How Square Enix can solve both data center travel and ping/routing issues for NA

[shiftweave]

The issue is that there's insufficient raider population on Crystal, Dynamis, and Primal for raiders to meaningfully engage with the content on these servers.

Adding more servers would make the issue significantly worse. Just add cross-dc pf. Yoshi-p says "spaghetti code" instead of "no comment", it means nothing.

[mana-burner]

The cloud server test was not to test the viability of other data center locations, it was to test the viability of spinning up AWS servers to meet demand before bringing them back down, basically what Shadow in EU was for Dawntrain launch. They were pretty clear the entire time that this was not a plan to move any existing DCs into the cloud or move them between data centers.

I know, I was saying it's to test the viability of those services, not that it was to test an east coast server. Point is that despite that the majority of the feedback was regarding how well the game played from the east coast. And I can't recall a time where they explicitly said moving locations would never happen. Given the positive feedback I wouldn't write off the possibility.

Maybe but it's still worth a try. They could block off normal versions of those to travelers as well.

Even if it doesn't prevent everyone traveling, prevent some wanting to travel is half the battle because there are people that travel reluctantly (they want to stay on their Home DC, but because everyone left, they feel pressured to as well). It's an exponential problem.
A lot of people can't do that due to work and stuff like that.
Less but some do. It's really such a common thing that I once filled a linkshell in 2 days with people who felt that way. 128 people in 2 days. There are a threshold of people who break through the initial anxiety and join a [Practice] party but it's not like it completely vanishes.

It doesn't really make sense to me that you say preventing some people from moving will fix things and then acknowledge that there are already people who are reluctant to travel. To me this just goes to show that you can't just stop some people from transferring. Because those who really want to do it anyway will do it, and then everyone that's left will feel like they have to follow just like they have been.

Anyway I'm just not a fan of this type of solution, where the devs have to keep coming up with different limitations to adjust for how players work around the system. If party finder is neutered people will find other ways to make grouping work like LFG discord servers and if they went further than this we'll end up with a system where you can't do shit outside of your home server and DC travel becomes pointless.

I'd much prefer physically moving data centers. You don't lose access to anything you previously had. Instead of forcing them with shitty restrictions people go to the server that works for them because they want to be there.

[mana-burner]

We already know this won’t work because of materia. Oceania got a DC with good ping, and even most aussies didn’t transfer to it, because why would they, they’d been raiding just fine on the JP ones for years.

From the Aussies I've spoken with, ping to JP is only somewhat manageable and the main reason many of them aren't transferring is because they would be completely abandoning their old friends and communities. Even now that DC travel to materia is possible it only works one way so it isn't ideal.

The issue is that there's insufficient raider population on Crystal, Dynamis, and Primal for raiders to meaningfully engage with the content on these servers.

Adding more servers would make the issue significantly worse. Just add cross-dc pf. Yoshi-p says "spaghetti code" instead of "no comment", it means nothing.

I don't know if you played before DC travel was implemented but PF outside of Aether was fine back then.

[shiftweave]

I don't know if you played before DC travel was implemented but PF outside of Aether was fine back then.

Firstly - no it wasn't. Crystal was widely regarded as a total meme, and Primal players regarded as the strange ones who did weird strats. Crystal still to this day held onto that reputation.

Secondly, even if it was, then they did implement DC travel. Aether became the absolute hub, and just removing our access to that space does nothing to fix that. There are 11 DSR parties up on Aether right now. There's ONE party up on ANY OTHER NA dc. With Cross-DC pf, every NA player would have access to twelve parties. Adding more DCs without adding cross-dc pf would just add more zeroes to the board.

[mana-burner]

Firstly - no it wasn't. Crystal was widely regarded as a total meme, and Primal players regarded as the strange ones who did weird strats. Crystal still to this day held onto that reputation.

Secondly, even if it was, then they did implement DC travel. Aether became the absolute hub, and just removing our access to that space does nothing to fix that. There are 11 DSR parties up on Aether right now. There's ONE party up on ANY OTHER NA dc. With Cross-DC pf, every NA player would have access to twelve parties.

I raided on Crystal before DC travel came out and it was fine. I also did the current tier on Crystal and the experience was still fine. There are definitely enough raiders on Crystal and the perception of it being a total meme is itself a total meme. As for Ultimate raids, party finder is a bad option no matter where you go.

Anyway, my suggestion was not to add new servers or remove access to Aether, only to spread the raider population with ping as the incentive.

[Jeeqbit]

Yoshi-p says "spaghetti code" instead of "no comment", it means nothing.

