Can we get free transfers off dead servers please?

[Char_Ell]

15 hours ago, TrixxieTriss said:

Also since when do we take what BW said publicly as the truth to their motivations? I can categorically tell you from first hand experience that I was playing on Dalbora & there was nothing wrong with that servers population. That post you linked was another BW spin story to justify cutting costs. If that wasn’t the case, why are they thinking of adding another APAC server after all this time? It’s because it won’t cost them much through AWS. 

LOL.  You are the one who wanted to make sure people weren't starting conspiracy theories about credit sellers being banned in March when there was no evidence of it (the evidence was circumstantial).  What evidence do you have that BioWare closed APAC servers in 2013 in order to cut costs?  Zero.  It's just your interpretation of the real motivation behind BioWare's actions compared to what they said.  And I think you are probably right that cutting costs was a motivating factor to close all APAC servers in 2013 but BioWare of course did not say that.  They gave us the expected corporate speak of how closing APAC servers was in the best interests of the long-term game experience for APAC players.  Just remember this when others are assigning implicit meaning to explicit actions and you tell them that is not a good idea because that is the pot calling the kettle black. 

With respect to the possibility of SWTOR devs adding new server for APAC, it seems logical to think adding a new server to the game for APAC would cost more (who really knows how much more?) so I don't know why they would do it because it sure does not look like the game is growing its player base to me.  Unless the devs have reason to believe your argument that because of the lower latency APAC players would return in sufficient numbers to sustain a new APAC server and create a corresponding increase in revenue.  Another possibility could be if the devs are thinking server consolidations (they have not said they are) then by reducing the number of NA and EU servers they could use the savings generated to justify adding a server for APAC.  It will be interesting to see how this actually develops.

15 hours ago, TrixxieTriss said:

The only people who complained were the RP players & some pvp players who wanted cross server. Neither of their servers ever hit full status & dropped off fast. But Dalbora was full. I know this because I spent many a weekend waiting in line to login. 

I interpret your response to mean that a thread with 237 pages of posts spanning from 2012 September to 2013 August, not to mention other threads posted about the issue, were just APAC RP and PvP players whose complaints gave BioWare the justification they needed to close all APAC servers even though Dalborra had a healthy population.  I wonder if other APAC players who played on these servers agree.

 

[WayOfTheWarriorx]

8 hours ago, Traceguy said:

I have 35 toons. Transferring would not only be a nightmare in item transfer, but would cost 35,000cc

Respectfully, I'm not sure that that is a sound basis for determining whether or not servers should be merged or not.

I'm just giving my opinion on server mergers and the truth is that I have always been against mergers and I don't envision that ever changing and that's just me being honest here.

You're a cool dude and I certainly don't like the notion of things being hard for some one and I would rather you not be in that position, but I feel moved to take the effects of a server merger that would incur problems and issues for my fellow Star Forgers and what I think is best for Star Forge and the reality is, and I base this solely on the many times the idea of a server merger between SS and SF has come up and been discussed here on the forums, most people on Star Forge are against a server merger.

I don't feel that people wanting free transfers is a good a reason to merge servers. I feel a merger between the two would have potentially damning effects on the game as whole and could very well hasten the end of the game.

If you don't have enough people to fill more than one server for such a populated country as the United States, the homeland of the creator of Star Wars and where the game is based in, I feel that it's kinda like signing the death warrant of the game. That tells everyone they are on a  sinking ship and people don't tend to sign onto or stay on a sinking ship.

Beyond that, as I'm sure you well know, there are many downsides to server mergers as well and can effect people negatively.

Name conflicts, increased respawn issues, lag, sign on quece times, competition for resources,(in game), us vs. them mentality, people trying to make their bones on a new server, and increased toxicity are just some examples of the effects that server merger can bring.

Additionally, Star Forge already has a very healthy population, it gains nothing by a server merger, it only incurs negatives.

Another reason why I'm against it is that for every person who says SS is dead and needs a merger, there comes along someone else who also plays on SS and says that that isn't true and that SS doesn't need a merger.

