3. Shard 3

Shard 3


  • Are there any plans for a shard 3? Shard 2 has had its last boundary rooms filled now and we're running out of space for new respawn/novice zones in shards 1 and 2.


  • If we do get a shard3, I think it may be time to take another look at the way portals connect shards; shard0 and shard2 are already extremely isolated from each other, shard3 will make that even worse, and I feel like this sharding also sort of echos in the community as well.

    A few ideas:

    • Portals in highway rooms can lead to any shard, not just the next shard over

    • Portals in sector centers can lead anywhere

    • Portals that creeps can define what shard to exit on

    • A structure allowing players to create their own portals

    • Something something power creeps

    I think this would help a lot with preventing shards from becoming islands.

  • Culture

    I also would like to see all of the shards connected to each other.


  • There's also some issue where your code doesn't necessarily start running on the other shard when a creep goes through a portal, so that's another disincentive to inter-shard gameplay.

    1 Reply
  • Culture

    @wtfrank is the issue just that there's no CPU available? I do wish we had a base level of 10cpu on all shards no matter what.

    1 Reply

  • Shard3 would be cool.

    But I am a bit concerned about the additional space that would bring us. Wars in screeps are almost always triggered by territorial disputes and are declining if there is enough space for everyone to grow.

    I have the feeling, that the sharding feature added too much space to screeps, even with the size reduction of shard0.

    The world of screeps needs to be crowded for alliances to form and wars to break out. And we do want wars, to keep people interested.

  • SUN

    I'm not convinced shard3 is necessary; even the slightest incentive to clear sectors to allow for re-spawn zones would probably be enough for the short term... for example special structures that only renew when a respawn zone forms?

    I have observed that near me on shard 0 there are several sectors that are barely populated by active players. There is also a lot of empty space within a lot of empires that I have noticed.

    We just need to encourage leaving larger continuous chunks being empty. The flipside of this is that I forsee any respawn zone is going to be routinely demolished the moment the walls fall.


  • I agree with the last two commenters. Unless the game mechanics change somehow or current shards are increased in size it's going to be inevitable though. Either more rooms need to appear or there won't be any place for novice zones which in itself is a game mechanic change.

    I feel the devs need to start thinking about further incentives to lead people to conflict. I suggested a "combat leaderboard" here, but other things such economy buffs coming from some combat related activities would work.

  • Dev Team

    Hey guys,

    Shard3 is planned for a nearest future, so don't worry, novice and respawn areas are here to stay; all shards except shard0 stays their size. We also discussed your concerns about 'too much space'; honestly, the issue is not about being too much space (it would the same as if we had one large shard), it's about isolation between shards. We have some plans to decrease said isolation.

    👍

  • @tedivm no it's not about no CPU being available, i've tested 1 and 5 CPU being assigned to a shard, and the code just doesn't start running after a creep goes through a portal unless you upload your code after the creep has gone through the portal. I claimed a room on shard1 last night and my code has run continuously since (as you would expect given that I own at least one structure). Though someone in YP is moaning about the room I claimed so I will be unclaiming it out of friendliness. Once no creeps or structures exist on the shard, my code will stop running and it won't start running when a creep transfers through a portal (until I upload more code).

    Basically it works like this:

    [ code not running]

    creep1 goes through portal

    [code not running]

    creep1 dies

    [code not running]

    creep2 goes through portal

    [code not running]

    upload codebase

    [code starts running!]

    creep2 dies

    [code not running]

    creep3 goes through portal

    [code not running]

    upload new code

    [code running!]

    creep3 dies

    [code not running]


  • Any ETA on shard 3? The shard 2 novice zones is looking pretty crowded!

  • Dev Team

    I'm sorry to say that the plan has changed, we decided to postpone shard3.

    Despite of that 'too much space' issue is not related to shards, it's still a thing, and it was a thing even before shards. By postponing shard3, we'll try to reduce free space. This probably means we'll change novice/respawn zones policy if we have to, like making more smaller zones instead of few bigger (I'll keep you informed about any planned changes)

    👍