Producer's Letter: August 2015 Updates

Really? That's what Crushbone has devolved to (haven't jumped on there for awhile; have many projects on other servers, and a hemorrhaging guild hall on Everfrost)? WoW Crossroads?

Uwk
who ought to jump back on there with the Horde and elevate the server, apparently ;->

It was one of the things I really did not like about WoW...I was willing to put up with it (never did any PVP server there, though) to an extent for the sake of the game engine (which was incredible; at a time I was struggling to play City of Heroes on dial-up, and was finding it all but impossible here [and I was the main tank for the party], I had NO trouble whatsoever with WoW on dial-up, thanks to the lovely game engine!) and the storyline. The in-game economy was abysmal (though the outer, Marketplace-equivalent economy was superb!), the community were mostly PVP mindset types (at least the noisy ones; I knew people from RL, good friends, male and female, who PVP'ed on any server, and they were still good people. You just didn't hear about them, because they were quiet folks), and we didn't have Appearance slots for that awesome-looking equipment we could get...sigh. Once they changed the storyline to Cataclysm, that was the last straw for me.

But they lost a good friend of mine to the game earlier when she wearied of having her quest turn-in NPC constantly, deliberately slaughtered by a high-level the minute he'd re-pop. In this game, that would be griefing, and in the days when GMs actually showed up, that would be dealt with ("God-level Ice Comet, comin' online from invisible source!" >BAM< /rinse, lather, repeat as often as necessary, to teach said griefer the error of his ways). In That Other Game, my buddy was told by the GM to "just get some high-level friends" and basically stop whining about it. On a non-PVP server, mind you. She quit that day (last straw situation for her) and told them in no uncertain terms (including using the GM's name) precisely why. :-/

If the PVPers here want to keep their server, even if there's like 10 people left, they should be able to. If their desired solution to their low population there is to merge with the rest of the server(s) that are left and turn it all PVP, I'm leaving.

Uwk

I know it probably won't happen, but I'd like both systems in place: the "old-fashioned way" (where we can /bug and let the devs do their thing with the info) and the "popularity contest" system, where if you have, say, a bunch of bugs that "affect gameplay" rather than just being "cosmetic" or "causes crash" (not sure what the uber-one is actually called, since if I do have a crash, it's not likely I'll be able to re-create everything that happened in a /bug report before I got slapped out of the world, and hence, rarely use that category), then the number of folks chiming in about them could be more immediately apparent. Not all of us have the presence of mind to give the same bug affecting 200 people the same name/title when we do the /bug report, rather than 200 different ones... ;->

Uwk

Absolutely yes to all of this...well, except maybe the last bit, that sounds more like personal opinion...

I hadn't even thought about the disadvantages of having "healthy server populations," mainly because whenever I think about the "good old days," I frequently wake up in a cold sweat, screaming "Game over, man! Game over!!" Frankly, I LIKE not being hassled for nodes, especially during the holidays; I LIKE being able to get into someplace or access a transport whatever without a bunch of yahoos thinking it's funny to block them; I LIKE being able to take on an AA-granting boss outside a dungeon without having to worry about queuing up for him for hours on end. That gets a bit tiring with seven toons, let alone 60.

And yes, I remember the days before character slots could be purchased; if you wanted the full compliment of tradeskill specialties for just yourself (how DARE you not want to be forced to group or guild with other people for crafting requirements, you sick, twisted, evil pervert?!), you were basically forced to pay for a Station account, which cost almost twice as much per month. Nice price if you wanted to play any another SOE games, 'cause you got a whole 12 characters per account, but I didn't need 12, I only needed 9... ;->

Uwk

Absolutely yes.

As a matter of fact, why don't they do another mail poll: "If given the chance, would you like to leave the server you're on for a consolidated server?" Wouldn't have to be AB, could be any/all, including the new one they have in mind, whatever that winds up being called. ;->

Any CHARACTER (not just account) that votes "no" ought to be allowed to at least have the option (one thing I love about this game; the many options!) of being able to transfer to an existing server they want to be on (if the one they're on now and like will go belly-up anyway), and given a free Transfer token...providing, of course, the one they wouldn't mind joining doesn't get "consolidated," too. :-/

If the one they're on gets enough "no" votes to tip the scales towards keeping it intact, then the Powers should leave that server alone, thanks. ;->

Uwk

/raising_paw

I'm not that nostalgic about the old days. ;->

Uwk

Absolutely amen to every single bit of this (though I wouldn't need a plane ticket; I know where they live, and can drive there).

One reason why I left City of Heroes was when they were introducing the concept of PVP, which was okay, then FORCING us to do it (which was not). World of Warcraft, even on not-specifically PVP servers, was all about the PVP, which got wearying after a bit. Da Spousal Unit here at Chez Uwk actually liked the Battlegrounds (your hubby got you on a PVP server? are you still married to him? if so, then Forbearance Level maxxed!), even when there were like 100 Horde/8 Alliance or vice-versa (was a Hunter and could snipe to the heart's content). Then they changed the rules where the numbers had to be exactly even before you could even enter, and if you didn't have the latest/greatest/uberest gear for PVPing, you didn't get picked for the team, L00s3r!

