A minor inconvenience, but would it be too much to ask to have the chat channel cap raised from 400 to 1000? 1000 would be more than sufficient to accommodate everyone, and I can't imagine it would be a difficult change to make. If not, I'd at least like to hear the logic behind having such a small cap, especially considering 90% of the people in the channel are AFK in the guild lobby.
they jsut doubled it not that long ago from the original 200, itd be nice not ot keep getting knocked out if you go ld and haveot reload and it screws up yourchannel orders but they did do it recently and knew how many are usually in the general and general 1 and 2 channels so if they coudlve made it bigger they probably wouldvve
After Tuesday's patch, I noticed that general was exceeding 400 players. Then we had a bunch of servers tank. After that got resolved I've noticed that the general cap of 400 seems to be back in force. I obviously have no idea what caused the servers to crash a couple of days ago. This is just one thing I observed.
Only in Everquest do players have to camp a chat channel! Putting everyone, including free-to-play folks, in the same chat channel would help with forming groups, and that is of paramount importance for the health of the game.
I'll assume a few things here. If the cap is currently 400, then it obviously isn't based on the idea that there needs to be a cap to prevent everyone from talking at once, since 400 is way too large if that was the reason. So, it comes down to one reason I can think of: Server / network speed or resources. If you have 1000 clients all in the same chat channel you need to keep track of 1000 clients. You need to send out a chat to all 1000 every time someone texts. You need to be there when any 1 of the 1000 types and sends a text. SOE Live 2012 - After Action Report:
We all are assuming things when it comes to back end processes...and it may be server / network issues...but that would be sad if it was the cause at this point in EQ's existence. Really...having 400 in one chat channel on one server (on the back end) and 400 in another chat channel is silly. Having 400 client connections to a chat server each...and all chat servers working on the same channel is a much better solution. If there are 3 general chat channels with 400 each...it is three different servers on the back end? How hard it is to have each back end server send text to the same channel. Each server handles the 400 client connections fine...why can't they handle the same channel name? If it is one chat server and it is dealing with threads and it isn't able to process 1000 threads at the same time...well...still possible to send the same text to all the threads in different processes. Or add another server... These excuses that we get are all short-sighted vision issues. Scalability is challenging if the system isn't designed properly up front. For example, Firefall is having server stability issues since open beta...and it uses separate servers for things like the GH in EQ and the Bazaar etc. Different interfaces are handled by different servers in Firefall yet it is being overwhelmed on a 'soft release' open beta. This is simply poor scalability design. EQ is old enough..EQII has been out long enough...that these things should have been addressed already. When each server in EQ was full "all the time" (pre mergers) the scalability shortfalls should have been addressed. Designing systems to handle huge loads is part of the job on MMO teams you would expect. We are not talking Google-level hits to a server or suite of servers. Sure it is not 100 people but it isn't millions either. Having knowledge of the inner workings of the server back end processes of EQ would be very interesting to see...sadly working in California is not on my bucket list.
I'm sure they are saving the new universal chat to use as a feature in the new expansion. Universal.....to those that fork over $40.
I am one of those rare people who join the channels to interact, so increasing the channel limit would not be a bad thing.
I thought I made clear in my post with: SOE Live 2012 - After Action Report: “I mentioned that the Universal Chat Server (UCS) sucked, with it going down constantly. I was told that a new UCS was in the works, with, as usual, it coming to other SOE games first, then coming to EverQuest, Soon™.” That the current UCS is a kludge and SOE knows it. They want to replace it with a system like you are saying they should currently have. They don't have it and they know it and they want to replace it with one that does. But the team working on it is also working on 5 million other things and EQ usually comes last among SOE games when it comes to anything. So, yes, you guys are right that the UCS is terrible and should be fixed. The fix is on the way as a totally new fresh from scratch not the same system at all UCS (unless they canceled the project, who knows what SOE is doing behind the scenes), but don't expect it for a few years yet. They are not going to do much more than add a few rubber bands and duct tape to the current UCS. No point in throwing good money after bad if they have a real new UCS in development.
The UCS is not something that can be restricted to just those who buy an expansion. When / if the new UCS comes out, I'm sure it will replace the old one and be there for everyone, not just those who pay for the latest expansion. As long as you are Silver or Gold, I'm sure, just like currently, you will have access to the UCS.
