Take wizard back

[Nyeleni]

They would have put a timer in a long time ago, if it was possible. But as it is, afaik, it's not. Hardcoded bio-nuisance. Maybe with a hak it would be feasible.

[Daral0085]

My understanding is that it's possible to put a delay in hips by exploiting some sort of function hook injection which is possible on linux but not in windows for some reason. Not sure if the devs are going to put in the effort to implement this.

[Bargeld]

I just want to throw it out there... I am aware of 'HiPS spamming' and all it's benefits/flaws. I don't use it personally for one main reason. YOU DON'T NEED TO. If your hide beats the spot, then you remain hidden, you don't need to spam it. If your hide matches the spot, then they see you sometimes (this is the only time that spamming it will actually function). If your hide is less than the spot (by a significant amount), then they will see you regardless of your spam. With a 100 hide sneaky vs a 120+ spotter, spamming hips does absolutely nothing.

If you are spamming hips, it will be obvious... it also won't really do you any good, because archers will still target you (spam right back at em by clicking to target them, if they are spamming then they are barely crawling, and targeting will remain pretty easy.) Casters who target spells and can spot should know better than to cast a targeted spell at an SD anyway, even with AQ3, the casting time is too long to catch an SD out of hips, regardless of whether they spam, or just hips legitimately. The only other scenario is a melee'r trying to chase and target the SD... again, they crawl, you run. You will catch up to them, they will continue to crawl and spam and it will be very obvious they are spamming. This should prompt a shout with the goal of 1) shaming the offender and 2) making any staff aware of the offender and allowing them to act as they see fit. Beyond that, it's going to be a long trip to wherever that SD is spam crawling to, and you can tail them the entire way. Oh and have some friends meet you on the way... hopefully someone with a NEB and other AoE damage spells.

I think of it this way... spam is a tool in the SD toolkit. It has very limited use, and even less people who like to use it. If you know how to counter it (just like any aspect of any other build) then it's not really an issue. If you don't have a good enough spotter to make the spam impossible, then maybe you should get one. All it means is that your mediocre spotter will be 50/50 with a mediocre hider. Neither of these toons will have any major impact on each other, and so it is a stalemate. It's just another ability that some toons have and that some toons can counter. Just cuz you have 110 spot on the charsheet doesn't mean you can kill anything that hides. That is where knowledge and experience and play ability enters the picture.

[Amoenotep]

injection hooking yes:dev time/testing no

[Delisha Zrazorian]

Well... I got through it all

more nerfing

New epic runs.. new and exciting epic monsters... new and unique epic weapons and gear

time much better spent...

at your service,
DZ

[mining]

Nerfing is pretty important for game balance - also I'm interested in hooking HiPS at least to stop the "omg stupid HiPS lags the server" case of HiPSers spamming HiPS. Its not a tool, its just abuse.

We need to nerf ~as much as we buff, and probably more, because otherwise there's inevitable crazy power creep. There already is, really - compare builds of pre-wipe to now - its a whole different ball game (based on what I've heard/seen). Better gear also leads to more competitive toons - and atm we're swimming in it.

Also: nerfing is far quicker than it seems, especially compared to epic planes.

Re: 125 hide on an AO ranger:

Lets roll... 21+ ranger / blah / blah don't care because ranger self buffs pretty much everything he needs.
Ghostwise, because we love cheese like that. Possibly 5 HS, 13 rogue, 22 ranger - that gets us a good array of bonus feats from harper, good sneak damage and edodge - but hey, its not up to me to decide your builds .

43 ranks
04 size
17 feats
20 dex (6 great dexes in epic - 4 feats 2 HS, say)
______
84 baseline. (80 to +127 cap)
______
10 ghostwise
04 OWTL spell
07 cloak
07 armor
02 rings
08 boots
03 shield (+4 to +50)
(+41)
______
125.

Because feats are slightly tight, we'd possibly see 30 ranger / 5 HS /5X where X is probably rogue or bard. Build also gets awesome AB, especially for a sneak (30 BAB + 20 dex + 2 BoE + 8 weapon + 1 blinding + 2 Aid => 63 AB) which is a huge bonus.

[Rufio]

Hips spamming isn't a problem when you can see a toon easily and they are just rapid fire spamming in desperation.

It is a problem when you can just barely spot something. If something has more hide than your spot, it might take a few rounds to get a favorable spot roll. As soon as the hipser realizes that you have a lock on him, he can rehips and throw you off for another few rounds.

I've experienced this a few times:

My main spotter is a drow with 122 spot. Against a 127 hider with a +4 small size conditional modifier, I am effectively trying to spot 131 hide. I've gone up against a few of these in relic defense. It will take 5-10 rounds to win a spot roll in this case. Sometimes I win the roll and spot the hider. What happens is that I can get 2 shots with my sling before they notice and hide again. Considering almost all hiders have epic dodge, I only have a chance at hitting with 1 shot. If they have deflect arrows, I won't hit at all and have to resort to running them down in melee. If they notice that I have keyed in on them in melee, they can re-hips before I even attack. Then it is another 5-10 rounds before I get a lock on them again. Of course, this isn't very efficient, and the hider would be able to kill me easily just by engaging while hipsing, since chances are I will be flatfooted.

