Lag Reduction and Mailbox Limits: Last Call!

[illuminar]

As you may know, we recently implemented a system in DDO that limits your mailbox inbox to 50 mails. This was done to start addressing an issue where exceptionally-large inboxes were causing lag due to character data bloat. When we implemented this system, we asked everyone to voluntarily reduce their inboxes, and the system itself began preventing people from sending mail or posting things in the Auction Houses if they had more than 50 mails.

We appreciate everyone's efforts to address this issue. Remember that we won't see a lag reduction until players have smaller mailbox inboxes, so it's been up to you to help improve things by reducing your inbox. We're now at the stage when we need to take the next step. We have a command that allows us to prune inboxes down to fifty mails, and we will soon be running that command starting with the characters that have the largest inboxes (we have a couple that are literally in the thousands...) Consider this your LAST CALL. Please get your inbox down to 50 mails if you are above this limit and are concerned about losing anything in your inbox.

As of Wednesday, July 20th here's the player count of folks with 50+ mails in their inbox:

Argonnessen: 273
Cannith: 245
Ghallanda: 311
Orien: 216
Khyber: 219
Sarlona: 300
Thelanis: 307
Wayfinder: 45

Total: 1916

Some of these may be folks who are no longer playing the game, or who haven't logged in in a very long time, but we know some of these numbers include active players, so we're putting out this final call to voluntarily reduce your inbox size if you have more than 50 mails prior to running a command that will automatically prune things. Thank you!

Wait... so even players that are not logged in and playing are causing lag. That's disappointing... but makes me think that the first purges should be based on last login for non-Premium/non-VIP and maybe a 365 day TTL for mail for all non-Premium/non-VIP players. A 50 item limit is good, but it doesn't stop people from making a ton of free accounts just to store their items and therefore continuing the problem.

If the players that are not logged in are not contributing to the problem, then limiting logged in time to 30 minute sessions for players over 50 should accomplish the same goal without making players feel like anything has been taken from them. They can always reach out to a GM if they prefer the automated process to being kicked out ever 30 minutes.

That said, none of my mail boxes have anywhere near 50 items so no skin off my back either way.

[Aelonwy]

As you may know, we recently implemented a system in DDO that limits your mailbox inbox to 50 mails. This was done to start addressing an issue where exceptionally-large inboxes were causing lag due to character data bloat.

Lag caused by character data bloat?

So what about those people who have broken buy back tabs? You know 80+ pages of character buy back items (@20 items per page) that never seem to expire or even disappear upon TR? Does that not cause character data bloat and by extension lag?

Is this issue being looked into?

[Ghost000]

When an account goes from paying to non pay, the chars available drop to base level. (plus purchased extra ones) I assume the other chars not picked get put in a backup storage, or at least off the playing servers. Could we do that same type thing with players not logged in over 6 months, and take their pile of items off the servers that way? Then, upon log in, they would get a similar start screen, instead of "pick only 2 chars" it would be "click here to restore your dusty, cobwebbed account back to life" and then they have to re-log in after say half hr for the backup to be brought live to the servers... or more realistically, the next down time of the servers. But better they wait less than a week, than loose everything forever. I mean, after all, they waited over 6 freaking months since last log in, lol. So, is it doable?

[koluka]

It seems the problem is people using mail to store large volumes of items indefinitely.....

But the proposed solution is going to hit at a totally different group of people.

I regularly go over 50 items in my mailbox, but not through storing stuff. My mail is typically less than 10 days old.

On weekends, I tend to run one zone after another and shove everything on auctioneer between runs.
I've only been playing 6 months and typically it will take me at least 45 minutes to run a zone. Sometimes hours coz real life takes me afk midway through a zone.

These auctions expiring will take me over the 50 limit for mail - just simply through regular play on weekends. I would be a bit surprised if this was considered excessive in any way.

Yet, I will often finish a weekends play having posted as many items on auctioneer as I can and still have more items in my bags to be posted. The new mail limit means I have to store that stuff elsewhere so I can unload my mailbox to disjunct and then go pick that stuff back up out of storage so I can list it on auctioneer.

I do not use my mail to hoard stuff.
I typically don't store anything for longer than 10 days and since understanding it is a problem, have made an effort to limit my mail to 5 days.
I rarely repost stuff - if an item doesn't sell first time it is listed, I disjunct it.
I don't do the rounds of the pawn brokers and buy stuff for the purpose of reselling.

Everything I list for auction is either something I have looted personally or something I have purchased for my personal use and no longer want.

I am not a plat farmer - I currently have 435k plat, which is the most I have ever had.

I would really like to see a time parameter added to the purge - even if it is only 5 days. ie: if people have more than 50 items, only items more than 5 days old are purged.

