Server population is dropping...

[Tielgard]

.

 

Nice sig, I thought I was on Newegg for a second. Grats on the Sandy Bridge-E, but did you really need to post your WEI, too?

 

Anyway. I had fun playing this game, leveling up a Vanguard and having a romance with Elara Dorne--which was totally broken but still enjoyable. It was fun right up until I got to Ilum (well, aside from not being able to put my adequate tanking skills to use in any groups, but 2-manning 4-man quests was a good challenge at times). Maybe it was not a good long-term design choice to make the zone that most level 50 toons would experience every day so drab. I mean, we had to deal with Hoth, which wasn't too bad, but one ice planet--which actually existed in the original Star Wars, no less--is fine. Two, though? And it's dark? (Belsavis was easily my favorite planet, and the geographic lore was cool, too.) I was bored with the dailies within a few days. Hard-mode FPs? I never had a chance to do the regular versions.

 

I started on Prophecy of the Five which was way over-populated at launch. My wife and I rerolled on Gardens of Talla, thinking that, as this game expands, this light server will maybe become a standard, tops. It astounded us what a difference one week made. Making matters worse was we picked the wrong faction: Republic. The population disparity between the two in this game always bothered me, since Alliance at least could hold its own in WoW, with obvious exceptions such as Illidan aside. I stayed subscribed for a month's worth of inactivity, but I reluctantly unsubbed. (I wonder if this thread will be locked by the time I press 'Submit'?"

[DirtyDiggler]

I'm getting to the point where I'm ready to call it a day and quit.

 

I like the game but not having anyone to play with sucks....

 

Since tera and the beta GW2 weekends my server went from low pop to dead

[Andryah]

if you follow the sever select lists at all during server prime times one thing becomes increasingly clear:

 

Most of the servers that have dropped into sub-LIGHT are PvP servers. Which is not all that surprising, given the fact that PvPers are some of the most vocal and impatient MMO players on the planet. No game pleases them. The LIGHT PvE servers are pretty much the ones that were always LIGHT since launch, give or take a few.

 

In addition, PvPers are the ones that will most readily server hop with rerolls.

 

Now, if one wants to beat the drum about too many servers at launch (which I do not agree with) it would be proper to beat the drum a little more precisely..... too many PvP servers at launch. Of course the PvPers were among the most vocal teeth gnashers about queues too back around launch.

Edited May 7, 2012 by Andryah

[Thunderslice]

if you follow the sever select lists at all during server prime times one thing becomes increasingly clear:

 

Most of the servers that have dropped into sub-LIGHT are PvP servers. Which is not all that surprising, given the fact that PvPers are some of the most vocal and impatient MMO players on the planet. No game pleases them. The LIGHT PvE servers are pretty much the ones that were always LIGHT since launch, give or take a few.

 

In addition, PvPers are the ones that will most readily server hop with rerolls.

 

Now, if one wants to beat the drum about too many servers at launch (which I do not agree with) it would be proper to beat the drum a little more precisely..... too many PvP servers at launch. Of course the PvPers were among the most vocal teeth gnashers about queues too back around launch.

 

 

 

It amazes me the level of denile u have

[uncommonsavior]

I don't normally post in the forums but I had to log in with the hope that some dev somewhere might read this and turn to his dev buddy next to him and say "okay maybe this should be fixed"

 

Where is everyone?!?!

MMO? Yes there is going to be some attrition in every game, people get bored or don't like the game, maybe it did not meet their standards... moved on to another game etc... But there are still a lot of people playing... they are just spread out so thin!!

 

I got to play for the first time in a few nights this evening and I couldn't wait to queue up for some warfronts.

To my surprise it was a fast Q!! ... game finishes, Q up again.... hey ... fast queue again... alright im thinking!!

 

.... Its the same crew we just beat... awesome, another easy win...

.... then again.... and again.... and again....

