[Conclave] Region Merge for consoles

[(PSN)WhiteStrike_PT]

As you probably know, consoles don't have dedicated servers due to Sony and Microsoft having partial control over the game's network service delivery. This makes it hard to find matches sometimes without switching regions.

A friend of mine suggested something: merge all regions when it comes to Conclave matches, as in, your regional preferences are ignored and a player from Russia can now play with someone from western Europe. Now, there is one big problem with this suggestion that'll I'll address:

• This will lead to laggy matches.

Sure, ping settings exist but imagine this: a player from West Europe joins a match with an Eastern European and a Russian. The Western European has a Ping limit of 100. He has a 50 ping difference from the Eastern European, who is hosting in this example. So far, so good. However,  the Russian has no ping limit active, and this caused him to join this match even though he has 450 ping to the host. In case of host migration, the Russian will become host, which will create a spectacularly laggy match for the European player, and there's nothing the European could have done to stop this.

To address the above issue, I propose the following: only allow players to join matches where everyone is in the player's set ping interval. To clarify, imagine this:

• Jack is from West Europe. He has an 150 Ping Limit.
• Jack searches a match. Jack can now only find matches where everyone is 150- Ping from the host.

This would be a mandatory feature, not something you could opt out off so it wouldn't split the population. In fact, it would increase the number of available matches.

 

These measures would also severely cut down rep farming.

Edited October 3, 2017 by (PS4)WhiteStrike_PT
Clarification

[SevenLetterKWord]

On 10/3/2017 at 11:23 AM, (PS4)WhiteStrike_PT said:

To address the above issue, I propose the following: only allow players to join matches where everyone is in the player's set ping interval. To clarify, imagine this:

• Jack is from West Europe. He has an 150 Ping Limit.
• Jack searches a match. Jack can now only find matches where everyone is 150- Ping from the host.

What about the following situation:

Player A has a ping limit of 300ms. Player A hosts a match.
Player B has a ping limit of 150ms. Connection A-B has 100ms latency. Player B connects to Player A's match.
Player C has a ping limit of 500ms. Connection A-C has 300ms latency. Player C connects to Player A and Player B's match.

Now Player A doesn't get information from Player C until 300ms after the fact, and Player B doesn't get information until 400ms after the fact.
This system doesn't protect low-limit players from high-latency connections occurring after they've already joined.

---

21 hours ago, (PS4)WhiteStrike_PT said:

Player C wouldn't have been able to join the match since he has a Ping Limit of 500. 

You wrote: "only allow players to join matches where everyone is in the player's set ping interval".
Player C is perfectly able to join, because at the time that he connects, everyone is within his ping limit of 500ms.

The only way to prevent this would be to enforce the ping limits of all existing players when a new player attempts to connect... but that produces new problems.

What if I start hosting with a limit of 150ms, and then someone joins with a limit of, say, 50ms?
Basically nobody else is able to join after that, as 50ms is highly restrictive.

This problem is more complicated than you realize, and there is no clean solution.

---

21 hours ago, (PS4)WhiteStrike_PT said:

Player C wouldn't be able to join the match because Player A, the only player in the lobby if you take the above into account, has a Ping Limit of 300 whereas Player C has a limit of 500 ping.

What are you talking about?
Ping limit isn't ping.

Player C's ping limit is 500ms. Player A's is 300ms.
Player C's connection to Player A has 300ms latency, which satisfies both their requirements.
Thus, they connect.

The fact that Player C's ping limit is higher has no bearing on this situation.

---

21 hours ago, (PS4)WhiteStrike_PT said:

Player B wouldn't be able to join Player A's game. Player B would only be able to join matches with other 150 or less Ping Limit players.

Player C wouldn't be able to join the match because Player A... has a Ping Limit of 300 whereas Player C has a limit of 500 ping.

Wait, what??
This situation keeps getting more ridiculous.

So Player B can't join Player A because Player B's limit is lower than the host's limit...
But then you say, Player C can't join Player A because Player C's limit is higher?!?

So what, your system only allows players to join other players if they have the exact same ping limit, regardless of actual connection quality?

This is all hot nonsense.

Edited October 5, 2017 by SevenLetterKWord

[(PSN)WhiteStrike_PT]

2 hours ago, SevenLetterKWord said:

What about the following situation:

Player A has a ping limit of 300ms. Player A hosts a match.
Player B has a ping limit of 150ms. Connection A-B has 100ms latency. Player B connects to Player A's match.
Player C has a ping limit of 500ms. Connection A-C has 300ms latency. Player C connects to Player A and Player B's match.

Now Player A doesn't get information from Player C until 300ms after the fact, and Player B doesn't get information until 400ms after the fact.
This system doesn't protect low-limit players from high-latency connections occurring after they've already joined.

Player B wouldn't be able to join Player A's game. Player B would only be able to join matches with other 150 or less Ping Limit players.

Player C wouldn't be able to join the match because Player A, the only player in the lobby if you take the above into account, has a Ping Limit of 300 whereas Player C has a limit of 500 ping.

Edited October 4, 2017 by (PS4)WhiteStrike_PT