I honestly think the concept of "servers" is outdated and all future online games should move away.
They are a relic of a period of time where software were monolithic deployables running on single machines.
Times have moved on significantly since then.
I would love to see and EVE Online -esque realm. Everyone from around the world in 1 virtual world.
I would however be content with a single realm for each geographic region for ping.
I would not like to see a population base fractured within a single geographic region.
You get fun and surprising interactions when you have to deal with groups of people from nationalities you dont generally interact with.
Exactly how big of a world would you need to have to sustain a multi-million concurrent player population?
EVE gets away with this due to its game world beingnliterally nothing at all. A game set in a world like Verra cant do that.
Sure, a game could use instancing or psuedo-instancing in order to achieve it (as per ESO), but this leaves the world feeling kind of shit.
Just because a game mechanics or system was introduced due to technology limitations, it doesnt mean that mechanic or system isnt still good once those limitations have been overcome.
The example of this I give often is in regards to turn based strategy games. Originally, they were just called strategy games, as real time strategy simply wasnt technologically viable. When it became viable (around the late 1990's), there were very few major turn based games for about a decade. All the developers were working on real time strategy games.
Then people realized that real time strategy doesnt actually give the same gameplay as turn based strategy - both actually have a place simultaneously. All of a sudden, developers started making turn based strategy again, and we got two new X-com games out of it.
Incidentally, real time strategy has kind of fallen off a cliff now.
In terms of MMO's, mega servers do have a role to play - just not in every MMO. The game needs to be built with it in mind from the ground up, and Ashes is not built with it in mind.
Exactly how big of a world would you need to have to sustain a multi-million concurrent player population?
EVE gets away with this due to its game world beingnliterally nothing at all. A game set in a world like Verra cant do that.
Let's not get ahead of ourselves. A touch over a mil probably, not multi-millions.
Yes, it would be crowded at launch, but we have no idea on how the new player experience will be setup atm. Will there be multiple stater zones? Perhaps a queueing system which progresses as people leave the starter zone(s)? It's up in the air atm (from what we can tell as outsiders) but one thing for sure is that whatever mechanics exist must function as a function of player count.
The Ashes team has demonstrated that they can do some pretty good things with network and rendering optimisations (based on A1). I'm excited to see what other deep technical fundamental tech they can bring to the table.
Before any code is written is the best time to be debating these fundamentals.
Just because a game mechanics or system was introduced due to technology limitations, it doesnt mean that mechanic or system isnt still good once those limitations have been overcome.
The example of this I give often ... <cut short>
In terms of MMO's, mega servers do have a role to play - just not in every MMO. The game needs to be built with it in mind from the ground up, ....
Sure different flavors of gameplay go in and out of style, regardless of their genesis.
I'm putting forth my belief that fewer and bigger fragmentations of the player base is better than highly fragmented smaller ones.
You mention that EVE universe is mostly empty space (pun?) which is true, but when combat/action occurs, it's suddenly NOT the case. I've had amazing interactions living and fighting on the edge of Russian controlled space, dealing with people who's way of thinking was so different to mine (and my corps'). The timezone games, sabotage, mutli-lingual trash talk etc... These things would not be possible on tiny servers with only the people within 50ms ping to me.
Ashes is *NOT BUILT* yet. Which is why I think conversations like this are warranted NOW rather than in Beta.
I understand you seem believe many smaller populations is better for AoC, I simply disagree.
We both seem to want the best of Ashes, and I'll still play AoC regardless of what model is taken.
Also part of my argument is a higher level one about the language used.
"Server" as part of gaming nomenclature I think should be dropped for a word that encapsulates what is actually happening, a carving up and fragmentation of the player base.
Ashes is partially built already. The time that went into building the basic universe in Eve Online is probably less than how much time the devs have already spent building the world in Ashes.
Wanting to play Ashes on a megaserver with 1 million players is something that should have been discussed and decided 7 years ago in 2015, when it was all only on paper. It's a completely moot point now, and it will not happen.
Yes, it would be crowded at launch, but we have no idea on how the new player experience will be setup atm. Will there be multiple stater zones? Perhaps a queueing system which progresses as people leave the starter zone(s)?
Except we do know. There's gonna be 5 starting areas and there'll be queues, that supposedly will be remedied by preregistrations. We know that there'll be no shards either.
Yes, it would be crowded at launch, but we have no idea on how the new player experience will be setup atm. Will there be multiple stater zones? Perhaps a queueing system which progresses as people leave the starter zone(s)?
Except we do know. There's gonna be 5 starting areas and there'll be queues, that supposedly will be remedied by preregistrations. We know that there'll be no shards either.