Like Belenos, no fun, no game, gone, bye.

Uwk

Hmm! Actually, I'm not having too many issues with that, surprisingly enough, so long as being flagged PVP is NOT the default...it could be yet another option, like "Decline duels" being checked. Hmm...isn't duelling in EQ2 = PVP?

Uwk

Okay, so how do you save layouts if you don't have Layout Editor? I can save an individual house using /save_layout HouseName and the Notepad Method, but it seems like you're all referring to something different when you go on about such things (see many entries in the Norrathian Homeshow forum). :-/

Also, even if you save the file so you can open it again in, say, Notepad, if your items didn't make the move with you and you have to replace them all, what do you do about a unique item you can't get any more (Uwk has many of those, some placed, some in the House Vault, some in the Bank...)?

Uwk

I wouldn't until we know which servers will be "consolidated." :-/

Uwk

Aw! With 60 toons on Gold (and more on Silvers!), I need me my Excel... ;->

Uwk
who actually has several quite...unique names, and others not impossible to change and live with...but I would get irked if someone ninja'ed one of my toon names, then went around acting like an even bigger jerk than I am :-/

At the beginning (I've been on since 2006, so my mileage may vary from someone who found this game last week [if so, welcome, new folks! /wave]), you could have seven characters, max, on your "home" area server (if you were US-based when you joined the game at the beginning of your account), seven on Test, and seven on a "non-home" area server; I placed my first seven "foreign" characters on Splitpaw, I have to admit.

I think I had some extra character slots saved up; I wasn't sure how many, since they do a poor job of letting you know how many you have left, but I don't think I had a whole nine more saved, and I was able to create that many characters recently on Storms (hi, y'all!). I haven't made any on Valor yet; was about ready to, then I saw this thread. I don't think I want to until I find out what they're going to be doing to Europe. :-/

Uwk
who might want to look at Japan or Russia, but learning French is tricky enough; don't think I could cope with the different alphabets...

It's one of the main reasons (there were others, including financial and security questions) why people were so upset about the Pro7 deal. :-/

Uwk

Ah, you're absolutely right on this one, Belenos; I had forgotten about the dangers of PVP flagging on WoW. Very good; thanks for this. I'll have to withdraw my "might not suck after all" vote on it here. :-/

And yeah, if he was gonna be an idiot, he deserved to get beaten until he stopped being an idiot...at least with you. ;->

Uwk

Replacing fun with work in a game was why WoW finally lost my Spousal Unit. After not logging in for weeks->months, we both realized paying good money for a game neither of us cared for any more was pretty futile.

Uwk

Ostensibly, but most folks don't abide by that, unfortunately; depending on the guild, that can be enforced there, but not so much on the server at large. And since there's Antonia.Bayle_Homeshow (or Antonia_Bayle.Homeshow; I can never remember) that anyone can hop onto from any server (except maybe Naggies?), their comments and concerns using metagame-speak can be a bit non-immersive. :-/

Uwk

After finally getting caught up with all the upteen posts on this now (and realizing I should delete a few of my old ones--whoops, we can't do that any more...sigh), I have to say that while the various ideas (many incorporated from other games) for helping with low populations, keeping names, etc., are all well and good, a lot of them probably can't be implemented here, largely due to the age of the game engine. I'd had a chance to chat with a tech/dev/Power back in the old days, and he would've loved to see the whole thing brought down for like a month, have the engine re-written, and brought it back up again, far more robust and ready to go (I think this was after the Big Hack, so don't blame him for that. It's a shame that all their time then had to go towards getting the game back, period; fixing the holes; and making sure it was clean).

SOE made, perhaps, a huge mistake back in the day when the debate was on about single core vs. multi-core capability...but then again, the parent company brought us Betamax--never mind ("Sorry, that was mean." --Bruce Banner, The Avengers). At any rate, I'm not sure how many of our suggestions could be implemented, but I do think the Powers would be better served going with the old "one server merge at a time" bit, rather than wanting to dump all the "low population" servers into one or two immediately.

Uwk

Can we get some kind of confirmation on what is going on with the server population, my server Unrest is a ghost town be lucky if there is 1 pug going every 3 hours at anytime of the day.With what was meant to be peak US time I did a /w all and it showed 71 players in all my time I have not seen this under 100 ever. Its really getting to the point of why even bother logging in to stand LFG for hours at a time.

Please give us some light at the end of the tunnel!!!!!

I logged on with Holly talking to Guk, (mid talk it seems) but she did say that the names would be first come. Can't say I am happy about that. Most days I can be on any time I want, so I'm feeling that I will probably get my names; but I don't think it's the best way to do it.

Anybody have a log of this?