[Megathread] Star Citizen

[MrAnderson]

I mean didn't SC slow down to comical levels during the last test of over 50+ players when this was being talked about before? Does this mean that with a 100 player server cap that if all 100 players are in a ship combat it won't slow down?

Sacrebleu non! The servers even holded on with 120 players surprisingly well.

I think even CIG were surprised with the results since at first they didn't commit to stating a server cap increase.

A 200% increase of the server cap is a welcomed upgrade. A clear sign of progress thanks to all the network back-end work that CIG has been tirelessly working on along the years.

3.17.2 Patch should deploy tomorrow for the Live build along with a wipe and the increased player cap.

Expected a flood of old and new players an the servers taking a beating.
Bring on the Salty waters!

[Ripster42]

A 200% increase of the server cap is a welcomed upgrade.

That's not how percentages work. It's a 100% increase going from 50 to 100. A 200% increase would be from 50 to 150.

[MrAnderson]

That's not how percentages work. It's a 100% increase going from 50 to 100. A 200% increase would be from 50 to 150.

Indeed it is. I've fixed the post. Thanks.

[Amorac]

Due to EvE not being a first person shooter and using time dilation to achieve those big battles it's not a great comparison as the "tricks" they use can't be applied to fast paced / action based games which can't afford to slow down combat to power point presentations levels when presented with a large number of players. Planetside would be a better comparison since it's a First Person Shooter and manages to accommodate huge numbers of players, which albeit not with full scale planets spans for very large areas.

Sounds like excuses. Fact is Eve servers can handle 2500+ players years ago, Star Citizen 120 max in 2022. I mean, how many (fps) multiplayer games have servers crashes (with 50+ players) and how old are those games? This isn't some fancy net code, it's tech that's decades old.

And people go crazy about it as if it is a worlds first. And its not as if ships in Eve fly 1 mph. Fact is SC could have implemented this while waiting for their mesh tech that I doubt will ever come*

It's the same with 'going to the bathroom' tech. Nothing special but people go 'wow' over it. The Sims does it good enough, basically it's 'after eating x amount go to toilet after y time+/- z%. If you want realism add a circulatory system including lungs so wounds look real...

When are you ever going to see an NPC go to the toilet and watch him doing his dump...

So far, the only thing SC really has is good gfx and soon those will start to look dated if not already compared to what Unreal 5 has shown.

*If they ever get server meshing out working fine and if they can get a lot more players then 2500 great, but since no one seems to be able to tell how it would work.

If one server can only handle 100 people and you need 20 more to handle 2000 total, and all people are in the same space battle you going to see a lot of latency because of all the messages needed to be sent between those 20 servers and the database servers.

And good luck when needing more servers at demand from amazon and getting those servers on the same switch as the others else latency goes up further, but you'd be lucky to get servers in the same datacenter. Ideally you want those servers to talk with each other by connecting them directly without a switch.

[Stickiler]

*If they ever get server meshing out working fine and if they can get a lot more players then 2500 great, but since no one seems to be able to tell how it would work.

If one server can only handle 100 people and you need 20 more to handle 2000 total, and all people are in the same space battle you going to see a lot of latency because of all the messages needed to be sent between those 20 servers and the database servers.

And good luck when needing more servers at demand from amazon and getting those servers on the same switch as the others else latency goes up further, but you'd be lucky to get servers in the same datacenter. Ideally you want those servers to talk with each other by connecting them directly without a switch.

I believe it's far more likely that they've rented datacenter space and they're running their own servers, that way they can guarantee that the servers are in the same rack, and deploy the instance/database servers appropriately.

[Amorac]

I believe it's far more likely that they've rented datacenter space and they're running their own servers, that way they can guarantee that the servers are in the same rack, and deploy the instance/database servers appropriately.

They say they use AWS (https://starcitizen.tools/Developmen...rvices%20(AWS))

Even then, good switches with 48 ports or more are rather expensive.

If you want (hundred of) thousands of players 48 ports is going to be an issue if you need to have dozens of servers with a 100 players max per server.

So either get the server software to be able to handle tens of 1000's of players or find a way to spread them over several game and database servers without needing more then 48 cables without having latency issues in a big space battle with players spread over dozens of servers. Or hell, just having them walk around the same space station (meaning if 1 server can only handle 100 people... well..)

