Cleaning Up Instancing

[realXCV]

There are ages I don't really see having a public instance (even by changing SDL and hiding stuff).
...
- Pods ages: The only thing you can do there is waiting. Private instances of theses ages will no longer be necessary.

This is a contradictory statement. You don't see the Pods having public instances, but they should only be public?

I don't see them being public and private.

If you make a public instance of every ages. Some ages will have two instancing models (a private Minkata and a public Mikata), others only one (a public Delin, forget the private Delin).

This too is a contradictory statement. Under my suggestion, the public Delin would have no Bahro door... so if you don't have a private Delin, you've just made it impossible to solve the Age. Players would still need to form a group to solve Delin. Unlike other Ages with puzzle elements that are persistent, the group would not need to solve the Age once for each player in the group; all members could run through the Bahro door and claim the reward.

If you remove the Bahro door, there will no longer be any puzzle. By "private Delin" I hope you mean hood instanced (or something like that).

In MOUL, Ae'gura is the only place with two instancing models (public and hood). Instead of confusing the players on "Is this place a private or a public instance", it will confuse them on "Can I have a private instance of this Age ?"

I made very clear in my proposal on the exceptions - they are minimal. No confusion. There are public and private versions of everything except your personal Relto (if there is a Phil's Relto, then it has public and private versions), Nexus (D'ni have engineered it so two people don't land in the same Nexus cell), and Neighborhoods (they are not considered instances from an IC point of view; "public" and "private" for these only defines if they are open to all players from the Nexus).

Phil's Relto is still a Relto so instancing it doesn't make sense IC.

but I don't want to spend a lot of time defining and detailing a workaround until we know it won't be wasted time and effort.

Isn't that what we're doing with instancing ?

No. Instancing isn't a workaround for population limits. Instancing is a solution to allow every player the same opportunity to solve the puzzles and earn the associated rewards.

What I meant was something about spending a lot of time defining and detailing instancing while we don't know if it will be wasted time and effort

Following up on the two posts after that - I disagree with Grogyan about disabling the rotating door in Kadish. Parts of an Age that aren't part of Bahro or Yeesha tampering should be present and operating in public Ages (provided they have been restored by the DRC or whoever). Minkata presents a special challenge as that Age is so heavily modified by the Bahro, but I would expect the public Age of that to be absent all of the changes that the Bahro added. I'd like to see the public Ages all open for exploration - but keep the rewards reserved for solving the puzzles in the private Ages.

How will you explore sphere 4 in Ahnonay if you remove the cloths?

PS: For anyone that says, "But the public instances will spoil the puzzles!" - Yeah, and so does the internet.

It will spoil the Age and kill the puzzle. The internet doesn't solve games for you it explains you how and shows you what you get. Public instances do all of that.

[T_S_Kimball]

What I meant was something about spending a lot of time defining and detailing instancing while we don't know if it will be wasted time and effort

I'd like to repeat the above point. Though the discussion has been quite interesting (and a mind-bending learning experience), I reserve judgment on what Cyan did with instancing until I get to see the networking code. And review it with the eye of a SysAdmin who thinks a half-second TCP delay is a Bad Thing.

--TSK

[Marten]

If you remove the Bahro door, there will no longer be any puzzle. By "private Delin" I hope you mean hood instanced (or something like that).

No, I do not mean hood instanced. The group system eliminates the need for 'hood instancing. Please read my proposal, it is back a few pages - here's the direct link - and then we can discuss the merits and problems with it with complete understanding of each other's positions. Please follow that with Alahmnat's suggested changes to my proposal - as I haven't had time to merge in corrections and repost, yet.
Proposal: viewtopic.php?p=485#p485
Alahmnat's comments: viewtopic.php?p=501#p501

How will you explore sphere 4 in Ahnonay if you remove the cloths?

Privately, where there are still cloths.

PS: For anyone that says, "But the public instances will spoil the puzzles!" - Yeah, and so does the internet.

It will spoil the Age and kill the puzzle. The internet doesn't solve games for you it explains you how and shows you what you get. Public instances do all of that.

