General Overview

[N1kolai]

Ahoy.

After being a lurker on forums such as this for over a year I've noticed that there are very few attempts at explaining all the various elements which go into making a functioning emulator server. Sure, there are guides and walkthroughs, but they don't really explain what all the various parts are doing. If anyone would be willing to clarify a few things for me that'd be great.

From what I can tell, you've basically got the core, the database, the extracted game files (maps, vmaps and DBC files), the game client itself and then scripts.

I understand the database stores things like accounts, creature spawns, creature templates, quest data, items etc., but don't know much beyond that. For example, where are the spells defined; I don't see a table for spells, so are these inside the game client? Or the core? Same goes for creature and item models; I see displayids but don't know what these refer to or how to find out.

I'm not sure how much of what occurs in game is dependant on the core versus how much is dependant on the client.

I also don't know where the AI behaviour comes from. On all the servers I've set up, the AI is basically reduced to melee combat, I don't think I've ever seen them use spells or ranged attacks. Bosses don't do much either. Is this where scripts come in?

I'm also curious about where the databases actually come from? Are they created completely from scratch? If so, that's a heck of a lot of work to try to replicate Blizzard's.

I would like to be able to improve the database myself, but without really understanding how it's structured or where particular values refer to, it's very difficult.

I work with code and databases in my job, and I'm keen to help contribute, I just need a bit of clarification.

Thanks in advance.

[MentaL]