Why does Tractor still zone us?

[Romanova]

Hmm, figured as much.
Anyway putting it simply.
Draw-in: Point A (Player/Starting Point) > Point B (Enemy/Destination)
Tractor: Point A (Player/Starting Point) > Random point, depending upon distance of Point A to B (once a certain distance is exceed, the point is no longer random) along the line to Point B (Destination) > Point B (Caster)

I don't think it'd be that hard to put a range cap on tractor then just make it work exactly like draw-in (make it go straight to the blm instead of near him). And ya as others said draw-in can move dead bodies.

[Krisan]

Hmm, figured as much.
Anyway putting it simply.
Draw-in: Point A (Player/Starting Point) > Point B (Enemy/Destination)
Tractor: Point A (Player/Starting Point) > Random point, depending upon distance of Point A to B (once a certain distance is exceed, the point is no longer random) along the line to Point B (Destination) > Point B (Caster)
Conflux: Point A (First Conflux/Starting point) > Point B (Other Conflux/Destination)

I'm not saying that I disagree that it should most certainly be possible. I am merely pointing out the difference as things currently stand. Draw in moves your character to the position of the enemy using the ability, Tractor does not move your character to the position of the person casting the spell (unless they are within a certain range), it only moves you toward that character. Thus, tractor involves an additional step that may require re-loading your character upon that ever-changing point (the point you are moved to during draw-in does not move, the thing it is centered upon does, it's a bit different).

I'm not sure I understand entirely what you're saying, I'm afraid. I think I get your reasoning to it to a degree, but still a smidgen confused. The enemy that draws you in can move, yeah, and the point of being drawn in is centered upon the enemy, that's essentially correct. But the enemy can be anywhere in a zone and draw you to its exact location. The way this works is the server checks for the enemy XYZ Pos, copies it, then immediately sends it to the client which then pastes the copied value over the player's XYZ Pos. The player then "teleports" across the map to where-ever the mob is. (This is why when you get drawn in you are seemingly standing underneath\inside the enemy, because you are sharing the exact same coordinates on the map.)

This is actually not all that different from how Tractor already works, they just added an extra step to it whereas you zone before the casters XYZ Pos is pasted over your own. Why you zone is actually not clear to me at all, since as mentioned earlier - movement is completely client-side based, the server only keeps track of where you are, it doesn't control your positioning, so there's nothing special the server would need to do (such as zoning you) to accomplish an effect like Tractor. I suspect this was a spell that was made very early in development of the game, and it was just poorly implemented\designed\coded by someone on the team that never could imagine how the zoning effect could inconvenience us down the line. In fact in retrospect.. I bet they chose this not out of necessity at all, but for the sake of aesthetics.. They probably thought it might look odd if you just suddenly "popped" next to the caster after hitting confirm, as opposed to the zoning effect which kind of adds its own unique illusion to the effect.. That's ultimately pretty silly, but I'd not doubt it for a minute.

Anyway..
I am not arguing that the concept of tractor and draw-in are different, you're right in that sense. Because one can be drawn-in from across a map, and entire alliances can be drawn-in at once. But the mechanics behind the effect of draw-in are in principle exactly what you would need to achieve a zoneless Tractor. The actual distance from which Tractor can be used shouldn't be changed and I'm not arguing that point, not suggesting Tractor should be changed to a Draw-In effect either - only that the mechanics behind how Draw-In function should be applied to Tractor as opposed to using a needless zoning effect which is probably nothing more than aesthetic hogwash.

[hiko]

what sesh said, it have been coded this way, and with all their spagetti code it would be too much work to fix it withour breaking something else

[Krisan]

I don't think it'd be that hard to put a range cap on tractor then just make it work exactly like draw-in (make it go straight to the blm instead of near him). And ya as others said draw-in can move dead bodies.

Draw-In in a Nutshell: Check for Enemy XYZ Coordinates, Copy Enemy Coordinates, Paste the copied Coordinates over the Player's own coordinates.
Tractor in a Nutshell: Check for Caster's XYZ Coordinates, Copy Caster's Coordinates, Rezone Player and paste the copied Coordinates over the Player's own coordinates.

They're almost exactly the same as it is now, really. I only used Draw-In as an easy to understand example of why the zoning is not necessary. (And to yes, prove that a dead body can be moved. There's technically never a situation in the game where you can't be moved - even when under the effects of the spell Bind you could be moved across the map by something like Draw-In.)

what sesh said, it have been coded this way, and with all their spagetti code it would be too much work to fix it withour breaking something else

If you understand coding at all, you should know this wouldn't be difficult to implement at all. Making it the way it is now is more of a trial than making it work the way we'd prefer it to. (And the excuse of "spaghetti code" should not be justified.. If their own spell effects aren't outlined clearly in the source files of this game, god knows how they've kept it running this long.)

[Paksenarrion]

what sesh said, it have been coded this way, and with all their spagetti code it would be too much work to fix it withour breaking something else

I realize that there's a ton of spaghetti code in the game at the moment. If they could find a way to make us NOT lose stuff like visitant status, Campaign tags, or our earnings from Besieged when we get tractored, I wouldn't care so much.

One thing that could debatable be changed alongside a change in making Tractor zone you is that they could allow you to use Tractor in a BCNM settings. Now I know what you're thinking, "accept the wipe and move on." Why? If there's a chance of victory and you've wiped and someone with Raise and Tractor could help recover the group from a failure, why shouldn't we be able to do that? You're also probably thinking "That would make the BCNMs with multiple monsters faceroll." Again, so? You spent the seals, you should be able to get the prize, even if Generic Hume Male™ does something stupid.

That's my opinion at least. Take it for what it's worth.

[Atomic_Skull]

(And the excuse of "spaghetti code" should not be justified.. If their own spell effects aren't outlined clearly in the source files of this game, god knows how they've kept it running this long.)

SE is the same company that deleted the original source code and art assets for FF7 to make room for FF8 on their development workstations. It didn't cross their minds to archive all that stuff because it might be needed later. When Eidos made the PC version of FF7 they had to work from a beta version of the source that someone found on a hard drive that was laying around. The original uncompressed cinematics and textures were all gone and they had to use the PS1 versions.

So yeah, their coding practices have never been good.

[Alhanelem]

The ability to move a player without any special scripted events or what not has been around for a very long time.

Draw in isn't a spell or a normal ability or TP move.

[Yarly]

This doesn't even need to be even considered until 2013.

[GlobalVariable]

I'd wager the current programming staff wouldn't know how to edit code from that far back in the games history to change how tractor works.

p.s.
I had a GM move me without zoning me once. I was stuck on a rock and didn't want to lose my TP or have to run allll the way back while my party was fighting the NM. I've had to be unstuck exactly 3 other times and this was the only instant I wasn't zoned. I forget which GM that was but thank you, saved my party a lot of hassle trying since I was supposed to tank that bugger.

[Camate]

After checking with the development team in regards to this, they mentioned that they are not currently planning anything to make it so using tractor will not result in an area change. Since they feel the measures needed to address this are not realistic, they have no plans to make changes. We do understand that it is inconvenient that visitant status will be removed upon use and we apologize for this.