[Stickiler]

They say they use AWS (https://starcitizen.tools/Developmen...rvices%20(AWS))

Even then, good switches with 48 ports or more are rather expensive.

If you want (hundred of) thousands of players 48 ports is going to be an issue if you need to have dozens of servers with a 100 players max per server.

So either get the server software to be able to handle tens of 1000's of players or find a way to spread them over several game and database servers without needing more then 48 cables without having latency issues in a big space battle with players spread over dozens of servers. Or hell, just having them walk around the same space station (meaning if 1 server can only handle 100 people... well..)

They must be getting a REALLY good deal on AWS dedicated servers, or they're morons Possible that they got a deal because they're using lumberyard?


For dedicated rack space, switches are a drop in the bucket compared to the millions you'd spend on servers to fill out a 48 or 96 port switch, and it's more likely that they're using either blade servers or those awesome supermicro compute modules that let you really specialize the servers you're running, and for those you only use a single 100gbit link for the whole rack.

[Amorac]

They must be getting a REALLY good deal on AWS dedicated servers, or they're morons Possible that they got a deal because they're using lumberyard?

Considering how it is worded I would guess yea, but may be they got a deal to use Lumberyard because they use AWS. Tho, thats just guessing offcourse.

For dedicated rack space, switches are a drop in the bucket compared to the millions you'd spend on servers to fill out a 48 or 96 port switch, and it's more likely that they're using either blade servers or those awesome supermicro compute modules that let you really specialize the servers you're running, and for those you only use a single 100gbit link for the whole rack.

Was more thinking about switches that excel at low latency but I'll admit switches haven't peaked my interest in ages.

As for Blade servers, if the server software is not able to handle more then 100 players you gonna need a lot of blades. Or the software itself is so buggy or something but you can put more then one instance of that software on one blade, you're still transferring lots of data between those instances. Faster then with a switch in between sure, but if you want 2500+ players in one system that's a lof of communication between instances. Would be easier to have it all being handled with 1 instance.

Imagine a space battle with a 100 ships vs 100 ships, some with crews of say 50.. That's a lot of messaging going around per player. Can that player see ship X, is Y going left or right, etc etc etc..

Of course if one of those instances crashes you just spin up another and it only impacts 100 players so that's a plus. Well, not for those 100 whose instance just went poof of course, one could argue it would be unfair (esp when in a (pvp) battle).

[banmebaby]

That's not how percentages work. It's a 100% increase going from 50 to 100. A 200% increase would be from 50 to 150.

Color me surprised to see something like that coming from someone who spent years accusing others of lacking the "intellect" to understand SC development, when not downright calling them dumb

[Proskill]

wipe in 3.17.2 and another wipe in 3.18 as stated in captain berks video. good god, i wanted to start playing with the 17.2, but fuck me, whats the point

[kenn9530]

About time.

Been 8 years since Eve had one of it's biggest pvp battle with more then 2600 players in the same system.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_B-R5RB

Glad to see SC is catching up in that regard.

There is no point in having large battles if the performance is terrible and every large scale battle in EvE has had major issues in that regard, in star citizen terms of quality level 200 player battles in space should be more than reasonable, it will only get raised to the point where you can still actually play the game.

[Amorac]

There is no point in having large battles if the performance is terrible and every large scale battle in EvE has had major issues in that regard, in star citizen terms of quality level 200 player battles in space should be more than reasonable, it will only get raised to the point where you can still actually play the game.

Even so, not saying you are right about Eve performance, but at least Eve can handle 2600 people in one system, 50+ times of what SC manages before the next update, and Eve could do that al least 8 years ago.

Now, I am not saying SC servers should handle 2600 people as well if they also want to push stuff like NPC's that go take toilets breaks but they should have been able to get a lot more then a mere 50 without any issues and people should not go "wow 100 people at once, what an achievement".

[kenn9530]

Even so, not saying you are right about Eve performance, but at least Eve can handle 2600 people in one system, 50+ times of what SC manages before the next update, and Eve could do that al least 8 years ago.

Now, I am not saying SC servers should handle 2600 people as well if they also want to push stuff like NPC's that go take toilets breaks but they should have been able to get a lot more then a mere 50 without any issues and people should not go "wow 100 people at once, what an achievement".

