P2P servers. Open universe.

[Greg]

Hello guys. I recently started playing this game. I have 40 hours. But iam pretty experienced in open universe games.

I think this game is great. But i just found something that takes the impressiveness. Iam not saying i wont be playing the game, iam saying that this game could be much more than it is now. I hoped there was an open universe rather than sub servers ( p2p ) that limit the players so much. Another player told me. ''And I think most of us who do play open feel your pain....we would like to be able to have more people reliably in an instance, heck I'd like wings with multicrew....plenty of times I've been winged and had a friend on but they couldn't get to us in time!

Anyway I think such things would make open more popular for some, though possible less popular for others. Either way though I think even those who play private would also like bigger instances with more friends and better networking etc''.

Imagine ED being an open space stace game. No limitations. Like eve. How do you think this would work?. Could they make it happen?. I heard its impossible but i still hope. I would gladly hear your opinions on this topic as its a popular one. With this change hundrents of doors for this game would open. I would pay for it. Many would. Fly safe cmdr's

 

[FurtivePygmy]

First, welcome to the game!

In short, yes it would solve many of the instancing/networking issues that we've all become so accustomed to, BUT you are correct that it would be impossible without a huge rewrite of the game and massive architecture investment on Frontier's part (which simply isn't going to happen). It was essentially built from ground up with P2P in mind, and changing to a server based model would be prohibitively expensive and difficult at this point. If you are interested generally in what that approach looks like in an open world space game, I would suggest checking out what has gone into the development process of Star Citizen for an example (if you haven't already). Of course, that approach has its own set of technological hurdles to overcome, and presents many challenges that a P2P approach effectively avoids. So in the end, its a matter trade offs.

Although the topic is really just an academic one at this point, it is fun to speculate on how different Elite would be on a dedicated server model. I for one would probably prefer it since one of my main draws in the game is the social, player interaction aspect. Increasing reliability and stability there would be great IMO. But for those who like Elite essentially as space-truck simulator 2018, and the many who play solo, then such an approach would be largely unnecessary and probably introduce more problems than it's worth. I also frankly think we wouldn't have nearly as much of a completed game at the present point if Frontier had elected to go the central server route, since it would have been such a time and money sink compared to implementing the current P2P system. I also suspect that they would have had to introduce subscription costs (like Eve) in order to continue to support the architecture and running costs. I personally just don't play subscription based games since I never have the time to play consistently enough to justify the continued cost. I like being able to take several months off without feeling like I'm wasting money, or having to go through the hassle of continually activating and deactivating a subscription. Who know though, perhaps they could have found a way to work it out with the season model.

As it stands, it is one of those things that won't ever really be "fixed" in this sense, but can be mitigated somewhat. There have been improvements in networking and instancing, and as a player we can take some steps to work around potential issues. As I see it, yes it is annoying at times, but it is also so fundamental to what Elite actually is now that the best we can do is try to reduce that irritation and appreciate all the opportunities that we do have (when they work).

 

[StiTch]

It would be beautiful, OP. It would let players TRULY blaze their own trail; achieve self-motivated action in the galaxy, devlop roles, and police ourselves in the ways that ED has the potential for - instead of relegating the galaxy's great "narrative" to "who hauled the most cargo in the BGS". And our galaxy is big enough to support that alongside the peaceful solo playstyles if structured correctly; unlike EVE and its notorious gank-fest-ness, there are no guilds to promote the "join one or fail" mentality and no resources so scarce they are fought over by giants to the extent the newer players have to live off scraps.

Alas, ED is unlikely to change its architecture in any form. I suspect for its lifetime it will remain a game that showcases the worst of solo play gaming and the worst of multiplayer gaming. And this is not down to "can't" change but "won't".

 

[FurtivePygmy]

I suspect for its lifetime it will remain a game that showcases the worst of solo play gaming and the worst of multiplayer gaming.

