FREE Character Transfers are Coming!

[Emrill]

I don't think we should presume that Bioware will follow anyone's pattern. I also don't understand why people argue that transfers are clean and mergers will cause the sky to fall. The only difference between the two is transfers usually involve a choice by the player for character destination. With the Legacy system that could easily get messy if people are not forced to move all their characters together. The simple fact is when you are moving massive amounts of character data around it is going to be risky be it merger or transfer. If it takes a couple weeks to minimize that risk, then so be it.

 

Also I don't know what Bioware would do with characters that were not moved from a server that is going to be closed. They could automate emails to people warning that characters risk deletion, but that would work against them to get players to return. After all if you had stopped playing for a while now, you probably are. Ot going to reactivate your account to move characters within an alotted time frame. Granted some people might still have active accounts and just need to log on, but the ones that don't will probably not. The stance of permanently deleting their character if not moved basically guarantees that player probably won't ever come back. Then again that is probably the case already. It's a tough call for Bioware to make. It would probably be best for them to make some type of queuing system that tells returning players they need to select a new destination server from the same list that will be originally offered. Until the player comes back the character data is just stored in a 'holding' server that has no actual world data.

[Devlonir]

The real reason they dont already have it moded and released is because they know that once it is they will have to either merge or close some servers. As they are ghost towns now. So when the few remaining people on them servers can transfer they will go from ghost towns to pergatorys.

Tinfoil hat much?

 

Do you even know how much problems can occur when scaling a system like this? They are giving themselves 2 months (which is when early-summer is upon us) to make sure the current APAC implementation works on a larger scale as well. Currently, the system only allows specific transfers to specific servers, the current system does not yet have a prooven functionality to ensure people can transfer from a server to whatever server they want.

 

Yes, APAC is being used to debug the system.. and when reading the customer support forums there are enough problems present still that our Asian and Australian friends are finding out for the rest of us.

 

Yet, instead of looking at the realistic problems still in the system, you prefer to proclaim that you know the real reason and that is is because Bioware is afraid of bad press. You think the whole 'ghost town servers' story is not bad press already? Everyone in the business knows merging or transferring is what Bioware should do. But instead of rushing something out and risking thousands of complaints and bugs, they are taking the needed time to develop a system for it.

 

But no, leaving servers as ghost towns with all the bad press that comes from that is a lot better news to tell than merging servers because average time spent in game is down compared to launch week.

Edited May 2, 2012 by Parali
inappropriate content - politics

[Moofausa]

ACK!! No thanks! Do you know how buggy and non-playable it would be to merge servers? No, transferring people off of low-pops and closing them down is good enough, and works great. (Which is NOT a merge. It is a transfer...)

 

What if I'm the last person on my server refusing to transfer, then they close the server? what then?

 

K, so think about what you're saying before you reply.

If we have entire merges as in two, three, even four servers being put together into one server, theres no chance for it backfiring.

 

See my logic?

[Devlonir]

What if I'm the last person on my server refusing to transfer, then they close the server? what then?

 

K, so think about what you're saying before you reply.

If we have entire merges as in two, three, even four servers being put together into one server, theres no chance for it backfiring.

 

See my logic?

 

Your 'logic' comes from the need to stay on your home server even if you are the last person playing on it. As long as Bioware offers more players to play with on another server and you choose not to take it, that is fully your own choice. Far as I care, Bioware can keep your server open just for you untill the end of time, as long as other people get to choose where to go.

 

No, there is a lot less chance of backfiring a transfer than a merger. Mostly because of how much easier it is to move people off a server one-by-one than it is to move everything at the same time.

 

So no, sorry.. I don't see your logic at all. In part because you don't explain why there is no risk of backfiring at all, and in part because I have a feeling there is no logic besides a need to defend an earlier statement that mergers are better than transfers.

Edited May 2, 2012 by Devlonir

[Mifunk]

So initially in early summer (aka December), we'll get targeted transfers. Which means they'll let folks on high pop servers transfer to low pop servers for free. My question is why would anyone want to transfer off a healthy server like Fatman to a dead server like Dead Weight?

 

I can't see this as a solution..sure they'll progress to open paid transfers, but that'll be further down the road.

[Griso]

It's pretty much straight forward to me. I'd prefer to wait 15 minutes in queue rather than log in on an empty server as it happens since a while now. So far my subscription will expire at the the end of the month, if no news on the topic will occur in the meantime I'll not renew. Same apply to all of my friends and guild mates on Tyrus Academy, probably the most desolated server in EU

[Leggomy]

What about established guilds? My server is prob considered low pop but our guild has hundreds of people in it. If they force us all to transfer then what? Start over? Its significantly harder to start a guild over then it is to simply reroll someplace else if you dont like the server you are on.

