Rationing Playtime - An Unpleasant Sounding Temporary Solution

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This is a horrible idea. Absolutely not.

No Thanks.

I doubt this will last that long and while I has a nearly two hour que time, I wasn't knocked off and got in in the end.

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Originally Posted by ArkenaeuxBelmont

This is a horrible idea. Absolutely not.

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Assertion requires substantiation. Current projections for SE to acquire new server hardware to alleviate the issue is fall of 2022. Drastic situation, that players won't tolerate for 10 months.

Making a supermarket only open for 4-6 hours a day won't stop everyone from trying to walk through the front gates when most people get off work at the same hour in the afternoon.

Same concept applies here.

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Originally Posted by aveyond-dreams

Making a supermarket only open for 4-6 hours a day won't stop everyone from trying to walk through the front gates when most people get off work at the same hour in the afternoon.

Same concept applies here.

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Rations would cycle players out making room for the prime time players. The servers are full basically 24 hours a day at this point with the queues dwindling into reasonable territory only in the very late night/very early morning window.

No thank you.

No but if people are using new work arounds to bypass auto logout, we are heading to serve resets. Except with people being at home I expect them to log back in and start cheating again.

awesome idea! how exactly do you intend to assign the rationed slots? first come first server? excellent!!!

so you take a hours long queue... and make the payout only a couple hours as well.

wonderful idea.

so, remove any possible idea of people being able to play with friends, it will now be just a jumble of random people able to be on at the same time.

I can see, as explained, several reasons why this would be an abysmal plan and guarantee a dissatisfied player base.

if you were trying to kill a game, this would go a long way towards it.

sir... your 15 minutes are up.

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Originally Posted by Haseno

Assertion requires substantiation. Current projections for SE to acquire new server hardware to alleviate the issue is fall of 2022. Drastic situation, that players won't tolerate for 10 months.

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The only reason the queues are so large as they are, is because *everyone* who was unsubbed came back to play EW. The queues will lessen in another week or two. Stop calling down doom and gloom. It's not the end of the world.

Why should those of us that were able to take time off, rearrange our schedules and are able to log in during non-peak hours be punished for those that can't? I don't mean to sound like an evil person here, but we all pay the same subscription fee. If you can't log in during the non peak times, then you sit in the queue.

The ONE thing I'll side with on the gripe side of all of this, is Square looking into and trying to further improve the problem with the 2002 situation. There should be a coding fix there somewhere, or an increase in the disconnect grace period, that can help that situation.

You are basically calling for everyone to suffer, because a fraction of the playerbase is suffering, right now. I'm empathetic to people who can't change their hours, schedule, and don't have time to suffer through those queues right now, but *they will not be around forever*. Literally wait a week or two and the numbers will start to go down, either from the returners that don't want to stomach the queue, or the casual of casuals that finish their MSQ and then unsub like they always do.

"Why is it good to want others to be happy?" -- Ayn Rand


Can I just point out how hilarious it is that the guy with the Ron Paul signature wants us to stand in a virtual bread line with our Eorzean comrades, waiting for our daily allotment of gameplay welfare rations? Isn't it my Twelves-given freedom to selfishly stay logged in as much as I want to? Don't "rob your neighbor to make up for your mistakes," OP! Should have picked yourself up by your bootstraps and logged in earlier! :rolleyes:

But just to play devil's advocate, wouldn't the logic suggest that we should each get less time on weekends, not more? After all, that's when the most players are trying to log on, so it would help ensure the most people get to play to some extent.

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Originally Posted by Fyrebrand

"Why is it good to want others to be happy?" -- Ayn Rand


Can I just point out how hilarious it is that the guy with the Ron Paul signature wants us to stand in a virtual bread line with our Eorzean comrades, waiting for our daily allotment of gameplay welfare rations? Isn't it my Twelves-given freedom to selfishly stay logged in as much as I want to? Don't "rob your neighbor to make up for your mistakes," OP! Should have picked yourself up by your bootstraps and logged in earlier! :rolleyes:

But just to play devil's advocate, wouldn't the logic suggest that we should each get less time on weekends, not more? After all, that's when the most players are trying to log on, so it would help ensure the most people get to play to some extent.

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Exactly! Isn't a redistribution of playtime very anti-consumer and anti-freedom? I mean after all, we should be free to choose to play however long we want. Just like we're free to choose to sit in the queue or not.

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Originally Posted by ArkenaeuxBelmont

The only reason the queues are so large as they are, is because *everyone* who was unsubbed came back to play EW. The queues will lessen in another week or two.

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Thant will be because by then. 25-50% of the current player base will get fed-up and cancel there subs.

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Originally Posted by tuckerpb2

Thant will be because by then. 25-50% of the current player base will get fed-up and cancel there subs.

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And then most likely come back in smaller waves. Like has always happened before. With every single expansion.

Why the community is acting like this is outside the norm is beyond me. It's just scaled up from the same exact issue every expansion the game has. Either deal with it, or unsub. There is basically nothing Square can do at this point.

Be patient, and in a week or two the queues will start to come down. Or don't, and unsub, and come back later. The game isn't going anywhere.

