Can we get free transfers off dead servers please?

[Toraak]

1 hour ago, Darkestmonty said:

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.

Fleet isn't necessarily the most congregated spot to buy and sell items. When I want to buy or sell something I'll go to one of my SH's (often Nar Shaddaa) and just go to my GTN terminal there and buy or sell whatever I want. If something I have would be over 1 billion credits I'll wait until the GTN cap is raised, because I don't like wasting game time spamming in chat to sell whatever item.

[WayOfTheWarriorx]

2 hours ago, krackcommando said:

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.

I'm in the camp that's against mixing 5+ premades with solo quecers. It's even an issue on Star Forge so I can certainly see that if the population is too low there how that kinda of situation you described could occur.

The answer to that problem, however, in my opinion, isn't solved by merging servers, because there are plenty of people, as I know you know, over in the PVP forums, on Star Forge that complain about that situation.

Some may disagree with  me on this, as some agree with me on this, there should be separate queces for premades and solo quecers. That solves that problem on all the servers.

2 hours ago, krackcommando said:

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).

Well, sometimes this even happens on Star Forge, perhaps it's worse over on SS, I don't know, I don't play on SS, I have no idea about what goes on over there other than what I read on the forums. And if we are going to be fair, I think perhaps even you might agree with me when I say, it depends on who you ask, or who's doing the telling.

As I stated previously, and this is just me being honest, the situation over on SS, whatever that might be, isn't something that effects my thoughts on server mergers. My greater concern is for Star Forge and the health of the game. Those are my priorities on this subject.

Part of my reasoning for this, and again, this is just me being honest, is that when they did the last server mergers and Harbinger got rolled into SS, people on SS starting coming on the forums and saying that Star Forge is the RP/Solo server, and SS is the PVP/Raider server in an effort to steal players off Star Forge to go over to SS. This, of course, was a lie. That was Harbingerites being butt hurt over not being the biggest server anymore and wanting to have the bad ass reputation.

Star Forge was/is the everything server. They're all everything servers. So they didn't show any concern for the well being of SF and were happy to try and plunder from it and lower its population for it's own benefit. So my heart is a little cold when it comes to the situation over on SS. This is public record, anyone can do a search on the forums and find these posts that they did.

I don't know the truth about the state of affairs, as they truly are on SS. But, anyone who is unhappy over on SS, for whatever reason, always has the option of transferring to S.F. and that hurts no one.

I am against server mergers.

Edited July 17, 2023 by WayOfTheWarriorx

[WayOfTheWarriorx]

2 hours ago, Darkestmonty said:

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.

I'm glad you brought that up. That is one of the "other possible places players can be that you can account for."

The other factions players are just as much members of that server as the other faction and that could be a whole ton more people that can't be accounted for by a player trying to gauge the population on any given server.

I'd say, that's one of the worst ways for players to judge how active a server is because it's impossible to be on both factions at the same time to try and figure that out.

Pub side has a lower population that Impside on all the servers. Everyone knows this and is therefore no indication of how populated a server is.

Using Fleet as a gauge, I agree with you, you're almost always going to get the single greatest concentration of players there than any other one place. But, because you can't take into account players playing everywhere else in the game, it remains a totally unrealistic way to gauge the population of the server. While it may be the single greatest concentration of players in any one place, compared to all the other places players can be playing at any given time, compared to the total of those on Fleet, there's going to be probably 80-85% of the people playing on a server who are not going to be on Fleet at any given time.

The simple truth is, we cannot gauge the active population on a server at any given time as players. We have to acknowledge that for the truth that it is. Bioware knows that, we don't. So they're in the best position to gauge whether or not a server is under-populated or not.

They're no more likely to listen to people like myself who are against server mergers than they are to people who are for server mergers. Because they have the numbers and that's what they're gonna use to determine whether or not server merger's are necessary.

I wouldn't worry about people like me who are saying they are against server mergers, because the last time people were talking about server mergers before the last series of mergers, I was also saying than I was against server mergers and they ended up merging servers anyways. If the game needs them, than they'll do it.

