dirtybladesEU posted:
Housing market... Take the fecking cap off on how much a CM can hold!!
This keeps coming up ever so often.
They can’t raise the CM Plat cap without rewriting most of the code for the entire game. This is one of those cases where Mythic was not fibbing when they said the cap can’t easily be raised.
The max number is based on the size of a standard 32-bit binary computer word. 31 bits for the number and one bit for + - . The database was designed to use a standard 32-bit computer word length. To make the word length longer Mythic/Bioware needs to build a new database for the entire game and they need to recode any part of the game that manipulates/accesses/moves Plat/Gold/Silver/Copper to start using a double length word (64 bits). So, to increase the Plat cap, the database needs to be scrapped and rebuilt and much of the game code needs to be rewritten.
A computer 32-bit binary word for the number 1 looks like:
00000000000000000000000000000001
A computer 32-bit binary word for the number 5 looks like:
00000000000000000000000000000101
A computer 32-bit binary word for the number 6 looks like:
00000000000000000000000000000110
A computer 32-bit binary word for the number 7 looks like:
00000000000000000000000000000111
Filling the computer word with all ones gives us the following:
01111111111111111111111111111111
and converting the above computer binary number to DAoC plat/gold we end up with the largest amount of money the database can have which is:
2147483647
or
214,748,36,48
or
214 Platinum, 748 Gold, 36 Silver, 47 Copper
Once the 32-bit word is full of ones the number can’t get bigger without making the binary computer word longer. The only way to make the word longer is to use a double length word. It can be done but as I previously stated it would require rebuilding the database and much of the game code.
dirtybladesEU posted:
whats the point in having a mithril on the character if you cannot use it!!!
Initially there was supposed to be Mithril, Plat, Gold, Silver, Copper and each slot was only supposed to be displayed as two digits. The max number was still supposed to be 2147483647 (which would be displayed as 21,47,48,36,47 or 21 Mithril, 47 Platinum, 48 Gold, 36 Silver, 47 Copper) but an error was made when different departments did not discuss (or misunderstood) and the gold and plat slots were coded to both display as three digits instead of two digits.
So the monetary number ended up being 214 748 36 47 ( no Mithril, 214 Platinum, 748 Gold, 36 Silver, 47 Copper). The number ends up being the exact same thing 2147483647 but with the separations being different and it ends up that Mithril is not used.
Following Mythic’s tradition of not cleaning up after themselves (or not doing it very well) they left the Mithril slot in the game UI.
More info can be found in the discussions on the following threads:
Topic: why hasnt the 200p cap been taken away yet?
http://vnboards.ign.com/daoc_general_board/b5176/114389044/p1/
Topic: @Mythic - Remove Houses with Full CMs from the Search.
http://vnboards.ign.com/daoc_general_board/b5176/115759578/p1/
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