Musings about dedicated servers

[babelfisch]

Since the topic comes up again and again, here are my ideas about it:

I think it would only work with subscriptions but non paying players shouldn't become 2nd class citizens. Player cap would still be around 32 slots, otherwise I fear lags are too much of a problem when it comes to PvP. I also believe dedicated servers wouldn't work for the entire galaxy / each system since it would get too costly and inefficient.

Let us rent personal servers for a monthly fee (€10-15). The game basically remains the same but instead of hosting an instance yourself it would be handled by your personal server. So everywhere you go you would 'carry' your server with you. This shouldn't be very difficult to achieve since all it does is handing over hosting of an instance to a different machine, which basically already happens in game today.

PS
Personally I don't need this and I don't have any hard feelings about matchmaking since I don't have a problem playing alone. Wanted to share the idea anyway since it seems to be the best solution (for a problem I don't have).

 

[amigacooke]

Paying a monthly fee would be a problem I do have to which there would be an obvious solution.

 

[babelfisch]

Paying a monthly fee would be a problem I do have to which there would be an obvious solution.

It would be completely optional.

 

[Factabulous]

Sooo. if we all have personal servers, then how do you share an instance - your place or mine

Not sure why this keeps coming up - as is always pointed out you then have the issues of latency between all the clients and the (now remote) server. Would be nice if FDev did a livestream about it

 

[CMDR Cosmic Spacehead]

I've suggested this before, but I didn't describe it very well. Lol

+1 as an option of course.
I'm personally not going to pay any kind of subscription for ED, but I can imagine other will for the added stability.
Depending on the server, you can probably up the count to 64 though.
Huuuge battles.

It would be kinda cool if FD organised, or "set the table" for battles, and put that battleground in its own server.
All new rules apply, so clogging is impossible (no more P2P so the server can keep your ship around to be shot).
Proper PvP battles, or dedicated PvE co-op (like us Vs Thargoids) battles with friendly fire off.

Would be good fun, but I'd imagine it would be pay to enter to support the costs. So probably not gonna happen.

 

[babelfisch]

Sooo. if we all have personal servers, then how do you share an instance - your place or mine

Doesn't matter since that 'problem' already exists today.

Not sure why this keeps coming up - as is always pointed out you then have the issues of latency between all the clients and the (now remote) server. Would be nice if FDev did a livestream about it

Latency is not a problem unless you are playing cross continents. FPS servers handle it as well. And I heard somewhere that Elite is very forgiving when it comes to latency.

 

[amigacooke]

It would be completely optional.

Then why would anyone do it?

 

[babelfisch]

Then why would anyone do it?

Because otherwise you wouldn't use a dedicated server? It seems like you don't understand the proposal at all.

That's probably my fault since English isn't my first language and I am pretty bad at explaining things.

Let's say I want more reliable matchmaking for me and my friends or random strangers. I could pay to use a dedicated server for hosting my instance instead of letting my machine do it which results in more stability. Or I am happy with the current situation and don't rent a server. In that case I only play on dedicated servers when I join the instance of someone who pays for it. Server hosted instances would obviously be prioritised when it comes to matchmaking.

 

[kpmop]

Doesn't matter since that 'problem' already exists today.

It doesn't though. We have peer-to-peer connections at the moment. All "personal" servers would add is an extra connection to go wrong and a load of arbitration to deal with (if I'm in an instance on "your" remote server, what happens to "my" remote server?). Peer to peer is certainly the easiest way to do what Elite needs to do given the number of potential instances required.

 

[tafkabb]

Fortnite has dedicated servers and that doesn't have a subscription. Just release a CQC Battle Royale mode

 

[Bigmaec]

Would the dedicated servers link into the shared BGS?

Because I foresee ... "problems" with that

 

[Dash]

Exactly what issue were people hoping to resolve by having a client-server model over peer-to-peer?

 

[babelfisch]

It doesn't though. We have peer-to-peer connections at the moment. All "personal" servers would add is an extra connection to go wrong and a load of arbitration to deal with (if I'm in an instance on "your" remote server, what happens to "my" remote server?). Peer to peer is certainly the easiest way to do what Elite needs to do given the number of potential instances required.

Please highlight the differences between an instance hosted by a server and an instance hosted by a player.

