/tg/Station 13

In the interests of promoting more interaction between players and improving game balance we've been discussing adding a population cap to both servers. We've noticed a stark decline in communication and cooperation between players the higher the population of the station rises. To combat this and more evenly distribute the population to avoid crowding we're strongly considering trying this as a solution to a lot of issues that have been plaguing our servers for a long time.

We'd like to survey people's opinions to see how receptive folks might be to that and gather more input from the playerbase before doing so. Please vote above and share relevant commentary below.

Please try to keep things civil and on topic. Mods are watching.

If you guys want a more solid number, we were thinking of a cap around 60-70 players.

I for one genuinely believe this has a good chance of improving the quality of the SS13 play experience. It's something the headmins would like to at the very least try out.

I acknowledge the population issues but this is a far, far worse fate than what we have now in my mind.
A cap of 60-70 players might work, but anything less would cause problems I think. Like idling to save slots and shit, I dunno.

How can you say it's bad when we've never even tried it?

We've seen how the game becomes different as the population rises and we have two servers we could split people between, giving everyone a chance to play at a number the game was balanced around.

There's no reason we shouldn't at least try it.

Every anecdote we have says this should work.

It's just my prediction, I really don't have a lot of solid reasoning for it. Call it a gut feeling. It should definitely be given a shot.

Theres really no harm in trying it. If it sucks ass, we can easily turn the config off and go back to normal.

It's not going to be the same cap you see in Source games. It's not a technical limitation, it' doesn't have to outright block you from connecting to the server at all, it's just something we'd design to protect the game experience.

We're probably going to make admins not count towards the cap. Same could be done for observers as well.

Yes but lift it when hopefully more departments/jobs get added. This code is in dire need of expansion.

Could observers also not be counted? I don't see the harm in having, say, people watch the round, or join as drones or be chosen for special events. Performance isn't an issue, so why not?

It would be a config option so changing/removing the cap will be easy as piss.

I abstain until we're told whether or not both servers will be running the same map. I don't think efficiency has been tested at anywhere NEAR that number.

I like the idea but I'm worried about forcing players to play on a map they don't like.

Down the road if we can expand the stations to hold more people comfortably, in a way that the same design of the station is as fun for 30 people as it is for 90, then we can increase the cap up to whatever.

The current issue is we have two great servers and often both are not at their optimum player count. One server is deserted and the other has people packed in like sardines. One of our houseplants is sick from too much water and the other is wilting. We need to spread the wealth, as it were.

The player counts we're tossing around aren't just arbitrary numbers. We're talking a lot about our collective experiences with the stations at different numbers and most of us agree that somewhere in the neighborhood of 60-70 seems to be the number both designs really shine at. It's a limit of the map and nothing else. When the people who built this sat down and drew them up they had a specific count of players in mind to fill them out. In one case we're operating way under it, and in the other we're going way over it.

Though people will have favorite designs and a familiar place they're used to playing, I truly believe that if people have the option of picking between two places that will run at the populations they should, they will be happy with both choices instead of the favoritism "Give me X or give me death" attitude some people have today.

No, I don't' like basil,I don't like the history attached to it. I do not want it sam I am, not even with green eggs and ham

my one concern is that basil will be flooded with POOPY SIBYL FOLKS if the cap is reached
on one hand this remedies the issue of 2manyplayers on sibyl, on the other, it threatens to ruin the balanced lowpop experience that basil players prefer and force those who like superhighpop to play on a server they arent used to
its worth a try for sure; i myself have been a proponent of a player cap for a while. i just hope it doesnt have any huge adverse effects.

When you say 'observers don't count towards the cap' that sounds all well and good. So say you have 60 player cap, and 70 people, with 10 observing. But then what happens next round if all 70 people ready up? 10 people randomly just get told to fuck off by the RNG?

I hate high pop to the point where I won't even join the serve if it's above 60-70, but I don't really like the idea of it, since it's essentially going to be forcing sibyl players onto badger during peak times, even though they are players that actively choose sibyl over badger.

Also if there is a player cap, are you going to just like ban the shit out of anyone that roundstart braindead/suicides?
And if someone dies/goes braindead, does that open up a slot, or do they shut that slot for the whole round?
If it opens a slot, then that punishes people for observing (players that sit on the lobby screen hammering join game can get in, where as observers can't) and it the slot doesn't open, then well, that's bad for pretty obvious reasons.

That would be what will happen, so effectively if the cap was at 60 people, you have a 1/7 chance of being told you can't play the round.

I disagree with a population cap, perhaps encouraging people to move servers by advertising the other server if the current server is full. I don't want to be told to fuck off cause I had the audacity of joining at the wrong time.

60 player cap sounds good to me. Boxstation really isnt designed for 90+ players. It just ends up as a clusterfuck, which may be be fun sometimes, but overall hurts the SS13 experience.

The second server also isnt some private club for certain players. There is no reason not to move players from Sybil to Badger.

Just a few thoughts.

danno wrote:Like idling to save slots and shit, I dunno.

