Why not a live server merge?

Discussion in 'The Veterans' Lounge' started by RandyLahey, Apr 6, 2018.

  1. Geroblue Augur

    Maybe one big server for all the players who want a merger, free transfers there, and leave the rest of us out of the transfer.
  2. Laronk Augur


    What are you talking about, Live gets a new expansion every year. Now you could say TLP has taken over if they made another expansion between kunark and velious and made it only level appropriate for level 60.
  3. Zhaunil_AB Augur

    A rhetorical question i take it, since it's all all been discussed in depth and is well known to you:
    Low population, no "high end" anything, no (or not much) overlap of population's playtime (i.e. no recruiting pool for those that'd transfer; even if you move an intact guild this alone means it'd fold in a year or two or three due to "natural" fluctuation), the ripping apart of established ties on AB (if ppl weren't as close as they are on AB, even across guilds, it'd mean the "death" for more than those that left for example), the involved difficulties of character-based server-moves instead of account-based ones, the general issues of server-transfers (Real Estate for example, Namechanges for another)...
    and on top of that a certain rep (granted, from ppl that left the server so subjective but still - if i've come to respect and even like someone then his opinion matters too). In no way up to AB's community "standards" (yes, that last part is my personal opinion resulting from all of the above only).
  4. Zhaunil_AB Augur

    That's a pointed remark ofc and i do not quite share it.
    I rather think that the strong point of being an MMO also *can* be a drawback, e.g. when you have a notorious person or group of griefers. "One rotten apple spoils it for the rest" or so. On my server i know who to group with and who better to avoid - many possibly just don't want to stomach that learning curve again or dread it even if they'd win overall.
    I think the concept of going back to static zones also has some effect on that; and the "you can /pick" is invalid too because a pick is still not an instance you have "for yourself" when you want (or need) to.
    That's design decisions and their impact more than merely player's expectations we're talking about in this context imo; not necessarily a k.o. criteria, but one that lets ppl shy away.

    i agree. With emphasis on the bolded part, where i also see the issues ppl are having with the idea.
    Expansions simply are too small these days to provide said "space" in static zones (compare any of the last 4 to, say, Kunark thru Luclin or even PoP which were current at EQ peak times - especially with regard to available number and size of zones within a certain level spread) and the mudflation has done it's own to move people out of "old content" that was - at the peak times for EQ i spoke about above - still used by a significant portion of the population.
    Geroblue and Xianzu_Monk_Tunare like this.
  5. Sissruukk Rogue One

    You gave me the answer I was looking for.
  6. Yinla Ye Ol' Dragon

    Before we even think about a server merge we need some server upgrades, fixed to universal chat and random disconnects.
  7. Xianzu_Monk_Tunare Augur

    That's not the main argument against server mergers, it never has been. The main argument has always been that it kills guilds and communities because they are torn apart resulting in fewer total guilds.

    Also to the person who was going on about the load balancing and such that Phinny has and everything; that stuff has all been pushed to live servers as well for those expansions that Phinny has. The thing is that on Live servers those zones do not need to be able to do that. The last few expansions however have came with zone load balancing to some degree; but it is rarely noticed other than at launch.
  8. code-zero Augur

    It really doesn't take much for even what seem to be big zones to be overpopulated. After RoS opened I saw numerous threats of training in /ooc in Overthere. Lot's of people play with friends and family and long established guilds and won't be receiving anything positive from a merge and they could possibly see friends, family and guildmates drop out if gameplay becomes a hassle.

    And of course there's the problem of character slots being insufficient for merges as well.

    Face it, pickup groups are not coming back and there's been enough TLP's in recent history to see what sort of toxic environment packed zones breed
  9. Geroblue Augur

    I haven't counted them, but it certainly seems to me the majority of the posts in these forums is about the TLP servers in one way or another.
  10. Corwyhn Lionheart Guild Leader, Lions of the Heart

    I think the same thing is happening on the servers without mergers the only difference is that it plays out over a longer period of time. I have seem a couple guilds that were raiding basically vanish and the one casual guild that came close in size to mine on Xegony is a shadow of itself.

    I do understand what you are taking about and I agree it is a concern but I still think a server merger would be a net benefit but Daybreak has the stats on that and they aren't doing mergers so you may well be right in your supposition.

    My concern is that server populations may fall below a certain number of players (not box accounts). I think the reason chat channel numbers haven't dropped is that more and more people are boxing. But just from looking at guilds that have vanished or become shadows of themselves I think the total number of actual players is way down.

    I might see 70 or 80 toons online in my guild but as time goes by more and more of those are taken up by box accounts. Several years ago we would have 120+ online and few were boxes.

