Lag Reduction and Mailbox Limits: Last Call!

[JOTMON]

a good place to start would be deleting all the mail notifications for favor benchmarks... we don't need mail notification for that.

[AnEvenNewerNoob]

Since I assume you have the ability to send a mass email to all people with an account, you MAY want to send one to let people know about this.

I mean, It's going to be an effing awesome forum week when you finally clean things out anyways.......but this might make it a little more tame.

[Ziindarax]

I thoroughly second this notion - perhaps a special storage should be created when people have their mail removed, but a message needs to pop up in the mailbox telling them where their stuff went (and how to access it).

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

[Enoach]

Just a thought, but since Turbine can know the character, they should know the Account and could possibly send them an email letting these accounts know what character needs to have their Mail accounts cleared. They could give notice to the individual even if they might not be in game still.

[trevitt]

I am fully behind this idea. Everyone complains about the lag in ddo and how the devs are not doing anything to fix it. This lag is actually caused by certain players and the devs are trying to fix it.

So prune away devs. They have been warned. I would rather someone loose 300 items they clearly don't use then have unneeded lag.

Yes, yes I know. 'I may be using it in a different life.' Pretty sure that's what your tr bank is for. Don't make the rest of the game world suffer because you want to horde your trophies.

[Cordovan]

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.

Technically, if a player never logs into the game, they are not contributing to the problem, unless they log in (which is something we'd like them to do, of course.) We are targeting active players when possible.

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?

Yup, which is why we're working to fix the broken buy back tabs on Sarlona.

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.

The mailbox is different because it uses the mail system. That said, yes, one of the main reasons we've limited the amount of available character bank space and inventory is because it can and will cause issues if it gets too big. In regard to why it can cause lag in X, think if it like a cookie. If you have to eat a cookie in order to move, it matters whether the cookie is the size of an Oreo or the size of a living room. Remember that there is never one single cause of lag, so the "state of lag" in Kundarak compared to the state of lag in the Marketplace is not relevant regarding this particular source of lag.

i couldn't imagine that mess....

that's 1000s of shards lost too? that's big money.

At least in one case it appears that someone may have put EVERY SINGLE ITEM ever acquired from random gen loot into the Auction House that could be put there, then if it didn't sell, left it sitting in their mailbox because why not, there was no reason to worry about it. Add several years to the mix and you get a very large inbox.

Dauntless Cordovan,

I understand that this mailbox revision needs to happen to de-bloat the system, but please tell us exactly how much time do players (In my case, on Sarlona) have to finish clearing the mailboxes across their account before the system will disintegrate the items stored within? I have been pruning my mailboxes across my various characters since the initial announcement, but I still need a day or two to finish cleaning house. I fear that when I get home and log in tonight, my old (6 year +) mail will be gone forever. As always, thanks for the community updates Cordovan!

Remember that our plan is to start by targeting the largest inboxes, so this isn't a "press button everyone affected" event. We'll be running this command as necessary in the coming weeks. We're getting the word out now because we don't want people waiting until the last second to clear out their inboxes if they are concerned about losing stuff. If you are concerned - take care of it.

[Stenky]

Go ahead and fix the problem; no further wait time, or notices are warranted. I have no sympathy for people who abuse/circumvent the rules/intent of the game.

[Loromir]

Go ahead and fix the problem; no further wait time, or notices are warranted. I have no sympathy for people who abuse/circumvent the rules/intent of the game.

I disagree....a Notice (On the Game Launcher as well as Twitter and Facebook) that purges will commence on "X" date. Announce that if you have anything you don't want to lose...remove it from mail before that date.

[duntduntduuun]

a good place to start would be deleting all the mail notifications for favor benchmarks... we don't need mail notification for that.

correction: if you're a grizzled vet you don't, if you're a newb they basically the only thing that lets you know there's such a thing as favor and what you just got and who you need to go talk to.

without the mails new players will run around with uncollected favor rewards. those mails also expire automatically so I don't seen this as anything but a vet player callously suggesting something that will make the game more new player hostile than it already is.

[Cantor]

correction: if you're a grizzled vet you don't, if you're a newb they basically the only thing that lets you know there's such a thing as favor and what you just got and who you need to go talk to.

without the mails new players will run around with uncollected favor rewards. those mails also expire automatically so I don't seen this as anything but a vet player callously suggesting something that will make the game more new player hostile than it already is.

I agree. But easily solved, link them to the show hints option.

[gabbatastic]

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!

Why does my inbox not have a delete all function. The mail interface is horribly cumbersome to manage.

[Aelonwy]

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

Good to know.

Yup, which is why we're working to fix the broken buy back tabs on Sarlona.

Good job! Was this the only server affected by this issue?

At least in one case it appears that someone may have put EVERY SINGLE ITEM ever acquired from random gen loot into the Auction House that could be put there, then if it didn't sell, left it sitting in their mailbox because why not, there was no reason to worry about it. Add several years to the mix and you get a very large inbox.

Holy cow! I would nuke from orbit with extreme prejudice just for the audacity, but that's just me.

[LightBear]

Go ahead and fix the problem; no further wait time, or notices are warranted. I have no sympathy for people who abuse/circumvent the rules/intent of the game.

