Horse pc proprieties.

[Hellblazer]

If it doesn't exist yet, could you put a check into the dismount option of the saddle, so that when you are dismounting, the system clears the Character of the pc propriety thingy that gets put into the inventory. That should take out the problem of the horse aura that we are experiencing.

[darkstorme]

I imagine that the check is already in place, but isn't firing due to a TMI error or something similar.

[Hellblazer]

That could be, although I'm not seeing any when dismounting, probably due to being taken out of what messages are shown.

But if there was a fix for that, it would be greatly appreciated by all horse riders. As it would end the need to relog each time you dismount. Which in turn helps out the rest of the server as it would help with the login lag that can happen

[Dorganath]

Every check I can think to put in is in, without making things horrendously more complex and potentially even more buggy.  

Removing the "PC Properties" object would cause havoc with the subrace system, actually.  The "aura" issue is something that has nothing really to do with the PC Properties object.

It's not TMI issue but rather one of object creation.  When you dismount, the system is creating a new horse object, which is wickedly complex in its model (as anyone who lags when one comes into view knows), and this processing lag can cause that incomplete dismount in one form or the other.

[Hellblazer]

Well thanks again for your explanation dorg.

Although I have to say that I have noticed this effect even when I was the only one on, or with an other player on, and no lag from the server. So there might be an other problem in it?

I was wondering though if there could be an other option set into the saddle, that instead of making the check as the player dismount. If it could be manually started by the player using the 3'rd saddle option. Once the player has dismounted.

Ie:
option 1: mount/dismount horse
option 2: set horse speed ( which I noticed today isn't working for ty)
option 3: Reset character
Option 4: nothing.

Now what I mean by resetting the character is either, find a way of getting rid of that thing (even though I understand the possible problems that could occur). Or have the saddle save a log of all effects negative or positive that is on the character before it dismounts, so that it can then reset the character to it's original form and then reapply the effects that were on the character before the dismount, minus the extra speed and the skill decreases. This way once the initial lag that is caused by the horse mounting dismounting is gone, the player can then reuse the saddle to make sure the character is back to what it should be.

[darkstorme]

If you look into NWScript, Hellblazer, it's very difficult to save/reapply effects with the same expiry they had before their removal, and similarly difficult to track down which skill decreases are applied by the horse system and which by others.

The only way to remove effects reliably is to keep track of them to start with - which is what (I assume) the horse system does.  So this is not by any means an easy fix.  I'd suggest fiddling around with the toolset to see if you can find a solution that doesn't involve too many instructions being called.

Finally, I'm curious about what "Option 2" is supposed to do once the character is dismounted.  Cancel horse speed?

[Acacea]

When mounted, there was an option on the saddle to use one of two speeds for the old horses. The option to run at 'normal speed' has not been functional since the switch, and I imagine that is what he is referring to.

[Jilseponie Wyndon]

Question:  If the PC Properties thingy that appears in one's inventory is for subraces ... and if you are not such, can that object be trashed without causing the character harm or loss of something?

[Dorganath]

When mounted, there was an option on the saddle to use one of two speeds for the old horses. The option to run at 'normal speed' has not been functional since the switch, and I imagine that is what he is referring to.

Eh...would someone file that as a bug report, please?

[Dorganath]

Question:  If the PC Properties thingy that appears in one's inventory is for subraces ... and if you are not such, can that object be trashed without causing the character harm or loss of something?

Yes and no.  Yes, you can trash it without harm to the PC, but you will need GM help to do it.

Generally speaking though, the PC Properties skin can disappear on its own under certain sets of circumstances.

[Hellblazer]

That is the actual thing I was talking about though. So if a gm can trash it, why can't a system trash it for you?

[Hellblazer]

The only way to remove effects reliably is to keep track of them to start with - which is what (I assume) the horse system does.  So this is not by any means an easy fix.  I'd suggest fiddling around with the toolset to see if you can find a solution that doesn't involve too many instructions being called.

Would I be able to code, I would gladly do so.

[Hellblazer]

Surfing on the the nwn forums, I did find this. Maybe it can help?

[Dorganath]

Well thanks again for your explanation dorg.

Although I have to say that I have noticed this effect even when I was the only one on, or with an other player on, and no lag from the server. So there might be an other problem in it?

I was wondering though if there could be an other option set into the saddle, that instead of making the check as the player dismount. If it could be manually started by the player using the 3'rd saddle option. Once the player has dismounted.

Ie:
option 1: mount/dismount horse
option 2: set horse speed ( which I noticed today isn't working for ty)
option 3: Reset character
Option 4: nothing.

Now what I mean by resetting the character is either, find a way of getting rid of that thing (even though I understand the possible problems that could occur). Or have the saddle save a log of all effects negative or positive that is on the character before it dismounts, so that it can then reset the character to it's original form and then reapply the effects that were on the character before the dismount, minus the extra speed and the skill decreases. This way once the initial lag that is caused by the horse mounting dismounting is gone, the player can then reuse the saddle to make sure the character is back to what it should be.

No you misunderstand what I mean by lag.  It has little to do with how many people are on but rather how much time and cycles it takes to process the creation of that horse object after the dismount.  NWN scripting it seems has a sort of built-in timeout sometimes, and if the script takes too long to execute for whatever reason, the script seems to get aborted, even without a TMI.  Granted, that's just an observation.

Anyway, compound the problem with the fact that in most of these cases, by all the settings we can set, the PC is already in the "proper" state.  Which means that we can tell the engine all we want to set the Phenotype, clear the tail and a few other things, but if the engine already thinks everything is happy, then it's not going to budge. Generally speaking, in a fight between scripting and the game engine, the game engine tends to win.

And darkstorme surmises correctly in that the horse system is already storing and restoring the PC's state before mounting.  Again, it turns into a script vs. engine battle, and the engine is just better armed.

Lastly, this is sadly one of those things that performs differently when running on my test system than when on the live server.  It might have something to do with two logical NWN servers running on the same OS, but I'm really not sure.

[Acacea]

Eh...would someone file that as a bug report, please?

Done. Sorry, until recently hadn't really used a horse since Pony died after trying to rescue Acacea.

[Dorganath]

*hand over heart* Poor Pony.  Alas...