When will there be a SERVER MERGE?

[PacmanChampion]

Free server transfers, however, are coming, have already started, and will fix the issue of lower concurrent playing.

 

I dont understand how free server transfers are gona help? What am I gona transfer too? another low pop server?

[Dozer]

Check the dev tracker. Stephen Reid has stated several times how APAC is the beginning of server transfers for everyone.

 

Yeah a system in development that is still "some ways away". So sorry that doesn't comfort me that maybe in a few months i might be able to transfer. My server has been dead for atleast 2 months. I don't want to wait another few months to be able to play the game the way i was supposed to all along.

 

Daniel Erickson recently commented that servers population is not an issue and that mergers are not a priority. Do you really think they are going to let people transfer off low pop servers? They will open it up so only people on high pop servers can transfer to the low pop servers, but guess what? No one is coming...

Edited April 26, 2012 by Dozer

[JeramieCrowe]

I dont understand how free server transfers are gona help? What am I gona transfer too? another low pop server?

 

Well, just refer to every other MMO that has had the exact same "launch surge/dropoff", implemented free transfers, and the flow leveled out across the board and fixed the issue.

 

What we're seeing here is the same old same old thing, different MMO. In other words, it's typical. Normal. And server transfers have been the fix for over a decade. To expect it to suddenly be different now is unreasonable.

[AlwaysG]

I hereby triple dog dare a BioWare dev to create a character on the Nathema server, republic side, and level it to 50. Then tell me we don't need server mergers.

[Soulami]

It would seem that Bio after the first couple months should have done what Rift did. I dont remember if they said certain servers were test servers or what, but it really seemed to help out. Im hoping that Bio takes the same path. I understand that them doing server merges might be making them admit that what they did was a failure, but you know suck it up. If for any reason BIO devs or whoever acually read this. I hope they take it to heart. Please dont do multi server PVE. It looks good on paper but when it comes down to it Id rather not have the hassle of palying with someone youll never see again. Now I think what WOW did was brilliant. With battle groups. Start implimenting something like that, and Im sure you will with ranked warzones, and PVP can be happy again

[MarsX]

How can this possibly not be addressed by Bioware?

 

Do the devs actually play the godd dammn game? Sign onto Firkrann Crystal, a East Coast PVP server...there are never ever enough republic for a WZ pop. That's right. It never happens.

 

On the empire side, you can pvp between the hours of 5pm and 10pm waiting approx 15-45min per queue pop, against a rotating group of the same 20 people who sign on daily.

 

I know for a fact this occurs on other servers. How is this not a blatantly obvious problem?

Edited April 26, 2012 by MarsX

[JeramieCrowe]

It would seem that Bio after the first couple months should have done what Rift did. I dont remember if they said certain servers were test servers or what, but it really seemed to help out. Im hoping that Bio takes the same path. I understand that them doing server merges might be making them admit that what they did was a failure, but you know suck it up. If for any reason BIO devs or whoever acually read this. I hope they take it to heart. Please dont do multi server PVE. It looks good on paper but when it comes down to it Id rather not have the hassle of palying with someone youll never see again. Now I think what WOW did was brilliant. With battle groups. Start implimenting something like that, and Im sure you will with ranked warzones, and PVP can be happy again

 

BioWare is implementing transfers, at around the same time Trion did for RIFT.

[MarsX]

Here is my post on our server forums:

 

I'm on Firkrann Crystal (3rd lightest pop server) and I've heard there is a new faction being added!! In fact other servers are testing it right now!

 

The Republic is coming in 1.3! Don't get me wrong, I love playing against the same few people every night, but I'm looking forward to a totally new faction, and a brand new War Zone called Civil War.

 

I really respect how quickly Bioware has pumped out this exceptional fix for our low population. Add that to the awesome new tauntaun mini pet and the recent add of amazing legacy options and I couldn't be happier. Just when I thought Bioware went above and beyond having their team dedicated to such important new features like unlock-able class emotes, I realized they dedicated more time than I would have ever expected to purchasable tech and tool emotes too!! SO AMAZING. In fact, I'm so impressed you can keep your free 30 days. ill pay double for these awesome new adds!!