That's not the reason. It's a genuinely complicated and risky feature on the backend like DC travel and world visit is.

[Ardeth]

I like that you have thoughtful solutions. I just don't trust players to not shoot themselves in the foot. That's why cross DC PF/DF is a necessity. We need to remove the server completely to remove the problem. If playing on Dynamis or Aether becomes meaningless, you've solved the issue. The problem chiefly is the players. You have to remove the barrier. Granted, it will make the community worse as a whole, but to be fair, it kinda already is. You have players selfishly moving to better suit them over their own server health. You're splitting hairs to keep the server communities. They died the second DC travel became a thing. Let's be honest with ourselves.

[mana-burner]

Considering I'm on Dynamis but live in Oregon... it would suck *massively* to have my data center end up on the other side of the country, so now I have to deal with a dead server *and* endless lag, so that's definitely a "nay" from me.

If they're going to do a bunch of data center moving of any kind, it should be merging Dynamis into Aether/Primal/Crystal. Give the 2 least populated worlds to Aether, split the remaining 6 into 3 each for Primal & Crystal, and then give Aether a new world later on (when Primal & Crystal population has stabilized) thus bringing all of the data centers that people actually play on up to 11. And just to avoid the same mishap that happened when they created Crystal; Put it to community vote as to which of the 6 remaining Dynamis worlds go where between Primal & Crystal, while also offering people on all 8 of its worlds the ability to free transfer prior to the merge just in case their home world ended up going somewhere they didn't want. Top it off with some official stance on how *none* of the worlds are designated as this or that so people shouldn't feel like they *need* to go to Aether for raiding/Primal for PVP/Crystal for RP because ultimately the labeling issue is the fault of the PLAYERBASE and not Square-Enix, meaning we're mostly to blame for why Aether became too congested in the first place and we really need to break that habit.

At least you would have the option of moving to a server closer to you. Those of us on the east coast don't currently have that choice. And moving Dynamis to the east coast would probably grow the population significantly. I know I'd transfer in a heartbeat.

[VerdeLuck]

Considering I'm on Dynamis but live in Oregon... it would suck *massively* to have my data center end up on the other side of the country, so now I have to deal with a dead server *and* endless lag, so that's definitely a "nay" from me.

If they're going to do a bunch of data center moving of any kind, it should be merging Dynamis into Aether/Primal/Crystal. Give the 2 least populated worlds to Aether, split the remaining 6 into 3 each for Primal & Crystal, and then give Aether a new world later on (when Primal & Crystal population has stabilized) thus bringing all of the data centers that people actually play on up to 11. And just to avoid the same mishap that happened when they created Crystal; Put it to community vote as to which of the 6 remaining Dynamis worlds go where between Primal & Crystal, while also offering people on all 8 of its worlds the ability to free transfer prior to the merge just in case their home world ended up going somewhere they didn't want. Top it off with some official stance on how *none* of the worlds are designated as this or that so people shouldn't feel like they *need* to go to Aether for raiding/Primal for PVP/Crystal for RP because ultimately the labeling issue is the fault of the PLAYERBASE and not Square-Enix, meaning we're mostly to blame for why Aether became too congested in the first place and we really need to break that habit.

This is what everyone not living on the west coast has to experience so what you'd go through is what we have to go through every time we log in and have 100+ ping to the server and trouble double weaving. I don't have a lot of sympathy when west coast players have told anyone from the east coast or midwest "suck it up" and "skill issue" for years.

[VoidsentStatus]

This is what everyone not living on the west coast has to experience so what you'd go through is what we have to go through every time we log in and have 100+ ping to the server and trouble double weaving. I don't have a lot of sympathy when west coast players have told anyone from the east coast or midwest "suck it up" and "skill issue" for years.

(east coast here) I remember when I started the game on GNB and found out about double weaving, and I thought it was just my internet dipping temporarly when I randomly couldn't double weave as I was progressing and changing gear frequently (not even materia usage). Wasn't until I played MNK/SAM that I realized my GCD speed played that important of a role under my ping tier for something I saw everyone doing casually everywhere on youtube. Only now as a growing/semi-veteran that I know 80% of those people I saw with no issues are PC using software or West Coast privelege. Actually an even more problematic issue for PvP because your sustain on healing, burst sync'ing to lower reaction, etc. are all ping tied so different jobs have different playstyles and reactions based on how their kit is personally cripled by ping. And it's a "well, I just objectively can't heal as fast, burst as fast, guard as fast, as anyone West Coast without cheating and risking my account, well that's not a fun choice to make."