The Big Prim Problem

The main issue I see is that the sim processors and physics engine need to work well for the overall good of SL. If it isn't technically feasible at this time to have prims > 10m, then they shouldn't be in SL at all.

Now having said that, I do think that there might be middle grounds, for example allowing mega prims that are phantom only so they can be used for visual effects, but don't break the rest of SL. If the SL infrastructure can handle more later, add more capabilities, but only if it will not mess up the rest of SL.

If the physics engine will have issues with prims >256m...then that should be the limit. I do believe that the 10m limit should be changed, however. *IF* prims of dimensions greater than 10m pose no additional strain on the resources...why not allow it?

It seems silly to make people use multiple prims to do things like walls, floors or fences. If a landowner with a single 512m plot wants to put a decorative fence around their plot, why should they have to use 12 prims to do it...when a single hollow cube may do the trick, or at the very least, they could do it in 4 prims. That 117 prim allotment goes REALLY quick as it is.

As for the griefing and encroachment issues...they are not going to go away, no matter how small the maximum size is. The statement that "Prims don't grief people. People grief people." is dead on. *Tips hat in the direction of Coaldust Numbers*

It is probably not a good idea to have a prim or child prim, automatically recognize when it is encroaching another plot. However, what if a "Check Encroachment..." function was added (buried deep in the "More..." realm of the pie menu) that was able to determine 1) if the prim encroached land not owned by its Owner/Group, 2) if the person checking was the Owner/Group Member of the encroached property, and 3) then allowed them to Return it. That way, every prim is not constantly making the check when rezzed or moved, but a Land owner can activate that functionality if and when needed.

I for one, would love to make a Roundhouse and a Turntable for Locomotives with appropriate sized cylinders...rather than having to kludge an approximation together with an overdose of prims. In most people’s hands, such capability would make SL a better place. We should deal with the griefing minority whenever it becomes necessary and let honest folks have greater flexibility in exercising their creativity.

i vote to increase prim size limit, 10m is too small. give us 20, 30 or 40 or some other agreeable size fully editable and i wouldn't need to use any mega prims and it sounds like most other users wouldn't either. maybe allow folks larger ones on a case by case basis for art etc..

put it to a vote, a world created by users!!!

LL should facilitate uses for all creative tools. Clearly from all these responses, many people are using prims larger than the now-miniscule 10x10 for structures including walls, floors, roofs and sky platforms. Certainly sizes up to 100x100 must remain and they should be made manipulable. Too many are in use and they don't really hurt anyone. The idea that griefers are wildly through them up wildly and ruining the SL experience is spurious. I have a 100,000 sqm public park filled with attractions, including many structures built with prims larger than 10x10. I have built a university campus with stacked 50x100 sky platforms on 10,000 sqm of mainland. Think how many extra prims would have been used at 10x10.

I say keep them, at least the reasonable ones. I've used the 50x50 and smaller. You can keep them from encroaching on neighboring parcels if you pay attention to the way you set them, but it does require responsible use. The 40x40 sphere has allowed me to do things I couldn't otherwise and I really would hate to see it go.

These prims have their limits in usefulness, but saving on laying out a base plate and flooring can make the difference in being able to build a large structure and being stuck with a cottage due to prim usage. As others have said, great for sky home bases or above ground sand boxes.

Now something the size of a sim, I can't see a use for, but that's my opinion.

As to abuse, I've seem some abusive items made from standard size prims(screamer boxes pop to mind). Responsible people will work responsibily. Griefers will continue to use whatever tool is at hand, big prims or standard size, they will find a way, unfortunately.

. . . is just a very clear yes or no, one way or the other.

(1) CAN WE USE MEGAPRIMS OR NOT: I'm at a disadvantage because I don't feel I can try them in the houses I sell as long as I know they "might be removed" if they are bothering anything. Somehow. In ways you can't predict. Differently in different sims. Et cetera and so on and so forth.

I just can't sell something that the customer may just have to throw away.

It would be much better, in terms of selling items and building them, to have very clear-cut rules on what IS allowed, and what ISN'T, period. The uncertainty is the worst thing. I have no idea what might happen if I used megaprims in my builds, yet I would like to.

This idea of "case by case" decisions - AFTER the fact - is the kiss of death to someone who spends ages on a build, and then sells a bunch of them.

