The New "Vanilla Standard"

[Black_Sun]

On the other hand, server admins are already able to restrict ships sizes on their servers. Not doing so may have a reason. Changing the default configuration in the game likely leads to server admins reverting these changes.

A number of players who have no idea about what is happening would now stumble upon error messages because their game does not support their ships anymore.

In the end the only ones actually effected by these changes may be players who do not know what is currently happening in the game. This in turn leads to these players also reverting these changes.

I do not see any gains in these changes as I do not think that server admins are not monitoring their own server configurations.

Going on, servers that are already running for a while, likely have ships in their universes that already exceed given restrictions. This would either force server owners to reset their servers or force them to revert configuration changes.

 

[Edymnion]

Even then, we don't have final optimizations. Its a little premature to talk about imposing limits when we don't even know what the final "average capabilities" for the game are going to be.

 

[Black_Sun]

Even then, we don't have final optimizations. Its a little premature to talk about imposing limits when we don't even know what the final "average capabilities" for the game are going to be.

Yes, I have the same opinion.

 

[Extholious]

As i see it this could be helpful and very useful in a server scenario but should not be on by default because Starmade is a sandbox game which means being able to do whatever you want, but i do agree it would be a useful thing for servers to be able to easily turn on and manage.

 

[DistantLifeform]

On the other hand, server admins are already able to restrict ships sizes on their servers. Not doing so may have a reason. Changing the default configuration in the game likely leads to server admins reverting these changes.

A number of players who have no idea about what is happening would now stumble upon error messages because their game does not support their ships anymore.

In the end the only ones actually effected by these changes may be players who do not know what is currently happening in the game. This in turn leads to these players also reverting these changes.

I do not see any gains in these changes as I do not think that server admins are not monitoring their own server configurations.

Going on, servers that are already running for a while, likely have ships in their universes that already exceed given restrictions. This would either force server owners to reset their servers or force them to revert configuration changes.

Agreed, this is problematic for single player settings and established servers, but about 50% also agree it's not very useful in multiplayer... The best solution would probably be to just have defaults as they are, but find an efficient set of settings that work best in multiplayer.
Sort of an e-sports compliant standard for PVP servers that server owners can adopt if they choose, something that we could agree on, and post a "standard PVP config" that we can use as a baseline guideline for a "community accepted standard" to have a fair competitive environment, but not forced.

 

[Benevolent27]

I have noticed a lot of what makes starmade unplayable for more than 50% of the player base at the moment is that the game is completely unlimited even if people's computers or the server code itself can't handle it.

All you have to do is push an update that only changes the default settings in the configs so "officially by default" (some would call it "Vanilla") the game's configs are set in such a way that is actually playable in a low-lag environment. This would still allow people to change it to their liking, but at least those without much knowledge about scripting or who prefer to play the game "out of the box" would have a smooth and enjoyable experience, and any issues that arise out of setting the configs well above the default settings (such as weapons not firing properly, or loading issues, etc) would be their own fault, and would not be "intended".

As it currently stands in the multiplayer community, most people consider 1 million mass ships to be the standard "maximum size" which is very problematic when even 2 of these ships do battle, everyone gets near 1 frame per second, and the server nearly or actually crashes because of it. This is definitely not intended that the game crashes itself or can't handle it's own gameplay... So obviously a default set of limits that are actually "playable" and that the server can handle without issues, would be the best until there is some means of optimizing the code so that larger scale ships and combat can occur reliably without lag or disappearing bullets, or damage not being counted, etc.

What I'm suggesting is to establish a much lower "maximum size standard" as the vanilla, which would be a smooth, playable, and enjoyable experience for more than 50% of the player base (who do not possess top of the line gaming computers)

I know this might upset some of the people who like to build bigger instead of smarter, but sadly, the current state of the game and most likely a lot of the future of the game's server and client code, as well as end-user machine specs for the majority of possible audience will not be able to handle things on a scale that melts your cpu and blows up the server.


Now, limiting the maximum ship size to about 100k mass by default would ensure that everyone can have an enjoyable gameplay experience and avoid a lot of the problems involved with the heavy load of extremely over-sized ships. Also, limiting the number of computers and the number of outputs per computer (and salvage computers with separate standards) would ensure that "no bullet is left behind" to have a much smaller load on the server and player's machines.

