I did not know world zone was instanced.

Jemcrystal

[PC-NA]

If I try to do a quick google research I see words like "megaserver" and "all one zone." It seems people think that ESO world (not dungeons) is one instance but it is not.

I can stand next to a friend and they are invisible. Their zone chat is different than mine. But if I teleport to them I am suddenly in their instance and I see what they see. Same world of course but not the same players. So they were looking for some trade guilds and I had to tell them what was being advertised on my zone chat when I logged in because my zone chat was hopping. But my friend said no one was talking in her chat except to ask to kill a big crab. Anyone else know we were instanced in the regular world? Was it just me who has been naive all this time?

If we have zone-instances why are they not marked numerically with option to change instance without having to talk to and port to a friend? Let's say I want to kill a big blue crab but no one comes to help. Or start up a WB hunt and no one cares. What if I'm on a low pop instance? I would like the option to be able to switch my zone-instance so I could ask in another zone chat. I would at least like to see how many instances are up and running and the pop number. And if zos doesn't care has anyone made an addon that shows zone-instance info?

JasonSilverSpring

There are definitely different instances but I believe zone chat crosses instances. I have asked for help in zone chat and had the person show up invisible even when we were grouped since they did not teleport.

CasNation

Yep. It was kind of the big selling point back at launch. You can't fit all potential players into the world without it being overcrowded, so the overworld is separated into "shards" dynamically based on population at the time. You are more likely to be placed in a shard that you share with guild members and friends who are logged on at that time.

It is actually really impressive tech, and it is doing its job if you didn't realize that it was even there until now.

And for the record chat is not cross-shard. That would get insane if all 30k people in Rawl were talking at once...the invisible thing was probably just a common bug that happens from time to time.

NewBlacksmurf

Yep it's best understood by going to certain major cities

Just walking from merchant to merchant sometimes hits a loading screen which means it's moving you to another instance as there is a max amount of players that can fit.

What's odd is if you're ever placed into the empty one.....I think back around Orsinium it happened to me on Xbox one NA.

Fleshreaper

Jemcrystal wrote: »

[PC-NA]

If I try to do a quick google research I see words like "megaserver" and "all one zone." It seems people think that ESO world (not dungeons) is one instance but it is not.

I can stand next to a friend and they are invisible. Their zone chat is different than mine. But if I teleport to them I am suddenly in their instance and I see what they see. Same world of course but not the same players. So they were looking for some trade guilds and I had to tell them what was being advertised on my zone chat when I logged in because my zone chat was hopping. But my friend said no one was talking in her chat except to ask to kill a big crab. Anyone else know we were instanced in the regular world? Was it just me who has been naive all this time?

If we have zone-instances why are they not marked numerically with option to change instance without having to talk to and port to a friend? Let's say I want to kill a big blue crab but no one comes to help. Or start up a WB hunt and no one cares. What if I'm on a low pop instance? I would like the option to be able to switch my zone-instance so I could ask in another zone chat. I would at least like to see how many instances are up and running and the pop number. And if zos doesn't care has anyone made an addon that shows zone-instance info?

Yep, instance probably means a different server completely. There have always been three server zones for each physical zone. They used to be for each alliance, now they are for everyone and when you zone in, you zone in to the least populated server zone.

Fleshreaper

JasonSilverSpring wrote: »

There are definitely different instances but I believe zone chat crosses instances. I have asked for help in zone chat and had the person show up invisible even when we were grouped since they did not teleport.

Zone chats are not crossed over. Not seeing the other player was just a bug in the game.

Elsonso

They keep the details under wraps, and we have no concrete picture of what they do behind the scenes. Over the years, they have let slip little tidbits about how the game works. This allows some estimation on details, which may have various degrees of accuracy. I am sure that they laugh, and frown, at these speculations.

Each overworld zone stands by itself and has an individual game map. Cyrodiil is a single overworld zone and map. People in these zones are part of what one Dev called a "channel", but other games might refer to as a "shard". They do not use the term "instance" for this. Depending on the population of a zone, there could be one or many channels. The exception is Cyrodiil, which is a single channel for each campaign.

Loading screens when entering an overworld zone are there to cover up channel selection. Loading screens at other times are probably for other reasons, one of which could simply be that you have been put on "hold", so to speak.

