Emergency Maintenance would solve nothing.

So I am seeing cries for "DO MAINTENANCE!"

Uh...

What would that solve, exactly?

What needs to happen, is people need to log off and go to bed, and let some people through. We are having these problems because the servers are just inundated with ridiculous floods of people all trying to do the same things at once.

If they don't do maintenance, people will eventually get tired of the waits, log off, and go to bed which is exactly what needs to happen.

If they did maintenance, then you force everybody to log off (which hinders progress), and then set a time that everybody can set their alarms to, so that they can all try to log on simultaneously, and we're back to square-freaking-one all over again.

Maintenance is not the answer. It would only make matters worse.

They can create more instances or maybe take down DF or cross world support for a few hours. Lots of solutions. Just really bad developers.

battle solo instance could be change, example put party with 3 people it could works too.
or remove all solo instace

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Originally Posted by Rubiss

They can create more instances or maybe take down DF or cross world support for a few hours. Lots of solutions. Just really bad developers.

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There's only so much you can do with the hardware you have, lol.You expect them to whip up complex routines that would only be used in certain situations within the span of a few hours, and think this would work well? lol?

Yeah, sure, I bet you got a couple dozen network coders out there who could whip up a brand new cross-server code snippet within the span of <12 hours and then take the servers down, patch it in, and it would just..... work.

Without any, you know, beta testing to catch any bugs that might be in the code, etc? And that's not to say how complicated that could possibly be to patch this code in to all of their servers... lol.

If it were that simple, don't you think they would have already done so?

Did you play World of Warcraft during Mists of Pandaria? If you did, then surely you remember when Cross-Server Play was first introduced? Several days of game-breaking bugs involving that, from what I remember. Do you really want that coming here, only worse because you expect these coders to be able to code something like that in the span of 12 hours or less?

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Originally Posted by Maeka

So I am seeing cries for "DO MAINTENANCE!"

Uh...

What would that solve, exactly?

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Well if, during the maintenance, they did things like introduce additional hardware for the servers that handle instances and introduced a small patch to get rid of the solo instance bottleneck quests, replacing them with a cutscene or something, or introduced a queue for the solo instances, then the emergency maintenance would solve the problem. This is exactly the thing Blizzard did to solve the same exact issue in WoW.

OP has been whiteknighting for hours, aren't you tired yet? Take a nap

Blah. I tried to reply and accidentally lost what I had typed in the clipboard because of that stupid 1000 character limit. *sigh*

But seriously, do you guys think it is THAT easy to modify server hardware, or code new cutscenes? *sigh*

And I'm not white knighting as much as I'm calling people out for reacting entirely unreasonably. And I've not been doing so for "hours". Maybe one hour, max.

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Originally Posted by Maeka

There's only so much you can do with the hardware you have, lol.You expect them to whip up complex routines that would only be used in certain situations within the span of a few hours, and think this would work well? lol?

Yeah, sure, I bet you got a couple dozen network coders out there who could whip up a brand new cross-server code snippet within the span of <12 hours and then take the servers down, patch it in, and it would just..... work.

Without any, you know, beta testing to catch any bugs that might be in the code, etc? And that's not to say how complicated that could possibly be to patch this code in to all of their servers... lol.

If it were that simple, don't you think they would have already done so?

Did you play World of Warcraft during Mists of Pandaria? If you did, then surely you remember when Cross-Server Play was first introduced? Several days of game-breaking bugs involving that, from what I remember. Do you really want that coming here, only worse because you expect these coders to be able to code something like that in the span of 12 hours or less?

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They clearly have the ability to already allocate instances. The expected server strain should have been anticipated. Getting into the EA period required a preorder. It isn't like people just randomly bought the game and logged in. They had figures and they had time too. You mean to imply they didn't believe the people who preordered wouldn't play the game?

They could have even just made the instance battle skippable, mark the quest as cleared upon viewing the cutscenes. Plenty of options. You're going about beta testing, but this certainly doesn't feel like it was beta tested in any real regard.

I think the biggest thing they failed to foresee is ridiculous reaction of the playerbase at large. Instead of going "oh well, I'll try again tomorrow", everybody's throwing themselves at the brick wall expecting things to be different the next time. If people'd be more reasonable, more people would get through and this wouldn't be such a huge issue.