Or alternatively, as I suggested earlier, adding a disjunct option to mail - at least for VIP accounts as an extension of the 50 item limit for auctioneer. It is questionable having a 50 item limit for auctioneer for VIP's if it means stuff that doesn't sell may get purged. If I had a disjunct option on mail, my mailbox would be empty virtually all the time.

I would much prefer a time limit on mail rather than an item limit, even if that time is as low as 5 or 10 days. I really don't want to have to keep watching my mailbox and my auctions so I can be ever-ready to run to either Kundarak or Cannith to disjunct stuff. It will really suck the fun out of the game for me by creating a whole heap of maintenance overhead.

[huntdawumpus]

Agreed,but i find it a pita going to the tradeskill instances themselves. Kundarak and Cannith may as well be in another galaxy. That is why I leave the mail build up - coz it is inconvenient going to Kundarak and Cannith. It's one of those little things that sucks just a little fun out of the game - and fun is 100% of the reason I pay for a subscription.

If the devs understand the reasons why some people let their mail build up, then they can look at compromises that work instead of having to rely on the big stick. Better to have people like me happily emptying their mail on a continual basis than letting 40 messages build up and having to go tradeskill when they really don't feel like it. The result is better all around. Less lag. More happy players. More ongoing subscriptions. More money to create new content.

You don't have to go to Kundarak and Cannith for crafting, there's a guildship amenity for that. Buy it for yours or beg to use another guild's. People used to do that all the time for the Shroud altars, back when cap was 20. I'd be surprised if there weren't a few generous souls on each server that would invite you on for some disjuncting.

[zagler]

As you may know, we recently implemented a system in DDO that limits your mailbox inbox to 50 mails. This was done to start addressing an issue where exceptionally-large inboxes were causing lag due to character data bloat. When we implemented this system, we asked everyone to voluntarily reduce their inboxes, and the system itself began preventing people from sending mail or posting things in the Auction Houses if they had more than 50 mails.

We appreciate everyone's efforts to address this issue. Remember that we won't see a lag reduction until players have smaller mailbox inboxes, so it's been up to you to help improve things by reducing your inbox. We're now at the stage when we need to take the next step. We have a command that allows us to prune inboxes down to fifty mails, and we will soon be running that command starting with the characters that have the largest inboxes (we have a couple that are literally in the thousands...) Consider this your LAST CALL. Please get your inbox down to 50 mails if you are above this limit and are concerned about losing anything in your inbox.

Can you explain how exactly how the mailbox affects lag? How is having things in the mailbox different from carrying things on your toon? If I buy bank space to accommodate everything in my mailbox, wouldn't that just transfer the "character bloat, turning it into "bank bloat?" If it's "character bloat" that's causing the lag, how is it in quests? There are no mailboxes in quests. And, if it's the mailboxes, why is House K virtually lag-free (in the public areas) but the Market is always sooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo laggy? Like why would it affect only certain areas and certain quests? Like, for example, Lagning Star--er, I mean Evening Star is alway laggy--really bad, I might add. I can barely walk in there.

I have to say, the lag has gotten worse since you switched the servers; not better. How much of the lag is based on ones internet connection v. game IT stuff (yes, I'm whipping out those technical terms!) Maybe if you could explain it a little better, people (such as myself) would understand it a little better. Thank you.

[Duana]

lol, I pay real life money every month for my subscription. And I would expect that would cover performance issues. My mail typically is never older than 10 days. I don't use it for storage, just catching what doesn't sell on auction from stuff I have looted. I mostly only run 1 to 3 zones a day except on weekends and I don't run zones every day. So in fairness, I would expect to be covered by the real life money I pay every month for my subscription.

Dammit. I was really hoping you knew of a post office that blew up magic stuff. That would make an awesome tv show.

[jalont]

Can you explain how exactly how the mailbox affects lag? How is having things in the mailbox different from carrying things on your toon? If I buy bank space to accommodate everything in my mailbox, wouldn't that just transfer the "character bloat, turning it into "bank bloat?" If it's "character bloat" that's causing the lag, how is it in quests? There are no mailboxes in quests. And, if it's the mailboxes, why is House K virtually lag-free (in the public areas) but the Market is always sooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo laggy? Like why would it affect only certain areas and certain quests? Like, for example, Lagning Star--er, I mean Evening Star is alway laggy--really bad, I might add. I can barely walk in there.

I have to say, the lag has gotten worse since you switched the servers; not better. How much of the lag is based on ones internet connection v. game IT stuff (yes, I'm whipping out those technical terms!) Maybe if you could explain it a little better, people (such as myself) would understand it a little better. Thank you.

Attempt to pull the hundreds of items people store in their mail to bypass the limits Turbine puts in place and then find a place to put it on your toon. You're describing the actual problem....