I only play on Star Forge, I have no idea what the actual situation over there is, but, why some people on SS would say it isn't dead and doesn't need a merger, makes me rather suspect of some of the people who say it does.

If it was really that bad, it was dead and needed it, no one would have a reason to say that isn't true, they'd gained nothing by telling that lie and I would think they also would want it.

Both opinions on the state of SS can't be true, so someone's not being truthful and I have no idea which side is not being forthcoming.

But, again, with respect, it really doesn't matter all that much which is true, because either way my position remains the same. Even if SS is dead/dying, well, that's an SS problem, not a SF problem.

SF is a great server and I'm very happy with it and I don't want to see that apple cart turned over. And I'd imagine if the roles were reversed there would be many on the other side saying the same thing.

But, if I was in that position was reversed , and I was playing on a dead server (if that's even true of SS) and my options were to pay for a transfer, or incur negative effects on a large population of the game (effects of a merger), I personally would think it better that I transfer than negatively effect a lot of other players.

I understand that is you have 35 characters that you would have to pay for 35 transfers, which would be expensive, but, that does stand to reason.  I wouldn't expect that the price of ordering 35 Big macs would be the same as the price for just one.

But if BW or BS wants to lower the price of transfers or make them free, I'd have no reason to have any issue with that whatsoever. And I hope, for the sake of people such as yourself, if things on SS are really that bad, that they do just that. Either make the transfers very cheap or make them free.

Edited July 16, 2023 by WayOfTheWarriorx

[Ruvalie]

I play on both SF and SS and would hate for them to be merged. Someone suggested cross-server queues and I think that would be a much better solution.

[Darkestmonty]

5 hours ago, Ruvalie said:

I play on both SF and SS and would hate for them to be merged. Someone suggested cross-server queues and I think that would be a much better solution.

I play on both and mainly play on the larger server SF. I would rather see them merge for one reason, new players who join SS when the population is low suffer long wait time for group content. Those new players will abandon SWTOR with the idea that the game is dead.

I've been on SS on a Friday/Saturday/Sunday night around 5-9 and stood around for 20-30 minutes waiting for PvP to pop and nothing. Check out fleet and notice there are so few people online that Empire can't even fill up one instance of Fleet during prime time on the weekends. I log off and go back to SF.

It doesn't help the game when a US server has a low population, slow queues, and a barren GTN.

Edited July 16, 2023 by Darkestmonty

[StrikePrice]

19 hours ago, Traceguy said:

I have 35 toons. Transferring would not only be a nightmare in item transfer, but would cost 35,000cc

Exactly. This is why I'm suggesting free moves for a period of time. It's cost prohibitive to move my entire legacy at this point. I don't want to spend $300 just to get a fair service from EA. 

Edited July 16, 2023 by StrikePrice

[Ruvalie]

10 hours ago, Darkestmonty said:

I play on both and mainly play on the larger server SF. I would rather see them merge for one reason, new players who join SS when the population is low suffer long wait time for group content. Those new players will abandon SWTOR with the idea that the game is dead.

I've been on SS on a Friday/Saturday/Sunday night around 5-9 and stood around for 20-30 minutes waiting for PvP to pop and nothing. Check out fleet and notice there are so few people online that Empire can't even fill up one instance of Fleet during prime time on the weekends. I log off and go back to SF.

It doesn't help the game when a US server has a low population, slow queues, and a barren GTN.

If queues are the issue, then cross server queuing would solve that equally well.

I don't want them to merge because 1. it would put me over the max number of character slots and I would have to pay to play all the characters that I can currently play for free, 2. sometimes I want to replay the story on my current characters and since the game does not allow this I can only do so by recreating them on another server, and 3. chat has become far more toxic than when I left the game a year and a half ago, which means emptier servers are less unpleasant to play on.

Edited July 16, 2023 by Ruvalie

[Eckrond]

On 7/12/2023 at 11:49 AM, Toraak said:

Edit: also not everyone wants to be on a huge Mega server. So just because you may want all US servers or all servers to be merged into 1, doesn't mean everyone does.

Every person that enjoys the MULTIPLAYER aspect of any MMO wants megaservers.  Separate servers on MMOs are not a feature, they are a sad necessity.

