When will there be a SERVER MERGE?

[Sammm]

Im just gutted by this whole debacle. I put my faith in bioware and for the first few months i loved the game, i still do, but since april i havnt logged in for more than a couple of minutes and each time i do i see the same thing, no matter what time of day, 1-10 people on rf....I had fun with my guild, lots of it, but this is an mmo, and i need people to play with.

 

Please bioware, just listen to your community and merge the servers, bring people back to the game before its too late.

 

Im finding it harder and harder to justify paying the sub each month anymore and will stop doing so soon.

 

Ena

 

Probably in about 2-3 weeks, they'll do that merge we're waiting for so long. Well, it isn't actually a "merge" more a population increase + free transfers but we'll probably end up with many Jedi Covenant population type on all the remaining "super servers". But again, I'm speculating, we don't have a lot of details.

[Rocen]

As a noob. I just transferred via quit and start on another server.

 

Not that this is going to solve the content, or "open world feel" issues. But at least now when I reach 50 I'll have people to play with! ALTHOUGH I played my first toon up to L24 before starting a new one on a "heavy" server.

 

I DO hope to play that guy again some day.

[WaywardOne]

Outside of dates (which will not be accurate I know), they should be able to say things like "we are offering free transfers to these servers" or "we are creating these 10 brand new (massive) servers and closing these 50". Considering that the process is "almost out of development" they should know things like that by now. We need something to attach our hopes to. Hearing nothing but "soon" for several months straight while people are getting fired, most server's active pops are nearly empty and things like flash points and ops are all but unusable is just depressing. Edited June 3, 2012 by WaywardOne

[LarryRow]

I still LOL at the date of the original post.

 

And a funny thought occurred to me. What does a brand new MMO player experience when they log in to TOR for the first time? A huge list of servers. Totally overwhelming, until they scroll down, and amidst all the "Light"s there is that shining red "Very Heavy." And they say "Hmm, every server is light except for this ONE."

 

I wonder where they make their character.

 

Now this is good for new player retention because they get to play in a great environment, but it's terrible for folks on the other servers.

[Kthx]

Honestly, why they launched with so many is beyond me. Clearly there was a gross overestimation of their market draw and then they drug their feet on making the changes that need to happen.

 

Not sure why it would be beyond you to understand. Maybe the raging community demands for more servers to be added had something to do with it.

[Skullbash]

Seriously, what is the reason for this taking so long?

 

It's been the number 1 issue in this game for months now, just look at the date of the op...

[Sheldoom]

About the "so many servers at launch", I think they just took a huge gamble. It was either launch with only a few servers and let a lot of players wait in 4-6 hour queues OR launch with much more servers so that the average queue time would be minimal. Even with so many servers, I think they planned that most players would reroll many alts for many months before ending up with nothing else to do in the game around June 2012. Also, they didn't expect that we would play so much: the average playing time for the first 2 months was 8 hours everyday! All that combined contributed to the population decrease starting around February 2012. In other words, I think the developers were caught off guard.

 

It was a huge gamble, partly from pressure above (I would imagine) and below (the community). In either case, imo, you NEVER GIVE A CHILD EVERYTHING THEY WANT.

 

As for being caught off guard; that is a massive understatement. I would imagine most new MMOs see play times like that for the first few months, I've been playing them for quite some time now and myself and most people I know fall into that category... with a gradual decline in playtime over a few months to a normal, 'reasonable' amount of time (unless you ask my fiancee).

 

Most people I know that played from release that no longer sub (or don't log in even tho they have 6mo. subs) quit because they didn't feel SWTOR offered anything new or they had issues with lack of features, bugs, etc.. the people in the latter group are 'taking breaks' to see how they progress on those issues. I think out of the dozens of people I know that play only 1 has quit because of populations.. most begrudgingly have left 50s behind for greener pastures.

 

About that "missing tons of basic mmo features". I bet that the Bioware developers wanted to launch the game around May-June 2012 instead of December 2011, but it's the EA bosses who take the final decisions and they decided to launch it during the year 2011. It would explain why a lot of basic mmo features weren't there at the launch.

I agree 100% with this. I feel like they were rushed out to do a Christmas release. Huge mistake.

 

Although it doesn't explain the lack of macros, which most would consider basic features. I thought I read somewhere that some people working on the game don't like macros in other games so they just don't have them here. That seems foolish, I can't even do anything as simple as create emote macros. Fail if you ask me.

