Question: why theres a blacklist cap..?

Thanks to all the rmts, i need to blist them whenever they send me tells or shouts.

But... My blist is full now and i have to manually delete all the previous rmt and add the new ones ._.

Because of character data limitations I assume.

Why do people always assume data storage is infinite? I will never understand this...

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Originally Posted by RylaiBluecrow

Thanks to all the rmts, i need to blist them whenever they send me tells or shouts.

But... My blist is full now and i have to manually delete all the previous rmt and add the new ones ._.

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Delete the first 50 in the list.
Characters on banned accounts don't get deleted.

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Originally Posted by Squrilruler

Why do people always assume data storage is infinite? I will never understand this...

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Well, it seems like it on other MMO's that don't have to worry about the limitations of console data storage.

Data limitations, limits that SE set for every account equally.

Because under logical circumstances, if a player needs to blacklist 200 people in a video game, then they may as well quit playing cuz everyone hates them anyways.

But along came gil sellers and logic and reasoning went out the window.

But on a serious note, from my impression, PS3 has been the limiting factor when it comes to data storage currently. PS3 is not a console meant to handle large MMOs if a developer has to be put this much care into preserving every last kilobyte of data. Hence why they hosted that upgrade to PS4 compain and are going to end support for the PS3 which will free up vast amounts of data storage thankfully.

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Originally Posted by Elusana_Celah

Because under logical circumstances, if a player needs to blacklist 200 people in a video game, then they may as well quit playing cuz everyone hates them anyways.

But along came gil sellers and logic and reasoning went out the window.

But on a serious note, from my impression, PS3 has been the limiting factor when it comes to data storage currently. PS3 is not a console meant to handle large MMOs if a developer has to be put this much care into preserving every last kilobyte of data. Hence why they hosted that upgrade to PS4 compain and are going to end support for the PS3 which will free up vast amounts of data storage thankfully.

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PS3 is not the limitation, the only thing that PS3 limits is the graphics it's client can handle. Even then, it runs at 720p with less detail, fewer effects and less physics that PC or PS4. If PS3 was really holding things back we'd all be stuck with 720p at best, barely any physics to speak of and almost no lighting effects and a draw distance that makes everything muddy after about 50 yalms.

Character data (including blacklist) limitation is something established on the server side, and it relates to how much character data has to be tossed around by the servers on a continual basis. IIRC the character data is written back to the database something like every 3-5 seconds, when you multiply that by all the active characters, you can quickly see how much data is being transacted continually in the background no matter what else the servers are doing. So the memory budget for character data is really limited by how often they write back to the DB, and how much bandwidth they can devote on the server infrastructure just for character data.

PS3 is also the reason why we can't have a TP bar in the party list or have more graphical options for the PC version or have actual add ons instead of relying on 3rd party stuff.

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Originally Posted by Kosmos992k

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Well I guess I got my facts and information wrong. Still, SE is literally counting kilobytes like a person on a diet counts carbs. That kinda concerns me.

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Originally Posted by Squrilruler

Why do people always assume data storage is infinite? I will never understand this...

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It's not infinite, but 200 names (~5kb ish?) takes a fraction of what a single character model stored on your hard drive would take. Of course there's also performance considerations (client load times, etc).

More to the point: Why don't we have a "remove all" button for our blacklists?

This is like asking why we can only store so many items or make so many characters.

200 blacklisted names isnt much but you need to see the big picture so if say 50.000 players fill their blacklist then suddenly its 10 million blacklisted names.

That and even if they did increase the limit you would eventually complain why you only have 300, 500 or a thousand slots.

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Originally Posted by Devils_Lawyer

This is like asking why we can only store so many items or make so many characters.

200 blacklisted names isnt much but you need to see the big picture so if say 50.000 players fill their blacklist then suddenly its 10 million blacklisted names.

That and even if they did increase the limit you would eventually complain why you only have 300, 500 or a thousand slots.

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50000 players * 200 names * 25 characters = 250 megabytes. Not that much. Storage likely isn't the issue (if this is even stored serverside). Performance might be.

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Originally Posted by Risvertasashi

50000 players * 200 names * 25 characters = 250 megabytes. Not that much. Storage likely isn't the issue (if this is even stored serverside). Performance might be.

