Game Discussions Star Citizen Discussion Thread v12

Is the true end goal one single shard for all players?​

This is our ambition, however giving a definite answer is not possible at this point.

We will start with many small shards per region and slowly reduce the number of shards. The first major goal will be to reduce this to only needing one single shard per region. To get there, our plan is to gradually increase player count per shard and constantly improve the backend and client tech to support more and more players.

It’s not just technology changes that are required to get to this goal - new game design and game mechanics are needed too. Without mechanics to prevent every single player going to the same location, a large mega shard will be very hard to achieve, especially on the client. For example, there could be a mechanic to temporarily close jump points to crowded locations, or create new layers for certain locations.


Am I right in thinking this is saying the following?

SC galaxy will be split into regions. each region will be a shard and there will be multiple shards per region initially with the intent to drive this down to one per region. Logically if you move region you must move shard so that is a transition phase, presumably what they call a jump point. If you try and jump to a region where the shards are fully populated the jump point will be closed, presumably while a new shard is provisioned or maybe until someone leaves.

Is region equal to location equal to system or something different? Currently we have servers, but in the speak it's effectively a system shard. It makes sense to me to transition system to system via a jump point, but what they envision sounds more like systems will be split down into multiple shards depending on how much is present data wise. A system with a barren planet might be a single shard, but if there were multiple city planets you might have several shards per system. So there will need to be intra system jump points (or similar) for the shard transition.

Sorry lots of questions, but I am intrigued as to how significant a change this will be from the current no transitions.
 
SC galaxy will be split into regions

Yes. But they mean real world regions there, not in-game regions.

In-game the whole game world will exist inside each shard (or 'instance' if you prefer), with a background sim shared by all of them. (IE iron ore demand in Hurston will be the same for all etc).

Each solar system will be hosted by multiple servers (one per planet etc), in their initial plan for 2022.

A key comedy aspect at the moment is that they can’t push the shard player count beyond the server player count for any given location. So the initial player count for the whole shard will be… 50 players

There are various implications: How will they populate a shard with multiple solar systems? How will capital ship battles work? How will they handle transitions between server locations? Etc etc.

Should be fun ;)
 

Is the true end goal one single shard for all players?​

This is our ambition, however giving a definite answer is not possible at this point.

We will start with many small shards per region and slowly reduce the number of shards. The first major goal will be to reduce this to only needing one single shard per region. To get there, our plan is to gradually increase player count per shard and constantly improve the backend and client tech to support more and more players.

It’s not just technology changes that are required to get to this goal - new game design and game mechanics are needed too. Without mechanics to prevent every single player going to the same location, a large mega shard will be very hard to achieve, especially on the client. For example, there could be a mechanic to temporarily close jump points to crowded locations, or create new layers for certain locations.


Am I right in thinking this is saying the following?

SC galaxy will be split into regions. each region will be a shard and there will be multiple shards per region initially with the intent to drive this down to one per region. Logically if you move region you must move shard so that is a transition phase, presumably what they call a jump point. If you try and jump to a region where the shards are fully populated the jump point will be closed, presumably while a new shard is provisioned or maybe until someone leaves.

Is region equal to location equal to system or something different? Currently we have servers, but in the speak it's effectively a system shard. It makes sense to me to transition system to system via a jump point, but what they envision sounds more like systems will be split down into multiple shards depending on how much is present data wise. A system with a barren planet might be a single shard, but if there were multiple city planets you might have several shards per system. So there will need to be intra system jump points (or similar) for the shard transition.

Sorry lots of questions, but I am intrigued as to how significant a change this will be from the current no transitions.
To be honest...I've utterly no idea. To me, the whole thing looks like a Google translation of how Turbulent probably explained the whole concept to Ci¬G in French :whistle:
 
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Yes. But they mean real world regions there, not in-game regions.

In-game the whole game world will exist inside each shard (or 'instance' if you prefer), with a background sim shared by all of them. (IE iron ore demand in Hurston will be the same for all etc).

Each solar system will be hosted by multiple servers (one per planet etc), in their initial plan for 2022.

A key comedy aspect at the moment is that they can’t push the shard player count beyond the server player count for any given location. So the initial player count for the whole shard will be… 50 players

There are various implications: How will they populate a shard with multiple solar systems? How will capital ship battles work? How will they handle transitions between server locations? Etc etc.

Should be fun ;)

One thing, in a way they will have invented the Private Group. Get 49 Org mates together, congrats, you've locked off a shard for your private play.

Who needs a PvP slider when you can simply cap the whole 'verse with your friends?
 
I shall name my mini-verse, Mobius :)

Ooooh, was just thinking, SDC might be a bit salty at the news.

Also...

tl1lw2sh60z71.jpg


CIG don't have a clue if they can do it, but got to keep hopes alive!
 

