CrackboneFTW Posted April 4, 2012 Share Posted April 4, 2012 Well those queues were on purpose, they reduced server caps and wanted to spread out people. Look where it got them now. And heck just about every server had hour long queues and now most of them are light/standard. We only have 5 servers that are heavy in peak with 1 having queues. All bioware need to do was raise server pop caps but no they didnt. And Dead servers do help no one, MOST PEOPLE will not reroll and do the same old crap again they would rather quit. I have talked to many ppl on my server which is now a low pop server they feel the same. They will quit come Diablo 3 or GW2 or sooner. Yep. You hit it on the head. As an aside, only 3,389 X-fire players yesterday, which is an all time low. The server divides are only accelerating the tanking of SWTOR. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lostkoss Posted April 4, 2012 Share Posted April 4, 2012 Bit ridiculous that we are still waiting for a reasonable amount of info on this They won't say anything here. Someone will make a very carefully worded video sometime in the future. They are to scared of starting a mass revolt or sit in or some other protest if they even accidentally say something the player base doesn't like. It's not a pleasant time to be in the office these days I would imagine. They have access to the actual player metrics. We can all see what the game worlds look like when we log in. It's not like they don't know. They are probably brainstorming right now for some way to give all of this some sort of positive spin. Sadly I donated 15$ in March to get my founder title, So I will count as a "subscriber" for at least that month. I expect they won't be announcing any more subscriber numbers any time soon. Just a hunch. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NotDonnaReed Posted April 4, 2012 Share Posted April 4, 2012 Exactly ... because there are none! There is no official proof of anything: decline or growth. It's just windbags making stuff up to bring attention to themselves. The data is easy to mine; you just have to do it yourself. --Create a character on each faction of each server you want to monitor. --Log on at different times of day. (Friday/Saturday at 9pm is the peak time for most servers.) --Use the Who list to add up everyone on the server (excluding yourself to avoid inflating the numbers). If you've been doing this for any length of time, you'll be able to determine the thresholds for light, standard, and heavy. You'll see for yourself why the parameters for standard are too broad and why light becomes a single player game. If you've been tracking the populations over time, you'll notice that a handful of heavy servers have absorbed refugees from light servers. The heavy servers are bursting with low level characters, and the light population servers have lost a third of their players. My conclusion was that this game needs a minimum population of 500 on each server to prevent the crickets from chirping, and double that is needed to make grouping feasible for flashpoints and heroics. In other words: 500 = minimum; 1000 = ideal. To put that in perspective, ~25% of the servers have less than 300 people at peak time. That's why these threads exist. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Frostvein Posted April 4, 2012 Share Posted April 4, 2012 The data is easy to mine; you just have to do it yourself. --Create a character on each faction of each server you want to monitor. --Log on at different times of day. (Friday/Saturday at 9pm is the peak time for most servers.) --Use the Who list to add up everyone on the server (excluding yourself to avoid inflating the numbers). If you've been doing this for any length of time, you'll be able to determine the thresholds for light, standard, and heavy. You'll see for yourself why the parameters for standard are too broad and why light becomes a single player game. If you've been tracking the populations over time, you'll notice that a handful of heavy servers have absorbed refugees from light servers. The heavy servers are bursting with low level characters, and the light population servers have lost a third of their players. My conclusion was that this game needs a minimum population of 500 on each server to prevent the crickets from chirping, and double that is needed to make grouping feasible for flashpoints and heroics. In other words: 500 = minimum; 1000 = ideal. To put that in perspective, ~25% of the servers have less than 300 people at peak time. That's why these threads exist. From what I've gathered, 1-500 is light, and 500-1500 is "standard" thus the huge discrepancy between "My standard server is fine" and "My standard server is dead" parties. I'd argue that each server should have around 1000 per side, but I don't disagree with any of your other conclusions. There are simply too many people reporting the same problems. I'm not saying there is a fire yet, but there sure is a ton of smoke. