Other Mmo Stats

[ReaverKane 363]

Hi!

Since many of you seem to have problems understanding why we sometimes discuss nerfs when it comes to the number of items and/or animals available to you per area, I would like to see some numbers from other MMO games. Maybe that will show how bad we are or if we are at par with other games. MMO games we should compare with are not games you are allowed to host on your own computer unless you accept 2-300 players on your local machine.

We are now using fully animated creatures (even if we'll be adding more animations later) with I'd say normal to high resolution textures. You may also consider ground decorations such as moving grass/farms and the density of trees. When it comes to trees we absolutely use less complex models than other games but it makes Wurm forests pretty dense comparatively.

So - please provide statistics from other games about items on ground you can see, items in inventory, number of pets, number of creatures you can control, etc.

Feel free to provide screenshots!

Ah Rolf, we're more concerned about hard caps on the server (maximum number of animals), its understandable to limit what your client renders, although that should be done mostly locally, and with settings like drawing distance (but with a max objects slider) Guildwars 2 is actually having simmilar issues with World Vs World settings, there take originally was a "culling", making the client render only a certain number of objects (in this case mostly other players) in the area, which led to issues with the fighting since there were people targetting you, who you couldn't see.

Recently that was changed with a more dynamic approach, using client-sided settings, and multiple types of placeholders.

Here's their article on the recent changes.

https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/world-vs-worldthe-end-of-culling/

[Dreago 11]

Java can be summed up as the number 1 issue, it simply was not made to handle an MMO and database of this magnitude, now I know you cannot really do much about that without halting development completely to convert your code to a different language but what you can do is STOP releasing new things and just focus on Optimizing your code, and Java to make everything use less resources. And if we are going to grow expand and get a few more servers to handle the load.

[KellyTxX 614]

I dont got many horses (nine or ten), but i love them.

If all my animals get killed in a short time-period, i sell my gold and take my last wurm-break, my final one.

Agreed

[Pashka 707]

Some people seem to have missed the point here (in particular the first two replies), though having said that I can't read Rolf's mind . What sort of desities of mobs or decorations are people expecting from their MMO's these days. Is Wurm so far behind, even, or even a bit ahead of the majority? How could it be addressed if behind? I think we can all agree that hunting can be difficult at times, certainly on some servers more than others, but is that may be due the nature of the game rather than low MOB desities? Certainly, we don't have instances here which in other games are insta-populated for the group you're with. As for decorations, again, tricky because Wurm allows for such customisation compared to many other games, especially when storage of 'stuff' is so important in Wurm. However, there are games out there closer to Wurm than the WoW's and guildwars etc. but I've not played them, so can't really comment on how they compare with respect to the above.

I understood exactly what he was looking for. But I stand by what I said. In no other game have I had to craft as many items in order to gain a level as I do in here. (I have been a crafter in every game I have played.) In no other game did I need as many animals in order to do what we do here. In short, again, in no other game do I need to do what I need to do here in order to gain the levels as we do here.

I am not saying it is a bad thing. I am obviously still playing here rather than in the other games. I am just saying as a few others have said that he might need to look at something to optimize rather than to spank folks for doing exactly what he has made them do in order to advance.

If he changes the game to fast easy mode, he will be no different than any other game out there in my own opinion. So that isn't the option that many that I talk to would want.

[rosedragon 2,282]

Answering the topic:

Hasn't really see any games that can shine like wurm in term of number of objects, although found many that can handle more players on one place (but again, on the case of many players on one place, there also many objects that should be factored in.. the only too-many-players I have experienced is impalong, which also have too-many-items). Thing is, wurm is sandbox, all those other games are rpg, which doesn't need tons of stuffs in single place. To limit the number of items on an area might means have to reduce the amount of materials needed to make stuffs-- assuming we are talking on clutters as much as impalong, not a personal space.

Before I stay in wurm, I'm used to be a big minecraft server named TheVoxelBox, also played several servers that have limited features yet host tons of players. In TVB we often held event with 30-50 players attending on one place (can find videos if you want, but posting mc here sounds like advertising another game lol)and it is fine... until people start screwing around by droping many entities (items), play particle effects, or terraform using our photoshop-like voxelsniper... I would say that the number of different entities, particles effect, and lighting updates are some stuffs that can easily lag a minecraft server. Griefing by throwing 1.000.000 entities also possible, a player won't be able to go near it and will keep dc-ing when trying. Also I ever have around 100 animals on a single pen on minecraft server and it happen to make myself lag badly LOL ...

