@joe smith: This was more of an addition to your bug report with some observations of my own. The mob spawning is working on our Realm (other than how we get overworld mobs like spiders and creepers spawning in the nether, plus no mobs in nether fortresses), playing on normal difficulty, so doesn't seem to be a universal problem but no less important.
This appears to be sphereacle, so going mining at diamond levels almost immediately moves you out of range of surface farms. I agree this is too small.
Ticking areas help, but ultimately, the render distance of mobs shouldn't link to the growth of farms or entities. This is also affecting how mobs despawn, as they move off the edge of active areas and freeze. If you stay in a small area, this freeze affect causes massive buildups of mobs, passive and hostile.
I have noticed the weird spawning issues. I have not seen mobs spawning in high light levels at night. My friends and I play on a Realm extensively at night in a well lit area and have had no mobs spawn there.
However, in the nether, there is a ridiculous number of mobs still around. I love the high mob cap, and that should stay the same, but I think there is an issue with random despawns.
One of the issues is the way mobs move out of active areas. I've noticed that since this is different from Java, and mobs will actively move up to about 60 blocks away (whatever their visual radius is from the player), this allows them to move into inactive areas and freeze. When the player approaches that inactive area and makes it active again, there can be huge numbers of mobs. I have also seen this with ticking areas, where the mobs move out of the ticking area and if that area is not approached by a player for many game days the mobs build up to high numbers in the edges of the ticking area.
We use the nether as a hub between different areas, and can hear absurd numbers of ghasts. I found an area near a fortress that was a bit of a valley where dozens of mobs had fallen and weren't despawning.
And, just as posted, a newly generated fortress was cleared, and no mobs spawn in it except at blaze spawners.
I had this happen on a converted world (not sure if that's what you meant by "synced" world). Had to use cheats to restart the spawners (using Realms). The strange thing is that when I first encountered a spawner, it worked. It was in a previously generated area, but we had not found it yet. 2 were about 50 blocks apart and both were working, then a few days later were no longer working, and no mob was featured in the spawner cage. Breaking the spawner and replacing it fixed the issue.
Noticed this is true on Win 10, Realms. Could not figure out a pattern as to when they attack. Was able to approach multiple blazes by a spawner, and they did not do their short range melee attack, either. Then, one would randomly display the fire particles like when they are supposed to aggro, and shortly afterward they throw the fireballs. (and most of the time, they get an insta-kill as reported in another bug). The others did not aggro, as they are supposed to do.
I have been watching this issue in my Realm. I have narrowed the problem down to villagers are not loading when they are standing on plowed dirt. I have had a pair of villagers consistently in a 8x8 area that is sealed off and lit, and when the ground was tilled, they were constantly despawning (most likely during the game load, as this area was set in a ticking area). I would summon two more and test other things...like were they falling through the tilled ground (no), getting stuck on a ladder (no), or having mobs spawn there (no, one would be left sometimes b/c there is a strip of cobblestone that he likely was standing on but the other was on plowed ground).
Similarly, cannot throw a potion through a half slab opening, and when it hits next to that block, the splash affect doesn't pass through the half-block opening.
Hit Escape? That closes most windows.
Even more info to add:
2 days ago, my problem friend and I were in the Realm in 2 different places. He was entering the command to enter creative and then survival. For both commands, about half the time it would make me go into those modes; the other half it would correctly put him in that mode.
Also, when typing commands, the suggestion list will show player names that are on the Realm. His never shows for me. If I use a different player account, it will show his name as a suggestion. (and this other account can be in the same place as he with no crash)
This has got to be a problem with having the same player ID of some sort, but it never affects our inventory, location, or actual game play (beyond the crashes). I hope you can write a simple script that checks for duplicate ID's and reassigns them.
I noticed the other day that other players appear as arrows on the locator maps up until the two players approach within about 50 blocks of each other, and then it changes to the skin of the other player. This may be the same distance at which our game crash is occurring. Maybe there is a problem at this point?
I have a wild idea. Is it possible that both he and I have the same ID, such as an owner's ID? When he handed off the map to me, it could have created the conflict. When we look at a locator map, the icons for the two of us appears as bouncing arrows....it highlights me for 5 seconds or so, then turns off and highlights him for 5 seconds. It seems other characters appear on the map as a picture of the other player's face. Only he and I appear the same on the map.
I hope you can create a quick algorithm that reassigns this ID....creating a new ID for him, leaving me as the owner of the Realm. This would be helpful for other players out there that want to do the same, and allow map transfers between players.
Thanks for looking into it!
Additional info: I also tested this on my mobile device. Other player was on Xbox One, I was on an Android phone. The crash occurs on both devices in the same way, closing the game but not crashing the OS. We also tested newly generated areas of the map as well as the Nether. always when we're someone around 30-50 blocks near each other the crash occurs. Realms itself maintains its state, our positions and inventories. We also changed our skins to test conflicts there. It has to be something in some sort of communication between our devices, or some data about just our two characters that conflicts with each other.
Not a bug. They changed this in the Java version as well. It was "too powerful", or so the devs think. I disagree with them.
Lia, they'll look at it. It won't be updated instantly. They have to figure out why it's occurring and make sure new programming doesn't cause new problems.
Additionally, parrots sitting on shoulder are preventing being able to enter a nether portal (doesn't matter which direction you are going).
In a similar (and probably related vein), my wife 'owns' our edition of MC on Xbox on her gamertag. When I sign in to my home console, I have to sign her in as well to play the game. Very frequently, I will not see my Realms in my list, usually saying Realms is not available.
Restarting the console (full restart, not the sleep mode) usually fixes it until I close the game. Sometimes the restart does not fix the issue.
Having this problem as well. When other players sign in, the parrots that are tamed to me will teleport to them as if they tamed them. They remain in place when told to sit, but teleport the next time anyone signs in. This is on Realms, and at least Xbox and Win 10 editions of BTU.
I can second this occurrence. I own the Realm, and brought in a Realm that my friend created on his Xbox. It's a dual conversion experience...it was originally a 360 save that was brought to the XBox One. Both those versions worked fine in multiplayer. Then, he converted to the Bedrock version, downloaded it to a PC, and I picked it up, and sent added it to my Realm.
When he and I are in the same area, the game crashes for both of us. We can both play on the Realm independently of each other. Yesterday, we both played on the Realm for about 2 hours while I was off explorer new map areas. When I returned to our "hub" where my friend was, the game crashed. Tonight, the game has continued to crash every time we try to connect when one of us is already on. He is the host of the game. He and 2 other friends and I all had played on a previous map with no crashes. The error should be related to the two of us playing on a converted map at the same time.
However, there was a short time where we did both play on this map in the same area. It does work occasionally.
Additional info: I was able to download the Realm on my work computer twice with no errors. I still cannot download to my laptop consistently as of 4 days ago.
Thanks!