You still haven't answered my question about Trackers being able to Unite into my manse while I'm not there by "retrieving" one of the monolith sigils.

Edit: Not just a monolith sigil. An eye sigil too. Or any other item I leave there, since I'm too poor to buy a safe.

Haven't tested that yet, but if it does work they'd have to know the specific number of it, I think. Which brings up another good question ... do they get a list of possibilities within the local area that fit the profile for what they wanted? When next I'm ingame and catch one of the Serenguard hunters, I'll have more questions for them ... unless someone else wants to test meanwhile and find out for us?

There's a scary thought.

Hmm, bit lazy at the moment and only read the first few posts but I would prefer to see a new item to stop trackers rather than a monolith or eye sigil. Those two just wouldn't make much sense to me if they were to stop a hound from sniffing things out, perhaps a new item that emits a strong smell. I have no idea what to name something like that though

Aye I was looking around those stones in Serenwilde the otherday, wondering if my dog counted for explorers.

Soll thats not how it worked last time i tried (though I kinda lost my dog again since last night).

Whats this so we going to put a restriction to moonbeam too?

I'm asking for beam to not work across manses.

Then shouldnt be able to unite across manses What else?

Just to allay Rauros' fear, it's highly unlikely that anyone could enter your manse by seeking an item there, UNLESS you have something incredibly uncommon lying around like say.... a trophy, or um... a sketch sheet.

When you use the dog to look for things, the dog will find the first one in the game's item list, presumably the one with the lowest number. You CANNOT specify a number for the dog to seek. EG:

4122h, 3654m, 3420e, 10p, 19509en, 17170w ex-09:38:55.718>> ih

"painting46617" a painting of within a dance of light in the translucent forest
"zash-if20991" Zash-if Niqtezah, the Argent Gryphon


4122h, 3654m, 3420e, 10p, 19508en, 17170w e-09:39:05.343>>

looking for 'painting':

You cannot command your companion to seek out something that is in a stockroom.

4122h, 3654m, 3420e, 10p, 19508en, 17170w e-09:39:15.343>>

looking for 'painting46617':

You sense through your bond that your companion cannot find what you are
searching for.
4122h, 3654m, 3420e, 10p, 19510en, 17170w e-09:39:16.375>>

You have recovered balance on all limbs.
forge

looking for '46617':

4122h, 3654m, 3420e, 10p, 19510en, 17170w ex-09:39:19.468>>
You sense through your bond that your companion cannot find what you are
searching for.

--------------------------------------

And as for the timer:

4122h, 3654m, 3420e, 10p, 19508en, 17170w e-09:37:06.265>>

You focus hard on your bond, willing yourself to strengthen the connection
between you and your companion.

You feel your bond with a golden retriever strengthen until you cannot bear to
be apart, and a rush of air surrounds you before you find yourself united.
(room)
4122h, 3654m, 3420e, 10p, 19509en, 17170w ex-09:37:15.734>>


About 9.5 seconds, looks like.

That was done in the Aetherways, by the way. I ended up in someone else's manse through seeking out a particular item. Earlier, I recalled the dog to me from my manse into Lazul's.

--------------------------------------

And a bit of clarification by the way: You can look for a player continent-wide, but objects and mobs are restricted to seeking in the local area. Unite is local area only in all cases, through a monolith and everying.

--------------------------------------

Another little thing I'd like to bring up about unite is that so far, I haven't found anything that will stop me from uniting, either through my own control or someone else's (Alger might know better if something like paralysis stops uniting?). Even moving to the next room didn't stop me, and I don't think the STOP command worked either last time I tried. But erm, slightly off the point of the thread.

I agree that there should be some kind of defense against this. I'm a tracker myself, and I'm just as worried about the possibilities that hunting companions open up as everyone else, especially guildhall security.

In uh, summary I guess: I'm all for some sort of defensive sigil or item that stops seeking into a particular room.

That's odd. Diamante's wolf found my staff... maybe it was the first in the database then, or something... still odd.

I know one way to stop unite, but paralysis doesnt do it.

Recall the pet before you're finished uniting, I'd guess. But maybe you can't when you're uniting.

Im gonna start dropping flamed eye and monolith sigils in other people's manses with lower numbers than mine, now.

Can't unite when recalling, not sure about recalling when you try to unite.

That does seem insanely powerful. Are they any penalties to losing your hound? I know I take about 1/3 of my life in damage if someone kills my familiar, or I simply die if it's deepbonded.

And I don't see how this is similar to Moonbeam. You can't beam to items or denizens, which is what most of the problem is.

There are no penalties from what I've seen. On the other hand, we're not THAT deeply connected with them that we would suffer so much at their dying. They're a hunting companion, so you do share a bond, like a good friend and stuff, but in my eyes, it's not like bonding your spirits together, or whatever you do in Ecology.

I will add, though, that I was surprised there was no cost to get a dog from the kennels. If there were to be a cost associated with losing your hunting companion, I would say something like this:

Cost 5,000 gold to get one
If it dies, you can't get another one for a day or two, a sort of "mourning" period for losing your good friend (anything more than 2 days is a bit harsh, really)....



Generic Kennel.
You see exits leading out.

4122h, 3500m, 3420e, 10p, 19505en, 17170w e-10:57:26.890>>

You cannot bring yourself to accept another companion so soon after the death of your last.

As horrible thoughts fill your mind, you begin to sob uncontrollably.

Nice touch.

Any good hunter knows if you want to blend in with the surrounding scents, you use the musk of a wild animal! Give Alchemy a new skill Musk, requires 5 dead (insert natural animal here) + some random herbs... Defense against hounds/wolves/whatever else there is sniffing you out, may be stripped with a cleanse enchantment.

Ooo, sounds good, as does the cost to get your hound. I can't believe it's absolutely free. Our familiars aren't half as good (before transmigration, at least), but make us hunt down a creature to rebirth and costs 8 power.

Candles! Pretty please..

EDIT: Otters are good for getting musk..does Lusty have otters? hmm

No, the dog just goes to the spot of the first one it finds.





I like the thought, and was thinking about something like the scented bauble they have in Achaea/wherever, for distracting falcons. However, the problem I see with something like that is that it'd just become too common place. Wild animals aren't all that hard to kill, and soon everyone will have some musk, rendering Tracking useless for, well.. tracking.



So why would it be up to alchemists to make musk, eh? I would suggest that it be a skill in Tracking, since that's where the expertise in such things is supposed to lie. But if that happened, no tracker would openly sell the stuff, otherwise they're potentially shooting themselves in the foot, so it's a tricky one to place.


EDIT: On a related note to the musk thing, I notice this in one of our tracking AB files:


Hunting has a bunch of skills revolving around animal capture and such, seems odd that skunk stink is mentioned but there isn't a way to catch a skunk and/or capture the stink for use later on. Because it's sort of hard to get people to walk through stink traps just because you want them to.

I think its time all trackers go rogue! Come, well make a mercenary clan... We'll charge only 1M gold for 5 years of loyal service, or highest bidder.