Last year was NOT the first time they stopped issuing visas at the limit. A limit is *normally* imposed through limiting the case numbers assuming a prediction of when the visas would run out. Last year was unusual because they (unwisely) let all regions go current FAR too early, then had the realization that there would NOT be enough visas to meet the demand, so they put the brakes on. We have seen that miscalculation happen before at the country level, and in that year scheduled cases were suddenly cancelled. However, it is important to understand that they did NOT impose the limit on any scheduled cases, they imposed the limit on unscheduled (unallocated) cases - i.e. AOS cases, rescheduled, resolving AP, additional derivatives and so on. In other words, if the scheduled cases had resulted in a number of something over 50,000, that would have been allowed to continue. It is an assumption (and an incorrect one in my opinion) that the 50,000 was a hard limit - they just aren't that well organized. The recently introduced DS260 (being an online form) is making the process better, but they are still changing procedures to manage the process better.