[krackcommando]

6 hours ago, StrikePrice said:

Exactly. This is why I'm suggesting free moves for a period of time. It's cost prohibitive to move my entire legacy at this point. I don't want to spend $300 just to get a fair service from EA. 

BW has in the past offered free transfers off of dead servers. and you know what they did a less than a month later? merged the servers anyway. 😄

fyi: from what I heard, we are already at the minimum possible number of servers for each region due to various legal/contractual obligations to maintain certain language servers and servers per region. that's 2nd hand info, but iunno. I think it sounds about right.

[WayOfTheWarriorx]

57 minutes ago, Eckrond said:

Every person that enjoys the MULTIPLAYER aspect of any MMO wants megaservers.  Separate servers on MMOs are not a feature, they are a sad necessity.

I enjoy the MULTPLAYER aspect of MMOs and in particular, this MMO, and I most definitely do not want megaservers.

In fact, I would say that I think, most people who enjoy the MULTPLAYER aspect of MMOs DON'T want megaservers.

Saying that everyone that enjoys the MULTIPLAYER aspect of any MMO want Megaservers is an objectively false statement and you cannot speak for everyone else.

Star Forge already has a good population, it has everything it needs and what people want, it doesn't need another server added to it for any reason.

If this game starts having mega-servers, than I won't be able to call out doom-sayers/game is dying/game is dead peeps on the forums anymore because they'll have a point.

If you're on a server that  doesn't have everything it needs and what people want, than transfer to Star Forge and you won't have that issue anymore.

Seperate servers on MMOS are a necessary feature if you want people playing your game all around the world to be happy with the service they are paying for because most people in certain parts of the world, far from the locations of the server they are playing on, aren't happy playing in MMOS where they suffer from large amounts of ping issues and lag. Just ask the APAC players in this game.

Edited July 16, 2023 by WayOfTheWarriorx

[Darkestmonty]

1 hour ago, Ruvalie said:

If queues are the issue, then cross server queuing would solve that equally well.

I don't want them to merge because 1. it would put me over the max number of character slots and I would have to pay to play all the characters that I can currently play for free, 2. sometimes I want to replay the story on my current characters and since the game does not allow this I can only do so by recreating them on another server, and 3. chat has become far more toxic than when I left the game a year and a half ago, which means emptier servers are less unpleasant to play on.

Cross server queue only help with flashpoints and pvp. They don't help keep a GTN well stocked, they don't help people form groups for killing world bosses or completing Galactic Season goals, they don't fix the fact that all extraneous servers will reach Leviathan levels of population eventually.

1) As a subscriber you will retain access to all characters even if a merge pushes you above your character cap. So if you have 20 characters on one server and 50 characters on another while your character limit is 50 character, you will retain access to all 70 characters after a merge.

2) lif you only care about playing the story you have three options. Delete a character, keep adding more character slots until you exceed your current character limit or start a new account. How is that any different than if you reach your character limit normally versus hitting your character limit across 5 servers? Oh, you can still play on the other servers unless you have maxed out your characters on every server.

3) if empty servers = toxic, you should actually be looking forward to a server merge

Edited July 16, 2023 by Darkestmonty

[Darkestmonty]

6 minutes ago, WayOfTheWarriorx said:

I enjoy the MULTPLAYER aspect of MMOs and in particular, this MMO, and I most definitely do not want megaservers.

In fact, I would say that I think, most people who enjoy the MULTPLAYER aspect of MMOs DON'T want megaservers.

Saying that everyone that enjoys the MULTIPLAYER aspect of any MMO want Megaservers is an objectively false statement and you cannot speak for everyone else.

Star Forge already has a good population, it has everything it needs and what people want, it doesn't need another server added to it for any reason.

If this game starts having mega-servers, than I won't be able to call out doom-sayers/game is dying/game is dead peeps on the forums anymore because they'll have a point.

If you're on a server that  doesn't have everything it needs and what people want, than transfer to Star Forge and you won't have that issue anymore.