Back than, the Trixxie-baby was for server mergers and I was against them, and I love Trixxie 💕. There's nothing personal here.

 

Edited July 17, 2023 by WayOfTheWarriorx

[TrixxieTriss]

7 hours ago, Darkestmonty said:

Cross server queue only help with flashpoints and pvp. They don't help keep a GTN well stocked

It would also be possible to have cross GTN & even cross chat. The same way WoW do it on their virtual servers. 
Those other things you mentioned, besides World Bosses can all be solo’d. And to be frank, it’s usually a couple of guilds per server who monopolise the WB’s anyway. 

Edited July 17, 2023 by TrixxieTriss

[TrixxieTriss]

3 hours ago, krackcommando said:

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).

Cross server per region on AWS would fix that for PvP or other group queues.
I really hope that is some something they are looking at when they migrate the game to AWS virtual servers. Even if both servers had enough players for group content, it would be beneficial for the game. 

Edited July 17, 2023 by TrixxieTriss

[Darkestmonty]

3 hours ago, WayOfTheWarriorx said:

I'm glad you brought that up. That is one of the "other possible places players can be that you can account for."

The other factions players are just as much members of that server as the other faction and that could be a whole ton more people that can't be accounted for by a player trying to gauge the population on any given server.

I'd say, that's one of the worst ways for players to judge how active a server is because it's impossible to be on both factions at the same time to try and figure that out.

Pub side has a lower population that Impside on all the servers. Everyone knows this and is therefore no indication of how populated a server is.

Using Fleet as a gauge, I agree with you, you're almost always going to get the single greatest concentration of players there than any other one place. But, because you can't take into account players playing everywhere else in the game, it remains a totally unrealistic way to gauge the population of the server. While it may be the single greatest concentration of players in any one place, compared to all the other places players can be playing at any given time, compared to the total of those on Fleet, there's going to be probably 80-85% of the people playing on a server who are not going to be on Fleet at any given time.

The simple truth is, we cannot gauge the active population on a server at any given time as players. We have to acknowledge that for the truth that it is. Bioware knows that, we don't. So they're in the best position to gauge whether or not a server is under-populated or not.

They're no more likely to listen to people like myself who are against server mergers than they are to people who are for server mergers. Because they have the numbers and that's what they're gonna use to determine whether or not server merger's are necessary.

I wouldn't worry about people like me who are saying they are against server mergers, because the last time people were talking about server mergers before the last series of mergers, I was also saying than I was against server mergers and they ended up merging servers anyways. If the game needs them, than they'll do it.

Back than, the Trixxie-baby was for server mergers and I was against them, and I love Trixxie 💕. There's nothing personal here.

 

I play on all 5 servers. No server at any time has more Republic players on Fleet than Empire players on Fleet. You have been waiting for someone to bring this up? Why? Do you think the Republic player count on Fleet ever exceeds that of the Empire player count on Fleet?

No one has stated that using any single instance to judge populations will accurately give us real time population numbers for a server. We have stated numerous times that using Empire Fleet is the best way to judge a servers population since it has the highest concentration of people at any given time.

Edited July 17, 2023 by Darkestmonty

[SteveTheCynic]

6 hours 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.

For sure, but that wasn't what you said.  You said that you'd have to pay to play the characters you already have.

[Darkestmonty]

5 hours ago, TrixxieTriss said:

It would also be possible to have cross GTN & even cross chat. The same way WoW do it on their virtual servers. 
Those other things you mentioned, besides World Bosses can all be solo’d. And to be frank, it’s usually a couple of guilds per server who monopolise the WB’s anyway. 

The devs could do a lot of things with cross server game play but we have seen nothing hinting that they are working on this feature or what limitations will exist. Unless the devs make every bit of social content available with cross server game play, cross server game play will remain inferior to merging servers.

Social aspects of the game includes all chat, all trade, all GTN interactions in the "redesigned GTN", non queue group missions like Heroics or mediating at the Amity Shrine etc. Not only the ability to verbally help people in chat but also the ability to group with them long enough to show them what they need or help them finish a mission.

