My server is dead - we need transfers now, not in early summer

[ironix]

Wrong. The tech is there for manual transfers involving someone actually going and moving files from one server to another. That's what they did in the limited transfers that were available for the new Asian / Australian servers... they had people going in and manually transferring characters. I doubt they have the resources to do that on a large enough scale to handle general transfers in the US / EU servers. They are currently developing tech to automate the process so that they can handle large volumes of transfer requests, and they'll release that when it's ready. If your server is dead then why not do what I did: start an alt in a class you haven't played a lot yet on a populated server and then transfer your characters from the dead server to the one your alt is on (or transfer them and the alt to a third server if free transfers to your new alt's aren't offered) once it's available.

 

Didn't take long for this argument to be brought up again. As such, time to copy and paste the following:

 

I've been both a senior game designer, executive producer, and studio manager for 2 major gaming developers, including one that is an EA affiliiate. This is par for the course for EA. EA and some of its partners (lets hope not Bioware) have the bad habit of laying off anyone remotely competent and saving the ***-kissers when the time comes. Senior management in the games industry in general is incompetent to the point of absurdity, which I racked up to the fact that it was generally a young industry (no guilds, no unions, no evaluations at the end of the project). Working in the games industry for major developers is like the Groundhog's Day movie where the same mistakes get made every single project like there is some kind of collective amnesia.

 

The subjectiveness in which both marketting and development determine their criteria for future success is also patently ridiculous sometimes. I could write a multi-volume book series with examples of this.

 

As for people that don't like this game, I will say from my own experience that this is actually close to a bug free launch as it gets. There were some very big SNAFU's, but game-breaking bugs were almost nil. Biggest SNAFU was the arbitrary server limits imposed to try to spread people out. Those wait times in the first weeks had no bearing on reality, the servers could most definitely have held more - it was an arbitrary limit. The arbiters of that limit did have their reasons, but they couldn't anticipate the massive exodus of the player base after a few months. In hindsight, I would not have made the same call and imagine myself arguing to slowly introduce servers as thy fill to the breaking point. Its much easier to add more servers than put the genies back into smaller bottles.

 

From a game design perspective, the stats system was entirely too dumbed down, even for casual players. This is fixable though. What keeps people busy for hours when NOT playing the game is figuring out the hundreds of ways to combine stats with their abilities and then make plans for specific gear to get those stats. In this game, none of that is meaningful. The game is like a girlfriend...if she's too easy, you lose interest.

 

Also, ugly armor. Fire the fashion designer and hope there's a suitable place for him in the afterlife. WW2 potato-masher hand grenades stuck to my back? Really?

 

As for those that say "this can't come now" because of different aspects of the team work on different things...true to a limited point. Management has the power to recombine the SCRUMs or whatever functional units they want at any time, then assign priorities as determined. If team pipelines are kept small and efficient, there's no reason they can't shelve what they're doing and go with another priority...except this is EA and the rule in management is that those who know what is going on are not allowed to make cost/production decisions, and vice-versa.

 

As for the server combines, they can do it and should ASAP. My bet on the delay in this feature is setting up the billing logistics while the accountants crunch numbers to determine the strategy. They already failed at economic systems (both player base management and in-game economy) and they know it. This is their one chance to fix it and the designers/producers don't want to screw it up. EA doesn't let production teams make a move with anything that involves actual money without blessings from higher-ups that have no freaking clue what's actually going on, so sip a marguerita while you wait. I'll just be happy to take potshots from the sidelines happy that this isn't my project

[KeepMeOnPins]

I'm not saying trash their characters or anything i'm just saying make an alt or something while you wait.

 

If you can't do either one they go play something else

 

I have 3 lvl 50's and another on the way. Most people on dead servers like mine have several 50 alts too. Know why? Cause that's all there is to do. So yeah, not really helpful advice you are handing out there.

[skarr_tor]

I started my 3th alt now

 

PvP is dead on my server. Been on each night for the last week (on my alt since nothing to do on my main) but checking the who 50 regularly and didn't see a single WZ up

 

At this rate BW won't need transfers anymore because everyone waiting for it will have quit

 

Next week diablo 3 comes out, it will get even worse (although can't get any worse on my server)

[Mercurial_Harpy]

You know, I've been avoiding these threads but just wanted to post my experiences this weekend. I'm on The Corsair, PvE NA Server, Empire. I'm one of the 3-4 consistently active players in my guild. My main is a lvl 50 Sniper.

 

At prime-time Saturday and Sunday evening (5 PM to 9 PM CDT), Server Population was light. Then I looked at the login screen and Server Population was light across almost all servers, with a few mediums sprinkled in there, and the only heavy being of course The Fatman.

