Institute Temporary AFK Kick Timer

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Originally Posted by Moonblaze

Today I was trying to log in (off and on) for 6 straight hours without success. Then I finally got logged in and the first time I teleported after about 15 minutes I got kicked. Haven't been able to get back in since.

I promise you very few people are exaggerating.

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The reason why you can't get back on isn't afkers.

http://na.finalfantasyxiv.com/lodest...bc4f3ed64e7da8

Something needs implemented, but players will just put something on the W key or tape the analog stick on their controller to constantly walk into a wall to avoid this.

AFK timer is needed bad I was talking to a friend who's entire guild of 50+ all agreed to keep their characters afk in their world just to insure they can play when they are awake. this to me is selfish that right there is 50+ slots people can use to enjoy the game that some to most haven't been able to. Also something needs to be done about these gold spammers which an AFK log would help some but what is needed is something to stop their gold farming bots from making them their gold to sell. If nuthin is done about this the ingame market will see unheard of pricing just like other games who seem to do nuthin about this gold selling/ farming deal.

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Originally Posted by Moonblaze

Today I was trying to log in (off and on) for 6 straight hours without success. Then I finally got logged in and the first time I teleported after about 15 minutes I got kicked. Haven't been able to get back in since.

I promise you very few people are exaggerating.

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This has nothing to do with afk players, afk players have little impact on server capacity, and if you think otherwise its only because you are trying to find someone to blame for not being able to log into the game. Get over it, the amount of afk players is nothing compared to the amount of actively playing players, and those are the ones that causing the servers to reach full, not a few thousand, if that many, afk players

Even if they put this in place people will find away around it if they really wanted to. I can come up with one right know a controller + rubber band around your gamepad analogy sticks while inside your inn so never really go idle the likely hood of something like this would be rare but people wanna play >.>

Hands on heart, no one wants an Afk kicking timer. SE will expand servers and optimize even more, and yes it will take some time to fix that. After that when anyone can log in, hopefully at any time, an Afk kicker would be the most annoying stressful thing ever in a game like this. Hope SE see this and that they fix the REAL problem asap.

Yeah, I think FOR NOW while we're having these massive issues, anyone who hasn't hit a key or button or interacted with the game at all for an hour or more should get automatically booted to let on someone who actually wants to play.

In general I'm not really in favor of AFK-kicking, but during this time, it's a good idea.

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Originally Posted by odintius

Even if they put this in place people will find away around it if they really wanted to. I can come up with one right know a controller + rubber band around your gamepad analogy sticks while inside your inn so never really go idle the likely hood of something like this would be rare but people wanna play >.>

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I know an AFK program that would not allow that and a few games uses it which is if your AFK a question pops up every 20 minutes while your AFK and if you don't answer it boom out the game you go. and as for your inn ideal it would never work because eventually your character would become stationary against some object and would activate the AFK timer to remove the stationary character.

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Originally Posted by Tsukiyo

Don't understand why this isn't in the game, I guess I can understand why it wasn't at early access or launch day....oh wait no I can't. This is one of the things that would actually help the servers please add this...

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What would help the servers is this:

Not intentionally choosing to save money and place servers in Montreal rather than LA/Dallas and Germany.

Not intentionally creating less NA/EU servers than JP servers.

Not intentionally limiting the number of servers Legacy players could play on.

Not intentionally choosing a shortened release/beta timeline.

Not intentionally failing to fix or recognize these problems in Phase 4 of the beta.

Not intentionally continuing with release when the game obviously wasn't ready.


Be mad about that, not about someone who stays logged in.

SE has stated that world transfers will be implemented mid september so it will be possible transfer character to a low pop server soon.

