Feature Suggestion: Seamless travel between Exiled Lands and Isle of Siptah

Conan Exiles General Discussion Feedback
1

So here’s one for you :slightly_smiling_face:
I haven’t played the Isle of Siptah map yet, despite owning the expansion, so I don’t know whether that includes some feature that would completely conflict with this idea - I imagine slight conflicts could be solved etc.

Basically the suggestion is to facilitate travel back and forth between the exiled lands and the isle of siptah and any other future maps / expansions that might appear.
And yes, I realize that would be a very ambitious project as currently your servers are designed to load a map and call it a day there :slight_smile: so it would need a bit of work.

But the finished product could be something like guild wars 1 had way way back, to where you could start your character in any expansion you purchased and once you leveled a bit and unlocked certain areas you could travel between maps / expansions etc.

So I’m just imagining here that it could potentially be cool to idk… pick the place you’re starting in, but once you’re like level 25 or so, be able to come across some portal or idk bribe a captain of a ship or something to travel to the other map… maybe have a “vacation home” there as well… interact with the special objects to learn the exclusive feats and recipes of the specific map… then bring your knowledge back and use those things in the other map… etc etc… possibilities are endless

Again, just a random thought, could help popularize the expansion a bit more and give players even more freedom.

(Ed: Edited the title to better reflect the suggestion)

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Server transfer is currently disabled, but when it is re-enabled, I would love to see it more like a portal to and from maps instead of it’s current state.

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I never used server transfer as I mainly play on my own server or single player.

But sure, that could be a thing too, maybe being able to select which Server the map you want to travel to should belong to…
or a setting in the menu whether to use that teleport to switch between the maps of the current server (if available) or display a selection of other servers too (I imagine there would be technical limitations of being able to travel to any server all the time - maybe server-clusters / alliances might need to be made to easier handle that)… idk

In terms of the technicality of the individual servers themselves, one thing would obviously be a concern and that is memory usage, since having to load another map would pretty much double the memory usage of the server.
For that I actually have an idea, you could add a config option whether to load the additional map as well or not… If set to load then the server would simply nest another instance of itself into the same app under a different thread that would handle the other map. This way it could be up to the discretion of the server owners whether they want to enable that or not.
You would then have the option to travel to that other map on the same server, else if the flag is set to not load the other map, the portal / ship / etc would be disabled (in case of DaVice’s spin-off idea gets implemented, then it would still allow you to pick other servers idk - I’m thinking more locally here for now :smiley: )
But yes, with the above as a potential solution, it actually wouldn’t be as hard to accomplish this as I initially thought… since all the puzzle pieces are already there, just have to be put together

4

Apparently I misunderstood your original idea. I wasn’t trying to suggestion something different than you. I was stating that transferring from one map to another and back again already exists, via server transfers. Since you can only have one map loaded per server instance (in current form) we need to upload our character to the cloud and then download onto the new server (map). There is also a mod that already exists (utilizing Apache) which links servers into clusters and allows you to transfer directly to the map that you wish.

In short, I understood your suggestion to be the implementation of a method that is similar to this mod which allows for a portal-like transfer between servers. Was I wrong?

5

Oh, I see.
Based on what you typed I thought you meant to suggest to use this method instead of the current “official” server transfers. As in walk into that portal / whatever and then pick which server you want to go to.
That obviously seemed a bit more complicated without a backend like what you described just now.

My suggestion wasn’t to allow portal-like transfers between servers thou :slight_smile: My suggestion was to redesign servers so they have the option of loading BOTH maps on the same server and simply teleporting to the new area / new map without leaving the server. So in practice it would look as thou the two maps have been merged to expand the area with a teleport facilitating transport between them. The player would just have a loading screen much like what you get now when you walk into the volcano area, but instead you would walk on to the other map which would be part of the same server.

I hope that makes more sense now :slight_smile:

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I like that, if it’s possible. I understood UE4 to have a size restriction that prevents more than one map, I hope that’s not the case though.

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Hmm, I don’t think it would apply in this case seeing as we’re talking about two separate maps and only one of them would be rendered at any one time.
Seeing as how both of those maps are capable of running on their own atm it should be fine. I believe those limitations are applied per level and teleporting a player to the other map when they interact with some teleporter would actually be opening the new level and would not require both of them to be stitched together in a single level.

At least that’s how I understand it, didn’t do any game development thou :slight_smile:
The more I think about it thou the more it seems viable and actually not as much work as I initially thought

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You can’t load both maps on the same “server” simultaneously. The server handles one map continuously, so it takes two “servers” (could be on the same machine but takes two instances to run).

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That was already covered above… That the server app would need a simple modification to self-nest another instance with the other map if configured as such. And then you can :slight_smile:

E: it would be obviously bit more complex than that… If done elegantly then they would redesign it a bit to be able to use the same database and such and add legit 2-map support to the server. However it would “work” even with a very crude version where they don’t do that and simply have the server app load another instance on a different port with the other map and just use the crude “server transfer” code between the two locally when you teleport.

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Its not the app. Its the fact that UE4 gives you 8 km maps and CE uses all of it. If you make smaller “maps” you can transfer between them because they all exist in the same persistent level. If you want CE and Siptah to run, it takes two servers due to UE4. No way around that.

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What you edited to include requires twice the resources and is “two servers”. You can already do this privately with the mod. No game changes necessary and its what you effectively do using the official server transfer method. FC has not connected them by choice and its presumably to prevent to much exploitation by those who have siptah. Its also worth noting that its disabled currently to address issues they have with allowing it.

