Can spider mounts climb walls?

aescleal · February 2013

Can spider mounts climb walls? Has this been asked/answered at all? Because spiders as mounts, to me, implies they can scale walls. In the Neverwinter novels by R.A. Salvatore, underdark lizard mounts can climb walls. I would expect a giant spider to be able to do the same. But I haven't heard anything about this.

Thanks for any info,
Aes

keirkin · February 2013

aescleal wrote: »

Can spider mounts climb walls? Has this been asked/answered at all? Because spiders as mounts, to me, implies they can scale walls. In the Neverwinter novels by R.A. Salvatore, underdark lizard mounts can climb walls. I would expect a giant spider to be able to do the same. But I haven't heard anything about this.

Thanks for any info,
Aes

No............

aescleal · February 2013

Okay, so no they can't, or no it hasn't been asked? Either way, "No..." isn't a helpful answer... but thanks.
So how about I rephrase. Does anybody have any Cryptic/PW footage or commentary or valuable insider information they can share about if spiders as mounts can climb walls?

silvergryph · February 2013

Due to limitations in the game engine this is not likely. If, however, they have found a way around those limitations I had better be seeing an update to Champions Online pretty darn pronto. :cool:

chili1179 · February 2013

As much as I would love to think that owning a spider mount means having the ability to climb walls, in a MMO setting with the mount being easily obtainable and the clear advantage this would present, I have to say no, it's not going to be a thing. If it were a thing, there would be 0 reason to own any other type of mount.

angrysprite · February 2013

I would think "no, they cannot climb walls or over things where an unmounted avatar cannot go" - for technical reasons alone.

You don't clarify if you've participated in NW Beta at all, but if you have then you already are familiar with how the world works - which is similar to Cryptic's other MMOs Champions Online and Star Trek Online, which are linear play style and not really "sandbox" style.

That is to say that quest progression (once you actually start a "mission) is generally guided along a specific path, where you must accomplish specific steps before moving forward. For example: you must speak to NPC "A" before you can open Door B and only after opening Door B will bad guy horde "C" appear to ambush you.

Allowing mounts to crawl on walls willy-nilly could 1) break immersion when you run into the "stage wall" and 2) allow you to move past a required point in the quest. For example, having used the STO Foundry, one "trigger" is a point on the map you must reach before the next aspect or goal is turned on. So, if you must trigger the "reached" point on a map to have a NPC contact appear, crawling up a wall migh allow you to miss this invisible trigger altogether, the NPC never appears - the quest becomes broken - you can't complete it and you don't know why.

I hope this helps explain WHY the spider (or other mounts) won't be able to crawl up walls, etc.

I don't KNOW this stuff, I am hypothosizing based on my knowledge of how the basic system works through using the Foundry (in STO) to create missions; a.k.a. "Quests".

aescleal · February 2013

Aah, thanks! I haven't played any other Cryptic game, so I'm very unsure what the engine can handle or how physics work ingame. But that is a fair comparison. I'm a tad disappointed (else why would they choose to develop spider as a mount other than being a drow worshiping Llolth. Still, it's faster travel. But if I have the choice, I'd pick a horse over a spider if it's just for speedy travel times.
Spiders by nature, are climbers after all.

angrysprite · February 2013

Good point.

However: based on game engine mechanics, it is possible Cryptic will find a way to allow the spider to climb walls, etc - but they'll have to build-in "safeties" to handle the scenarios I've exampled. Which, I wouldn;t be surprised that they do eventually. STO was pretty basic when it started out, now it's a completely different monster and literally a completely different game, and very nicely matured. So I would say if you like it now (at launch) stay with it. The beauty of MMOs is how they morph into finely-polished mature entertainment extravaganzas eventually.

belzub · February 2013

I would throw money at the screen for such a mount. The big question is why didnt I think of that.

daytonamax · February 2013

I wouldn't expect an Armored spider with someone on it's back in armor w/ gear, to be able to climb walls.
Normal small spiders can climb well because of small size/light weight. Larger spider don't climb as well because they are heavier. Ther are some species of large spider that can't climb another but the roughest surfaces.

