Quote Originally Posted by Seig345 View Post
I’m not saying the code doesn’t need fixing, but how exactly can the server send you data about what other players are wearing without sending that data to your client?

The reason YOU would also end up naked is because the cross-data-center duties are hosted on a separate server dedicated to dungeon instances. Meaning you are playing a temporary copy of your character the moment you set foot in a duty, any changes to your character are then sent back to your world server upon leaving the duty and overwrites the character data as it was when you started the dungeon.

Also, if you didn’t carry any inventory into a dungeon with you, how would the game need to handle someone who doesn’t have enough inventory slots open to keep everything they decided to pick up in the dungeon when they leave?
It's not a question of whether or not data gets sent; it's how much, and how often. FFXIV sends huge amounts of data very frequently. The net result of this is less third-party manipulation (in theory - there are plenty of exploits that FFXIV has had to deal with), but a lot of unnecessary constraints imposed by server limitations.

There isn't a perfect solution, to be sure, but I would argue that as soon as an implementation begins meaningfully infringing on a company's ability to grow the game, it's time to shift course. If SE doesn't want to rebuild the engine, they should invest in vastly improved server capabilities, so that the effects are invisible for the foreseeable future. Otherwise, they're letting their own architecture throttle their cash cow.