Seperate servers on MMOS are a necessary feature if you want people playing your game all around the world to be happy with the service they are paying for because most people in certain parts of the world, far from the locations of the server they are playing on, aren't happy playing in MMOS where they suffer from large amounts of ping issues and lag. Just ask the APAC players in this game.

Dead servers harm MMOs. What do you think SWTOR would be like if it still had 209 servers? Would telling people "transfer or suck it up" help or do you think server merges would be more beneficial to the overall health of the game?

[WayOfTheWarriorx]

15 minutes ago, Darkestmonty said:

3) if empty servers = toxic, you should actually be looking forward to a server merge

Star Forge is toxic as hell and it is far from empty. So apparently toxicity isn't beholden to "empty servers". You might also want to explain why the people on SS who are saying here on the forums that SS isn't "empty" are "lying." Mind you, I don't think they are lying, If anything, I think it more likely that the people who are saying that SS is dead/empty are the ones not being entirely honest because there is no reason for people who ARE on a dead/empty server to say it isn't and that they don't think a merger is necessary or wanted, because who would want to play on a dead/empty server?

A server that has a smaller population than another and may have longer quece times than a larger server doesn't mean that smaller server is dead or that the quece times are too long, It just means there are less people on that smaller server who who have to wait longer for queces than a larger server does, both of which stand to reason.

A server merge with Star Forge would just increase the amount of toxicity it already has by a noticable amount and worsen the experience for everyone.

 

Edited July 16, 2023 by WayOfTheWarriorx

[WayOfTheWarriorx]

2 minutes ago, Darkestmonty said:

Would telling people "transfer or suck it up" help or do you think server merges would be more beneficial to the overall health of the game?

Telling people to transfer to a larger server would be more beneficial to the overall health of the game because one server for all the the United States of America would be signing the death warrant of the game. One server = sinking ship.

Healthy games don't have only one server for the United States of America. And given the amount of times Star Forge goes off line, which happens quite often, a merger would only make that worse, happen more often and effect an even larger segment of the game population.

Server goes down than, no one in the United States of America will be able to play the game.

[Darkestmonty]

2 minutes ago, WayOfTheWarriorx said:

Telling people to transfer to a larger server would be more beneficial to the overall health of the game because one server for all the the United States of America would be signing the death warrant of the game. One server = sinking ship.

Healthy games don't have only one server for the United States of America. And given the amount of times Star Forge goes off line, which happens quite often, a merger would only make that worse, happen more often and effect an even larger segment of the game population.

Server goes down than, no one in the United States of America will be able to play the game.

If SWTOR doesn't have the population to keep 2 US servers well populated... guess what.

Ignoring the problem and keeping a dead server around doesn't magically fix the games population. If anything people who join the dead server and have a hard time finding group content for an MMO will assume this game is dead and leave it faster than if they join a well populated server that is always active.

[Spikanor]

36 minutes ago, Darkestmonty said:

Dead servers harm MMOs. What do you think SWTOR would be like if it still had 209 servers? Would telling people "transfer or suck it up" help or do you think server merges would be more beneficial to the overall health of the game?

is it not better to fix the problem at the core then only fix it temporary like a server merges since that is not going to do anything good on the long therm with the population then.

then you not have to merges 2 servers in to 1.

Edited July 16, 2023 by Spikanor

[LD_Little_Dragon]

1 hour ago, Darkestmonty said:

 

1) As a subscriber you will retain access to all characters even if a merge pushes you above your character cap. So if you have 20 characters on one server and 50 characters on another while your character limit is 50 character, you will retain access to all 70 characters after a merge.

 

You will not be able to make a new character unless you delete 21.  This is NOT a solution.  Bioware would have to double (or quadruple depending on how many servers get merged) the allowable chars to avoid major backlash.

I have chars on all 5 servers, and there are advantages even to the low population servers like Leviathon.  It is nice to be able to quest without crowds sometimes.  Contrary to some people opinions, the GTN is not dead on Leviathon, and I've made billions there (legit) from GTN trades.

The needs of all players, including those addicted to making new alts, should be considered before merging.

Too many players on a server can lead to problems the same as too few can, it's a balancing act.