 

About that "huge delay before the population consolidations", I have the feeling that they really wanted to activate the process way before June 2012 but for some reasons they just couldn't. The Bioware developers aren't stupid, seriously, they aren't. They kept analyzing the server populations statistics since the launch and they witnessed like us the population drops on so many servers from February 2012 until now. I think that either the boss (EA) refused to let them merge the servers or they weren't just ready yet to do it.

 

I always imagined that their discussions on this have been a total split room, which would explain why it has taken this long. Its good business to analyze all the data available to you but failing to act quickly on a trend, especially a negative trend, can kill you.

 

So, this update 1.3 with the population increases, the free transfers, the group finder and the ranked warzones (probably) is the most important update for SWTOR so far. I really think it will break or make the game for many years to come.

 

I would agree that this is the final thing that could save the game. Enticing people back with the ability to get those 50s offa dead servers could be huge. I really hope they prepare for that though. There are a lot of different scenarios here and not all of them are good. Ranked warzones are huge, there are so many people that play MMOs entirely for PVP.. which I don't fully understand.. but whatever... the group finder is huge, too. It would be amazing if it was cross realm, but lets not put the cart before the horse on this one.

 

Message to the developers: please, be more specific in your Q&A and your interviews. "End of June" or "Beginning of July" is better than "Early summer". "In about 4 weeks" is better than "Soon".

+1

 

Not sure why it would be beyond you to understand. Maybe the raging community demands for more servers to be added had something to do with it.

well there you have it, blame rests on the shoulders of the community lol

[Photoshop]

Seriously, what is the reason for this taking so long?

 

It's been the number 1 issue in this game for months now, just look at the date of the op...

 

Yeah i took a look, this thread is mad old.

 

I am the only one left out of my 8 friends that played....

[Jabbthehutt]

I just find it hard to believe that any MMO launched these days doesn't have a plan to deal with over population at the start and under population a few months in, it happens on every MMO.

 

It is clear Bioware weren't ready to deal with non-existant economies, dead fleets, and lack of players and had some rose tinted glasses telling them their populations would only grow, so they only needed more servers.

 

Well, I have unsubscribed and unless they merge before it runs out, I will look for another game, as by then, all the freinds I have made will have left as well.

 

Would you believe they didn't have an option on their independent unsubscription survey to cover poor realm population, that is how blind they are to all this.

[Koramik]

The SWTOR server I am on is around the 11th highest population server. It is becoming a ghost land. I can only imagine what it is like on most of the SWTOR servers below it.

 

EA is not focusing on customer retention for SWTOR.

 

I really do not think Electronic Arts plays their own game. They also close threads on this low population server subject so discussion becomes buried in huge hard to read threads. They do this so search engines only produce minimum results on the this SWTOR low populaton server subject.

 

Merge servers, make people happy by improving Qs and groups and improve customer retention.

 

I do not want to hear about new expansions because they will be useless with no one to play with on these low population SWTOR servers.

[Reryn]

I have 4 level 50 characters and an almost complete legacy. The problem is I'm on a dead server and I have almost no one to play with.

 

If there are not server mergers or transfers before my sub ends, why would I resub? There is literally no one on my server to play with, fleet averages around 5-6 people and there was a point last week when I did a /who and I was the only person online on my server.

 

It really doesn't take 3 months to implement server transfers/mergers, I encourage everyone to unsub before their next month is up " to get this across to BW". At this point they have to be aware of the problem and known about it for months!

[Cucubelu]

I have 4 level 50 characters and an almost complete legacy. The problem is I'm on a dead server and I have almost no one to play with.

 

If there are not server mergers or transfers before my sub ends, why would I resub? There is literally no one on my server to play with, fleet averages around 5-6 people and there was a point last week when I did a /who and I was the only person online on my server.

 

It really doesn't take 3 months to implement server transfers/mergers, I encourage everyone to unsub before their next month is up " to get this across to BW". At this point they have to be aware of the problem and known about it for months!

 

I am in the same boat. A bunch of 50s, no-one to play with and considering dropping my subscription as this is starting to become beyond annoying.

 

I keep getting the "please give us feedback" email, but how good does that do when they can't even reply to the things we bring up on the forums, and have been bringing up for months. The lack of customer service, in addition to not being able to fix certain aspects of the game for so long (Server mergers, resolve etc) is upsetting, and is causing a constant drop in number of players. Someone is not doing their job, and either EA or Bioware need to put someone in charge that can reassure the community that they are not only working on fixes, but also keeping us player in the loop.