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Originally Posted by Rubiss

They clearly have the ability to already allocate instances. The expected server strain should have been anticipated. Getting into the EA period required a preorder. It isn't like people just randomly bought the game and logged in. They had figures and they had time too. You mean to imply they didn't believe the people who preordered wouldn't play the game?

They could have even just made the instance battle skippable, mark the quest as cleared upon viewing the cutscenes. Plenty of options. You're going about beta testing, but this certainly doesn't feel like it was beta tested in any real regard.

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They could have done a lot of things, but none of that matters in finding solutions that they can do right now.

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Originally Posted by Maeka

Blah. I tried to reply and accidentally lost what I had typed in the clipboard because of that stupid 1000 character limit. *sigh*

But seriously, do you guys think it is THAT easy to modify server hardware, or code new cutscenes? *sigh*

And I'm not white knighting as much as I'm calling people out for reacting entirely unreasonably. And I've not been doing so for "hours". Maybe one hour, max.

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Exactly. This is a problem that will sort itself out in due time. Trying to fix it by fuddling around with the code would just be a waste of resources.

You can buy server space online. I believe Amazon sells some - you buy a certain amount, you pay for it while you're using it, and when it's empty you can cancel it. A couple thousand dollars and this could have been avoided completely.

Early access is only three days, and the Complete Edition is selling well. Of COURSE people are going to be upset at now having lost 1/3 of their time before the extra people get added.

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Originally Posted by Rubiss

They clearly have the ability to already allocate instances. The expected server strain should have been anticipated. Getting into the EA period required a preorder. It isn't like people just randomly bought the game and logged in. They had figures and they had time too. You mean to imply they didn't believe the people who preordered wouldn't play the game?

They could have even just made the instance battle skippable, mark the quest as cleared upon viewing the cutscenes. Plenty of options. You're going about beta testing, but this certainly doesn't feel like it was beta tested in any real regard.

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Since the particular problem is affecting every world equally and the DF, it's pretty obvious that it is cross realm, so nothing to fix there. The shear number of people repeatedly clicking to get in an instance is most likely acting like a DDoS attack not allowing the machine to respond properly. Do you know what MMOs do to fix DDoS attacks? They apologize and wait for them to stop.

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Originally Posted by savageink

Since the particular problem is affecting every world equally and the DF, it's pretty obvious that it is cross realm, so nothing to fix there. The shear number of people repeatedly clicking to get in an instance is most likely acting like a DDoS attack not allowing the machine to respond properly. Do you know what MMOs do to fix DDoS attacks? They apologize and wait for them to stop.

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Right, the players are at fault for a low capacity server and shoddy instance handling.

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Originally Posted by Finnfinite

You can buy server space online. I believe Amazon sells some - you buy a certain amount, you pay for it while you're using it, and when it's empty you can cancel it. A couple thousand dollars and this could have been avoided completely.

Early access is only three days, and the Complete Edition is selling well. Of COURSE people are going to be upset at now having lost 1/3 of their time before the extra people get added.

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Whether or not people bought the Complete Edition is a non issue. Early access is a bonus to all pre-ordered versions of the game, no matter the edition. Had people needed to pay extra, I could understand it, and if the issues continue into the official release, I'll be voicing my concerns right along with everyone else. But as it stands, for now, this is a universal bonus with no guarantee of full functionality.

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Originally Posted by Finnfinite

You can buy server space online. I believe Amazon sells some - you buy a certain amount, you pay for it while you're using it, and when it's empty you can cancel it. A couple thousand dollars and this could have been avoided completely.

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That works only if your server setup is designed for it from the start. Which is not the case here.

You don't work at SE, or for the people responsible for our servers. How do you know that?

Cross-posted from that other thread; a simple, temporary fix that would allow players to get past the current bottlenecks, disperse the userbase across a wider segment of the servers instead of putting all the stress on one particular point, and should not require an extensive amount of work produced from nothing (as it would take to code a 'queue for solo instances' function) or cost a bunch of money (as expanding raw server power would):

Temporarily flag "Let Fill Your Hearts With Pride" (the quest that follows "Best Served with Cold Steel") to be available as soon as you've completed "Signed, Sealed, and to Be Delivered" (the quest that precedes 'Cold Steel'), so that players can bypass the quest with the instance, and go back to complete 'Cold Steel' later.