@Nerror , a few bits of a biome and almost nothing in terms of class kits a game does not make (things we have visual confirmation of). We need to remember that the whole A2 map could get scrapped if things don't work out as expected during testing. We're so early in things that ANYTHING can change.
I'm going to keep advocating for larger, fewer servers as I believe it'll spark the most ingame interactions that'll make memories for people.
If we were really going to keep the server nomenclature, maybe strive for 250k servers caps with expected 50k concurrent connections. That to me would be a really healthy bustling world with loads of opportunity for sparks.
Also, It's a bit disingenuous to insinuate that the EVE core universe was something that was not "deep" at launch and that AoC is already shitting all over it in its current early dev stage...
EVE was started by a bunch of nerds, just like AoC.
I'm going to bow out of this thread, it's clear people here are just doggedly sticking to the original vision set forth many years back and aren't stopping to think if its still relevant now.
Whilst I don't think sticking to the original vision on servers will kill AoC, in general, the above mindset is death to long run software engineering projects.
Nerror , a few bits of a biome and almost nothing in terms of class kits a game does not make (things we have visual confirmation of). We need to remember that the whole A2 map could get scrapped if things don't work out as expected during testing. We're so early in things that ANYTHING can change.
It's not about whether it's possible, it's about whether such huge changes should happen. NW did a 180 in their design during alpha and we know how that turned out.
I'm going to keep advocating for larger, fewer servers as I believe it'll spark the most ingame interactions that'll make memories for people.
If we were really going to keep the server nomenclature, maybe strive for 250k servers caps with expected 50k concurrent connections. That to me would be a really healthy bustling world with loads of opportunity for sparks.
How exactly would the game change for you, as a singular player? Node sieges might already bring together 1-2k people to fight over the node. Those people will be split apart around the node's center during a siege purely due to body collision. So you, as a singular player, would never even see more than a few hundred people on your screen, be it a 10k server or a 50k one.
And when you travel you'd still see the same amounts of people, because, as Intrepid's internal testing have apparently shown so far, the game needs way more space to properly accommodate its playerbase. Hell, it might even need more of that space once we get to alpha2 testing and have a few thousand people on a server.
Unless Intrepid go down the route of randomly generated content on the scale of whole continents - the game just can't support such numbers of players. And RGC is very rarely as good as properly manually designed one, let alone better.
Nerror , a few bits of a biome and almost nothing in terms of class kits a game does not make (things we have visual confirmation of). We need to remember that the whole A2 map could get scrapped if things don't work out as expected during testing. We're so early in things that ANYTHING can change.
It's not about whether it's possible, it's about whether such huge changes should happen. NW did a 180 in their design during alpha and we know how that turned out.
I'm going to keep advocating for larger, fewer servers as I believe it'll spark the most ingame interactions that'll make memories for people.
If we were really going to keep the server nomenclature, maybe strive for 250k servers caps with expected 50k concurrent connections. That to me would be a really healthy bustling world with loads of opportunity for sparks.
How exactly would the game change for you, as a singular player? Node sieges might already bring together 1-2k people to fight over the node. Those people will be split apart around the node's center during a siege purely due to body collision. So you, as a singular player, would never even see more than a few hundred people on your screen, be it a 10k server or a 50k one.
And when you travel you'd still see the same amounts of people, because, as Intrepid's internal testing have apparently shown so far, the game needs way more space to properly accommodate its playerbase. Hell, it might even need more of that space once we get to alpha2 testing and have a few thousand people on a server.
Unless Intrepid go down the route of randomly generated content on the scale of whole continents - the game just can't support such numbers of players. And RGC is very rarely as good as properly manually designed one, let alone better.
one of the best examples of too many players was that mode in the new battlefield game where 20 people just spawn on you. And having people look at you from every angle wit how crowded it was.
Overcrowded games are not fun, this asmongold take is really bad and not really built on game design but simply just wanting a ton of players without an answer or a reason based on design. 100000 players in a town at the start of the game is just going to feel gross. No mobs or anything just players non stop and unable to do what you want in the game.
Maybe shard was the wrong term. AoC uses servers instead. Are the servers all connected? Meaning will every player be in the same logical entity regardless of server where they can have the possibility of interacting with each other or would you have to transfer servers if you wanted to play with a group of friends. I get the EU, APAC and NA having different logical entities but will all of the NA player be on the same logical entity. I read through the wiki and I guess I wasn’t as savvy as I thought I was in trying to understand how player interaction is going to work.