Viajero

Volunteer Moderator
Is the true end goal one single shard for all players?
This is our ambition, however giving a definite answer is not possible at this point.

We will start with many small shards per region and slowly reduce the number of shards. The first major goal will be to reduce this to only needing one single shard per region. To get there, our plan is to gradually increase player count per shard and constantly improve the backend and client tech to support more and more players.

It’s not just technology changes that are required to get to this goal - new game design and game mechanics are needed too. Without mechanics to prevent every single player going to the same location, a large mega shard will be very hard to achieve, especially on the client. For example, there could be a mechanic to temporarily close jump points to crowded locations, or create new layers for certain locations.


Am I right in thinking this is saying the following?

SC galaxy will be split into regions. each region will be a shard and there will be multiple shards per region initially with the intent to drive this down to one per region. Logically if you move region you must move shard so that is a transition phase, presumably what they call a jump point. If you try and jump to a region where the shards are fully populated the jump point will be closed, presumably while a new shard is provisioned or maybe until someone leaves.

Is region equal to location equal to system or something different? Currently we have servers, but in the speak it's effectively a system shard. It makes sense to me to transition system to system via a jump point, but what they envision sounds more like systems will be split down into multiple shards depending on how much is present data wise. A system with a barren planet might be a single shard, but if there were multiple city planets you might have several shards per system. So there will need to be intra system jump points (or similar) for the shard transition.

Sorry lots of questions, but I am intrigued as to how significant a change this will be from the current no transitions.

There is obviously no cost whatsoever, reputational or otherwise, in saying that you are trying to accomplish a hugely challenging, near impossible thing. Saying that has, on the other hand, the advantage of maintaining hype, hopes (as unrealistic as those may be) and therefore obviously funding. Other more ethical developers when faced with a task whose outcome was still way far from guaranteed or clear perhaps would simply remain silent on the matter, and of course wouldn´t even dare to base their main business model on getting customer money thanks to that unrealistic hype.
 
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Yes. But they mean real world regions there, not in-game regions.

In-game the whole game world will exist inside each shard (or 'instance' if you prefer), with a background sim shared by all of them. (IE iron ore demand in Hurston will be the same for all etc).

Each solar system will be hosted by multiple servers (one per planet etc), in their initial plan for 2022.

A key comedy aspect at the moment is that they can’t push the shard player count beyond the server player count for any given location. So the initial player count for the whole shard will be… 50 players

There are various implications: How will they populate a shard with multiple solar systems? How will capital ship battles work? How will they handle transitions between server locations? Etc etc.

Should be fun ;)
Thanks for the reply. I dismissed region as world regions based on what you reflect in the "various implications". Now I am very interest in how this will work out.
 
Never believed their singular shard stuff and the whole "coffee cup always stays there no matter what" stuff anyway, so for me its good that they've finally given us a rough timeframe for when we'll see SM + Pyro.

I'm sure going forward there will be many people proclaiming they never believed it (although i can almost guaranteed if you dug through their post history on reddit or spectrum you might see a very different story).

One of the fun things about these long-running threads has been watching the fan narrative shift over the years

"They're going to do it all, and it's going to revolutionise gaming!"
"Just wait for the next jesus patch, then you fudsters will see!"
"When the community voted for the scope increase, it was inevitable it would take longer, everything's still on track"
"Development only really started in 2016"
"It's not finished but I'm having fun with it so it's fine"
and now,
"I never believed they would be able to do it"
 
One of the fun things about these long-running threads has been watching the fan narrative shift over the years

"They're going to do it all, and it's going to revolutionise gaming!"
"Just wait for the next jesus patch, then you fudsters will see!"
"When the community voted for the scope increase, it was inevitable it would take longer, everything's still on track"
"Development only really started in 2016"
"It's not finished but I'm having fun with it so it's fine"
and now,
"I never believed they would be able to do it"

One of my favourite typical comment from way back circa 2014+ was "CIG are going to release a complete product, not an unfinshed buggy game like Elite!"

Oh boy, if only they knew back then what we know now.
 
Yes. But they mean real world regions there, not in-game regions.
Imagine going to a certain part of the galaxy and the game becomes unplayable because you went from 100ms to 300ms latency! that would be massively stupid and it will pretty much deny access to certain regions

edit: feels like the word datacenter is in the same “we don’t say that word here” list, just like instance
 
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Yup. 1000 in Manchester. Frankfurt is getting a new office and expanding. And there are the US people as well.

CIG clearly are thinking their income is going to more than double in the coming years. Either that or CR simply thinks existing backers will keep pledging more and more.
 
1700 developers? LOL wut? I work for a software company that does like 150 million in revenue a year (and growing) and I'm not sure we even have 100 developers
 
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