Do the same thing with the quest that follows "In Crimson It Began" (the Pipin-triggered instance) so that you can begin it as soon as you complete the quest that precedes 'In Crimson', so that players can bypass 'In Crimson' and move on with the story, and come back to complete the instance later on, once things have calmed down.

Continue to do that with any other early-Stormblood quests that involve solo duties, so that none of them will roadblock the entire player base for no good reason. It's a simple enough solution that it could have been implemented already, and could simply be rolled back as early as the official launch on Tuesday, if the congestion issues at that one particular point in the game have been alleviated by then.

Congestion issues are congestion issues, and although you can make the argument that SE should have seen this particular one coming, nobody is expecting them to have perfect foresight. But there's no justification for being this slow to roll out a temporary fix, when the problems the game is experiencing are so laser-focused onto such a small, easily-bypassed portion of the game.

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Originally Posted by Maeka

I think the biggest thing they failed to foresee is ridiculous reaction of the playerbase at large. Instead of going "oh well, I'll try again tomorrow", everybody's throwing themselves at the brick wall expecting things to be different the next time. If people'd be more reasonable, more people would get through and this wouldn't be such a huge issue.

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tomorrow won't be better since so many people need it. The gated 90% of the expansion behind this. Saying "oh well, I'll just wait a month to do this" isn't acceptable.

Emergency Maintenance'd do one thing. Kick everyone off.

Isn't that what everyone has been arguing they should do?

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Originally Posted by Hatman

Emergency Maintenance'd do one thing. Kick everyone off.

Isn't that what everyone has been arguing they should do?

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No. They're saying that some to most should get off, because others could then go through easier. If everyone's off, then no one goes through and we start back at square one when everyone logs back in again.

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Originally Posted by Hatman

Emergency Maintenance'd do one thing. Kick everyone off.

Isn't that what everyone has been arguing they should do?

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no. that would halt everyone at the same point and start them up at the same point. same problem. half the players just need to go to bed. so us night owls can get through and we will be out of their way when they try tomorrow.

Edit: Uhhh...yeah, what he said. ^^^^^

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Originally Posted by Maeka

If they don't do maintenance, people will eventually get tired of the waits, log off, and go to bed which is exactly what needs to happen.

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people logging off and going to bed so others can do the quests does not really fix the issue, that is a workaround which in the long run only allows the problem to come back. they need to find a real fix for this. redunancy server clusters should be in place and the fact that their twitter indicates they expected this kind of thing shows how unprepared they actually were. so please OP stop trying to tell people to log off as that is just a bandaid workaround that wont fix anything.

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Originally Posted by Maeka

Maintenance is not the answer. It would only make matters worse.

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it is possible that a maintanance would fix the problem IF they actually did it properly

Besides, at the rate people are getting kicked out of the game, the logging off is happening anyway. :P

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Originally Posted by Wildsprite

people logging off and going to bed so others can do the quests does not really fix the issue, that is a workaround which in the long run only allows the problem to come back. they need to find a real fix for this. redunancy server clusters should be in place and the fact that their twitter indicates they expected this kind of thing shows how unprepared they actually were. so please OP stop trying to tell people to log off as that is just a bandaid workaround that wont fix anything.

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it won't fix the underlying problem. no. but it does fix the problem symptomatically. you won't even know it's there once people get through it, since it's always been there.

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Originally Posted by Gramul

Early access is a bonus to all pre-ordered versions of the game, no matter the edition.

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I don't get why people keep treating early access to the release version of the expansion the same as an open beta or a stress test weekend event. When you advertise things that come with a product you are beholden to deliver those; they aren't 'free bonuses'. A 'free bonus' would be if they did not advertise it as something that came with the game, but then they invited all pre-orders to it after the fact. If you ordered a TV off amazon advertised to come with a DVD player and an HDMI cable, you'd be OK if they just sent you the TV with a note apologizing due to poor planning, they couldn't deliver the other items and thanking you for your understanding? This isn't like a technical glitch, server instability etc. This is just bad design.

