Charms

[Mr Guy]

Someone posted here some time ago that according to showEQ, charm durations were decided when the spell landed. Which is why you get 'charm wears off' some minutes later if you end a charm early.


Is that true? Is that something visible and viewable?

[gore]

No.

All charms have a maximum duration value, some charms (Dictate at any rate) have a fixed duration value.

NPCs get a save vs normal charms every tick based on level difference, SVM, and the charm caster's charisma. (You can't really take this as gospel since there is no real way to verify, but by my own observations playing Enchanter and by admissions of VI this seems logical)

The "your XXX spell has worn off" is reported when the spell icon is removed from the target. This can happen if:

1) NPC saves vs the charm
2) Charm reaches max duration
3) Charm effect is dispelled

When you break charm with inviso or zoning, even though the NPC is no longer really "charmed," it still has the effect on it. When that effect eventually wears off, you get the message.

Note that this used to create a VERY annoying bug if you lost a DC pet and attempted to recharm it, as the DC effect would still be on the NPC and it wouldn't take hold. (I do think they fixed this though).

[Nobody]

Gore, I see his question though. If you do not intentionally break charm then the random durration spells last some X seconds.

Your client knows this X number because it holds until then and give that wore off message. Is this calculated by the client (very unlikely) or does the server send it when it send the sucess/fail message? If it does, can it be pulled out and put into the spell table? This would be amazingly helpful to charmers, knowing if your charm is going to last 5 mins or 3 secs.

I doubt it's client side cause it'd be very nice to find a way to just set the value to max durration every time with a memory editor. Not easy but I'm sure it ccould be done.

[Spaz]

I've understood that all spells that have a variable duration (typically due to the NPC getting a resist check every tick) have always been determined on the server side.

Imagine how nice it would be to know if that Root was a 6 second or a three minute one...

[JustACoder]

Originally posted by Spaz
I've understood that all spells that have a variable duration (typically due to the NPC getting a resist check every tick) have always been determined on the server side.

Imagine how nice it would be to know if that Root was a 6 second or a three minute one...

not possible for roots, root has many other factors then resistance , I.E if you have a dot on the mob it could break any second and if you nuke the mob it could break.

[msk]

Are we positive there is a check every tick? Isn't it possible that the duration is set when the spell hits the mob? Then there is a separate check every time some DD damage hits a mob?(for root at least) This would explain the charm wearing off messages.

In addition, wouldnt it take less server resources if some random duration was generated when the spell lands versus continuosly runnig checks for every random duration spell going on a server. I had seen this hypothesized before on other boards. Seemed logical to me at the time.

MSK