People standing and jumping around in town not doing anything maybe there just waiting for there friends to log on? and maybe you should blame SE, not that I am, for putting sits all around town I love to just sit there for 15-20 not doing anything while I tidy up my house, hearing the music seeing the players run past its what I paid for. (I am not selfish) Im not rushing this game like some pumped up freak, gonna take it slow hang around town hang aroung the camps fish lv 1 areas at lv 30, watch my friends character craft while I just do nothing, stand and look out at the sea. I would say 1hour of sitting around is alittle much and maybe you should be kicked then but don't go on about afk people, how do you know do you stand there for hours to see if they don't move and how do you know that there not on the forum or talking to there link shell?people that don't wanna blame SE. SE just didn't make room for the people that don't stay and pay the 1st bill.

Afk people need to be removed there wouldn't be 1/2 the problems if people couldn't afk for longtime

AFK players isn't the issue. I know I hate to get caught up in RL for more than 20 minutes to find that I have been kicked from a game and without properly logging out it doesn't save changes. The issue is failing to have what-if procedures in place. This was try number 2 for FFXIV and therefore there is no excuse. I will continue to play regardless, however; I am sad that this will discourage many players from ever playing before ever given the chance. Many players base their game decisions on game reviews and right now the reviews have mixed feelings. The game is great but the lack of preparation for a second launch is ridiculous. ALSO, how about all the gil spammers taking up spots that everyone seems to forget about? How hard would it be pay a few employees to moderate in-server?? Seriously, log on for 1 minute see the 5 gil spammers and ban their account / credit card. They are unable to create new characters atm and yet I keep seeing new names spamming.

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Originally Posted by RelmLavres

AFK players isn't the issue. I know I hate to get caught up in RL for more than 20 minutes to find that I have been kicked from a game and without properly logging out it doesn't save changes.

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Um, ALL MMOs save changes when you log out, even if the game logs you out. Even if you crash. Even if you alt-f4. Even if your pc explodes.

even whole they work on the code and everything they could at least reset the servers from time to time. Really sucks that there is probably at least 25% of the server population that is just afk

I love the logic that SE has here in this situation......

Lets keep the people in game who are not playing, and lets keep out the people who are trying to actually play the game.

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Originally Posted by fxivexno

People standing and jumping around in town not doing anything maybe there just waiting for there friends to log on?Im not rushing this game like some pumped up freak, gonna take it slow hang around town hang aroung the camps fish lv 1 areas at lv 30, watch my friends character craft while I just do nothing, stand and look out at the sea. I would say 1hour of sitting around is alittle much and maybe you should be kicked then but don't go on about afk people, how do you know do you stand there for hours to see if they don't move and how do you know that there not on the forum or talking to there link shell?people that don't wanna blame SE. SE just didn't make room for the people that don't stay and pay the 1st bill.

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I know they are, because every town is full of people doing nothing. Trust me, they are not looking at the attunement crystal for 8+ hours because of the scenery. Good god can you be more ignorant?

You guys realize they already said they are actively looking into creating an AFK timer, right?

The only problem is that it would take longer to program an AFK timer than to optimize duty finder and increase the number of servers.

"Actively looking into creating an AFK timer" does not help a situation that is now over a week old. This was a problem on the first day, and nothing has been done about it. Will it end eventually? Well yeah of course it will eventually. It is just sad that they refuse to address an easy solution to a problem that is plaguing every single player in the game.

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Originally Posted by Sajittarius

You guys realize they already said they are actively looking into creating an AFK timer, right?

The only problem is that it would take longer to program an AFK timer than to optimize duty finder and increase the number of servers.

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It's not as hard of a task as you make it sound *and*, they should actually get to work on it rather than consider getting to work on it.

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Originally Posted by Steeled

It's not as hard of a task as you make it sound *and*, they should actually get to work on it rather than consider getting to work on it.

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Really? Maybe optimizing duty finder is even easier. Maybe that will fix the problem. I work on servers for a living, so I'm all for throwing more servers at the problem. Sorry for being biased.

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Originally Posted by Sajittarius

Really? Maybe optimizing duty finder is even easier. Maybe that will fix the problem. I work on servers for a living, so I'm all for throwing more servers at the problem. Sorry for being biased.

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There's also that small detail that kicking AFK players from the world will not help stabilize the instance servers. The entire reason they are manually restricting logins (1017).