Banks and building interiors within a zone are generally located somewhere under the world. Occasionally, things do not draw and we can see the people milling about above. The loading screens there, when present, merely hide the transition. The channel is the same.

Zone chat covers the channel, so if you can see someone in zone chat, they are in the same channel. People who are not in the same channel cannot talk to each other with /zone, /say, or /yell. Whisper, party, and guild chat have nothing to do with channels and span the whole game.

From what I have seen, delves, dungeons, trials, solo instances, are actually separate spaces and are instanced and are not part of the zone channel. The loading screen coming into them covers creating, or joining, that instance. Loading screens coming out of them are covering insertion back into a zone channel.

We do not know how big channels can get, but it seems to be less than 500 for normal PVE zones. We do not know what the relationship is between zones, instances, and channels, but rumor has it that there are multiple channels per instance, likely multiple instances per zone. The exact structure and relationships are fuzzy.

On top of all of this, there are "phases" that players exist in. Phases are where you and other players are in the same channel, but you see different things. Various cities and towns in the world look and behave differently based on quest progression. Players standing in a particular spot might be talking to an NPC that is not there for you. This runs somewhat counter to One Tamriel, but still exists in the game.

I might have forgotten something. I am doing this from memory.

xari228

NewBlacksmurf wrote: »

Yep it's best understood by going to certain major cities

Just walking from merchant to merchant sometimes hits a loading screen which means it's moving you to another instance as there is a max amount of players that can fit.

I'm so glad you mentioned this! I knew about the multiple zone instances, but I didn't realize the game will sometimes moves you to a different zone in your current city due to population max.

It would drive me CRAZY in Skywatch and other places when I'd be near the edge of the city and suddenly be hit with a load screen.

Now, at least, I know why it happens.

Thank you!

Violynne

lordrichter wrote: »

Players standing in a particular spot might be talking to an NPC that is not there for you. This runs somewhat counter to One Tamriel, but still exists in the game.

I see this in Mistral every time I go to Khenarthi's Roost. The Silvenar sits on a chair behind the front desk as we walk into the bank, and players look silly standing there in front of an empty chair, since my phase was completed many moons ago.


Still, some pretty entertaining insights to how the game works. Unfortunately, it looks like there are kinks in the chain as Hew's Bane is a complete and total nightmare, instanced or not.

Elsonso

NewBlacksmurf wrote: »

Yep it's best understood by going to certain major cities

Just walking from merchant to merchant sometimes hits a loading screen which means it's moving you to another instance as there is a max amount of players that can fit.

What's odd is if you're ever placed into the empty one.....I think back around Orsinium it happened to me on Xbox one NA.

Actually, I am fairly sure that loading screens while walking around were explained by the devs as an issue where there was what I will describe as server attention deficit disorder. The loading screen was covering for that. The loading screen, in this case, is not a loading screen, but a "please hold" screen. There was a case back in 2015 where they made changes along these lines. I remember because I was in Shadowfen when I first started to see these, after they made this change. Maybe 2014. I remember where I was, not when.

Fodore

Yes. This is what makes megaserver possible, without it you wouldn't be able to move at all because the whole of tamriel and coldharbour would need to be loaded and each change would need to be loaded.

I like to think of it as tiny little servers within one huge server, the mega server

Danikat

Is this unusual?

I first encountered this system in Guild Wars 1 back in 2005 and I thought all MMOs worked this way these days. Since the alternative is massive lag if too many people go to the same place, or queues to enter the game it seems strange that any of them wouldn't make use of the technology now it's out there.

NewBlacksmurf

lordrichter wrote: »

NewBlacksmurf wrote: »

Yep it's best understood by going to certain major cities

Just walking from merchant to merchant sometimes hits a loading screen which means it's moving you to another instance as there is a max amount of players that can fit.

What's odd is if you're ever placed into the empty one.....I think back around Orsinium it happened to me on Xbox one NA.

Actually, I am fairly sure that loading screens while walking around were explained by the devs as an issue where there was what I will describe as server attention deficit disorder. The loading screen was covering for that. The loading screen, in this case, is not a loading screen, but a "please hold" screen. There was a case back in 2015 where they made changes along these lines. I remember because I was in Shadowfen when I first started to see these, after they made this change. Maybe 2014. I remember where I was, not when.

