EZ Server

Just want to get some ideas and discussion going on about the lag on these type of events, just so we can work towards a future of lag free events on EZ..

This place is awesome and all the events are Awesome just they become unplayable for the players that can really reward from these types of events.. no harm intended.



-The double loot days make the server almost 90+% unplayable with the current connection.. from 300+ it gets questionable, 400+ unfun, 450... shoot me.

-I don't think leashing / corpse expires and small other tricks will solve this anytime soon  ??? I don't know how much stuff is being "collected" and what Burden it has on the server during peaks..

-Seen 1000+ on other servers so the groundwork and infrastructure to be able to maintain is intact. I guess just skinny pipes..


I'm not ungrateful by any means just I know a lot of people want to play during the holidays and the server is smashed atm making it unlikely..


/Fugi

The recent changes to the game this year alone from Hunter / Hateborne / (misc GMs)

-190+ New spells, has made EVERY class playable with almost any group make up.
-Epic Click Fixes 4.5+, has made end game totally different and neat
-Loot table drops upgraded
-RoA Quest EXPANDED
-SoA Quest Added!!!!
-Quest rewards upgraded to quest windows and what nots
-Halloween !!! BEST EVENT EVER
-Neat Donor items
-(I also know there is some nice FF7(ish) events that is coded out there that would rock rock)
-T7 soon!!!
-ToFS soon!!!


The point I'm trying to make all these changes have made EZ SERVER very very very popular! You guys rock putting together an awesome place to call home, even with the bitching and griping(mostly me) I still enjoy logging on and grinding.

What is the direction you intend to take the server

-Keep growing it get those massive raids that you love?

-Maintain what we have and just watch a lot of turnover?

With those questions and the VAST amount of knowledge from the GM / Hateborne / Hidden (inviso GMs) / and this Community I'm sure we can and do have many ideas and thoughts.

For myself, I would be interested in Hunter's thoughts regarding the future of Ez?

Specifically, would you like to see Ez grow to a population of 1000 or 2000 players?  Or do you prefer to keep the server population small, 300-500.

We all stand back tossing out suggestions and ideas, however, not understanding your goals really means we are just shooting in the dark.  

Any thoughts Hunter?

Just bumping this thread so Hunter has a chance to comment ...

I don't want to waste Hunter's time making suggestions that don't fit his vision for the server.

I'm still looking into options for bandwidth, just not willing to commit to $500/month data center and not comfortable shipping off the hardware anyways, esp since I'm in the Philippines right now. This has been discussed several times before.

Our hardware and bandwidth has come a long way since when it started and we would have horrible lag at 35-75 players online. Our 2nd set of hardware/bandwidth capped us at 175 players online, and now for a few years we're at our 3rd generation of hardware/bandwidth and seem to cap around 400-500. Our senior players know all of this. Of course I'd love to get to 2k players some day.

After last Halloween Event, I realize with what we currently have, massive raid style content isn't going to work due to lag and disconnects. Future content would be geared towards 2-3 groups max. Doesn't mean it always has to be that much though.

What do other servers have for hardware, bandwidth, etc? Are they on Linux instead of Windows? Are they using 64 bit version instead of 32 bit version? Obviously some of them have better bandwidth than we do too.

Lag can have several other reasons too, such as the race changes people do. Creating a guild creates a massive lag spike due to server updating all zones which we have hundreds of both static and dynamic zones loaded. Also I have various logging for quest that could be causing lag. Recently we've upgraded the source, and I'm also using custom tables that our perl quest connects to mysql databases. Maybe I'm doing it wrong and the tables are getting locked? Players love to make trains for loot and exp. I think leashing mobs would help with this, but I'll need to tweak the drop rates too such as in LDoN if I leash them. Maybe its our router? Do they have limits of how many concurrent connections they can handle?

I'm always keeping eye out for bandwidth possibilities. I need to get in contact with my friend hosting our server for us about some possible solutions. There is a good chance we can upgrade our upload from 6Mbits to 10 Mbits but that would only be a short term quick fix based on current population. Technology keeps improving over time, and hopefully we can get lag free, sooner rather than later.

I do plan on growing EZ Server to have as much content and players as possible. Just won't happen over night. I've also invested too much time on this to just give it up or stop making content or other improvements.

Bottom line is, Fugitive is probably right, that its probably just skinny pipes.

Thanks Hunter - this type of feedback helps the community understand your direction for the server as well as formulating suggestions.