5 warfronts, the same 16 people (all imperial btw) it was only a fast pop because it was the same people queueing up!! Give me some variety, this is suppose to be a multiplayer game, yet the population imbalance leads to 'just a few' of the following problems

 

1) No Auction House economy or viable activity

2) Mid range planets have no one on them, I spent 2 days as the ONLY person on quesh!

3) Unless you bring a guild friend good luck doing a 2+ heroic daily in level range on a planet... and NEVER a 4+

4) Republic?..... Jedi? ..... starting to think its a myth that they do not really exist...

5) Long Queue times for warfronts

6) World PvP?

7) Pick up groups for flashpoints impossible (unless in decent guild)

8) Ops even more impossible (unless you in decent guild)

9) no direct player to player economy , the /2 trade channel is always quiet

10) Limited player base

 

You folks need to really look at doing some server merges.

Even just to lump 4 or 5 servers together one tuesday and say "Surprise !!!" and poof now we are on a new server with more people.

Maybe some cross server battle groups?

I dunno something... I play Heroes of Might and Magic when I want to play a game by myself, I play an MMO to interact with others. Diablo 3 is coming out next week, and I don't know if tumble weeds exist in space but I promise you that you will see them blowing past the Imperial Fleet the day after.

[Mallorik]

if you follow the sever select lists at all during server prime times one thing becomes increasingly clear:

 

Most of the servers that have dropped into sub-LIGHT are PvP servers. Which is not all that surprising, given the fact that PvPers are some of the most vocal and impatient MMO players on the planet. No game pleases them. The LIGHT PvE servers are pretty much the ones that were always LIGHT since launch, give or take a few.

 

In addition, PvPers are the ones that will most readily server hop with rerolls.

 

Now, if one wants to beat the drum about too many servers at launch (which I do not agree with) it would be proper to beat the drum a little more precisely..... too many PvP servers at launch. Of course the PvPers were among the most vocal teeth gnashers about queues too back around launch.

 

Maybe, but i believe the most populated servers are pvp servers.

[bluezigzag]

Aussie/NZ severs are rocking PVE at peek time is 200-270 on fleet rep side,imp side about 300 Edited May 7, 2012 by bluezigzag

[Darth-Rammstein]

Aussie/NZ severs are rocking PVE at peek time is 200-270 on fleet rep side,imp side about 300

 

Yeah, that's because you guys only have afew servers...take a look at the US servers, there's way too many.

[bluezigzag]

Yeah, that's because you guys only have afew servers...take a look at the US servers, there's way too many.

 

yep 3 severs ftw,plus we are playing with 20-40 ping,where if we are on USA severs its around 400-500 ping

[zuile]

You forgot quite some servers, there are about 85 EU servers.

 

I only counted the EU English servers as I said, suppose I'll count the rest of them next time but I doubt the situation with the german and french servers is any different, 4 or 5 servers need to have their populations consolidated so we end up with a good handful of heavy and higher pop servers.

[Oobob]

Most of the servers that have dropped into sub-LIGHT are PvP servers. Which is not all that surprising, given the fact that PvPers are some of the most vocal and impatient MMO players on the planet. No game pleases them. The LIGHT PvE servers are pretty much the ones that were always LIGHT since launch, give or take a few.

 

In addition, PvPers are the ones that will most readily server hop with rerolls.

 

what are you talking about? daoc had a community of pvpers who played and loved that game for years. same with ultima online. eve is primarily a pvp game and despite lower population numbers it's growing 7+ years into its life. eve players are committed and love that game.

 

the problem is hardly any game focuses on pvp except as a side note in tacked on "RvR" or warzones. daoc came out years ago and still has better pvp than most current games cause no one spends development time and money to enhance pvp. flaws notwithstanding, the reason we are excited for gw2 is that they took the ideas from daoc that everyone loved. FOR YEARS IN ANY OTHER MMO THIS HAS NOT HAPPENED, DESPITE EVERY DEVELOPER SAYING THEY ARE "COMMITTED" TO PVP. even warhammer had "RvR" added in after beta testers complained, and the worlds had already been designed to funnel the two factions away from each other when questing!

