Dragon Size Suggestions

[Senkeleron Fell]

Currently there are alot of discussions (some very heated) about the size of the Ancients. Anyone who has grouped with an adult dragon or plays an adult dragon knows that the huge size sometimes gets in the way, especially during combat. Having the ancient dragons be much larger can only compound that problem, but everyone who plays an ancient wants to be visually a bigger, more powerful creature. So, assuming the devs relent and make the ancients truely big, are there any suggestions on how to make them not annoying to play or group with? I know there are some who will say the huge size will never be annoying, but about the 100th time you have to back way up to select a resource node, we will see whining everywhere.

We used to have /setscale, which helped, but wasn't that removed because of exploits?

The only other idea I can think of is a command to make a character wireframe and have no select area, or how about wireframe with a heart that is the select area?

Any other thoughts on how to have truely huge dragons without the problems associated with having a model that big?

[Cobal]

Ancient dragons should be the size the ancient npc's have always been.
any solution that involves shrinking the ancient dragons model is completely unacceptable (aside from /setscale that is)

A more viable solution would be to let a dragon in khutit form have the same stats as a dragon in dragon form.
Currently going khutit is akin to nerfing yourself.
If khutit had the same stats as a full dragon much more dragons would be inclined to go khutit when hunting with bipeds.

Another solution could be to make just the head selectable.
Its allready a seperate model anyway.

My personal solution will be not to group with bipeds that have a problem with the size.

[Goriax]

I don't like the khutit idea. If they did that the only time I'd be able to go as a DRAGON would be when I solo. If I wanted to play a biped I'd have made a biped.

Making the head selectable would be fine though.

I always select nearest and assist so don't see what's the big deal.

[Dragor]

Before you say that the huge size gets in the way, download the old ancient Guaran put up, and see for yourself, the height off the ground makes it much easier to see around the dragon and see in first person view

[Deth]

Yes make us bigger all the way around, longer of leg, leagthen our bodies and tails and increase our wing span. and do it to such an amount that you could also do it for Adults so that Bipeds could see under us easyer. But I do not see this happening as that would be artist time they do not have.

[Leviathan]

Good Idea, but they could even make a /setpref command that could makedragon bodies semi-transparent and unselectable except from the group window. that would resolve the issue. But maybe they can't program that, who knows.

[Senkeleron Fell]

I'm not sure it is just a problem with bipeds seeing things when grouped with a dragon though. I know that I have trouble just as an adult dragon trying to select targets when I have 5 or 6 WA undead swarming around. When they consist of 5 melee mummies and one bloodmage, I want to be able to see good enough to target the bloodmage without wasting time. Currently I get in my own way. I can't imagine how it would be if I was bigger...

[Phillip]

it is extremely annoying to be in combat and got a few dragons in the fray. select nearest and assist don't do much when you have to specifically pick a certain mob to kill in an epic battle (ie healers, etc).

if you think assist or select nearest is the solution then i can say this: learn how to fight.

the way TulgAE design mobs for WA battles is on making one bossmob type, and an entourage consisting of healers, nukers, debuffers and so on. look closely Mineos, Titus, Gorto, Satyr & Novo mobs, and recently the rez-r-us kids. you HAVE to be able to select the little minions at will because any dumb szzchmuck could beat on the boss but it takes a smart, decisive fighter who knows to keep the minions on tap to ensure victory. the biggest contributor in a WA battles isn't the one whocan dealthe most damage to the boss. it's the ones who can keep things under control by picking apart the little bastards.

my experience is 90% of the dragons i've seen in combat only know to pounce on that one mob...i have been told by Radzy that they too can't see a ******** thing since the mobs are within their belly area. whatever the reason who cares. the fact is as adults, dragons asses are fat enough as it is, and they block our view.

funny however, that most dragons don't see things this way. they see it as it is owed to them to be bigger, stronger, etc etc.

screw that.

how about making new art so that Khutit form don't make y'all look like geckos on crack?

make Khutit form look formidable, with armor showing.

[PJ]

My biggest issue, is basically the melee range Issue. The melee range of a dragon is measured from the middle of the dragon model, and same for a melee mob trying hit the dragon. And because, hand to hand combat doesn't (nor should it) have much range to it, the mobs rush in and get swallowed by the hugeosity of the dragon model.


My question is, would it be possible to change the point on the dragon model, adult and ancient, from which the melee range is determined. Say closer to the head. That way, when a dragons fighting fact to face, it won't be completely sitting on the mob.

Ideally the range woudl be measured from the edge of the model, but I doubt that's feasible at the moment.

[Goriax]

Dragons aren't going to get any smaller. Even the new ancient is slightly (very slightly) larger then adult.

Sounds like for those particular mobs you want the ancients to be back at their original size and unselectable, where they're so big they're raised above your field of view and you can walk undeneath them without ducking.

[Kitimandiri]

Bipeds are about Hatchling height if I remember, and as a hatchling I could walk totally under that big ancient on the floating isle without touching, and target fine too, so wouldn't the bigger size be better?!?