I would love to see every social aspect of the game work for cross server but we have no clue what devs are planning. Unless you know that the devs are developing a cross server system that allows in depth social interaction, being against server merges while day dreaming what could happen if the devs had access to X,Y,Z technology, time, and money doesn't help the lower pop servers.

Personally I kind of wish we still had 209 servers. I could spend a few million credits per server unlocking the first 200 CC and net 41,800 CC every season.

Edited July 17, 2023 by Darkestmonty

[WayOfTheWarriorx]

4 hours ago, Darkestmonty said:

I play on all 5 servers. No server at any time has more Republic players on Fleet than Empire players on Fleet. You have been waiting for someone to bring this up? Why? Do you think the Republic player count on Fleet ever exceeds that of the Empire player count on Fleet?

No, I don't, we're in total agreement on that point. I said that very thing in my reply post. The main point was, because you can't be on both factions at the same time, there's no way to estimate how many active players are on any given time, and that you just pointed out one of the other places that "I may have forgotten." that other players could be if not on fleet of that faction. You have to take into account all the other players any where on the other faction. They count towards the total player base on a server. Which really goes without saying, I just hadn't thought of that in my response post.

4 hours ago, Darkestmonty said:

No one has stated that using any single instance to judge populations will accurately give us real time population numbers for a server. We have stated numerous times that using Empire Fleet is the best way to judge a servers population since it has the highest concentration of people at any given time.

Than on that, again, we are in total agreement.

While using Empire Fleet as the best way to judge a servers population since it has the highest concentration of people at any given time, it's also a very inaccurate way to judge a server population. Which was the point I was trying to make. That being, that as players, there is no accurate way for us to judge the server population, those are just stabs in the dark based on a very limited segment area, and we have to accept that as a fact. We don't know, we can't know.

We have to leave the judgement call for whether or not server mergers are actually necessary to Bioware/Broadsword. What we're doing here is giving our opinions, preferences, and what we think is best based on the limited information we have.

Like I've said a few times, I have no idea of the actual state of affairs on SS. I can only take from what people say here on the forums into account on that and we get very mixed signals on the state of affairs of SS here on the forums. Some people say it's dead and needs a server merger, and some people say it isn't dead and doesn't need a server merger.

I've yet to see anyone try and explain why there would be people on SS lying about SS, saying it isn't dead, if it is in fact dead, and doesn't need a server merger, if in fact it does need one. That doesn't really make a whole lot of sense for people to do that unless they want their own experience in the game to be bad. Most people don't pay for a bad play experience and want it to continue.

And as a genuine question to you, do you see my point on that, why I find that questionable? I'd honestly like to hear your thoughts on that.

Edited July 17, 2023 by WayOfTheWarriorx

[Darkestmonty]

24 minutes ago, WayOfTheWarriorx said:

No, I don't, we're in total agreement on that point. I said that very thing in my reply post. The main point was, because you can't be on both factions at the same time, there's no way to estimate how many active players are on any given time, and that you just pointed out one of the other places that "I may have forgotten." that other players could be if not on fleet of that faction. You have to take into account all the other players any where on the other faction. They count towards the total player base on a server. Which really goes without saying, I just hadn't thought of that in my response post.

Than on that, again, we are in total agreement.

While using Empire Fleet as the best way to judge a servers population since it has the highest concentration of people at any given time, it's also a very inaccurate way to judge a server population. Which was the point I was trying to make. That being, that as players, there is no accurate way for us to judge the server population, those are just stabs in the dark based on a very limited segment area, and we have to accept that as a fact. We don't know, we can't know.

We have to leave the judgement call for whether or not server mergers are actually necessary to Bioware/Broadsword. What we're doing here is giving our opinions, preferences, and what we think is best based on the limited information we have,

Like I've said a few times, I have no idea of the actual state of affairs on SS. I can only take from what people say here on the forums into account on that and we get very mixed signals on the state of affairs of SS here on the forums. Some people say it's dead and needs a server merger, and some people say it isn't dead and doesn't need a server merger.