Another game I can think of is the now closed glitch. The housing are separated entities from the world, yet in that house we can place unlimited furnitures albeit limited amount of animals. The furnitures, especially the boxes that act like single type of item bsb would make a player lag out for a moment until they have all updated and I guess.. cached for usages. Sometimes we make a place for party and can host 30ish players at that one place just fine, with more than 100 entities on the floor. But as soon as someone start to turn on a music box that play song on everyone computer and give graphical effect above the characters, it lagged out. This glitch game is using flash platform.

Commenting one of the first post:

Considering that we are still in the medieval era, and that during this era, horses, deer, chickens, and bison were (and in some areas still are) plentiful, I do feel that re-spawns need to be more regular and that those re-spawns should be based more or less on local area populations rather than server wide populations.

Excuse me, I live in the oldest server Independence and few days ago I killed a few unicorns and happen to witness they respawning after I go back there around 30 minutes later. Just on that single back and forth I collected 250 unicorn meats.. prolly killed around 20 unicorns. Also a month or something ago I and my friend hunted 1/4 of a secluded island that full of mobs, few horus later we found a few mobs already respawning on where we started. At this rate, I got around 20 fs just this month alone, and I only able to travel / hunt on weekends. Would suggest to not hunt at your home / place populated by deeds.

Edited March 26, 2013 by rosedragon

[Heroic 30]

Auction houses would be a great addition (some MMOs has them).

[Wulfgar 1,128]

Auction houses would be a great addition (some MMOs has them).

And completely kill Wurm. I don't see how it solves any of the problem or answers any of the questions raised in the OP either.

I think one big problem with this suggestion is.. current system creates old abandoned mines infested with creatures.. that means they are dangerous places as old mines should be. Would be a shame, if this would be changed.

True. There are no perfect solutions that will make everyone happy.

I dont got many horses (nine or ten), but i love them.

If all my animals get killed in a short time-period, i sell my gold and take my last wurm-break, my final one.

You would only need 20 AH to care for those 9 or ten horses, so I don't see the problem. If we go with the more radical suggestions like from Protunia, each player could only keep 5 animals and they would all be dead if you took a break.

[Rolf 3,563]

We're working on optimisations all the time, both server and client side and we are currently moving more code to use the GPU with shaders which hopefully will help a lot.

Optimisations won't help us when you render several 100 decent 3D models on the ground and 100s of animated creatures and a bunch of customized players. Eventually you will run into hardware limitations no matter how well you code.

I believe that's why you can find no other games with these numbers except Ultima Online which is using 2D graphics. Oh, Xsyon apparently is unlimited. I checked their website gallery and saw (rough estimates) 10 players and 5 creatures in the same screenshot, or screens with something like 50 crates or cannisters max. Trees in other games usually use more advanced models than we do though, but still can't be put in one place in endless amounts either.

Allowing unlimited number of items on a tile and solving it by clipping doesn't matter either. Since clipping involves figuring out whether an item needs to be clipped its vertices still have to be processed which uses up cpu be it on the server or the client. If the server should figure out whether an item is visible, it would have to run graphics calculations which would require supercomputers.

In short: it's not only what renders that takes a toll on cpu and graphics card, first you have to figure out what should be rendered and that also uses up cpu. Hence we want to spread them out so there are fewer within viewing distance. One alternative would be to only use piles and billboards for creatures but I don't think anyone of us want that.

The barn idea seems to do a couple of things:

It may make it possible to have pretty much as many creatures you wish

It may free up a lot of slots for hunting

It may make it very easy to stand still and grind, and a lot of the current mechanics for AH would be made pointless

It may make full trait horses everyones property for free

It may take away a lot of the connection with the creatures

If you should be able to enter them in some sort of instance, it may halt development for months or a year so that's too big a risk

It may be very good so I will consider it

My conclusion is still that we need to make sure you are somewhat limited in the number of creatures you can keep in a certain space. It has always been the intention but disease and other functionality fails for various reasons usually called bugs or OP. I don't see how it is unreasonable.

[Void 75]

You would only need 20 AH to care for those 9 or ten horses, so I don't see the problem. If we go with the more radical suggestions like from Protunia, each player could only keep 5 animals and they would all be dead if you took a break.

Well, i didn´t want to discuss my statement.

And i surly don´t discuss anything that come from Protunia, that name is the only one on my ignore-list for a reason.

Edited March 26, 2013 by Void

[Protunia 735]

Wulfgar, on 26 March 2013 - 01:29 AM, said:

You would only need 20 AH to care for those 9 or ten horses, so I don't see the problem. If we go with the more radical suggestions like from Protunia, each player could only keep 5 animals and they would all be dead if you took a break.

This is a lie I never said you could only keep 5 animals.

I started on Pristine 12/12/12 I left horses on Indy and have been on Pristine since the start.