It's vital to know that what IS or ISN'T going to be allowed to be used by the purchaser. This winking and waffling and looking away approach just isn't good enough for business purposes.

Please. Clear rulings. For everyone. Can we use them or not? And if so, what sizes can we use?

If we can't, get rid of them. If we can, say so, so those of us who follow the "rules" - such as they seem to be - can start using them.

(2) GRIEFING: I don't think griefing should really factor into the decision as to whether to officially allow megaprims or not. (Use of megaprims to grief would, in fact, be the one and only thing that should be handled on a case-by-case basis, as you would with any other prims used to grief.)

(3) PERFORMANCE/HAVOC: If they are going to mess up performance to a degree where some of them have to be removed, then don't allow those at all.

Performance is more important, in my opinion, than whether or not we can have more with fewer prims on our properties, or enjoy spectacular, huge builds. I very much don't like the idea that people are going hog-wild with megaprims if they hurt the sim performance, avatar manouevering, and other such considerations. Nothing is worth that!

In general, though, we could certainly use bigger prims - ideally, ones that can be modified and are supported just as the prims we have now are. I would much rather see that than these limited hacked things.

(4) A QUESTION (for anyone): The way it stands now, I've been understanding that I cannot use them at all without risk. Yet - the way the blog reads today, apparently these dire warnings about removal have had to do with people building wild and wacky things, not simply using them in regular houses? So - I've been an idiot?

And by the way, it's most annoying to have been a good SL citizen regarding megaprims and then find out they are going to be TESTED ON in the certification program!!!!

(5) A THANK YOU: And, Michael, may I say how very much I appreciate your opening this forum thread. We went to the museum this afternoon, and by the time we returned, the blog entry was posted and already filled before I'd had even so much as a chance to look at it!

Thank you so much for thinking of us, and being willing to read all the input!

And thank you, too, for working toward clarity on this issue. It is very difficult to be a responsible builder when these things aren't clear.

coco

Laughs

We use them for walkways, seamless pool water, rooftops, some walls, and ground cover. The limitation to 10x10x10 in Build is too limiting. Since there is no way to choose which parts of the ground that I would want grass, sand, dirt, rock, etc (a spraypaint selected texture tool in terraform would be a great idea) the 10x10 max would take an awful lot of prims just to cover a large area.

I would say, allow the mega prims to be allowed within reason. Just ban the idiots that abuse their use of them. Or even better, up the prim allotment per sim.

I've seen megaprims used quite creatively for large objects. In Solheimer for instance, the Shadows of Ithilien roleplay has a set of Giant trees,which use cylindrical megaprims to form the trunks. Such scale would be impossible with 10X10 prims.

In addition, such things as prim mountains (necessary for caves) provide excellant situations in which to use megaprims in an entirely beneficial way.

If you intend to remove all megaprims altogether, then at least up the maximum size of prims in the build tool to at least 50x50 or so. That way, those decent builds that REQUIRE megaprims in order to function correctly won't be entire hard to repair.

As with a lot of others, i would be very upset if megaprims were removed. We use them (By we, i refer to the folks i build projects with.) to get bigger structures onto smaller plots. For example, i have a place on a main land sim with a larger megaprim (Which i can't think of the exact size off the top of my head, but a larger rectangle.) serving as a pole to a platform. Its of size enough that its saveing me quite a few prims of what it would take to build something that size in normal sized prims. We also use megaprims to make it quite simpler to upgrade our larger malls and dance "places" and so forth, much simpler to build off a larger prim theme in the build then have to build with a bunch of smaller prims. In general, they help a lot with builds and also save prims on smaller plots.

I have found a majority of good uses for the megaprims. I do a lot of large scale designs and I find the larger ones especially useful to manipulate etc. My favorite example to be the sim Rezzable Hallucinogen where there is absolutely AMAZING displays of the good ways to use them, in sculpties especially. Some of the sim and half sim sized ones also have a place in my opinion, such as having two water levels on your sim, or other terrain things -- or also a swirly extra cloud layer above. Other uses would be to 'box' in your sim so you can't see a ton of water at the edge, where some would prefer other things. The 20x20's are also useful to somewhat make this effect on a smaller parcel. There is an endless amount of possibilities to make them beautiful and add presence to our SecondLife, but I can imagine there is also an innumerable amount which can hurt them.