EvE cant handle 2600 in the same system though most of the large scale battles have terrible performance, i dont count a laggy, 1 fps battle as actually handling it where you dont even know what you are shooting at, performance matters a whole lot more than having a large number of players in one battle.

EvE is also a completely different game, the detail on it is very minimal, the star systems are mostly just backgrounds so the only thing the game has to really actually deal with is the players, while star citizen has everything loaded in that server currently, its not just dealing with the players its the whole star system at the same time at a far greater level of detail than EvE has.

The current system to handle the servers is not fully implemented yet, once it is then the servers wont often be getting pushed so much and larger scale battles will be possible, we just dont know what the limit will be, i would give within reason 300-400 player battles as a posibility and thats more than reasonable.

[Amorac]

EvE cant handle 2600 in the same system though most of the large scale battles have terrible performance, i dont count a laggy, 1 fps battle as actually handling it where you dont even know what you are shooting at, performance matters a whole lot more than having a large number of players in one battle.

Count every orange dot in this video
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w3LaaWBC2Lk
Note that this is someone observing.

This is the battle I was refering to.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ab36h4aDUUI

Performance is at least reasonable, esp compared SC.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J0-hicHRqSE

EvE is also a completely different game, the detail on it is very minimal, the star systems are mostly just backgrounds so the only thing the game has to really actually deal with is the players, while star citizen has everything loaded in that server currently, its not just dealing with the players its the whole star system at the same time at a far greater level of detail than EvE has.

I already said "I am not saying SC servers should handle 2600 people" acknowledging it's not apples to apples comparison.

But again, having SC servers crash with 50 players, even for an alpha, in 2022 is laughably bad. For example, Call of Duty 2 had 64 players max and is from 2005. Do you know how long ago that is and how much CPU performance has improved? Ye sure, other COD games dropped that support for some darn reason, my guess to expensive for a game without sub costs or because there are no dedicated servers at all. Point is, more then 10 years ago servers could handle 50 people without crashing.

The current system to handle the servers is not fully implemented yet, once it is then the servers wont often be getting pushed so much and larger scale battles will be possible, we just dont know what the limit will be, i would give within reason 300-400 player battles as a posibility and thats more than reasonable.

Wasn't even specifically talking about space battles, just that there are games out there that can handle way more players then SC can. And at least Eve can have huge battles with hundreds of ships (and drones).

[Kyanion]

I'm just wondering how it is some crowning achievement that SC can handle 100 people now (supposedly not melting if all 100 are in the same space fighting) when the game is selling ships that require at minimum 12 people to function and can have up to 80? Like this game is being built around having massive ships with tons of people yet it cannot handle more than 100 people on the server at one time after 10 years and 450+ million?

The massive space ships battles are about to become even more epic

Like really? They weren't epic to begin with and they sure weren't massive. There are not enough players on the servers yet to have MASSIVE EPIC battles. If everyone goes into a single player ship it can have up to 100 ships in a fight. Okay? What if someone has 12 people on one ship instead? That sure does remove a lot of ships from the fight huh?

All that happened is that a laughable server cap became slightly less laughable but it is still a joke after this many years and the amount of money tossed into making this mess.

[Yelmurc]

3.17.2 Patch isn't out yet, but trailer has been found.

[kenn9530]

Count every orange dot in this video
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w3LaaWBC2Lk
Note that this is someone observing.

This is the battle I was refering to.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ab36h4aDUUI

Performance is at least reasonable, esp compared SC.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J0-hicHRqSE



I already said "I am not saying SC servers should handle 2600 people" acknowledging it's not apples to apples comparison.

But again, having SC servers crash with 50 players, even for an alpha, in 2022 is laughably bad. For example, Call of Duty 2 had 64 players max and is from 2005. Do you know how long ago that is and how much CPU performance has improved? Ye sure, other COD games dropped that support for some darn reason, my guess to expensive for a game without sub costs or because there are no dedicated servers at all. Point is, more then 10 years ago servers could handle 50 people without crashing.



Wasn't even specifically talking about space battles, just that there are games out there that can handle way more players then SC can. And at least Eve can have huge battles with hundreds of ships (and drones).

