To fix long queue times:Turn off "Air Force One" GATE until Gold Saucer event is over

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08-03-2021, 10:04 AM
HeavyMetalGod

To fix long queue times:Turn off "Air Force One" GATE until Gold Saucer event is over

SQUARE ENIX: The title says it all. With the surge of new players and everyone doing content. The "Air Force One" GATE is taking up instance server queues. I think it would help everyone if the GATE was replaced with an older non-instanced GATE(s) for the time being. It can return once the Gold Saucer Event is over.
08-03-2021, 11:02 AM
Kes13a

what on earth? how is it taking up instance server queues more than any other one?
08-03-2021, 11:19 AM
Bacent

I like Air Force One more than I like the dumb leap of faith. It's only me in that instance that I can see and I can actually have fun in it. Leap of Faith I'd have to wait until the last 30 seconds of it to actually not have a plethora of players around me at all times.

Just wish I could see the Cliffhanger ones more often though.
08-03-2021, 12:22 PM
KageTokage

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kes13a

what on earth? how is it taking up instance server queues more than any other one?

It has to create an individual instance for each player, unlike Leap of Faith which can accommodate several simultaneously.
08-03-2021, 01:52 PM
Iscah

Quote:

Originally Posted by KageTokage

It has to create an individual instance for each player, unlike Leap of Faith which can accommodate several simultaneously.

It's a very short-lived instance though, and no chance of people idling in it.

At most you might get a brief spike of Air Force games taking up lots of instances, but it's only going to happen for a few minutes every hour.
08-03-2021, 02:04 PM
Jojoya

Quote:

Originally Posted by HeavyMetalGod

SQUARE ENIX: The title says it all. With the surge of new players and everyone doing content. The "Air Force One" GATE is taking up instance server queues. I think it would help everyone if the GATE was replaced with an older non-instanced GATE(s) for the time being. It can return once the Gold Saucer Event is over.

Are we even certain that GATEs, dungeons/trials and solo duties are hosted on the same instance servers instead of having separate instance servers?
08-03-2021, 02:11 PM
KageTokage

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jojoya

Are we even certain that GATEs, dungeons/trials and solo duties are hosted on the same instance servers instead of having separate instance servers?

Back when the RMT bots were still flooding ARR dungeons, I'd occasionally ran into situations where the GATEs would not pop even during dead hours of the day when scarcely anyone was at the Gold Saucer, so I'm inclined to believe that at least some of instances are on shared servers.
08-03-2021, 02:13 PM
weebtext

I had a 20 minute queue for Leap of Faith the other week, yet on the same day AFO's queue was instant. Leap of Faith should be temporarily disabled instead.
08-03-2021, 02:25 PM
TeraRamis

Quote:

Originally Posted by Bacent

I like Air Force One more than I like the dumb leap of faith. It's only me in that instance that I can see and I can actually have fun in it. Leap of Faith I'd have to wait until the last 30 seconds of it to actually not have a plethora of players around me at all times.

Just wish I could see the Cliffhanger ones more often though.

I'm the opposite. I cannot stand Air Force One - it's stale, slow, it never really changes... it's just not good content.
08-03-2021, 02:35 PM
Fyrebrand

I seem to only get the long waits during peak periods when the most people are playing. If I'm playing off hours, there's no problem. I don't see a need to remove a GATE from rotation just for this.

And as Iscah pointed out, it's a much shorter instance and players don't stay in it after completing.

Quote:

Originally Posted by KageTokage

Back when the RMT bots were still flooding ARR dungeons, I'd occasionally ran into situations where the GATEs would not pop even during dead hours of the day when scarcely anyone was at the Gold Saucer, so I'm inclined to believe that at least some of instances are on shared servers.

Okay, but even if GATES and story/dungeon instances use the same server resources, there could be things going on behind the scenes we don't know about. Like, there might be a cap on how many instances GATEs can occupy at any one time, but no such cap on story and dungeon content. I think it would be hard to verify if the popularity of GATEs are impacting anything but themselves, without some sort of confirmation from Square Enix. On top of that, the game has such a huge influx of players in general right now, so that in itself is a factor.

When Stormblood first came out and we were struggling to overcome Raubahn EX, did anybody have trouble getting into a GATE?
08-03-2021, 04:02 PM
Soulebreaker

It's the only one I can do. Can't do the leap ones because of lack of depth perception. And I don't see how it takes up anymore time than the others. Try waiting for the one gate you can do.
08-03-2021, 04:51 PM
Sotaris

Don't see that problem on my server. But then I just spam the mini-games for an hour each day and make good enough MGP.
08-03-2021, 05:14 PM
Black_Wing

I would rather they get rid of the Gyr Abania LoF map. It's a cluster**** even when there aren't many people doing it. I've started to just not bother with LoF when that map pops -_-
08-03-2021, 11:59 PM
Sove92

Quote:

Originally Posted by KageTokage

It has to create an individual instance for each player, unlike Leap of Faith which can accommodate several simultaneously.

Really doubt it works this way. It can simply hold you and many other players in a dummy location while the minigame is being played.

It also doesn't matter because Air Force One doesn't affect the queues of any other instance. There are only so many instances a given duty can have up at any given time before a queue for that particular duty is formed (DF "stuck" at Reserving instance). These happen all the time for both GATEs.
08-04-2021, 01:48 PM
Fyrebrand

Quote:

Originally Posted by Sove92

Really doubt it works this way. It can simply hold you and many other players in a dummy location while the minigame is being played.

