[MUD-Dev] Libs for 3D Client/Servers

[Vincent Archer]

According to Adam Martin:
> From: "Vincent Archer" <archer at frmug.org>

>> If you go to the current top-of-the-line hardware, which would be
>> a quadri-processor Ghz board (with oodles of the ram pouring thru
>> the backpanel of the rack, too :) ), you could probably run a
>> good-sized world on a single box.
 
> ...could you please quantify "a good-sized world" ? :).

My definition of "good-sized world" is a 500 to 1000 peak use players,
with about the same number of "active" MOBs (MOBs that are sitting
at their guard points or "on patrol" on fixed paths don't count).
All that in a "3D rich" world.

> <provocative comment> 
> As I see it, obviously the most intensive function of the server
> is handling all those simultaneous connections - you have to have
> your protocol stack for each, and be doing lots of
> context-switching from one player to the next
> </provocative comment>

It's probably enough to occupy one of the processors full time, yep :)

The reason I mentioned a quad-processor board was that it is
amenable to splitting the tasks "relatively" easy:

  1 processor to handle front-end (player communications and login)
  1 processor to "run" the game world
  1 processor for AI
  and 1 processor to bind them all (back-end tasks, file/database
  access, backups, administration tasks. Probably the one with the
  less to do)

> Or, harking back to attempts to establish common vocabularies,
> does anyone have better suggestions for how to quantify how much
> of a game can be run on a given lump of hardware?

Never underestimate the impact of AI in your game. Going from
dumbass Asheron's Call AI to "slightly dumb and gameable" Everquest
AI changes a *lot* the resources needed for the task. So much that
EQ has to skim on collisions (mobs ignore smaller objects for their
path - hence the "tree climb" artefact that is commonplace in EQ).

--
	Vincent Archer			Email:	archer at frmug.org

All men are mortal.  Socrates was mortal.  Therefore, all men are Socrates.
							(Woody Allen)
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