"Skill Lock" exploit

To my knowledge, at least, if something is considering an exploit, it shouldn't be included in the wiki. The nature of this makes is very apparent it's a bug DevCat never fixed.

By this logic, it should be removed, right?

More like AI resets since it's probably just the first skill they would "naturally" load at first sight...I dunno how all this goes.

Whatever it is, I doubt it's intentional that enemies would randomly freeze themselves.

The bug is the fact that unlike every other time a monster uses the defense skill, it never cancels it. Something along the lines of it thinks it should be "running and attacking the enemy", but defense prevents the attack from ever actually happening, so it simply walks into the enemy until something happens.

Based on that logic, it's basically the same as an inexperienced player click spamming on a target and forgetting to cancel or not realizing they're using defense, which would make it, if anything, an exploit rather than a bug. Though i'm not sure it should even be considered an exploit, since lots of monsters have flaws built in to their AIs(like extended wait times before executing skills), which are obviously intentional.

An exploit is just a bug that people use to their own gain. Here's some evidence that shows this is not intentional:

1. Unlike players, if a monster gets stuck in this, they actually move toward the player. If a player has defense loaded and attempts to attack an enemy, they stand still.
2. Unlike every single other time a monster loads a skill, it never gets cancelled.
3. If the monster reaches the target, it will start to 'jitter' near the player.
4. The only time this happens is in a very small window within every monster's AI.
5. The skill that it can get stuck in is not a specific skill, but any skill.
6. Various monsters have various AI that make them seem more 'life-like'. This bug does the opposite of appear life-like.

It's actually because of the last reason that I sometimes question whether mill finish is intentional. It just doesn't look right when 20 spiders are all staring at you in a clump. But that's a whole other topic!

I should also mention: all bugs can be explained using logic. Some are harder to explain, but they all happen for a reason. That does not disqualify them as bugs.

The term "exploit" can also refer to poorly planned parts of the system (Mechanics that work as intended but can be used in a way that was not expected) that are not bugs(Problems in the code or hardware). Regarding that evidence:

1. That's just how monster AIs work, Many of them often alternate between moving and trying to attack, even when the movement would be the same as what would happen automatically with the attack. (It's coded that way so that they can run diagonally if you run to the side, so they can aim where you're going to be instead of where you are, thereby (usually) getting to you sooner; and to facilitate bluffing(walking while Smash is loaded to make it look like Defense, standing still while Defense is loaded to make it look like WM or Counter, etc.))
2. Ok, that one could support the bug theory. I have several possible explanations for that, but at least one of them could arguably be a bug/exploit.
3. The "jitter" is just from the monster repeatedly walking when it's already at the destination. Basically, it's jogging in place, which looks pretty snazzy since the model is repeatedly displaying the beginning of the walk animation and returning to the standing pose(and the running/walking animations are designed for continuous movement, so they look weird starting, and/or stopping). This alleged "bug" is not the only time such "jitter" occurs, and players can produce a similar "jitter" by repeatedly clicking the ground directly below them, tho it's harder to do now than it used to be.(It seems players now have a minimum distance for movement. I don't know when it was added but it was not there when the game came out. I assume monsters/pets/npcs are not affected this restriction.)
4. That one does not support the theory that it's a bug. In fact, it could even support the theory that it's intentional.
5. That could be due to copy/pasting most of the AI instructions and details (which I assume they do to make the extra delays after loading skills consistent for everything the monster does)
6. That's pretty subjective. This makes the monster occasionally behave like a confused or unskilled button-mashing player. One could argue that, in a game with Mabi's graphics, monsters don't get much more life-like than a monster that simulates a player experiencing nerd rage after misunderstanding the controls.

TL/DR: 1, 3 & 4: irrelevant; 6: moot point; 2 & 5: valid, but not conclusive.

"Whole other topic": WM finish is a good example of an exploit that's probably not a bug.

Note: I'm not saying this I think it's completely intentional, but I don't really think it should be treated as a bug unless a Nexon representative actually said it's a bug, since it's been around for ever, so Nexon and Devcat definitely know about it, and, some details of it have been changed at least once in the past, so I'm pretty sure they could have fixed it if they wanted too. IIRC, it only works on certain monsters, and works less or not at all on stronger monsters in the same category, and the frequency/usability of this phenomenon changes just about every time there's an update to the AIs(which also makes it seem possible that it's intentional).

Also, even though I'm not sure this is a bug, I'm not sure this should be kept in the page either. If there was a vote on weather or not to remove it, i'd probably be neutral.

Time for a new list!

1. A bug by definition is a feature that does not work as intended. A bug can be an exploit, while a trick can be a feature. This doesn't mean it can't be ignored, though.
2. If we want to talk about bugs that have been around forever, how about the dungeon party chat bug with CC'ing? I can't buy that horribly unintuitive exploit is intentional.
3. Simulating "nerd rage" until the next maintenance (aka days to weeks straight) does not equate to life-like. Just no!
4. The fact that the frequency/usability of it keeps changing indicates that they either
   1. Are changing other things that just happen to affect this bug or
   2. Can't figure out how to fix it
5. Given the... traits of pet AI, I'm inclined to believe they haven't been able to fix it without causing other issues. And because it's "rare", it's very low priority for them.
6. A vote would be fine. Even though I'm quite sure it's a bug, I don't actually care if it's kept on the page. I just brought it up for the people who do care to decide!