I am a big fan of megaprims. They have too many positive uses to be gotten rid of. I have built a half sim sized roleplay environment in a private sim i own, and many of the prims (not just large flat prims) are megaprims. I have changed the prim types and cuts for sone very dramatic architectural effects.

Prim encroachment on other people's land is a problem even with 10m prims. The problem has more to do with the people than the prims themselves.

If sim owners want megaprims they should be able to have them. I don't know how feasible this is with the current version of SL, but perhaps a feature could be added to let sim owners enable and disable the use of megaprims. That would cut down much of the abuse in private areas.

On the mainland, prim encroachment will always be a problem, I personally have been harrassed with prims just outside the edge of my land, and they weren't megaprims. If the bounding box for a prim could be used to determine whether it can be placed, that would cut down dramatically on prim problems. or if a land owner could return objects whose bounding boxes were inside the owners land. Either of these solutions would help the root problem, without encroaching on the creative use of a quirky but wonderful resource.

Furia

With all due respect, I very much disagree with those who say that the problems megaprims cause outweigh the positive uses. I see many positive uses, usually in floors for large buildings of clubs or malls. I don't think that the megaprims honestly cause any more trouble than anything else in SL. Griefers can use scripts, self-replicating normal prims, or any other number of means to cause havock to residents. Megaprims are just one more way, and a way that greifers would have no problem replacing with the myriad of other ways they currently use. I'm a "bouncer" at a few places, and I have honestly only seen megaprims used once out of all the time I've had that status, or even as a resident who attends those places. The number of times I've seen it for legitimate building purposes has far outnumbered the times I've seen it used negatively.

As for non-greifing problems, I agree with the last poster. I have seen things like land encroachment done with even the normal prims. That isn't anything new, and definitely is not specific to megaprims. If someone has a real problem with a resident's megaprim encroaching their land, then they can report them like any other person who abuses things like chat, scripts, etc.

I think the solution is simply disable megaprims from having physics enabled on them. I would even suggest adding them to the build menu, or increasing the dimension limits on the prims we have now. It would add a great more versitility in building, like for me as a ship builder. There are times when I end up using a lot of 10x10 prims in order to make up a floor or ceiling, and it frankly is far from efficient and is hardly easy to work with. Single prims with larger than normal limits, that can be reshaped like normal prims would be a great help. It'd actually be easier to control their use if they were part of the normal build system, so that you could both enable residents to make use of the many, many, many positive aspects, while also controlling how they are used, such as keeping them from being physical objects, what shapes can be used in megaprims, etc.

Mega prims are exceedingly useful for addressing a number of problems builders encounter in SL. Michael I daresay you and the rest of LL know this perfectly well, which is why they've been tolerated. Mega prims solve serious problems. Period.

Instituting a ban might fix some other issues, but it is frankly a lazy and stupid brute-force solution to a number of complicated problems. My advice? Spend the time addressing the real problems rather than lumping it all into "the big prim problem." The world will be better for it.

To begin I'd ask for clarification - there are a mix of technical and social problems at hand. What exactly do you and LL consider to be the "big prim problem" in a nutshell? Is it primarily technical or a matter of abuse?

If the problem is mega prims per-se (IE the graphics engine issue) my suggestion is simple - go fix the engine! Having worked for many years as a professional software engineer on enterprise class systems I'm not making that suggestion lightly - but could you imagine Adobe announcing tomorrow that photoshop will no longer open images with a particular shade of red, because it's too hard to support? Or microsoft word refusing to let you edit anything that happens to contain characters that were perfectly legal yesterday? (even if you pasted them in from some strange hungarian website?) This is crazy talk.

You've provided a tool for content creators and we have risen to the challenge to make our visions real - That's the great thing about virtual worlds - people use them in ways you never intended. You would have to be nuts to kill this kind of innovation off. I would, however, actively encourage addressing the issues that mega-prims solve for builders. You can make the problem go away by providing better solutions to the building community - I for one would gladly turn in my mega prims in exchange for "real" prims larger than 10x10 and for any truly better solution to all of the last 9 pages of reasons mega prims are useful.

If the problem you are trying to solve is misuse, and this is admirable, there are many good suggestions on how to do this, but be honest - can you provide one example of a case where (simple, easy to implement, lazy, brute-force...) prohibition has helped solve a complex problem for anyone except the short-sighted developer? All you will do is hurt the people who have been constructing the universe while shifting the issue to something else. The griefers will stay and come up with new ways of being obnoxious, while the content creators will be partially crippled by the loss of powerful tool.

