Blatant botting is completely out of hand

Wouldn't it be nice if somewhere there was a program that could monitor server traffic and look for repetitive patterns that bots have.

Yes would also be nice if Devs at DBG worked to improve game for all instead of what they do. One of those two is possible.

Your a casual thats why you have a different opinion. You do not raid. You do not have to have your guild ripped apart because your no longer top raiding guild on server an now your second best, with the BEST talent hunting your ranks.

Bet.. If YOUR guild went an lost 90% of its people from a server merge. You too would be singing a different toon.

I don't have a good response to this topic. Auto-flagging risks false positives. Granted, half the people I knew who complained of false positives in the past were lying and actually using cheat programs.

I'm very sorry if you had that happen. It really stings particularly if you thought someone was on board for the long run, but actually wasn't. Recruitment from the top guilds is something most guilds have to deal with, and even mid tier guilds must do cross-server recruiting now. Merging servers keeps communities together, and if guild mergers must happen, increases the potential familiarity between the members of the two guilds. That is the flip side to being at the top: you never know who's there just to be at the top and who's there to be part of your team. It makes it feel all the better if they decide to return or keep in touch, but sting all the worse if they leave unexpectedly.

Long term, lack of server merges risks server collapse, and returning players seeing people they recognize from years ago is a huge source of recruitment. Guild merges can only put that off for a time. Server merges preserve communities.

Yes you have a point I guess in part. Thing is the top guilds on my server don't really need or want a merger. They get more then enough players server transferring to join them. Well that and they tend to get eventually get my best players.

But in the end isn't it about what is best for the players? Server mergers will help all the players get the best opportunities. And if a guild is strong enough having a bigger pool of players to draw from might bring you from the edge to being a better and stronger raiding guild.

Can the answer be please no mergers we don't want people leaving our guild? Maybe if mergers ever get announced it would be a good time for guilds to look to do some mergers of their own before ending up on a new server.

I get it though. Having Lions dissolve and all going to other guilds would hurt some. Though as a casual guild I am used to having a flow of players some staying some moving on to raiding guilds. This happens all the time if it didnt our online numbers would be much higher. The thing is my guild is all about trying to ensure the players are having fun. If that means moving on that is what I want for them.

So yes the one point I do get is that if mergers happen players may move to more competitive raid guilds. But I am always losing players to raid guilds all the time but I just wish them the best and hope they have fun. People need to be in a guild because they want to not because they don't have any other choice.

Yes. And the second part to that question should be. What makes merger's better for player's who don't want them in the first place ?

Or is the minority of players (who want the mergers) the only opinions that matter ?

Curiously history does not support your claim.

The last server merges were in 2005. It is now 2019. If a server's population dies out its 100% in no way due to a lack of server merges.

100% of every single time a server dies population wise, its because there is lack of any real talent on the server to push / prop up a top 10 raiding guild. Combined with server politics.

Because those with the skill to be in a top 10 raiding guild an actually WANT to be in a guild of that type leave the server. Join those types of guilds.

Lack of player's on a server is 100% not due to lack of server merges (again I RE iterate, what I have already Iterated.)

History supports my claim. Brief history of server's who pretty much died out population wise.

Bertox. Had the capability to support not 1 , but TWO current content farming raid guilds. Due to in guild politics of Descendents an people leaving they folded. Most of those people left server or retired. Leaving Enceledas as the sole current content farming guild on the server.

Encel collapsed again due to in guild politics an lack of talent to prop it up once Desc players left / retired from the game.

The fact they had a near zero player jumping to the server to raid proves their server lacked the overall skill an talent to push past some of the harder current content at the time.

Once Encel hit that critical moment of lack of talent carrying the rest of the guild to support themselves in current content they also folded (again players leaving server or retiring)

So if players are on their own leaving a server. FORCING people to server merge with such a server only punishes those people who A: did not want the server merges in the first place and B: Does absolutely nothing for the remaining population on the server as they lack the skill to get into a top ten raid guild as it is thus they won't be able to get into what ever new power house guild is "forced" to move onto that server.

Holly already said they want to merge the low pop servers but there are technical issues preventing it. So it would seem DBG thinks it is time for mergers.

Lack of players on a server is more likely due to people returning to empty servers and not sticking around. That COULD be the result of the lack of server mergers. And Holly has also made it clear they feel their best efforts are in getting returning players back and staying back. I would be willing to bet that plays some part in them wanting to merge the low population servers.

Yes, she did. I was not responding to her.

I was responding to some one who made the claim:

" Lack of player's on a server is due to lack of server merges"

To which I pointed out facts. Sorry lack of players on a server is not due to lack of server merges but lack of skilled raiders to prop up a top ten raiding guild and in guild politics. I even described two guilds which I was in at the time they both folded. And watched as people left guild rather then make another guild ON THE SERVER. (Or they retired)

Are you telling me I am wrong ?

First I am pretty sure any of us can come up with whatever we want history to claim.

So how are people penalized? Where is the penalty in merging servers? I mean is it really about keeping a guild going over giving people more options?

So how do folks get punished? And yeah mergers give more opportunities to everyone except those who would rather go down with the ship then face change.

The best argument I have seen against mergers is DBG possibly messing things up big time with merging all that info onto one server. That is about it so far though.

Mergers may not be great for guilds but I think they would be great for players. And higher population servers are going to hold on to those returning folks much better then empty servers.

In the end DBG will do what they think is best for their profits. That's their job. I suspect server mergers are still on the table because of that.

I am telling you that I believe server mergers will benefit players greatly. Lack of mergers have probably sped up the decline of servers. So I would say lack of server mergers has played a part in things but I would also agree are not the only factor.

When mergers did happen it was in response to rapid declines in server populations. What happened after has been a slow bleed that has been killing off some servers.

And all this is also why I believe low pop servers should be merged with high pop ones. Obviously something about the high pop servers holds on to players. Some servers do well at holding players and also retaining returning players. Reinforce success.

Wrong.

The other person made the claim that

--> Long term, lack of server merges risks server collapse <--

The last server merge was in 2005. It is now 2019. FOURTEEN YEARS LATER Everquest is still going.

What length of time constitutes "long term" in a video game if 14 years does not constitute "long term"?

You keep using the term long term . I do not think those words mean what you think it means.

All your posts are wrong.

If I understood the posts correctly, I think this is the first time I've seen someone suggest top ten guilds keep servers afloat. That's not how the game works.

Everquest is still going but some servers are pretty dead and there is a strong argument that Everquest would be doing even better if returning players didn't come back to tubmble weeds blowing through PoK.

They design content. They open beta up to ALL people to come an test stuff out to tune it the new content exactly how the population tells them to.

Guess who that population that tells them how to tune that new content is ?

The top ten raiding guilds. Its not casuals who every expansion say how hard this or that is yet were not to be bothered to be able to login to beta an voice their opinion PRIOR to the next launch.

Ok it would not allow me to edit it dunno why. But allow me to correct myself.

I said its not casuals when in fact it HAS to be at the very least a very very VERY limited # of casuals that do login to beta. However its CLEARLY not enough to help steer the way its tuned.

So to all them I say CASUALS PLEASE LOGIN TO BETA !!

Read the topic and found a merger thread.

Things that make you go hmm.

Many of us have done many betas over the years and our input has been routinely ignored. Is there any reason whatsoever to think that will change? If not why bother especially when getting into beta now requires the purchase of the expansion which may offer little to no content for you?

Frankly, I regret paying for TBL. It offered me as a player precisely nothing. I made the mistake of pre-ordering on a couple of my accounts and got hosed. I will never per-order an expansion again after that sh-show and therefore cannot participate in future betas.