The devs had valid reasons for installing it so I don't see them removing it.
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Six years ago. And while I know they're never going to remove it, dropping it to 10-15 seconds would still be a major boon for such times when I change to the wrong outfit or my costume change emote misfires, not changing my costume but resetting the timer.
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Originally Posted by Forbin_Project
The devs had valid reasons for installing it so I don't see them removing it.
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Originally Posted by Arcanaville
Samuel_Tow is the only poster that makes me want to punch him in the head more often when I'm agreeing with him than when I'm disagreeing with him.
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Aye, I don't really see an issue with lowering it a bit. I remember when there was no delay people used to use binds to make it "strobe" between two cossies, which caused issues with server load, especially on any events. But making it 10 seconds is enough to prevent that IMO.
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Originally Posted by Samuel_Tow
Six years ago. And while I know they're never going to remove it, dropping it to 10-15 seconds would still be a major boon for such times when I change to the wrong outfit or my costume change emote misfires, not changing my costume but resetting the timer.
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10-15 seconds sounds about right to me. I hate it when a wrong costume changes leaves you floundering, or worse, when making minor adjustments to costumes (Like the addition of auras) and having to wait for the timer to reset.
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Originally Posted by Carnifax_NA
Aye, I don't really see an issue with lowering it a bit. I remember when there was no delay people used to use binds to make it "strobe" between two cossies, which caused issues with server load, especially on any events. But making it 10 seconds is enough to prevent that IMO.
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Anything below what it is now all the way to zero sounds good to me.
As a side note, "Strobing" as was mentioned earlier is still 100% do-able by turning on and off SG mode. I saw 5 people doing it together last night. It was cute at first, but after about ten seconds it made me want to slap the lot of them with a fish.
So unless a timer is also added to exiting/entering SG mode, I do not see this as a valid argument against killing the timer completely as it stands unless you're going to specifically target the costume pieces and not color.
I agree that if the 30 second timer was imposed on us to prevent people from "strobing" costume changes that it's a little strange they did not also put a timer on SG mode changes for the same reason. About the only reason I can think of for that mismatch is that the amount of data to transmit SG mode color changes is likely much smaller than the amount of data used to define entire costumes. The amount of server message spam related to strobing SG mode color changes maybe wasn't bad enough to put a limitation on it. On the other hand maybe the Devs just forgot about it. 
The Devs do have a habit of "overcorrecting" for things. I understand why the Devs slapped a timer on costume changes and I understand why they'll likely never completely remove it. But I agree with others in saying lowering that timer to 10 or 15 seconds ought to be a reasonable compromise for preventing both costume strobing and excessive annoyance waiting for an arbitrary timer.
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/this.|
Originally Posted by Samuel_Tow
Six years ago. And while I know they're never going to remove it, dropping it to 10-15 seconds would still be a major boon for such times when I change to the wrong outfit or my costume change emote misfires, not changing my costume but resetting the timer.
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10-15 seconds is fine.
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A typical costume file as I have them on my hard drive is 7KB. That's not a lot of data, but it potentially allows a person to cycle through all five of his costumes almost instantly, delivering on the order of 25-30KB of data to everyone around him, and this is possible to keep up... Practically indefinitely. That's a lot of load for people that really isn't necessary. The timer is there to alleviate that.|
Originally Posted by Lothic
I agree that if the 30 second timer was imposed on us to prevent people from "strobing" costume changes that it's a little strange they did not also put a timer on SG mode changes for the same reason. About the only reason I can think of for that mismatch is that the amount of data to transmit SG mode color changes is likely much smaller than the amount of data used to define entire costumes. The amount of server message spam related to strobing SG mode color changes maybe wasn't bad enough to put a limitation on it. On the other hand maybe the Devs just forgot about it.
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At the same time, a 30-second timer really isn't necessary. If the point is to keep a lid on unnecessary network load, then even a one-second timer would be sufficient. With that in mind, a 10-second timer should be more than sufficient to not only prevent people from causing adverse effects by "flickering," but actually discourage then from wanting to do so in the first place.
SG costume mode shouldn't be nearly as connection-intensive, as SG is incapable of changing any costume items on your character, and should as such take much less memory to transfer. Provided I'm an idiot and SG mode is just a different kind of costume swap, then you guys would have a point in that it's weird. However, being that I don't know and the developers blocked costume changes but not SG mode, I'll take that as a hint as SG mode swaps not being as intensive.
Incidentally, all of that is conjecture I've picked up over the years. None of this has ever been so much as commented on by a developer to the best of my knowledge.
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Originally Posted by Arcanaville
Samuel_Tow is the only poster that makes me want to punch him in the head more often when I'm agreeing with him than when I'm disagreeing with him.
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It's a very safe bet.|
Originally Posted by Samuel_Tow
SG costume mode shouldn't be nearly as connection-intensive, as SG is incapable of changing any costume items on your character, and should as such take much less memory to transfer. Provided I'm an idiot and SG mode is just a different kind of costume swap, then you guys would have a point in that it's weird. However, being that I don't know and the developers blocked costume changes but not SG mode, I'll take that as a hint as SG mode swaps not being as intensive.