I've yet to see anyone try and explain why there would be people on SS lying about SS, saying it isn't dead, if it is in fact dead, and doesn't need a server merger, if in fact it does need one. That doesn't really make a whole lot of sense for people to do that unless they want their own experience in the game to be bad. Most people don't pay for a bad play experience and want it to continue.

And as a genuine question to you, do you see my point on that, why I find that questionable? I'd honestly like to hear your thoughts on that.

you can take samples of a population without having exact, second by second numbers to understand population trends.

No one is saying they have exact numbers to publish. They are saying "yeah, Star Forge has about 2-3 times the population of Satele Shan and you can feel that when you try to do group content and it's dead outside of prime time hours"

Edited July 17, 2023 by Darkestmonty

[WayOfTheWarriorx]

13 minutes ago, Darkestmonty said:

you can take samples of a population without having exact, second by second numbers to understand population trends.

No one is saying they have exact numbers to publish. They are saying "yeah, Star Forge has about 2-3 times the population of Satele Shan and you can feel that when you try to do group content and it's dead outside of prime time hours"

Well, pal, I have to say, that's not a very convincing argument to me, and I would have really been interested to hear your thoughts as to why you think people are lying about SS and saying it isn't dead, if it in fact is, and why they're also lying about it not needing a server merger, if in fact it does.

I would have thought that would be a great opportunity for you to make a better case in trying to convince some of us who are against servers mergers and to try to understand what's really going on there.

You can say it feels dead outside of prime time hours, but some other of the 'they' people are saying they don't feel that way.

If the server is truly dead and it needs a server merger, than they'll do it.

Edited July 17, 2023 by WayOfTheWarriorx

[Darkestmonty]

1 hour ago, WayOfTheWarriorx said:

Well, pal, I have to say, that's not a very convincing argument to me, and I would have really been interested to hear your thoughts as to why you think people are lying about SS and saying it isn't dead, if it in fact is, and why they're also lying about it not needing a server merger, if in fact it does.

I would have thought that would be a great opportunity for you to make a better case in trying to convince some of us who are against servers mergers and to try to understand what's really going on there.

You can say it feels dead outside of prime time hours, but some other of the 'they' people are saying they don't feel that way.

If the server is truly dead and it needs a server merger, than they'll do it.

Well, pal, you don't have to believe me, you can take a basic course in statistics to understand you do not need to have exact second by second numbers to spot trends in a population.

And since I play all servers and queue for group content on every server at that servers prime time (only choice for some of the EU servers unless you want to wait 30-40 minutes) I may have a better idea on which servers have population issues more than a player that doesn't play more than their one server.

Edited July 17, 2023 by Darkestmonty

[krackcommando]

11 hours ago, WayOfTheWarriorx said:

As I stated previously, and this is just me being honest, the situation over on SS, whatever that might be, isn't something that effects my thoughts on server mergers. My greater concern is for Star Forge and the health of the game. Those are my priorities on this subject.

bruh. imma put this more bluntly: this is you saying "my server is great. I don't care about servers that lack population to function properly." 

fwiw @TrixxieTriss, virtual servers won't be any different than merging servers. you still have a much larger "server" population. in fact even larger than SS + SF. it's just where that server is "located" that changes. or worse, the virtual servers are smaller than current servers. but as i understand it, you're using the global population then assembling groups and creating a regional virtual server. so...actually a larger base server. 😄

Edited July 17, 2023 by krackcommando

[DWho]

28 minutes ago, krackcommando said:

it's just where that server is "located" that changes. or worse, the virtual servers are smaller than current servers. but as i understand it, you're using the global population then assembling groups and creating a regional virtual server. so...actually a larger base server. 😄

This is incorrect. cloud servers are physical servers just like any other server. They can be moved if needed but will not shift willy-nilly based on who is online at any one time. The only movement will be within a region (EU,US,APAC) and even that will be rare. There won't be one mega server that moves around the globe with the changing of the time of day.

Edit: to clarify "moved" . The running software can be shifted to a different data center (though this is not a flip the switch kind of operation and would require some amount of downtime to accomplish) but the data centers all have fixed locations.