 

There were no more than 7 people (at max, usually there were 2-3 on) in my guild logged in any time I was. We used to be a guild of over 100 people.

 

We've suspended raid times because we just can't get the people on. We've tried alliances with 2 other guilds, and they are having the same problem.

 

So I thought "Well I'll just PvP."

 

I did not run in a full PvP group all weekend. Because we are consistently down 1-3 team members, we get face-rolled by the opposite faction who all have the top-tier gear. I'm frustrated at this point, and not doing it any more. Grinding tokens is one thing, but playing with the deck stacked against you each and every time is a deal breaker.

 

I'm working on levelling a Sorcerer, and I guess since the Republic side is better balanced I should just reroll over there. But I'm angry that I can't play what I want because after months of it being an issue, Bioware still has no plans to fix the server population problem.

 

I know I know, tons of people are in the same boat. I hate to say it, but my experiences this weekend I think finally broke me. Unless things change soon, I'll be moving on. I don't want to, I love the game, but not in its current state with no promises of a fix nailed down. And yeah, I'm sad about it.

[Thatwillhurt]

Another Corsair player here.. Sick and tired of 1 pvp per hour and then get rolled 8 v 5 .only got 41 days left unless they allow server transfers im done.. waste of time and effort re-rolling just to have the same thing possibly happen again. Gl luck to Bioware keeping this going with so many dropping off...Thanksalot :-)

[Merkavamark]

.Several weeks later after many other "accidents" suffered by other players during transfer, your characters are restored. Will you still be subscribed then?

 

The question is will I be subsribed for that to even happen. I would rather cross my fingers than not play at all which is aready happing. SWTOR has actually got me playing BF3 again. There is an average of 30 people on our fleet and 5-10 on each planet. Many on our server have left including my guild which sucks because I already have two 50's and dont want to run up another one due to time constraints. I would even offer up mine as a test case it is so bad.

 

Never played them before Diablo 3 HERE I COME!!!!!

 

Get your Sheet together BW.

[Frostvein]

I don't understand how my "standard" server has 36 people in fleet and is considered standard. this makes me sad.

 

/who by level range. Count the number of reps, then count the number of imps. If the number you get when you add them both together is over 350, then tada, you are a "Standard" server.

 

People will try and argue with me but the best thing is you can do this yourself and see.

[-Dench]

/who by level range. Count the number of reps, then count the number of imps. If the number you get when you add them both together is over 350, then tada, you are a "Standard" server.

 

People will try and argue with me but the best thing is you can do this yourself and see.

 

I find it easier to who by actual class type when on a low server. for instance, to find all the Imperial Agents, search: Imperial Agents (for the toons still on Hutta), Snipers and Operatives. Do the same for the other classes, and you can add up how many players are around. its a lot faster then who'ing levels, I thought.

 

Unless you can who levels in a range, can you do that? I haven't tried.

[Kthx]

This guy is absolutely right. We just want to play the game right now. Bioware is preventing that from happening for a lot of us on low pop servers by sitting on their hands.

 

For those of you who believe there is a green "MERGE SERVER" button and BioWare is just sitting on its hands refusing to press it, can you explain what their motiavation would be to deliberately hold up this feature? I'm just curious exactly how you guys reason...

[Frostvein]

I find it easier to who by actual class type when on a low server. for instance, to find all the Imperial Agents, search: Imperial Agents (for the toons still on Hutta), Snipers and Operatives. Do the same for the other classes, and you can add up how many players are around. its a lot faster then who'ing levels, I thought.

 

Unless you can who levels in a range, can you do that? I haven't tried.

 

Yes. But since the numbers are so low its roughly the same anyway. Both work well for servers under 500 or so people, but after that on busier servers it gets hard to accurately track.

[Mallorik]

I don't understand how my "standard" server has 36 people in fleet and is considered standard. this makes me sad.

 

My server is the same way, imp side is in ok shape but the republic side is rediculously empty, If you play on the republic most of those "standard" servers are actualy very very light,

 

My server is in the top 20 servers on torstatus but in prime time fleet rarely breaks 40 and theres about 120 total republic players on so as far as im concerned its not a standard pop server at all.

[ironix]

For those of you who believe there is a green "MERGE SERVER" button and BioWare is just sitting on its hands refusing to press it, can you explain what their motiavation would be to deliberately hold up this feature? I'm just curious exactly how you guys reason...

 

Armed with my copypasta from many pages ago in this thread!