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Originally Posted by Wildsprite

people logging off and going to bed so others can do the quests does not really fix the issue, that is a workaround which in the long run only allows the problem to come back.

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The thing is, it's only an issue with a major surplus of users, which is a very rare occurrence that doesn't last very long.

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Originally Posted by Asphexius

I don't get why people keep treating early access to the release version of the expansion the same as an open beta or a stress test weekend event.

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Because a stress test is practically what it is. Companies sometimes do this to partly split congestion so it's not that bad on release. They just dress it up as a fun bonus, because if you tell people that some users have been selected to play before you, they'd be way more upset than people are now.

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Originally Posted by Asphexius

I don't get why people keep treating early access to the release version of the expansion the same as an open beta or a stress test weekend event.

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It's been a couple weeks, but didn't we all have to click on a early access terms of service box when we signed up? But yeah we treat it like a stress test because the devs treat it like one. That's why they have an official launch day.

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Originally Posted by Asphexius

I don't get why people keep treating early access to the release version of the expansion the same as an open beta or a stress test weekend event. When you advertise things that come with a product you are beholden to deliver those; they aren't 'free bonuses'. A 'free bonus' would be if they did not advertise it as something that came with the game, but then they invited all pre-orders to it after the fact. If you ordered a TV off amazon advertised to come with a DVD player and an HDMI cable, you'd be OK if they just sent you the TV with a note apologizing due to poor planning, they couldn't deliver the other items and thanking you for your understanding? This isn't like a technical glitch, server instability etc. This is just bad design.

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What else would you really call it? The servers won't be under this amount of stress for years after this.

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Originally Posted by Gramul

Because a stress test is practically what it is. Companies sometimes do this to partly split congestion so it's not that bad on release. They just dress it up as a fun bonus, because if you tell people that some users have been selected to play before you, they'd be way more upset than people are now.

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This would be a valid point if this was an actual pre-order bonus that ended some time before release. As anyone can buy this game at any time and get the access immediately right up until 'release date' its not really going to do anything/split up the congestion. This system turns the 16th into the default release date as so far as server loads and the general player base go. You say 'companies' like this is industry norm, but pretty much every other triple A studio MMO utilizes Beta phases to stress test, not convoluted early access. This might be more akin to what you get with early access for a crowd funded Indie title... (Or maybe a triple A from a decade ago).

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Originally Posted by Asphexius

This would be a valid point if this was an actual pre-order bonus that ended some time before release. As anyone can buy this game at any time and get the access immediately right up until 'release date' its not really going to do anything/split up the congestion.

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Well, that's why the "real" release date is in name only. Totally for the sake of splitting up the userbase.
It's all about the pastiche. The illusion of consumer reward. Convincing those that come in "early" that they're getting something special, while those that don't care as much will just buy it when it comes out "officially". It's all for show to try to mitigate the rapid influx so that issues can work their way out before the "official" release date when the mighty eye of the media casts its judging gaze.

I feel like Early Access has been more of a Beta test to be honest. I did not do a single Stormblood thing today. I came on the game at 5am CDT. I played 19 hours. In that 19 hours I unlocked SAM and RDM. The Duity Finder was broke a good chunk of the morning . When it did work and you leveled in PotD you might MIGHT get a run in. For a while it was working well than slowly but surely DC after DC after DC to the point I would DC log in wait for que get to loading screen to DC again. Happened all day long . I didn't even get SAM to 60 its half way into 58 I'm too tired and frustrated to finish it to 60. My plan was Wake up spend a good 8 to 10 hours to get SAM to 60 and rest of time enjoy Stormblood.................Never Happened. Something should be done on server level

The biggest issue currently is how tight lipped they are about accessibility. If there was some form of logic to ability to get these instances done then people could actually wait without having to play lotto with the NPC that initiates the instance.