Yeah... unfortunately although I think there are many positive elements to appreciate in Elite, I do think FD really crippled themselves by choosing in the beginning to try to straddle the solo vs multiplay issue. We have ended up with a Jekyll/Hyde scenario of both a single player game that is online only and is still affected (in the BGS) by other players no matter what you do, and/or a massively multiplayer game that only allows tiny pockets of limited interaction which are unstable at best. They tried to combine two essentially opposed approaches and ended up with something that sort of loses its identity as either.

 

[Brrokk]

Yeah... unfortunately although I think there are many positive elements to appreciate in Elite, I do think FD really crippled themselves by choosing in the beginning to try to straddle the solo vs multiplay issue. We have ended up with a Jekyll/Hyde scenario of both a single player game that is online only and is still affected (in the BGS) by other players no matter what you do, and/or a massively multiplayer game that only allows tiny pockets of limited interaction which are unstable at best. They tried to combine two essentially opposed approaches and ended up with something that sort of loses its identity as either.

I'd prefer to say that it's an imaginative hybrid of the two approaches which has many good features from both. It doesn't satisfy those who want just solo or just open universe, but it's a unique and very interesting game environment. A bit like a Python: not as good at combat as an FDL, nor as good at trading as a Type 9, but able to undertake either role creditably.

 

[JosiahD]

One thing to remember when it comes to a central server approach though is imbalance in terms of latency. P2P at least means that when I encounter another player, I can expect the outcome of any engagement will be less impacted by latency, whereas if I was in open with a UK or US based server, I would be at a significant disadvantage due to anything from 200 to 500 ms latency (depending on connection quality). Not unplayable, true, but a significant disadvantage based on my experience. Unless there were to be regional servers....but that would still have the effect of separating the playerbase, not to mention problematic for Frontier to manage. While I'm sure UK or US based players would benefit from a central server, by virtue of being geographically close, those of us much further away get disadvantaged......and after years of having to put up with that in a variety of online games, I'll take the P2P approach this time around thanks. As someone has already stated, it comes down to being a trade-off.

 

[Bunkerkind Anni]

One thing to remember when it comes to a central server approach though is imbalance in terms of latency. P2P at least means that when I encounter another player, I can expect the outcome of any engagement will be less impacted by latency,.....

ok, i welcome you to enter the same instance as i am with a third player,
and then tell me that due to peer2peer you are less impacted by latency.

 

[two quiet suns]

OP this video / explanation is fascinating if you are interested;

[video=youtube;EvJPyjmfdz0]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EvJPyjmfdz0[/video]

 

[TieKnee]

Hello guys. I recently started playing this game. I have 40 hours. But iam pretty experienced in open universe games.

I think this game is great. But i just found something that takes the impressiveness. Iam not saying i wont be playing the game, iam saying that this game could be much more than it is now. I hoped there was an open universe rather than sub servers ( p2p ) that limit the players so much. Another player told me. ''And I think most of us who do play open feel your pain....we would like to be able to have more people reliably in an instance, heck I'd like wings with multicrew....plenty of times I've been winged and had a friend on but they couldn't get to us in time!

Anyway I think such things would make open more popular for some, though possible less popular for others. Either way though I think even those who play private would also like bigger instances with more friends and better networking etc''.

Imagine ED being an open space stace game. No limitations. Like eve. How do you think this would work?. Could they make it happen?. I heard its impossible but i still hope. I would gladly hear your opinions on this topic as its a popular one. With this change hundrents of doors for this game would open. I would pay for it. Many would. Fly safe cmdr's

seriously..... you cannot compare this to eve.... I played Eve for just over ten years but 100% stopped when this game came out with VR and the ability to actually fly your own ship ... you cannot compare the two ... this is so much better!!! Hugs ...

 

[FurtivePygmy]

I'd prefer to say that it's an imaginative hybrid of the two approaches which has many good features from both. It doesn't satisfy those who want just solo or just open universe, but it's a unique and very interesting game environment. A bit like a Python: not as good at combat as an FDL, nor as good at trading as a Type 9, but able to undertake either role creditably.