@lordrichter

We may be talking about different things.
For certain when I was doing crafting writs last week I walked across the Auridon room and hit a loading screen. The people who were dueling were gone. Diff folks appeared instead.

An older Dev comment mentioned this is normal and can be where you're moved just like quest phasing when you turn in a quest and it loads all those new ppl and what seems desolate prior to the quest turn in

Elsonso

NewBlacksmurf wrote: »

lordrichter wrote: »

NewBlacksmurf wrote: »

Yep it's best understood by going to certain major cities

Just walking from merchant to merchant sometimes hits a loading screen which means it's moving you to another instance as there is a max amount of players that can fit.

What's odd is if you're ever placed into the empty one.....I think back around Orsinium it happened to me on Xbox one NA.

Actually, I am fairly sure that loading screens while walking around were explained by the devs as an issue where there was what I will describe as server attention deficit disorder. The loading screen was covering for that. The loading screen, in this case, is not a loading screen, but a "please hold" screen. There was a case back in 2015 where they made changes along these lines. I remember because I was in Shadowfen when I first started to see these, after they made this change. Maybe 2014. I remember where I was, not when.

@lordrichter

We may be talking about different things.
For certain when I was doing crafting writs last week I walked across the Auridon room and hit a loading screen. The people who were dueling were gone. Diff folks appeared instead.

I don't see that as a normal situation, and have never come across it on PC/NA. That seems a lot like an error recovery situation, like where something 'crashed' on the server and they moved you to a new place. Maybe some GM playing with your head. I can't think of a normal reason for them to do that in the middle of a zone. If it was due to population, it would have to be extreme, since they won't be putting people in a full channel or instance. They can create them as you initially enter, so they shouldn't get surprised by overpopulation very often.

Cêltic421

I found this out on release day on consoles. So many people that day. Was a que for logging in. When I logged in a buddy told me where he was at and Imran over there and didn't see him. Joined his group and on the map showed him near me. I found the travel to player feature and travels to him. He was in a different version of same zone. It's cool they do this since everyone on same server.

Bax

Danikat wrote: »

Is this unusual?

Well, many MMOs use this, but they usually do not hide it and openly tells you "you are in channel XY" and allows you to switch channels (if desired channel has space). On the other hand, those MMOs usually doesn't have so sophisticated system such a one in ESO which automatically picks best fitting zone for you based on your friends, guildies or group members and so on. Honestly, I did not really notice that there are channels in this game (I know about them, but I don't really feel they are there), so I guess it is working well.

Also some MMOs use a bit different approach - having several servers which users can pick and once the server is full, player cannot pick it until there's a spot or they have to wait in a queue for a spot. That's very inconvenient compared to ESO.

Cryptical

Regarding the location of the insides of buildings, some quest markers point to a npc inside a building and attempt to be helpful by saying (above) or (below), but are wrong.

Example, the daily writ boards in the big tree. On the wayshrive level, the arrow says below, but the door is marked as upper level.

starkerealm

Danikat wrote: »

Is this unusual?

I first encountered this system in Guild Wars 1 back in 2005 and I thought all MMOs worked this way these days. Since the alternative is massive lag if too many people go to the same place, or queues to enter the game it seems strange that any of them wouldn't make use of the technology now it's out there.

Guild Wars was actually instanced. At least everything after the char was. As I recall, the tutorial zone was also instanced, but it's been a long time since I played (somewhat obviously). There was an open world you could wander through, but as I recall, that was strictly your party (this may have changed in the expansions). Quest zones were, straight up, instanced, again to your party.

With Guild Wars you could almost think of the game as using a lobby system. You group up in the settlements, and then go out and run quests.

The difference is, with instanced systems, the player is directly responsible for creating the new shard. You pass through a door, interact with something, and the game creates a new copy of an area for you (and your party). What ESO does is dynamically pick a shard and then places players into it, with the intention of putting you into a populated zone. There's a fine distinction here, but, technically, what ESO is doing isn't, exactly, instancing.

Elsonso

starkerealm wrote: »

Danikat wrote: »

Is this unusual?

I first encountered this system in Guild Wars 1 back in 2005 and I thought all MMOs worked this way these days. Since the alternative is massive lag if too many people go to the same place, or queues to enter the game it seems strange that any of them wouldn't make use of the technology now it's out there.

