How big a PS world is too big a PS world?

[Karyuu]

Who said that there will never be maps, at all? We meant that we won't have automatic maps, but did you forget the Cartography skill? :}

[steuben]

to answer zanzibar's question.

if it takes 3 months of 24/7 game time to run across it is too big.

but it terms of number of players. i don't think there really is a too big. as in rl, there a groups of people you interact with daily, reguraly, occastionaly, never. as ps grows it will be the same thing. you do not have to interact with everybody.

[BlackAcre]

It's never too big.  People will congregate where the action is, no matter how big the map is.  But having the freedom to wander is very cool. 

[Jeraphon]

It's never too big.  People will congregate where the action is, no matter how big the map is.  But having the freedom to wander is very cool. 

That's very true. The remedy? Lots of places where the action is, or things to do all over (such as wilderness areas for spawning, crafting areas in each city, farms, etc.) Give incentives for people to be in that small village instead of in Hydlaa. Clumping has a time and place, but having a spread-out population is a good thing.

[BlackAcre]

I played SWG from beta through the initial release (it disappointed most beta testers that they released it so early) for a while, and talk about enormous, that MMORPG is gigantic--10+ planets that were several hundred square kilometers apiece.  You can walk around for days if you feel like it.  The population did spread out in that case, for a number of reasons, but it was pretty fascinating to wander through, and there were still centers of population to be found on each planet.  Another gigantic MMORG is WWIIOnline, which is like, a 2/3 scale mockup of western Europe, and some have tried to walk the entire distance, but nobody has succeeded in one 'life' that I know of.  Truly enormous, but the playerbase keeps up the intensity by fighting where...the fighting is.  Enormous MMORPG playing fields are totally doable, and no hindrance to roleplaying, powerleveling, or anything else you want to do.  Ideally, I think they should expand Planeshift in perpetuity, whenever they get the resources to do so.  Eventually, It seems like money will probably become the issue limiting size, however, as all those servers have to add up, no matter how big the devs hearts are. 

[Karyuu]

That's precisely how I would like to envision PS in the future :} It'll be comprised not just of Yliakum, but whole other worlds to "planeshift" to. That sense of "Wow! Where does it end?" is absolutely delicious.

[Suno_Regin]

That'd be nice. It'd give more of a feel to the history. Like we'd be able to see where the Diaboli came from, and we could run around on Earth where humans came from. And go to wherever the other races were born in. =P

[Gated]

I think that you tend to find people at differing levels of experience and knowledge in different parts of the world.  This is think, at least to a degree, can lead to vast distance between those that know something enough to help someone, and those that are in essence the blind the leading the blind.

[Pestilence]

Well the feel with PS right now is pretty good with the number of people. You tend to see other people quite a lot and that should be the case, but atm 150 people is about the most peoplle I have seen online at the same time. Other games this is 10 time that and then a bigger world would definately be nececary.

The idea of mutible world I don't know we have a whole plane to explore first and ofcourse then there are other planes. Think thats enough expansion if the wilderness is a sign of things to come.

[Mindari]

i want to see a huge world, where expeditions will lierarelly takes days ( or at least hours ), and there will always be somewhere new to explore. similar to game like anarchy online, project entropia, and guildwars etc, but without the teleports

has anyone considered the technical aspects ? e.g. the terrain  engine and file sizes

[Peacer]

to answer zanzibar's question.

if it takes 3 months of 24/7 game time to run across it is too big.

but it terms of number of players. i don't think there really is a too big. as in rl, there a groups of people you interact with daily, reguraly, occastionaly, never. as ps grows it will be the same thing. you do not have to interact with everybody.

ptetosaurs *cough* teleportation *cough*

[Pestilence]

Well technical side might be an issue aswell I guess seeing I believe the devs have chosen for a mapstyle that makes it so you can adapt more but it also takes up more room that way. (no expert on it thought) But I think thats for the devs to look at when the time comes

Better to look here at what would be ideal and try to work to that. Ideally I think the world should be bigger then it is now but unless there are also a lot more people not that much bigger so you keep meeting people while just walking around. Ofcourse as planeshift becomes more mature I am hoping the number of people will increase even more so that new maps will also be populate with players.