Mastermind Pet: Clones and/or female minions

[Haijinx]

Actually was on a DFB pug with a water blaster named poo water  😣 so yeah. ...

[Galaxy Brain]

1 hour ago, Bossk_Hogg said:

That's frankly a terrible reason. It implies that whatever violence/sexual behavior that is unacceptable towards women/female pets is somehow acceptable towards men or the existing male pets. 

 

This isnt COXG, we actually do have mods to sort that stuff out. It's like not wanting global chat channels for fear someone would say something crappy...

Also this. This sort of implies it's ok to do it to the male minions?

 

This had come up before in the threads as well, and I beleive it ended up asking if it's ok to even have female NPCs that can be defeated lol

 

 

[MetaVileTerror]

The concerns about gendered violence not having any parity are valid, so dismissing them with the loaded statement of "but men have violence perpetrated on them" is old-hat.

I think the efforts to encourage the Devs to invest in to examining implementation of Henchpet customization are best served by not bringing up the false claims of equity.  Please.  I really want to see the Henchpet customization coding challenge solved, and I think turning this in to a gender politics thread is just detrimental toward the stated objective of the thread.

Discussions on the subject of gender inequity are definitely worth having; I just don't think it's here and now.

[Redlynne]

I'd be perfectly happy with being able to pick HenchPets from a pulldown menu of options for specific powersets.

[Tsabrock]

This conversation degenerated very quickly from a, "Can we do it" to a, "Should we do it" conversation.

 

My stance on whether we can do it:  I for one always wanted to see some customization options for Masterminds, whether it be a full-blown character customization like what we can do for our own characters, or the ability for them to spawn in with random appearances to mix things up a bit.   Perhaps we could look at the code used for placing NPC inside of SG bases - many of those NPC will change every time the level or NPC is reloaded.

 

My stance on whether we should do it:  We should not be afraid how female minions or other customization options could be misused.  Yes it likely would be misused, but it would likely be by a a very small number of people.  Those people can be easily reported and ignored just like we handle offensive people currently.  Do not punish the majority of people that will use customization tastefully.

[MetaVileTerror]

Now, I've heard rumours and nebulous reasons of why it's technically not feasible to get Henchpets to spawn in with customized appearances, or even to stop them from spawning with random appearances . . . but I'm wondering if there's a coder out there who can break it down for the viewers at home just how exactly the existing code is uncooperative.  I've heard it described as a "hack" just to get Henchpet to be a thing at all.  And that the clones/shadows/dopplegangers are even /more/ "hax" than that.

What does a codehead and/or programmer have to say to the suggestion that we jury rig another layer of doppleshadowy hax on top of our Henchpet hacks?  Yes, it'll be adding more spaghetti to the plate, and that's not healthy for the long-term goal of straightening our noodles out . . . but where's the feasibility sit on that compared to the feasibility of this proposal:

 

- Create another 6 Costume Slots, locked* to Masterminds (* if possible.  If not, hell!  6 more costume slots for everyone else isn't a bad thing).

- Modify the doppleshadow code to access a specific costume slot, rather than the currently active costume being used by a player-character.

- Jury rig up a toggle so that players can choose between the current randomized Henchpets, or the customized Henchpet appearances.

- When toggled to Custom, the game calls on those 6 Costume Slots to determine the Henchpet appearances.

 

So, immediate concerns with my plan:  

- Extra costume slots.  We know these can be added, but how much of a pain in the ass is it?  What happens to the "/cc #" commands when we exceed single digits?  What's the data load gonna look like, and can the new servers handle it?  Can extra costume slots be created which exist "outside" of the normal 10, and therefore potentially avoid some issues (while introducing entirely different ones)?

- Toggle for default or custom.  What's this going to look like?  Is it an option in the Power Customization tab of character creation?  Some new GUI element (which is apparently one of the bigger pains in the ass)?  Some NPC like Null the Gull?  What happens when you switch the Toggle while Henchpets are already summoned?

- What does the doppleshadow code even look like?  What makes it such a hackjob, and does it contribute to instability issues?  

