know they can't see through invis.
If something is ready to attack, you don't know for sure--nor do I
recommend trying to find out with insta-kill mobs like specs, giants
and griffons (at least insta-kill to a char in their teens).

I haven't researched the Spectres seeing through IVU much, is this just a case of someone seeing them con and thinking they would still attack? The minos seem to be confirmed, as are hill giants.

I'm sure there are a ton of mobs like this in old world. Gordon was the dev that confirmed the AggroPC mechanic and he was pretty good at communicating code stuff / game mechanics from what I could tell.

So does this close the hill giant debate on see invis? What other mobs could using this? Could use some help on researching.

For the record, it looks like Uthgaard remembered this from this thread here:

Originally Posted by Uthgaard [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

In the eq.castersrealm.com archives, once they added guides to their pages, there's a rogue guide. One of them is RP style from a halfling PoV. It explains giants conning kos while invis/hidden but not really seeing invis. Anyone who cares enough to find it can track down the archive from that information.

Had more to do with a bug in their faction code than them actually seeing invis.

I think I found the info he was mentioning.

[Rygar]

Re-reading this, maybe a summary should have been in order...

• AggroPC but can't See Invis = Scowls (will not agro you if invis is up)
• AggroPC and CAN See Invis = Scowls (will agro you if invis is up)
• Not AggroPC and can't See Invis = Indifferent (will not agro you if invis is up)
• Not AggroPC and CAN See Invis = Scowls (will agro you if invis is up)
• AggroPC, mob is on KingXorbb faction, you are ALLY with KingXorbb = Scowls and will attack you, cause he's just angry at everything (same invis / see invis rules as above)

It seems certain that same rules applied to conning while Rogue was Hide/Sneak, but I know there is some debate as to whether or not a true 'See Invis' mob could see a Rogue Hide/Sneak.

Sneak, as far as I can tell, still worked as Indifferent if behind the mob. I believe it was just a check to see if you were in the awareness radius as it was call by the dev team and ignored faction completely.

[paulgiamatti]

Originally Posted by Rygar [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

• Not AggroPC and CAN See Invis = Scowls (will agro you if invis is up)

Yeah, that can't be right. What that would mean is any time anyone happened to be invis in a friendly city, they'd be jumped by every see invis guard/NPC. That was definitely not a thing.

Originally Posted by Rygar [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

Sneak, as far as I can tell, still worked as Indifferent if behind the mob. I believe it was just a check to see if you were in the awareness radius as it was call by the dev team and ignored faction completely.

Correct - it's important to demarcate sneak from any discussion about invis and hide. Sneak shouldn't even enter the conversation - it's a simple 180-degree aggro check across all classes, and nothing can see through it. Not gods, not see invis mobs, not see rogue hide mobs, not the undead, etc. Anyone who says otherwise doesn't understand that mechanic. The only notable difference in sneak is that it never fails for rogues once the skill is trained (except after vendoring for some god-forsaken reason), and sneak's movement speed increases for rogues as they level.

A common confusion is that sneak somehow affects a rogue's hide ability - it doesn't. Sneak allows a rogue to move while hidden, and stacks the 180-degree non-aggro feature, but that's it - hide is no more and no less effective for a rogue if the rogue is also sneaking. It simply allows them the advantage of movement while also being hidden. The rest of this stuff is pretty interesting, but as the saying goes: substantive claims require substantive evidence. If I were developing P99 I wouldn't quite feel confident in changing anything unless there were some really solid classic-era screenshots demonstrating these mechanics.

[Rygar]

Originally Posted by paulgiamatti [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

Yeah, that can't be right. What that would mean is any time anyone happened to be invis in a friendly city, they'd be jumped by every see invis guard/NPC. That was definitely not a thing.

Perhaps I poorly communicated this in the summary... in all examples the mobs are naturally scowling at you and would definitely attack you if you just walked up next to them with no invis. In none of the cases am I talking about a mob that is naturally non-KoS to a player character (such as guards in your example).

The first 4 examples just show what the mob would con and what action it would take against you if you were invised and whether or not it had the AggroPC flag.

The 5th example is just showing even if an AggroPC mob is on a certain faction, and you are ally with that faction, it will attack you anyways. If you had invis up on it, it would still con scowling. If it had see invis it would attack, if it didn't see invis it would leave you alone.

[paulgiamatti]

That makes more sense, but in that case you can literally just say everything should function exactly the way it currently does on P99 except for the first and last bullets, rephrased as such:

• non-see invis mobs flagged AggroPC should con scowling to anyone with invis, regardless of faction, but shouldn't actually attack a la Oasis crocodiles or EK crag spiders.
  
• see invis mobs flagged AggroPC should con scowling to anyone with invis, regardless of faction, and should actually attack.

And then there's the problem of which mobs are flagged, and which aren't. So far we have giants and spectres.

[paulgiamatti]

Originally Posted by paulgiamatti [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

So far we have [old world] giants and spectres.

Oh and Gorge minotaurs.

[Bummey]

There's definitely something wrong about the way rogue hide works on this server. It's not as simple as 'mobs that see invis can also see hide,' because that was definitely not the case.

One of my clearest memories of Sebilis, for some dumb reason, is a time when I was trying to get to a disco group and one of the froglok casters along the way conned scowl, preventing me from getting to the group. Why this routine, forgetful, pointless, mostly inconsequential memory takes precedence over Trakanon raids or desperate rushes to the zone out? I don't know. Along with that, I remember plenty of other times where things would see me or block my movement throughout dungeons.

I'm not gonna lie, I like having free movement throughout all non-raid zones but Chardok and SolB, even though I know it's not Correct.

[Rygar]

Originally Posted by Bummey [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

There's definitely something wrong about the way rogue hide works on this server. It's not as simple as 'mobs that see invis can also see hide,' because that was definitely not the case.

One of my clearest memories of Sebilis, for some dumb reason, is a time when I was trying to get to a disco group and one of the froglok casters along the way conned scowl, preventing me from getting to the group. Why this routine, forgetful, pointless, mostly inconsequential memory takes precedence over Trakanon raids or desperate rushes to the zone out? I don't know. Along with that, I remember plenty of other times where things would see me or block my movement throughout dungeons.

I'm not gonna lie, I like having free movement throughout all non-raid zones but Chardok and SolB, even though I know it's not Correct.

I'm confused on when you are talking about live vs. P99? I've heard a lot of stuff about rogue hide not functioning as good on Live, but I've heard counter arguments. Not sure if the 'AggroPC' flag lead to confusion on live thinking something could see through hide, but really couldn't (result: more things on P99 see through hide?).

Can you h/s around 2nd floor of Hate on P99?