 

Heck... I would settle for a "working as intended" just to see that the developers and the community managers reply to what has been said. Silence is not gold in this matter.

[RangerBeo]

We need server mergers yesterday...and yes I am going to keep bumping threads regarding this topic until it happens...your game is dying Bioware....we want to have fun....and are not able to....you are failing to provide your customers with the product you promised...this is a MMO right?

[Malichidemonos]

Just canceled my account... 30 people on my server on the weekend. Sad really...

Forget server transfers... they need to merge servers. That way people are not moving to servers that are populated and then those people on those servers are moving to other servers. Thus causing the servers to be in the same state that they are currently in. This should have happened over a month ago.

[trussasp]

If the servers are merged already, there's a higher chance for me to renew my subscription when it expires.

 

No worries though, it is is better for you to wait a while, take your time...

[DodgeRaider]

I've only been playing for a couple of months. I'm on Shadow Hand server (East Coast). In April, there were typically 65-75 people on Dromund Kass each night during prime hours, and 100+ on Tatooine. Lately, those numbers are down to about 20 and 30 respectively.

 

I was shocked to see recently that Shadow Hand is one of the top 20 servers in terms of population! Last night on Alderaan, there was me and 3 other people running around. That's it.

[sharville]

I don't think BW understands how serious them taking so long to implement the server transfers is.

[Iseldor]

I don't think BW understands how serious them taking so long to implement the server transfers is.

 

^

 

Seriously, every day they wait to implement server transfers they are losing subs. They've needed to fix the population issue since mid-March. Can't BW see that the subscribers are outraged?? This *********** game is unplayable, fix it!

[sharville]

I think you said it best ... when you said the game is unplayable..

 

I basically had to completely start over.. I have my level 50 Character with plenty of credits and for some reason I'm low leveling and struggling for credits on Fatman.. I kinda need access to my credits at least.

[Iseldor]

I absolutely love this game, I've been playing since launch. I have a character that I invested a lot of time in that I cannot play. My server is dead and it isn't even the worst one. It is complete ******** that I am paying 15 dollars a month for a game I cannot play. BW needs to implement transfers and they need to do it now. They should be working on a fix 24/7 because it is the one thing that can save this game. Get your damn heads out of your asses and make this game playable again. It is completely broken as it is now.

[curtkram]

So community relations staff who want to reconnect with the community after the last round of layoffs, are you reading this? Care to respond and thank us for our patience and understanding? Want to tell us about how you consider this a priority and how you might fix it soon after we've all quit?

 

Thanks for understanding our concerns.

[KivanSane]

I still don't understand why they even want to entertain the purpose of transfers.

 

Merge servers first to get a basis on what needs to be transferred later.

 

Because merging servers causes too many problems.

 

there's a 10 charactar limit per server , right ? What if they merge servers and you windup with 15 charactars on the new merged server ? Do they just randomly delete 5 charactars without asking you ? That will cause some screaming.

 

What about legacy's on different servers that merge ?

 

A free charactar transfer system is the best route since it puts all the choices in the players hands. Now he gets to pick which charactars he's taking with him, and which one's he's leaving behind. Which legacy will survive (delete the one on the target server if you hate it) and which one will die.

[sharville]

I heard a rumor that after that awesome e3 speech bioware is cancelling the server transfers/mergers. They figure if we just wait until the new planet and new race come out then they will have enough players that they wont need to. I think what they are doing now is just keeping us you on the hook.

[KivanSane]

I heard a rumor that after that awesome e3 speech bioware is cancelling the server transfers/mergers. They figure if we just wait until the new planet and new race come out then they will have enough players that they wont need to. I think what they are doing now is just keeping us you on the hook.

 

I heard a rumour that companies actually pay an entire marketting department to get on enemie companies forums and troll troll troll , all day long , thats all they do.

 

I wait , that wasn't a rumour. That one turned out to be true ...

[dipstik]

announce something soon please. this is my first mmo and im not sure how this works.

 

will we be moving into an empty server so first come first serve in terms of having to rename characters?

 

Will we need to reform our guild and spend another 14 million credits to get our 5 bank slots?

 

will server merges take place after transfers? this would allow guilds who do not want to disband and people who dont want to change their names continue to play on dead servers until this happens.

 

I honestly think a set of server merges would be a much smoother process than transfers.a transfer could entail having to rename all your characters and your legacy name, whereas a set of merges could concievabley mitigate these issues.