 

So . . . do we have anyone available who might be able to address these in detail?  Bonus points if terminology can avoid getting too technical, while still being detailed enough to articulate the nuance and depth of the various challenges laid out.

[daveyfiacre]

at least with some of the suggested alternate pets, you dont need mysogeny! here's a mysogeny free list of alternate pets we could and should consider, if its possible and someone's willing to do the work:

 

-Demons: CoT Demons, Rulu-Shin, Bat'Zul, Wailers, Soldiers of Rularuu
-Ninjas: Tsoo, Legacy Chain,
-Thugs: Destroyers, Mooks, Skulls, Hellions, Syndicate, Lost, Angry Citizens, Prisoners, Family
-Mercs: Longbow, Wyverns, DUST, Arachnos, GoldBrickers
-Bots: Clockwork, Prae Clockwork, Council, Crey, Malta, Nemesis
-Beast: Devouring Earth, Hydra, Tuatha, Soldiers of Rularuu, Spirit Stalkers
-Necro:Banished Pantheon Zombs, Vahzilok, Ghosts, Spectral Pirates, CoT SPectral Daemon/Folloer/Knight

 

and for control pets:

 

Darkness: Ghosts/Spirits, Darkservant, Haunt Shade, Unseelie, Spectral Daemon, Nictus
Earth: DE Rockmonsters + Crystal Monsters, Slag Golemns, Redcaps, Trolls, Minions of Igneous
Electric: Outcast, Freakshow, Storm Elementals, Clockwork, Praet-Clockwork
Fire: Outcast, CoT Behemoth, Fir Bolg, Living Hellfire
Gravity: Wisp[rularuu], AnimusArcana-Time Stop,
Ice: Snowmen, Outcast, CoT Hellfrost, CoT Blade Prince
Illusion: Anything available, Mirror-Self/ Doppleganger, AnimusArcana-Ball of Light
Mind: [no pets]
Plant:DE Tree ppl, DE Mushroom ppl, Tuatha, Hydras
Wind: Storm Elementals
Watercontrol: Coralax Guardians, Coralax red/blue/green, Sharks, Hydras
Gun Drone: Dikti Drone, Zenith Hoverbot, IDF Battle Orb
FF Generator: Skyraider's FF Generator, IDF Battle Orb
Triage Beacon: cairn[rock turd], quartz[sm crystal], Crystal of Health[med crystal], Will of the Earth[big crystal]
Spirit Tree: cairn, DE tree of life, DE Fungi

 

----------------------------------------------------

though a recent conversation with folks who were looking at the code for this specifically said it can't be done because of how pets are coded. to give them alt models, it would end up summoning the actual npc's [or homemade models]. anything BUT the actual pet model cannot replace it just visually, they can only be replaced in their entirety which is a whole other buttload of issues. 😞

Edited September 6, 2019 by daveyfiacre
correction

[Dragonfire]

22 minutes ago, MetaVileTerror said:

Now, I've heard rumours and nebulous reasons of why it's technically not feasible to get Henchpets to spawn in with customized appearances, or even to stop them from spawning with random appearances . . . but I'm wondering if there's a coder out there who can break it down for the viewers at home just how exactly the existing code is uncooperative.  I've heard it described as a "hack" just to get Henchpet to be a thing at all.  And that the clones/shadows/dopplegangers are even /more/ "hax" than that.

What does a codehead and/or programmer have to say to the suggestion that we jury rig another layer of doppleshadowy hax on top of our Henchpet hacks?  Yes, it'll be adding more spaghetti to the plate, and that's not healthy for the long-term goal of straightening our noodles out . . . but where's the feasibility sit on that compared to the feasibility of this proposal:

 

- Create another 6 Costume Slots, locked* to Masterminds (* if possible.  If not, hell!  6 more costume slots for everyone else isn't a bad thing).

- Modify the doppleshadow code to access a specific costume slot, rather than the currently active costume being used by a player-character.

- Jury rig up a toggle so that players can choose between the current randomized Henchpets, or the customized Henchpet appearances.