I went back today and checked I have 4 foals ( older now ) still alive in nice sized penned area's 3 old & 1 aged.

The ones that survived had trees and grass in the pens, the ones on the farms did not.

This is after 3 months and they were not Cared For, all the Cared For ones starved to death on barren farm land.

Breeding is to fast after they give birth period as well as other things I posted in the other thread about never failing to breed and having to wait another ovulation cycle

Disease never kills anything I have seen, because its very easy to remove it.

I have 70 AH and have done it with 20-30 or so horses for the most part of that.

Care for is being abused with alts to the point some people want to keep every one alive they can.

Edited March 26, 2013 by Protunia

[Zuuma 42]

My conclusion is still that we need to make sure you are somewhat limited in the number of creatures you can keep in a certain space. It has always been the intention but disease and other functionality fails for various reasons usually called bugs or OP. I don't see how it is unreasonable.

We need chupacabras (http://en.wikipedia....wiki/Chupacabra) to deal with that if the animal is left outside the barn/stable structure.

You can let the fenced animals in deeded area be treated like citizen for population limit...or just create one animal population limit. And make harder to keep them in off-deed area.

Edited March 26, 2013 by Zuuma

[Elen 1,013]

limited in the number of creatures you can keep

Make things a smidge more realistic. Animals require a lot of care.

1. Add appropriate breeding cycles to female horses.
   
2. Increase gestation time to RL/8 ~ 43 real life days
   
3. Make horses require daily food and water, or they starve and die. 1.65kg of food and 5kg of water PER DAY PER HORSE (rl ammounts at 1/8 rate) ~ make it impossible for the horse to forage this much from tiles once a player had interacted with the horse. Also keep these functions from being able to automate, thus meaning inactives lose the horses.
   
4. Give disease a buff if horses aren't receiving regular grooming.
   

Also, what if caring for an animal didn't make it immortal, rather slow its aging by say a factor of 20. Combine this with the 14 day lifespan idea and you get a cared for horse living 280 rl days, while the ones uncared for cycle pretty quick.

Edited March 26, 2013 by Elen

[Protunia 735]

Make things a smidge more realistic. Animals require a lot of care.

1. Add appropriate breeding cycles to female horses.
   
2. Increase gestation time to RL/8 ~ 43 real life days
   
3. Make horses require daily food and water, or they starve and die. 1.65kg of food and 5kg of water PER DAY PER HORSE (rl ammounts at 1/8 rate) ~ make it impossible for the horse to forage this much from tiles once a player had interacted with the horse. Also keep these functions from being able to automate, thus meaning inactives lose the horses.
   
4. Give disease a buff if horses aren't receiving regular grooming.
   

Also, what if caring for an animal didn't make it immortal, rather slow its aging by say a factor of 20. Combine this with the 14 day lifespan idea and you get a cared for horse living 280 rl days, while the ones uncared for cycle pretty quick.

How about we get rid of care for all together?

That's 1/2 the problem if you ask me...........................more and more alts caring for more and more animals.

Care for was supposed to be so they would keep less, that's not what its being used for.

Like I said I moved to Pristine had a bunch of Horses left in Pens on Indy.

3 Months later I check and 4 foals not cared for ( 3 Old & 1 Aged now ) where there was trees and grass are still alive, the penned cared for ones in just farm tile area's all died from starvation and would have more than likely still be alive had they also been in pens with trees and grass.

Edited March 26, 2013 by Protunia

[Sandyar 526]

To me the barn idea is an immersion killer just like instances are in other games. I am not a heavy breeder by I have some animals for fun and some you can not find in the wild, likes deers, pigs, horses and cow/bulls. Personally I would rather see all those animals in the wild.

Let the wild animals live long and let player breed live short unless care for and then limit number of pregnant at a time that's a much better solution imo.

For the graphics if you have a non 3d accelerated graphic card you should expect some reduction in quality. If you want to play a 3d game it is reasonable you need a computer meant to play game with.

[rosedragon 2,282]

Make things a smidge more realistic. Animals require a lot of care.

1. Add appropriate breeding cycles to female horses.
   
2. Increase gestation time to RL/8 ~ 43 real life days
   
3. Make horses require daily food and water, or they starve and die. 1.65kg of food and 5kg of water PER DAY PER HORSE (rl ammounts at 1/8 rate) ~ make it impossible for the horse to forage this much from tiles once a player had interacted with the horse. Also keep these functions from being able to automate, thus meaning inactives lose the horses.
   
4. Give disease a buff if horses aren't receiving regular grooming.
   

Also, what if caring for an animal didn't make it immortal, rather slow its aging by say a factor of 20. Combine this with the 14 day lifespan idea and you get a cared for horse living 280 rl days, while the ones uncared for cycle pretty quick.