If anything it will make them need to make the restriction even lower to counter balance it.

Or perhaps given that they have eyes on exactly where the bottleneck is, they are simply buying time till a proper solution can be rolled out. Also note that given that SE are rather proudly proclaiming large concurrent connection numbers (And likely chasing every last client they can), Idle players having a reduced load on the server comparative to a regular player helps them publish ever larger numbers. And before you scream 'why would they want 200k idle players?!', think of the bean counters that are funding this whole exercise. Big numbers now will likely equate to SE feeling safer in investing in this game which will benefit us all down the road.

This lynch mob thread really doesn't benefit anyone.

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Originally Posted by Sajittarius

Really? Maybe optimizing duty finder is even easier. Maybe that will fix the problem. I work on servers for a living, so I'm all for throwing more servers at the problem. Sorry for being biased.

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Cool. We have something in common.

A tool to auto-kick afk people can be entirely client-side. There are ways to get around such a thing but most players wouldn't have the know-how or desire.

At the moment, nobody logs out because nobody else logs out. Nobody wants to put up with the login issues.

I say that while I put up with the login issues each day because I shut down my PC when I'm not using it.

AFK kicker isn't the solution. you just have to make the server capable to handling that much volumne.
best solution to traffic is making the highway bigger, not banning people from using the highway.

during the 10 some years I played FF11 I never seen this kind of problem, not to mention FF11 servers hosts both JP/NA players and anyone who been to Jeuno during peak hours would know what I am talking about.

not sure if SE cheaped out on server or what because the miserble failure of FF14 v1.0, but not able to handle the initial comeback volumne is not helping the game either.

a mmo that kicks afk player out just because the server can't handle the volumne won't get anywhere. you are going to have people complain about gil farmer that takes up all the server slots later.

11 also virtually never advertised. I found my copy of 11 on a gamestop shelf.

You obviously don't understand just how many people afk right now. Look around the towns at all the people standing in random rooms and such, where there are no NPCs.

This should not be a permanent solution, but only an immediate solution.

So I went to login today around 6am est and I got 1017 errors... At 6am. On a NA server. Normally I play from 6-4ish while I'm working(don't ask ;P) then i log off. It's getting worse everyday. This game does not have bazaars, there is no need to be logged in overnight. I don't care if you "want" to, funny thing, in MMOs we don't make the rules. So it doesn't matter that you're paying, if they want a rule that says you get kicked off for being AFK for even 5 minutes they could and you could deal or leave.

I get the bigger problem but this AFK thing is making that problem even worse. Unless you think "5000" which I don't think is the current cap due to throttling, people are playing at 6am on a Sunday morning... Won't fix the problem but it won't make it worse either.

Seriously this needs to be done. There is zero reason that anyone should be allowed to afk for 24 hours. its killing the launch and people are getting pissed because they cant play.... like seriously enough is enough 30 min afk timer

How could you not have an AFK kick in an online game like this? AFK (away from keyboard) no keyboard activity for 30 minutes for example and you get disconnected...instead everyone just stays logged in.And people who paid for the game and cant login get frustrated and quit..Sorry gonna pull my sub and unsub.........Can't deal with Incompetent people in real life Let alone a game maker who is stupid as mud.

Stop telling people you care about this issue and will take care of it at a later date. If you really cared about the AFK issues you would have done rolling server restarts during low points of each regions population spikes. People have now held spots for days at this point. Since your too lazy to give your players/customers the common courtesy of an auto-kick AFK system even though there is no player based bazaar outside the AH system, the least you can do is stop being a total jackass and manually flush off people abusing the lack of AFK auto-kick. You have been punishing players for being considerate, and logging out when they are not playing as to give someone else a chance.

At this point is feels like just laziness that they haven't put in an afk auto kick

An auto-afk kick won't help, that much, with the current batch of server problems... It will just add to the problem, by adding more people trying to get through a broken lobby system and into their character's worlds.

Their subscriber base is pretty much DDoSing the one server setup they're using to handle both the JP and NA/EU logins.