It also doesn't matter because Air Force One doesn't affect the queues of any other instance. There are only so many instances a given duty can have up at any given time before a queue for that particular duty is formed (DF "stuck" at Reserving instance). These happen all the time for both GATEs.

I'm guessing you're probably right about that. Sure, I sometimes get some substantial waits for Air Force One and Leap of Faith, but I haven't noticed any problems getting into anything else. MSQ was instant. Lord of Verminion was instant. Chocobo Racing was instant, or with only a very short wait. It's clearly not impacting other content.
08-04-2021, 07:08 PM
Moonlite

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jojoya

Are we even certain that GATEs, dungeons/trials and solo duties are hosted on the same instance servers instead of having separate instance servers?

You know that also includes inside houses, apartments, inn rooms,and squadron rooms. Think I missing one.

But has anyone been stuck in a reserving instance que, when a dungeon popped? I haven't seen one, so honestly curious.
08-04-2021, 11:35 PM
Sove92

Quote:

Originally Posted by Moonlite

You know that also includes inside houses, apartments, inn rooms,and squadron rooms. Think I missing one.

But has anyone been stuck in a reserving instance que, when a dungeon popped? I haven't seen one, so honestly curious.

Inn and squadron rooms work similarly to the Scion HQs and some few other area. All players share the same zone but the server doesn't send information about other players in the zone to you, so you only see yourself there. Long ago, this wasn't the case and you'd see lots of players in the Scion HQs. That's why both of them have the Solar behind a locked door you need to interact with to go through, to mitigate the performance issues caused by hundreds of players during heavy traffic days. Not entirely sure how the housing interiors work, it's far more complicated.

Amdapor Keep is a dungeon RMT bots are constantly farming, so it's one you can easily get a reservation queue for. Because it's an old dungeon that players are not doing a lot, it has less instance slots available to it.
08-05-2021, 12:39 AM
Iscah

Quote:

Originally Posted by Sove92

That's why both of them have the Solar behind a locked door you need to interact with to go through, to mitigate the performance issues caused by hundreds of players during heavy traffic days.

While it sounds correct overall – I've seen the party list indicating that I'm "in the same inn room as" another party member before – I'm not sure that the door lock to the Solar is there to manage player population because it's all part of the same instance. If you let the camera go into idle mode, you can see NPCs who are in the other room.

I think it's primarily there as a cutscene trigger point.
08-05-2021, 02:24 AM
Sove92

Quote:

Originally Posted by Iscah

While it sounds correct overall – I've seen the party list indicating that I'm "in the same inn room as" another party member before

The party list is a whole different beast entirely when it comes to client-zone communication, but you still won't get the remaining data necessary to see them in zone.

Quote:

I'm not sure that the door lock to the Solar is there to manage player population because it's all part of the same instance. If you let the camera go into idle mode, you can see NPCs who are in the other room.

I think it's primarily there as a cutscene trigger point.

The door acts as a camera barrier and the game can thus not render any object inside, increasing game performance. It's not about how many players are inside the zone, but about how many are rendered. Idle camera can see inside from the other side, but even it cannot see inside both sides at once, at least under normal circumstances. If it does, then the game simply renders both sides, but you are not exactly looking for performance in idle cam anyway. The idle camera also did not exist back in the days they still displayed other players inside.
08-05-2021, 02:35 AM
Bright-Flower

Quote:

Originally Posted by TeraRamis

I'm the opposite. I cannot stand Air Force One - it's stale, slow, it never really changes... it's just not good content.

I love AF1 in theory, but it's too slow and easy to get any sort of challenge out of it.
08-05-2021, 03:28 AM
Bacent

Quote:

Originally Posted by TeraRamis

I'm the opposite. I cannot stand Air Force One - it's stale, slow, it never really changes... it's just not good content.

Lord of Verminion would like a word with you, lawl
08-05-2021, 09:11 AM
Iscah

Quote:

Originally Posted by Sove92

The party list is a whole different beast entirely when it comes to client-zone communication, but you still won't get the remaining data necessary to see them in zone.

I couldn't see them, but for a local (not cross-world) party it shows members' HP and such only if they're in the same zone as you. From that I could see that someone was in the same zone, even though they visually weren't.
08-05-2021, 11:03 AM
Warlyx

oh the memories of 2.0 when instances were full ...u queued with a full pt and had to wait
08-05-2021, 01:29 PM
Macleod

How to fix long queues: Kick people the hell out of Leap of Faith when they're done. I don't need to see a crowd of people emoting and dancing like idiots on the last platform.
08-05-2021, 01:59 PM
Fyrebrand

Quote:

Originally Posted by Macleod

Kick people the hell out of Leap of Faith when they're done.

How can the game differentiate between someone who's "done" versus someone who's still trying to complete it? Until you click the goal and accept the reward, there's no way.

I guess you could flag the entire surface of the final island, so that if your character touches it then you're "done" and will soon be booted out. But then the players who want to remain in the instance will simply not hop on until they're ready to leave.

It's a shame people won't leave when they're finished, but the Make It Rain event only lasts another 5 days so I seriously doubt the devs are going to bother addressing it unless it becomes a long-term problem.