Thread Tools Display Modes
01/18/21, 04:20 PM   #1
nk125x
Join Date: Feb 2020
Posts: 5
Help with identifying other players

Am trying to make an addon which puts an Icon above another player NOT in my group.

I know I will have to use SetFloatingMarkerInfo

but how do I identify the player (I know his @ name

Thanks in advance

N
  Reply With Quote
01/18/21, 04:29 PM   #2
Baertram
Super Moderator
 
Baertram's Avatar
WoWInterface Super Mod
AddOn Author - Click to view addons
Join Date: Mar 2014
Posts: 4,912
You cannot as you got no access to the other UNGROUPED players position, nor their nameplates, nor their model in the 3d world.
You can only change your own reticle as you look at them (have them below the reticle), or the UI frames showing the currently selected target.

Search in the API txt documentation files (https://wiki.esoui.com/APIVersion#100033 -> "API TXT Documentation") for GetUnit* functions, and use "reticleover" as unitTag. unitTag "player" is your own character.

https://wiki.esoui.com/UnitTag

Last edited by Baertram : 01/18/21 at 04:32 PM.
  Reply With Quote
01/18/21, 04:33 PM   #3
nk125x
Join Date: Feb 2020
Posts: 5
Originally Posted by Baertram View Post
You cannot as you got no access to the other UNGROUPED players position, nor their nameplates, nor their model in the 3d world.
You can only change your own reticle as you look at them (have them below the reticle), or the UI frames showing the currently selected target.
This is for a addon in PvP when we have a number of sub groups (as limit is now 12). So I want people to track the raid leader who might be in another group.

I know it is possible as another guild (in a different faction) uses an addon which does this functionality
  Reply With Quote
01/18/21, 04:40 PM   #4
nk125x
Join Date: Feb 2020
Posts: 5
Just reread what you said - So if I look at the "real raid leader" run a slash command that gets his unit tag and pin, Can I then use the function that puts an icon over his head?
  Reply With Quote
01/18/21, 04:40 PM   #5
Baertram
Super Moderator
 
Baertram's Avatar
WoWInterface Super Mod
AddOn Author - Click to view addons
Join Date: Mar 2014
Posts: 4,912
Well if you know it is possible then ask these guys as we all know it is not if you ARE NOT GROUPED

Edit:
No, again: If you are not in the same group you got no access to these other groups/non grouped overland/whatever other units!
You cannot see where they are, cannot access their nameplates in teh world, cannot access anything about them via addons or you'd be able to mark hidden players with a marker icon e.g which would be cheating!

Whatever your other guild told you it's either no addon or they found a way ZOs does not want it to work, believe me.
But if you find a solution that is legit and ZOs allows it, feel free to tell us all please!

Example:
The unitTag for grouped players in the same group are group1, group2, group3 up to group12.
But you cannot read data of other groups, just your own one.
So no, you cannot use that functions to set an icon as you got no access to these other grouped players, not at all!
You could only redirect the textures of your own 12 group members.

You cannot even share data to other groups via MapPings, like combat sharing addons do, as players that are not grouped with yourself cannot read the mapping data of other groups.
And you are not even able to circumvent this by sending the data via guild notes to other guild members as changing the guild notes too often in short period would get you kicked from the server. Even if it would be possible to share the data you would still NOT be able to get the needed unit information and position of other players in realtime, which is good that it is not possible, to prevent botting, cheating and addons like Miat'S PVP alerts that alerted you before someone even short t you (from sneak)...

There were the same questions in the past several times and so far there was and is no solution I'd know.
But ask the other guild, I'm pretty sure they also don't own such an addon. Or if, it's made of whatever code and maybe external tools that might be forbidden by ZOs TOS.

Last edited by Baertram : 01/18/21 at 04:49 PM.
  Reply With Quote
01/18/21, 04:59 PM   #6
nk125x
Join Date: Feb 2020
Posts: 5
The guy who built the other icon refuses to tell anyone else outside his guild as it gives his guild a definite advantage in Cyrodiil.
  Reply With Quote
01/18/21, 05:23 PM   #7
Baertram
Super Moderator
 
Baertram's Avatar
WoWInterface Super Mod
AddOn Author - Click to view addons
Join Date: Mar 2014
Posts: 4,912
Well, I doubt it is working then as he says or he is using other tools. From what I/we know here your request is not possible with the standard game API and tools.
If he found a way to make it possible and thinks he should use it for his (guilds) advantage alone -> "Speaks for the personal character" and is an example why some API functions get nerfed or even removed by ZOs...
Sad.
  Reply With Quote
01/19/21, 02:33 AM   #8
andy.s
AddOn Author - Click to view addons
Join Date: Jul 2014
Posts: 40
What is actually the maximum frequency of changing a guild note without being kicked? I guess there is no need to be super precise in Cyrodiil, since it slow and laggy anyway
  Reply With Quote
01/19/21, 02:56 AM   #9
Baertram
Super Moderator
 