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Disk space is unlikely to be an issue, although cumulatively there is a hell of a lot of data involved with characters in general. Just looking at the example you gave, if that data is stored as part of the character data, it has to be rewritten to the database every 3-5 seconds, and that's just the blacklists...

I'd like to see a multi-select option in black list management, perhaps a remove all as you suggest. but I would also like to see an option to remove all accounts that have been permanently banned. They don't delete the characters from the game - but they could at least flag them for removal from blacklists.

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Originally Posted by Kosmos992k

Just looking at the example you gave, if that data is stored as part of the character data, it has to be rewritten to the database every 3-5 seconds, and that's just the blacklists...

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Yup, that could be one of many points where performance comes into play. Doing those kind of ops frequently makes every kb count. Of course the only people who really know exactly how different aspects are handled is Square.

Also, I'm not sure if blacklists are stored serverside. I've never tried logging in from a different computer to see if my blacklist carries over. Has anyone tried this?

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Originally Posted by Risvertasashi

Also, I'm not sure if blacklists are stored serverside. I've never tried logging in from a different computer to see if my blacklist carries over. Has anyone tried this?

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They aren't, BL is Completely Local. The reason it's limited at 200 is because that list need to be loaded in to your memory every time you log in to filter messages. The PS3 doesn't have much ram so they need to limit memory where ever they can.

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Originally Posted by Risvertasashi

Yup, that could be one of many points where performance comes into play. Doing those kind of ops frequently makes every kb count. Of course the only people who really know exactly how different aspects are handled is Square.

Also, I'm not sure if blacklists are stored serverside. I've never tried logging in from a different computer to see if my blacklist carries over. Has anyone tried this?

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I'm hoping that they come up with a better strategy for character data that only writes changes every 3-5 seconds and perhaps does a full refresh every minute or so. I know they do it so frequently to prevent rollback issues, but I still find it hard to believe that the entire character data is rewritten when the amount of data changed every 3-5 seconds can't be terribly large. It would make more sense to only send the changes. But that would complicate recovery after a DC of any kind. Oh well, I guess that's just one more thing we have to leave to the devs.

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Originally Posted by Haibel

They aren't, BL is Completely Local. The reason it's limited at 200 is because that list need to be loaded in to your memory every time you log in to filter messages. The PS3 doesn't have much ram so they need to limit memory where ever they can.

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Are you certain that the BL is client side, not server? I can't find any information on it either way. Also, I point blank refuse to believe that the trivial amount of RAM needed to hold the 200 member black list in any way impacts the game client on PS3.

The information in this linked post from Reddit would suggest that the BL and FL are both server side data;
http://www.reddit.com/r/ffxiv/commen...tafriendslist/

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Originally Posted by Haibel

They aren't, BL is Completely Local. The reason it's limited at 200 is because that list need to be loaded in to your memory every time you log in to filter messages. The PS3 doesn't have much ram so they need to limit memory where ever they can.

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Sensible. And that explains why they're still counting each kilobyte even though it's local...

If the blacklist is completely local, what is the problem in capping it at 200 on PS3, 1000 on PS4, and 5000 on PC? If the list of 5000 RMTs doesn't carry over to your PS3 anyway, what's the issue?

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Originally Posted by Moonleg

If the blacklist is completely local, what is the problem in capping it at 200 on PS3, 1000 on PS4, and 5000 on PC? If the list of 5000 RMTs doesn't carry over to your PS3 anyway, what's the issue?

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If it's local, then I see no issue with that. Not sure it's local though;
http://www.reddit.com/r/ffxiv/commen...tafriendslist/

On the other hand, command hotbar/crossbar configurations do appear to be held locally as when I launch my PC version, none of the configuration I have for gear or commands appears.

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Originally Posted by Kosmos992k

The information in this linked post from Reddit would suggest that the BL and FL are both server side data;
http://www.reddit.com/r/ffxiv/commen...tafriendslist/

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He's right and he's wrong. He's is correct that character relationship is done by Character ID. Certain Data when you move the game to a different machine will download from the server.
Your character Data folder on any machine you log into will have the same name. The stuff that gets download are mostly flags to let your client know what jobs you have and what actions you can have open. To my knowledge, there are only two files that get download. It's been awhile since I've added a new machine that I play on. FFXIV_CHR_01.dat and ACQ.dat all others are created client side.