Catatonic/gibbed/incinerated players free up a slot for late joins.

lumipharon wrote:When you say 'observers don't count towards the cap' that sounds all well and good. So say you have 60 player cap, and 70 people, with 10 observing. But then what happens next round if all 70 people ready up? 10 people randomly just get told to fuck off by the RNG?

I'd say exclude assistants first, then move up from there.
And on the topic of assistants.


Why don't you just add a job cap for Assistants at 10 players or so, instead of making it a specific server config?

You get a handful of engineers, nobody can join as engineer anymore.
You get too many assistants, people should start being filtered into non-assistant jobs until all job roles are full.

This is a way the HoP can play a more important role by actually opening up job and PLAYER slots for people in departments that need it due to various !FUN! things that happen during the round.

I don't mind a cap too much but it only makes any sense if the servers are otherwise identical.

Saegrimr wrote:Why don't you just add a job cap for Assistants at 10 players or so, instead of making it a specific server config?

You get a handful of engineers, nobody can join as engineer anymore.
You get too many assistants, people should start being filtered into non-assistant jobs until all job roles are full.

This is a way the HoP can play a more important role by actually opening up job and PLAYER slots for people in departments that need it due to various !FUN! things that happen during the round.

That.

god just fuck off if your reasoning against this is "i dont want the bad players from the OTHER server..............."
kill yourself already. just go for it.

miggles wrote:my one concern is that basil will be flooded with POOPY SIBYL FOLKS if the cap is reached
on one hand this remedies the issue of 2manyplayers on sibyl, on the other, it threatens to ruin the balanced lowpop experience that basil players prefer and force those who like superhighpop to play on a server they arent used to
its worth a try for sure; i myself have been a proponent of a player cap for a while. i just hope it doesnt have any huge adverse effects.

literally nobody gives a shit about this

basil people prefer lowpop but metastation feels empty with 20 people compared to 30 or 40, which was the ideal pop for server 2 imo

i'd rather have 30-40 pop with 20 extra people i can probably dunk anyways than 10-20 pop of braindeads and metabuddies

Saegrimr wrote:Why don't you just add a job cap for Assistants at 10 players or so, instead of making it a specific server config?

But what if someone's completely new to the game and joins at peak hour? They should be given an option to be assistant to learn the game unless we want Head positions filled with newbies who couldn't join otherwise.

kosmos wrote:

Saegrimr wrote:Why don't you just add a job cap for Assistants at 10 players or so, instead of making it a specific server config?

But what if someone's completely new to the game and joins at peak hour? They should be given an option to be assistant to learn the game unless we want Head positions filled with newbies who couldn't join otherwise.

Just because a new person can't be an assistant doesn't mean they have to be the HoS. There are typically plenty of slots open for cargo techs, janitor, chaplain, or other low expectation jobs. Besides, someone already mentioned the HoP being able to open up more slots.

Back to the poll, I'm curious what all the people who voted no thought. There have already been a number of arguments made in favor of it, but very few people have explained why exactly they don't want to try this considering how close of a poll it is.

I guess quite a few Basil players are afraid of their server getting shat up with the Sybil overflow. It is a different culture.

I'll remain tentatively optimistic, since this will probably pass anyway.

Personally I think 60 people is far too low a cap, maybe 70, 80 would be safe. The problem is of course that at those limits the number of people getting "shunted" to the second server wouldn't make it high pop enough for it to replicate the sybil experience. So while it's not a terrible idea, I think we (ironically) don't have enough active players to pull it off.

As i understand it, box is designed for 40-50 players. Id say 60 is more than enough. Any higher and you are not addressing the "crowded station" issue. Most ive seen is 90+ on weekends. Maybe the server host or headmins can give us some statistics?

The job system allows for 61 positions + an undefined number of assistants, so all stations that use those defaults job set ups are designed to accommodate at least 60 players (or at least they should be) and realistically more, as the public spaces (aka asstopia) are fairly large.

There's a paradox of change here in that there's been a fair option for people who dislike superhighpop here for a long time in the second server; I'd wager that most people actually playing on Sybil don't mind the congestion because if it was such a problem to them they wouldn't still be there at this point.

I dont like basil, i dont want to play on basil
When people prefer to be 26th assistant on sybil over playing on basil it probably tells you something about that server

Kinda like how people would rather join a snorefest than the unorganised mess of shitlers that they perceive to be Sybil.

Honestly, the two servers are a little too different for population spilling to lead to any good.

Except in the past every time sybil has crashed and people played on basil they didn't mind and enjoyed the map for being pretty similar to boxstation

once metastation has directional signs too it won't be hard to find departments or anything either.

There are certain BOX ONLY!! people but honestly who cares they can just wait for a slot to open

alternatively, just cap assistant ffs. that way, people can join the server, but not join any jobs.

If we cap assistants we should add an exception for ckeys younger than, say, a few weeks.

This changes the "culture" of both servers.