 

instead we get broken *** ilum as a sidenote and even the developers can't do that right. compare this to daoc or gw2, with 3 faction objective based RvR that is a key feature of the game. 3 factions provide autobalancing and this was known since daoc. you would think that in this game they would have let the mercs/smugglers join as a third party that would autobalance ilum, when that was still around. but we still see two faction games, and in ones like this they even split up quest areas! for a "pvp" game you would think i'd run into more repubs, but the actual design of the quest areas funnels us away from each other.

 

it's really just a tacked on afterthought, like pvp is in so many other games. this is why pvpers are "vocal and impatient." because games advertise pvp and then fail to live up to the standards of games like daoc that were released many years ago. you feel cheated and betrayed when you consider that one popular game (eve) has actually focused on pvp. every other game since has tricked you into buying it when years ago there were better, more enjoyable pvp titles, and that remorse at being duped again is where the anger comes from.

 

i'm a pvper (though not in swtor, for reasons already mentioned) and have stuck around for 4 and a half months. my server is dying - kinrath spider, which was already brought up in this thread. i'm not rerolling because i have a life outside of this game, which is sad because i really enjoy swtor. i'm tired of only one faction wzs popping against the same group of people repeatedly.

 

i really enjoy this game for the pve content. i would gladly keep playing if i didn't feel like my server was near death. but if server merges/transfers take this long and cost money, i'm not even going to consider continuing. it suggests terrible problems in terms of priorities and maintenance.

 

this is even more concerning when you consider how they screwed healing in pvp to fix a pve problem of people clearing raids too easily. now we can still clear the raids easily, but my main heal is 2.5 seconds and begging for interruption followed by quick death in pvp.

 

this reminds me so much of warhammer and it's horrifying to think that they learned nothing from that game. well, i guess they didn't put collision detection in

Edited May 7, 2012 by Oobob

[glabgr]

Transfers or merge now. I wont be paying for an empty server once the free 30 days run out.

 

How could you do the same mistake you did with warhammer again...amateurs.

 

+1

 

Merge & free transfer - Cross-Server LFG, Bioware NOW or our time is lost once more and beleive me nobody is going to trust you again ever with another online game..............

[-Dench]

Last night was worse on my server, which isnt 1/10th as bad as a lot of people had it.

 

Places like Tat, 6-9 people. Fleet, 40ish. Level 50 PVP queues were 20+ mins.

 

The sad thing is, I have it pretty good compared to a lot of people.

 

Either way, I dont consider my servers level of shrinking activity to be acceptable. The PVP wait times, and the lack of people on almost all the worlds is sucking the MMO right out of this game.

 

All of the content that requires other people to play is either impossible or takes hours to organize.

 

On Saturday night, my guild was the only one to run EV from 8-11:30. We arent even a PVE guild!

[ohpleasework]

Transfers or merge now. I wont be paying for an empty server once the free 30 days run out.

 

How could you do the same mistake you did with warhammer again...amateurs.

 

It's remarkable isn't it? Bioware had the chance to stave off the impending free fall, and many of the people they absorbed from Mythic had recently lived through the disaster that was Warhammer Online. A month ago Bioware should have merged at least five sets of low pop servers and implemented a cross server queuing system for flashpoints and operations, as well as some kind of summoning ability to make partying for heroics faster and easier. An abundance of dead servers combined with an inability to rapidly group/party for content dealt a swift coup de grace to Warhammer Online. The same thing is happening to SW:TOR, only it's more akin to a gut wound - killing it slowly - partly due to the strength of the license, with a little help from a free month subscription.

 

But rather than addressing the actual problems they chose to cite strong active subscription totals (a completely meaningless statistic to customers), pushed out a lack luster legacy system, and pushed some new content. Bioware and EA's stock holders are going to be in for a rude awakening once the additional free month expires.

 

A server-only LFG queue for a game full of dead servers.... laughable.