Guild Wars was actually instanced. At least everything after the char was. As I recall, the tutorial zone was also instanced, but it's been a long time since I played (somewhat obviously). There was an open world you could wander through, but as I recall, that was strictly your party (this may have changed in the expansions). Quest zones were, straight up, instanced, again to your party.

With Guild Wars you could almost think of the game as using a lobby system. You group up in the settlements, and then go out and run quests.

The difference is, with instanced systems, the player is directly responsible for creating the new shard. You pass through a door, interact with something, and the game creates a new copy of an area for you (and your party). What ESO does is dynamically pick a shard and then places players into it, with the intention of putting you into a populated zone. There's a fine distinction here, but, technically, what ESO is doing isn't, exactly, instancing.

Yeah, I don't think it is really "sharding", either. ZOS tends to invent new terms when the existing ones don't exactly match what they are doing. Chapters, for example.

NewBlacksmurf

lordrichter wrote: »

NewBlacksmurf wrote: »

lordrichter wrote: »

NewBlacksmurf wrote: »

Yep it's best understood by going to certain major cities

Just walking from merchant to merchant sometimes hits a loading screen which means it's moving you to another instance as there is a max amount of players that can fit.

What's odd is if you're ever placed into the empty one.....I think back around Orsinium it happened to me on Xbox one NA.

Actually, I am fairly sure that loading screens while walking around were explained by the devs as an issue where there was what I will describe as server attention deficit disorder. The loading screen was covering for that. The loading screen, in this case, is not a loading screen, but a "please hold" screen. There was a case back in 2015 where they made changes along these lines. I remember because I was in Shadowfen when I first started to see these, after they made this change. Maybe 2014. I remember where I was, not when.

@lordrichter

We may be talking about different things.
For certain when I was doing crafting writs last week I walked across the Auridon room and hit a loading screen. The people who were dueling were gone. Diff folks appeared instead.

I don't see that as a normal situation, and have never come across it on PC/NA. That seems a lot like an error recovery situation, like where something 'crashed' on the server and they moved you to a new place. Maybe some GM playing with your head. I can't think of a normal reason for them to do that in the middle of a zone. If it was due to population, it would have to be extreme, since they won't be putting people in a full channel or instance. They can create them as you initially enter, so they shouldn't get surprised by overpopulation very often.

It happens consistently every time I play in Auridon, grahtwood, (same basically), daggerfall castle, mornhold, and Craglorn.

Danikat

starkerealm wrote: »

Danikat wrote: »

Is this unusual?

I first encountered this system in Guild Wars 1 back in 2005 and I thought all MMOs worked this way these days. Since the alternative is massive lag if too many people go to the same place, or queues to enter the game it seems strange that any of them wouldn't make use of the technology now it's out there.

Guild Wars was actually instanced. At least everything after the char was. As I recall, the tutorial zone was also instanced, but it's been a long time since I played (somewhat obviously). There was an open world you could wander through, but as I recall, that was strictly your party (this may have changed in the expansions). Quest zones were, straight up, instanced, again to your party.

With Guild Wars you could almost think of the game as using a lobby system. You group up in the settlements, and then go out and run quests.

The difference is, with instanced systems, the player is directly responsible for creating the new shard. You pass through a door, interact with something, and the game creates a new copy of an area for you (and your party). What ESO does is dynamically pick a shard and then places players into it, with the intention of putting you into a populated zone. There's a fine distinction here, but, technically, what ESO is doing isn't, exactly, instancing.

Should have explained that better - you're right that the explorable maps were instanced and were created specifically for 1 party - like dungeons in ESO.

But towns worked like all the open-world maps in ESO do. There was a little drop-down menu which told you which copy of the map you were in and how many others there are and let you move between them, unless the one you wanted to go to was full. When a festival was going on you could easily get over 100 copies of the same town.

And now Guild Wars 2 uses basically the same system as ESO.

Elsonso

NewBlacksmurf wrote: »

lordrichter wrote: »

NewBlacksmurf wrote: »

lordrichter wrote: »

NewBlacksmurf wrote: »

Yep it's best understood by going to certain major cities

Just walking from merchant to merchant sometimes hits a loading screen which means it's moving you to another instance as there is a max amount of players that can fit.