 

Thank you Bioware for all your attention to what matters most; I am seriously looking forward to all the awesomeness to come.

 

PS Hopefully more emote options are on the way!!

Edited April 26, 2012 by MarsX

[JeramieCrowe]

Here is my post on our server forums:

 

I'm on Firkrann Crystal (3rd lightest pop server) and I've heard there is a new faction being added!! In fact other servers are testing it right now!

 

The Republic is coming in 1.3! Don't get me wrong, I love playing against the same few people every night, but I'm looking forward to a totally new faction, and a brand new War Zone called Civil War.

 

I really respect how quickly Bioware has pumped out this exceptional fix for our low population. Add that to the awesome new tauntaun mini pet and the recent add of amazing of legacy options and I couldn't be happier. Just when I thought Bioware went above and beyond having their team dedicated to such important new features like unlock-able class emotes, I realized they dedicated more time than I would have ever expected to purchasable tech and tool emotes too!! SO AMAZING. In fact, I'm so impressed you can keep your free 30 days. ill pay double for these awesome new adds!!

 

Thank you Bioware for all your attention to what matters most; I am seriously looking forward to all the awesomeness to come.

 

PS Hopefully more emote options are on the way!!

 

And you know what's even better? The team that provided you with all of that had nothing to do with, nor took any time and resources away from the dev team that's working on transfers! Thank goodness BioWare doesn't have a "zero sum" development department, eh?

 

Isn't that great?!

[MarsX]

And you know what's even better? The team that provided you with all of that had nothing to do with, nor took any time and resources away from the dev team that's working on transfers! Thank goodness BioWare doesn't have a "zero sum" development department, eh?

 

Isn't that great?!

 

I seriously appreciate some well placed sarcasm as you can tell from my post, so thank you for that reply

 

What drives me crazy is that they think any of that stuff matters in the face of the actual problems directly destroying game play.

[Frostvein]

Do you really think they are going to let people transfer off low pop servers? They will open it up so only people on high pop servers can transfer to the low pop servers, but guess what? No one is coming...

 

This. Simply put, there aren't enough high pop servers to feed into the low pop ones. And I don't know too many people that are going to leave the high pop ones either, especially given the sheer number of re-rolls that went there specifically to escape the low population servers to begin with. In any case, the number of people leaving high pops for low pops will not be close to the number of people leaving low for high pops. Its an unsustainable model.

 

Further, the transfers are just going to make things worse for the people who don't leave. What you'll see is a dozen to 2 dozen (and I'm being generous here) servers pick up population wise from all the people transferring from standard/light pop servers to heavy/high pop servers. The standard/light ones they left are now light/dead and the people left behind are in a worse place then before.

 

If they don't want to do merging, they need to make transferring mandatory. Meaning, the server is shutting down by the end of the month, you have X number of days/weeks to pick which one of these 4 servers you are going to. if you don't pick one by the end of the time specified, you get auto assigned.

 

Just opening up transfers is akin to throwing their hands in the air and telling us to fix it (similar to those who told everyone to reroll to Fatman)

[JeramieCrowe]

I seriously appreciate some well placed sarcasm as you can tell from my post, so thank you for that reply

 

What drives me crazy is that they think any of that stuff matters in the face of the actual problems directly destroying game play.

 

So, fixes for problems, or transfer software that won't screw up, takes longer to develop than simple "quality of life" items. Are you saying that BioWare should hold back all that stuff that's quicker to develop until they provide server transfers?

 

I'd prefer not, personally. And no, adding more devs to the transfer team would only result in a "too many cooks in the kitchen" scenario and actually prolong it. Don't want that, either, do we?

[Antipodes]

For all the good SWTOR has, the declining population is getting to the point where the game is unplayable for me. No one is looking for groups. WZs have the same set of players and promptly die outside of prime time. 1.2 did not fix it. The free month did not fix it. Each day is worse than the previous.

