August 8 Hotfixes, Old World Sharding Disabled on RP Realms

[chaud]

Patch 7.3 PTR - Build 24781

Patch 7.2.5 Hotfixes - August 8

Classes

• Druid (Forums / Skills / Talent Calculator / Artifact Calculator / PvP Talent Calculator)
  
  • Efflorescence healing will prioritize players over pets in all cases, including with the Spring Blossoms talent.
    

Dungeons and Raids

• Tomb of Sargeras
  
  • Demonic Inquisition
    
    • Increased the time Calcified Quills takes aim at a player before casting to 5 seconds (was 3 seconds).
      
    • Increased the time it takes Demonic Inquisition to enrage to 12 minutes (was 8 minutes).
      

Old World Sharding Disabled on RP Realms

Over the last couple of years, we've begun using some new technology we've occasionally referred to as "sharding" in non-instanced zones, which separates players in high-traffic areas out into separate "shards" of a particular zone. The benefit to our server performance has been massive - it was a huge part of why Legion's launch went so smoothly - and so, as a whole, we've been very happy with the system.

The one exception has been on RP realms, where player-run events are much more common. On RP realms, we believe that the overall loss to game performance is worth it in order to support those events. If players on RP realms choose to organize an event and congregate somewhere, and have a laggy experience as a result, that's their choice, and we'd like to allow them as much freedom to do so as possible.

So, we've recently applied a hotfix that should disable realm sharding in the vast majority of the outdoor world on RP realms. That includes Kalimdor, the Eastern Kingdoms, Northrend, Pandaria, Outland, Draenor, and all related sub-zones. This has actually been our intention for some time now, but as part of investigating some reports involving a player-run event in Northrend, we discovered some secondary issues that were causing it not to function properly.

There are still limits, of course; we don't want playing on an RP realm to mean you can't properly experience core game content due to low FPS or heavy input lag. As such, all Legion zones (including all of the Broken Isles, the Broken Isles version of Dalaran, and soon, Argus) will still have sharding active, as they do on non-RP realms. Similarly, when the game itself points players toward a specific area of the non-Legion world (such as for a holiday event or new patch content), we may temporarily re-enable sharding in that area until things settle down.

In general, however, our goal is to follow the general rule of thumb that RP realms do not shard, except in current-expansion zones, or when temporarily necessary to support gameplay. This should now be the case on all RP and RP-PvP realms worldwide. This is in addition to our existing rule that RP realms do not automatically fill areas using our Cross-Realm Zones system (although you can still enter an RP realm using CRZ if you're grouped with a player on an RP realm).

Thanks for all your patience while we implemented the hotfix on this, and awesome job on the Tournament of Ages, guys!

What about cities ?
No, capital cities should not shard, with the exception of Dalaran above the Broken Isles as mentioned in my post.

If you are seeing issues with this for some reason, please let us know!

Ornyx. On Wyrmrest Accord in Stormwind, Sharding does still seem to be an issue.

I've tested it MANY times, and a lot of times I can't see my own alt sitting in the same spot as my main (When my second account was active).

And while it may not have as much RP or many events, Dalaran (Broken Isles) still does have RP, and a lot of times I'm disconnected from my guild and end up having to be invited to a group because of it.

Can we please just eliminate sharding all together for RP realms? It's quite annoying to know that on one shard there's open RP, but you can't join in unless you ask to be invited to a group
The hotfix mentioned was applied yesterday evening and currently appears to be functioning properly. I would ask that you check this again, as I'm not seeing any issues on the couple of servers I personally checked.

We have no plans to eliminate sharing systems for Legion content at this time, as mentioned in my earlier post. Legion is considered core and current gameplay, and the last thing we want to see is latency or FPS issues affecting players who are trying to complete current content. As current content moves away from current zones, whether that be in a patch or expansion, we will review feedback on those zones on a case-by-case basis as the need arises.

Lemme also ask if you're still reading Ornyx. With the removal of phasing in the old world, is it possible to bring back World Defense just for those zones?
I don't have anything to add on this, unfortunately. From my understanding the system that supported World Defense was deprecated and I'm sure what the timeline may be to see its return. I'm aware of Holinka's recent words on this, but I am not aware of any current status of the project. Let's keep this thread on-topic though.

I don't have anything to add on this, unfortunately. From my understanding the system that supported World Defense was deprecated and we are very unlikely to see its return at this point. Let's keep this thread on-topic though.
I don't really believe that this is completely off topic. Like stated before on RP realms with PvP, one of the biggest reasons as to why the World Defense Channel was removed was because of the phasing technology that was implemented. But now seeing that it was removed in the old world, I wanted to ask if there was a possibility of it making a return.

As to the point of it very unlikely returning, I thought it was said during Holinkas Q&A that while there's no delivery date, there will be an effort to making it return in the future for roleplayers.

I'm aware that he doesn't work for WoW PvP any longer, this statement came from the PvP Lead of World of Warcraft. So it leaves me in confusion.
Apologies, I think my wording may have caused some confusion - i meant 'at this point' as in, in the current scope of things I'm not sure we are likely to see its imminent return. I updated the wording on my post to be more clear. Again, I don't have updates on where that project is or as to the status of it at all.