It isn't the players that broke the game.

A lot of players (used to) post the good stuff up the AH for low prices.
Not to make gc but to help others out get their twink gear.
(That's also why there are active craftsmen out there helping others get their stuffs.)
If it didn't sell then you could always repost it at a later date or just wait for the mail to expire as you know you'll get something similar or better the next life.
Somewhere along the way the mailboxes didn't get emptied anymore.... and then you blame it on the players.
As said before, we didn't brake the game and I seriously doubt there is intent and foul play at hand.

Now what concerns me is that such few players could cause so much lag, this really makes me doubt the technical design of the game.

[LucidLTS]

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 as long as you're making changes in the mail system code, if this doesn't fix lag, will you remove the annoying and outdated 3 week timer on mail? I know it hasn't really worked and that's allowed people to get huge mailboxes, I don't mean put it back to allowing huge mailboxes, I mean if somebody takes 4 weeks instead of 3 to pick up their 5 auctions, let them still be there.

There was a time, years ago, when DDO was a hot new game and you wanted to keep people logging in regularly. The mailbox limit helped with that. But those days are long gone. The player base has a lot more casual players who take breaks because that's the nature of casual gamers, and new content is a thin stream at best so hard core games have played through it for many weeks ahead of the next update. The assumption that you can keep players from taking a break from the game isn't valid for today's game.

What you can do is make it more welcoming to come back from a break. And removing the 3 week limit would do that.

With the limit, when somebody thinks about coming back, there is a good chance they will wonder if they lost valuable mail to the 3 week limit, and that makes people sad. Your 3 week limit causes people to associate coming back to DDO with feelings of sadness and regret. You could remove that by keeping your "no send mail or use the auction house if you have 50 items" rule, but removing the "you lose mail after 3 weeks" rule. You keep the benefit of smaller mailboxes, and gain the benefit of people feeling happier when they think about returning.

[Stenky]

It isn't the players that broke the game.

A lot of players (used to) post the good stuff up the AH for low prices.
Not to make gc but to help others out get their twink gear.
(That's also why there are active craftsmen out there helping others get their stuffs.)
If it didn't sell then you could always repost it at a later date or just wait for the mail to expire as you know you'll get something similar or better the next life.
Somewhere along the way the mailboxes didn't get emptied anymore.... and then you blame it on the players.
As said before, we didn't brake the game and I seriously doubt there is intent and foul play at hand.

Now what concerns me is that such few players could cause so much lag, this really makes me doubt the technical design of the game.

Anyone who allowed their email to become a mass storage for game items, is indeed showing intent, where it be from action, or lack of action. To blame it on the game designers is beyond pathetic. I stand by my original assessment. Btw...it is "break", not "brake."

[LucidLTS]

Regarding that mailbox limit and players that weren't logging for a long time. <snip>
- sending an email (real one, not in-game) to all those players

This should be the first, and for at least a few months the only, step. You require an email address to sign up, so use it for a serious change like this. If they don't read their email, or didn't keep it up to date that's one thing, but if you don't even try that's a really crappy thing to do to your players, even if they aren't currently active. People take breaks, don't make them hate you.

[FullMetalAlchemist]

Let me have the nuke button.
Problem will be resolved in a few hours.
AHAHAHAHA DUKE NUKEM!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

KIKKU

[jalont]

It isn't the players that broke the game.

A lot of players (used to) post the good stuff up the AH for low prices.
Not to make gc but to help others out get their twink gear.
(That's also why there are active craftsmen out there helping others get their stuffs.)
If it didn't sell then you could always repost it at a later date or just wait for the mail to expire as you know you'll get something similar or better the next life.
Somewhere along the way the mailboxes didn't get emptied anymore.... and then you blame it on the players.
As said before, we didn't brake the game and I seriously doubt there is intent and foul play at hand.

Now what concerns me is that such few players could cause so much lag, this really makes me doubt the technical design of the game.

Right. You're giving THESE players the benefit of the doubt? Have you ever been to the "other" forum? I can guarantee a majority of people with filled mailboxes were using it as storage. Why wouldn't they? It's a lot easier than the hoops everyone had to jump through to dupe.

[skorpeon]

correction: if you're a grizzled vet you don't, if you're a newb they basically the only thing that lets you know there's such a thing as favor and what you just got and who you need to go talk to.

without the mails new players will run around with uncollected favor rewards. those mails also expire automatically so I don't seen this as anything but a vet player callously suggesting something that will make the game more new player hostile than it already is.

Yeah I agree, I have been around a fair time and I still use this notification about the rewards. After all you need to know who to see to collect the reward right? This is probably the only mail that I keep until I have made the run to the said patron.

[ColdBrewer]

Dauntless Cordovan,

I understand that this mailbox revision needs to happen to de-bloat the system, but please tell us exactly how much time do players have left to finish unloading their mailboxes across the various characters of their account (In my case, on Sarlona) before the system disintegrates the items stored within? I have been diligently pruning my mailboxes across various characters since the initial announcement about lag and mail concerns, but I still need a day or two to finish cleaning house. I fear that when I get home and log in tonight, my old (6 year +) mail will be gone forever. As always, thanks for the community updates Cordovan!