- When toggled to Custom, the game calls on those 6 Costume Slots to determine the Henchpet appearances.

 

So, immediate concerns with my plan:  

- Extra costume slots.  We know these can be added, but how much of a pain in the ass is it?  What happens to the "/cc #" commands when we exceed single digits?  What's the data load gonna look like, and can the new servers handle it?  Can extra costume slots be created which exist "outside" of the normal 10, and therefore potentially avoid some issues (while introducing entirely different ones)?

- Toggle for default or custom.  What's this going to look like?  Is it an option in the Power Customization tab of character creation?  Some new GUI element (which is apparently one of the bigger pains in the ass)?  Some NPC like Null the Gull?  What happens when you switch the Toggle while Henchpets are already summoned?

- What does the doppleshadow code even look like?  What makes it such a hackjob, and does it contribute to instability issues?  

 

So . . . do we have anyone available who might be able to address these in detail?  Bonus points if terminology can avoid getting too technical, while still being detailed enough to articulate the nuance and depth of the various challenges laid out.

That sounds like a very doable option.

[Dragonfire]

22 minutes ago, daveyfiacre said:

at least with some of the suggested alternate pets, you dont need mysogeny! here's a mysogeny free list of alternate pets we could and should consider, if its possible and someone's willing to do the work:

 

-Demons: CoT Demons, Rulu-Shin, Bat'Zul, Wailers, Soldiers of Rularuu
-Ninjas: Tsoo, Legacy Chain,
-Thugs: Destroyers, Mooks, Skulls, Hellions, Syndicate, Lost, Angry Citizens, Prisoners, Family
-Mercs: Longbow, Wyverns, DUST, Arachnos, GoldBrickers
-Bots: Clockwork, Prae Clockwork, Council, Crey, Malta, Nemesis
-Beast: Devouring Earth, Hydra, Tuatha, Soldiers of Rularuu, Spirit Stalkers
-Necro:Banished Pantheon Zombs, Vahzilok, Ghosts, Spectral Pirates, CoT SPectral Daemon/Folloer/Knight

 

and for control pets:

 

Darkness: Ghosts/Spirits, Darkservant, Haunt Shade, Unseelie, Spectral Daemon, Nictus
Earth: DE Rockmonsters + Crystal Monsters, Slag Golemns, Redcaps, Trolls, Minions of Igneous
Electric: Outcast, Freakshow, Storm Elementals, Clockwork, Praet-Clockwork
Fire: Outcast, CoT Behemoth, Fir Bolg, Living Hellfire
Gravity: Wisp[rularuu], AnimusArcana-Time Stop,
Ice: Snowmen, Outcast, CoT Hellfrost, CoT Blade Prince
Illusion: Anything available, Mirror-Self/ Doppleganger, AnimusArcana-Ball of Light
Mind: [no pets]
Plant:DE Tree ppl, DE Mushroom ppl, Tuatha, Hydras
Wind: Storm Elementals
Watercontrol: Coralax Guardians, Coralax red/blue/green, Sharks, Hydras
Gun Drone: Dikti Drone, Zenith Hoverbot, IDF Battle Orb
FF Generator: Skyraider's FF Generator, IDF Battle Orb
Triage Beacon: cairn[rock turd], quartz[sm crystal], Crystal of Health[med crystal], Will of the Earth[big crystal]
Spirit Tree: cairn, DE tree of life, DE Fungi

 

----------------------------------------------------

though a recent conversation with folks who were looking at the code for this specifically said it can't be done because of how pets are coded. to give them alt models, it would end up summoning the actual npc's [or homemade models]. anything BUT the actual pet model cannot replace it just visually, they can only be replaced in their entirety which is a whole other buttload of issues. 😞

Interesting ideas for alt pets there.  When CoH was live, I did really want to summon skeleton warriors (yes, inspired by the cartoon) with armor, as my undead army.  Ninjas so I could have them look similar to Lin Kuei or Cyberninjas.  Heck, why not a cheerleader squad armed with chainsaws?  I understand folks say it's difficult or nigh impossible to do, but it looks like there are a few options that might at least expand the base of masterminds somewhat.  Summoning in-game creatures that already exist, or baddies that already exist like the guys from Outbreak shouldn't be much of a stretch.