 

People act like playing the game is not what they wish to do. Game will be around for years and people complaining about having to redo a few days work. Just crazy.

[Sparviero]

I hope name priority goes by when you placed your pre-order and CE holders get priority over standard users. :eek:

 

/elitistnerfherder

[Griso]

Its significantly harder to start a guild over then it is to simply reroll someplace else if you dont like the server you are on.

 

No problem to start over, at least for me, having already 3 lvl 50 and 1 lvl 40, the question is... There are no 'more populated servers'... That's the real issue and that's why more and more people are quitting swtor.

[Leggomy]

No problem to start over, at least for me, having already 3 lvl 50 and 1 lvl 40, the question is... There are no 'more populated servers'... That's the real issue and that's why more and more people are quitting swtor.

 

What? The fatman isnt populated enough for you with the 2 hr queues?

[Timesjoke]

Despite the incorrect use of the word "merge" that people keep doing, transferring and closing dead servers is probably the FIRST thing they're going to do for FREE.

 

OMG, are you ever "not" on this forum attacking people?

 

Do you think "paying customers" have a right to talk about the things they are concerned about?

 

 

Let's discuss this word "merger" you seem to be so completely scared to allow other people to use, why not a merger? Who knows better about the active number of players on each server and what servers can accept those numbers than BW? They can slice the pie with precision and exacting care to provide the most balanced populations based on time of play and total numbers than anyone else so why not do it themselves?

 

Allowing completely blind trasfers would be like putting a 10 year old in the drivers seat of your automobile, while they could possibly get the vehicle to go down the road, the results would more than likely not be what you desire.

 

Sometimes "daddy" has to drve to get us where we need to be. BW needs to lead, not ask everyone else to just scatter about willie nilly and hope for the best.

[Griso]

What? The fatman isnt populated enough for you with the 2 hr queues?

 

Sorry, I probably had to specify, I'm referring to the EU/EN situation. counted about 90 Server, 3 have 'Standard' population, the rest are light (almost empty I would say). Are these figures a bit unbalanced or it's just me?

[Leggomy]

Sorry, I probably had to specify, I'm referring to the EU/EN situation. counted about 90 Server, 3 have 'Standard' population, the rest are light (almost empty I would say). Are these figures a bit unbalanced or it's just me?

 

I dont play on the EU side so I cannot comment on that. Sounds low tho you are right. I do think they have too many servers but how do you tell people on the one closing they lose their guild and everything they have earned like guild bank etc. They get to start over spend all those credits again etc. Try and recruit everyone back it wont happen.

[Griso]

Yep, I know it will be a problem, but the point is they rushed to add servers before looking at the real figures (clearly overestimated). And for my experience this is the best way to kill a mmo. What really puzzle me is that EA/BW were perfectly aware of the risk, I still remember back in December during the beta weekend with people complaining about the the long queues and the Dev replies were just pointing at the problem that 'adding too many server is risky'. Now it's May and we have (again in EU) 95% of the servers empty... Edited May 2, 2012 by Griso

[Timesjoke]

I dont play on the EU side so I cannot comment on that. Sounds low tho you are right. I do think they have too many servers but how do you tell people on the one closing they lose their guild and everything they have earned like guild bank etc. They get to start over spend all those credits again etc. Try and recruit everyone back it wont happen.

 

And this is why a merge is much better for the players then a transfer. When you transfer you loose everything not specifically attached to the toon. Things like guilds are erased. In a merge they can all be preserved and at most you have some conflicting names issues that can easily be fixed. Consider if some people have the same guild name or the same legacy or character name, this would be the only difficulty to sort out in a merge.

 

Well BW simply prompts the person on a loading screen to rename their toon, or select a new legacy name, or the GM is prompted to rename their guild. These steps are very easy to put into place and would simplify the lack of population issues because only BW knows the exact numbers of active players on each server and can easily calculate the best way to divide people up.

[Leggomy]

Yep, I know it will be a problem, but the point is they rushed to add servers before looking at the real figures (clearly overestimated). And for my experience this is the best way to kill a mmo. What really puzzle me is that EA/BW were perfectly aware of the risk, I still remember back in December during the beta weekend with people complaining about the the long queues and the Dev replies were just pointing at the problem that 'adding too many server is risky'. Now it's May and we have (again in EU) 95% of the servers empty...

 

Yep I agree they should have just told people to relax the queues wont last long. Now we have people established on these servers who may simply move on instead of trying to start guilds over etc. So tis a lose/lose for them either way. Lose people due to server merges or lose people because you dont do server merges.

[Soullessone]

i agree, with all of this. I don't even log in as much as i used to because people are leaving my server left and right. we used to have 200+ people on fleet and could get groups going no problem. Now lucky if you see 90, least amount i saw was 15, and maybe 1-2 people on a planet

[Woetoo]

I recall reading somewhere recently that Bioware had tweaked things, made stuff more efficient and generally scaled up their exceptions as to what a single server is capable of.

