Question About Psychic Clone Power

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Gregpooh
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Question About Psychic Clone Power

Post by Gregpooh »

Hi Guys.

This is a nuts and bolts question for people with more scripting experience than I have:

The Psion power "Psychic Clone" originally duplicated everything that a person was carrying in their inventory. Some time back, this was changed so that only what a character had equipped was copied. It feels like what is happening now is that the power still copies everything, but then it dumps the items in inventory when the copy is finished. This leads to a huge server hiccup if the person duplicating is carrying more than a few items in their inventory. Does anyone know if there is a way to get the engine to ONLY copy the items that are equipped and then stop? It would speed up this power greatly.

I know this wouldn't be a high priority. I was just wondering if any of the big brains had thought about this and if there was a way to accomplish it. As it stands now, I won't use this power in a group because I fear to bring the whole server to a crashing halt. If there is a relatively quick fix it would be great.

Thanks.
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Daecon
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Post by Daecon »

It feels like what is happening now is that the power still copies everything, but then it dumps the items in inventory when the copy is finished.
Unfortunately, that is what happens. The lag is two-fold. First because duplicating a PC object is a little complicated, and second because after doing it it then loops through the inventory to destroy every object...
Does anyone know if there is a way to get the engine to ONLY copy the items that are equipped and then stop? It would speed up this power greatly.
NWScript limitations mean this isn't possible either, alas. But there is another method I had in mind which would reduce the lag this power causes. A lot. I'll try to write up a test case sometime in the future. It's been on my "to-do" list for ages.
Sable
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Post by Sable »

As controversial as this would be I would suggest a few things based on both performance and D&D mechanics (I’ll steer clear of the word balance).

Its been a long time since I’ve worked with NWN code, so I could be blowing hot air. If so, I apologise now.

1. Create a standard spiritual body of the character (a template form in the toolset – optional to create one for each race/gender), rather than a duplicate of the character itself. I can’t remember if you can set appearance after creation, if you can then fair enough go with that otherwise aim for a shadow form or similar incorporeal/non descript form.

2. Apply physical stats to the creature (str, con, dex, hit points and AB). If the template creature has 3 in all stats, then you only need to raise it by the value of the characters base value – 3. Though for the sake of D&D feel, I would use the casters mental stats as physical. Eg (and I can’t remember the actual translation off the top of my head, but I’m pretty sure theres some abilities out there that use it so a little research would produce the right ) Cha = Str, Int = Dex and Wis = Con. I’d suggest that AB should also be based off Psion levels rather than total AB, but that’s another subject. Mental stats should not be important since it shouldn’t be using none physical abilities as an ability spawning your abilities is just madness waiting to eat you.

3. Equip basic versions of items based on the type worn by the psion – Its long been a mechanic in D&D that no ability can duplicate a magic item. In fact, the only power I’m aware of that can spontaneously create/duplicate a magic item are gods.

Whilst the above sounds like a lot of work for the system, I’d wager it is a fraction of what its doing atm.
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Tremayne7
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Post by Tremayne7 »

I was reading the Arkaz forums this morning and found this interesting item.

http://www.arkaz.com/viewtopic.php?f=59&t=3366

Perhaps the team could talk to the Arkaz team and see if this might be implemented here. Just thought I'd pass this on. :wink:
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