 

I've been both a senior game designer, executive producer, and studio manager for 2 major gaming developers, including one that is an EA affiliiate. This is par for the course for EA. EA and some of its partners (lets hope not Bioware) have the bad habit of laying off anyone remotely competent and saving the ***-kissers when the time comes. Senior management in the games industry in general is incompetent to the point of absurdity, which I racked up to the fact that it was generally a young industry (no guilds, no unions, no evaluations at the end of the project). Working in the games industry for major developers is like the Groundhog's Day movie where the same mistakes get made every single project like there is some kind of collective amnesia.

 

The subjectiveness in which both marketting and development determine their criteria for future success is also patently ridiculous sometimes. I could write a multi-volume book series with examples of this.

 

As for people that don't like this game, I will say from my own experience that this is actually close to a bug free launch as it gets. There were some very big SNAFU's, but game-breaking bugs were almost nil. Biggest SNAFU was the arbitrary server limits imposed to try to spread people out. Those wait times in the first weeks had no bearing on reality, the servers could most definitely have held more - it was an arbitrary limit. The arbiters of that limit did have their reasons, but they couldn't anticipate the massive exodus of the player base after a few months. In hindsight, I would not have made the same call and imagine myself arguing to slowly introduce servers as thy fill to the breaking point. Its much easier to add more servers than put the genies back into smaller bottles.

 

From a game design perspective, the stats system was entirely too dumbed down, even for casual players. This is fixable though. What keeps people busy for hours when NOT playing the game is figuring out the hundreds of ways to combine stats with their abilities and then make plans for specific gear to get those stats. In this game, none of that is meaningful. The game is like a girlfriend...if she's too easy, you lose interest.

 

Also, ugly armor. Fire the fashion designer and hope there's a suitable place for him in the afterlife. WW2 potato-masher hand grenades stuck to my back? Really?

 

As for those that say "this can't come now" because of different aspects of the team work on different things...true to a limited point. Management has the power to recombine the SCRUMs or whatever functional units they want at any time, then assign priorities as determined. If team pipelines are kept small and efficient, there's no reason they can't shelve what they're doing and go with another priority...except this is EA and the rule in management is that those who know what is going on are not allowed to make cost/production decisions, and vice-versa.

 

As for the server combines, they can do it and should ASAP. My bet on the delay in this feature is setting up the billing logistics while the accountants crunch numbers to determine the strategy. They already failed at economic systems (both player base management and in-game economy) and they know it. This is their one chance to fix it and the designers/producers don't want to screw it up. EA doesn't let production teams make a move with anything that involves actual money without blessings from higher-ups that have no freaking clue what's actually going on, so sip a marguerita while you wait. I'll just be happy to take potshots from the sidelines happy that this isn't my project

[Exsqeeze]

Niman here - 25 on Imperial Fleet.

Log on to Tomb of Freedon Nadd 120 in Civil War alone.

 

I PvP against the same people every single night. All my guild are considering re rolling, if our guild were to re roll it would kill the PvP on the server as we are now one of 3 guilds left PvPing.

 

Server merges should be top priority. We have no economy on our server, we have little PvP on our server. 16 mans have all but stopped. We have no republic on our server.

 

The economy is the main thing, want to build your War Hero Augmented? Have fun spending the next 2 days running missions for Zal Alloy.

 

Give us inter-server Warzones, but more importantly make the Galactic Trade Market CROSS SERVER! It is stupid to have tiny little economies ruining the experience for us players to stupidt ore roll on a new server.

 

Bioware I am paying you for the service you provide, I have the power to stop paying which hinders you financially. If you wish to retain my subscription then release server merges/transfers within the next 28 days.

[SageOfSixPath]

Okay, let's say they rushed the transfers.

 

Oops, all your characters get deleted. We can rebuild them. We have the technology. Several weeks later after many other "accidents" suffered by other players during transfer, your characters are restored. Will you still be subscribed then?

 

As such BioWare wants to take all the time it needs to ensure that the transfers lead to as few problems as possible.

 

Transfer was already done for Asia : i don't see any reason it would bug, Specially if they already made it without any incident.

 

Having an empty server would not matter if PVP was crossed-server, also if there was a cross serve dungeon finder ; we would not need those transfer. Does Bioware cannot do it for now or they are waiting on something special ? All this situation make me think.

 

I know alot poeple left PVP server since 1.2 . Also i know lot poeple won't wait this summer to get what they want. There is many game that will be released in May & June 2012.

Edited May 7, 2012 by SageOfSixPath

[seiyA]

EU pvp serv - Bazilik droid

This server just "died", it used to be good... there was Q all the time at any time of the day.