Edited July 17, 2023 by DWho

[TrixxieTriss]

42 minutes ago, krackcommando said:

fwiw @TrixxieTriss, virtual servers won't be any different than merging servers. you still have a much larger "server" population. in fact even larger than SS + SF. it's just where that server is "located" that changes. or worse, the virtual servers are smaller than current servers. but as i understand it, you're using the global population then assembling groups and creating a regional virtual server. so...actually a larger base server. 😄

That’s not entirely technically correct, but you’re on the right track. And it really depends on how they go about setting it up. 

But with the devs debating setting up a seperate APAC server, it would seem they aren’t going down that global population track, but rather region only options.  

I believe there are 2 possible scenarios that may happen. 

1. They put both virtual servers in the same hardware location 

2. They split the virtual servers up & geolocate them to the east & west coast  again. 

If they go with option 1, then cross server shouldn’t be an issue. If they go with option 2, cross server would be more difficult, but not as much as it currently is. They could actually find an AWS location in the middle of the US to use to make the combined group instances. 

It’s all speculation at this point. But from my perspective, the logical course of action would be to use an AWS in a central US geolocation for both servers to be located. 

Edited July 17, 2023 by TrixxieTriss

[OlBuzzard]

12 hours ago, WayOfTheWarriorx said:

I'm in the camp that's against mixing 5+ premades with solo quecers. It's even an issue on Star Forge so I can certainly see that if the population is too low there how that kinda of situation you described could occur.

The answer to that problem, however, in my opinion, isn't solved by merging servers, because there are plenty of people, as I know you know, over in the PVP forums, on Star Forge that complain about that situation.

Some may disagree with  me on this, as some agree with me on this, there should be separate queces for premades and solo quecers. That solves that problem on all the servers.

Well, sometimes this even happens on Star Forge, perhaps it's worse over on SS, I don't know, I don't play on SS, I have no idea about what goes on over there other than what I read on the forums. And if we are going to be fair, I think perhaps even you might agree with me when I say, it depends on who you ask, or who's doing the telling.

As I stated previously, and this is just me being honest, the situation over on SS, whatever that might be, isn't something that effects my thoughts on server mergers. My greater concern is for Star Forge and the health of the game. Those are my priorities on this subject.

Part of my reasoning for this, and again, this is just me being honest, is that when they did the last server mergers and Harbinger got rolled into SS, people on SS starting coming on the forums and saying that Star Forge is the RP/Solo server, and SS is the PVP/Raider server in an effort to steal players off Star Forge to go over to SS. This, of course, was a lie. That was Harbingerites being butt hurt over not being the biggest server anymore and wanting to have the bad ass reputation.

Star Forge was/is the everything server. They're all everything servers. So they didn't show any concern for the well being of SF and were happy to try and plunder from it and lower its population for it's own benefit. So my heart is a little cold when it comes to the situation over on SS. This is public record, anyone can do a search on the forums and find these posts that they did.

I don't know the truth about the state of affairs, as they truly are on SS. But, anyone who is unhappy over on SS, for whatever reason, always has the option of transferring to S.F. and that hurts no one.

I am against server mergers.

One other solution that might be considered!  Not trying to be a smart XXX but ... what would happen if there was enough stuff to do for both PvE and PvP to generate enough interest so that this wouldn't be a problem anymore.

I mean I get the whole thing about needing better access to other countries outside of the continental US (such as described by @TrixxieTriss and others who really understand first-hand what that means), BUT ...
** Just how many servers are left now ??  Total?  Regardless of location?
** What areas (national/international) are they designated for?
** And we don't have enough players to keep all of them full 24/7 to actively engage in.

OUCH!!  

While I don't necessarily support another server merge at this time ... IMO this throws up another red flag of sorts!

[DWho]

9 minutes ago, TrixxieTriss said:

It’s all speculation at this point. But from my perspective, the logical course of action would be to use an AWS in a central US geolocation for both servers to be located. 

