Can anyone please tell me if... (1017, login queues)

[AlexSkylark]

... if SE ever announced anything related to the queue system, or why we're getting 1017s instead of a long queue, or if they are doing anything to address this problem specifically in today's maintenance?

I've been trying to locate anything in that regard, but came up with nothing... did they ever made a clear announcement on what's causing error 1017 (instead of putting you in a queue), or there are only speculations by the forumers?

[zombifiers]

As far as I can tell the 1017 was intended to be put in place for when the queues were overloaded and you just couldn't do anything at all, but then 1017 started kicking people out of queue so I have absolutely no idea what's going on. It almost seems like it's a bug when you look at it that way?? But they never said anything specifically in regards to fixing that particular problem. They just said "addressing known issues" so maybe that's one of them.

[Dombringer]

You are not getting a queue because the queue list is full and thats why you get the 1017 code

[LionKing]

1017 meanings the world is full and they can not let you in. While put you in queue means there are several spaces are left in the server, therefore you can queue in for your turn but because there are people ahead of you, therefore you have to wait.

An example explanation: A world can only hold 5000 Players at any given time. So if you try to log in while the sever already has 5k players occupied, it will not let you in. Now, after a while 1000 players log off due to some various reason, means there are 1000 slots available. If you log in at this time, you will be put in queue. Say if your queue number is 378, you will get in eventually. However, the server will not accept any more player if there are already 1000 players in queue.

Not the best explanation out there but I think you can understand :P

[AlexSkylark]

1017 meanings the world is full and they can not let you in. While put you in queue means there are several spaces are left in the server, therefore you can queue in for your turn but because there are people ahead of you, therefore you have to wait.

An example explanation: A world can only hold 5000 Players at any given time. So if you try to log in while the sever already has 5k players occupied, it will not let you in. Now, after a while 1000 players log off due to some various reason, means there are 1000 slots available. If you log in at this time, you will be put in queue. Say if your queue number is 378, you will get in eventually. However, the server will not accept any more player if there are already 1000 players in queue.

Not the best explanation out there but I think you can understand :P

Well, IF the queue works like this, it's the worst queue system of the entire history of MMOs... That's how the queue system SHOULD work:
Server hold 5000 players online. you try to login when there's already 5000 people online. You are put in a "virtual queue" of sorts, organized by time of arrival (the time you tried to login). So, when someone logs out, person #1 on the queue is logged in the game, and everybody on the queue moves up a spot. And so, as people log out of the game, more people are let in, and your queue spot keeps going down until you're #1, and when the next person logs out, you get in. So, the server always has exactly 5.000 people on, never more than that, except on off-hours when there's less than 5k people playing...

Now, on that kind of system, you SHOULD be able to hold a near-infinite ammount of people on said queue, limited only maybe by the capabilities of the lobby server to handle said queue (depending on the server). But the 1017 error tells us there's a... maximum number of people who can be put in the queue? like, if the QUEUE is 300 people long, anyone else who try to login will get the 1017 in the face...

So, I'll ask again, does anybody here know of any official word on this specific problem, and if it's being addressed on today's maintenance?

[Nekodar]

As a followup to the newspost...
They limited logins and character creation because the duty/instance cluster couldn't handle all the people.
It was a temporary measure.
Real queues and AFK kick may come in addition to that if the expanded clusters are not enough to deal with it, but for most existing worlds there shouldn't be problems after this.

[AlexSkylark]

As a followup to the newspost...
They limited logins and character creation because the duty/instance cluster couldn't handle all the people.
It was a temporary measure.
Real queues and AFK kick may come in addition to that if the expanded clusters are not enough to deal with it, but for most existing worlds there shouldn't be problems after this.

Well OK, that means they are limiting LOGINS... but not why they are not putting us in a QUEUE. WHY they're not putting us in a queue and whether this will be done after maintenance today is the real answer I'm looking for...

[Nekodar]

Well OK, that means they are limiting LOGINS... but not why they are not putting us in a QUEUE. WHY they're not putting us in a queue and whether this will be done after maintenance today is the real answer I'm looking for...

They've most likely been too busy with server program changes in order to facilitate what this maintenance is about...
This could mean that they have put in some work into real queues too, but it remains to be seen if they're actually needed after the maintenance.

[Tsobail_InKari]

Well OK, that means they are limiting LOGINS... but not why they are not putting us in a QUEUE. WHY they're not putting us in a queue and whether this will be done after maintenance today is the real answer I'm looking for...

Their lack of transparency concerning their server updates is disturbing. I've found no hard evidence as to what their patch is going to involve.

[Kosmos992k]

As a followup to the newspost...
They limited logins and character creation because the duty/instance cluster couldn't handle all the people.
It was a temporary measure.
Real queues and AFK kick may come in addition to that if the expanded clusters are not enough to deal with it, but for most existing worlds there shouldn't be problems after this.

The servers are designed to handle 5000 people concurrently - spread across the server. They know going into this that the 3 start zones, Gridania, UlDah and Limsa are going to be the initial pressure points with far more users than any other, so I would think that the zones themselves are capable of holding more than 1000 simultaneous users. However on opening day, imagine if the server tried to allow all 5000 concurrent sessions into these three zones alone, it would collapse. Which is why they were initially throttling logins.

Limiting logins and the creation of new characters on servers is necessary at the start because the majority of players are packed into a small number of zones within the game. To make the game playable, you actually have to put limits in place. The reason is simple, it prevents too many players attempting to run the same leve's, side quests and FATES (remember these are generally not instanced) at one time in the same zone. If you've ever been in a really crowded FATE you will understand the problem.

Even if the population spreads out across all zones, there will be hotspots, most probably Uldah, Gridania and Limsa since the guilds, airship and Grand Companies are all there. Vesper Bay will be pretty busy as well because of the Wandering Sands key location. Because the server must reserve enough space for active players to enter these zones during play, there is a concurrent user cap on each zone to prevent over crowding that would affect gameplay. I'd bet we have been running at the cap in a lot of zones on most servers. The concurrent user cap in a zone is smaller than the total server cap since the server cap is made on the assumption of players spreading out.

The net impact is that if you try to login and are in a highly busy zone, you may not get on because the game knows that it cannot add any more users to that zone - even if the total concurrent user base on the server is below 5000. As players spread out, this becomes less problematic, and then we start running into the server concurrent user count problem. If they increase the concurrent user count on the servers and players start spreading out, it will reduce pressure on any one zone, and make getting into the game far, far easier.

An AFK timer would help right now, but may not be needed long term.