Finally, on a personal note, I truly love working in SL, but have always felt haunted by the specter of corporate fiat; The thought that all of my work could be destroyed by someone else's arbitrary decision, with no recourse, and I know I'm not alone.

It would be overly dramatic to say that I would leave SL if such a ban occurred, but the destruction that would result from a mega-prim return would certainly make me reconsider wether or not to spend time making anything again.

A global return/ban constitutes a kind of violation of trust. I use your tool knowing full well that I cannot really maintain personal backups or copies of my work becase I trust that my objects will be there, intact, tomorrow. Linden, you have set for yourself the difficult role of caretaker and steward of our creations. You are bound to honor this agreement because it's the right thing to do, and while it may not be a legal agreement, it is a moral imperative. Violating the trust of the people who created the universe is a special kind of evil, and I for one would no longer feel up to contributing to a world where the caretakers believe it okay to rip the rug out from under me as they please.

I encourage you to support your builders, and not by taking away our tools, because when we're gone you'll have nothing left but big empty plains of wandering griefers, waving 10x10 victory flags and dancing on the grave of what once was a thriving community.

I think the current megae prims are too limited, but that LL might consider creating a set of mega prims of their own that could be more easily manipulated, or else increase the prim parameters to 100X100X100. if encroachment is a problem then consider making them unusable under like 300 meters up in the air. Some of us like building skyboxes that APPEAR to be on the ground

I have a huge tree that's trunk is a megaprim. It would have taken many smaller units to build something that did not look as I intend, and would have seriously eaten away my prim alotment. It's on my land not bothering anyone.

The two ideas I've heard here I live very much

1. Only allow megaprims to be rezzed by the owner of the land it is being rezzed on. (this means megaprims would not rez in a sandbox unless you own the sandbox).

2. Allow prim sizes larger that 10m, which is really really about time to do because how much stuff do you have to stack and connect now to get something built - and again eat away at your prim limits.

Thank you for asking.

In Midian City mega prims have become a vital part of the build. As many others have stated already, to remove them at this point is a little after the fact and would end up damaging a lot of content. Both the Midian City sim and the Apocalypse sim make use of them in the buildings.

A few gargantuous mega prims surround and cover both Midian City sims, serving as the sky and horizon. Removing them now would remove destroy a lot of the build and take away from the ambiance.

I created a JIRA at http://jira.secondlife.com/browse/SVC-813 that I think embodies all the comments on it in terms of where the line is drawn on useful size prims vs oversize prims and why useful size prims should be made possible using viewers.

i think lindenlabs should make their own huge prims or megaprims or bigprims, fully editable and adjustable, lets say for example instead of the usual prims 10X10X10, allow all objects to be made 20X20X20 or 30X30X30, or even 50X50X50

remove the ones that exist now, and give citizens the change to make the "bigger" objects themselves, without the chance of exraordinary huge prims.

If the engine won't run smooth with big prims, just change the engine so it will


i recon this will take time but i can see why people want to use big prims.
Right now its a legal question, yes, some #$%@! grievers are using bigprims now to annoypeople - ban those, delete the current bigprims, and improve the object creation to a bigger maximum size, then youll have control again, and socalled mega-prims wont exist anymore, just "larger then usual"

for a builder/land owner, mega prims are a gift. They help so that one's prim count may not increase too much, and when you have other things, such as 70-prim furniture that is required to use, megaprims are a blessing. The most aggravating thing to see is when you cannot rez something on your own land because the prim limit is full.

On the other hand, i can see why prims would be a disgrace to Linden Labs, because of the difficulties they create by being so big, too big to handle, if you will.

Why not compromise? limit how big megaprims can get (lol) ....reject the ones that can only be bigger than 128 meters, or so, for example. the 10X10m boards can only go so far when you are trying to build, and it gets very very aggravating when four walls equal 30 prims. I think that would be the best way to go- easier for land owners, and more convienient for linden labs...everyone wins!

unless you were already thinking about that, then ignore my....blissful ignorance, lol.

