Scaleable and robust solution for reducing complexity of resource identifier distribution in a large network processor-based system

In a router comprising one or more network processing (NP) devices for routing data packets from a source NP device to a destination device via a switch fabric, with each network processing device supporting a number of interface ports, each port capable of interfacing with one or more data queues for receiving packets associated with a class-of-service characterizing the routing of the packets, a system and method for routing packets comprising: classifying a packet to be forwarded from a source NP device according to a particular class-of-service and determining outgoing interface port information of a destination NP device to forward the packet, the interface port having a pre-defined queue base address associated therewith; encoding a queue index offset for the packet associated with a particular class-of-service associated with the packet to be routed; forwarding the packet, queue index offset and outgoing interface port information to the destination NP; and, determining a queue identifier from the base address and transmitted queue index offset for indicating a particular queue by which the classified packet is to be forwarded, wherein the queue identifier is determined locally at the destination NP device forwarding the packet.