 

Bioware, you did nothing to help the Rep vs Empire population and now you are not doing anything to help low population servers. What do you expect players to do? Do you think the average player is more likely to reroll on a new server or quit?

 

I'm willing to play an alt on the empty worlds to pass the time *if* server merges are in the near future. Otherwise, the game was fun for the first few months, but it really is ending on a sour note.

[JeramieCrowe]

This. Simply put, there aren't enough high pop servers to feed into the low pop ones. And I don't know too many people that are going to leave the high pop ones either, especially given the sheer number of re-rolls that went there specifically to escape the low population servers to begin with. In any case, the number of people leaving high pops for low pops will not be close to the number of people leaving low for high pops. Its an unsustainable model.

 

Further, the transfers are just going to make things worse for the people who don't leave. What you'll see is a dozen to 2 dozen (and I'm being generous here) servers pick up population wise from all the people transferring from standard/light pop servers to heavy/high pop servers. The standard/light ones they left are now light/dead and the people left behind are in a worse place then before.

 

If they don't want to do merging, they need to make transferring mandatory. Meaning, the server is shutting down by the end of the month, you have X number of days/weeks to pick which one of these 4 servers you are going to. if you don't pick one by the end of the time specified, you get auto assigned.

 

Just opening up transfers is akin to throwing their hands in the air and telling us to fix it (similar to those who told everyone to reroll to Fatman)

 

Except that, as shown today, TOR is still launching in other countries, possibly even more than today. They need the servers. Also, there is no proof that the transfers will only be one-way....

[Frostvein]

Except that, as shown today, TOR is still launching in other countries, possibly even more than today. They need the servers. Also, there is no proof that the transfers will only be one-way....

 

What?

 

They aren't the same servers. They didn't pull 6 US servers down to open 6 Asia Pacific ones. The population problems on US and Euro servers still exist.

 

And you are right, there is no proof the server transfers will be one way. That still doesn't change anything.

[JeramieCrowe]

What?

 

They aren't the same servers. They didn't pull 6 US servers down to open 6 Asia Pacific ones. The population problems on US and Euro servers still exist.

 

And you are right, there is no proof the server transfers will be one way. That still doesn't change anything.

 

What should change this discussion, though, is well-documented track records, wouldn't you say? Look at every other MMO that has had the very same "launch surge/dropoff" of concurrent playtimes, implemented server transfers 4 to 6 months after launch, and how often did that fix the issue? 9 times out of 10 it worked.

 

Why are we suddenly so pessimistic now? BioWare has already stated three times last week that actual sub numbers have not dropped, but concurrent playtimes have. That means that if they merge the servers, the FULL queue times during Events and Expansions would be unacceptable.

Edited April 26, 2012 by JeramieCrowe

[rakuenCallisto]

I seriously appreciate some well placed sarcasm as you can tell from my post, so thank you for that reply

 

What drives me crazy is that they think any of that stuff matters in the face of the actual problems directly destroying game play.

 

THIS THIS THSI THSIT **** SHTISTHSUST.

 

Who gives a flying F WHO is working on this asinine stuff? We want to be able to PLAY THIS GAME AS IT SHOULD BE. All of the rest comes after.

 

Almost all of the people I know that cancelled their subs were for this exact reason.

 

So like I said, I don't care if there's 1 person working on stuff that no one cares about. That's one less person helping the game stay afloat.

[Frostvein]

What should change this discussion, though, is well-documented track records, wouldn't you say? Look at every other MMO that has had the very same "launch surge/dropoff" of concurrent playtimes, implemented server transfers 4 to 6 months after launch, and how often did that fix the issue? 9 times out of 10 it worked.

 

lets see this list.

[rakuenCallisto]

What?

 

They aren't the same servers. They didn't pull 6 US servers down to open 6 Asia Pacific ones. The population problems on US and Euro servers still exist.

 

And you are right, there is no proof the server transfers will be one way. That still doesn't change anything.

 

Honestly, don't even bother. Jeremie will defend BW until he's the only one left defending them.

 

It's almost like he's willingly ignorant to what's goin on around him.