I could only really think of comparing mountable spiders to be more like horses.
They would have been selected from the begining for the ability, strength, stamina, temperment and then specially bread to be riden. This would forgo their ability to climb.

Then there is gravity, leverage and shearing force to to consider when a spider mount goes vertical.
Along with a very specialized saddle/harness that would have to be worn by the rider, that would forgo a quick dismounting as your unstrapping yourself.

daytonamax · February 2013

silvergryph wrote: »

Due to limitations in the game engine this is not likely. If, however, they have found a way around those limitations I had better be seeing an update to Champions Online pretty darn pronto. :cool:

This^^
They haven't figured out "Super Climbing" for the Super Heroes yet, so...

xbattleheartx · February 2013

daytonamax wrote: »

I wouldn't expect an Armored spider with someone on it's back in armor w/ gear, to be able to climb walls.
Normal small spiders can climb well because of small size/light weight. Larger spider don't climb as well because they are heavier. Ther are some species of large spider that can't climb another but the roughest surfaces.

I could only really think of comparing mountable spiders to be more like horses.
They would have been selected from the begining for the ability, strength, stamina, temperment and then specially bread to be riden. This would forgo their ability to climb.

Then there is gravity, leverage and shearing force to to consider when a spider mount goes vertical.
Along with a very specialized saddle/harness that would have to be worn by the rider, that would forgo a quick dismounting as your unstrapping yourself.

What she said ^^. Some spiders simply are not meant to climb walls. Especially really big ones that must weigh several hundreds of pounds...

aescleal · February 2013

I haven't experienced the beta yet. I'm very excited to see how it feels in game though. You know it's so true about how MMO's evolve as they mature. Hopefully for the better. And yes, if NWO lives up to even part of my expectations, I presume I'll be playing it for years to come... heck, it's a F2P game, so why not, right?
Anyways, mounts are a really great feature, and what it says to me is that zones are going to be huge. I can't find the thread, so maybe it was in a video, but I thought it was suggested by a Dev that zones in NWO were going to be gigantic. So mounts become very useful.

aescleal · February 2013

Wait now, if we're talking imaginary things (outside of the technical development realm of what can be coded or not), then we have to accept that this is a game, a fantasy game, where we have magical trinkets for all sorts of things. How do the drow lizards scale walls? Wouldn't they also be hundreds of pounds with riders in armor and special harnesses? Forgotten Realms is a game world filled with things that are beyond reality, including but not limited to hordes of creatures from other planes and realms. Imagining a giant spider can climb a rocky cave wall isn't so unimaginable. Is it?
Rogues can teleport...

starkaos · February 2013

Considering that it is a fantasy world, then large spiders can climb walls. However, carrying a person, their companion, all the gold, and all the equipment makes the spider too heavy to climb anything. If you have a really short and skinny halfling that has absolutely no gear, gold, or companion, then it might be possible to have the spider climb walls while being mounted by the halfling.

skinneykrn · February 2013

It would be pretty overpowered for players who have the spider mount and can climb walls. Kind of silly if you ask me.
Just imagine, hundreds of players mass climbing walls with their spiders... *shivers*

aescleal · February 2013

Ya, for sure hundreds of players riding spider mounts climbing all over the place, that would spoil it for me nearly as much as the sky filled with players on winged mounts. But still, there will be hundreds, if not thousands, of rogues teleporting, or shadow walking, all over battlefields everywhere, presumably carrying a backpack full of multiple sets of armors and weapons of all types, and all the while carrying all of their wealth in gold, silver, copper, and a multitude of gems and jewelry. Looking at climbing mounts with blinders on, it's not cool, what with all the players that would want them, but comparing it to a plethora of other things we can expect, given experience from any number of other MMO's on the market, I'd think it's just as plausible as anything else, wouldn't you?

Can spider mounts climb walls?

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