What's with all the frequent lag spikes lately?

[Kent]

So the game experience is now characterized by very regular hang-ups of lag? What's begun recently to cause this? It's rather frustrating.

Someone told me the game lags every time someone logs in, but as a player, I have no way to know if that is the case or not.

[Daiden]

Since Kent pointed it out on the 22nd or so, I have tried to pay as close attention as I can when I get a lag spike. Maybe my data is biased or tainted by Kent's statement, but it DOES appear that there is a connection between the lag spikes and when someone both connects AND disconnects to the game.

[Noctere]

There are many items that could potentially cause a latency spike. Many of these we have identified and we have some solutions in the works but these are items that take a great deal of effort and will most likely not be ready for some time. For now, please just bear with us as there may be moments where high player counts or multiple log ins/outs or other factors may cause things to slow down or pause every once in a while.

[Daiden]

Much appreciated! I was just trying to follow up on what Kent mentioned since I told him I would after I looked into it. :)

[Vaelin]

Yeah. this is why I hesitate to play when it's those times of the day. I get dc a lot due to my internet and I fear I may be causing problems for other players when I keep relogging in.

[Jirato]

After some testing, it appears that it takes approximately 6 seconds for the login system to run from the time someone enters the login command to the time they are able to play. As CLOK is not a multi-threaded application, this blocks everything else while it is running.

As Noctere said, we've got a couple things in the works for this, but now that I've seen what a significant impact this is, I'll bump it up on the priority list.

[Jirato]

Upon further investigation, it looks like the majority of the character loading time has to do with mounts, I'd like to urge anyone concerned about causing lag to please stable their mounts before they log off rather than logging off while mounted.

Also, do not hoard items in your saddlebags, they're great for a few adventuring necessities, but shouldn't contain hundreds of items. I haven't actually looked to see what people are currently storing and what the saddlebag item limits are, but if needed, will have to lower their max weight and implement a total item count limit.

[Jirato]

Issue has a slight band-aid on it right now, referencing the below development log entry:
* Mounts will now persist in the game world upon character logout/disconnect. Characters will log back in the standing position and will need to re-mount, unless their mount has been auto-stabled. This is a temporary action to prevent the game from freezing for 6+ seconds every time someone logs in, and will be re-assessed once a more permanent solution can be implemented. -- Jirato 14:09, 1 July 2020 (EDT)

I know this isn't a desirable permanent solution, and I have a couple changes in mind which will allow is to more quickly and easily access the offline mounts so that we can re-enable this feature, but for now, the login and disconnect lag has been resolved. It will take awhile to put together though.

Note that characters who previously logged out mounted prior to this change will still cause a lag spike upon their first login (the game will retrieve their mount one final time). Any future login/logouts from that person should go relatively smoothly.

[Lemuel]

As a stopgap measure, could we confine the possible autostabling locations to these four places only:

Mistral Lake Stables
Shadgard Stables
Haiban South Stables
Dwaedyn Vil Stables

The reason behind this request is this: We are getting a lot of new persons trying out CLOK lately, some playing quite late hours with few others on, and it is difficult to explain to someone with little in-game map knowledge how to find places like the Chapterhouse or Flint's Corral. Perhaps it is even harder for those players using software that doesn't permit them to 'Examine Map' to find those off-road stables even with someone explaining well.

Sometimes the game stables my horse in the Chapterhouse anyway when I log out south of Haiban and I have to walk three times longer to the Chapterhouse than I would to Haiban South, so this suggestion would fix that as well. A few weeks just past, some horses went to the Festival Stables too.