Suddenly, and that since 2 weeks, the population on fleet gone from average 60 to 15....

 

We dont need a server transfer.

The server must be merge to shut down prolly half of the server.

 

Then later propose the transfer service for the rest of people which still QQ.

[brentonj]

Sword of Ajunta pall is effectively dead.

 

4 major PvE and PvP guild have quit. A population that was well above 150 (sometimes 200) on the fleet every night, is now down to barely 70.

 

The server itself rarely if ever reaches above "Standard" status.

[Rayla_Felana]

Transfer was already done for Asia : i don't see any reason it would bug, Specially if they already made it without any incident.

 

Having an empty server would not matter if PVP was crossed-server, also if there was a cross serve dungeon finder ; we would not need those transfer. Does Bioware cannot do it for now or they are waiting on something special ? All this situation make me think.

 

I know alot poeple left PVP server since 1.2 . Also i know lot poeple won't wait this summer to get what they want. There is many game that will be released in May & June 2012.

 

Manual APAC transfers=/=Automated global ones.

[Kthx]

Armed with my copypasta from many pages ago in this thread!

 

I'm not sure how a wall of text from a disgruntled ex-employee who self-admittedly "is happy to take potshots from the sidelines" answers my question, but in case it does, congratulations!

[ironix]

Manual APAC transfers=/=Automated global ones.

 

Nor does that mean 3+ months of development time required.

[oldshatterhand]

700 replies and not even a yellow post from BW? This is currently the biggest problem this game has, and they just refuse to admit it. I can only imagine how much worse it will be next week, after Diablo 3 is out.

 

I honestly think the game will die if they don't bring transfers before the free 30 days are over (which is at the end of May), only people who play on servers like Fatman or Freedon Nadd will keep playing.

Edited May 7, 2012 by oldshatterhand

[mypadinla]

Lord Praven is dead as is the game. 3 of the top PVE/PVP guilds core groups are gone to Tera and only going back to drag more people over to Tera since Star Wars is not going to change anytime soon as obviously seen by many. Maybe by summer, maybe by fall... hell even maybe by winter but it may be just too late. Good luck BW/EA whoever or whatever is running the show.

[iosifinig]

7 PM, 5 people in Republican Fleet and our server has more Reps than Imps.

 

Early summer will be too late. Do something asap, BW.

[Adsomelk]

7 PM, 5 people in Republican Fleet and our server has more Reps than Imps.

 

Early summer will be too late. Do something asap, BW.

 

I agree with my venerated Master!

[Tigerstarr]

I am going to make this clear to some of the bumbling morons posting in our discussion....

 

AGAIN, its not that we HATE the game. If we did we wouldnt even be here posting in the forums. People who hate things tend to never touch or involve themselves in it. We (the players) WANT TO PLAY but there is NO ONE TO PLAY WITH. You young kids and fan boys need to realize how big of a problem this is.

 

Typing in caps well help you understand my point here.... IF THERE WAS PEOPLE TO PLAY WITH WE WOULDNT BE HERE POSTING IN THE FORUMS! WE WOULD BE PLAYING!

 

Stop with the "Roll an alt" .... Stop with the "Re-Roll on a new server"....you know what you can do if you think that? You can BLOW ME , BLOW US! This problem was created by the company BIoware and THEY need to fix it SOON!

Summer is way too late because , like I've said BEFORE, two really good games are coming out and one was just released! I play Tera now in hopes that Bioware will magically fix this issue this coming week. I miss playing SWTOR trust me, Tera is good, but I am more into the SWTOR world when it comes to lore.

 

And to correct another moron that stated "find something else to do in game if you cant pvp or raid or flashpoints".... LIKE WHAT? Quests (dailies) are 4mans .... I logged in an hour ago on BLack Vulk and I was the ONLY ONE Republic and Imperial side in the Black Hole Daily hub. So what is there to do seeing most things need OTHER PEOPLE to do them?????!! craft? why? There is NO BODY TO SELL CRAP TOO. My god friend, you need some common sense prior to posting ever again!!!!!!

 

FIX THE DAMN SERVERS and let us PLAY AGAIN! Thus the forums will become a lot less QQ and a lot more PEW PEW.

 

QFE...This person hit the nail on the head....Iceberg dead ahead...If BW waits til we hit it, it might be too late.

[CoNfuSioN_]

25 people on my entire server now Rep side.

 

Is it sad that I'm about to go fire up Diablo 2 to enjoy some GAMING until I go to work because I can't get that from SWTOR right now on my dead server?

Edited May 7, 2012 by CoNfuSioN_