This becomes an even bigger issue at 127 hide. Because a spotter can only match that number at 127 spot, things end up being won with conditional modifiers, which generally favor the hider. If the spotter is an elf, the hider has a +4 conditional modifier for being small. Once the spotter engages in combat with the hider, they will get a -10 conditional modifier. If the hider plays it smart, they will also take advantage of the +5 modifier for standing still. If the spotter engages in melee, and the hipser takes advantage by using quick hipsing immediately before attacking, it is going to be an effective 136 hide vs 117 spot. The spotter will lose that -10 combat modifier on the next opposing spot roll, so if the hiper takes advantage of the short window, they will catch the spotter flatfooted and hit for big sneak damage. Now, assuming the hider takes advantage of their defenses (they generally have decent AC when not flatfooted, epic dodge and can shield swap at times), they should actually be able to take down spotters painlessly.

[Bargeld]

Assuming the spotter stands there waiting to get hit. I call this a stalemate, just like a pair of non-spotting hipsers.

If it takes 5-10 rounds each time to spot him, it shouldn't take long to concede that your spot isn't good enough at the moment. Tokens and buffs wear off, cradles debuff and cause penalties.

[rocketkai]

I like to hips spamming on those listeners and it works pretty well. At least can easily get me out of a lot of bad situations

[Alkapwn]

Spot rolls are made 5x/second in detect mode/keensenses. Hide rolls are made 1/6second

Its pretty easy to strip off 30+hide off a hider in like one round by just knowing the general area.

Seriously you could make a ranger that could flawlessly spot anything that can be on this server. TC/NC have THE best spot options of any faction .... Why are you complaining about nerfing hiders ? Build a better spotter. *cough ranger cough* I'd expect it coming from RK or MA ....

Alls i'm seeing is "My mediocre spotter can't see your Epic hider so it must be the server. Nerf all hide bonuses".

Although i totally agree hips is annoying as hell , spot is definetly more powerful and way easier to aquire

[Ajantis.]

TC/NC have THE best spot options of any faction .... Why are you complaining about nerfing hiders ? Build a better spotter. *cough ranger cough* I'd expect it coming from RK or MA ....

I'll remind you that this thread was started in AO. I'm not seeing any NC/TC complaining (in fact, plenty of defending of the status quo) However, stating the facts in the pursuit of continuing the conversation, for all to insert their input, since the subject was brought up... shouldn't be perceived as complaining.

[mining]

Spot rolls are made 5x/second in detect mode/keensenses. Hide rolls are made 1/6second

This is (somewhat) correct but recall that HiPS can be used to exploit this, also:

Stealth checks (from wiki)

Player detects stealth: 5 times per second NPC detects stealth: 4 seconds
Creatures roll for hide/move silently/spot/listen: every 6 seconds
The detect rate is shorter than the rate of making rolls in part because there are situational modifiers that can change between rolls. When a roll is made, the unmodified result is recorded for use with all checks that are performed before the next roll is made.
This implies that you get 1 opposed roll per round that is affected by modifiers 5 times a second - which means that strategic use of standing still vs moving is super useful and stuff.
HiPS can be used to force another roll, repeatedly.

[report]

hmm, forget the size because gnome spotters are quite common now. But how you get 17 from feats? 10 is epic focus, 3 is focus, 2 is stealthy, this makes 15. So this 125 is back to 119 for me (you are building a 50 dex toon, tc/nc/ma/sl can max hide with only 48 dex).

[Alkapwn]

TC/NC have THE best spot options of any faction .... Why are you complaining about nerfing hiders ? Build a better spotter. *cough ranger cough* I'd expect it coming from RK or MA ....

I'll remind you that this thread was started in AO. I'm not seeing any NC/TC complaining (in fact, plenty of defending of the status quo) However, stating the facts in the pursuit of continuing the conversation, for all to insert their input, since the subject was brought up... shouldn't be perceived as complaining.

Was pretty much directed at Rufio since he was the one who suggested the nerf and continues to defend it.

[mining]

hmm, forget the size because gnome spotters are quite common now. But how you get 17 from feats? 10 is epic focus, 3 is focus, 2 is stealthy, this makes 15. So this 125 is back to 119 for me (you are building a 50 dex toon, tc/nc/ma/sl can max hide with only 48 dex).

That's like saying "forget the OWTL because dispels exist" "allow for -8 hide because curse song".

So yeah, my bad, 15 not 17. Throw in two more dex feats, then - 124 hide. Yeah, its not 125 - but that's a fully focused build out of AO, which has no hide/ms bonuses, no SD evade and no trickery domain *and can only HiPS outside*. You don't get SD - you still get heaps of hide/ms/AB/OK AC.