(if I'm in an instance on "your" remote server, what happens to "my" remote server?)

Nothing, the servers are virtual. You are sharing the server until you part ways.

 

[TheMegaTurnip]

So the issue between using player to player hosting is that the game, by default, gives the host to the player with the weakest connection (Shown time and time again with instance dynamics), resulting often in people not being able to instance, being bluescreened on drop because the game freaks out trying to find the IP, or straight up disconnects.

Dedicated servers offer none of these issues and with a far more generalised latency. (Im not sure on exactly how it works but I know Battlefield uses a system that tries to keep everyones latency at a similar level throughout the match.) Moreover, it allows FDev to monitor server traffic and optimise the servers based on such infomation, such as peak times, number of people on average in what systems etc etc. In turn allowing for much more control of thier game and a much better policed game. IE: loggers could be monitored and a real time server log could provide the evidence.

There is nothing to be lost with didicated servers and everything to be gained. The only reason I can see anyone contesting this matter is most likely down to them being a serial combat logger (Or cheater to the normal person), who does'nt want to finally have to eat ramifications for thier actions.

o-bloody-7.

 

[kpmop]

Please highlight the differences between an instance hosted by a server and an instance hosted by a player.

Well for a start there's an additional connection between a player and their server. If a player was to join an instance on another server they'd disconnect from "their" server and connect to the other server. If they then leave the instance they'd rejon or more likely create a new server instance and then reconnect this to the mission, adjudication server etc (of course you could maintain the original server instance, but that would need to be kept in sync and probably require another connection between the servers), either way it all starts getting a bit messy and this is just for two players... (This is all off the top of my head, btw! No, really.)

 

[ZeeWolf]

ED has (potentially) infinite instances so you have a major logistics problem if you want Frontier to provide servers to accommodate every possible instance variation at any time.

OK so OP mentioned everyone renting a dedicated server, but yeah what is that trying to solve? It's also adding a significant charge to players that won't see any benefit.

 

[VR Murgle]

Exactly what issue were people hoping to resolve by having a client-server model over peer-to-peer?

Amazing isn't it that the client server model has been around for so long when peer to peer is clearly the superior option...


Oh and I'm sure the players of "For Honor" were very upset when Ubisoft switched their game to client server networking as they were more than happy to be using P2P...

 

[babelfisch]

Well for a start there's an additional connection between a player and their server. If a player was to join an instance on another server they'd disconnect from "their" server and connect to the other server. If they then leave the instance they'd rejon or more likely create a new server instance and then reconnect this to the mission, adjudication server etc (of course you could maintain the original server instance, but that would need to be kept in sync and probably require another connection between the servers), either way it all starts getting a bit messy and this is just for two players... (This is all off the top of my head, btw! No, really.)

All of that already happens with the P2P model. Apart from the 'reconnect this to the mission, adjudication server etc' part since these servers aren't related to instances, therefore no reconnecting is needed. If I host an instance with 5 players and decide to quit the game the hosting of the instance gets transitioned to the next player, that already happens today. The basic infrastructure wouldn't change much with an additional server.

 

[ZeeWolf]

Amazing isn't it that the client server model has been around for so long when peer to peer is clearly the superior option...


Oh and I'm sure the players of "For Honor" were very upset when Ubisoft switched their game to client server networking as they were more than happy to be using P2P...

The "but game X uses dedicated servers" argument is a bit tired unless it's a large scale real time simulation with players interacting around similar design. Most real time simulations are designed around arena instances with limitations that well suited to a dedicated server model. Distributed instances is very useful for an entirely different kind of game.

There are very few examples of open arena real time simulation with MMO type design. Aces High 3 does have pretty large scale open arenas for example however in the case of ED you'd have to redesign massively to limit the amount of players in a fixed instance representing something like a system or remove the "infinite instances" possibility by stopping all game-play that involves interdicting or creating X numbers of connections created anywhere at any time.

 

[babelfisch]

ED has (potentially) infinite instances so you have a major logistics problem if you want Frontier to provide servers to accommodate every possible instance variation at any time.

OK so OP mentioned everyone renting a dedicated server, but yeah what is that trying to solve? It's also adding a significant charge to players that won't see any benefit.

Please read my post again. I never suggested that everyone rents a dedicated server, it would be completely optional.