[Nuclear_Elvis]

As you may know, we recently implemented a system in DDO that limits your mailbox inbox to 50 mails. This was done to start addressing an issue where exceptionally-large inboxes were causing lag due to character data bloat. When we implemented this system, we asked everyone to voluntarily reduce their inboxes, and the system itself began preventing people from sending mail or posting things in the Auction Houses if they had more than 50 mails.

We appreciate everyone's efforts to address this issue. Remember that we won't see a lag reduction until players have smaller mailbox inboxes, so it's been up to you to help improve things by reducing your inbox. We're now at the stage when we need to take the next step. We have a command that allows us to prune inboxes down to fifty mails, and we will soon be running that command starting with the characters that have the largest inboxes (we have a couple that are literally in the thousands...) Consider this your LAST CALL. Please get your inbox down to 50 mails if you are above this limit and are concerned about losing anything in your inbox.

As of Wednesday, July 20th here's the player count of folks with 50+ mails in their inbox:

Argonnessen: 273
Cannith: 245
Ghallanda: 311
Orien: 216
Khyber: 219
Sarlona: 300
Thelanis: 307
Wayfinder: 45

Total: 1916

Some of these may be folks who are no longer playing the game, or who haven't logged in in a very long time, but we know some of these numbers include active players, so we're putting out this final call to voluntarily reduce your inbox size if you have more than 50 mails prior to running a command that will automatically prune things. Thank you!

So, if we had 0-5 emails in our mailbox from the time this problem first surfaced, and still maintain that low number, do we get a participation trophy for helping to prevent Lag

Of course, I'd equate such an honor like getting a perfect attendance certificate for school. It feels good to have the teacher hand you something, and then you realize years later that it's not a reward you really want to brag about.

[Nuclear_Elvis]

I totally did not think of this until now - this is the first time that Wayfinder has beaten all the other servers in a statistically significant issue.

Wayfinder Wins!

(starts the "Wave" only to realize that 25 players are logged into Wayfinder...)

[koluka]

Dammit. I was really hoping you knew of a post office that blew up magic stuff. That would make an awesome tv show.

lol can we have a like button please to vote up the funniest comments. or is there one and i just can't see it. i'm an old woman with failing eyesight.

[koluka]

Attempt to pull the hundreds of items people store in their mail to bypass the limits Turbine puts in place and then find a place to put it on your toon. You're describing the actual problem....

so could we perhaps have some extra tags for tagging items in our inventory? or would that bloat stuff as well?

[gravisrs]

Regarding that mailbox limit and players that weren't logging for a long time. Before truncating their mailbox some way of archiving it's content would be nice to allow players to appeal from this step later.

I have 2 guildmates on Argo who having a longer break and I'm pretty sure their mailbox is full of precious stuff - and they gonna back to game sooner or later. I don't want them being ****ed off and having even longer break (like ethernal) after they find out what happened to all their stuff.

If you want to make players empty their mailboxes make their life harder:
- display a confirmation dialog every 2 minutes (that covers rest of UI)
- make them heavy encumbered

If you really need to take an action against (especially inactive) players. please consider:
- moving mailbox content to TR cache (shards convert to inventory version, plat also if possible ?)
- easy way for GM's to bring back deleted items of appealing player
- auto-detach all emails that has just the plat (till limit) or shards
- sending an email (real one, not in-game) to all those players

[Kza]

Mail should expire after 1 month if not opened. How can ppl ask for developer time used for those ppl that exploit this bug to save their crappy obsolete loot?

Just nuke it and call it a day.

You ppl that whine over this and want coders work hard on solutions for so few players that exploit the mail system and probably not even playing anymore? I dont understand you.

Nuke all mails over 50, less talk more action vs lag! :-)

Thanks and best regards to all

/Kza

(When i have used bugs for my "winning" i have never had the stomach to whine on forums afterwards when devs have corrected the issue)

[drwho1985]

Maybe a few days before you hit the magic button, you do a world wide server announcement (like when you're bringing the servers down).

Or some type of warning at log in and / or character selection.

There still we be much weeping and gnashing of teeth but I applaud your efforts to improve game performance.

[Careall]

Is it folks that are logging in and have excessive mail that are causing that lag? I certainly don't understand why someone not logged in could possibly impact anything regarding lag, though I suppose I could understand how (yes, I am a hobbyist programmer and know enough to be dangerous).

Just a wild, but not unreasonable, guess: Is it that little icon in the corner that tells me I have new mail causing the lag? Is it reviewing all mail in an inbox every few minutes? If so, perhaps fix that to be more efficient. Or, at least have it only check for new mail when folks log in and maybe only once per 12 or 24-hours. Also, not updating it in dungeons might be a thing. I don't know if anyone really needs such an up-to-the-minute update on new mail; "oh sorry, can't rez you atm... need to run off and check mail... brb." Maybe try this: Turn the new mail icon/checking off for a week or two and see if that helps the lag. I don't think folks would complain... much... or maybe they will.