 

To the point where server populations could effectively be doubled without significant impact.

 

It wasn't clear if that was "current active players" doubled or "if everyone who played at launch came back" doubled.

 

But my view would be that if the servers can take twice the number of people... Do it !

Figure out a new maximum server population. Take 80% of that number. Then merge servers en masse to reach those new population limited across as many servers as is practical.

 

From what I can see, the two negatives for server merges is a degree of negative publicity by people outside the game and a lost opportunity to squeeze a little extra cash out of players. For every one else, any short term concerns should be considerably outweighed by the increased populations, even on server who currently think they are quite large already.

 

Big communities = better player environment = happier players = better word of mouth referrals = more income.

 

Now the cynical part of me is looking at it and thinking EA/Bioware are looking with the $.$ expression on their faces at the chance to introduce paid server transfers. Not because it's the right thing to do, but simply because they can probably get away with it. Clearly server mergers solves the problem for 90%+ of the player base without the opportunity to charge dollars to do it.

 

But the current players are those people who "kept the faith" in spite of Ilum, EV bugs, the 1.1 patch and ever decreasing populations. Server populations are not the fault of the players, who made their choices within the framework Bioware set out during the initial rollout. And rush towards the "you pay, you pay!!!" mindset so quickly seems a bit off for what is essentially a Bioware led mistake (not that I think they made bad choices at the time, but in hindsight... it's the players who lost out).

 

And yes, whilst there will be free server transfers, they appear to be in the blizzard style of "you can go where WE say you can move to".

 

I've made a number of assumptions here based on what has been announced so far. It could be the free server transfer process won't be as tainted as I'm painting it. But either Bioware are in this for the long term and aiming to rebuild trust and customer satisfaction or they've already decided to monetise as much as they can in the short term, not really expecting a long term.

 

I hope Bioware live up to my hopes rather than down to my expectations. Because I've already been down that route with Blizzard - and whilst they still have a huge player base, a lot of people came here looking for something else.

Edited May 2, 2012 by Woetoo

[walbo]

could someone plz explain if my legacy will olso be moved az i dont think al ever log on again if i cant.I realy like this game but the number of servers is crazy,iv leveled 2 of my 3 characters to level 50 with no multiplay at all.I love the sw lore and always have but am starting to feel az if im in denial with this game and its small flaws that seem to be adding up.

[Krohnnic]

Logged into my dying Euro Server yesterday at primetime (21.00 CET), There was ONE at Republic Fleet, Yes it was me... All alone at what should be Prime-time.

 

Created a ticket to ask for a xfer not possible so i guess, what option do i have? Play alone in a MMO? Wait it out? Put my subscription on hold to the time i can acutally play an MMO?

[Torcer]

The feeling that server mergers will signal decline is ridiculous and insane. It's clear to EVERYONE that server mergers are needed to stop people from leaving due to low server pop. It's a vicious circle that needs to end.

 

EA/BioWare need to man up and admit that the way the servers were handled in the first week was a mistake, and announce in a clear and confident way, that server transfers off those servers, then merging some and closing the dead ones will be a one time correct of that initial error.

 

The gaming community needs strong, healthy, populated servers and they need to start seeing some better communication and transparency from the dev team. All people want is the ability to play a game they like in an atmosphere that is clear and fair.

 

YES. Transfers don’t solve the core problem that low pop servers are unhealthy for the game. There’s no guarantee that the server you transfer to will be high Pop anyhow. It’s backwards thinking that server mergers signal decline – if pop has declined then it’s already happened, regardless of the “Signal,” and mergers are needed to prevent further decline. A MMO without a healthy population isn’t really a functioning MMO. BW needs to merge servers and do it fast.

[Woetoo]

Yep I agree they should have just told people to relax the queues wont last long.

 

They did. So did a lot of experienced players. But at the same time, they also encouraged players to head to the not "very heavy" servers by imposing queues.

 

Yep, I know it will be a problem, but the point is they rushed to add servers before looking at the real figures (clearly overestimated).

 

They had the pre-order figures to work from and honestly, at the time I think they made the best choices that were evident. They still had a few performance issues to work out and players would not have reacted well to huge lag spikes and horrendously low FPS when in areas with a lot of people. So they played it safe and spread people out.

 

If more people had carried on actively playing, that would have been the right choice.

 

What I think they underestimated was how many people would leave within the first 2 months. They knew a lot would... but...

 

The reasons are emotionally subjective. But in our guild, we had over 100 active characters played by around 60 players, 30+ of whom reached level 50 and most of whom had transferred over from warcraft or rejoined the guild after take a break from warcraft/rift/eq/warhammer.

