This raises another issue with AOE's....if you are checking your targets stats then you are only checking one target so what about the others? Your target could be more resistant to one specific resist type but the rest of the npc's could be getting hit by that spell. I bring this up because a common tactic for the Corinav event is to pull 20+ mobs into a small space then aoe nuke them to death.
If there is a way to do a resist check for all npc's in close proximity to your target then it would give a more realistic view of what spell needs to be used.

I do not run bots but all your talking lately has me wondering. What purpose are bots going to service once the merc code starts coming in? Will some / all of the bot code be useful for that?

Merc code is a hard guess at this point, if and when they're implemented. I (believe) Congdar was in charge of the mercs - Which after coding the bots and having people change/modify his code and run away, leaving him to pick up the pieces, is a tricky mess at best. I'd say don't worry about Mercs for now. Be happy these people have come together to discuss/implement changes to better the bots. Roll with it and be happy.

I've been watching EQEmu from its' inception WAY back, I'm honestly shocked how far it's come - from 4.4DR-1 TCSMyworld's DB releases (with MOVING(!?!) NPC's, to 5.7DR6 on the Scorp2k Server, and forward to working LDONs and countless other things. Things will happen in time, just help where you can.

Check IsBotAttackAllowed(). I know it needs work, as I had a report of a bot's dire charmed pet attacking itself. I never got around to trying to figure it out. I made a couple changes in there before to allow bots to cast spells and bot pets to attack in the arena (I was trying to parse some stuff and they wouldn't attack the test dummies correctly).

Wildcard had begun work on mercs, but has been missing sicne.

Basically, mercs would be built in on top of the mob objects, created live-like, then bots on top of mercs (taking out merc only stuff such as upkeep and stuff, but adding in bot specific code, such as class specific code, raid support, etc.)

If anyone wants to take a look, there's a branch in the svn that he created for mercs and bots, but I'm not sure what if anything was done on it.

If we have any opcodes and such for some of the merc functions, I would be willing to try and get a working merc (but I'm sure it would take a while, as I don't have the most time in the world now). I'm just not sure I want to take the time to figure out how to do opcodes at the moment.

EDIT: I checked out the code, and it appears as if he just added a header file with constructor and destructor declarations.. lol

I found it.. lol I'm not going completely crazy..

There is a bot rule in place to activate a quest that makes acquiring bots tougher. Maybe he didn't know about this and thought you could just make 71 bots and go.

RULE_BOOL ( Bots, BotQuest, false ) // Optional quest method to manage bot spawn limits using the quest_globals name bot_spawn_limit, see: /bazaar/Aediles_Thrall.pl

The reason the convienence methods were made was due to the fact that making macros to spawn an entire raid almost used up all your available macro slots and you hardly had any left for #bot group attack commands etc. Either way you would still be able to get a bot raid force up with or without the newer macro.

Here is a good page on mercs

I didn't mess with mercs much after they went live as by this time I mainly played my necro because of time constraints. However, I think that a player only can hire one at a time which is why bots will still be useful. Now I am mainly thinking of players like myself that play solo, but I know I'd like to raid and such and from the merc page classes like enchanters aren't an option with the merc system. This leaves room for bots in the future.

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Anyone know of a page that lists raids and what size raid force is required? I would like the challenge of gearing up a 3 group raid force and tackling raids and only use 4+ group raids when neccessary. I definately don't like the idea of filling 7 groups with wizards and monks to zerg something and would rather slowly take on smaller raids for gear as I work my way towards larger scale raids.

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I was wondering if someone with more experience in engine/spatial coding could look at the movement/spacing code for bots. I love the way angelox has hits bots spaced behind the player and x,y,z code is something I have no experience with.

I didn't realize that quest was put in before those changes were made. He must not have thought about it.

Regardless, I just thought I remembered reading why raid bots were removed. I would like to see them added back in.

I use this as a reference: http://everquest.allakhazam.com/wiki...gression_guide
Really, just try with however many bots you have and adjust your strategy accordingly.

Try Chardok, Western Wastes Dragons, Kael and see how you do. Look for named mobs in harder areas, such as Grieg's End. You may not be able to take Grieg to begin, but try out any of the named in the zone. Kael isn't great until you can take out Derakor or AoW.

When I really began raiding, I started hitting Akheva Ruins (Itraer.. Shei's DT sucks), Greig's, then Chardok B for Korucust (one of my favorites.. quick to get into and out of and good loot for my Mage). Then I moved to Ssra, then Vex Thal. You may not take out the boss of the zones, but running Ssra, and hitting the Rhags, High Priest, Arch Lich, Creator will get you a lot of loot.

I tried to work through the progression of expansions if I could, so I waited for PoP bosses, where PoI, PoS, PoN could get you decent loot. BoT, PoT, PoNB, and a couple others preEPs.

Just beware some encounters are difficult if not impossible if it's just you with your bots.. Manaetic Behemoth for one.

Nice list. I am actually thinking of removing DT from my server or switching its effect with something else. I was running poFear and getting hit with that DT when its insta raid end was really not fun.

Runnng solo with bots using AXClassic was a blast raiding. I basically hit Kael until I geared myself and main group up and then hit PoGrowth for my other 2 groups and then tried Griegs End...one of those named was a fun fight until it destroyed me. I also like Akheva Ruins. The boss that blinds was so much fun. Trying to post my casters just out of the aoe range and trying to hold agro. The first fight I didnt realize the blind effect was dispellable until about half way through and I was like DOH.

There is also another rule which limits the total number of bots you can create.
RULE_INT ( Bots, CreateBotCount, 150 ) // Number of bots that each account can create
That in concert with the other one could be made to make that strategy unworkable. The cost to quest for the extra bots plus the limited number of bots createable would require that you make healers and tanks etc. It may be still doable but could be made such a pain as to not try.

If I didn't take so much time to name and gear my bots, I would try to make 150 of them to see what it would be like (changing the rule for max spawned at one time). Running with 53 (9 groups) is enough for me..


This reminds me that I had recently thought about how I would like bots being account based, instead of character based.. I made a script to update the botownercharacterid to another of my characters when I want to, since I don't want to gear up multiple characters work of bots. Does anyone see any downside to that? I don't remember it being discussed before. You could still have separate bots for your characters since they may be different levels and with level specific gear, but you would have access to all of your bots.. Saved bot groups would need to be changed to character based, but I think it would be doable..