Or could've done what many of us did and took time off and cleared our schedules to adjust for the mass chaos that we all knew would come.

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Originally Posted by ArkenaeuxBelmont

And then most likely come back in smaller waves. Like has always happened before. With every single expansion.

Why the community is acting like this is outside the norm is beyond me. It's just scaled up from the same exact issue every expansion the game has. Either deal with it, or unsub. There is basically nothing Square can do at this point.

Be patient, and in a week or two the queues will start to come down. Or don't, and unsub, and come back later. The game isn't going anywhere.

Or could've done what many of us did and took time off and cleared our schedules to adjust for the mass chaos that we all knew would come.

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many of teh people this time are new, so an expansion is a new experience here

thats why the community, parts of it, are acting the way they are

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Originally Posted by Kes13a

many of teh people this time are new, so an expansion is a new experience here

thats why the community, parts of it, are acting the way they are

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It's not a good excuse, to be honest. I've only been playing since last December, so only a few months more than the huge wave, and even I know to look for information and to take these devs at face value.

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Originally Posted by MilkieTea

It's not a good excuse, to be honest. I've only been playing since last December, so only a few months more than the huge wave, and even I know to look for information and to take these devs at face value.

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no, it isnt a good excuse, but really, you have to remember, a lot of those people do not have the experience here, and might be used to other game forums, where complaining at the top of your lungs is.. I dont know, therapeutic?

early experiences with SOE taught me not to have blind trust in a gaming company regarding a game I enjoy. but, while I will never fully trust SE and business decisions, I do take the devs here at face value, and am wise enough to know there is likely a LOT of information that I may never know, nor do I need to know. besides, research online is easy enough than believing someones rant at face value.

queues suck, no doubt, but the game is running flawlessly from my experience, so.. seems like a good launch and glad they took 2 weeks to polish the game more. (the login servers... meh... things happen)

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Originally Posted by Kes13a

no, it isnt a good excuse, but really, you have to remember, a lot of those people do not have the experience here, and might be used to other game forums, where complaining at the top of your lungs is.. I dont know, therapeutic?

early experiences with SOE taught me not to have blind trust in a gaming company regarding a game I enjoy. but, while I will never fully trust SE and business decisions, I do take the devs here at face value, and am wise enough to know there is likely a LOT of information that I may never know, nor do I need to know. besides, research online is easy enough than believing someones rant at face value.

queues suck, no doubt, but the game is running flawlessly from my experience, so.. seems like a good launch and glad they took 2 weeks to polish the game more. (the login servers... meh... things happen)

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Pretty much this.

I think a lot of people are lumping the developer team completely together with the company that employs them. Sure, the team is most likely beholden to a lot of the company's decisions, but this dev team has earned the credit and respect they get. They are as open as they can be. They DO listen to feedback. They stumble, but they are human. They admit fault.

The queue situation sucks for the entire community, but be patient. It WILL come down, just as it has in previous expansions. If we're all still sitting here an entire month down the line in the exact same place with queues of this size, I will be beyond surprised. It's been barely a week. Give it some time.

Or, simply don't, and unsub, if it is THAT traumatic and your experienced is soured. No one is begging the masses to stay subbed and convincing people to stay. Everyone is free to make their own choice is this is something they want to deal with or not. Vote with your wallet and your subscription.

"No one agreed with me so I deleted my OP". Bloody coward.

"this problem doesn't affect me so everything should stay the same UWU BEANS"

Dumbest idea ever. Considering how little I've been getting to play this past week, if they started rationing the time I do get I'll just play something else.

If they rationed playtime, you, and those of us stuck in the queue-error-requeue Bermuda triangle would be able to play, and the ones who net lose playtime would br those who have the privilege of not needing to work a 8-4 job and those who currently break ToS bypassing AFK detection.

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Originally Posted by Haseno

Assertion requires substantiation. Current projections for SE to acquire new server hardware to alleviate the issue is fall of 2022. Drastic situation, that players won't tolerate for 10 months.

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Interesting that the Ayn Rand guy would support a communist solution. Welcome to the revolution Comrade Haseno.

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Originally Posted by Haseno

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So he got called out because his suggestion is rather like rationing and not in line with his drival political views. Considering he deleted the post because he realized he was showing his troll side. Because you know the comparison of governments locking down people to SE rationing play time would ensue so quick the troll deletes his post. I love when people who spout a view point just do it for theater and not for any real belief. What a tool.

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Originally Posted by Snorky

So he got called out because his suggestion is rather like rationing and not in line with his drival political views.

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Considering how extreme and inflammatory his posts are.. I don't think there's any actual expression of personal values in them. Just trolling.

Most of the players can weekdays only play in the evening, so what will it help when the daily playtime ist reduced to for example 3 hours? Wont change anything. Only solution is to upgrade the server and yes sadly this will take time until done.

If you give everyone 3 hours per day, most people will still try to play at 7-10 pm. There will still be a massive queue and most people won't be able to play at prime time.