The ships for one dont or barely move, the battle is over 14 hours so not all players are taking part in the battle at the same time and it was an organised event where the company devotes resources to it, its the most boring combat you can do by sitting still auto shooting at whatever you can reach, its not a battle, as soon as you zoom in on a ship the game lags so it can only be played fully zoomed out where the ships are barely even loaded in.

Star Citizen howevers assets are far larger and detailed than all of the EvE ships, you dont seem to understand the simple difference that star citizen has planets, stations, cities, ships, several hundred npcs all loaded on the server, all EvE has is some basic ship skins and they are tiny and not to scale and the stations are the same so all the games peformance can be used for the players since the game doesnt need that much.

Star Citizen isnt complete and an alpha is just there to test so complaining about crashes is pointless, no game currently has to do what star citizen is doing on that scale, you dont understand the game at all if you think just because CoD can have x players star citizen should do it easy, CoD loads a small map, SC loads a star system, do you not understand the scale you are comparing here.

[banmebaby]

no game currently has to do what star citizen is doing on that scale

You mean, no game is currently doing what star citizen is TRYING to do, for a decade now…

Probably for a good reaon.

[Amorac]

The ships for one dont or barely move, the battle is over 14 hours so not all players are taking part in the battle at the same time

The larger ships yes, those things are huge. You know little to nothing about current day Eve it seems. You realize that video is filmed from a rather large distance?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bOMcDmnJ2XA

And again, count the orange dots. Again, way more players in one system 8 years ago then SC can handle today.

and it was an organised event where the company devotes resources to it,

Irrelevant. Also doesn't SC organize events?

its the most boring combat you can do by sitting still auto shooting at whatever you can reach, its not a battle, as soon as you zoom in on a ship the game lags so it can only be played fully zoomed out where the ships are barely even loaded in.

Most likely far more realistic then SC is to be honest. You know, how Newtonian physics work in space. Though Frontier, Elite 2 was far closer to that.

Star Citizen howevers assets are far larger and detailed than all of the EvE ships,

Irrelevant.
Besides, Titans in Eve are massive and the ships are very detailed. Not bad considering Eve is almost 20 years old and CCP has about 250 staff total.

http://crossingzebras.com/wp-content.../Eve_chart.jpg
https://lamp.im/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/flot-16.jpg
https://content.eveonline.com/www/ne...1/VEHEMENT.png
https://webimg.ccpgamescdn.com/kvd74...PENTIS_CAP.jpg
https://cdn.player.one/sites/player....atch-20.03.jpg
https://tagn.wordpress.com/2020/04/06/

you dont seem to understand the simple difference that star citizen has planets, stations, cities, ships, several hundred npcs all loaded on the server, all EvE has is some basic ship skins and they are tiny and not to scale and the stations are the same so all the games peformance can be used for the players since the game doesnt need that much.

Again: I already said "I am not saying SC servers should handle 2600 people" acknowledging it's not apples to apples comparison.

Star Citizen isnt complete and an alpha is just there to test so complaining about crashes is pointless, no game currently has to do what star citizen is doing on that scale, you dont understand the game at all if you think just because CoD can have x players star citizen should do it easy, CoD loads a small map, SC loads a star system, do you not understand the scale you are comparing here.

So much bullcrap. No mans sky, Elite, Eve all can handle more players then SC, and have far more then 1 star system. But muh details and muh realism... Yea SC has better textures and models, has nothing to do with what the server is doing.

And modelling / loading a star system is hardly a big deal considering programs like Universe Sandbox or Space engine exist that work fine on 5 year old PC's or even older.

You do realize it is not the server that renders the planets and it textures right?

[Kyanion]

several hundred npcs all loaded on the server

How many are doing the glorious T-Pose? All of them?

- - - Updated - - -

Star Citizen isnt complete

Will it ever be? 10 years and 450+ million wasn't enough to finish it.

- - - Updated - - -

and an alpha is just there to test so complaining about crashes is pointless

How long will they hide behind this alpha shield again? The alpha is there to collect money from the gullible as well bud.

Ah yes complaining when the game crashes or melts down is sooo pointless. How dare people expect the game to be at least playable for hours at a time when they are thousands of dollars deep.