[WayOfTheWarriorx]

1 hour ago, Darkestmonty said:

If SWTOR doesn't have the population to keep 2 US servers well populated... guess what.

Problem with that is that that's just you saying that SS is 'empty/dead'. But, like I said, there are other here on the forums that also play on SS that say it isn't dead/empty, it just has a smaller population and longer quece times than you find on Star Forge.

I have no reason to take your word over theirs. And like I said, I find it very suspect that you have just as many people who play on SS saying on the forums, that it doesn't need a server merger.

I am more inclined to believe that it may be that some people on SS would like to have a bigger server to play on but don't want to spend the money on transfers and so are asking for mergers so they can get what they want for free.

But, lets just assume for the sake of argument what you are saying is true, it still wouldn't change my position. I'd still be against a server merge,  Ruining Star Forge, one server that people are actually happy with, also wouldn't be good for the game.

It's not that I'm unsympathetic to others. I don't think that the server could be healthy with that many people on it. It already goes off line too frequently. And in my opinion, one server for the U.S. is signing the death warrant of the game because there's no place to go from there.

A server merger is just gonna upset the people on Star Forge and cause player losses. People don't want to have to change their names, lose characters, have to pay extra money to keep what they already have, have their game play negatively effected by increased lag, more frequent server outages, wait times to sign on, competition for resources, more wait times for open world respawns, turf wars, and increased toxicity, which on Star Forge is already a big problem.

You're also making some assumptions here on the true population of players on your server. There's no way for us to know how many people are actually actively playing on a server at any given time. You can't use Fleet to determine that because it doesn't take into account all the people playing that aren't on fleet. Players can be playing in other areas of the game that you can't see from any one location at any given time. Like players in/on -

PVP, in raids, on their ships, on their guild ships, in strongholds, on planets, doing story chapters, class story instances, in FPS, In Uprisings, playing GSF, playing space missions (on the rails), ghosting, in PVP instances on planets, in heroic instances, doing Star Fortresses or Eternal Championship, and anything else I may be forgetting.

You can't base player population on how long it may take you to get a pop for something or group content time spent forming. If we based it on that, all the servers are dead to people trying to do uprisings because most people don't want to do them.

This game's player population is a majority of story players and people who like to play solo. And if you're one of those people, quece times, getting other players to form groups for something are irrelevant.

We don't know the player populations on the servers beyond what we can personally verify. If the population on a server is too small to maintain the server than they will merge servers. If they're not doing that, than that may be because the population there actually isn't too small to maintain the server. Our own personal misgivings aren't the determinate factor here.

All we are doing here is giving our opinions on things based on our own perceptions. You are certainly entitled to your opinion, and you are free to express it. You are giving your opinions, if the devs are watching, your position has been noted.

I'm just expressing my opinions here for the same reasons.

You're vote is for a server merger with SF. My vote is against a server merger with SS.

You're less concerned with the negative effects to Star Forgers of a server merger with with SS, and that's fine. We're all a little selfish here. I'm more concerned with the effects to Star Forgers than I am with the state of SS. There's no moral high ground here.

Edited July 16, 2023 by WayOfTheWarriorx

[SteveTheCynic]

4 hours ago, Ruvalie said:

1. it would put me over the max number of character slots and I would have to pay to play all the characters that I can currently play for free

That didn't happen the last time they merged servers.

[DWho]

36 minutes ago, SteveTheCynic said:

That didn't happen the last time they merged servers.

The issue comes when you have more characters than unlocked slots. Although you can continue to play the characters you have created, you cannot create any new ones until you have less characters than character slots available whether that be by purchasing additional character slots or deleting characters. There are a lot of currently subbed people that would fall into that situation.

It's pretty much the flip side of the argument pro server merger people make when they say they shouldn't have to pay to move characters to a different server (or more often they want the server merge to transfer dozens of characters  and their belongings for free). You shouldn't have to delete characters or pay for additional slots for a merge you didn't want just so you can start a new character.

[DWho]

2 hours ago, WayOfTheWarriorx said:

You can't use Fleet to determine that because it doesn't take into account all the people playing that aren't on fleet.