 

Almost everyone universally praised the levelling experience, but our roster now has an inactive rank of about 30 previous "mains" who've stopped playing (and mainly returned to warcraft).

 

 

• Some blame bugs.
  
• Some weren't ready to wait for others to reach 50 to form a raiding team.
  
• Some felt the game had been rushed out to meet a Christmas / end of year deadline.
  
• Some just found warcraft more comfortable and familiar.
  
• Some felt what made the levelling process unique and special hadn't been carried forward into endgame raiding, which was seen as more or less what was already in warcraft - except with more bugs and less polish. And if they were going to do warcraft like raiding, they may as well do it in warcraft.
  
• And whilst we aren't a PvP oriented guild, a couple didn't appreciate what was happening in PvP.
  

 

Whatever the reasons, and I'm sure whilst those applied to us, there were more I don't know about and even more than didn't even occur to our members, we were left barely able to hold an 8man raid team together. Currently we're about 6, regularly pugging the 2 remaining spots on a "standard" population server (the server has about 100 to 200 players in EV/KP/ECD most "raid" nights). I doubt we are unique, and as such my viewpoint is that server populations reflect our guild's experience.

 

In my opinion, Bioware made the only assumptions they could at the time. They assumed that most people would like their game enough to continue playing. They undoubtedly knew a fairly large chunk of the population wouldn't stay - but just underestimated how many people that would be. At that point, they had no idea how badly Ilum would hurt confidence, same for the 1.1 patch rollout and the cumulative effect of bad things stacking up with more bad things. Even external things like the Mass Effect 3 drama tainted Bioware's halo. But hindsight is like that.

 

Personally I think they aimed to launch with what we currently know as 1.2 - but were pressured into releasing quicker by EA. If they had launched with 1.2 - I think things would be in a much different position right now.

 

imo, that's how we got here. What Bioware do next could either be spectacularly impressive or another Mass Effect 3 like shot in the foot.

Edited May 2, 2012 by Woetoo

[Woetoo]

Logged into my dying Euro Server yesterday at primetime (21.00 CET), There was ONE at Republic Fleet, Yes it was me... All alone at what should be Prime-time.

May I ask which server?

 

Simply put, I don't believe you. I wish my experience on forums liked these left me with a high opinion of people, but sadly it doesn't. I'm sorry if that seems offensive, but sadly some people seem to enjoy overstating things for very questionable reasons and that number seems so extreme that my doubts are raised.

 

Basically I would like to check it out myself.

 

Could someone please explain if my legacy will also be moved as I dont think I'll ever log on again if I cant.

 

Yes. Legacy is moved with your character.

 

My understanding is that if you already have a character on the server you are moving to, the legacies are merged in such a way that you keep the highest of the two legacies - but they aren't added together. So if you move a legacy level 18 to a server where you already have a legacy level 14 - your new legacy is level 18 for all characters.

 

The best way to get an absolute answer would be to look at the sticky topics for the Asia/Pacific transfers that Bioware have just been doing manually. They have a large FAQ that includes stuff like what happens to legacy.

Edited May 2, 2012 by Woetoo

[Hawk-Firestorm]

As far as I can see it Character movement should have been in at launch.

 

It should be free, it's not our fault bioware made mistakes in designing the game enviroment, for a larger one like Eve for instance instead of the fractured one it is now.

 

People level up invest time doing so only to find their server is now dead, they can't move so they stop playing because they aren't prepared to grind all over again, frankly I can't blame them.

 

Long term they need to make either a account have so many character slots that can play on ANY server, redesign the game enviroment so it can support a large and vibrant population, or allow character movement free of charge at each downtime.

 

It was singulary the most important feature that should have been added, 6+ months on everyones still waiting on it, instead we get fluff patches.

 

And its had a massive impact I believe and caused many to simply upstakes and quit, Bioware kindly stop faffing around and sort it!

[JeramieCrowe]

YES. Transfers don’t solve the core problem that low pop servers are unhealthy for the game. There’s no guarantee that the server you transfer to will be high Pop anyhow. It’s backwards thinking that server mergers signal decline – if pop has declined then it’s already happened, regardless of the “Signal,” and mergers are needed to prevent further decline. A MMO without a healthy population isn’t really a functioning MMO. BW needs to merge servers and do it fast.

 

Transferring everyone off of low-pop servers and shutting them down is NOT a merge, people! This is important because when James Ohlen said there would be NO merges, he's talking about the convoluted, buggy process of merging the economy, loot tables, software and complete environment of two servers together. THAT'S a merge.

 

What BioWare will likely do is close some low-pop servers. That's a TRANSFER.

Edited May 2, 2012 by JeramieCrowe