If you give everyone 3 hours per day and distribute them to random hours of the day, some people will still get to play more. One person can play at 8 am, 1 am and 3 pm which he got assigned to, while another person will not be able to play at those times and is locked out for 3 days.

Stop trying to punish everyone because you can only play in the evenings.

The only advantage of rationing playtime is that those who abuse the afk detection to not get kicked, now simply cant afk as they still get kicked (and with it waste their playtime in the process). But outside of that it barely does anything positive, because in the end, the spike of players still remains far too high.

If rationing should happen, i would adjust the system: Each person collects 2h a day. Outside of peak hours, this time depletes at a reduced speed (promotes playing outside peak hours, causing a lower peak). Players can collect up to 8h (casual players dont get to feel any limited time as they can do a session of 6h easily). Watching a cutscene gives a grace period in which time doesnt deplete (so there is no benefit from skipping, and no gain to extend the duration for no reason), the time is based on the expected cutscene length (and on that also displayed). Players also get the ability to request a certain time to play at (the queue tries to get them to log in at that specific time), and this queue is based on the last time someone queued (someone who wasnt able to play the previous day gets priority over someone who could).
But this would require a big update and still frustrate players, while i rather see that money spent on detecting AFKers that use bots to avoid the autokick (because they are truly abusing the system).

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Originally Posted by Puremallace

Interesting that the Ayn Rand guy would support a communist solution. Welcome to the revolution Comrade Haseno.

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Oh no, rationing playtime is the most capitalist system you can imagine!

You charge the same, but then you arbitrarily limit service (and therefore cost) to everyone! That's peak cost reduction business let's go neoliberalism horrorscape!

Simply put I cannot see how that would be fun. Even for non-paying customers because they are gonna want to keep them happy so they eventually want to buy etc..

It is a tough situation kupo but we will get through this hurdle.

<3 kupo

It will also cause issues in any party content.

The new tank who isn't comfortable with big pulls gets more pressure to do so because now he's "wasting the playtime" of other players.

A new player messing up mechanics is more likely to be kicked so that they can get someone new who may do better to avoid spending all of their allotment in that dungeon or trial or whatever.

''Logic clearly dictates that the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few.'' -Spock

Ergo, why should the majority of people who manage to get through the queue and log in, or sideline the queue by logging in before the pile on begins, then be punished with 'your allotment of 3 hours are up, out you go.'? I've said it in a similar thread, as long as I am actively playing the game, SE has no business telling me to log out after 3 hours, or worse, doing it for me. If I'm afk and get booted by the timer, entirely fair. But rationing? No.

op are you ok? you only post bad ideas in some weird way to get ppl to talk to you. do you need friends?

Not sure why every assumption is that people are "afk botting" all day. I'm sure there are some out there who've wrangled a basic VB script to quote shakespeare to their summoning bell, but a lot of us now work from home and it's trivial to set a timer for 25 minutes to poke your game manually.

I craft and gather during my breaks in the daytime hours. I can't run dungeons or any other more time demanding content until I'm off work, but I'm doing the most selfish tasks during the off hours when the queue is the standard "load no more than 100 people at a time" hours (mine was 44 when I logged in.) Then sticking with group content when my friends can log in, so the get the benefit of me playing. And then logged off pretty early to free up a slot. (I've gone to bed earlier in the last week than I had in the last year.)

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Originally Posted by Catwho

I'm sure there are some out there who've wrangled a basic VB script to quote shakespeare to their summoning bell)

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“To sell, or not to sell? That is the question—Whether 'tis nobler in the pocket to suffer the coins and ventures of outrageous fortune, or to take arms against a sea of bots, And, by opposing, undercut them? "

<3 kupo

Not many people will like this idea.

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Originally Posted by ArkenaeuxBelmont

And then most likely come back in smaller waves. Like has always happened before. With every single expansion.

Why the community is acting like this is outside the norm is beyond me. It's just scaled up from the same exact issue every expansion the game has. Either deal with it, or unsub. There is basically nothing Square can do at this point.

Be patient, and in a week or two the queues will start to come down. Or don't, and unsub, and come back later. The game isn't going anywhere.

Or could've done what many of us did and took time off and cleared our schedules to adjust for the mass chaos that we all knew would come.

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I agree with you mostly. But where I disagree is that this launch is quite different than previous expansions because of the surge of players that happened earlier this year. Shadowbringers launch had a queue but it was NOTHING like this.

The main difference between then and now is FFXIV is now essentially the market leader in MMOs. As Yoshi has stated numerous times now this has been the largest amount of people trying to login in the history of the game.

So the comparisons to previous expansions are not apt at all. And while I think the numbers will come down, I think the queues may still be significant even a month from now. But honestly that’s a good problem for the game to have. Suck for us, though.

I mean, set the number high and there's some value here. There's not much risk of people using tools to AFK for 12 hours before playing if they're going to get booted for the day after 6.

It's pretty drastic and almost certainly not going to happen, but after a couple of nights of not getting in at all while some clown on Reddit boasts about using a bot to AFK all day to save themselves a spot? I'm game for pretty much anything that isn't the status quo.

I would be okay with a 16 hours logged in and mandatory 8 hours off...