Recognized Server config option to keep some sectors loaded all the time

[Xavori]

Pretty straightforward. I think the game would benefit from being able to name at least one sector (and preferably more) as 'always on'

That means any factories, logic, NPC's in that sector would always be doing what they're supposed to be doing. And, as we get more tools for moving stuff around, you could create some very interesting motion-based stations for people to explore and interact with making for a much richer universe.

 

[jayman38]

Pretty straightforward. I think the game would benefit from being able to name at least one sector (and preferably more) as 'always on'

That means any factories, logic, NPC's in that sector would always be doing what they're supposed to be doing. And, as we get more tools for moving stuff around, you could create some very interesting motion-based stations for people to explore and interact with making for a much richer universe.

I can see this being useful for single players, but having a server config doesn't really help the multiplayer players. When they go off into another galaxy and start up their factory, they need to be online to have it running, unless they ask the server admin to add their factory sector to the settings and the request is granted. However, then you get into issues of responsiveness and favoritism, not to mention server load.

 

[Xavori]

I can see this being useful for single players, but having a server config doesn't really help the multiplayer players. When they go off into another galaxy and start up their factory, they need to be online to have it running, unless they ask the server admin to add their factory sector to the settings and the request is granted. However, then you get into issues of responsiveness and favoritism, not to mention server load.

Hence why it's an option and not mandatory.

(p.s. Arguing bad administrators is pointless. Don't play on their servers. Problem solved not matter what it is which is important because this new feature would be the very least of what an admin can do in this game to play favorites. After all, you don't need always-on factories when you can just create blocks out of thin air.)

I'm a server administrator. I would absolutely use this feature to build a neutral station with lots of cool stuff in it which I think would make my universe more fun for all the players. I used to do the exact thing my building cool stuff in the origin chunk of Minecraft.

You can even do things like personal warp gates that let everyone connect to your central, always on, station (I'd recommend keeping them small, maybe just astronaut sized) turning it into a community hub for your universe.

 

[jayman38]

I can definitely agree to this.

Edit: and it wouldn't be terrible if the devs decided to make the spawn sector perma-loaded by default.

 

[Lecic]

I can definitely agree to this.

Edit: and it wouldn't be terrible if the devs decided to make the spawn sector perma-loaded by default.

Minecraft has the spawn chunks perma-loaded by default, I've never seen any lag issues with it.

 

[CyberTao]

Minecraft has the spawn chunks perma-loaded by default, I've never seen any lag issues with it.

With just the spawn? No problems. But when everyone gets access to anchor blocks and decides to keep their factories/machines/etc loaded and running, it can lag a bit sometimes if the server isn't quite powerful enough.

That is probably my only concern, too much stuff being loaded permanently, though I suppose you can always yell at the admins about that one.

 

[Calbiri]

This is a VERY touchy mechanic to flesh out, if you're not sure about the reasons, simply look up world anchors in MC. A few of these things are no problem, but if even 1 is active in a sector and something... laggy happy, the server is trapped in that lag until an admin can find and clear up the problems. Imagine multiple's of this occuring. I'm not saying this shouldnt be an option, but it also should probably not be an option that is by default accesable to every player on a server.

 

[ltmauve]

Could we just have factories that keep running even when the sector is unloaded?

 

[jayman38]

Could we just have factories that keep running even when the sector is unloaded?

The whole point of unloading a sector is to shut down the included events, to keep the game running as smoothly as possible. I can't help but wonder if the starting time when the sector is unloaded could be stored, and then when it starts up, it calculates the difference and calculates the output that would have occurred in the meantime and updated automatically. A hug lag burst when it first starts up, but overall, the processing would be relatively moderate integer math.

 

[ltmauve]

I'm pretty sure you could keep the calculations going for what needs to be done to keep the storages and inventories working. No need to have the ships themselves loaded in RAM. Though if you don't just want people leaving the server with a bunch of factories running maybe have it a faction point cost?

 

[keylan118]

With just the spawn? No problems. But when everyone gets access to anchor blocks and decides to keep their factories/machines/etc loaded and running, it can lag a bit sometimes if the server isn't quite powerful enough.

That is probably my only concern, too much stuff being loaded permanently, though I suppose you can always yell at the admins about that one.

This is a VERY touchy mechanic to flesh out, if you're not sure about the reasons, simply look up world anchors in MC. A few of these things are no problem, but if even 1 is active in a sector and something... laggy happy, the server is trapped in that lag until an admin can find and clear up the problems. Imagine multiple's of this occuring. I'm not saying this shouldnt be an option, but it also should probably not be an option that is by default accesable to every player on a server.

Could we just have factories that keep running even when the sector is unloaded?

Solution: Have it calculate the stuff in the background, not even needing the area to be loaded. Or we could have it so that once the areais rendered it calculates it. So, kind of like jayman38 's idea.