Sharding alternatives

[Dawnspirit-wyrmrest-accord]

Any talk about the potential population as launch of Classic is nothing but speculation.

[Fateweaver-misha (Fateweaver)]

Any talk about the potential population as launch of Classic is nothing but speculation.

Ergo, I prefer they leave any (Non-Vanilla) changes for when they can come to a more definitive conclusion. Don’t put the cart before the horse, as it were.

[Dawnspirit-wyrmrest-accord]

And they never actually confirmed sharding was going to be in. Ion said at the Blizzcon QnA panel it was something they were looking at doing, not something guaranteed.

[Fateweaver-misha (Fateweaver)]

And they never actually confirmed sharding was going to be in. Ion said at the Blizzcon QnA panel it was something they were looking at doing, not something guaranteed.

I am aware. Which is why I make my opinion known when people say Classic™ will NEED sharding or “fail”. Blizzard hasn’t dropped the hammer on this one either way yet. I prefer as few Non-Vanilla changes myself since it wasn’t needed previously and, arguably, doesn’t fix some problems on retail.

[Dawnspirit-wyrmrest-accord]

As do I. I’m just not completely opposed to sharding the starting zones for a week or two. Would prefer them to come up with a better solution though.

[Laeric-wyrmrest-accord]

Blizzard may very well not be able to operate the game properly without it if there are too many people playing in one area.

If this is the case then they need to delay Classic’s launch until they can come up with a solution to it that is not sharding.

They run ALL their games off the same platform. That would mean they’d have to literally retool everything, which isn’t going to happen.

Besides, they might not even need to use it. Do you really believe that many people are going to be playing Classic per region?

[Dawnspirit-wyrmrest-accord]

They run ALL their games off the same platform. That would mean they’d have to literally retool everything, which isn’t going to happen.

The fel are you on about with this statement?

Besides, they might not even need to use it. Do you really believe that many people are going to be playing Classic per region?

Doesn’t matter how many per region, in the US it’s likely to be several hundred thousand at least. Maybe higher for the 1st couple weeks.

[Thalmàr-ravenholdt]

No sharding please, as a paying customer I am ready to face the consequences! Server queues, server crashes, fight for a mob when 10s of people around is part of a social experience. I prefer fight over a mob, to group up or just buff them and make some way of connection than not seeing, knowing a person because they are on a different shard, thanks.

[Laeric-wyrmrest-accord]

They run ALL their games off the same platform. That would mean they’d have to literally retool everything, which isn’t going to happen.

The fel are you on about with this statement?

Besides, they might not even need to use it. Do you really believe that many people are going to be playing Classic per region?

Doesn’t matter how many per region, in the US it’s likely to be several hundred thousand at least. Maybe higher for the 1st couple weeks.

How the fel else do you think we’re able to chat across multiple games? It’s not some magic feat of the launcher, it’s Battlenet itself. Which is a cloud gaming service at this point.

[Gnomistake-jubeithos]

I have already solved this, give people early access for a fee. They are more than likely to stick around because they paid more. I would be happy to pay an early access fee.

Also they should do sharding no sharding servers. I will guarantee my early access servers would outperform the sharded ones.

Also Bli$$ard makes money (secretly worships) and the server demand is staggered as the normal crowd join a day after etc.

This has been in the industry for decades. Bli$$ard are going to mess this up if they keep it, leaving millions on the table.

Let’s move on to more pressing problems like the destructive force of 1.12 and how it will destroy server longevity and quality.

[Sabetha-turalyon (Sabetha)]

And now you’re being just as hyperbolic as they are. Again, I do not want it. I’d very much like for it to be off permanently. But unlike you guys, I’m more than willing to accept the fact that Blizzard may very well not be able to operate the game properly without it if there are too many people playing in one area.

The cloud servers currently running the entirety of Battlenet literally cannot handle 200+ people crowding the same zone. That’s already been tested and proven.