While I believe you could come up with a better solution, as far as notices, imho you've done your job.

1) The rule has been in effect, if not enforced, for a long time. You have also provided several notices about pruning mail, which you did not need to do. However, it is good customer service to provide such notices.

2) Active players with excessive mail, which would likely be causing the lag, should know by now and have had opportunities to reduce their mail. Lost mail, items, plat, shards, and so on are on the players. This does not however, reconcile the space problem of where to put attachments, so this might be another problem I suppose. It certainly is a grey area between an exploit and a feeling of necessity. Maybe you could accept support tickets from the occasional folks with such dilemmas? Hopefully this is not an overwhelming number of cases.

3) Inactive players/toons are another case, which could be problematic later if/when they log back on. As mentioned, some folks may be temporarily away to return later. However, they would have to fall in the category of gone today - here tomorrow, the category of excessive mail, and the category that the excessive mail has value to them. Therefore, the number of players impacted should be relatively small. Still, the notices have been placed; see #1.

[Blarg1976]

the fact of the matter is that ddo mail (just like the TR cache) was never meant to be used as storage. players have come to expect to use both for item storage but that is not their function
ddo mail explicitly has a disclaimer of expiring- anyone that was using the mailbox for storage past that expiration was taking a calculated risk- they cannot get upset at turbine for housecleaning



* but i was curious to know though whether the pruning command is going to be an automated function going forward that is applied to ALL mailboxes? as other people mentioned, sometimes when expired (unsold) auctions are being returned, it brings the mailbox count to over 50. does this pruning/culling mean that there will be a strict 50 mail count going forward so that anything beyond the 50 gets wiped, including returned auction items that have not sold?

* if you are going to start trimming down the game mailboxes to reduce lag............ then is it not sensible ALSO to start deleting or archiving accounts/characters that have been inactive for more than 5 years? if the excessive # of mails from inactive accounts has been causing lag then it seems reasonable to assume that inactive accounts themselves are bogging down the system as well. there have been many arguments that it would dissuade retired players from coming back to the game- so maybe archiving old accounts/characters would be possible (taking them out of the game database and storing externally where a customer service agent would need to reinstate them).
but i am sure that the game database is bloated with characters that have been forgotten/abandoned.

* someone mentioned letting players check mail externally outside the ddo client. that would be really nice - just a simple gateway to the ddo game that lets us check mail, auctions- it would just be gravy if the ddo api was brought back to let us see our character sheet/inventory

[silinteresting]

Lag caused by character data bloat?

So what about those people who have broken buy back tabs? You know 80+ pages of character buy back items (@20 items per page) that never seem to expire or even disappear upon TR? Does that not cause character data bloat and by extension lag?

Is this issue being looked into?

on sarlona in my guild this has already happened, the other day i had 173 pages in my
buy back. i went to bed woke up the next morning re logged on and found my buy back empty.
im guessing as all my guildies had the same thing happen this happened server wide.

your friend sil

[Enoach]

Nice try, ohh you were being helpful?

Problem computer is in the bedroom. You should try being married it's not that easy!

Well I guess I am should not really worry, I don't have that much mail and most of the stuff is only plat AH stuff I wanted to offer to others (I actually put stuff on AH to sell as I think it is helpful to others playing the game, weird concept I know). The few shards that I am no doubt going to loose will be regained if I actually do log in again anyway.

I am married, and I will say that having the computer in the bedroom is just a bad decision. Of course I don't believe a TV should be in the bedroom either. The bedroom should be a place to escape technology.

I'm sorry you won't be able to check your mail to see if you are one of the people with a character that has more than 50 emails.

[Enoach]

Can you explain how exactly how the mailbox affects lag? How is having things in the mailbox different from carrying things on your toon? If I buy bank space to accommodate everything in my mailbox, wouldn't that just transfer the "character bloat, turning it into "bank bloat?" If it's "character bloat" that's causing the lag, how is it in quests? There are no mailboxes in quests. And, if it's the mailboxes, why is House K virtually lag-free (in the public areas) but the Market is always sooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo laggy? Like why would it affect only certain areas and certain quests? Like, for example, Lagning Star--er, I mean Evening Star is alway laggy--really bad, I might add. I can barely walk in there.

I have to say, the lag has gotten worse since you switched the servers; not better. How much of the lag is based on ones internet connection v. game IT stuff (yes, I'm whipping out those technical terms!) Maybe if you could explain it a little better, people (such as myself) would understand it a little better. Thank you.

As a developer I can only guess...
With mailbox they monitor to see if you have new mail to give you a notification. This is monitored on a time interval so when you login and on the interval your UI is getting checked and updated. Additionally, the updating of what is in your mailbox is dynamic.

With the bank the data only needs to be loaded when you open the bank. Also, it is not monitored for updates as the only time the bank is updated is when you are accessing it.