Ultra sucky, super silly, will get you killed follow bug

[Anonymous]

I'm not sure if this is real.. But I've noticed more than once now that sometimes when I am following someone my commands stop working.  I can watch the mud fine and everything happens in a non lagged manner, just my commands cease.  Infact it even affects so long that I've managd to watch it, and get into a fight while ten or so rounds go by before my commands work again.  Now I know this isn't lag on my end as I was able to re-connect no problem and continue to watch the real fun lag.  I don't know if this is really a bug or my imagination, but it seems as though following a faster person assigns a little lag which builds up as they continue to walk (faster than you) untill it's to the point where you get to wait a long time for the game to catch up.  In other words, if this is a bug, it is a painful one.

Yeah, I learned early on NOT to use the way while following people. You
can get your commands lagged up to like 5 minutes and then you just go
unconcious without being able to break.

im not sure what causes it.

[Delerak]

It's the height code I think, if your a dwarf or a short human, and are following a half-elf with max height or a human with max height sometimes, or a pure elf at 90 inches, they don't get as much lag, because they can take longer strides, yeah it's realistic in that sense, but you can't get in follow self, once I followed someone and they started running, they were an elf and I was a dwarf, I ended up dying in the 'rinth 3 minutes later.

[chang]

Yea, same thing happened to me -just- today.

[Tlaloc]

Are you suffering from Movement lag? If someone who moves at a faster rate then you do is leading, I beleive that if your movement lag can stack, and take affect at the end of your destination. Its freaky, but something thats been that way since I first started playing, years ago.

Of course, I could be completely wrong, but this might be what you're seeing.

Some mounts add a large bit of lag between rooms than others. Say a kank adds 1 second and a war beetle adds 3 second of lag. Just for arguments sake. If the beetle is leading, you move slower, and the kank is fine. But if the guy is moving quick with the kank moving immediately after his 1 second lag, then you get a 2 second build up each room he moves. So if he moves 20 rooms, you got 40 seconds before you catch up and your wait-state wears off. Or it could just be your following someone with a really nice connection and they can move a lot quicker and your connection sucks and is trying to catch up..dunno. The mount thing used to work that way. maybe its different now.

[chang]

Two potential code fixes to this could be:

a.)  When your mv delay still exists when you try and move another due to a follow.  You don't move along with them and you get a: "You fail to keep up."  Message.

b.)  Coupled with the previous fix, if its predicted that they will generate less lag than you will, it can try and make you 'run'.  And if you're allready running and can't keep up, you get message 'a'.

[crymerci]

Suggestion: perhaps when a certain amount of lag gets built up, you could come unhitched, with a message like "Try as you might, you just can't keep up with the svelte, long-legged woman any longer". And the person you're following could get a message like "The rugged, stubby dwarf falls behind, unable to keep up with you".

[Lazloth]

Good suggestion, chang (& merci).  I don't believe it's feasible to have the followers change speed, as that's predicated by the leader, but "losing someone" via them running up an overly-high waitstate might be neat.   Poor dorfs.

well following a running person makes you run, but I guess its the natural race speeds that are causing the problem.

[EvilRoeSlade]

I guess this is why dwarves are always winding up as Byn Sergeants.

[The7DeadlyVenomz]

There is already a point at which a fast person can lose a slower person. It has happened to me. On my side, it says, 'You cannot keep up with the Roadrunner, and so you lag behind'.

Now, on the other hand, I find it really bad that your lag stacks so bad. That shit gets you killed, and it is lame. It also makes no sense. Every command should work -except- for a directional command, and this directional lag should only happen -before- you decide to stop following, ie: follow me.

Venomz

[Twilight]

This has been around awhile, I can remember this being an issue like 4 or 5 years ago.  What I learned, IC and OOC, is that good leaders don't spam movement commands, they wait a bit in every room they move into, at at the least once every few rooms.  I've had a few characters who considered anyone who didn't do that to IC'ly be a bad leader, as someone who rushed around without taking stock of where they are.

As for using this to cause someone's death, imho that would not only be bad roleplay, but code abuse, and any instance of it emailed to the imms.

[Plazgoth]

I agree with Twilight. Good leaders do stop every league allowing the people they lead to emote, say, or do something else. In addition that allows for a trip to be more colorfull and to take longer as it should. Using this bug to kill somebody is a big snafoo, and should be treated with the utmost contempt. It has been around for ages, and I am not sure if it is fixable. The other side of the story is to be really careful who you follow. I have had characters who would not follow code-wise, but will just follow once they see which way the leader went. Saved me from following a group of Byn over the shield wall, pointless since the sarge ordered me to jump after them regardless :lol:

[krelin]

I'm pretty sure it's not considered a bug, and is entirely intentional.  It might be nice if the mud would at least acknowledge commands, and give some sense of how far away you are from actually seeing them happen (which would allow people to distinguish between real network lag -- of which I suspect there is generally VERY little) and intentional delay.

[RideTheDivide]

I lost a character just last week from this.  Got led into the brinth and killed without ever getting to type a thing...

Hearing that someone else got killed in the 'brinth by this bug makes me wonder if someone is abusing the bug intentionally...

[Plazgoth]

If you feel there is any abuse going on, mail the mud account with a log soon after the incident. That's the best way to resolve these kind of conflicts.

[Anonymous]

If this is not a bug and intentional than shame on the imms.  There is no plausibly explination ic for why this would affect people the way it does.  I would only blame the chars partially in that they should be mindful, but I would say a majority of this one falls on the code.  Frankly it's ludicrus to try and justify such a thing being in the game.  I can't think of any ic reason to explain why someone would become like a vegitable because they are following someone too quickly.  Other solutions I would suggest is make it so you lose more st if you follow someone faster than you, or you lag behind really quickly rather then actual lag.  There should be NO command lag from following like this, it makes no plausible sense and it would get someone killed.  Would someone get a rez? They should if that killed them because frankly they're helpless. You type follow and they just have to spam rooms and you can't unfollow, the lag would get you too quickly.  This is just ridiculous.

If the players are the one abusing their ooc knowledge then shame on them. There is a lot of things that can kill you. Its like an older player leading a newb to a tarantula after the newb responded to a "need a role filled add thing" to get their newb sids. That is not necessarily the imms fault for having uber newb killing machines exist.

I do not really get along with the imms at all, however you can't blame them so much for this in my opinion. There is a lot of ridiculous things, but saying you should be ashamed of yourself will probably just piss the imms off.

Sometimes I have seen it when you go to fast you lose someone. I think it should happen easier..that is if people want to be left behind more or lag more..tough call.

[Anonymous]

I can't think of any ic reason to explain why someone would become like a vegitable because they are following someone too quickly.

How about an OOC reason then?  If this wasn't put into place then people could follow a delf  and get the benefit of that race's quicker run speed without any drawback.

So, you could follow a speedwalking delf through a room full of gith and stand a better chance of getting out of their before they aggro on you.