This is what I expect to happen. Splitting them into two geo-locations more or less doubles the cost of maintaining them and part of the reason for going to AWS is reduced cost (it's possible operating two separate AWS servers is cheaper than the ones in NC but I'm skeptical of that). I'd suspect the location of the US server would be in Chicago and the EU one to be somewhere like Berlin (to be slightly better centralized). An APAC server probably would be somewhere in northern Australia (for simplicity - not to be ethnocentric but having everyone working on the datacenters involved sharing a common language has a distinct advantage - and a lot of Germans are pretty fluent in English now). The risk of one "server" per region is downtime for the region.

[DWho]

21 minutes ago, OlBuzzard said:

And we don't have enough players to keep all of them full 24/7 to actively engage in.

There haven't been enough players to keep servers "active" 24/7 for years. That takes a population probably 10 times what we have since the vast majority of players are going to be online during their local "prime time". In order to get 24/7 coverage there would have to be enough players in other regions that play on a non-regional server and there is no drive for that. That is why they need an APAC server as that is the only population that really doesn't have an option where to play in their local primetime.

Server activity is an opinion. You are not going to find players of different styles of play agreeing on it. If there are enough players to get good pops for group content, RPG players may find it too crowded and good RPG populations may result in poor group play pops since it is pretty clear that most players play the RPG content more often than they play the group content. A server merger would probably be alright (though risky) if they significantly lowered the number of players required to open a new RPG instance. The 100 players per instance on a lot of planets is far to many, 50 or even 25 would be better since all instances can communicate with each other.

I also think Broadsword/Bioware/EA should be looking at an endgame for the game. While we all hope it will last another 10 years, things change and game shutdowns are often sudden and unexpected. While they are doing all the updates to the game to make it more "modern" they should be looking at a version that could function offline (or in a fashion something like games on the EA Play system that requires minimal support from a "game server"). The servers mainly track what other players are doing with the majority of the game code actually on your PC.

[TrixxieTriss]

56 minutes ago, DWho said:

An APAC server probably would be somewhere in northern Australia (for simplicity

Sadly there isn’t one in the NT of Nth QLD. The only AWS choice in Australia is Perth or Sydney. And the majority of Australia’s population are on the east coast. So considering they already trialled the PTS AWS server in Sydney, I would assume it’s going to be located there if they are still moving forward with it. 

[OlBuzzard]

51 minutes ago, DWho said:

There haven't been enough players to keep servers "active" 24/7 for years. That takes a population probably 10 times what we have since the vast majority of players are going to be online during their local "prime time". In order to get 24/7 coverage there would have to be enough players in other regions that play on a non-regional server and there is no drive for that. That is why they need an APAC server as that is the only population that really doesn't have an option where to play in their local primetime.

Server activity is an opinion. You are not going to find players of different styles of play agreeing on it. If there are enough players to get good pops for group content, RPG players may find it too crowded and good RPG populations may result in poor group play pops since it is pretty clear that most players play the RPG content more often than they play the group content. A server merger would probably be alright (though risky) if they significantly lowered the number of players required to open a new RPG instance. The 100 players per instance on a lot of planets is far to many, 50 or even 25 would be better since all instances can communicate with each other.

I also think Broadsword/Bioware/EA should be looking at an endgame for the game. While we all hope it will last another 10 years, things change and game shutdowns are often sudden and unexpected. While they are doing all the updates to the game to make it more "modern" they should be looking at a version that could function offline (or in a fashion something like games on the EA Play system that requires minimal support from a "game server"). The servers mainly track what other players are doing with the majority of the game code actually on your PC.

Yeah ... 24/7 was probably not the best way to say that.  Point well taken!  On the other hand, there is something to be said for the new proprietor to be looking at:  Not just taking care of an issue (aka symptoms) but rather look at the central part of the matter creating the problem in the first place (the actual cause).  If there simply is not enough people available (particularly during what should be optimal hours) then that is a clearcut indication of multiple symptoms and a better solution should be looked into.