[Ghaiana]

I only counted the EU English servers as I said, suppose I'll count the rest of them next time but I doubt the situation with the german and french servers is any different, 4 or 5 servers need to have their populations consolidated so we end up with a good handful of heavy and higher pop servers.

 

Since I counted 55 standard/heavy servers at about the same time as you last night, I think it does matter. You made it look like less than half of the servers was standard or heavy, while in fact it was more than half of the EU servers.

[TurokDarkstar]

Why is it that multiple 50+ page threads can pop up without a single word from the developers (and if they do respond, it's scripted). Meanwhile, you can't shut up the GW devs and their corny sense of humor.

[babykahna]

my server is counted a mid population server...problem is its getting more and more pathetic each and every day. the republics complain that they barely have 20-30 people on their fleet at peak hours while the imperials have 60-70 people at most. At reallllyyy good periods we might get 100+ imperials on the fleet but the other faction side is dying...

 

I'm not sure if 200-300 people is counted as a mid population server because if it is...then i think i wanna unsub. I'm not gonna waste my money transferring to another server when bioware knows the solution is the merge servers together to create a better playing environment for players. I do enjoy this game to some extent..pvp is ok, pve isn't anything great..but after awhile things get boring. And I mean really boring. I've cleared the pve content, I've pvp-ed till rank 85 but with no rated warzones i'm not going to bother wasting my time grinding for some superficial valor title. Within the last few weeks some real big guilds on my server have just left completely while others I talk to are in the process of leaving for other games..

 

I got a month left and I'll wait to see if anything is done. I may just be one small subscriber but even I can see that every person adds up and judging from the number of people who have left my server...multiplied by what I can assume is only happening to other servers too...I'm guessing that is alot of money that is flying out the window because the developers dont seem competent enough to recognize a simple solution to a large problem. Server mergers.

[-Dench]

Since I counted 55 standard/heavy servers at about the same time as you last night, I think it does matter. You made it look like less than half of the servers was standard or heavy, while in fact it was more than half of the EU servers.

 

Standard doesn't mean much. The thing with Standard is that to get the server to move from LIGHT to STANDARD does not require a lot of people. Its under 500 total for the entire server from my guesstimates.. To get it to move from STANDARD to HEAVY is an entirely different beast, the number appears to be decently high to get that jump.

 

So, you cant really include STANDARD when your talking about healthy server pops, because it usualy doesn't show that it is one. Look at servers that hit HEAVY occasionally, those would be good servers to include in healthy lists. My server hits Standard every night, and its a ghost town most of the time regardless.

[tegororn]

if you follow the sever select lists at all during server prime times one thing becomes increasingly clear:

 

Most of the servers that have dropped into sub-LIGHT are PvP servers. Which is not all that surprising, given the fact that PvPers are some of the most vocal and impatient MMO players on the planet. No game pleases them. The LIGHT PvE servers are pretty much the ones that were always LIGHT since launch, give or take a few.

 

In addition, PvPers are the ones that will most readily server hop with rerolls.

 

Now, if one wants to beat the drum about too many servers at launch (which I do not agree with) it would be proper to beat the drum a little more precisely..... too many PvP servers at launch. Of course the PvPers were among the most vocal teeth gnashers about queues too back around launch.

 

What a simple minded thought

 

I suggest you to read thousands of posts about the issue before you make a statement.

[Kthx]

Why is it that multiple 50+ page threads can pop up without a single word from the developers (and if they do respond, it's scripted). Meanwhile, you can't shut up the GW devs and their corny sense of humor.

 

They have responded on their plan for managing server populations here: http://www.swtor.com/blog/community-qa-april-27th-2012

 

Why is it that players keep saying BioWare is not responding when, in fact, they are?

[Kthx]

So, you cant really include STANDARD when your talking about healthy server pops, because it usualy doesn't show that it is one. Look at servers that hit HEAVY occasionally, those would be good servers to include in healthy lists. My server hits Standard every night, and its a ghost town most of the time regardless.