There's no connection between different servers. You have a server and that's its own entity. That's it. No server transfers either (at least so far). So if you want to play with your friends - choose the same server.
prob be cash shop item tbh eventualy to server transfer but yeah wanna make sure ur on same server at launch
Hopefully not. It would mess with the local economy. Unless they transfer a naked character.
generaly transfers tend to be no items in most games or only specific items, Teransfers imo should be no items and currency up to X amount to get started on new server, X would be based on either character level or the server there transfering to economy (So player adverage gold on server x is say 1000g this would allow u to transfer 1000g with char transfer for that account)
Yes, it would be crowded at launch, but we have no idea on how the new player experience will be setup atm. Will there be multiple stater zones? Perhaps a queueing system which progresses as people leave the starter zone(s)?
Except we do know. There's gonna be 5 starting areas and there'll be queues, that supposedly will be remedied by preregistrations. We know that there'll be no shards either.
@Nerror , a few bits of a biome and almost nothing in terms of class kits a game does not make (things we have visual confirmation of). We need to remember that the whole A2 map could get scrapped if things don't work out as expected during testing. We're so early in things that ANYTHING can change.
I'm going to keep advocating for larger, fewer servers as I believe it'll spark the most ingame interactions that'll make memories for people.
If we were really going to keep the server nomenclature, maybe strive for 250k servers caps with expected 50k concurrent connections. That to me would be a really healthy bustling world with loads of opportunity for sparks.
We have seen a shit ton more content than "a few bits of a biome and almost nothing in terms of class kits". You're the one being super disingenuous now.
Also, It's a bit disingenuous to insinuate that the EVE core universe was something that was not "deep" at launch and that AoC is already shitting all over it in its current early dev stage...
EVE was started by a bunch of nerds, just like AoC.
I'm going to bow out of this thread, it's clear people here are just doggedly sticking to the original vision set forth many years back and aren't stopping to think if its still relevant now.
Whilst I don't think sticking to the original vision on servers will kill AoC, in general, the above mindset is death to long run software engineering projects.
The two are not even remotely the same. I played Eve back then. I played Ashes in A1. They had built a lot more of the world already than was shown in A1, based on the videos from before A1.
Your idea would likely kill the project entirely, with years of added developer time to multiply the size of the handcrafted world 5 times or more to fit in all those people. Unless you just want copy-pasted areas?
Not to mention the huge impact it would have on the core design of the node system and all the tuning of the interconnected systems, and all the time it would take to rebalance that. That's a hard no thanks.
One mega server is something that sounds nice, but it’s expensive in general, and as we all know MMOs are notorious for underfunding server resources.
The example people give of ESO’s mega server is a great example. Group pvp in large engagements was terrible, and people would desync all the time. It was an issue of the cost I assume, because during events conditions would improve (slightly) and then go back to atrocious afterwards. Group pvp was unplayable… and I mean that literally and not as hyperbole.
So I’d say if AoC can do mega servers and do it well then sure, otherwise it could sink the game.
Comments
Exactly how big of a world would you need to have to sustain a multi-million concurrent player population?
EVE gets away with this due to its game world beingnliterally nothing at all. A game set in a world like Verra cant do that.
Sure, a game could use instancing or psuedo-instancing in order to achieve it (as per ESO), but this leaves the world feeling kind of shit.
Just because a game mechanics or system was introduced due to technology limitations, it doesnt mean that mechanic or system isnt still good once those limitations have been overcome.
The example of this I give often is in regards to turn based strategy games. Originally, they were just called strategy games, as real time strategy simply wasnt technologically viable. When it became viable (around the late 1990's), there were very few major turn based games for about a decade. All the developers were working on real time strategy games.
Then people realized that real time strategy doesnt actually give the same gameplay as turn based strategy - both actually have a place simultaneously. All of a sudden, developers started making turn based strategy again, and we got two new X-com games out of it.
Incidentally, real time strategy has kind of fallen off a cliff now.
In terms of MMO's, mega servers do have a role to play - just not in every MMO. The game needs to be built with it in mind from the ground up, and Ashes is not built with it in mind.
Yes, it would be crowded at launch, but we have no idea on how the new player experience will be setup atm. Will there be multiple stater zones? Perhaps a queueing system which progresses as people leave the starter zone(s)? It's up in the air atm (from what we can tell as outsiders) but one thing for sure is that whatever mechanics exist must function as a function of player count.
The Ashes team has demonstrated that they can do some pretty good things with network and rendering optimisations (based on A1). I'm excited to see what other deep technical fundamental tech they can bring to the table.
Before any code is written is the best time to be debating these fundamentals.
