anyone else hates instancing as it is now?

Simone · **Joined:** Tue Feb 23, 2010 10:43 am **Posts:** 282

I started posting this in another thread, but I realized I was OT... so here it is!

I'd like to see simple instancing rules. I think this would go a long way towards making it easier for new explorers to catch up, and for old and new explorers to meet and enjoy the multiplayer environment.

Random thoughts about this:

- the main problem for me is: how is a newcomer supposed to know about instancing at all?!?!? without looking at the forums, of course, or asking other explorers after hours of confused linking

- no 'hood instances of balconies etc, but only public ones... the only 'hood instance which could make sense is the Ae'gura link in the hood linking room, and of course Delin and Tsogahl (although it does not make sense to me that these two are books and not stones)

- public instances of Ages available in the city and the Great Zero! I do not think that queueing up for the KI machines is such a big problem with the amount of people we have in the Cavern right now... it would be awsome IMO to be able to link to a new Age, and find other people who are starting to explore it with you.

- private instances are available via the Relto bookshelf which collects copies of all books, and also the Nexus "Personal Ages" menu

- for those who not want to go to a public instance ever, not even to collect the book on their Relto bookshelf: they can lay their hands on an appropriate symbol in the left-hand page of the public book, in order to copy it to their bookshelf

- explorers would then need to be more careful about spoilers in public chat, but I do not think this would be hard to achieve, or bad in general

What do you think?

Nalates · **Posted:** Thu Apr 08, 2010 4:37 pm

I think several people agree with you. I'm one.

I suspect in some cases odd things were done for convenience and as coding shortcuts for story. Some would like to see that fixed in open source. I can't find it but I seem to remember a good post Tweek wrote in instancing at OpenUru.org. You will see some conversation in that regard in this section: Suggestions

JWPlatt · **Posted:** Thu Apr 08, 2010 5:34 pm

You can also find some of the instancing (and Starting Point) discussions documented on the OpenURU.org wiki:
http://wiki.openuru.org/index.php?title ... ity_Portal

Also, vid did a whole lotta work on instancing, covered in this thread on the DRC site:

vidkid7 wrote:

This might help... some crazy over at the DRC forum went and mapped out the whole instancing situation.

http://forums.drcsite.org/viewtopic.php?t=1485

...wait... oh.

But there are broken links now (vid!) and I'd love to see his work archived on the OpenURU.org wiki.

belford provided a suggestion here:
http://mystonline.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=14962

And D'Lanor explained how it all works here:
http://mystonline.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=12797

Simone · **Joined:** Tue Feb 23, 2010 10:43 am **Posts:** 282

Thanks a lot to both for all the links! I usually don't go to the openuru forums, so I did not know similar things had been discussed there as well.

I know that people have written descriptions of how instancing works, and I know that complaining about how instancing is implemented is not a new thing, but I have not seen anyone bringing up the issue recently. Moreover, I'm not sure there's any (relative) consensus on what would constitute a better instancing model, so I guess it does not hurt to see if someone else jumps into the discussion! ;-)

Tai'lahr · **Posted:** Thu Apr 08, 2010 8:05 pm

JWPlatt wrote:

But there are broken links now (vid!) and I'd love to see his work archived on the OpenURU.org wiki.

Is that just an off the cuff comment or have you actually asked him about it?

JWPlatt · **Posted:** Thu Apr 08, 2010 8:22 pm

It's sincere, and I figure mentioning it here *is* asking. vid sees all.

AdamJohnso · **Posted:** Thu Apr 08, 2010 9:39 pm

I like instancing as-is; it makes perfect sense to me from an in-game perspective and always has.

belford · **Joined:** Thu Jun 08, 2006 7:01 pm **Posts:** 1890

My old (MOUL-era) post about simplifying instancing: http://eblong.com/zarf/uru/rj/essay-bet ... ncing.html

This is a fairly drastic proposal -- I'm getting rid of the Nexus, for a start -- but it preserves the ways that people played MOUL and adds a lot of flexibility, while also being much simpler.

Simone · **Joined:** Tue Feb 23, 2010 10:43 am **Posts:** 282

AdamJohnso wrote:

I like instancing as-is; it makes perfect sense to me from an in-game perspective and always has.

What do you mean by "in-game perspective"? Do you think it makes the game work better, the way it's implemented? I'd be honestly happy to understand.