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There's no way that updated color definitions, which at worst have to refresh some textures (and that may not even be the case, I'm still unsure how colored costume parts actually work myself), are anywhere near as intensive as forcing the client to completely (re)draw new parts, especially already server-intensive things like capes.
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I wouldn't mind a lower timer on costume changes. When doing lots of corrections to a bunch of costumes, I know I find it annoying.
Can I live with it, yes. Would I like to see it lowered a bit, yuppers.
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10-15 secs? /Signed. 10 is fine IMO.
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Originally Posted by Zwillinger
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Originally Posted by Captain_Photon
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Strobing is relatively easy on bandwidth and GPU resources to change the color overlay of a costume bit.
Changing costumes asks the local client to pull up textures from the hard drive creating a greater burden.
And since that 30 second limit, we can now change models which involves the server removing the old model and replacing it with the new with all its new costume pieces. So, actually, costume changing is now more burdensome on systems than less.
Should the timer be looked at to see if it can be lowered? Yes. But we should be ready to accept the judgment if it is "Sorry, we can't."
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So the time limit was imposed to prevent easy lag griefing?
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Yes. Player characters are by far the most complex objects ingame. It's already easy to create lag just from too many players in one area just doing emotes, much less firing off powers.|
Originally Posted by Ang_Rui_Shen
So the time limit was imposed to prevent easy lag griefing?
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Think of a costume change as essentially multiplying the number of players in a given area by how quickly they can be executed. For the most part when someone changes costume, it's for all intents and purposes a whole new person entering the area, in terms of instructions your computer and the servers have to send back and forth. To a computer, it doesn't really matter that the costume someone changes to may be the same one they had on 5 seconds ago, it's a whole new model to draw and animate.
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Yes that's a good point about the possibility of swapping not only costume items but the full body models (male, female and huge) adding to the system burden.|
Originally Posted by Zombie Man
Strobing is relatively easy on bandwidth and GPU resources to change the color overlay of a costume bit.
Changing costumes asks the local client to pull up textures from the hard drive creating a greater burden. And since that 30 second limit, we can now change models which involves the server removing the old model and replacing it with the new with all its new costume pieces. So, actually, costume changing is now more burdensome on systems than less. Should the timer be looked at to see if it can be lowered? Yes. But we should be ready to accept the judgment if it is "Sorry, we can't." |
But I would counter that with the point I mentioned earlier: the Devs always overcompensate for these things. The average computer people are using to play this game today has to be better than the average was 6 years ago. The choice of 30 seconds was probably a very conservative concession to the slowest computers of 6 years ago. Can the Devs continue to reasonably hold this game to that standard for this situation?
I find it very hard to believe that resetting that timer to 10-15 seconds would not be adequate for its purpose in the later half of 2010.
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The average computer is indeed better. But then again the average burden of information in each costume has gone up too.
I'd rather sacrifice a few seconds on a change timer for far more elaborate costume pieces than we had 6 years ago.
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While this line of thinking is interesting I can't really imagine the Devs ever telling us directly, "Well we would have liked to have given you guys some super new costume items but you forced us to lower the costume change timer from 30 to 15 seconds so now we can't do it." |
Originally Posted by Lemur Lad
The average computer is indeed better. But then again the average burden of information in each costume has gone up too.
I'd rather sacrifice a few seconds on a change timer for far more elaborate costume pieces than we had 6 years ago. |
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^^This.|
Originally Posted by Lemur Lad
The average computer is indeed better. But then again the average burden of information in each costume has gone up too.
I'd rather sacrifice a few seconds on a change timer for far more elaborate costume pieces than we had 6 years ago. |
My computer is right at 1 year old and off the shelf, because I needed to replace my fried laptop that day. I can run the game just fine at just about minimum Ultra settings.
But considering that people have binds to engage all of their toggles when logging off... at the market... for which there can be no other reason than to grief others, I would fully expect people to take advantage of the lack of a timer to spam their costume changes.
I am not opposed to dropping it to say, 15 seconds, but I would be opposed to eliminating it entirely.
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I think it's safe to say it'll never completely go away unless the Devs come up with some other semi-miraculous scheme to accomplish the same safeguard without a timer. But I do think having it set at 30 seconds is (and maybe always was) far too conservative even when taking everything else that's been raised in this thread into account.
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Originally Posted by Red Valkyrja
I am not opposed to dropping it to say, 15 seconds, but I would be opposed to eliminating it entirely.
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Why not? They've made a lot of costume decisions based on the bandwidth limits they operate under in the past. They have a budget, and they can't go over it. I love me my costumes, but I'd rather have the budget spent on things that make them better than things that save a few seconds here and there.
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Originally Posted by Lothic
While this line of thinking is interesting I can't really imagine the Devs ever telling us directly, "Well we would have liked to have given you guys some super new costume items but you forced us to lower the costume change timer from 30 to 15 seconds so now we can't do it."
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"Null is as much an argument "for removing the cottage rule" as the moon being round is for buying tennis shoes." -Memphis Bill
I wouldn't mind a 15 second delay.
/sign
I would like to see the cool down timer removed between costume changes.
That is all.
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