Part of making Classic should be making sure the server doesn’t crap out just because there is a large number of people in one area.

Cloud servers could, without a doubt, handle 200+ people in an area if it were optimized to do so.

[Laeric-wyrmrest-accord]

And now you’re being just as hyperbolic as they are. Again, I do not want it. I’d very much like for it to be off permanently. But unlike you guys, I’m more than willing to accept the fact that Blizzard may very well not be able to operate the game properly without it if there are too many people playing in one area.

The cloud servers currently running the entirety of Battlenet literally cannot handle 200+ people crowding the same zone. That’s already been tested and proven.

Part of making Classic should be making sure the server doesn’t crap out just because there is a large number of people in one area.

Cloud servers could, without a doubt, handle 200+ people in an area if it were optimized to do so.

Blizzard switched to Battlenet 2.0 back when cloud servers were still in their infancy. I highly doubt they’re running modern cloud hardware.

[Dawnspirit-wyrmrest-accord]

How the fel else do you think we’re able to chat across multiple games? It’s not some magic feat of the launcher, it’s Battlenet itself. Which is a cloud gaming service at this point.

You do realize that the chat is managed by a chat server akin to something like skype or messenger. That’s how we’re able to talk across games. All the chat is posted in it’s own specific channel/sub channel on that chat server.

Changing how 1 game works doesn’t affect how chat works on any of the other games.

[Laeric-wyrmrest-accord]

How the fel else do you think we’re able to chat across multiple games? It’s not some magic feat of the launcher, it’s Battlenet itself. Which is a cloud gaming service at this point.

You do realize that the chat is managed by a chat server akin to something like skype or messenger. That’s how we’re able to talk across games. All the chat is posted in it’s own specific channel/sub channel on that chat server.

Changing how 1 game works doesn’t affect how chat works on any of the other games.

It still needs to access the Battlenet cloud in order to function though. That’d mean you’re technically running Classic off of not one but TWO completely different sets of servers. Can you not see how this is a bad idea, financially? For a project that’s not even meant to replace the main game?

[Hypêrspace-dalaran (Hypêrspace)]

btw, my idea is not the same as a typical server merge. its the same as the sharding server not sharding when the population depletes in the area where the server had started sharding. its the same thing. the only difference is, it lasts longer and has a name, so it can be joined by others who want to be on the original server the sharded server started out as.

[Dawnspirit-wyrmrest-accord]

It still needs to access the Battlenet cloud in order to function though. That’d mean you’re technically running Classic off of not one but TWO completely different sets of servers. Can you not see how this is a bad idea, financially? For a project that’s not even meant to replace the main game?

How do you think it works right now? All they have to do is give Classic access to the chat server. Like all their other games. And seriously? The main server, the login server, and the database server. WoW already runs on the 3 servers without counting the chat server.

[Sabetha-turalyon (Sabetha)]

Blizzard switched to Battlenet 2.0 back when cloud servers were still in their infancy. I highly doubt they’re running modern cloud hardware.

Setting aside that I would imagine they’d have upgraded the hardware at least once since Battlenet 2.0(even more so if the entire operation is maintained by another company Blizzard is simply paying), that’s not really the point.

One of the biggest strengths of cloud servers is that it’s very easy to pull in extra resources the moment that you need it, and to send them off somewhere else the moment you no longer need it.

With cloud servers, Blizzard no longer has to scramble to get additional hardware to bring more servers online just because there is a spike in traffic.

People keep talking about cloud servers like that’s supposed to be some kind of a negative here, but on the contrary: It should help Blizzard to handle expected spikes in traffic more easily than dedicated servers did back in the day.

[Laeric-wyrmrest-accord]

Blizzard switched to Battlenet 2.0 back when cloud servers were still in their infancy. I highly doubt they’re running modern cloud hardware.

Setting aside that I would imagine they’d have upgraded the hardware at least once since Battlenet 2.0(even more so if the entire operation is maintained by another company Blizzard is simply paying), that’s not really the point.

