Paragon Chat Development Roadmap and Wishlist

[Noyjitat]

well well well... What do we have here? :)

[Azrael]

well well well... What do we have here? :)

A time line...

*Smiles.  :D

Azrael.

PS.  'Is our action not just?'

[Leandro]

I have a small (ish) QoL improvement suggestion for Paragon Chat itself: make hitting Enter in the password field trigger Launch City of Heroes. Every time I've logged in so far, I've done this, and then remembered that I have to click or tab down to the button.

Done internally, will be on the next build. Don't want to release 0.97g just for that...

[GamingGlen]

Done internally, will be on the next build. Don't want to release 0.97g just for that...

But Arcana will be disappointed...

[themamboman]

Hmm... would having citizens wandering down the bot-paths on the sidewalks or cars driving around be too much for this project?

[Shadowe]

Done internally, will be on the next build. Don't want to release 0.97g just for that...

Big things are made of little things. Thanks for doing this. Thanks for everything.

[Chernobyl Man]

Hmm... would having citizens wandering down the bot-paths on the sidewalks or cars driving around be too much for this project?

I love this idea in theory... I am betting there would be lag issues if this were implemented, however...

[emperorsteele]

I love this idea in theory... I am betting there would be lag issues if this were implemented, however...

Maybe there's a way to make those things client-side to avoid the lag?

[Eoraptor]

Maybe there's a way to make those things client-side to avoid the lag?

not likely... the walking NPCs were timed to the server... because they had to be able to randomly say things about randomized user accounts "did you hear they're making an action figure of X?", or spout off the time or date or usage stats when clicked, or whine about their purse getting ganked, etc.

[Charged Mastermind]

I'm betting if they get a much better server (which I'm not sure of) they could run NPC's easily but not much else

[Paragon Avenger]

I want to confuse NPC's and watch them battle it out, maybe version 1.4ish.

[Shidan]

Any chance we could get the Mission Architect interface added to Paragon Chat? I know you obviously wouldn't be able to do anything with it besides edit your locally stored characters, missions, groups, etc. But it's one of my go to things when I'm bored, and I'd much rather be doing it in PC instead of Icon.  :)

[Codewalker]

Any chance we could get the Mission Architect interface added to Paragon Chat? I know you obviously wouldn't be able to do anything with it besides edit your locally stored characters, missions, groups, etc. But it's one of my go to things when I'm bored, and I'd much rather be doing it in PC instead of Icon.  :)

Good idea! We'll go back in time and add it to version 0.97c, just to make sure it's done soon. :)

[Paragon Avenger]

Hey, shouldn't you name these versions?
Either, like CoX with Issues.
Or Apple's and Android's code words.
0.97f = FrankenChat
0.97g = GotChat
0.97h = HeroChat
0.97i = internetChat
0.97j = JoltChat
0.97k = KitKatChat
0.97l = LolipopChat
0.97m = MilkdudChat

or something like that.

[The-Hunter-JLJ]

Good idea! We'll go back in time and add it to version 0.97c, just to make sure it's done soon. :)

Well, that's one way to do it...

[The-Hunter-JLJ]

not likely... the walking NPCs were timed to the server... because they had to be able to randomly say things about randomized user accounts "did you hear they're making an action figure of X?", or spout off the time or date or usage stats when clicked, or whine about their purse getting ganked, etc.

Ya know though... the walk-path information IS available on the client side. Anything non-critical tasks you can push out to the client means that much less load on the server, obviously.

From a design perspective, I wonder sometimes if the industry does not reserve too much for the servers. Some things obviously HAVE to involve the server as the authoritative source, to avoid cheating if nothing else. In this case, the one strong argument I can make for the wandering NPCs being tracked by the server is so all players would see them in the same spot. But there might be other ways to handle that.

Just off the top of my head, you could run the NPCs around their walk paths based on time. Sync  Paragon Chat with an NTP time server probably on login and every time you zone, and everyone's clients would probably stay "close enough". If you really wanted to go nuts you could keep them closer than that, but why bother? So long as you keep them synced within a few feet on different player's clients, the only people who would ever realize they are not standing in the exact same spot are dual-boxers - and THEY would be very likely to be time-synced within milliseconds of each other anyway since they're on the same lan segment and uplink.

You'd only need to "track" NPCs in the zone / room you're currently standing in, which probably helps. The original server had to keep them moving in ALL zones, your client really does not care about NPCs in a zone you are currently not in. The other functions of NPCs maybe could be faked, too. Time is easy, as is anything referring to YOUR character.

The NPCs who mention other people's character can probably even be handled, since Paragon Chat "knows" who else is currently logged in. That gives you a list to work from, add in your global friends, and now you've got a probably much smaller list of possible heroes for them to comment about. Might get a bit weird since villains and heroes are mixed willy-nilly, but  even that could be finessed if it's possible to query the info from the other Paragon Chat client when it is needed.

The network environment is VASTLY different than it was when CoH was first designed. And for that matter, I suspect based on what I see from the outside looking in that a lot of things are done a certain way in the industry cuz that's how they've always been done. A project like this gives you the chance to discard the old ways of doing things if it makes sense.

[Leandro]

It's just a low priority thing that is far more complicated than it looks. What the maps have, client-side, are specific points saying "an NPC can walk to here", not a "walk path" that includes information like "don't approach me from the north because there's a building in the way". Creating proper walk paths out of the navigation points is not trivial and there are more important things that have priority.

The actual generated walk paths (as well as all other information for NPC movement) were server side, and the client only has remnants on how they work for debug purposes.

[Shidan]

Good idea! We'll go back in time and add it to version 0.97c, just to make sure it's done soon. :)

Great job on that! Though if you guys have working time travel, why exactly didn't you go back in time and save our game already?  ;)

I apparently missed Leandro's post about it in the download thread, and it wasn't in the patch notes so I just assumed it still wasn't working. Well, I guess I know what I'm going to go do now.  ;D

[Vr2Lrose]

Sooo sorry the closing of City is a fixed point in time. 😒

[Rejolt]

How hard is ai pathing?

1. Escort out missions. They were grrrrrreat. Hey, why is this guy playing ring around the elevator?
2. Pushy NPcs. Who didn't love being shoved away from a vendor or wedged into physics hell tightroping on the geometry?
3. Floating Redside kitty pride family barrel rollers. Seriously. Those guys didn't respect gravity or physical laws of the universe.

And that was when the game was actively developed.

We've been given the maps and friends that we can slowly do more stuff with. Our chefs are taking us from starving to ramen noodles. I'm not going to ask for better place settings as they try to make us steaks.
Edit: reserves right to kill post at later date. Stupid insomnia upping my snark quota.