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Again, not the case. UE limitation only applies to rendering… and the client is the only thing that does rendering, the server does not, it merely supplies data.
The client would only ever render one map at a time, the one the player is on.
Even on the second point, UE has something called Level Streaming where it can dynamically load and unload maps and stitch them together plus many other ways around their static level limit. However in this case neither of those limitations would apply.

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That is not how it works. You’re out of your depth, donny.

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And what I edited was already explained above as well…

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Am I thou? :slight_smile:
Also not to be mean or anything, but you seem to be very hostile for absolutely no reason.
I made a feature suggestion, I provided some pointers and ideas… Now you either like the feature or you don’t, but unless you’re officially representing Funcom as a developer, it’s probably not a good idea to start shooting down things in this negative fashion.
If you have something against the suggestion itself and you have another reason why you really don’t want this to happen, then by all means, say that instead

16

Because you arent listening.

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Hmm, I believe it’s you who isn’t listening, or rather reading the details posted here before typing.
For example I already clarified that in the current environment it would require two instances of the server to run… which you somehow still felt the need to point out, even thou it was already there and explained…

I also explained that with a bit of modification to the server, one of those instances could be hidden and nested into the other one so based on configuration they would start at the same time and yes, I even explained that it would take twice the resources… I also pointed out that with even more modification to the server app itself, they COULD introduce complete 2-map support so the server would serve both maps and be able to store data in the same database.

You seem to think that just because something “is” a certain way… it cannot be modified and that we’re stuck with the server application we currently have and there’s no way to modify that…

As for the unreal engine limits… there are various ways around those, but again like I pointed out, it can be completely bypassed, as like I said the client only needs to render one map at a time… and you yourself so graciously pointed out that there are ALREADY mods that do a server transfer to the other server instance… so how do you think UE4 renders that then?.. Again no problem on the client side - however it could still be improved to make it seamless

Bottom line… it CAN be done and I am certain of that…
Whether the devs want to or not, now that’s a different story

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I will use simple concepts because you are making it out to be more complicated than it is. Right now, let’s say 1 map worth of data to run with its current performance (which many people say is insufficient on gportal) takes 1 core and 6GB of RAM. To handle another “map”, it will need another core and another 6GB of RAM (ignoring database size as hard drive space is effectively free). Whether its one “server program” or two, it takes twice the resources and is therefore 2 servers as far as funcom is concerned. Funcom already gave people the level of server transfer they are willing to give, and already its being reworked because it had unintended consequences. If you don’t like that, you can use amunets on a private server.

So I ask you; what’s your point then if you acknowledge this and already have the ability to do server transfer? You are asking for something that you can already do on privates and are not allowed to do on officials by funcom’s choice.

So the answer to your request is actually quite simple:

No.

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20

They need to connect Siptah and Conan Exiles somehow.

For a lot of reasons.

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Again the boxed in thinking…
You seem to think that only “gportal” exists and that funcom has the same deals on there as you if you wish to rent a server…
I am not making it more complicated than it is… I am suggesting an actual way to include the expansion into the main game. And yes I am aware that if Funcom initially wanted to do it like that, they probably would have, however that’s why I am making a suggestion?.. Isn’t that why this place exists?

So to clarify… I never said anything about funcom’s official server hosting… This isn’t about server transfers at all… this is about changing the game… in such a way that you can seamlessly go from one map to the other, without logging out… without switching to another server… but walking up to an obelisk or something in-game… and getting loaded on to the other map as if you just fast-travelled there…

I’m going to go out on a limb here and wager that you’re one of “those” people who mainly do PvP in this game and are terrified of any potential change that may upset your “balance” and that’s why you’re automatically trying to find excuses as to why any change should not be made etc etc. Am I close to the truth here? No offense, but that hostility has to come from somewhere and to me it seems that you really do not want to add anything productive to these discussions, but rather try to find ways why it can’t be or shouldn’t be done?

Now to answer your question as to “Why would it be worth it for funcom to redesign their game to use up twice the server resources when they can keep it separate?”
Because… money?..
How many people bought their expansion?.. How many more would buy it if it was part of and accessible through the Exiled Lands and you could go over there, learn feats, have a base there as well just like you can in the north (keep in mind, that was an expansion too, it was simply a free one as an apology for a plethora of issues at the time, and yes that one they added to the old map since they had the space, this one they could just keep as a separate level and have a loading screen)

I know for a fact that sales would sky-rocket if that was introduced, there are a LOT of people that simply don’t buy the expansion atm because they prefer the EL map, but they might like the new weapons and feats… they just don’t want a completely new unfamiliar land to play 100% of their game on.

As for the cost of servers… when hosting… the cost could be calculated as cost / person… and when the combined server would use twice the resources… (2 cores and 12 GB RAM going with your example) - it would also potentially be capable of supporting twice the playerbase… or close… so they could simply merge an EL and a Siptah server in pairs… and call it a day… I see no issue there.

Again, I appreciate your opinion and you clearly don’t wan this change, which you have stated, however if you cannot add anything productive to this discussion and merely wish to sabotage it… then it’s probably best if you just stay out of it. And also… before you ever tell anyone how they’re out of their depth… might I suggest you check the water levels around yourself? I’ll even let you use google to double-check those UE4 limits…
Cheers!