[Dragonfire]

Just thought of something - armorbots as a pet for a mastermind.  We have a few different armor types in the game, and we could summon knights, androids, or robots, or armor-bots like Iron Man did in IM3.  For science-ATs who play as armored heroes like Positron, that would be pretty cool for RP.

[Shadowsleuth]

7 hours ago, Dragonfire said:

 or baddies that already exist like the guys from Outbreak

Contaminated/Infected would be an awesome addition.

 

7 hours ago, Dragonfire said:

 armorbots as a pet for a mastermind.  We have a few different armor types in the game, and we could summon knights, androids, or robots, or armor-bots like Iron Man did in IM3.  For science-ATs who play as armored heroes like Positron

This is a great choice for the Science/Tech hero who doesn't like the bulky looking robots we have now.

[daveyfiacre]

a thought i shared on another server's discord, but was also deemed too complicated:

 

What if controllers/MMs can get a power, maybe through p2w vendor, (similar to Halloween costume temp, or secondary mutation -monkey, or granite armor... one that changes the skeleton to something new) that only works on their pets (like MM upgrade power only works on owners pet)? And it can be used to then ‘customize’ your pet, til it dies or you have to respawn it, then you ‘buff’ it again with the (costume change/monkey/granite armor type of) power?

 

 

Or does that still encounter the same issue of: cant overlay anything or replace model because then it wouldn’t be the pet anymore thing (?)

[Steampunkette]

24 minutes ago, daveyfiacre said:

a thought i shared on another server's discord, but was also deemed too complicated:

 

What if controllers/MMs can get a power, maybe through p2w vendor, (similar to Halloween costume temp, or secondary mutation -monkey, or granite armor... one that changes the skeleton to something new) that only works on their pets (like MM upgrade power only works on owners pet)? And it can be used to then ‘customize’ your pet, til it dies or you have to respawn it, then you ‘buff’ it again with the (costume change/monkey/granite armor type of) power?

 

 

Or does that still encounter the same issue of: cant overlay anything or replace model because then it wouldn’t be the pet anymore thing (?)

So the way Pet Powers work is that there's a specific Call tied to the Power to summon an NPC from a specific 'Batch' dedicated to that powerset.

 

The actual -control- over the pet that Masterminds get is baked into the pet itself, it has a deferred AI that the Mastermind gets control of through a UI. It's AI does not function like normal NPC AI. Controller pets, on the other hand, do -mostly- work like normal NPCs only they're set to bungie-follow the person who created them like they're part of a patrol and you're the 'leader' of the patrol.

 

So in order to make new pets you'd have to take the AI Set that exists for the Mastermind Pets and then apply it to a new NPC model that is then added to the batch that the power summons, but also apply all power logic and stuff to it so it uses the same powers as any other member of the batch. But unless you remove all other NPCs from that batch, it's still going to be random whether you get the White Dude Thug with Red Hair or the Black Dude Thug with Black Hair or the White Girl Thug with the Blond Hair.

 

To set up model swapping they'd either need to create an override power and a separate NPC AI/Power Loadout/Etc to a separate NPC Batch with 1 NPC in it -or- create a way to divide all NPCs from the full combination of Model/Powers/AI that they currently are into a floating cloud of individual pieces that can be swapped around.

 

Like right now? The Devs could not Spawn a Crystal Titan that uses the Zeus Titan attacks. Those things are baked into the individual characters and aren't interchangeable. They'd need to decouple all of those things for every NPC in order to just "Swap the Model"

 

Obviously the override method would be less work, but still a LOT of work.

 

Meanwhile creating ANY Mastermind Powerset would, according to the Live Devs, take as much effort as creating 8 regular powersets... Sooo... We can get a new powerset with female minions or we can get 8 other powersets... So I wouldn't hold your breath on any of the above happening any time soon.