What's odd is if you're ever placed into the empty one.....I think back around Orsinium it happened to me on Xbox one NA.

Actually, I am fairly sure that loading screens while walking around were explained by the devs as an issue where there was what I will describe as server attention deficit disorder. The loading screen was covering for that. The loading screen, in this case, is not a loading screen, but a "please hold" screen. There was a case back in 2015 where they made changes along these lines. I remember because I was in Shadowfen when I first started to see these, after they made this change. Maybe 2014. I remember where I was, not when.

@lordrichter

We may be talking about different things.
For certain when I was doing crafting writs last week I walked across the Auridon room and hit a loading screen. The people who were dueling were gone. Diff folks appeared instead.

I don't see that as a normal situation, and have never come across it on PC/NA. That seems a lot like an error recovery situation, like where something 'crashed' on the server and they moved you to a new place. Maybe some GM playing with your head. I can't think of a normal reason for them to do that in the middle of a zone. If it was due to population, it would have to be extreme, since they won't be putting people in a full channel or instance. They can create them as you initially enter, so they shouldn't get surprised by overpopulation very often.

It happens consistently every time I play in Auridon, grahtwood, (same basically), daggerfall castle, mornhold, and Craglorn.

That is crazy. I play on PC and PS4 and I have thousands of hours in the game, and cannot recall it happening. I have had the "please hold, your call is important to us" type of load screen come up, maybe a handful of times. Mainly during periods of high volume. Early in PS4 release. Last year's anniversary event when everyone wanted to be friends with the Chef. First day of New Life. Times like that.

Enodoc

lordrichter wrote: »

NewBlacksmurf wrote: »

lordrichter wrote: »

NewBlacksmurf wrote: »

Yep it's best understood by going to certain major cities

Just walking from merchant to merchant sometimes hits a loading screen which means it's moving you to another instance as there is a max amount of players that can fit.

What's odd is if you're ever placed into the empty one.....I think back around Orsinium it happened to me on Xbox one NA.

Actually, I am fairly sure that loading screens while walking around were explained by the devs as an issue where there was what I will describe as server attention deficit disorder. The loading screen was covering for that. The loading screen, in this case, is not a loading screen, but a "please hold" screen. There was a case back in 2015 where they made changes along these lines. I remember because I was in Shadowfen when I first started to see these, after they made this change. Maybe 2014. I remember where I was, not when.

We may be talking about different things.
For certain when I was doing crafting writs last week I walked across the Auridon room and hit a loading screen. The people who were dueling were gone. Diff folks appeared instead.

I don't see that as a normal situation, and have never come across it on PC/NA. That seems a lot like an error recovery situation, like where something 'crashed' on the server and they moved you to a new place. Maybe some GM playing with your head. I can't think of a normal reason for them to do that in the middle of a zone. If it was due to population, it would have to be extreme, since they won't be putting people in a full channel or instance. They can create them as you initially enter, so they shouldn't get surprised by overpopulation very often.

Yeah that sounds like a bit of an odd situation. I'm sure you can tell when the game is putting you in a different server shard/channel, because it's more likely to play the intro theme over the Loading Screen instead of zone music.

Elsonso

Enodoc wrote: »

I'm sure you can tell when the game is putting you in a different server shard/channel, because it's more likely to play the intro theme over the Loading Screen instead of zone music.

Hmm. I have never bothered to pay attention to which song was playing during which loading screens. The only long ones I get are the ones where I am initially logging into the game, so I don't pay much attention.

MakoFore

i would LOVE to have my own instance.....especially when farming necropotence chests in Rivenspire- imagine having all those master chests to oneself....ooh

FlyLionel

Sometimes when I farm in Wrothgar the node disappears right before I get there, or when I hit X......it is a conspiracy I tell you..

NewBlacksmurf

lordrichter wrote: »

NewBlacksmurf wrote: »

lordrichter wrote: »

NewBlacksmurf wrote: »

lordrichter wrote: »

NewBlacksmurf wrote: »

Yep it's best understood by going to certain major cities

Just walking from merchant to merchant sometimes hits a loading screen which means it's moving you to another instance as there is a max amount of players that can fit.

What's odd is if you're ever placed into the empty one.....I think back around Orsinium it happened to me on Xbox one NA.