And of course this board has had enough of said comment but it comes back to, why are they so unwilling to even attempt to implement a queue system for these instances? They have queues for everything else, dungeons, which you can solo queue right now with no issue, so why is it they don't want to implement a hotfix to create a queue for this content. a queue would solve the congestion, it would reduce the amount of information being sent to the server at a given time because the people who are spamming to enter would now have a ticket waiting for their turn. It's just baffling that they seem to have no other response but be patient and wait for it to die down.

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Originally Posted by Sayora

What else would you really call it? The servers won't be under this amount of stress for years after this.

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Oh i don't disagree that this is what it has essentially turned out to be. I just disagree that this is what it should have been and subsequently disagree with White Knights (generically, not anyone specifically I've been speaking with directly here) saying that its OK to have a failed launch but use semantics to say 'Oh no, the launch isn't reallllly until the 20th' as if this wasn't the same product that they would have turned out on the 20th. A proper Beta/stress phase would have been weeks in advance anyways, not 4 days till launch.

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Originally Posted by Asphexius

Oh i don't disagree that this is what it has essentially turned out to be. I just disagree that this is what it should have been and subsequently disagree with White Knights saying that its OK to have a failed launch but use semantics to say 'Oh no, the launch isn't reallllly until the 20th' as if this wasn't the same product that they would have turned out on the 20th. A proper Beta/stress phase would have been weeks in advance anyways, not 4 days till launch.

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LOL! I don't think I qualify as a white knight. I crank off half the people I talk to on this board. I've just done enough "launch days" to expect them to be like this.

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Originally Posted by Gramul

Totally for the sake of splitting up the userbase.The illusion of consumer reward. Convincing those that come in "early" that they're getting something special, while those that don't care as much will just buy it when it comes out "officially". It's all for show to try to mitigate the rapid influx so that issues can work their way out before the "official" release date when the mighty eye of the media casts its judging gaze.

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I totally agree with this likely being a way to mitigate bad media impressions, but I really doubt this is going to fool the players into buying and accessing the game 4 days later for no real reason, do you? I also agree that the 'early access bonus' certainly could have snagged extra pre-orders early on, but I just really doubt anyone is just sitting around for the 'release date' if they intend to play it instead of just getting it then/now/whenever and getting instant access (to the first half an hour of content).

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Originally Posted by Asphexius

Oh i don't disagree that this is what it has essentially turned out to be. I just disagree that this is what it should have been and subsequently disagree with White Knights saying that its OK to have a failed launch but use semantics to say 'Oh no, the launch isn't reallllly until the 20th' as if this wasn't the same product that they would have turned out on the 20th. A proper Beta/stress phase would have been weeks in advance anyways, not 4 days till launch.

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Oh, fair enough. I am indeed curious though if we'll see a surge on the 20th.

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Originally Posted by savageink

LOL! I don't think I qualify as a white knight. I crank off half the people I talk to on this board. I've just done enough "launch days" to expect them to be like this.

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I dunno if I read your post or not lol. I didn't name any names, more of a general thing as I've for sure seen some die hard fanboying here and in shout while trying to advance this borked MSQ. I'm also used to server stability/bugs/etc, but this is probably some of the worst dev. planning/short sighted issue I've seen to date out of a big dev like Square. Like everyone knows not to funnel everyone to the same hardpoint in expac #facepalm. Maybe "FF apolgist" would be the more apt expression :P.

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Originally Posted by Maeka

So I am seeing cries for "DO MAINTENANCE!"

Uh...

What would that solve, exactly?

What needs to happen, is people need to log off and go to bed, and let some people through. We are having these problems because the servers are just inundated with ridiculous floods of people all trying to do the same things at once.

If they don't do maintenance, people will eventually get tired of the waits, log off, and go to bed which is exactly what needs to happen.

If they did maintenance, then you force everybody to log off (which hinders progress), and then set a time that everybody can set their alarms to, so that they can all try to log on simultaneously, and we're back to square-freaking-one all over again.

Maintenance is not the answer. It would only make matters worse.

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I did that, got back on. Still a problem. And the problem got worse. And now I can't do pretty much anything except fate grind and crafting/gathering. Serves me right, for thinking maybe I'll just come back later and shit will die down. I mean it's not like more and more people won't get on repeatedly because they payed for a game to play.