Servers: The entire matter is a bit fuzzy to me personally, although I'm certain that it will affect me sooner or later (depending on how this all finally shakes out).  IMO it seems to be logical to have at least 3 locations (if LOCATIONS actually do affect how this system will eventually work).  And ...from what I'm reading ... it will affect groups that play SWTOR abroad. Sooo  My thoughts are:

** One location in the US that would be optimal for Euro-customers
** One location (at least) for all Western Hemisphere usage
** One location for APAC customers

[TrixxieTriss]

44 minutes ago, OlBuzzard said:

** One location in the US that would be optimal for Euro-customers
** One location (at least) for all Western Hemisphere usage

Just in case I misread this or you typed it incorrectly, can you clarify what you mean by these points. 

Do you mean the EU server location should be geolocate in the USA?

And when you say western hemisphere, do you mean NA/SA+EU? And if so, where would you locate such a server? 

[OlBuzzard]

48 minutes ago, TrixxieTriss said:

Just in case I misread this or you typed it incorrectly, can you clarify what you mean by these points. 

Do you mean the EU server location should be geolocate in the USA?

And when you say western hemisphere, do you mean NA/SA+EU? And if so, where would you locate such a server? 

Hmmm...  Let's take a slightly different approach (Maybe that would be best)
Of those three geographical regions I tried to encompass ... where are they physically located now? Where should they be?

Bottom line ... there should be three regions being addressed ... not 2 or 1.  

As to where I would personally locate them ???  A lot of that depends on a company's holding / connections / manageable assets where they have the type of connections and accessibility to properly service.  And when I say PROPERLY service I don't mean half....  um ....  half done!

😉

[krackcommando]

14 hours ago, TrixxieTriss said:

Cross server per region on AWS would fix that for PvP or other group queues.
I really hope that is some something they are looking at when they migrate the game to AWS virtual servers. Even if both servers had enough players for group content, it would be beneficial for the game. 

gonna try this again (forgetting about cloud/aws). sharing queues without sharing instances just segments the population. you cannot just do x-server queues. you'd have to create an LFG queue like the clusterbleep that exists in WoW. and that still leaves pugging groups in fleet or elsewhere completely borked. I agree that x-server queues would largely address one very finite issue (pvp queues - maybe PVE queues?) but it doesn't address server wide quality of game:

e.g., WB on alderraan. on SS, you might spend 5 hours trying to put a grp together. on SF, it might only take 10 mins. literally all grp content gets screwed over when there's a low population. dude who wants to protect his happy life on SF and forsake ppl on SS b/c he likes things just the way they are on SF is completely bollocks:

15 hours ago, WayOfTheWarriorx said:

As I stated previously, and this is just me being honest, the situation over on SS, whatever that might be, isn't something that effects my thoughts on server mergers. My greater concern is for Star Forge and the health of the game. Those are my priorities on this subject.

within the context of a server merger, the dude is espousing two contradictory concerns. the whole point of the merger is for the health of the game, which is detrimental to his comfort zone on SF.

and in before someone says separate grp queues solve all that or SF queues are terrible. I literally spend 8+ hours ~5 days per week in the two PvP queues for two months. premades aren't the problem. they are there, and they are annoying (mostly in WZs) but they are not there all the time, and they are not the reason (mostly WZs) are a very frustrating experience for (almost) everyone.

I don't want to start the same back and forth with trix again, but I'm the one playing the game so often that I'm physically ill. not you. I really and truly do have the best anecdotal evidence/experience of the situation on SF pvp of just about anyone over the past 3-ish months. are there more ppl who play more? maybe. but not many. iunno what else to say here. I'm not pro. I'm well better than average, but average is pretty darn bad. I solo queue all the time, 100% solo. I don't have a single friend left who plays this game let alone PVPs. premades on SF isn't the problem. when I get into arguments with other ppl (usually WZs, they are also solo). you can take the word of random dudes who pvp a few matches a week or and rage b/c the one hour they try they get rekt, or you can...you know...take it from someone who queues all hours all days the week on any given week. the pvp situation is bad, but it ain't cuz premades are curbstomping solos every pop. /shrug

edit: i mention this not in response to anything trix said but wayofthewarriorx did spit out some nonsense about SF being bad and other ppl say other things and that premades are the issue.

