XMLSpawner mobs are Multiplying when Released

[The Real Keith]

So we've launched our shard and everyone and the flood gates opened. People started rushing their favorite taming spots and we've been keeping an eye on everything. I've noticed that if I have a spawner that has a limited number of creatures on it (ie, 1 single sheep) and that creature is tamed and released in the same area, the spawner will spawn a second one.

At first, we thought no big deal, it'll sort it self out. That's not the case. I had a guy tame and release like 15 dragons on dragon isle, shit was getting out of hand lol.

Is there a way to prevent this from happening within the XMLSpawner default properties, to maybe count a creature type within it's home range as a "spawn" or will this require some additional coding?

Thanks in advance.

 

[tass23]

This would be a pretty complicated thing to do actually, because once the mob has been tamed, it is removed from the Xmlspawner. That is why another mob spawns. Some simple things you can do:
1. Increase the Min/Max Delay in the Xmlspawner Props so it takes longer for mobs to spawn.
2. Prevent mobs being spawned from the Xmlspawner from being tamed (hiryu/tamable/false for example).
3. You could set an Xmlspawner with a Speech trigger, so that when they released their tamed mob, they get guard whacked, the mob I mean, as long as you're in a town zone that is.
4. You could have an Xmlspawner running in the problem areas that "kills" mobs with no owners (GETONNEARBY,5,Owner=Null).

Probably the easist thing to do would be to tell players to kill tames they release.

 

[Abigor]

Tass hits the nail on the head. All four of those options, while not perfect, would help resolve the over spawn problem. If you're worried about people farming sheep for their wool, the tamable/false is the easiest to implement. We set this up initially on our shard because folks were taming 50+ sheep and dropping them off on islands for the cheap wool respawns. For the dragon spawns, if it's becoming a real serious issue and you don't want it to run its course naturally, it'll probably be less heartache for you and your coders to just just have staff check up on those hot spots and delete excess spawn.

For what it's worth, I would leave the dragons be and let the players sort it out. I know your shard is pretty new so folks might not have skills to handle the 15+ dragons yet, but give it time. They'll get there eventually. You could even turn it into a mini event if you're so inclined. Everyone loves some monster hunting quests.

 

[The Real Keith]

Thanks for the replies guys. I had assumed that the Spawns had an option to check the area for the same type of mob. It doesn't happen often, but when it does, it's insane.

I think we'll take the approach to make tamed and released creatures despawn after a period of time to prevent them from flooding over the natural spawn.

 

[tass23]

One other suggestion I forgot to mention was setting up a slightly more advanced spawn than just say 10 sheep.

On one Xmlspawner you can handle more than one type of spawn (sheep, goats, bulls, dogs, Stygian Dragon, etc). If you were so inclined, you could spawn up to 5 sheep with the first line entry, the second line entry could be a sheep, but you could increase it's stats right on the spawner. You would have to set it up as a sequential spawner and put each line entry in its own group. (see attached screenshot)

The Xmlspawner I set up will spawn 5 sheep. When those are killed, tamed, etc (removed from the spawner any way possible) a rabid sheep spawns with 400 hit points and a light-blue hue. While the rabid sheep is still spawned, more regular sheep will start respawning as well. Besides just increasing the rabid sheep's HP, you could alter it's attacks, giving it something a bit more devastating than...well whatever half-hearted attempt sheep attack with (you could give them Dark Father attacks if you wish even).