"Dismiss" Helpfile

[Athon]

Hello,

Saw that another player had some issues with the "dismiss" command. They dismissed their pet when they were trying to get it to stop following them. Upon reading the helpfile, it does not make it clear that dismissing a pet/cart will release it from your command permanently. I propose that it be modified to help clarify this.

Maybe also suggest that "order <pet> follow self" or "order <pet> sit" be added to help with a situation like this in the future.

Thanks!

[Raona]

That's a fine suggestion, Athon, which I've tried to implement. Thank you!

However, it looks like you can't order a pet to follow itself (it still follows you), and you can't readily CLAIM a pet after dismissing it. Does anyone have experience to the contrary on either of these points? (Who's not a druid, on the latter?)

I thought CLAIM might be a way to un-do a mistaken DISMISS, but it looks like it requires the animal empathy skill. Perhaps creatures coded as pets should be CLAIMable without animal empathy? I know I've mistakenly gone through this route (trying to give away a steed to a young PC rather than just dismiss it, only to find they could not claim it), so if we don't change the code, I should also clarify the CLAIM helpfile to make it clear that you need the animal empathy skill (and perhaps also that only druids can get it, I think?).

[Brar]

Rangers have it too... (well Brar have it, not sure about new rangers)

[Gwain]

The easiest non-coded way is that if you wanted to give away a pet, you sell it and it is bought by the second party. The problem with this is abuse, people should not resell unique or rare pets without imm consent. I would love having the ability to dismiss and claim pets at a whim though.

[Keltorn]

I know I've mistakenly gone through this route (trying to give away a steed to a young PC rather than just dismiss it, only to find they could not claim it), so if we don't change the code, I should also clarify the CLAIM helpfile to make it clear that you need the animal empathy skill (and perhaps also that only druids can get it, I think?).

Unless something's changed, rangers get it, too. Unfortunately, my experience is that it won't work when you really need it to. I had a pet that got forcefully seperated from me once, and the claim command simply failed outright. It actually does that pretty often. I'm thinking the list of animals that can be claimed is a lot smaller than the list of those that cannot.

It'd be really nice if the claim skill worked on a pet that you yourself just recently dismissed. Having it work on pets dismissed by others would be nice, too, but then you might see a lot of pets being given as gifts, which could be good and bad. The example Raona gave of gifting a horse is perfect (as long as the youngling didn't look it in the mouth ), but I think we'd have a problem if people started giving away dire tigers and the like. You know. Animals they shouldn't have.

Also, just in case this isn't widely known, there seems to be two different kinds of pets. One kind can be told to stay put by just having them sit down, leaving the room without them following, or shoving them into another room. The other kind tends to be very clingy and will actually track you down and follow you. The best way I've found to ditch one of those is by having them sleep somewhere, but I always got the feeling that their being coded to follow you incessantly was on purpose.

[Brar]

The 2 differents behavior for pets is area code, and decided when building by adding a flag.
It was used for familiars/companions pet and mounts at first. Not sure how it is used nowaday.

[Raona]

Thanks for the feedback, everyone! I went upstairs for some clarifications, and hit the mother-lode. Here's the skinny:

1) DISMISS is intended to be permanent. CLAIM is not intended as a way to counteract it. I'm revising the DISMISS helpfile to clarify this, and also mention the minion limit.

2) If you have a minion that stands after you tell them to sit, it's an area coding error. They are standing up, of their own volition, after you order them to sit. Please report it as a bug, to the Bug Reporting forum. But in the meantime, it's fine to resort to SLEEP to make them stay put; you are not going around any intention on the part of the coders or builders by doing so. (These should mostly be fixed, now, however. Some ranger pets are set to intentionally do this, others should not.)

3) There is no way to give away (control of) a pet to another PC - too much risk of abuse. You can order them to follow another PC, but it is not permanent, it remains your pet.

4) Carts and wagons and the like CAN be CLAIMED by anyone after their original owner DISMISSes them.