15 hours ago, WayOfTheWarriorx said:

I don't know the truth about the state of affairs, as they truly are on SS. But, anyone who is unhappy over on SS, for whatever reason, always has the option of transferring to S.F. and that hurts no one.

yeah. the topic is free transfers. the joke is that last time BW offered free transfers, they became "forced" transfers a month(?) later with server mergers.

Edited July 17, 2023 by krackcommando

[TrixxieTriss]

4 minutes ago, OlBuzzard said:

Hmmm...  Let's take a slightly different approach (Maybe that would be best)
Of those three geographical regions I tried to encompass ... where are they physically located now? Where should they be?

Bottom line ... there should be three regions being addressed ... not 2 or 1.  

As to where I would personally locate them ???  A lot of that depends on a company's holding / connections / manageable assets where they have the type of connections and accessibility to properly service.  And when I say PROPERLY service I don't mean half....  um ....  half done!

😉

Quick suggestion, do a google search on AWS locations. That will show you where in the world Amazon have their server farms.

One thing that I think people don’t understand is AWS stands for Amazon Web Service. Broadsword will pay Amazon to put swtor onto the AWS.

As I understand it, the costs for this sort of contract are inclusive of different locations in case one particular server farm goes down or a customer wants the same service in multiple locations for better speed or redundancy. 

FYI, there are a lot of AWS locations in Nth America & Europe. But only 2 in Australia (at the moment). 

Broadsword could theoretically have the US virtual servers setup in multiple locations across NA for redundancy & speed. But that is a little more complicated with an MMO than other sorts of games (especially ones that weren’t designed with AWS in mind).

If it was me, I would centralise the 2 US servers at the fastest connected AWS hub geographically closest to the centre of the US. And I would set them up with a cross server system. I would do something similar in Europe. But move it out of Ireland to mainland EU. Maybe France or Belgium or Denmark so they are more geographically central. I would then place one trial server in APAC, probably Sydney if they plan on it being in Australia. 

[OlBuzzard]

8 minutes ago, TrixxieTriss said:

Quick suggestion, do a google search on AWS locations. That will show you where in the world Amazon have their server farms.

One thing that I think people don’t understand is AWS stands for Amazon Web Service. Broadsword will pay Amazon to put swtor onto the AWS.

As I understand it, the costs for this sort of contract are inclusive of different locations in case one particular server farm goes down or a customer wants the same service in multiple locations for better speed or redundancy. 

FYI, there are a lot of AWS locations in Nth America & Europe. But only 2 in Australia (at the moment). 

Broadsword could theoretically have the US virtual servers setup in multiple locations across NA for redundancy & speed. But that is a little more complicated with an MMO than other sorts of games (especially ones that weren’t designed with AWS in mind).

If it was me, I would centralise the 2 US servers at the fastest connected AWS hub geographically closest to the centre of the US. And I would set them up with a cross server system. I would do something similar in Europe. But move it out of Ireland to mainland EU. Maybe France or Belgium or Denmark so they are more geographically central. I would then place one trial server in APAC, probably Sydney if they plan on it being in Australia. 

Strangely enough ... I follow exactly what you are saying.  And IMO it does make sense.  As for final Jeopardy answer (to borrow a phrase) ... DEPENDS:
** The scope of agreements with said services
** RELIABILITY of said companies that are actually providing the hardware / services
** Accessibility to any and all of the aforementioned services / servers / support group(s)

This is one area that I wish I knew more about.  I can follow what you are saying.  BUT to be perfectly candid about the subject there's so much "stuff" going on today it's hard to get a good read on who to trust!  I would also dare say that there are a lot of others who are pretty much in the same boat that I'm in.  I'm not opposed to change in how this is done.  I would just feel a lot better if I knew more about those areas (companies) where there is so much unknown or strictly blind faith in a lot of guess works as to how things are SUPPOSE to work.  (As they say .. yeah ... famous last words!)

I hope this makes a little better sense.