Mega prims can save those of us who want to have a phantom wall up that is onesided to block out eye sores from other players. They are great for skyboxes providing a nice 1 prim solution for virtual land in the air and they allow the building of huge buildings. Plus they help us "cheat" the prim limit when a 20x20 can take the place of 4 10x10s. Prim limits are ment to help maintain game stability, but every now and again it's nice to be able to use those to save on prims. I would appreciate you treat them like a gun. If a person missuses them their account and all related accounts are tagged and the computer won't rez huge prims for them.

I voice the oppinion of others, I know you had a reason to set the prim limit to 10 M but consider making it 100 M obviously there is a desire from the players. As for encrochment, isn't that possible even with 10M? Size isn't really the issue here.

Hi all! I dont normally build often (Because i suck lol) But when i do build, i almost ALWAYS use mega prims. I go up to the 40x40x40 usually. I have not really played with anything bigger, but thats because i dont have a need to. I really do think that these prims are fantastic to use. Sure its a little tricky to get them down to size and manipulate them at first, but after awhile, it gets easier. Another thing, that i have not seen anyone touch on yet (I also have not read every post word for word yet) Is that most people dont realize when they are on a 20x20x5 or maybe even a 40x40x40 if you use them correctly. So maybe most of the people that say they have only always seen bad things with the mega prims is because they haven't noticed when they were on them? I see tons of people using mega prims in every day builds ESPECIALLY to cover land. But i doubt that everyone is mega prim aware to the point that they either know the size by heart, or that they rightclick-edit everything to find out if gene made it. lol. But i definitely do think that there is a big need for them.

Also, i was passed earlier this month, a new set of mega prims that someone had manipulated smaller, so that its easier to use. The 40x40x40 for example, is now more like 40x40x.700 or so.

I think we could cut back on the encroachment (havent seen this myself yet) if people would use these newly altered mega's and if they altered some themselves as well.

Also.. if i want to close in my area (Say i have a middle section in ... the main grid) i can put up a box around my area, set it as phantom (anything that i have as a mega prim that can be walked into is always set as phantom) then i can texture the sides that face me with whatever i want.. maybe a nice ocean texture so it looks calming and spa like.. then on the outside, i can make that transparent, so it doesn't get into anyone around my area's view.

And another note would be RESPECT YOUR NEIGHBOR!!! I cant stress this one enough. Yes i use mega's. Yes i love to use mega prims. But i know that some do not like it. If i am EVER asked to move or change, or switch up my mega's i gladly oblige. I can maybe sink them into the ground more, so that my neighbor doesnt see it... or i can help them put up their own box (Lots have seen mine and asked for help with theirs) You have to just remember to be nice. If someone asks you to maybe change it up a bit dont give a NO! $#%$ YOU! answer... But work it out with them.. Do they not like the one wall that faces them? If not.. why did you put that wall there, did you not like something that you can see from their area? Maybe you two can mutually agree to move those area's (Just an example)

If anyone wants the edited prims i mentioned earlier (i didnt mention much about them, but they are smaller, and easier to handle) Just give me a shout in game, i will pass them along. I guess the original editor of the mega prims (not the creator, just the one that made them a little more plyable) is freely distributing them, and alot of people have them..

Hope this helps.

I too support the use of megaprims in the use of building, but not as griefing tools.

As others have already explained, they are a real boon for things like flat paved areas where you can use one 40x40 instead of 16 10x10.

I see two solutions.

1) Allow megaprims to be made in the client up to a certain size (64x64?) but anything over 10m cannot be made phantom or physical - thus stopping some of the griefing possibilities.

2) Cut land prices in half, so that people can buy the extra land they want to have the prim space to use regular prims instead of megaprims.

You choose.

Broccoli

I would have no problem with the real giant ones being removed, but the smaller sizes are often enough essential for building. We just built a halloween place, using 20x20x0.5 for floors and walls, and it's a *huge* difference in prim count and texturing work using 30 prims or 120!

Removing already existing/used megas will surely kill some great creative work all over SL. I don't know if it is possible from the technical side, but I would prefer a solution like this:

- let the megas already used in builds in world in place
- make it impossible to newly rezz them
- open up the size limit in the viewer, so users could create "real" megas up to a acceptable size (20x20x20 would be nice already, 40x40x40 should cover many requirements)

Mega prims are good some of them for platforms the sim sized ones are just not useful at all if you could somehow let us have a 20x20x.5 or 40x40.5 prim would be very helpful this is what i use mainly for platforms and to level areas it is a big prim saver thanks