Grinding?

If there are other people in an instance and you close it then you merely break your association with that instance. The instance remains open for the other people who are still associated with it though. That way you can start a fresh instance or whatever.

As long as there are people associated with an instance it remains open. 'X'ing the instance or letting your timer run out won't close the instance but just break your association to it. Once the server realizes that there is no one left associated with an instance it will shut it down.

I think that sort of system would accomplish what you want.

"

The trouble is that there are a lot of tricky rules to come up with to make sure this isn't abusable.

Well to help this i would recommend making the vote have to pass a majority vote. Say Player A,B,C,D, and E are all playing. So player A says" lets replay this instance, and players B,C vote in favor giving them majority. I think that would be the best way to handle it. That will make it impossible for one or two grievers to ruin a instance. Possible problems if a player is AFK maybe after 30 seconds the decision by default is set to no.

As far as the actual instance interface i would recommend something kinda easy to follow. You don't want to put people off by making it complicated. Just something to keep in mind. Like a simple yes or no to close instance, and for the instances list them either alphabetically or chronologically by the amount of time left. Finally if people don't want to mess with a instance interface just make it automatically set to default settings with a prompt if they want to change it. Just my two cents.

Hm, i think we need to know if there are teleporters in the game and if there are connecting areas like for example the prison level 1, the prison level 2 and so on, with a teleporter at one of these levels or in every level. If it is done in the way it was done in d2 then we also need to know whether there are independent instances for each area or if there is one instance for the whole "prison" complex. And are there other options to travel back to town besides teleporters and town portals. (Or am i wrong with my assumption that there are teleporters and town portals^^)

If there is a single instance for every single level (e.g. for prison 1, prison 2 and so on) and you have the possibility to delete one instance you can easily abuse that system in a party: Go to the last level before the boss, open a town portal right in front of the way to the last level, kill the boss, reset the level with the boss, go through the portal and you can hopefully imagine the rest :)

"

Rhesos wrote:

If there is a single instance for every single level (e.g. for prison 1, prison 2 and so on) and you have the possibility to delete one instance you can easily abuse that system in a party: Go to the last level before the boss, open a town portal right in front of the way to the last level, kill the boss, reset the level with the boss, go through the portal and you can hopefully imagine the rest :)

I assume when you close an instance all portals into that instance close as well. Wouldn't really make sense otherwise.

Ya i meant on a group basis and on the condition they are all in town. If people we're still in town it would only make sense you would disband from the group and instance rather than close everyone else instance that would suck lol.

"

tpapp157 wrote:

I assume when you close an instance all portals into that instance close as well. Wouldn't really make sense otherwise.

But if you have independent instances for each level then a portal in the third level would not be closed if you close the instance of the fourth (= last) level. So you can but a portal right in front of the entrance to the fourth level (which is in level 3), close the last level and so on...

Edit:
As jonathan wrote about the timer thing i thought about a solution without timers but all the ideas strongly depent on the questions asked above and/or can be easily abused...

I thought of things like letting the instance open as long as at least one player and/or a town portal is in it. But how do you handle that in levels with teleporters in it? And what happens if the player want to reset the last level, where he used a town portal but the teleporter is in a level before => In my system he needs to go back to town, through the teleporter in an instance which is reseted already and has to open a new town portal, which will delete the old one to delete the instance of the last level... There are problems everywhere :(
But if you can live with the town portal thing i think that my system would work at least as good as the timer thing if there are no quests for which you have to go back to a previous area (but even with the time for that would be short).

Here is my idea:
An instance remains open until at least one player and/or at least one town portal is in it and an instance will be closed if and only if a player joins a new area (everything except of towns count as area in that case) => if the player uses a teleporter to go back to town nothing would happen to the instance. If he uses the teleporter to go to another area and there is no town portal in it there will be a reset.
I think that this could work if there are no complexes where the teleporter is in the last level. And of course there is the abuse possibility in partys which is described above...

Basic 3 Rules:

If someone's done with an instance s/he removes his/her access to the old one to start a new one quick.

If there is nobody has an access to instance; instance gets closed instantly.

If there is nobody in the instance and there are still players who have the access, it automatically gets closed in 30 mins.

Everything is solved :)

Well, this is how I imagine instance management -

Instances are broken up into single-use and multi-use types of instances.

- Single-use instances have a single player tied to them, multi-use instances have multiple players tied to them.

- Both instances close automatically after 30 minutes of non-use.

- Both types of instances can be reset by the party leader, however, multi-use instances are restricted from being reset while players are still inside.

- Only when all players are outside the instance the party leader can reset the instance.

- If the party leader leaves a group the instance is transferred to the next party leader.

- The leader that left the multi-use instance can now create a new single-use instance.

I also imagine a separate interface for instance management.

im not gonna " " that johnathan but what i will say is touche sounds like you guys ponder alot! and as far as an instance management great damn idea. Making the game more organized is always a plus.

@Zidjian i understand that everyone wouldnt be happy with the 24 hour reset but it'd be alot more time consuming to level up which in my opinion wouldnt be such a bad idea. Although WoW prob did it just so they could sneak some days onto your monthly fee :/. So you win on that thought always sounds like a good idea at the time >.<

just a brainstorm...

===============
== METHOD #1 ==
===============

* Upon entering an area, the game checks for instances of that area that are associated with your character, or your party members. If there is more than one instance, a dialog pops up prompting your to select the instance you wish to enter. If there are no instances, a new one is created.

* Different instances could be identified by various things, maybe time of creation, name of creator, etc. Mousing over each intance name would show a list of characters that are associated with that instance.

* Upon entering an instance, your character becomes associated with that instance, and disassociated with any other instances of the same area.

* Somewhere in the UI would be something that could be used to disassociate oneself from an instance. Characters are automatially disassociated if they have not entered the instance for [time limit]

* An instance remains open until there are no longer any characters associated with it, at which point it closes.

Pros:
- joining various parties would not put your personal instances in jeopardy
- easy to navigate to a specific instance

Cons:
- could become cumbersome depending on how good the UI implementation is, especially if town portals are in the game


===============
== METHOD #2 ==
===============

Players can only join a party whilst in a town (eg not currently in an instance)

A character can only be associated with one instance at a time. Upon entering an area, the game chooses an instance based on a set of rules:

If there is no instance associated with you or any of your party members, create a new one. Otherwise, enter ...

1. the instance with the most party members currently in it, if tied (will only ever be tied at 0):
2. the instance with the most party members associated with it, if tied:
3. the instance associated with the party leader, if none:
4. the instance already associated with your character, if none:
5. the oldest instance

Pros:
- No need for an instance menu
- Automatically chooses the most populated isntance

Cons
- Could be confusing
- Limits players to joining parties only while in towns

Parties could therefore control which instance is kept by choosing which character enters the area first.