[Tenceriker]

What should change this discussion, though, is well-documented track records, wouldn't you say? Look at every other MMO that has had the very same "launch surge/dropoff" of concurrent playtimes, implemented server transfers 4 to 6 months after launch, and how often did that fix the issue? 9 times out of 10 it worked.

 

Why are we suddenly so pessimistic now? BioWare has already stated three times last week that actual sub numbers have not dropped, but concurrent playtimes have. That means that if they merge the servers, the FULL queue times during Events and Expansions would be unacceptable.

 

If you actually believe Bioware isn't trying to save face you are pretty foolish. Sever populations have dropped and so have players subscribed. The game is contracting and what they do to fix the server population now will determine if it dies or thrives.

[rakuenCallisto]

What should change this discussion, though, is well-documented track records, wouldn't you say? Look at every other MMO that has had the very same "launch surge/dropoff" of concurrent playtimes, implemented server transfers 4 to 6 months after launch, and how often did that fix the issue? 9 times out of 10 it worked.

 

Why are we suddenly so pessimistic now? BioWare has already stated three times last week that actual sub numbers have not dropped, but concurrent playtimes have. That means that if they merge the servers, the FULL queue times during Events and Expansions would be unacceptable.

 

Oh. My. God.

 

There you go again with the subscription numbers.

 

If 100 people cancel their subscriptions for the month (example) and BW gave all 100 of these people a free month - guess how many subscriptions are active? THE SAME 100!

 

It doesn't matter what the active subscription of this month is, especially since ANYONE with a lvl 50 who left the game this month is technically STILL subscribed!

 

Do you see the difference yet? The subscription count doesn't mean JACK when they just refilled most people's subscriptions.

Edited April 26, 2012 by rakuenCallisto

[Soullessone]

yeah they pull that so that they don't get into **** with their Boss. Face it the game is boring as hell unless you have a server with enough people to group wit

[J-Slice]

The server I play on, Master Gnost-Dural, is a a Standard population server during prime time, and a little before and after, and light population during the rest of the day. The normal number of people on the Republic Fleet at prime time, is around 30-50 and between 20-30 during not prime time.

 

I think the one big mistake that BW made was launching with too many servers, and too many different types of servers. They should launch with only enough servers to hold the pre-orders and then estimate low on the number of extra servers for people who buy later. Then, if the demand exceeds the supply, open up more servers and authorize free transfers.

 

Seeing as that is all in the past though, at least we can all agree that introducing paid server transfers would alleviate the situation a bit.

[huntgod]

My guild is a multi-game organization, we did no real recruiting for SWTOR and at launch we had 140 players on HoG and around 80 on Juyo.

 

As of this moment, we have 62 accounts on HoG and maybe 50 on Juyo. These people are still members of our guild, but have moved on to new games or back to old ones.

 

I would find it anomalous if this was unique to my group.

 

I play for extended periods at different hours and out guild is international, so we have people in all time zones and it is clear from speaking with them that there has been a dramatic drop off in the number of players.

 

We had a good number move to Fatman and they are very positive about play time there, the biggest difference being that Fatman has consistently higher pop than HoG or other servers.

[oldin]

I have a 50 Sage, 50 Commando, 45 Vanguard and a 41 Knight. I am trying out a Gunslinger now.

I log on with the smuggler for some quick PVP. Get in a group for NC get beat. Try Voidstar loose, then Civil War, loose. What is the point of this post?

 

The last two WZ we were down one man the entire game. No one joined either match the whole game! Now I am not complaining that we lost, whatever. But the fact that there was only going to be so many persons in the rotation for PVP and probably the same ones over and over again.

 

I thought about rolling on another server with more population. It is not the fact that I would be doing most of the same quests again, that's cool. It is I would be leaving behind my legacy buffs and my maxed 400 crew skills, all nine of them.

 

I don't care if I have to change my character names or legacy title. Just moving to a server with a larger pop would make my experience more enjoyable. I ended up opening mail, cleaning off my desk and watching Three Stooges the rest of the night. AFAIAC the Mutliplayer part of this MMO needs help. Server mergers or character transfers wold go a long way!