[Goriax]

A few other things I thought of :

If you want to double check that bipeds can walk under an ancient, just log onto a a live shard switch to Khutit and visit Valkoth or someone. If you can't QUITE fit underneath and see clearly in first person (and if you don't fit it'll be very close) then they just need to make the ancients a tad bigger.

I fail to see how a dragon would get in his own way when selecting. All he had to do was switch to first person view. Might want to turn on free movement I suppose.

Setscalestill works doesn't it?

If all else fails, consider a shrink spell. Doesn't turn you into a biped (sheeze) but just makes you smaller -- perhaps hatchling sized. Use the same model as the character normally uses but scale it down. This would basically be a server side setscale. Character is still full strength and can do everything it can normally do. EQ had it and people were always shrinking down ogres and trolls in dungeons. Make some reasons why people shouldn't run around with it all day long (EQ had it wear off when you zoned but that of course doesn't apply here).Often entire parties of even normal (human) sized characters were shrunk.

[Arekaine]

If you look at the history of any popular RPG, table top or other wise you will see that there have always been rules that say working with larger creatures would be difficult at first and would need more skill to do so. Also the bigger creatures would always have a problem tring to hit the smaller ones just because of thier large size. So I think people tring to work around the big dragons makes since. It also makes since for the dragons to have a problem intargeting the little minions or what not. I mean it's justhard to do, in game or otherwise

[Goriax]

Yes, I could see making size a realistic drawback. However, since that makes it so bipeds won't want to group with dragons, dragons need to bring something to the group to make it worth the disadvantage.

Some of the threads about the new changes have had bipeds posting saying that dragons are already extremely powerful. If that were really the case, then I suppose they can indeed bring something to the group to make up for the disadvantage of size.

Except the whole reason size came up was bipeds have been complaining.

[IndyMan]

I would think ancients would be much larger than adults which should be much larger than hatchlings. Anything that is not this way is a sad option (imho)

Give them what you have been telling them for 2 years. Else it looks like all that was done was tease them to keep them paying for the game. [:|]

[Cobal]

My question is, would it be possible to change the point on the dragon model, adult and ancient, from which the melee range is determined. Say closer to the head. That way, when a dragons fighting fact to face, it won't be completely sitting on the mob.

Ideally the range woudl be measured from the edge of the model, but I doubt that's feasible at the moment.

Good idea.
I assume they take the center of the bounding box to determine melee range.
Would it be possible to change to this a certain vertex on the model? One on the chest perhaps.

If all else fails, consider a shrink spell. Doesn't turn you into a biped (sheeze) but just makes you smaller -- perhaps hatchling sized. Use the same model as the character normally uses but scale it down. This would basically be a server side setscale. Character is still full strength and can do everything it can normally do. EQ had it and people were always shrinking down ogres and trolls in dungeons. Make some reasons why people shouldn't run around with it all day long (EQ had it wear off when you zoned but that of course doesn't apply here).Often entire parties of even normal (human) sized characters were shrunk.

Another really good idea.
People could have lots of fun with this outside combat as well.
Make it a removable buff so people dont get overly annoyed when someone casts it on a dryad for a laugh :P

[Firedragon]

Give dragons longer melee range? Then you don't have to sit on the mob to kill it.

[Kitimandiri]

Thats a good idea! Would it give us any kind of unfair advantage tho? If it doesn't I think that might fix the problem [:D]

[PJ]

The problem with increasing purely the melee range of dragons, is that the mobs will still close to their melee range, which will swallow them in the dragon model.

Now they could increase melee range across the board. But then that indirectly nerfs ranged classes. Now I guess they could increase ranged attacks also, across the board. But there'd prob be alot of subtle side effects, especially with AoE effects.

It just seems easier to fiddle with the dragon model so that the "center of the model" is around the head/chest area. But well then IANAP

[Tribunal]

personally, when I hear Acients... I wasn't thinking of them getting larger, just having them look older. Who hasn't learned that Size doesn't matter? Stats, well since Dragons have already gotten the "we suck vamp us so we dominate" treatment, TG is going to have to get creative with how they should go about making you better-without increasing some of you're already great stats-. New ablities prolly, but why do you need them? You have gold-rage, you don't need armor, you don't need health, you have an attack that recycles every 15seconds that tears everything appart... and you can't state "It wastes to much horde" because it drops waaaaaaaaaaayyy to much, its bothersome for me now, I hate when I get horde... to much of it, I deleted 12 Royal Urns after hunting yesterday, a hole crap load of bells, and some odd coffers.

Ancients will be improved. I doubt size, strength, and the ability to take a mob down to decrease from 10 seconds to 5 will help yall. I just think you should look different, and have acess to newer abilities, hell they could give you the ability to swim and not die under water but would ya be happy? Complaining about not being as big as you wanted only says "I want to glorify myself by making it where no one can see anything but me."