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kthx Posted April 4, 2012 Share Posted April 4, 2012 (edited) The data is easy to mine; you just have to do it yourself. My conclusion was that this game needs a minimum population of 500 on each server to prevent the crickets from chirping, and double that is needed to make grouping feasible for flashpoints and heroics. In other words: 500 = minimum; 1000 = ideal. To put that in perspective, ~25% of the servers have less than 300 people at peak time. That's why these threads exist. Can you post your raw data so we can draw our own conclusions, in the name of science? Edited April 4, 2012 by Kthx Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Frostvein Posted April 4, 2012 Share Posted April 4, 2012 Can you post your raw data so we can draw our own conclusions, in the name of science? http://www.swtor.com/community/showthread.php?t=350700&page=15 Byerley did a fairly decent job of explaining it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NotDonnaReed Posted April 4, 2012 Share Posted April 4, 2012 Can you post your raw data so we can draw our own conclusions, in the name of science? How bout you do it yourself. Nobody likes an armchair quarterback. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NotDonnaReed Posted April 4, 2012 Share Posted April 4, 2012 From what I've gathered, 1-500 is light... Unless they've changed the parameters recently, I'm sure "standard" starts somewhere between 300 and 350. In mid-March my server actually switched from light to standard while I was watching, and when I added up the population it was under 350. I remember thinking, "350 is standard? Really??" Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Photoshop Posted April 4, 2012 Share Posted April 4, 2012 I know! This population issue is killing the game. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Photoshop Posted April 4, 2012 Share Posted April 4, 2012 So.;.is there an update on the merges? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Frostvein Posted April 4, 2012 Share Posted April 4, 2012 Unless they've changed the parameters recently, I'm sure "standard" starts somewhere between 300 and 350. In mid-March my server actually switched from light to standard while I was watching, and when I added up the population it was under 350. I remember thinking, "350 is standard? Really??" Byerley noted the same thing (~350) but I had figured there was something he had to be missing. 350 is such an arbitrary number. 500 made more sense. He also noted that 1800 is still standard as well. /boggle Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Touchbass Posted April 4, 2012 Share Posted April 4, 2012 (edited) It's pretty easy to gather subs are dropping in NA/EU across the board. First sub snap shot was at the investors call at the end of Jan at 1.7 million, we had another one by a CEO comment at the end of February/beginning of March that also gave us 1.7 million. Sales have pretty much slowed since February so more people are unsubbing then new players are joining the game and then continuing an active sub. Here's where things get interesting, even if subs are sustained at 1.7m through the end of March/beginning of April there is still going to be decrease in NA/EU due to the asian subs proping up the sub total with the release of the game there. The last thing BW wants is a public decrease, when will get our next snap shot? 1) If things were going great we've already have one, BW has announced everything that makes the game look amazing in the publics eye in attempt to spin this game in the best light 2) Are they waiting on the release of 1.2 in hopes to capture the subs coming back to get an articially inflated total to represent as an average? 3) As soon as they announce subs are faultering (if they are) it's going to cause more backlash then they can handle for server mergers/Cross server dungeon finders/server transfers and as it stands they aren't ready to deliever those tools yet even if they wanted too 4) Bioware is waiting for a strategic time to release their successfull sub numbers like another investors call, if this is true this would be stupid imo. Announcing the game has 1.9m would put so many "doom and gloom" threads to bed that are literally poisoning the community Edited April 4, 2012 by Touchbass Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rathmond Posted April 4, 2012 Share Posted April 4, 2012 Server Mergers now or your game will die. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jederix Posted April 4, 2012 Share Posted April 4, 2012 So.;.is there an update on the merges? Never. The better question is: When are paid transfers coming. Answer: Soon; there is much money to be made through that service. As these forums show. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jederix Posted April 4, 2012 Share Posted April 4, 2012 Server Mergers now or your game will die. You won't get to move for free. Count on it. It'll be paid tranfers if it will be anything. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Photoshop Posted April 4, 2012 Share Posted April 4, 2012 You won't get to move for free. Count on it. It'll be paid tranfers if it will be anything. I dont know...I joined a server with lots of people, now there is no one. If I have to pay more, just because BW made too many servers, that would be a huge let down the consumer. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pangscar Posted April 4, 2012 Share Posted April 4, 2012 You won't get to move for free. Count on it. It'll be paid tranfers if it will be anything. or free but for only select servers. Like WoW did it at first. They gave you server combinations that you could transfer to. I don't think they will ever just allow you to transfer where ever you want, not at first anyway. Most likely it will be from specific low pop server to specific Med/high pop server. