Alternate Option To Sharding

[Armourboy]

Doesn’t sound like a problem to me. Blizz says: hey if a server goes below x players, we merge it. That’s not ideal but the upside is players control the process of building communities. You could put in a limit for how frequently people can transfer or something.

Dead servers are going to happen no matter how they do it. That’s just the reality. My guild and most of my friends have been on a fairly dead server for 5 years and it would cost literally thousands of dollars for all of us to transfer our fleets of mains and alts to a good server. It’s terrible. Long since time they allow us agency in deciding whether we want to stay with the community we’re in or go to a better one.

It just seems like, long term, this is the best path to ensure that each server has a vibrant community.

Or you can just deal with sharding for a week or two and save the hassle of trying to shove several different set communities together after the fact.

They aren't going to do this, they are going to shard the servers early to actually try and keep as many dead servers from possible happening.

I have yet to figure out how anyone thinks ripping communities apart after months is a much better option than not seeing a few people for a week or two. Needing to do server merges is actually a worse idea.

[Kagthul]

You for serious? This is exactly what sharding is, but automatic.

No it isnt. With sharding, you're all still on the same server. The chat is not sharded. You can still group with anyone on the server. You will still run into only people from your server.

I swear to god, the number people who have no fucking idea what Sharding actually is is staggering.

[caervek]

You have to endure sharding for a few weeks, it's an unevitable technical necessity, stop being so whiny and butthurt about it.

Nope, read the thread, it's not required in the slightest.

It wasn't an issue for TBC launch and that involved 2-8x the players classic will have at launch and a single starting zone instead of several. So it cannot be an issue for Classic launch, it's that simple.

The argument for sharding is that the Vanilla launch servers had issues, which is true, but those issues weren't due to the amount of players in the zones, they were due to those Pentium 4 era servers having less computational power than an iPhone 6. Hence why that ceased to be an issue for launches (with even more players) long before sharding was introduced as a cost cutting measure.

[Armourboy]

I'd like to know where these magical servers were people played that didn't have launch issues. TBC was horrible, Wrath even started rough on my server. Cata was the first that was pretty stable for the most part, MoP I actually don't remember but then WoD was just horrible as well. Legion was really smooth and BfA was ok, but prior to Cata I spent a ton of time reading " world server is down " at the launch of every expansion.

[KaPe]

MoP I actually don't remember

MoP had tons of people on the Alliance side (probably Horde, too) stuck in the introductory quests, with hundreds of gyrocopters floating in circles and being unable to do anything. It improved after a while, but the launch itself was pretty bad. Sure, it was nothing compared to the complete disaster of Garrisons and being unable to play your character for several days, but still.

[Bhanzai]

Or people can stop drinking drama juice on a daily basis and grow up and realize that classic is going to have sharding because the alternative is a complete fucking mess.

If you're old enough to have played in the heyday then you know that on popular servers it was a complete fucking mess.

And if you have a business or have ever wanted to have a business you should know that the first thing you don't want to do is have a complete fucking mess on opening day/launch.

Seriously.

[The Stormbringer]

Alexensual suggested a great way to have a Classic launch without Sharding

Let's say the server is Archimonde, there will be 10 Archimonde servers named Archimonde 1 through to 10

All of these servers will be merged into one Archimonde server after the initial launch when the playerbase has stabilised and the number of players is consistent after let's say 1-2 weeks

So initially there will only be one tenth of the population of the total realm at launch not to have too much traffic in leveling zones and still keeping the community alive and seeing the same players around without them phasing out

It doesn't necessarily have to be 10 versions of a server it could be any number really just to keep the numbers stable on a server for the levelling experience

This has been the best solution I have heard so far while not having to use Sharding on launch which no doubt blizzard will have to manage the launch in some way or another to reduce player numbers in zones

This is exactly what sharding does, only it's virtual instead of physical space that they're separating and combining. There's no point to this, it's just needless expense.

[Bigbazz]

This is similar but worse than sharding, for real. Instead of 'merging' servers sharding does it automatically on the spot - at X point you'll still see unknown people (in a wide sense of the word).

If something must happen, I would opt for sharding for levels 1-10 strictly and for 1-2 weeks.

That's the problem people have with it, it's automatic and dynamic in nature as apposed to being static. Being static in nature is what people want, they will always see the same players no matter the current population, when it's dynamic the server will adjust to suite meaning it's different to as if it was a static vanilla server. This is the problem with sharding on retail, I rarely see the same people twice and I'm often sitting in Zanadalar a the entrance to the temple and there are like only 2-3 other players nearby, where a massively busy server looks no different to a completely dead server because of the shard I was dumped into.

That's sharding in work, the dynamic nature of it is exactly the problem, not the technology itself. Dynamic sharding vs static sharding is what is being discussed, dynamic creates all the phase issues people dislike.

No it isnt. With sharding, you're all still on the same server. The chat is not sharded. You can still group with anyone on the server. You will still run into only people from your server.

I swear to god, the number people who have no fucking idea what Sharding actually is is staggering.

People know exactly what sharding is you're just tone deaf to the discussion. You don't realise that not being able to physically see the same people at all times is a problem for many? That having to actually invite a guild member to the group so that you can see them in the world when you're both standing in the main city on the same spot is a problem?

Where are all these people suggesting that sharding means you can't group or don't have the same world chat as others on your server? Where are people saying that you won't ever run into other people from your server? They are saying you won't always run into the same people on your server even if you're in the same place, they are saying that the server isn't a static single entity shared and experienced by all players in one instance, but a dynamic constantly phasing one where you will be paired with different players depending on load.