D'Lanor · **Posted:** Thu Apr 08, 2010 10:26 pm

Instancing will remain necessary as long as this game practically stops dead when 200 or more people are in the same age. Fix that first and then we can get rid of those silly child age instances.

<rant mode on>And I wish people would stop using the ambiguous term "hood instance" and instead use the proper instancing terms the way Cyan named them. We have child age instances which you can share only with your neighbors. And then there are sub age instances which, if they happen to be in a neighborhood (Delin and Tsogal), you can share with all people in that neighborhood.</rant mode off>

Ian Atrus · **Posted:** Fri Apr 09, 2010 8:55 am

Instancing as it is is much too complicated, people need charts to understand it, and they're confused when trying to meet up with friends. It would me so much easier if 1. everyone (or every 'hood) had his own instance of things and 2. you could make groups up on the fly, with no silly need to share nexus links or stones or books every time you link: you simply select a group "leader" and everyone ends up in his instances until they leave the group. That way you always know where you're going to end up.

Simone · **Joined:** Tue Feb 23, 2010 10:43 am **Posts:** 282

D'Lanor wrote:

Instancing will remain necessary as long as this game practically stops dead when 200 or more people are in the same age. Fix that first and then we can get rid of those silly child age instances.

I'm not sure I've ever seen more than 30 people in any given place in the Cavern, in MOULa. But yes, if Uru gets bigger again, that could be a problem! Anyway, I'm not opposed to instancing, only to an undocumented (in game) and complex (for my brain) way of implementing it.

Quote:

<rant mode on>And I wish people would stop using the ambiguous term "hood instance" and instead use the proper instancing terms the way Cyan named them.

I would happily stop using the term "hood instance", if there was any way I could learn the correct names in MOULa, or without searching through forum histories. ;-)
It is always the same problem: how is an explorer supposed to know?

Pavitra · **Joined:** Sun Feb 14, 2010 7:53 pm **Posts:** 157

One very important step would be to show the instance name wherever then Age name is shown.

Generally, I'd say that every Age should be instanced by Explorer. Thus, there would be a Pavitra's Cleft, a Pavitra's D'ni-Ae'gura, and a Pavitra's Eder Delin (assuming that Pavitra's Hood had a Delin book rather than a Tsogahl book).

There could be a few "fake" Explorers built into the game, so that we could link to Real World's Cleft or some such. This is how I would implement the current concept of the "primary" Ae'gura instance.

By default, every Age links to instances of other Ages corresponding to the same Explorer. Thus, the book room in Pavitra's Hood would link to Pavitra's Gahreesen, Pavitra's Eder Delin, Pavitra's D'ni-Rezeero, Pavitra's Nexus, and Pavitra's D'ni-Ae'gura.

As a very special exception, each Relto would have a link to Real World's Cleft. I would set this Book apart from the others in some obvious way, such as placing it on a pedestal rather than on the bookshelf. Likewise, the Nexus would continue to work as it currently does.

I'm not sure whether Nexus should be strongly instanced, as it is now, or normally instanced, like everything else. I think I'm leaning towards the latter; this would allow new Explorers to have a friend come into Nexus with them and walk them through the process.

Whilyam · **Joined:** Tue May 09, 2006 1:04 am **Posts:** 4134

I'd like to see public versions of the Ages from any public area. Private versions on your Relto shelf. No city instancing. I have an up-to-date computer and I can tell you lag in Uru is almost 100% based on YOUR computer's power, not the number of people in an Age or whether there are cones in the City or not.

Pavitra · **Joined:** Sun Feb 14, 2010 7:53 pm **Posts:** 157

Whilyam wrote:

No city instancing.

As belford once said about something almost, but not quite, entirely unrelated: This is a lovely idea which needs to be shot dead.

The City must have something that at least fulfills the function of instancing. If it's not instancing, then it needs to be something else: maybe there are discrete regions that you can walk between but that are implemented as separate Ages or instances; maybe avatars beyond the N closest to you aren't rendered at all, with the value of N being adjustable in the options; maybe the game is changed in some way so that the City becomes less of a hub and more like Kirel or the Watcher's Sanctuary.

But "don't let more than 50 people in at once" is unacceptable, and even more so is "let everyone in, and if you can't handle it then buy a faster computer".

anyone else hates instancing as it is now?

Who is online