 

Since there clearly are servers with a healthy population that show up as "Standard", you also can't exclude Standard servers from the tally of servers with a healthy population level. Whether or not a Standard server is deemed healthy or not is highly subjective. But there have been many claims from those who complain about the population that the majority of servers are light, and this, in any case, is simply not true.

[babykahna]

They have responded on their plan for managing server populations here: http://www.swtor.com/blog/community-qa-april-27th-2012

 

Why is it that players keep saying BioWare is not responding when, in fact, they are?

 

if you read it right, it said specific servers only get free transfers. if people from dying servers are those that are allowed transfers, then they might as well close the server. whats the point in keeping a server around if its dead. And if thats the case why not just do server mergers?

 

Or if they mean high pop servers are allowed free xfers to low pop servers to balance out server populations...then I highly doubt high pop players would want to go to a less populated server.

 

And for everyone else...it seems its going to be a paid service? seriously? if they wanna charge me to xfer servers simply because my server doesnt have a low enough population then why would i stand for more greed on their part?

[Wootie]

BW please do something/anything about low population servers (free transfers, server merges, cross-server wz, anything!) before everyone who is still left leaves! WZ queues even on weekends at prime time are getting crazy long and can't find people to do PVE (fps, ops). Please help BW, you're our only hope!

 

- Wootie

Low Population PVP EU Server Basilisk Droid

Edited May 7, 2012 by Wootie

[Kthx]

if you read it right, it said specific servers only get free transfers. if people from dying servers are those that are allowed transfers, then they might as well close the server. whats the point in keeping a server around if its dead. And if thats the case why not just do server mergers?

 

I'm not sure why this matter. If everyone who got off the "dead" server had a chance to do so, and do so for free, why does it matter if BioWare decides to keep the server up and running? More likely, this is a multi-step process, with the transfers being the initial step.

 

And for everyone else...it seems its going to be a paid service? seriously? if they wanna charge me to xfer servers simply because my server doesnt have a low enough population then why would i stand for more greed on their part?

 

As a matter of basic microeconomics, any service that is priced below its marginal cost will be over-utilized. Why should other players subsidize your desire to transfer from a server whose population is not "low enough"?

Edited May 7, 2012 by Kthx

[-Dench]

Since there clearly are servers with a healthy population that show up as "Standard", you also can't exclude Standard servers from the tally of servers with a healthy population level. Whether or not a Standard server is deemed healthy or not is highly subjective. But there have been many claims from those who complain about the population that the majority of servers are light, and this, in any case, is simply not true.

 

Sure, standard is definitely not Light.

 

Standard is a problem. Like you said, some Standards are decent servers, those are the ones that are on the high end of that level, nearing Heavy. The other end of Standard, the light end, is a very SLOW place in comparison to the high end.

 

I think the current way Standard is set up is there solely to get more servers off light, and onto something else that looks better. The difference between standards low extreme and high are way to great for that term to mean anything.

 

Take heavy and very heavy. they seem to have very little noticeable difference, and either way, if your server is at either, the place is pretty packed. We know what those two mean.

 

All we know about standard is its not light, and its not heavy

 

My server for instance is now only dinging Standard for about 2 hours per night. Crap. Friday night showed 285ish Imperials on at 9pm, while running on Standard. Most instances were very slow.

 

The problem I think we are now getting into is the players who are left, are the players who like this game, want to play it and want it to continue on. But, the grumbling is starting to begin even within this core player base. Last night, we had 20 min PVP queue, while running standard and people werent to happy about it.

 

I dont want this game to die, I just want the people who want to play to be brought together so we can have a large, strong and vibrant player base that we can all enjoy that game with.

 

We don't really have that anymore, and its shrunk considerably on my server since the 1.2 bump.

 

It stinks, and I don't want this game to push me, and my guild away. The ghost town that Ven Zallow is turning into is doing just that though. I hope my friends last long enough for the transfers, I really do.

Edited May 7, 2012 by -Dench