Sound issue, NPC(MOB) walking/stepping...

[WarAngel]

First time poster, long time EQEmu fan. Finally retired and able to play.
EQEmu developers over the years have affected my wife and I more than you folks can possibly know. You ladies and gents are wonderful.
If this is the wrong place to post, please flog me as required.

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***ISSUE: NPCs (MOB) do not produce the walking or stepping sound.***
-Using the ROF2 client...Functions well.
-All other sounds that I can troubleshoot are firing. Casting, idle, attack, etc.
-Player character walk run sounds work fine.
-Checked the master changelog for any entries relating...do not think I found any.

***What I have been troubleshooting so far...***
-dusted off my SoF client and fired it up, all sounds work including the walk run sounds of the NPCs.
-In game sliders and checkboxes are all appropriately configured for enabled sounds.
-EQClient.ini Sound=TRUE.
-No "nosound.ini" in the directory.
-Used Azone2 to look at the .pfs files to ensure wave files were present...they are.
-Looked at the soundassets.txt and compared it to the SoF. All entries are there.
-Copied and overwrote files from the SoF client...no progress (hhmmn)
-Have performed a clean install using Akkadius's installer (thank you!).
-Did a COMPLETE clean install from my old secret squirrel backup of the RoF client.
-With the Azone2, pulled the Beetle walk wave file and placed it in the sounds folder as a test...no progress.
-With Azone2 looked at the models .eqg files to see any added or removed packaged files...all seem ok (looked at Beetles and orcs).
-Installed a fresh soundcard driver, just in case.
-Turned off all surround sound, effects, EQ, etc. in soundcard.
-Tried headphones
-Used the mother board sound controller, while disabling soundcard.
-Checked Windows 10 updates.

***My uneducated thoughts...***
I believe this is a client issue BUT...
-could it be a opcode issue?
-is there a perl or Lua file someone can point me to, that I can play around with?
-and am I missing any other files to look at in the client?

DISCLAIMER!!
I am only recently able to play, thus never noticed the sound loss till now. But it is deafening not having a single NPC play a walking or running sound in game...The whole game, every zone. Also, I tried (for a week) to SCOUR the internet and forums for anyone else having this issue. Just could not find any related info. (other than people wanting to remove sounds.)


Ok, Any thoughts? Or should I just accept my fate, and continue on to fixing the quests and NPC grids and waypoints.

Thank you!!
-Eric (WarAngel)