InternalMap Cleanup

[ArteGordon]

fury, psz, mebane, thanks for the thoughtful replies. You confirm what I think others need to know, and that is that there is nothing wrong with xmlspawner, but that there are features that differ between the spawners that some people like and others dont. Preference for walking and home range over the spawn region, homerange, and relative homerange approach that xmlspawner takes is perfectly reasonable.
I personally find the ability to specify multiple mobs per spawner to be extremely useful and the primary reason that I use it.
The spawn editor/viewer that works with it is very nice, with map synchronization and features reminiscent of pandora's box (please no flames, I know it is no pandora's box).
The visible spawners with the show all is obviously a feature that most admins would turn off, but it is trivial to do so and hardly qualifies as a bug. Its a flag. you either set it to true or false. Your choice. Yes, the default is true. Just change it if it bothers you.

I just get bothered when Phantom persists in referring to the spawner as 'buggy-assed' as though there are flaws in coding that are responsible for actual server problems and other improper behavior.
Can you put too many spawns down with it, lag your server and create problems? of course you can, but that isnt a bug, its just the spawner properly doing what it was designed to do. You can do exactly the same with any other spawner. The fact that it makes it easier to lay out lots of spawns hardly seems to be grounds for criticizing it (that is what spawners are supposed to do isnt it).
Oh, and the [get home issue is only when you use the homerelative flag. Its designed to give you the relative spawn point when it is set. If it is off, then it behaves like the distro spawner and reports spawner location. Again, not a bug, just a feature that some like and others dont.
I agree that the way spawning range, and walking range are handled are awkward, but again, not a bug, just a preference.

The issue with world packages in general is a completely different deal. I think most people when getting started appreciate the option of having a running shard up in a matter of minutes with 'stuff' to really give the system a try. Yes, it was a collection of scripts, and yes it wasnt perfect, but show me something that is. The real question is has it been of value to the community and enhanced their enjoyment of RunUO, and to that I think the answer is most definitely yes.
Yes, I understand and agree with the learn by doing philosophy that Phantom and others follow. But does that mean that providing things that make life easier for the community is doing the community a disservice? No. We are all trying to contribute in much the same way.

This all pretty much qualifies as a rant and I am going to stop after this. I just wish Phantom would lay off bob smart. It really bothers me to see someone who obviously spent time and effort giving the community something for no reason other than to help them enjoy the game, get slammed.
I dont think thats the way we want to treat our people.
.... and btw, merry xmas

 

[psz]

Phantom's complaint is with the package as a WHOLE, not the XMLSpawner itself. (Or rather, not JUST the spawner itself)

I happen to agree. Individually, the components usually work well (Though some are buggier than others), but as a whole package it has some SERIOUS issues (See my thread with the TreasureChest packages in this forum)

 

[Seven]

Just a question...how did bobsmart get into all this?

 

[psz]

There were, I dunno, 6 or 7 REALLY impressive scripts (His XMLSpawner, TreasureChests, Loot, and BaseHire, my Vendors, Hirables, Rokam's Vet rewards, the Harvest system, etc) on the forums, but they didn't play well together.

So, he tweaked them to work better, and packaged them all together with a pre-spawned world.

Unfortunately, they still don't all play well together, and some have been heavilly worked on just to be compatible with more recent betas.

 

[Phantom]

All I know is this:

XML Spawner when it fucks up places Mobiles on the internal map. This causes a good deal of increased Mobiles. This is a bug, in the script.

I want evidence more then somebodies word that the default spawner does this too. I seriously doubt it though, but with evidence I will believe it.

I still think the XML Spawner is buggy, I still think the entire package is buggy. I will continue to tell people its buggy and they shouldn't use it till I can write my own and promise there are no bugs in it. I trust Zippy's skills I do not trust Bob Smart's skills of editing other peoples scripts.

 

[Seven]

Anyways...anyone want to fix the
[internalmobiles command? It crashes when anyone uses it on my server.

 

[Phantom]

Post the error again, I will tell you what you do to fix it.

 

[mebane2]

All I know is this:

XML Spawner when it fucks up places Mobiles on the internal map. This causes a good deal of increased Mobiles. This is a bug, in the script.

I want evidence more then somebodies word that the default spawner does this too. I seriously doubt it though, but with evidence I will believe it.

