A method comprising advertising to a second node a total allocation of storage space of a buffer, wherein the total allocation is less than the capacity of the buffer, wherein the total allocation is partitioned into a plurality of allocations, wherein each of the plurality of allocations is advertised as being dedicated to a different packet type, and wherein a credit status for each packet type is used to manage the plurality of allocations, receiving a packet of a first packet type from the second node, and storing the packet to the buffer, wherein the space in the buffer occupied by the first packet type exceeds the advertised space for the first packet type due to the packet.