[daveyfiacre]

oh wow! but even if it was just a larger pool of random, i still think that'd be awesome lol. and having the same, identical powers as the original pets only makes sense. thats what you'd want, to avoid mismatching numbers or unfair advantages. customization here should only cosmetic, in my opinion.

 

but yeah 😞 that's what i figured.

[Haijinx]

7 hours ago, Shadowsleuth said:

Contaminated/Infected would be an awesome addition.

 

This is a great choice for the Science/Tech hero who doesn't like the bulky looking robots we have now.

could use rad powers as the ranged attacks 

 

The only issue I see is that its grounded in the game world 

 

Where none of the other MM sets are.  

[MetaVileTerror]

Thanks for the details on that, Steampunkette.

 

Was there any detailed information on the workings of AE and doppleshadows?  How do those systems differ that allow them to have Powers which function for multiple varied character appearances?  Where-in lies the barrier of sharing those solutions with the Henchpets (other than the potentially monumental task of copying/decoupling every pet power for all the Henchpet Sets, and then re-attaching them to the modular character models with baked-in Mastermind AI operators)?  Is it an issue with Enhancement inheritance?  Anything else?

[Steampunkette]

Just now, MetaVileTerror said:

Thanks for the details on that, Steampunkette.

 

Was there any detailed information on the workings of AE and doppleshadows?  How do those systems differ that allow them to have Powers which function for multiple varied character appearances?  Where-in lies the barrier of sharing those solutions with the Henchpets (other than the potentially monumental task of copying/decoupling every pet power for all the Henchpet Sets, and then re-attaching them to the modular character models with baked-in Mastermind AI operators)?  Is it an issue with Enhancement inheritance?  Anything else?

Dopplegangers are a tricky beast. Instead of using an NPC Model (That is, a one-piece model, like the Warriors or Thugs pets) it uses a Player Model. With that in place it can use a pre-selected set of variables, in the case of Doppelgangers: Your character's clothes/appearance. 

 

As to powersets they're pre-loaded in a model array of all the possible combos (Which is slightly smaller than possible combos based on Archetypes!). They don't have a "Primary" and a "Secondary" powerset, just a pool of selected powers, so a Tanker's Doppleganger is no different from a Scrapper's Doppleganger (So long as powers and such are the same sets).And the power options are entirely based on the AE's design selections.

 

So let's say you have a Huge Bio/SS Tanker. Your doppleganger mission uses the $Gender tag to find out you're 'Huge' gender, a Powerset Query, and reference the mission's parameters. It puck the huge doppleganger that has SS and Bio powers, applies your costume to the player model, and voila! Suddenly there's a second you running around. Though it gets the name as defined by the mission's parameters (Which could be "You?" "Your Doppleganger" or just "$Name"

 

Doppleganger tech couldn't be used, as is, for a pet mastermind 'cause your pet's powers would be your powers so it would summon more of you. Though the devs could make a "Doppleganger Batch" for a Mastermind Powerset that calls your appearance for the pets. They'd just need to have their own powersets defined separately from that to avoid recursion.

[MetaVileTerror]

Thanks again.
Sounds promising to me.  Again, not suggesting that it would be easy or quick, and without taking a look under the hood myself, based on the present information there seems to be some hope.

Now, the Enhancement inheritance issue is something I'm just assuming, but I've already started to consider a potential workaround.  It's even MORE work added on top of what is clearly going to be a series of tasks for whatever individual or team tries to tackle it, but:  Max-range no-clip AoE Auto Powers which buff specific tiers of Henchpets with the values from the Enhancements.  Immediately I realize that something like that opens a whole new bag of cans of worms, but it's a thought for a solution to a potential problem.  Hopefully one which won't be necessary to resolve, should a solution to the Henchpet customization challenge be discovered.  All the same, it came to mind, so I figured I'd spitball it.

[GM Sijin]

26 minutes ago, Steampunkette said:

Doppleganger tech couldn't be used, as is, for a pet mastermind 'cause your pet's powers would be your powers so it would summon more of you.