I still think the XML Spawner is buggy, I still think the entire package is buggy. I will continue to tell people its buggy and they shouldn't use it till I can write my own and promise there are no bugs in it. I trust Zippy's skills I do not trust Bob Smart's skills of editing other peoples scripts.

Hehe, at this point if I trusted my own skills I would write a new one. I mean while I have a different view on the XMLSpawner I do agree that one could be written to include all the features people want like using XML files and being able to get the spawner's home location off the monster. Unf sofar the best ive gotten to is the Orc Scout I just released in scripts. And I definatly trust your coding Phantom. But I know you are busy with factions.

oh, and P.S. Yes, I def agree that the package as a whole is buggy which is why I just use the XMLSpawner and a few other select scripts from it.

 

[Phantom]

All mine would be is a script to make a xml output of the normal spawners. Which then would read the xml file and place normal spawners.

Thus only thing custom would be the xml writter/reader not the spawner themselfs thus not ever causing problems if the spawners ever change ( as the normal spawners will always be the same due to not wanting those objects to be invalid ).

 

[mebane2]

Actualy you don't have to worry about writing this if you don't want to Phantom because OrbSydia is going to blow spawners out of the water. I am just drewling to get my hands on the first private beta. I am very thankful I was able to get into there core tester group.

Visual Spawn Management without Spawners at all. *sighs contently*

 

[psz]

People who already have XMLSpawners and Regular Spawners and Spawner2's, however, will most likely be interested because they don't want to (potentially) re-spawn things, whether it's easy or not.

 

[mebane2]

They are going to be using XML to store the data offline. It will be a client/server system so you can control the spawn. I think they even said they will have active monitoring of monsters in the world (though I am not the official word, but I remember reading that somewhere on the site). I am sure they will have import ability to read bobsmart's XML files, as well as other formats. They may even add a system to search the world, find handplaced spawners and ether produce a file there system can import or directly bring them into the system removeing the spawner in the world but putting all the spawn information into there sytem seemlessly.

I mean this is how advanced these guys are working. This is like high end comertial level programming these guys are doing, but the tools will all be free. If you want to see what I mean, go to there website and download the server and client for there UO Architect tool and put it on your shard. If you have done any house building you will be blown away by what there software can do.

Just imagine installing a piece of software. Running a program. And even if you have hand spawned the world you might be able to just use a command and poof, all your hard work is now on a easy to use visual interface where you don't need to use spawners at all anymore.

 

[psz]

I know Orbsydia ;->

I still don't wish to edit the spawns I placed over a year ago. Nor, I'm sure, do others.

The point is, have both systems. Why not?

 

[mebane2]

True. There is nothing wrong with having both. The more the merrier. Diversity is the spice of RunUO

But I can tell you 100% when it comes out I am doing a [xmlspawnerwipeall, import the XML files into thier system and jumping for joy

 

[psz]

I know how the system works :-P

I also know how the regional systems work.

I also know of numerous other methods.

I also know that I spent weeks at a time on OSI matching spawns as exactly as possible, and thus will not be using someone ELSE'S spawns.

I may export mine, but that's the limit.

 

[mebane2]

ok ok ok But others reading might not know about orbsydia so I was adding a bit for them too.

I spent about a week doing up Malas to match OSI myself and def wouldn't use anyone elses for that. Haven't gotten around to doing the other facets because the person heading our guild shard project keeps me too busy programing

 

[Thiago X]

If you wipe itens it will wipe comodity deed itens!

Players you lost the comodity deed, this will be a new one... :?

 

[Fury]

add it to the list of items not to display.. main reason i said doing a total wipe is not recomended.. my suggestion is figure out what is suppose to be there and whats not.. alter the items the command will display so it is custom tailored to your shard.. only then is it safe.. im assuming theres not many, if any full commodity deeds on my shard because i never noticed them =/

 

[Sno]

All mine would be is a script to make a xml output of the normal spawners. Which then would read the xml file and place normal spawners.

Thus only thing custom would be the xml writter/reader not the spawner themselfs thus not ever causing problems if the spawners ever change ( as the normal spawners will always be the same due to not wanting those objects to be invalid ).

I already did that, it's in the submissions... if anyone's interested

 

[Voran]

Sorry to drag this up again, folks - but the link's broken. It just leads to one of those "this could be your host" pages. I'd really like this, if anyone has it saved.