Yeah, to be fair I don't mean to imply that it is therefore *bad* at everything, but rather that it doesn't realize the potential of either of those two paths as well as a dedicated choice between them might have. But since the Python is still an amazingly good ship even post-nerf, I actually tend to think of it more like this one particular acoustic/electric guitar I have: way harder to play riffs and high up on the neck + much weaker sounding that my straight electric, but also much less rich sounding and quieter (due to slim body) than my straight acoustic. In most situations, I will simply choose one of the two single purpose guitars; however, sometimes I do need or want the flexibility of the hybrid even if it does everything less well overall. My point above with Elite here is the same reason I ended up getting those other two guitars: eventually I got tired of the compromise just for the sake of flexibility. I do appreciate the attempt to do something difficult and unique on FD's part, but I guess at this point in my life, I prefer to just have more tools that do their respective jobs really well, rather than some "interesting" multi-tool with all manner of mostly adequate bits sticking out of it like some kind of over-eager Frankenstein (in Shelley's original sense of course, he really is just a misunderstood nice guy/monster/thing after all)!

Aaaand I think I've thrown around far too many analogies at this point, so I'll just leave it there.

 

[MadDogMurdock]

I'm likely talking out of my butt, but surely the P2P model provides a basis to insert servers.
My understanding is that the first player in an instance effectively becomes the host and all following players are connected through that host with the expected shennanigans of host switching when that first player drops out.
So host switching already exists as an infrastructure mechanism.

My thinking on this would be that when a second player joins an instance, that instead of joining the first player as the host, a server would start up and act as the host for both players instead, any additional players then join that.

Obviously, the technicalities are far more complicated than that but it doesn't seem insurmountable.

The main issue would still be cost of server hosting, and as already pointed out, that creates its own issues based on locality anyway.

 

[Schmack]

Wow, someone wants ED to be like Eve. Never read that here before.

 

[Darty]

OP this video / explanation is fascinating if you are interested;

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EvJPyjmfdz0

"We had 0 experience with online gaming."

Now I understand why they went with P2P!

 

[Greg]

Understand it or not. EVE is the most realistic open universe game ever. also it was made 2 decades ago and has 40k players on the same server. ALthough iam not going to touch it cause the game is completely unfriendly to new players iam just gonna say that those guys are geniuses.

 

[Greg]

I would pay a sub for open world. conquerable stations etc

 

[kofeyh]

Now I understand why they went with P2P!

This is a false equivalence. P2P scales in a way dedicated servers cannot. Frontier do run 'servers' for the universe simulation, and to provide the BGS to interact with. A set of elastic instances that spin up, down as needed. People assume the issue with multiplayer at scale is solved when you "just remove P2P". This is not entirely accurate, and is a massive oversimplification of the issues that are intrinsic with high numbers of connections operating simultaneously.

P2P simply exposes connection quality more, than C2S (client to server) does. It doesn't solve anything; it simply replaces one set of issues, with another set of issues. The requirements for handling say 1000 commanders in a single location; despite connecting from vastly differing locations, over disparate technology is complicated. Running something akin to 'mega servers' is non-trivial.

None of this is easy. I'd desperately like them to improve the code that is used for connection handling to better handle large numbers of connections, but that has nothing, really, to do whether that happens over P2P and P2S, and more how well the chosen platform copes with large numbers of clients, over variable services.

Frontier's most recent approach, is to simply bundle players in regions, with each other; this creates a number of 'silos' and open can then be fractured over a number of instances. Open to be truly 'open' requires that an instance can cope with people on 500ms+ ping or higher; which will leads to symptoms such as rubber-banding, positional errors, ships that don't take damage due to lag and so forth.

And given people have whinged about that, in the past, Frontier has elected to simply silo a bit instead. There is a very big reason some games have regional servers; they have no peer to peer and this is the only way they can function and distribute the game universe.

Again; i'd love to see some improvements in the resilience of the netcode; but that's a distinct and separate to the question regarding P2P.

 

[Chaparral]

I appreciate your insights kofeyh, I can't rep you again - but +1 virtual.

