Possible timer for open world AFK'ers?

[aesteval]

Also through the years, we have heard the devs themselves citing network infrastructure and everything related as causes of various issues, or reasons for why certain things can not be done.

Some businesses operate on a bit of a use it or lose it policy for resources. Basically if they don't make full use of some resource they could see their budget cut in that regard because they didn't need it. Padding server usage could be a good thing if it keeps usage higher to prevent that sort of thing from happening.

[Madepossible]

Yet, despite all these, everyone seems to think that logging in and going AFK is perfectly fine?? And no, this isn't about a few 10 minutes, this is about characters rooted to the same spot with the little red chair next to their names for 4-6-10-16 hours. Sometimes even a day or two - I have seen such myself. These are just extreme and should not be allowed.

There is no valid reason why anyone should be AFK for more than hour; if that's the case, they probably have something much more important that's come up than a videogame. However little it may seem, the load on the servers could be lessened with the AFK autokick active. It needs to be there, it IS there in every online game with a bit of common sense. At the very least it needs to kick people who are idle for more than an hour.

And to add on top of that, it's not HARD to just log back in once you are back, just one click away tbh.

[Raynar]

Actually, no. Most other MMOs kick out players after they have been AFK for too long. Few people have a problem with it elsewhere, so I do not understand why it would be a problem here.

To name a game that issues in the long term was NCSOFT's Aion they ended up removing it cause people were QQing about D/Cing and Community Team justed didn't want to deal with which was random D/Cs and Force D/Cs. For Example. You and I may not see it that as issue but others do. I like stated Earlier I don't see problem of just relogin period.

[Renius]

Only place I have run into a problem is Quarrymill when lots are AFK so i simply do not go AFK myself there if you AFK in a "quiet" corner it does not affect anything or anyone. As long as you do not AFK the server very very very seldom will kick you. Plus I would really like to see a server that has 100's of people AFK at the same time. A bit of an exaggeration?

[TiaHariberux3]

They used to have this function, but decided to get rid of it since there were many complaints.

Wrong they had this function to secure a smooth heavensward release (same with instanced areas on bigger servers) after everything went to normal they just removed it again and Im sure we will see smth similiar at stormblood release again.

[Moonlite]

The afker mostly affect people with bad pcs/ps3s. They tend to migrate to certain areas for afkness. The op is crazy though. If the servers can not handle the players on the game it is SE fault. Even if the players are or aren't doing something They set the amount of players a server can handle and be stable. I do think in the future it would be better if they had a couple places for tomestone gear. People with older pcs and touchy internet have problems getting in and out of the zone.

To the Balmung thing. Balmung can have a que at any time of the day. But it is a lie. Just unque and try again and it is instant. Balmung has had open character creation during the work day. Yes Balmung can probably have 100 people afk in Idylshire, but the server has had less players on since a couple patches ago. It is not a patch lul it has been slowing down for awhile.

[HyoMinPark]

That's not entirely true. The sole reason iddyllshire is as laggy as it is and takes so long to load for many players is the sheer number of people afk there... that has nothing to do with internet route to servers.
Mor dhona was exactly the same in ARR but the problem magically vanished when the afkers all left and went to afk in iddyllshire...

That also doesn't haven't anything to do with the servers, but with your system, and how much it can handle. For example, my PS4 was so incredibly laggy every time I would teleport to Idyllshire, and I would take forever to log in. My FC mate, who plays on PS3, took even longer to load in. I recently switched to a gaming PC, and my load times are almost instant, and I don't see hardly any drop in my fps. So I don't really see that as a reason to implement an AFK timer. Because that's not an issue in regards to the servers, but one's own system limitations.

Honestly seeing all the AFKers doesn't bother me. Because they don't affect my game at all. Like others have said, the OP's random disconnects are not caused by too many people AFK, or the servers just randomly deciding to kick them. It's something related to their system, their connection, or something on the route between them and the server. And AFK timer won't solve their issue.

I suppose they could be useful for highly populated servers, but I don't play on any of the closed servers, so I don't know if there are queue times or such on a daily basis for those that do. Probably the only time they're useful is for expansion releases when everyone is wanting to get on and play. I could agree with turning them on then.

[Valkyrie_Lenneth]

Wrong they had this function to secure a smooth heavensward release (same with instanced areas on bigger servers) after everything went to normal they just removed it again and Im sure we will see smth similiar at stormblood release again.

Not entirely true. It was active up through 2.1 or 2.2 i believe/

[JunseiKei]

This was definitely a gripe back at 2.0 launch before they implemented the AFK timer for awhile; however, you still had some creative people who used third party software or macgyver'd something together to press their controller/keyboard and keep them "active" while they were away at school/work/whatever.

You don't even need to do that. Originally, you could just talk to an NPC to keep the game from kicking you. Another method was to just leave up your HUD customization and you wouldn't get kicked. Used this trick all the time, even when the feature was present; don't like getting kicked from the game. Sucks when you go and do something like load the dishwasher, come back and find yourself kicked and take 30+ minutes to an hour or more to log in (back in 2.0).

[Ilan]

Yeah please kick afk players, its totaly fun to que for something for 30 minutes or one hour and never tab out of the game because you could get kicked if you are afk for a second to long.

Idyllshire doesn't lagg because of the afk people it laggs because your pc or ps has to load all the people who are running around there.