Showing Posts For relt.6189:
I’ll second the first answer. I haven’t heard anything related to the lore, but shards are absolutely a term in server architecture. They are a way to horizontally partition a database so that each instance of the database (or World in the case of GW2) contains everything needed for a subset of players to fully experience the game, without the server needing to maintain the relationship with all other players. Having all players on the same instance (shard) of the server is very resource intensive, on the client side and the server side. See the wiki post for more info: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shard_%28database_architecture%29
The way it used to work (before the April 2014 feature pack) is players were “stored” on their World’s shard and each World had a shard (subset of server) set apart for its players to play on. You defaulted to your own World’s shard, but could move between them. Number of shards available to play on = number of worlds (plus overflow). 31 Worlds = 31 Shards (plus overflow).
With the new Megaserver system characters are still "stored’ on their World’s shard. But when you play PvE, each world no longer has it’s own shard; there is a shared set of shards, as many as are needed to handle all of the players on a given map. Number of shards available to play on = number of players in a map / max number of players allowed in a map. 500 players / 100 max = 5 shards (for that map). 550 players / 100 max = 6 shards (for that map)
One thing I loved about the original GW, something that set it above other games for me, was being able to move around and resize every UI element. Please give us the option to customize the UI.
I’ve been with the guild since WAR and they are a solid group to play with. Always a good time and hardly any drama—just fun.
I’d like to add my voice to the many suggestions for the ability to customize the UI. I loved being able to put everything just where I wanted it in Guild Wars, and when I went to other MMOs that didn’t have total customization, I always compared them negatively to GW. It is sorely missed by this efficiently minded player.
Agreed on build and gear saving.