No, the same rule applies - each player is in control of his or her destiny, his or her opportunity (or lack thereof) to be spoiled. Players would have the option of going to public or private instances of practically every Age. If players want to link to a public Age before playing it in private, then that is their choice, just as they may choose either to look up a solution on the internet, or (at the other extreme) to avoid all websites that may post even the slightest bit of spoiler.

[realXCV]

By "hood instancing" I mean a sort of instancing that is between public (only one global copy) and private (one copy for everyone). If you only keep private and public then don't make a private Delin because it just won't make any sense. There will be a public Delin where players can meet others players to solve the age and you want to force them to go to a private instance instead ? If the Age wasn't resetting itself I would understand but it's not the case.

So... no party in sphere 4

Do you know many games that come with a bunch of save games in the package ?

[Mac_Fife]

I realise that the whole instancing thing is a bit of a necessary evil, and I'll leave it up to you guys who understand the mechanics of it all to work out the best "clean up", but just remember that it needs to explainable to new players. The concept of instances is counter-intuitive to many beginners - I remember trying to explain to a newbie French explorer in my 'hood Ae'gura why he couldn't find his buddies that were sending him PM's to join them. The combination of language and concept made that a bit of a challenge .

In an ideal world, we wouldn't need instances, but having everything public would also mess some things (puzzles) up: I guess personal instances of the "Yeesha's Journey" ages is plausible on the basis that each player has to "make their own journey" though.

Sorry, I know this isn't really furthering the discussion: It was just a reminder that the most technically elegant solution might turn out to be a tad tricky to explain. I shall now crawl back into my darkened corner...

[realXCV]

In an ideal world, we wouldn't need instances, but having everything public would also mess some things (puzzles) up: I guess personal instances of the "Yeesha's Journey" ages is plausible on the basis that each player has to "make their own journey" though.

If you remove instances you also have to remove the concept of the Relto.

[Marten]

By "hood instancing" I mean a sort of instancing that is between public (only one global copy) and private (one copy for everyone). If you only keep private and public then don't make a private Delin because it just won't make any sense. There will be a public Delin where players can meet others players to solve the age and you want to force them to go to a private instance instead ? If the Age wasn't resetting itself I would understand but it's not the case.

So... no party in sphere 4

Do you know many games that come with a bunch of save games in the package ?

Do you also mean by "private" that only one player can enter the instance? That is not what I mean.

You're right that a totally private Delin isn't of much use. But the approach I envision for instancing is to enable ad-hoc groups of players to form and visit instances together very easily. The Delin book can still reside in the Neighborhood library. I think it would work this way:
- Players approaching the book would have the option of linking to the original (public) instance or the journey (private) instance.
- The public instance is a place to visit, relax, and party. It is not possible to collect rewards there.
- If the player is solo (a group of one) and links to the private instance, he or she won't be able to solve the puzzle. (For various reasons, I do not want to prevent a player from linking into this age by himself or herself if that is what the player really wants to do.)
- If the player has formed a group with other players, anyone from that group that links through to the private instance will land in the same instance.

By these same mechanics, you could still throw a party in sphere 4; you just wouldn't be able to do it in the public Ahnonay. You'd have to create a group and hold the party in a private Ahnonay. This is not really different from the way things worked in MOUL before... everyone linking into Ahnonay Cathedral from the Pub landed in their own Ahnonay Cathedrals unless the "Share Book" feature was used. Grouping replaces the "Share Book" behavior with something that is faster and easier, and applies it consistently across all books rather than having some books work one way (Ahnonay Cathedral book in Pub, Eder Kemo book in Eder Gira), some books work another way (Delin book in 'hood, Silo book in Ahnonay), and yet other books a third way (City book in Relto, Bahro stone to City in Neighborhood - it was not possible to bring non-neighbors to any 'hood-instanced version of the City).

* If you wanted to hold a party in the back part of Ahnonay sphere 4, then players would need to use the journey cloth in the group leader's player's Relto - also exactly how it worked in MOUL.

I hope this clarifies things... my intention is to develop a set of new rules that do not limit or take away what players could do in MOUL, but that introduces additional possibilities and makes the game easier to play and understand.

[realXCV]

Do you also mean by "private" that only one player can enter the instance? That is not what I mean.

