A Ramble from Tobberz
Lag & Player Cap
You'll remember that one of the principle reasons that EW v2 was shut down about 14 months ago was due to lag, and that's also why we are developing v3.
Lag is an issue which has plagued the current iteration of the server, and is effectively the only reason why we've been unable to grow: me and my predecessor hardly want to advertise and promote a laggy server.
A few months ago, thanks to some behind-the-scenes help, we managed to eliminate one of the major causes of lag on the server, though as you all know issues still remain.
I've raised the player cap from 42 to 72 for a few reasons.
- First, I know the server is playable at 40 players, so we may as well raise it to see how well the server does at higher player counts.
- Second, the server rarely reaches that number anyway, so raising the cap won't have any detrimental effects usually.
- Third, I have a personal interest in how well EW v2 would do at high player counts, and it's my intention to try and test that over the coming Easter season.
v3 Status
In other news, v3 development is proceeding steadily if slowly, and I'd expect another test around Easter or thereabouts (no promises though), with working gates etc.
I can also offer a little more clarity on how donor ranks/perks will transfer to v3 when the time comes, though I will again elaborate on this later. Your rank (and whatever perks may come with that rank) will be transferred to the new server, though possibly under a different title etc. You'll also be offered an amount of donor currency to spend in-game as some form of compensation, which will be able to be spent on classes etc. To read what we've already said about the topic: https://store.empirewar.org/
v2 Status
In recognition that v2 still has a lot of life left in it, you'll notice I've been concentrating on its development over the past month or so. This is heading towards the goal of implementing heroes (including Naz-Gul and Balrog) into gameplay. These will be implemented through Game XP, which you can view either above your hotbar in the XP section, or by using /xp. If you notice any bugs with this feature at this point, be sure to tell me.
Happy PvPing!