They should simply add a global semi-common drop Y and a bag. When you get X of that drop, you hit combine to turn it into a clickable item, and then right click and it opens a one hour expedition for the zone that you are in and gives you the bag back. Then add a command to zone yourself(/expedTL) to the expedition if it matches the zone you're in, and it places you at the same point in that zone with a one hour lockout for joining *any* new custom expedition. You can add, remove people via normal exped commands, but nobody else can enter that zone without being added to the expedition. Respawn and rare timers are normal for this type of expedition, but just like a pick... you get no raid bosses. So you can either join a pick, or essentially create your own after a period of time collecting Y.
This is fine and dandy if the servers can actually handle more picks. Since they fairly recently reduced the number of picks, due to server stability issues, I'm guessing they don't want to increase the number of picks. For better or worse, fixing the server stability issues resulting from large number of picks does not seem to be a priority.
For the umpteenth time, adding picks at will is simply not an option, the devs have made this point clear. The game is running on 20-year-old technology, and each new pick consumes a big block of server memory, because back in the day it never occurred to them how they might need to conserve memory use in an open-world game. It has already been demonstrated that after the total # of picks reaches a certain level, the server's memory allocation thrashes from swap-outs and performance goes to h*, ultimately with server crashes. 99.9% of the player base does not want to go through that again.I have confidence that devs are working on a solution that does not involve additional picks, but it might not be ready for prime time for a while yet.
you'd think in 20 yrs theyd fix the tech or youd think in 20yrs worth of, think its safe to say, thousands of monthly subs, id think they could either pay for gms or pay for server memory if you think they dont have the money, better question is who would? p99 runs over a thousand players, does so for pretty much free, but dbg cant handle a server with picks i sense some flaw in that logic capt
P99 is just the original Trilogy. EQ pick code has to run on live servers which have 25 expansions and well over 1000 zones. P99 caps at around 1000 simultaneous players. Mangler caps at over 5K simultaneous players in prime time, if the class numbers in chat channels are to be believed. Only a very small % of players on P99 are in active raid guilds, whereas TLPs and live servers all have a significant raid guild presence, thus they generate a lot more instances. I don't know this for a fact, but I would bet that EQ servers already have the maximum physical memory their hardware configurations will allow. EQ is not running on an IBM supercomputer. In any event, when devs say they have set the pick limits to the best possible numbers and still be able to maintain server stability, I believe them. Wanting a magic wand solution doesn't magically make it possible.
Of course its an option. Just one they decide not to take. That all is just excuses to me. If you have ever done any computer programming, its just a question of will and how much developer time/cost. After all, remember that this game never had picks for like the first 10-15 years to begin with.. and iirc still doesn't on Live. You might also note that I specifically delineated a way It could be done without specific picks, but with expeditions. I also provided a method where it could be constrained, with both lockout timers and needed drops, which can be tweaked to make it harder or easier to open an expedition for the current zone, which would act as a private pick. So simply do it as an expedition. As a positive, you then have the ability to add or remove people.. assuming they aren't on lockout for a custom expedition. You need to be able to open an expedition, triggered by an item(made by a combine or sold in the marketplace), for the current zone... which has standard timers for trash/rares, and no raid bosses. Then simply add a command to zone into it should the zone its an expedition for match the zone that you are in. You can also require standard exped triggers like requiring say 3 people in group to do it, no lockouts for any of them, yadda yadda. Upon zoning in, you receive a lockout. Maybe you constrain people to only joining one of these once a day(basically 18 hours for obvious reasons). The constraints are what make sure the server doesn't get overloaded, while insuring that people can always get camps. At the same time, the problem of bot armies and camp fighting vanishes like a fart in the wind. At that point, you can probably even drop the True Box and it would allow everyone to box while making absolutely zero difference to their game play. Also note that the intention here is that a guild could say open an exped of like lguk and then spread people out to the various camps. Then you could talk to each other in ooc or discord and if one group wipes for some odd reason, drag the bodies and rezz them up. Swap people out as needed. I don't. Its a 20 year old game with sketchy funding that they probably don't want to put any real effort into. But YMMV.
It would likely take rewriting huge chunks of code (or all of it). There isn't enough payoff or they would have done it by now.
If they didn't update code at the height of their market dominance, doing it at the bottom is less likely.
I am reminded of the old US TV series The Man From U.N.C.L.E., where hallway lights flashed and alarms sounded at the detection of Fippy Darkpaw a THRUSH intruder. The lights are flashing now in DBG hallways, they know you're onto them.