While I understand your point that World Defense was removed because of phasing, it's really a side discussion that should be held on its own, separate from this. Again, let's keep discussion here directed at the changes we made to phasing yesterday to support the on-going efforts of the RP community.

[snackfeat]

Why is Demonic Inquisition getting nerfed? Was there anyone actually struggling with the enrage timer?

[schwarzkopf]

Why is Demonic Inquisition getting nerfed? Was there anyone actually struggling with the enrage timer?

Obviously yes.... and obviously enough to trigger alarm bells.

[Kynario]

I'm moving all my characters to RP realms. It's decided.

[nekobaka]

I had to do a double take that Watcher actually increased the time of a mechanic rather than outright nerfing it to ignorability as he is known for.

[Penegal]

The one exception has been on RP realms, where player-run events are much more common. On RP realms, we believe that the overall loss to game performance is worth it in order to support those events. If players on RP realms choose to organize an event and congregate somewhere, and have a laggy experience as a result, that's their choice, and we'd like to allow them as much freedom to do so as possible.


Lol @ that statement.

[Sigxy]

Wow... I was happy with their choice for the Tournament event and now when they added this...

Thanks, Blizzard. I really mean it too. Thanks!

[Razorice]

Well then, time to move to RP realms.

[coprax]

I want sharding to be removed on all other servers as well.
Except cities, which old content zone would ever so overpopulated, even on high traffic realms, that things get unplayably laggy?

[wombinator04]

Fuck sharding, get it rid of it on ALL servers. One of the biggest contributors to the decline of the MMO aspect of WoW, it needs to go.

[huldu]

I would like sharding to be disabling on all older zones. At least it would bring the uniqueness of realms and not having random guy x killing mobs on "your" server when he's from a completely different server.

[alabaster jones]

Great news for ppl on RP realms, shame I'm stranded on pve/pvp realms.

[Radiobiology]

Now i regret not having more characters on rp realms, i really miss the times of server identity. I dont see why lag would generally be an issue without sharding, most servers are dead and the overpopulated ones would probably mainly lag on world bosses etc.

I think a good solution would be to migrate some of the most dead realms, this game still has realms to support a 12 million playerbase but lets be honest here, we're not going back to those numbers anytime soon, if ever. This way dead realms wouldnt be as dead anymore which would make them a more attractive target for free server migration off the overpopulated realms. And if people still choose to stay on the overpopulated realms thats a choice they have made and they cant really blame Blizzard for lag.

[Ibbi]

Does this apply to Emerald Dream and other RP-PvP realms?

edit: yes it does

[navaler]

Patch 7.3 Hotfixes - August 8
Originally Posted by Blizzard (Blue Tracker / Official Forums)
Classes
Druid (Forums / Skills / Talent Calculator / Artifact Calculator / PvP Talent Calculator)
Efflorescence healing will prioritize players over pets in all cases, including with the Spring Blossoms talent.

Dungeons and Raids
Tomb of Sargeras
Demonic Inquisition
Increased the time Calcified Quills takes aim at a player before casting to 5 seconds (was 3 seconds).
Increased the time it takes Demonic Inquisition to enrage to 12 minutes (was 8 minutes).

its not a 7.3 PTR Hotfix, its a live one

[Explicit Teemo Nudes]

I would like sharding to be disabling on all older zones. At least it would bring the uniqueness of realms and not having random guy x killing mobs on "your" server when he's from a completely different server.

That's something completely different - that's called CRZ zones. Even if a realm does not share CRZ zones with any other realms, that realm will still create additional "shards" of the same zone if there are too many players from that single realm there.

RP realms still share CRZ zones with other RP realms - it's just the sharding feature that has been disabled.

- - - Updated - - -

Now i regret not having more characters on rp realms, i really miss the times of server identity. I dont see why lag would generally be an issue without sharding, most servers are dead and the overpopulated ones would probably mainly lag on world bosses etc.

I think a good solution would be to migrate some of the most dead realms, this game still has realms to support a 12 million playerbase but lets be honest here, we're not going back to those numbers anytime soon, if ever. This way dead realms wouldnt be as dead anymore which would make them a more attractive target for free server migration off the overpopulated realms. And if people still choose to stay on the overpopulated realms thats a choice they have made and they cant really blame Blizzard for lag.

As I wrote; CRZ and sharding are two different things. RP realms do only share CRZ with other RP realms though.

[ImpTaimer]

Watcher is such a fucking tool forcing his broken CRZ technology on players he has to be passive aggressive when he's forced to back-peddle.

[tennesine]

That's something completely different - that's called CRZ zones. Even if a realm does not share CRZ zones with any other realms, that realm will still create additional "shards" of the same zone if there are too many players from that single realm there.

RP realms still share CRZ zones with other RP realms - it's just the sharding feature that has been disabled.

- - - Updated - - -



As I wrote; CRZ and sharding are two different things. RP realms do only share CRZ with other RP realms though.

Yeah, I could see somebody out there paying to transfer all their toons because they are confusing sharding for CRZ.

[Bathory]

We did it Moonguard!





tournamentofage.com

[Aeula]

Well thank fuck for that. At least my server can scrape back some of its identity.

It sucks logging in and going to silvermoon at prime time only to find the streets empty because you've gotten 'sharded'.