SE dropped the ball by having a 300 person queue. They dropped the ball by not having contingency plans in place to handle an "unexpected" (totally bullshit, mmos have been around for 10+ years, its to be expected now) spike in player loads. They dropped the ball by not having at least 2 weeks of open beta... Right now, we're pretty much paying to test their servers.

AFK players are not the reason for the server clog-up. It's the lack of an over-flow server. It's a lack of preparation. FFXI had an auto-disconnect feature that you could disable. I don't understand why so many people are whining and crying about a lack of an auto kick.

I'd be really angry at SE if I got up and went to the bathroom and came back 15 minutes later and was disconnected due to "inactivity", or I had to go to the store for some milk and was gone for 20 minutes and got kicked and wasn't able to log back in.

And for the people who stay logged in for 24/48/72 hours and don't log off? I'm sure they spent the same amount of time either locked out due to 1017 or 3102. So they learned to never log off because you're going to spend days trying to get back into the server. You all act like you wouldn't do the same thing!

I haven't been able to log in for 3 days now. I try at 6am mountain time and again at 6 pm.....still error 1017. SE should really have planned better for this. They should have been fully aware that they would have been absolutely flooded with players eager to test their new toy. Its like giving a kid a flashy new toy on his birthday and then taking it away after he unwrapped it.....

.......I want my toy back........

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Originally Posted by Tremere

AFK players are not the reason for the server clog-up. It's the lack of an over-flow server. It's a lack of preparation. FFXI had an auto-disconnect feature that you could disable. I don't understand why so many people are whining and crying about a lack of an auto kick.

I'd be really angry at SE if I got up and went to the bathroom and came back 15 minutes later and was disconnected due to "inactivity", or I had to go to the store for some milk and was gone for 20 minutes and got kicked and wasn't able to log back in.

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It is really astonishing the amount of people who have never played any of the other AAA MMOs out there on the market. They all utilize this function pretty liberally, and it helps lesson server congestion dramatically.

As to the above post, do you seriously sit in the bathroom for 15 minutes?! If so, you should probably go see a doctor about that. Perhaps invest in Metamucil?

What a buggy POS game..............

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Originally Posted by Meiyu

And then you'll see all the AFKers jumping or running in circles while botted to prevent this. I don't bot, but really, I can't blame people for not wanting carpal tunnel by clicking past a 1017 error.

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This is why I suggested the AFK timer reset only on XP gain. Goodbye AFK's nice knowing you.

btw an AFK timer still wouldn't help you in fact you'd never even know, the demand is so high right now that even if the afk's where knocked off the world would still fill up.
you're assuming that a symptom is the cause.

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Originally Posted by Kagato

People will still likely find a way, such as AFKing by going into their Inn rooms and setting up auto-run to keep their character moving without anyone being the wiser.

Though, granted, not everyone will do this so most AFK people will still just be standing around.

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thanks for the tip bro.

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Originally Posted by Tremere

I'd be really angry at SE if I got up and went to the bathroom and came back 15 minutes later and was disconnected due to "inactivity", or I had to go to the store for some milk and was gone for 20 minutes and got kicked and wasn't able to log back in.

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Then you're being unreasonable. Auto-DC on AFK is common and in a way expected. Even WoW with its 9 million subscribers has a system where if you remain idle for a certain amount of time, it will auto-DC you from the game and take you back to the login screen. And I'm pretty sure it is a way to help keep server resources available for other people who are wanting to play to log in (nevermind that Blizzard has infinitely better server infrastructure).

I'm perturbed at the fact that this is being brushed off. It's not unreasonable to want this in, and it's not unreasonable to have to relog in if you're away for a prolongued amount of time. WoW's auto-DC required you being AFK for 15-20, and that's perfectly fine.

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And for the people who stay logged in for 24/48/72 hours and don't log off? I'm sure they spent the same amount of time either locked out due to 1017 or 3102.

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And that doesn't justify their taking spots on the server while preventing others from playing. As I said near the beginning of this thread, the part that worries me is that this has conditioned some players to AFK to get around the login restrictions.