No. I mean one owner.

You're right that a totally private Delin isn't of much use. But the approach I envision for instancing is to enable ad-hoc groups of players to form and visit instances together very easily. The Delin book can still reside in the Neighborhood library. I think it would work this way:
- Players approaching the book would have the option of linking to the original (public) instance or the journey (private) instance.
- The public instance is a place to visit, relax, and party. It is not possible to collect rewards there.
- If the player is solo (a group of one) and links to the private instance, he or she won't be able to solve the puzzle. (For various reasons, I do not want to prevent a player from linking into this age by himself or herself if that is what the player really wants to do.)
- If the player has formed a group with other players, anyone from that group that links through to the private instance will land in the same instance.

Forget the original instance of delin. Players can visit, relax and party in the private instance which is already public (shared)

* If you wanted to hold a party in the back part of Ahnonay sphere 4, then players would need to use the journey cloth in the group leader's player's Relto - also exactly how it worked in MOUL.

No. Once the sphere is set as the active sphere, you can link there from the Ahnonay Cathedral. However if you want to link outside of the sphere, you need a cloth (or a new linking book).

I hope this clarifies things... my intention is to develop a set of new rules that do not limit or take away what players could do in MOUL, but that introduces additional possibilities and makes the game easier to play and understand.

Seen from that point of view...


I've got an idea... it's a mix between what is currently implemented and the public ages idea.

In MOUL, you have three instancing models. Public, hood and private. Public is exclusively used by the cavern. Hood is for multiplayer ages and private is for ages where you can have persistent changes. We can't remove public and we can't remove private. Now what to do with hood ? It can't become private because of the multiplayer aspect of the ages. On the other hand, if it becomes public, then you get all the population issues.

While thinking about the behaviour of the Delin book, I noticed something interesting. Every Delin book is in the same cavern (IC) but they all link to differents instance. One book, one instance.

A book instance.

An age can have a book instance and a private instance. -> Singleplayer ages
Another age can have a book instance and no private instance. -> Multiplayer ages.

The whole idea use the following rules:

Links to cavern in nexus are for the public instance.
Links in Relto are for private instances (except hood and nexus)

Concerning the cavern.
Nobody can own the cavern.
The "private" instance of the cavern is shared with every member of the hood.
The global IC instance of the cavern can only be accessed through Nexus. (except hood)
Rooftops and others places like that:
Each "public" rooftop has its own instance.
Each "private" rooftop is in the "hood instance"
Links to public ages.
2 books in the same instance -> 2 instances or 1 if it's the same age. Can also be 2 instances even if it's the same age.
1 book in 2 instances -> 2 instances
Links to private ages:
Same as in MOUL.

Concerning ages.
You can only acquire and/or access your own instances through a place you own or one that nobody can own.
Links to public ages:
2 books in the same instance -> 2 instances or 1 if it's the same age. Can also be 2 instances even if it's the same age.
1 book in 2 instances -> they all go to the same instance.
Links to private age:
You link to the current age owner "private" instance.

[BladeLakem]

I am really digging the bookmark idea, honestly. I like the idea that every linking book (except your Relto book and Nexus books) acts the same way.

It's also easy to explain:
"How do you link? Sure, just click on the panel and you'll go there. There also might be some book marks from Yeesha on the book. If you click the one with the one hand, you go to a version of that Age all to yourself. If you click on the one with the group symbol, you go to one that people in your party can all get to. If you click on the one with the neighborhood symbol, you go to the one all of the members of your hood can access. Not all of the tabs will always be there".

This, as a concept is scalable. There could be more tabs (maybe a 'guild' tab or some such). Or there could be less. And they could be turned on and off per book by Age creators or admins. And it seems pretty simple to me.

IC, you just say Yeesha made the bookmarks/tabs (She did say 'together or alone' after all).

[realXCV]

A symbol on the book to switch between private and public instances is what I had in mind while writing my idea. However I didn't include that on books in Relto because it didn't work with the multiple shared instances concept.

Too many symbols is not the best idea.
One for private
One for hood
One for a group
One for another group
One for public
One for a guild
One for testing