Baertram's Avatar
WoWInterface Super Mod
AddOn Author - Click to view addons
Join Date: Mar 2014
Posts: 4,912
I havent tested this exactly sorry, as I never needed it. You'd need to test this yourself.
What I read form others was something around 1 note per 2 seconds (per user), but could be also higher/lower meanwhile.
Else the server will get bitchy and kick your for event spam.
My GMs also reported it happens they get kicked if they do it manually and shortly after another!
They used the keybinds and just added 1 char, saved and repeated it frequently.
So there might be even higher delays needed than 2 seconds.


If many users would use addons who change the guild notes "on-the-fly", I'm not sure whow it would react in the end.
Maybe we got the same nightmare lags like the guild history and group finders provided in the past due to "also" addon usage trying to collect server infos
  Reply With Quote
01/19/21, 05:35 AM   #10
nk125x
Join Date: Feb 2020
Posts: 5
I thought of one possible way, but not sure if it is viable.

Can you use the GetPlayerPosition then drop a marker on that position (As like HarvestMaps). When the player moves, delete the marker and mark the new position

Would this work?

Regarding the person in the other guild - He def has it working as we use an addon that he wrote and I checked the code where he tracks the group leader and he has an exception in the code if another addon is used (the addon which tracks a leader of many groups).
  Reply With Quote
01/19/21, 09:05 AM   #11
Baertram
Super Moderator
 
Baertram's Avatar
WoWInterface Super Mod
AddOn Author - Click to view addons
Join Date: Mar 2014
Posts: 4,912
You do not seem to understand the client and server problem here:
How should other players see this marker then? You cannot just add a marker somewhere and ALL will see it.
It's not server saved. Its locally shown on your client side, for yourself only!

Groups are the only possibility to transfer that information, if you are using the same addon. The addon will save the marker locally for you, then transfer the data to the group via the server. Either via a map ping (not intened to be used for that originally...) or by getting the group members position by API functions directly (only working within the same group as server info is requested and used) and adding the marker at the positon then. This way all group members using the addon would get a marker at client side. This needs to be repeated on each position change of a group member.
So basically this also is stressing the server and the client. Maybe taken into account by ZOs, this could happen, or not and slow down the server if 100000 users use such addons.

But again: The API won't provide that info if you are in 2 different groups. And even a map ping won't work if in 2 different groups.
So you need to have something "server saved" to transfer the data, where different users got access to (even if not grouped).
And so far I can only imagine this could be the guild note, and would only work for users in the same guild then.

My conclusion:
As long as we cannot see the code of that addon where it seems to work I still cannot imagine this works across 2 different groups WITHOUT using external helper tools, or a "bug". At least it is not intended by ZOs and maybe be against their TOS then.

Last edited by Baertram : 01/19/21 at 09:08 AM.
  Reply With Quote
01/23/21, 12:22 PM   #12
marlonbrando
AddOn Author - Click to view addons
Join Date: Dec 2015
Posts: 17
Originally Posted by nk125x View Post
The guy who built the other icon refuses to tell anyone else outside his guild as it gives his guild a definite advantage in Cyrodiil.
Can I ask which guild this is?

I've played around with using guild notes to store player position in an addon and putting a "eye" icon over another non-grouped player. I found that if I updated the guild note more frequently than once every ten seconds I got kicked. It did work though, although, obviously, unless the other player stayed still for 10 seconds it wasn't really precise.

I thought about adding this functionality to Piece of Candyl but given how laggy it is, I wasn't sure it was worth it. I also wasn't sure that ZOS wouldn't nerf or remove the functionality if guild notes were used for this purpose. Also, it seems like this mechanism could be abused by bad actors who join the guild just to see where people are.
  Reply With Quote
01/24/21, 08:47 AM   #13
Baertram
Super Moderator
 
Baertram's Avatar
WoWInterface Super Mod
AddOn Author - Click to view addons
Join Date: Mar 2014
Posts: 4,912
Originally Posted by marlonbrando View Post
Can I ask which guild this is?

I've played around with using guild notes to store player position in an addon and putting a "eye" icon over another non-grouped player. I found that if I updated the guild note more frequently than once every ten seconds I got kicked. It did work though, although, obviously, unless the other player stayed still for 10 seconds it wasn't really precise.