One of the biggest strengths of cloud servers is that it’s very easy to pull in extra resources the moment that you need it, and to send them off somewhere else the moment you no longer need it.

With cloud servers, Blizzard no longer has to scramble to get additional hardware to bring more servers online just because there is a spike in traffic.

People keep talking about cloud servers like that’s supposed to be some kind of a negative here, but on the contrary: It should help Blizzard to handle expected spikes in traffic more easily than dedicated servers did back in the day.

Yeah… and you know how they accomplished that?

SHARDING.

Sharding is literally the visible effect of what you just described.

I mean, correct me if I’m wrong, but that’s EXACTLY what that sounds like to me.

[Sabetha-turalyon (Sabetha)]

Yeah… and you know how they accomplished that?

SHARDING.

Sharding is literally the visible effect of what you just described.

Sharding is an effect completely separated from cloud servers and in fact, has existed in the game long before cloud servers were being used.

What it does is sends people off into different instances so that there is less load on the server per user. If there are 200 people in the area and I want to cast Greater Heal, the server now needs to tell 199 other people that I am casting Greater Heal. A few seconds later, it now needs to tell 199 other people that I have casted Greater Heal and that somebody was healed for X amount(unless I was interrupted, in which case more messages =P)

Sending all those messages takes server resources. The example I mentioned isn’t a huge amount, but it can add up when all 200 people are doing stuff.

Now if you split those people off into 20 shards of 10, it only ever has to send a message to 19 other people rather than 199.

When we talk about sharding we’re talking about the game dynamically doing that do us out in the world. When I say that sharding has been in the game longer than cloud servers, this is exactly how dungeons works.

Ever remember walking into an instance portal and seeing a message about how the instance server was down? That’s because the game tried to pass you off to the server shard responsible for dungeons on your realm, but there was a problem.

Cloud servers also solved that by creating redundancies in the server infrastructure. If something goes wrong with the instance server, another one pops up immediately and covers for it.

There’s a lot one could get into in the topic of cloud vs dedicated servers, but when talking about handling a large spike of players you weren’t expecting: Cloud servers have the advantage, and that’s one of the major selling points of them.

[Laeric-wyrmrest-accord]

Yeah… and you know how they accomplished that?

SHARDING.

Sharding is literally the visible effect of what you just described.

Sharding is an effect completely separated from cloud servers and in fact, has existed in the game long before cloud servers were being used.

What it does is sends people off into different instances so that there is less load on the server per user. If there are 200 people in the area and I want to cast Greater Heal, the server now needs to tell 199 other people that I am casting Greater Heal. A few seconds later, it now needs to tell 199 other people that I have casted Greater Heal and that somebody was healed for X amount(unless I was interrupted, in which case more messages =P)

Sending all those messages takes server resources. The example I mentioned isn’t a huge amount, but it can add up when all 200 people are doing stuff.

Now if you split those people off into 20 shards of 10, it only ever has to send a message to 19 other people rather than 199.

When we talk about sharding we’re talking about the game dynamically doing that do us out in the world. When I say that sharding has been in the game longer than cloud servers, this is exactly how dungeons works.

Ever remember walking into an instance portal and seeing a message about how the instance server was down? That’s because the game tried to pass you off to the server shard responsible for dungeons on your realm, but there was a problem.

Cloud servers also solved that by creating redundancies in the server infrastructure. If something goes wrong with the instance server, another one pops up immediately and covers for it.

There’s a lot one could get into in the topic of cloud vs dedicated servers, but when talking about handling a large spike of players you weren’t expecting: Cloud servers have the advantage, and that’s one of the major selling points of them.

Then… does that mean Blizzard lied and Battlenet’s NOT being run on a cloud? Or is the cloud very, very recent and yet they’re still using sharding?

It’d be helpful to know just WHAT Blizzard is using so we can formulate a proper discussion because right now all we have is guesswork based on very little information.