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kiphere Posted April 4, 2012 Share Posted April 4, 2012 Transfers don't freakin fix the issue... how can it? On a personal level yes, I can pay to transfer my characters to a good server... where does that leave all the people on my old server? Ok, 75% of them pay to move... what now? does that server close? what about the people who aren't willing to pay because the server populations are so screwed up? Transfers, free or otherwise don't change the fact that there are too many servers for the number of people playing. Merge servers, eliminate some, fix the population, deal with the PR backlash. hell, spin it as "Bioware has decided to consolidate server populations to bring them up to a certain threshold to create large vibrant communities for our upcoming Ranked PVP seasons, we feel that larger communities will create a better environment for competitive PVP." Nothing negative there, people can read between the lines all they want. Just fix the damn issue before you start venting people out into space that 'want' to play your game but can't because theres no one to freakin group with and no PVP Q's popping. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nakazia Posted April 4, 2012 Share Posted April 4, 2012 You won't get to move for free. Count on it. It'll be paid tranfers if it will be anything. If they want to suck more money out of the players for their mistake, bad move. People in guilds were placed by Bioware on some severs that are now dying. I know when I began early access there simply weren't that many options of server to even choose from. Now they've got way too many servers period, a lot of which sit at light through the day and in prime time. They haven't even made an attempt to redirect anyone to the low pop servers while certain servers are just obnoxiously overloaded with people. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Photoshop Posted April 4, 2012 Share Posted April 4, 2012 If they want to suck more money out of the players for their mistake, bad move. People in guilds were placed by Bioware on some severs that are now dying. I know when I began early access there simply weren't that many options of server to even choose from. Now they've got way too many servers period, a lot of which sit at light through the day and in prime time. They haven't even made an attempt to redirect anyone to the low pop servers while certain servers are just obnoxiously overloaded with people. I just rerolled to fatman because there is no point in playing an mmo by yourself. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jederix Posted April 4, 2012 Share Posted April 4, 2012 or free but for only select servers. Like WoW did it at first. They gave you server combinations that you could transfer to. I don't think they will ever just allow you to transfer where ever you want, not at first anyway. Most likely it will be from specific low pop server to specific Med/high pop server. The really dead ones, maybe (I had forgotten that they had done this in the past). But that will just cause more outrage because everyone and their mother thinks their server is completely dead because of a lack of people in fleet. Even if they do a limited free move, it won't be for everyone. The rest will have to pay for the transfer, just like they have to pay in WoW. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Darnu Posted April 4, 2012 Share Posted April 4, 2012 This is the thing. - 4 to 6 hour login queues were unacceptable, they had to open more server (or do something else) - dead servers help no one, something needs to be done. They did something about the first issue, however Rift did something about both and is now growing in subs again. why are the server caps set so low anyone would ever have to face a 6 hour log-in queue? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nitewolfe Posted April 4, 2012 Share Posted April 4, 2012 While transfers and server merges are needed they wont fix the problem. The problem is why are the servers so empty in the first place. Why have the players left so fast in droves. For me it was lack of group finding tools, the game feeling single player and not very fun once the trip to 50 was over. The lack of seeing others running around the game worlds lead to single player feeling. Even if there was active chat (a lot of times there was no chat ether) not seeing other people out in the game world made it feel small and single playerish. Those were all factors in my hitting the cancel button. I dont hate the game far from it. I wish to see swtor succeed. Thats why i am still here on the forums in hopes that BW will open their eye's and fix the problems the game has. I just feel that i needed to vote with my wallet till they fix it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kiphere Posted April 4, 2012 Share Posted April 4, 2012 I really don't get the people who are asking for transfers... There aren't enough people on the "full" servers to transfer to the low pop servers and who would? If you're on a server where you can get groups, pvp happens, etc, why on earth would you move? Nope, if they offer transfers dead servers get deader, that's it. It's not a solution. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fidopro Posted April 4, 2012 Share Posted April 4, 2012 they need to open up server transfers or server merges or something SOOOON I still enjoy this game but being a "light" server is a complete joke and its not like I picked a "light" server it was medium or high but so many people left/quit sadly this will probably cause me to unsub soon Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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