It also doesn't take into account the people actively avoiding fleet (spending as little time there as possible - personally, I only go to fleet to dump tech frags and commendations which amounts to a few minutes once a week while still playing the game >15 hours a week). Fleet is pretty much people passing through between the starter planets and the capital worlds and PVP and OPs people standing around the terminals waiting for their pops. It's a terrible indicator of overall population, though an argument could be made it is an indication of group play populations (though even that is a stretch since you can queue for all group content from your stronghold - which isn't necessarily the one attached to fleet)

[Darkestmonty]

35 minutes ago, DWho said:

It also doesn't take into account the people actively avoiding fleet (spending as little time there as possible - personally, I only go to fleet to dump tech frags and commendations which amounts to a few minutes once a week while still playing the game >15 hours a week). Fleet is pretty much people passing through between the starter planets and the capital worlds and PVP and OPs people standing around the terminals waiting for their pops. It's a terrible indicator of overall population, though an argument could be made it is an indication of group play populations (though even that is a stretch since you can queue for all group content from your stronghold - which isn't necessarily the one attached to fleet)

Empire fleet has the highest concentration of players in any single location. It is one of the best ways for players to judge how active that server is since server populations are not published.

Fleet is where the most people congregate to chat, buy and sell items, wait for queues to pop, and pick up missions. It is the social hub of SWTOR.

Edited July 17, 2023 by Darkestmonty

[Darkestmonty]

1 hour ago, DWho said:

The issue comes when you have more characters than unlocked slots. Although you can continue to play the characters you have created, you cannot create any new ones until you have less characters than character slots available whether that be by purchasing additional character slots or deleting characters. There are a lot of currently subbed people that would fall into that situation.

It's pretty much the flip side of the argument pro server merger people make when they say they shouldn't have to pay to move characters to a different server (or more often they want the server merge to transfer dozens of characters  and their belongings for free). You shouldn't have to delete characters or pay for additional slots for a merge you didn't want just so you can start a new character.

celebrate that you will have access to more characters than you paid to unlock. If you are smart and plan ahead of a server merge, you can fill all empty character slots so you won't "lose" any character slots.

The counter to "lets combine servers so we don't have a dying server driving people off" is "I don't want to lose empty character slots that I am not using even though I will have more characters than I paid to unlock and will continue to have more characters than I paid to unlock after a server merge"?

There used to be 209 servers. I don't hear people arguing server merges should not have happened because they lost a minimum of 5,100 possible character slots due to 204 servers merging into 5.

Edited July 17, 2023 by Darkestmonty

[krackcommando]

4 hours ago, WayOfTheWarriorx said:

Star Forge already has a good population, it has everything it needs and what people want, it doesn't need another server added to it for any reason.

yeah. but does SS? I don't know what the deal is with PVE on SS, but I hear the PVP is pretty dreadful with the same few faces and a thus a lot more exacerbation of every problem (e.g., if you have a dominant premade and a small population, everyone else ends up facing the dominant premade every - single - time). thus the issue of premades and pugs, which is a non-issue most of the time on SF, becomes a game-breaking one for players on SS.

or imagine if you're in the arena queue. there's just one tank in the queue and no healers. whoever gets the tank in their team is almost automatically going to win (or lose if he's the dude who doesn't know how to guard). low population absolutely kills matchmaking, whether it's premades, support roles, or simple player skill (the worst or best player determines every match and there's no way to rearrange things in a small queue population).

Edited July 17, 2023 by krackcommando

[DWho]

25 minutes ago, Darkestmonty said:

Fleet is where the most people congregate to chat, buy and sell items, wait for queues to pop, and pick up missions. It is the social hub of SWTOR.

That has not been true for years

[DWho]

22 minutes ago, Darkestmonty said:

celebrate that you will have access to more characters than you paid to unlock. If you are smart and plan ahead of a server merge, you can fill all empty character slots so you won't "lose" any character slots.

That just compounds the problem. When a new class or race comes out you will have to delete all of those characters anyway

 

Edit: or if you decide you don't like one of those characters and want to create a different one, you now have dozens of characters to delete before you can create a new one.

Edited July 17, 2023 by DWho