Do you have any idea about what level of resource commitment is required to put together megaservers such as those in Guild Wars 2, ESO, etc. that can handle populations of 100/instance with pretty minor latency issues? I've seen remarkable performance with dozens and dozens of players, particle effects, skins, overlapping field effects proccing combos etc. It's really a marvel to see - especially in world vs. world environments (large team battles 50/side).

I must say I was spoiled playing in those environments, and was severely disappointed when I observed serious latency issues with as few as 3 players in an instance in ED.

 

[kofeyh]

I must say I was spoiled playing in those environments, and was severely disappointed when I observed serious latency issues with as few as 3 players in an instance in ED.

The thing to bare in mind, is that it's taken years in most cases for these large environments to stabilize and become reliable enough to house hundreds of people at once. I think Frontier was just really naive, and has had their focus stolen by 'drama of the moment' issues that have plagued the game of late. Particularly a lot of moralising, which has to be chewing valuable time, on pretty valueless witch-hunts.

I think elite would be incredible, with hundreds of commanders in an instance; but look at how stations are built, as an example; a dozen or so pads. That's it; engineers? Less than a dozen pads. It was never designed for huge numbers because the environment we are in isn't designed for it.

The game assumes 'pockets' of commanders, groups of a dozen or so, in any given instance. Infrastructure, indeed matches this. I mean how many mechanics rely on mega-ships now, that can have as little as a single large pad? I think this is less whether the game can actually tolerate that, or whether that's actually the developers intent.

I don't believe, honestly, it is. Frontier clearly never intended large numbers of people in one place. This is mirrored in stations, outposts, planetary bases, megaships, engineers. Then look at stuff like private groups; again, designed for a couple dozen or so (with zero deligation of rights, no permissions model, etc). None of this, essentially, is designed for massive player counts. Scale? Sure. Concurrency? Not even once.

Folks, ultimately, crave an experience the developer never intended, hasn't designed, and doesn't seem motivated to achieve. Disappointing? Surely. But I just don't think they see this as important. And certainly not enough to focus on it.

It took something like two years for the fragmentation of packets to be addressed and actually resolved, because it took that long before someone actually looked at it (and was apparently as surprised as the player base).

So the approach frontier take to 'squadrons' is going to be, to my mind, actually fairly interesting. Because that is going to raise the fundamental issue with the 'pocket' model they have elected; because it's likely to presume this will be a form of wing-of-wings. And we anyone who's tried to get a bunch of wings into one instance, can probably explain the futility as it stands.

Ostensibly; for a large-player-concurrency model to work, the instances and infrastructure almost needs to be re-written; and that's probably a bridge too far. My guess is Frontier assumed people would rally around factions and powers and form little groups; which they have, of course, but that that would be enough.

The reality is; the game was sold on this notion that it's a connected universe, with thousands of commanders active, with vibrant hubs and lots of commanders doing lots of things. Yet, you can fly around the occupied bubble and it's an utter desert, from a hollow square perspective. Squadrons may upend the apple cart here.

Who knows. Either way, I've stopped sweating it. Frontier are, ostensibly, simply not motivated to do anything about the concurrency aspect.

 

[JosiahD]

ok, i welcome you to enter the same instance as i am with a third player,
and then tell me that due to peer2peer you are less impacted by latency.

I can only speak to my experience, not yours. Force the matchmaking to a UK based friend (ie by being in a wing) and the latency even on P2P is crap - as it would be for me if a central UK server were used. Allow the matchmaking to use the P2P and match on latency (not influenced by the friends list) and my latency with fellow aussies has been fine. As matchmaking over P2P was intended to be. Your point?

 

[lokvette]

ED is a great game, and I dont want ED to become EVE, I played that for over 6 years and its, its own monster in in its own right, but ED with a proper CP and open world universe would have been nice.

It will always be for me at least a "it could have been so much more" but as others have said we have what we have its getting better, but I came to the conclusion a long time ago that ED for me will be a solo player experiance. I want the hubs to feel like hubs, not as bad as Jita, but seeing 100's of ships coming and going and knowing they were all people was a thing to see, or any hub in any proper mmo where you know you see more than 20 people in one place.