Sure different flavors of gameplay go in and out of style, regardless of their genesis.
I'm putting forth my belief that fewer and bigger fragmentations of the player base is better than highly fragmented smaller ones.
You mention that EVE universe is mostly empty space (pun?) which is true, but when combat/action occurs, it's suddenly NOT the case. I've had amazing interactions living and fighting on the edge of Russian controlled space, dealing with people who's way of thinking was so different to mine (and my corps'). The timezone games, sabotage, mutli-lingual trash talk etc... These things would not be possible on tiny servers with only the people within 50ms ping to me.
Ashes is *NOT BUILT* yet. Which is why I think conversations like this are warranted NOW rather than in Beta.
I understand you seem believe many smaller populations is better for AoC, I simply disagree.
We both seem to want the best of Ashes, and I'll still play AoC regardless of what model is taken.
Also part of my argument is a higher level one about the language used.
"Server" as part of gaming nomenclature I think should be dropped for a word that encapsulates what is actually happening, a carving up and fragmentation of the player base.
Wanting to play Ashes on a megaserver with 1 million players is something that should have been discussed and decided 7 years ago in 2015, when it was all only on paper. It's a completely moot point now, and it will not happen.
True, I missed that https://ashesofcreation.wiki/Starting_areas
@Nerror , a few bits of a biome and almost nothing in terms of class kits a game does not make (things we have visual confirmation of). We need to remember that the whole A2 map could get scrapped if things don't work out as expected during testing. We're so early in things that ANYTHING can change.
I'm going to keep advocating for larger, fewer servers as I believe it'll spark the most ingame interactions that'll make memories for people.
If we were really going to keep the server nomenclature, maybe strive for 250k servers caps with expected 50k concurrent connections. That to me would be a really healthy bustling world with loads of opportunity for sparks.
Also, It's a bit disingenuous to insinuate that the EVE core universe was something that was not "deep" at launch and that AoC is already shitting all over it in its current early dev stage...
EVE was started by a bunch of nerds, just like AoC.
I'm going to bow out of this thread, it's clear people here are just doggedly sticking to the original vision set forth many years back and aren't stopping to think if its still relevant now.
Whilst I don't think sticking to the original vision on servers will kill AoC, in general, the above mindset is death to long run software engineering projects.
And when you travel you'd still see the same amounts of people, because, as Intrepid's internal testing have apparently shown so far, the game needs way more space to properly accommodate its playerbase. Hell, it might even need more of that space once we get to alpha2 testing and have a few thousand people on a server.
Unless Intrepid go down the route of randomly generated content on the scale of whole continents - the game just can't support such numbers of players. And RGC is very rarely as good as properly manually designed one, let alone better.
one of the best examples of too many players was that mode in the new battlefield game where 20 people just spawn on you. And having people look at you from every angle wit how crowded it was.
Overcrowded games are not fun, this asmongold take is really bad and not really built on game design but simply just wanting a ton of players without an answer or a reason based on design. 100000 players in a town at the start of the game is just going to feel gross. No mobs or anything just players non stop and unable to do what you want in the game.
generaly transfers tend to be no items in most games or only specific items, Teransfers imo should be no items and currency up to X amount to get started on new server, X would be based on either character level or the server there transfering to economy (So player adverage gold on server x is say 1000g this would allow u to transfer 1000g with char transfer for that account)
We have seen a shit ton more content than "a few bits of a biome and almost nothing in terms of class kits". You're the one being super disingenuous now.
The universe in Eve Online was procedurally generated in about 24 hours based on the seed of '42'. https://www.engadget.com/2008-09-25-agdc08-the-meaning-of-life-in-eve-online-really-is-42-no-joke.html
Ashes of Creation is mostly a hand-crafted world.
The two are not even remotely the same. I played Eve back then. I played Ashes in A1. They had built a lot more of the world already than was shown in A1, based on the videos from before A1.
Your idea would likely kill the project entirely, with years of added developer time to multiply the size of the handcrafted world 5 times or more to fit in all those people. Unless you just want copy-pasted areas?
Not to mention the huge impact it would have on the core design of the node system and all the tuning of the interconnected systems, and all the time it would take to rebalance that. That's a hard no thanks.
The example people give of ESO’s mega server is a great example. Group pvp in large engagements was terrible, and people would desync all the time. It was an issue of the cost I assume, because during events conditions would improve (slightly) and then go back to atrocious afterwards. Group pvp was unplayable… and I mean that literally and not as hyperbole.
So I’d say if AoC can do mega servers and do it well then sure, otherwise it could sink the game.