I thought about adding this functionality to Piece of Candyl but given how laggy it is, I wasn't sure it was worth it. I also wasn't sure that ZOS wouldn't nerf or remove the functionality if guild notes were used for this purpose. Also, it seems like this mechanism could be abused by bad actors who join the guild just to see where people are.
Thanks for the info about the 10 seconds, and definately this is the same worries me (and others) had. APIs go nerfed already in the past because of some ppl abusing the functionality to get advanntages. Addons are not designed to onyl provide a benefit to some but to all. Either this guy should release it to public and risk getting into problems with it, or they should stop using it and especially stop getting an advantage compared to others. They risk that Zos will disable all addons in PVP areas, which imo would be okay, but I doubt all will feel like I do about it.
  Reply With Quote
01/24/21, 12:02 PM   #14
marlonbrando
AddOn Author - Click to view addons
Join Date: Dec 2015
Posts: 17
Originally Posted by Baertram View Post
Thanks for the info about the 10 seconds, and definately this is the same worries me (and others) had. APIs go nerfed already in the past because of some ppl abusing the functionality to get advanntages. Addons are not designed to onyl provide a benefit to some but to all. Either this guy should release it to public and risk getting into problems with it, or they should stop using it and especially stop getting an advantage compared to others. They risk that Zos will disable all addons in PVP areas, which imo would be okay, but I doubt all will feel like I do about it.
Yow. I would not like that. I use my other addons and a few others in PVP and would hate to have to forgo them. I'm sure there would be a huge outcry if they did that.

If ZoS wanted to nerf something they could just nerf the apis that could be abused like anything that accepts a string to update a guild function. They could also disallow map pings in PVP. That would cripple addons like Piece of Candy, RdK Group Tool, and Bandits User Interface ( think) but if it reduces lag in PVP then maybe it would be worth it.

Last edited by marlonbrando : 01/24/21 at 12:12 PM.
  Reply With Quote
01/24/21, 12:30 PM   #15
Baertram
Super Moderator
 
Baertram's Avatar
WoWInterface Super Mod
AddOn Author - Click to view addons
Join Date: Mar 2014
Posts: 4,912
Originally Posted by marlonbrando View Post
If ZoS wanted to nerf something they could just nerf the apis that could be abused like anything that accepts a string to update a guild function. They could also disallow map pings in PVP. That would cripple addons like Piece of Candy, RdK Group Tool, and Bandits User Interface ( think) but if it reduces lag in PVP then maybe it would be worth it.
I have the same lag in PVP areas with and without addons. Only the loading screens get longer if I enabled more addons.
I doubt the lag is created by addons. It could be if the mappings are coming in too often. But I have the same fps and network lags without any addons enabled. Maybe "it's because of the mass" using such addons but I remembe the time before map pings were used and I got the same headache and lags
  Reply With Quote
01/24/21, 10:51 PM   #16
marlonbrando
AddOn Author - Click to view addons
Join Date: Dec 2015
Posts: 17
Originally Posted by Baertram View Post
I have the same lag in PVP areas with and without addons. Only the loading screens get longer if I enabled more addons.
I doubt the lag is created by addons. It could be if the mappings are coming in too often. But I have the same fps and network lags without any addons enabled. Maybe "it's because of the mass" using such addons but I remember the time before map pings were used and I got the same headache and lags
I'm not suggesting that any-old-addon would cause lag or even that map pings cause all of the lag. I do think it's a possible contributory factor to lag when engaging with ball groups which rely on map ping communication. Some tools seems like they are pinging a couple times a second.

Addons which use map pings have been part of the game for quite some time. I just checked my git logs for my addon and see that the first checkin was about three years ago. I'd been using similar addons at least six months before that time.

But, regardless, if ZoS still wanted to experiment with things that could reduce lag then I think that's one thing they could try. I wouldn't be happy because it would break my addon but I would be happy if it caused ball groups to become less steam-rollery.

ZoS could also throw us a bone and provide us with a sanctioned (even if restricted) way to communicate a limited amount of information between group members but, given how much they have on their plate, I'm sure that would be something they'd never do, even if they thought it was an ok idea.
  Reply With Quote

ESOUI » Developer Discussions » Tutorials & Other Helpful Info » Help with identifying other players

Thread Tools
Display Modes

Posting Rules
You may not post new threads
You may not post replies
You may not post attachments
You may not edit your posts

vB code is On
Smilies are On
[IMG] code is On
HTML code is Off