    I am not hard core for mergers though because I don't know for sure it would be a good idea. My feeling is it would but you make valid points also.
  11. Tegila Augur

    I know this thread is a month inactive, but please don't do a server merge. All one needs to do is look at the last one, (REAL merge, as in Underfoot) to see what the effect is. Within a year the merged servers were nearly down to a single server's population premerge, almost half the guilds died or merged due to poaching or simply briefing that caused attrition, and socially/psychologically it was at least that year for the combined population to no longer be us vs them. I'm on Bertie, originally saryrns. When we merged each server had about 6 strong but not necessarily top raid guilds, and people could comfortably find camps to kill in in convorteum. The merger caused convorteum to have 90 or more in it at all hours, for a few weeks until half or more quit or whatever they did, half the raid guilds on each, perhaps more from saryrns, collapsed in on themselves and merged or just gave up and folded. There were ongoing fights in General of the saryrns vs the bertox ppl, and even fighting between guilds that formerly could at least coexist. Within a couple years of that another half the raid guilds died off or quit, and at this point in time, I THINK, other than wreckers who are their own unique animals due to time zone, we maybe might have 2 guilds still raiding but idk what they're even raiding personally, it's not FrontPage news anyway. The last 2 "big" guilds died off in eok, I'm told more so bc of tuning but who knows. Those 2 were the ones that sucked up the rest during and after the merger and never felt the hit the rest did.

    Servermerges just accelerate the death of servers. Half, maybe more maybe less, will quit playing within a year for whatever reason: infighting, crowding, grinders, guild poaching, all in all more hassle than it's worth to them, and then their friends quit bc like most today, ppl prefer to play with the devil they know. Logistically it sounds great, but in the end there's a huge human factor that makes a full-on merger a bad idea.
    Elskidor and KermittheFroglok like this.
  12. xcitng Augur

    I vote no on a server merge!!
    KermittheFroglok and Geroblue like this.
  13. KermittheFroglok Augur

    Please no mergers! I like Vox being low pop, I don't want queues! If you don't like your server's pop then buy a transfer token and move your character to a busier server.
  14. Numzan Augur

    I can honestly say i doubt there will be too many mergers coming down the road unless they have no choice to cut costs. I doubt they are running heavy into it now. TLP has nothing to do with live, other then those players do not want the catch-up demands of live. New people join TLP all the time, also many return from pre pop era. So this has nothing to do with live at all. Your people choose to quit or move off of live for many reasons. I can honestly say TLP is keeping the game alive otherwise most of live servers should be shut down with those numbers online.... Just saying check your own facts first...
    Yimin likes this.
  15. p2aa Augur

    Why DBG is making new expansions only for Live players ? The answer is simple : Live server players generate money, and more money than what you think.
    This mentality of a few TLP players thinking they "deserve stuff based on false facts" is just fun.
    The TLP crowd is migrating between each TLP server. One TLP crowd moves from one server to the latest one to restart over. This is an easy cash cow for DBG, no new expansion to make, nothing to add.
    Once in a while, one player ask for server merge, doesn't mean it's the majority of live server players that ask for it, and it's fun to see some TLP player rushing on it thinking "live server are in bad shape" when they haven't set a foot at all on live servers.
  16. Numzan Augur

    Proof?
  17. p2aa Augur

    Proof that TLP server generate more cash than Live servers ?
    The only real fact we have is that DBG is going on doing new expansions for live servers. Which clearly negates your opinion.
  18. Yimin Augur

    Both make money for DBG and that's a good thing ...:D

    YiMin
  19. Lorewood Lorekeeper


    Yes, it does matter I lost 3-4 toons on a merge because of names ( all eq generated ) if I would have lost my Main I would have been gone gone gone..As it was DB/Sony still owes me 3 heroic toons. And if I would have cared more about those lost ones I might have still left the game. Bear in mind I started on Tunare in 2001 so I've been through what 3 merges now ?
  20. Tegila Augur

    Though TLP requires being gold, no one ever pays for an expansion there. People on live rarely stay f2p for long even if THEY dont pay out of pocket, someone else does and then sells the krono for plat. That also happens on TLP, but TLP would lose almost nothing if it were available free, so they have to force it. On live, you can't do a whole lot with 1k aas, and they unlock 100 at a time in marketplace, when there are over 30k aas to buy. There are some armor choices and a much smaller pool of Aug choices for f2p, but one can not earn was, can not use too spells unless they buy the right, can only have 2 toons til they buy more slots (even though loyalty can get some that's barely an option on f2p) and HOUSING. Housing and other player studio items, enormous bags, armor ornaments, and any number of other thing generates a lot of income as well as the fact that EVERY current raider buys the current expansion, and retains gold membership as long as they play. Live generates a lot more than a handful of subscriptions. Having boxes increases that income too, and general chats aren't as much of a measure as many don't ever join them. When I stopped playing years ago, most ppl had multiple accounts then too. General chat was capped at 200 ppl, and though gen2 showed up certain times of the day, it wasn't always there. The chatter itself comes and goes, a little less than back then but not by much. I don't think there is a very big difference between today's subscription rate and 2013s, not if you also include krono sales, and bc of the way the ultrarares are going, they probably sell even more kronos, this making even more money than subs ever did.

    TOP requires subs, but almost nothing else applies to them. Love servers have every cash cow available, how many more years before a TOP even has Housing? Hm, well has a TLP ever even hit SoF much less SoD, UF, or HoT when they were introduced? Hardly. There aren't nearly the number of TOP servers as live either so even if our population were half or even 1/3 of TLPs per server, we'd still outnumber you, and we by far outspend you.

    Pardon odd wording, blame the phone