travelling and shadowspawn?

[asher]

Is it an oversight or intentional feature that shadowspawn don't die when going through gateways? This idea occurred to me with the recent pk log and a question about them being able to use weapons made of the one power. Figured it was worth asking.

[Dezadryk]

Probably an oversight about shadowspawn using items formed with the one power.

I'm of the mind that no one but the channeler should be able to use the items formed with the one power.

As to shadowspawn walking through gateways, I figure if trollocs can be prodded through water out of fear, then a gateway should be no different. Unless i'm missing something from the books.

[asher]

Shadowspawn die from gateways in the books, no marks or any indication of a reason. They just die.

[Dezadryk]

Ouch, that's harsh. All shadowspawn? Or just trollocs, fades, etc?

[Ganelon]

Asher is right.

As for reason - I'm guessing that it's all shadowspawn as Aginor used the One Power in their creation originally. I'm again guessing that perhaps crossing a gateway 'unravels' what binds them together for some reason.

With RJ dead though, it's all hypothetical.

[Dezadryk]

Hmm, in that case, I suppose it would be by the books to make it so shadowspawn couldn't go through it.

In game, it would most likely affect the following: trolloc players/npcs could only use the ways to get south and shadow stallions would also not be allowed through

[Ganelon]

In game, it would most likely affect the following: trolloc players/npcs could only use the ways to get south and shadow stallions would also not be allowed through

Yeah, that's how I'd want to keep it any case, even if there was lore to the contrary. The main reason is PK considerations. I don't want bunches of trollocs, gray men, etc zapping across the map. The idea is to make sure raiding is difficult - getting there, doing the job, getting back. Otherwise the CP issue for anything they do gets devalued.

Same reason that fades should only be able to fade themselves and their mount.

If Travel becomes a crutch for all of DS movement, then there's no real point to zones like the Ways - something RJ obviously already recognized, and why using the Ways to send hoards south was what he used as a plot device. Otherwise he could have just had the Forsaken gate them down in droves.

A reverse argument to the one just above could be made for Wetlanders gating others to raid Blight in terms of game balance, but for me at least, that rings a little hollow. They have lower hit points, usually lower damage weapons, everything aggro's them, not just select mobs, blight moves on a human are killer, etc. Trollocs in the south have it a lot easier.

And of course, in book lore, they DO gate whole armies around at the drop of a hat.

We're going to be adding some changes to the Ways (Machin Shin, etc), so as Immortals, we'd like to see them used.

I can't recall if it was in this thread or not, but gates like the Cairhien one were mentioned as being undesirable as they exit directly in the city.

This can't be helped. It's in the books, and I'd be loathe to change it. I would like to see more exit points to the Ways, but the original creator (Merc) is long-gone, and Niila and I have a ton of other priorities over more exits unfortunately.

[Dezadryk]

I would only ask that there be something put in place to prevent trollocs from entering a gate then, or at the very least, a warning when they try to...just in case anyone tried to follow a dreadlord through

[Ganelon]

I'd agree. I'd like to see it too.

But comes down to the old standard: coding time priority.

If it can be done quickly, Niila might be able to fit it in, but I'm unaware of the amount of possible complications inherent in doing so, as I don't code.

[Niila]

I'm a bit two-minded about this topic as a whole. Lorewise, trollocs/fades/draghkar/darkhounds die when they go through a gateway. This much is true. Yet at the same time, this creates a certain mechanic whereupon gateways are free-escapes for those of not-shadowspawn race. Meaning you could always go safely behind a gateway to get away from any harm from shadowspawn, instead of them being able to pursue you through it.

At a same note, Shadowspawn going through portal stones would suffer the same fate, considering it's a form of Travel by itself (that's why they didn't bring Shadowspawn from other worlds into the 'main' world). If we forbid them from entering Gateways, then we'll have forbid them from using portal stones too. Which in turn makes the only way they can get anywhere at the moment to be the Ways. This I have no problems with, but I can see it having gameplay ramifications especially to those that like to pull their shadowspawn out of Tunnels.


Is this 'issue' fixable? Yes. It is. It'll take a while to write code to check for the shadowspawn to not enter through gateways and change the currently existing triggers of portal stones to not port shadowspawn to one way or the other. I won't give a timeframe for this, since like Ganelon said, it's probably not high in the priority list for now. The triggers will probably be fixed first before the code will.

As a sidenote, this will have no effect on Graymen/Dreadlords/Whatever-else-is-human-but-serves-dark. They're not abominations made with One Power and thusly not subject to the restrictions of unraveling.

Will note this down as 'fix when there's free time'. Thanks for both reporting and discussing the matter.