New AT: Legion. Spawns copies of itself until the client/mapserver decides it has had enough. Every mission is a timed mission!

[Haijinx]

Think i saw that movie

[Zepp]

On 9/7/2019 at 7:04 AM, GM Sijin said:

New AT: Legion. Spawns copies of itself until the client/mapserver decides it has had enough. Every mission is a timed mission!

I am seriously considering putting this in the AT compilation thread...

[Zepp]

My take is that this is likely possible (I'd like to see it tested in Illusion Control first as that would allow them to test it without doing all the sets at once - while also being unlikely to be abused).

 

However, I do not see this as being ethically implementable until there is a manner through which we can have paid Mods that can look into complaints about people abusing this customization. I am hoping the NCSoft negotiations go well to make this possible.

[EyeLuvBooks]

Okay, people...let's take a real look here.

 

If we were REALLY worried about the kids playing the game then there would be no OFF switch for the profanity filter. It would be on and that's that. Is there a big difference between profanity and sadism? Sure there is...but don't go all 'slippery slope' on me when any kid can stand in Pocket D and overhear Local speech that would make a porn star blush or hang around Atlas and listen to F-Bomb tirades all hours of the day and night.

 

You don't want your kids exposed to this sort of thing? Don't let them play the game. It came with a rating for a reason.

 

That being said, the folks screaming about making it easier to do repulsive things in the game have yet to stand up when female toons do it to their male pets so sit down and shut up. If you REALLY want the game that clean then start a thread to remove the repulsive emotes from the game for EVERYONE. Personally, I would be happy if some of them were gone anyway but then I also don't think we need 7 different forms of Dance anyway.

 

Not having female pets is sexist, plain and simple. We have female enemies in the game already. Mother Mercy's rack has been the topic of conversation since Incarnate triels were a thing and I don't see anyone lobbying to blur THAT out.

 

If you automatically assume that every guy is going to be terrible then guess what? They WILL be. Use the same system we have now for offensive characters...reporting them. If someone does something terrible then that character gets deleted. Repeat offenses results in a banned account.

 

Don't limit the creativity of the many just because you're afraid a few might do something terrible with it.

 

 

[Steampunkette]

7 minutes ago, EyeLuvBooks said:

Okay, people...let's take a real look here.

 

If we were REALLY worried about the kids playing the game then there would be no OFF switch for the profanity filter. It would be on and that's that. Is there a big difference between profanity and sadism? Sure there is...but don't go all 'slippery slope' on me when any kid can stand in Pocket D and overhear Local speech that would make a porn star blush or hang around Atlas and listen to F-Bomb tirades all hours of the day and night.

 

You don't want your kids exposed to this sort of thing? Don't let them play the game. It came with a rating for a reason.

 

That being said, the folks screaming about making it easier to do repulsive things in the game have yet to stand up when female toons do it to their male pets so sit down and shut up. If you REALLY want the game that clean then start a thread to remove the repulsive emotes from the game for EVERYONE. Personally, I would be happy if some of them were gone anyway but then I also don't think we need 7 different forms of Dance anyway.

 

Not having female pets is sexist, plain and simple. We have female enemies in the game already. Mother Mercy's rack has been the topic of conversation since Incarnate triels were a thing and I don't see anyone lobbying to blur THAT out.

 

If you automatically assume that every guy is going to be terrible then guess what? They WILL be. Use the same system we have now for offensive characters...reporting them. If someone does something terrible then that character gets deleted. Repeat offenses results in a banned account.

 

Don't limit the creativity of the many just because you're afraid a few might do something terrible with it.

 

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/False_equivalence

 

 

[plainguy]

I think ( can be talking out of backside here, as not muck of coder) pre-selected pets as Redlynne mentioned might be a decent start.

 

Yea we could say go big or go home, but just having preselected pets or color change options for certain pets. EG  Red Robots.  Might be a a simple and safe start.

 

And then maybe 6 months down the line you can have your Mixed Gender all Steampunk Merc Team ( Just saying I called it first ).