You're ignoring the problems and pretending people don't understand what sharding is, and then arguing semantics out of your stubbornness because people reference the term "phasing" in the context of their discussions. You need to get your head out from up of your ass and start reading what people are saying.

[Hitei]

So... it's basically sharding in a stupid way?

Nope, sorry, but that's simply stupid. WHAT blizzard could simply do is FIX SHARDING:

How to fix:
Make People on the server and friends list always see each other.
Make People on the guild always see each other.
Make People in a group with others see each other.
Fix the issue that people disappear in the next part of a zone or on other zones.

In the end: sharding should only be an issue for the first few weeks.

This is poorly thought out.

Person A is friends with person B and person C. B and C do not know each other. Both are online in different shards: When A comes online, which shard do they join? Are they put on B's shard and then C is forcibly moved to B's shard as well because a friend came online? Are friends of friends of friends of friends now pulled into a random shard because someone they've never even met and don't know exists comes online?

If Person A is on a shard with friend B and gets invited to an unrelated group in a different shard, what happens to friend B?

If Person A is in a guild on one shard, and his friend B on the same shard joins a guild that is on a different shard, is everyone in B's guild now pulled into A's shard in order to make sure friends and guild members can see each other? Is everyone in A's guild on that shard yanked into B's?

You can prioritize one system (e.g. grouping right now). You can't prioritize three completely separate ones.

[munkeyinorbit]

same thing happens even with sharding

also it was getting much better since vanilla launch and b4 they introduced sharding.. we had like 4 different expansions launch without it and it was okay

And then we had a resurgance in subs with 11 hour queues, lag in the order of minutes (not millis conds), invisible mobs because they were constantly dead, and server crashes/ restarts multiple times a day. We even got free game time cause of the massive fuck up and rage.
Solution? Sharding. Smooth as fuck launches twice in a row. You don't want sharding? U can fuck right off my Classic server and wait a month.

[huth]

People know exactly what sharding is you're just tone deaf to the discussion.

No, most don't. They neither know what sharding does, nor when it does so, and in fact don't know what the difference between sharding and phasing is.

Sharding won't be a big issue either way. The server won't be big enough to warrant multiple shards.

The real issue here is that people are incapable of understanding the concept that if they really want that famed vanilla community back, they're going to have to actually do something for it. It won't happen on its own. Sharding is a minor side issue that the game provides you sufficient tools to deal with.

This is poorly thought out.

It's not thought out at all. With so many limitations on who can be put in seperate shards, you'd probably end up with one "main" shard were almost everbody is, and one were only loners with no guild or "friends" are.

[Kelathos]

You have to endure sharding for a few weeks, it's an unevitable technical necessity, stop being so whiny and butthurt about it.

Maybe their goal is to stop Classic from being played and liked.

[KaPe]

Maybe their goal is to stop Classic from being played and liked.

They probably expect "the retailers" to try it, be disgusted by queues and leave, thus making place for True Fans Of Vanilla. Nevermind that poor experience could just as well piss off other veterans, who don't feel like paying money to wait in queues and experience constant lags, disconnects and inability to complete basic quests in 2019.

For all their complaints how "sharding kills the community", they "forget" that there won't even be any community to kill if people can't play at all.

[Craaazyyy]

And then we had a resurgance in subs with 11 hour queues, lag in the order of minutes (not millis conds), invisible mobs because they were constantly dead, and server crashes/ restarts multiple times a day. We even got free game time cause of the massive fuck up and rage.
Solution? Sharding. Smooth as fuck launches twice in a row. You don't want sharding? U can fuck right off my Classic server and wait a month.

actually cata and mop launches were smooth for me personally.. yeah there were some queues, but its a given with 11+m playing and especially cuz i was playing on the most populated server in Europe at the time

but it was still fine

also, go fuck yourself

[Armourboy]

MoP had tons of people on the Alliance side (probably Horde, too) stuck in the introductory quests, with hundreds of gyrocopters floating in circles and being unable to do anything. It improved after a while, but the launch itself was pretty bad. Sure, it was nothing compared to the complete disaster of Garrisons and being unable to play your character for several days, but still.

Yep totally forgot about that.

[Akibaboy]

Alexensual suggested a great way to have a Classic launch without Sharding

Let's say the server is Archimonde, there will be 10 Archimonde servers named Archimonde 1 through to 10

All of these servers will be merged into one Archimonde server after the initial launch when the playerbase has stabilised and the number of players is consistent after let's say 1-2 weeks

So initially there will only be one tenth of the population of the total realm at launch not to have too much traffic in leveling zones and still keeping the community alive and seeing the same players around without them phasing out

It doesn't necessarily have to be 10 versions of a server it could be any number really just to keep the numbers stable on a server for the levelling experience

This has been the best solution I have heard so far while not having to use Sharding on launch which no doubt blizzard will have to manage the launch in some way or another to reduce player numbers in zones

And when you're merged and you get the message "The name 'Rex' is not available", you'll be cool with that?

[Lucarocks92]

And when you're merged and you get the message "The name 'Rex' is not available", you'll be cool with that?

Why is everyone making a big deal about names, here's a really simple fix

Names are shared across all the servers that will merge together so nobody can ever take your name once you have it

[Armourboy]

Why is everyone making a big deal about names, here's a really simple fix

Names are shared across all the servers that will merge together so nobody can ever take your name once you have it

There is no cross server in Classic though so that option/tech may not be available as it is in live.

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[KaPe]

Why is everyone making a big deal about names, here's a really simple fix

Names are shared across all the servers that will merge together so nobody can ever take your name once you have it

You do realize that this is even worse than sharding, right? Someone will take your name and yet you won't even be able to see that person until servers get merged.