The ship mass limits in the config can be bypassed by having tons of turrets that don't exceed the limits, and then docking them onto the main ship (last time I checked) this would need to be taken into account for helping keep things in reasonable stable limits. Speaking of turrets, turrets shouldn't share a pool of rail mass enhancers, they should require their own rail mass enhancers each (so 4x 5k mass turrets would require 20k mass worth of rail enhancers on the main ship).

If the game was limited to a smaller scale by default, output limits, mass limits, and so on, a lot of the playability of the game would return and combat would be fair and enjoyable once again.

From what I hear, a lot of players agree with this, and a lot of new players complain about this too...

Wouldn't matter if the limit was 1m mass or 100k mass, as long as everyone is on the same scale, battles will play out the same on equal footing, only difference is nobody would get lagged out or even completely crash when someone pulls a huge laggy ship into their system. Limiting weapon outputs and computers allowed per ship would also ensure that people can't abuse flooding the server with bullets to help them gain an unfair advantage as well.

Best thing for everyone would be some fair and stable default settings so everyone knows what game they're playing and what they're up against. Also, crashing and lagging is never intended or expected, the general rule of thumb for expectations for any sane player is that the game "just works" and simply limiting the defaults like this would provide a stable play environment by default that "just works" and if anyone pushes the limits beyond the appropriate limits, they can't expect the game to operate properly anymore.


tl;dr : smaller good - bigger bad.

Size only part of the issue though. I can easily crash any server with 20 1k fleet ships with some turrets on them. Heck, they don't even need to have turrets. Just tell them to move to a loaded sector and they'll all crash into each other and try to force their way to the center, lagging everybody out.

 

[PLIX]

If you're not allowed 20 1 mil ships people will have 1 mil 20 mass ships

 

[Jebediah1]

Size only part of the issue though. I can easily crash any server with 20 1k fleet ships with some turrets on them. Heck, they don't even need to have turrets. Just tell them to move to a loaded sector and they'll all crash into each other and try to force their way to the center, lagging everybody out.

If you're not allowed 20 1 mil ships people will have 1 mil 20 mass ships

Fleet limits?

 

[kulbolen]

Size only part of the issue though. I can easily crash any server with 20 1k fleet ships with some turrets on them. Heck, they don't even need to have turrets. Just tell them to move to a loaded sector and they'll all crash into each other and try to force their way to the center, lagging everybody out.

its a partial solution. but its still helps. you have limits on your own server.

Even then, we don't have final optimizations. Its a little premature to talk about imposing limits when we don't even know what the final "average capabilities" for the game are going to be.

why is it premature? people play the game right now.

On the other hand, server admins are already able to restrict ships sizes on their servers.

its dodgy and barely works, and is very difficult to set to include the entier ship. whether this is on or off by default, better controls are necessary.

I do not see any gains in these changes as I do not think that server admins are not monitoring their own server configurations.

youre wrong, many dont have a clue about their own settings and readily admit that here, and in their discs.

If you're not allowed 20 1 mil ships people will have 1 mil 20 mass ships

fleet limits as well.

 

[DistantLifeform]

After all of this, and considering the upcoming power update (which is going to force everyone to redesign their ships anyway) trying to load outdated legacy ships from times long past shouldn't be an expectation in the first place, and since we're already faced with players being forced to change anyway, then players should learn to play within some new more efficient limits in the future as well. Live and learn, come to a new conclusion and adapt for the better.

The point of this game isn't "no limits" and any professional game developer knows about developing within limits (especially for consoles), so it's not an outrageous expectation to establish limits to improve stability and performance, so the game can function properly.

That being said, coding languages are limited, so are a variety of end-user machines. In reality, nothing is unlimited, so it would be best to establish a "target specifications" for the range of PC the developers intend to support, and test the actual server code's limits to discover what it can and cannot support, and then limit accordingly within reason, such as the expected size of battles (5v5 for example).

• Fleet Size Limits
• Turret Count Limits
• Ship Size Limits
• Weapon Output Limits

These are some examples of things that need to be rounded up and controlled because we can't really expect the game to work properly when someone can simply spam an unlimited number of entities to crash the entire server (or another player's game).

Also, currently, the ship size limits in the configs don't properly apply to the entire ship, for example if you spawn in the turrets and dock them to the main ship after spawning in the main ship (since they are each below the limit) this could be considered for a bug fix.

It seems there are some who oppose this idea because it would take away the advantage they currently enjoy (my computer is also capable of titan sized battles at 1FPS but I still think it's unfair).