Is this sarcastic? Let's reset everyone horses then and see how many years until you get five speed horses.

Oh, and make it that our characters can't even walk on the first wurm year and wayy too fragile to do anything after 50 wurm years. And dead at 100 wurm years.

[AnarchistRise 320]

It may make it possible to have pretty much as many creatures you wish

It may free up a lot of slots for hunting

It may make it very easy to stand still and grind, and a lot of the current mechanics for AH would be made pointless

It may make full trait horses everyones property for free

It may take away a lot of the connection with the creatures

If you should be able to enter them in some sort of instance, it may halt development for months or a year so that's too big a risk

It may be very good so I will consider it

My conclusion is still that we need to make sure you are somewhat limited in the number of creatures you can keep in a certain space. It has always been the intention but disease and other functionality fails for various reasons usually called bugs or OP. I don't see how it is unreasonable.

Why not add , mabey 1 care for slot for every 2 ah, so 5 at 10ah, 10 at 20ah ect. Then, make all cared for animals log out as per the tamed setting. By increasing the usefulness of cared for, Uncared for creatures die faster, this may take off a massive amount of animals at any given time?

[Elen 1,013]

Is this sarcastic? Let's reset everyone horses then and see how many years until you get five speed horses.

Oh, and make it that our characters can't even walk on the first wurm year and wayy too fragile to do anything after 50 wurm years. And dead at 100 wurm years.

Sarcasm, nope. Tweaking features to make horses worth more money and increase wild spawns at the expense of people who want easy-mode pony-time, yes.

@ Protunia ~ yeah getting rid of care for would also be good

[FreshLJ 22]

Why not make it so that the care for limit is the same but animals must be cared for in order to bred? If the breeder removes the cared for status of an animal during the pregnancy then the animal instantly loses it's child. This could serve to reduce mass breeding and some over-population of penned animals.

[rixk 830]

Sarcasm, nope. Tweaking features to make horses worth more money and increase wild spawns at the expense of people who want easy-mode pony-time, yes.

@ Protunia ~ yeah getting rid of care for would also be good

Answering only to the making money part.. Currently there is no real need to get AH higher than 50(then you can start breeding 5-speeders), that is big part of the problem why horses are so cheap. So many breeders, who can breed best horses. Give a reason to get AH to 90 for example and the number of breeders will be considerably less and that also means less 5-speeders will be bred.

[Elen 1,013]

Why not make it so that the care for limit is the same but animals must be cared for in order to bred? If the breeder removes the cared for status of an animal during the pregnancy then the animal instantly loses it's child. This could serve to reduce mass breeding and some over-population of penned animals.

+1

[rixk 830]

Just had a thought.. make horses lifetime dependable on breeders AH.. this way those horses, which have been bred by people with 10-20 AH, will die rather quickly, but horses bred by high level (70-80 AH) will live long.. this would also give reason to keep skilling AH after 50.

[Suntzu 644]

You guys are doing it wrong, you only need one animal to shield train.

[Void 75]

Sarcasm, nope. Tweaking features to make horses worth more money and increase wild spawns at the expense of people who want easy-mode pony-time, yes.

@ Protunia ~ yeah getting rid of care for would also be good

Sure, why only get rid of care, why not set the lifespan of penned animals to 2 days?

Disgusting how certain people try to break husbandry for others.

I am off this Thread before i puke on my keyboard.

Edited March 26, 2013 by Void

[rosedragon 2,282]

Answering only to the making money part.. Currently there is no real need to get AH higher than 50(then you can start breeding 5-speeders), that is big part of the problem why horses are so cheap. So many breeders, who can breed best horses. Give a reason to get AH to 90 for example and the number of breeders will be considerably less and that also means less 5-speeders will be bred.

There is if you think beyond horses. I got difficulty on breeding hellhorses .

[Theos 13]

Commenting one of the first post:

Excuse me, I live in the oldest server Independence and few days ago I killed a few unicorns and happen to witness they respawning after I go back there around 30 minutes later. Just on that single back and forth I collected 250 unicorn meats.. prolly killed around 20 unicorns. Also a month or something ago I and my friend hunted 1/4 of a secluded island that full of mobs, few horus later we found a few mobs already respawning on where we started. At this rate, I got around 20 fs just this month alone, and I only able to travel / hunt on weekends. Would suggest to not hunt at your home / place populated by deeds.

Its great that you're having huge success finding unicorns. That doesn't explain low population on other animals, which is an issue complained about by many players, not just myself. My post didn't specify hunting, and a "secluded island"'s population is irrelevant. Noone cares how populated a secluded island is.