Frankly, the reason for two seperate servers was not to cater to two different playstyles. They share the same rules and admins because they're the same game. The same community.

If you want to tell yourself that one server is better than the other and you play differently on one or the other that's all in your own head. We don't encourage or otherwise enforce that.

The two servers existed because we had too many players crammed in to one. Not because a group of people wanted a special cool kids server of their own.

I don't think I"m alone in saying we don't care about server wars or server culture being independent of one another. I'm of the perspective that we're all one community.

Not quite sure it's all just imagined, Anon, it might as well be the community shaping itself. It's not enforced, and it's no rule, but you get regulars, these regulars develop a certain playstyle, new people starting on that server may or may not follow that playstyle, chances are that playstyle becomes dominant for the server and bam. Server culture...

...in a very simplified version because damn am I tired.

Incoming wrote:The job system allows for 61 positions + an undefined number of assistants, so all stations that use those defaults job set ups are designed to accommodate at least 60 players (or at least they should be) and realistically more, as the public spaces (aka asstopia) are fairly large.

There's a paradox of change here in that there's been a fair option for people who dislike superhighpop here for a long time in the second server; I'd wager that most people actually playing on Sybil don't mind the congestion because if it was such a problem to them they wouldn't still be there at this point.

Then the maximum amount of job slots + 10 Assistant slots. That should be more than enough. Even if you increased the amount of job slots, its still the same issue of having too many players on one station. Pretty sure the job slots have been increased since box was designed.

the only problem i would have with this is when your average sibylshitter is forced to come to basil and just whines in OOC until a spot opens up for him on sibyl

Ok here's a question I'm not sure has been asked...

What happens if the pop cap is reached, you D/C and then want to reconnect? If the server suddenly becomes full can you no longer get back on to the server? Cause that could get annoying quickly. Specially as people would essentially be removed from a round simply for connection issues.

An0n3 wrote:This changes the "culture" of both servers.

Frankly, the reason for two seperate servers was not to cater to two different playstyles. They share the same rules and admins because they're the same game. The same community.

If you want to tell yourself that one server is better than the other and you play differently on one or the other that's all in your own head. We don't encourage or otherwise enforce that.

The two servers existed because we had too many players crammed in to one. Not because a group of people wanted a special cool kids server of their own.

I don't think I"m alone in saying we don't care about server wars or server culture being independent of one another. I'm of the perspective that we're all one community.

This. I still remember the dark days of the Server Wars, before the dawn of Badger. Those were dark days, we were practically split right down the middle as a community. I know I certainly don't want us to go back to that.

By forcing some people to move around, we eliminate the "cultural" barrier between the servers. Sybil will slow down and Basil will speed up. While there are people who prefer the Call of Spessmen: Robust Warfare style Sybil and silent as the grave style Basil, I think both servers will turn out better with a happy medium.

peoplearestrange wrote:Ok here's a question I'm not sure has been asked...

What happens if the pop cap is reached, you D/C and then want to reconnect? If the server suddenly becomes full can you no longer get back on to the server? Cause that could get annoying quickly. Specially as people would essentially be removed from a round simply for connection issues.

I doubt it would be that much of an issue. But i guess rather than a server limit you could just have a job slot limit along with an unlimited number of observers.

peoplearestrange wrote:Ok here's a question I'm not sure has been asked...

What happens if the pop cap is reached, you D/C and then want to reconnect? If the server suddenly becomes full can you no longer get back on to the server? Cause that could get annoying quickly. Specially as people would essentially be removed from a round simply for connection issues.

In the PR I have on this right now (https://github.com/tgstation/-tg-station/pull/7544/) the "hard" cap option is one where new players are restricted at a certain point but once someone is actually in the round there's no threat of removal if they happened to lose connection.

There's a "harder cap" I call "extreme" in that pull that will outright deny entry to the game, but I don't recommend using it by itself. specificially because of situations like what you just said.

iteq wrote:the only problem i would have with this is when your average sibylshitter is forced to come to basil and just whines in OOC until a spot opens up for him on sibyl

Yeah if someone just whines and whines and whines in OOC about something like that they'll quickly end up muted.

GUYS KICK SOMEONE FOR ME PLEASE ALL MY METAFRIENDS ARE ON

iteq wrote:the only problem i would have with this is when your average sibylshitter is forced to come to basil and just whines in OOC until a spot opens up for him on sibyl

Iteq for valid point master 2015.

Tfw Lorenzo will have to migrate to server 2 sometimes and I will eventually get a chelp character appearance ban because apparently its dissalowed to use the same character on both servers.

deathhoof wrote:Tfw Lorenzo will have to migrate to server 2 sometimes and I will eventually get a chelp character appearance ban because apparently its dissalowed to use the same character on both servers.

what the fuck are you talking about

I've seen it a few times in people's admin notes

Is that a rule from another server? That's hilarious.

I thought the second server was just for those who didnt want to play on the overpopulated Sybil server, why would it have different rules? Hell, even if it did, how can a headmin not know about it?