Stuff that doesn't move machines. Settings, Gear List, Macros, UI Changes, Keybinds Etc. Stuff That moves machines and Download every time you log in. Character List Tied to the account and the current gear equipped to these characters.

Problem I have with pooling all the RMT into the same blacklist as players, are that the very few toxic players I had to blacklist for whatever the case are now lost amongst a sea of RMT. I no longer remember whom was who and by purging the list I'm sure I've accidentally removed persons whom I really didn't wish to be removed.

It's not a huge issue, but it would be nice if there was a distinction. Such as a black list, and a spam list.

Black list isn't server side. It's client side.

This is why we don't have fun tools like spam lists. IE 200 people blacklisted auto blacklist/block.
Finally it's not about space it's about parsing in coming tells. Bigger list = slower and then some chat will slip through, with all text being filtered.

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Originally Posted by Kio

Problem I have with pooling all the RMT into the same blacklist as players, are that the very few toxic players I had to blacklist for whatever the case are now lost amongst a sea of RMT. I no longer remember whom was who and by purging the list I'm sure I've accidentally removed persons whom I really didn't wish to be removed.

It's not a huge issue, but it would be nice if there was a distinction. Such as a black list, and a spam list.

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If they would give us an ability to sweep our black lists for perma-banned players it would be helpful.

Not sure why they decided to support consoles, even the PS4 will become a drag as time passes and more stuff is being put into the game. Consoles only hinders development. PS3 is ancient.

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Originally Posted by Imoye

Not sure why they decided to support consoles, even the PS4 will become a drag as time passes and more stuff is being put into the game. Consoles only hinders development. PS3 is ancient.

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Consoles are quite a bit more popular in Japan. Gaming PCs are, compared to the US and similar, rather expensive.

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Originally Posted by Imoye

Not sure why they decided to support consoles, even the PS4 will become a drag as time passes and more stuff is being put into the game. Consoles only hinders development. PS3 is ancient.

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Considering how many paying subscriptions there are from console gamers, if you like this game, perhaps you should adjust your attitude towards those gamers who choose to use a console. Also, if you are not blessed with a powerful PC to run FFXIV on, then you should be happy about the work that went into optimizing and scaling the game engine for the PS3 because that directly impacted how powerful a PC has to be to run this.

Honestly, I wish that people would get of their PC master race high horse, it's tired and needs to be put out to pasture.

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Originally Posted by Risvertasashi

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Definitely understand the problem.

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Originally Posted by Kosmos992k

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Got nothing to do with being on a high horse. PS3 is a huge bottleneck to this game. I mean for realz, we can't even have a TP bar because of this pre-historic brick case. Arguably, the long GCD is in the game due to consoles as well. That is definitely limiting. Also, how many abilities can we have on our bars before things have to start getting dumbed down to appeal more to consoles? Heavensward possibly being the last expansion for the PS3 only confirms the obvious.

In all sorts of games, consoles are always the limiting factor. MMO players are mostly found on PC, not console. As for now though, I think supporting the PS4 is a good move. But if it gets to the point where it becomes a bottleneck, then yeah, I think it's perfectly acceptable to highlight the issue.

It's the same as old people refusing to use their VISAs, and instead cash out their entire salary, completely ignorant of the fact that the removal of physical money would diminish crime.

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Originally Posted by RylaiBluecrow

Thanks to all the rmts, i need to blist them whenever they send me tells or shouts.

But... My blist is full now and i have to manually delete all the previous rmt and add the new ones ._.

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You do realize... that after you add them you can delete them the next day and they will already be gone, yes? No reason your blist should ever be full from RMT.

I only keep the last 30 RMT on my list :)

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Originally Posted by Elusana_Celah

But along came gil sellers and logic and reasoning went out the window.

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But everything changed with the gilseller nation attacked...

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Originally Posted by Imoye

Not sure why they decided to support consoles, even the PS4 will become a drag as time passes and more stuff is being put into the game. Consoles only hinders development. PS3 is ancient.

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Every gleaming city has a ghetto. Don't be so hard on our ghetto players. We need them to keep the game viable.