But as it has been stated previously, even if your client machine (Your PC) is capable of handling the lag, most of the time the server isn't (regardless of the server's specs) and bugs will start to occur, such as: damage not being counted, missiles stop dealing damage and start flying straight through the target and doing nothing (effectively disabling a ship that is dependent on missiles as weapons through exploiting a bug, aka locking up missile calculations), too many cannon bullets and they start to disappear due to a limitation, and possibly more.

I say if you want huge spectacles of engineering to look at (but will obviously still not work properly) just edit your single player configs if you would like to play with a titan-sized ship that doesn't work in multiplayer (and shouldn't be allowed in multiplayer because of the large array of issues it can cause to other players and the server itself).

Also, there should be some sort of in-game on-screen display showing you how many total weapon outputs your ship has, including all turrets, as well as other limits, and some sort of warning telling you that your ship may not function properly if you continue to exceed the limits known to be safe and stable. (Like some text in the build stats, and the text could turn red if it's too high)

This should definitely be the new default config approach with the coming power update, since everyone will be forced to gut and refit all of their ships anyway, so the game could use a new coat of "functional, stable and optimized" paint applied to the configs as we move into the future of StarMade and the game continues to advance and improve.

 

[Black_Sun]

youre wrong, many dont have a clue about their own settings and readily admit that here, and in their discs.

I am not talking about normal players, I am talking about server owners. I doubt that somebody who pays money for a server and has many hundred people registered on his server, does not monitore his server configurations.

As i already said, if configurations changed in a way that ship sizes are limited, some people may wonder about up comming error messages and after discussions revert them either way.

 

[GDPR 302420]

I completely agree the current vanilla default config needs to change, the current config is extremely unbalanced and self destructive to servers.

The biggest changes that need to be done imo are

• Disable NPC factions completely, although Schine won't admit it NPC factions is the most destructive feature of this game, most server owners will leave them on not knowing that in a short time their servers database is going to be filled with entries about NPC faction shit, eventually it causes database issues and can even force servers to reset their worlds given enough time. The Brierie server learnt this the hard way, I do remember Veilith (kulbolen) warning the Brierie admins about this and they didn't listen to him, now after being forced to reset their server they turned NPC factions off and left them off.
• Larger sector sizes, most server owners believe that "smaller is better" because less loaded areas and smaller databases, which unfortunately is wrong, larger sector sizes mean ships in combat will not be constantly loading new sectors just by moving slightly, a lot of server lag comes from the calculations associated with sector updates and chances, larger sector sizes mean this happens less often because ships need to move longer distances to load new sectors.
• Larger jump drive distance, vanilla jump distance is terrible and unbalanced, most server admins will turn this up before anything else.

However, I do not agree that their should be a default mass limit, let alone a small one. I think this should be up to the server owners to decide for themselves, most servers choose to their mass limit to be "If it lags the server its too big" and I thnk that is perfectly reasonable.


I do think this game must have limits even though it goes against the creative intrests of the developers, this game will never be able to be optimised where anyone can have 7 million mass titans duking it out in a single area, but I think its too early to say what those limits should be. I think when the game gets into Beta stages (I will probs be a grandfather by the time that happens lol) is when Schine needs to start thinking about flat hardlimits, for now, leave that too the servers but Schine needs to be putting limits on the game whenever they like it or not.


I believe this clip from Veilith's twitch stream basicly summarises my stance of limits for ships and stations.

https://clips.twitch.tv/ManlyZanyCarabeefDuDudu

[doublepost=1503835652,1503834923][/doublepost]

Even then, we don't have final optimizations. Its a little premature to talk about imposing limits when we don't even know what the final "average capabilities" for the game are going to be.

People play this game today, if the limits need to be changed as the game gets more optimised then it can be changed.

But right here in the current state of the multiplayer game that we (but not so much you) play, limits are need now.

 

[Matt_Bradock]

You want to make this game, the only space game that allows you to exceed known limitations, to limit itself? Sure, add the option for servers to limit people's mass, but certainly don't turn it on by default.

I lost count how many battles ended abruptly because one side or both (or the server) crashed due to overload. It's not funny.

On the other hand, having limits to adhere to, encourages building smarter not bigger (as DistantLifeform also mentioned) which gives people a good incentive to learn the kknow-how of Starmade shipbuilding.

I genuinely don't mind if you build a 1:1 Battlestar Galactica replica on a build server, but on survival servers where ships get put to use, asteroids and planets are constantly being mined, and NPCs are on, limits are required to keep the server load and client load manageable.