Actually, I am fairly sure that loading screens while walking around were explained by the devs as an issue where there was what I will describe as server attention deficit disorder. The loading screen was covering for that. The loading screen, in this case, is not a loading screen, but a "please hold" screen. There was a case back in 2015 where they made changes along these lines. I remember because I was in Shadowfen when I first started to see these, after they made this change. Maybe 2014. I remember where I was, not when.

@lordrichter

We may be talking about different things.
For certain when I was doing crafting writs last week I walked across the Auridon room and hit a loading screen. The people who were dueling were gone. Diff folks appeared instead.

I don't see that as a normal situation, and have never come across it on PC/NA. That seems a lot like an error recovery situation, like where something 'crashed' on the server and they moved you to a new place. Maybe some GM playing with your head. I can't think of a normal reason for them to do that in the middle of a zone. If it was due to population, it would have to be extreme, since they won't be putting people in a full channel or instance. They can create them as you initially enter, so they shouldn't get surprised by overpopulation very often.

It happens consistently every time I play in Auridon, grahtwood, (same basically), daggerfall castle, mornhold, and Craglorn.

That is crazy. I play on PC and PS4 and I have thousands of hours in the game, and cannot recall it happening. I have had the "please hold, your call is important to us" type of load screen come up, maybe a handful of times. Mainly during periods of high volume. Early in PS4 release. Last year's anniversary event when everyone wanted to be friends with the Chef. First day of New Life. Times like that.

So seems like there's a difference in servers on PS4 and PC compared to Xbox one.

The first year on a PC wasn't like this but all of 2016-2017 has been this way on Xbox one.

I don't recall 2015 in terms of this so I'd guess that first almost full year on PC we thought around 600k players at max played both NA and EU so without One Tamriel it prob wouldn't hit the server or phase max

Jemcrystal

WW & Vamp bites are affected by world_zone_instances. If I tell someone, "Meet me at Rift alter," when they show there is no meet and greet. Another rule to being turned that is not explained anywhere:

BE IN PARTY WITH THE VAMPIRE/WW THAT IS TURNING YOU
OR YOU WILL NOT SHOW UP IN THE SAME INSTANCE
IF YOU DO NOT SEE EACH OTHER
ONE OF YOU TELEPORT TO PARTY MEMBER USING PARTY TAB

You do not have to be in party to get bit. You need to be in party to get zoned right.

I want zos to fix it so we can see instances. Label the instances with numbers or letters or even unique names. Put it in options as an on/off to view on our UI what instance you are in and what other instances are up. An option to free port to another instance would be icing on the cake.

If I remember right other mmorpg's I have played put the instances at an <arrow drop down menu on the corner of the chat box.

.

zaria

Fleshreaper wrote: »

JasonSilverSpring wrote: »

There are definitely different instances but I believe zone chat crosses instances. I have asked for help in zone chat and had the person show up invisible even when we were grouped since they did not teleport.

Zone chats are not crossed over. Not seeing the other player was just a bug in the game.

Probably, we had an guy in group dungeon who was invisible. he should definitely be in the same instance there.

Elsonso

zaria wrote: »

Fleshreaper wrote: »

JasonSilverSpring wrote: »

There are definitely different instances but I believe zone chat crosses instances. I have asked for help in zone chat and had the person show up invisible even when we were grouped since they did not teleport.

Zone chats are not crossed over. Not seeing the other player was just a bug in the game.

Probably, we had an guy in group dungeon who was invisible. he should definitely be in the same instance there.

This was more likely a bug in how the client and server were working to display the character.

Zone chats are all local to you and the people you are with in the zone channel.

NewBlacksmurf

lordrichter wrote: »

zaria wrote: »

Fleshreaper wrote: »

JasonSilverSpring wrote: »

There are definitely different instances but I believe zone chat crosses instances. I have asked for help in zone chat and had the person show up invisible even when we were grouped since they did not teleport.

Zone chats are not crossed over. Not seeing the other player was just a bug in the game.

Probably, we had an guy in group dungeon who was invisible. he should definitely be in the same instance there.

This was more likely a bug in how the client and server were working to display the character.

Zone chats are all local to you and the people you are with in the zone channel.

Use to happen 50% of the time in dungeons for almost a year on Xbox

Hopefully they fixed it in the last patch