I have played the game for 3 weeks now, my blacklist is full. All of the characters have been lvl 1 gold sellers spamming me. Why on earth is there no option to block whispers from < lvl 10 players. Now i have turned off all tells, so obviously going to miss the benefical or friendly ones too. Thanks Obama.

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Originally Posted by Imoye

Not sure why they decided to support consoles, even the PS4 will become a drag as time passes and more stuff is being put into the game. Consoles only hinders development. PS3 is ancient.

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It increases the player-base. PS3 will be phased out soon, and then we'll just be limited by PS4 design, which should be much better. The benefits of a larger player-base certainly outweighs being forced to program around the limitations of the weakest link.

In fact, it encourages tight programming. FFXIV is the smoothest game for its graphics I've played in quite a while.

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Originally Posted by Jayonnaise

I have played the game for 3 weeks now, my blacklist is full. All of the characters have been lvl 1 gold sellers spamming me. Why on earth is there no option to block whispers from < lvl 10 players. Now i have turned off all tells, so obviously going to miss the benefical or friendly ones too. Thanks Obama.

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There is. It's called /busy :)

If you need to talk to your friends, create a linkshell and invite them to join or join a free company with them. Then they can talk to you to your hearts content without the need to send tells.

edit: and as I said previously, you only need to keep them on your blacklist until the next day then remove them.

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Originally Posted by Rhas

There is. It's called /busy :)

If you need to talk to your friends, create a linkshell and invite them to join or join a free company with them. Then they can talk to you to your hearts content without the need to send tells.

edit: and as I said previously, you only need to keep them on your blacklist until the next day then remove them.

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And if I want to talk to someone privately without having to set up a link-shell? What if I want to be in a state that a other person can privately send me a real message?

/busy prevents RMT ads from bothering you with tells and friend invites. It also cripples your ability to communicate with specific people that aren't part of your link-shell or fc.

It's not a solution, it's a sacrifice.

As for the black-list, it's not really a solution either. Since it only prevents messages from that specific character. RMT bots swap characters so much on servers that character creation is open, it's pretty worthless and just adds up more time wasted. Especially once the list is full and you need to take the tedious time to empty it.

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Originally Posted by Aerowaffle

And if I want to talk to someone privately without having to set up a link-shell? What if I want to be in a state that a other person can privately send me a real message?

/busy prevents RMT ads from bothering you with tells and friend invites. It also cripples your ability to communicate with specific people that aren't part of your link-shell or fc.

It's not a solution, it's a sacrifice.

As for the black-list, it's not really a solution either. Since it only prevents messages from that specific character. RMT bots swap characters so much on servers that character creation is open, it's pretty worthless and just adds up more time wasted. Especially once the list is full and you need to take the tedious time to empty it.

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All you said times infinity and more. I just wish someone from SE would read this too....

Again and again I find myself saying this: MMORPGs do not belong on consoles. At least not yet and definitely not current-gen MMORPGs. Maybe the PS4 will change this, but I think that what we will see is the game continue to be limited in its capabilities solely due to having to also be made for another console. It's very frustrating honestly, as I love FFXIV but the data issue in general, with housing, the amount of people you can black-list (although I find it ridiculous that anyone has to even consider black-listing that many characters due to the other huge and all too ignored issue in FFXIV: RMT), graphics, and etc. really puts a damper on the game in general.

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Originally Posted by Kosmos992k

PS3 is not the limitation,

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Oh and its not a PS3 limitation that doesn't allow that client to display all inventory bags at once like you can on the PS4 and PC? That the PS3 doesn't have limitations on how much it can disaply on screen due to Vram? That it is not limited by how much information it can hold on actual system memory?

Ok, I'll have what you are smoking too ^_^

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Originally Posted by Haibel

Stuff that doesn't move machines. Settings, Gear List, Macros, UI Changes, Keybinds Etc. Stuff That moves machines and Download every time you log in. Character List Tied to the account and the current gear equipped to these characters.

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Pretty much (usually) all data that can be exploited is done server side. EG, quantity of gil you have, imagine if the counter wasn't server side? XD

MMO designer law "The client is in the hands of the enemy, never, ever forget that"

Because it wasn't designed to be used for what almost every player is being forced to use it for. I doubt anyone could fill a blacklist with 200 legitimate people. The problem is the RMT, not the blacklist itself.