 

[Malacodor]

Size only part of the issue though. I can easily crash any server with 20 1k fleet ships with some turrets on them. Heck, they don't even need to have turrets. Just tell them to move to a loaded sector and they'll all crash into each other and try to force their way to the center, lagging everybody out.

According to my tests a high entity count is even far worse than a high block count. With 1800 cores, which were docked to 6 ships consisting only of basic rails, I had like 1 FPS and serious lag in single(!) player. Next to a planet I had a stable 120+ FPS.

The current gameplay encourages arms races between missile launchers and anti-missile defenses. To overcome PD turret fire more missiles are needed, and to defend against more missiles more turrets are needed. Furthermore, fleets of small ships are superior to single big ships of the same mass. This forces bigger ship designs to either be abandoned completely or to cover them with a high number of turrets. Ironically, the war on "gigantism" (better term would be compactness) made the performance situation worse rather than better. Additionally, even the biggest turret fails, if the docker or turret axis is destroyed, which makes them extremely vulnerable. This encourages many small turrets instead of fewer bigger ones. Also, the number of fleets should be limited, but how? A limit per player can be circumvented with alt accounts and a limit per faction with alt factions.

In conclusion:

• Mass limits don't make sense per ship, only per fleet; entity limits are more important than mass limits.
• Limits per fleet don't make sense if the number of fleets isn't limited, which is hard to do.
  
• Discouraging big ships/turrets in favour of many small ships/turrets doesn't make sense.
• Encouraging high numbers of missile launcher outputs and PD turrets is bad design.

 

[kulbolen]

I am not talking about normal players, I am talking about server owners. I doubt that somebody who pays money for a server and has many hundred people registered on his server, does not monitore his server configurations.

so am i... as i said, youre wrong.

 

[Black_Sun]

so am i... as i said, youre wrong.

I don't understand. Why am I wrong again? Because server admins have no clue about their configurations?

 

[kulbolen]

I don't understand. Why am I wrong again? Because server admins have no clue about their configurations?

i was talking about server owners from the start man. tons of them havent got a clue about them and have openly talked about it. many others have asked for clarifications on shit that isnt properly documented or doesnt have good control. games notorious for it. along with the low player count, and crap stability, professional server owners who like to break even or make a little money for their whatever communities run away from the game.

 

[Matt_Bradock]

Honestly, since this game is so multiplayer-focused, and the servers are ridiculously maintenance-heavy, one would think Schema would actually provide throrough documentation to server owners...

Well, that one would be wrong. It's trial and error, and server owners rarely even disclose what settings they use with each other, some kinda weird trade secret I guess...

 

[Black_Sun]

i was talking about server owners from the start man. tons of them havent got a clue about them and have openly talked about it. many others have asked for clarifications on shit that isnt properly documented or doesnt have good control. games notorious for it. along with the low player count, and crap stability, professional server owners who like to break even or make a little money for their whatever communities run away from the game.

Honestly, since this game is so multiplayer-focused, and the servers are ridiculously maintenance-heavy, one would think Schema would actually provide throrough documentation to server owners...

Well, that one would be wrong. It's trial and error, and server owners rarely even disclose what settings they use with each other, some kinda weird trade secret I guess...

I understand. Looks like Schine needs more developers. Two active ones seems to be not enough.

 

[Dr. Whammy]

It's too soon to impose scaling limits as a game mechanic. As was mentioned above; we don't know what the game's final capabilities will be. It's better to wait and see if Schema and company can optimize this game to make things like planets, capital ships and giant stations less taxing in multi-player.

A lot of people seem to forget that while their high spec gaming rig can handle whatever the game throws at them, a multi-player server has to process most of what is loaded on your computer and everyone else's.

For the most part, this isn't an issue of standard game settings. The issue is that players (and server admins) have a tendency to want things that exceed the current capabilities of this game, with regard to multi-player. As a whole, we need to recognize the limitations of the current iteration of the game in multi-player and adjust accordingly via smaller mining bonuses, and smaller, less complex builds until Schine optimizes further.

One thing that Schine can do in the mean time is buff the accuracy/effectiveness of AMS turrets to help cut down on the total entity count on ships and stations.

Another thing to consider; NPC ships and stations tend to be small. As per Schine's fleet contest, this is intentional. If you want any kind of PVE challenge in the upcoming faction content, you'll need to stop "hunting squirrels with a bazooka" and try fighting a pirate station in a 5000 mass ship instead of a 50,000 mass one.