Character will be stuck on IoR?

Honestly who cares? IoR was a cynical money making ploy. If they'd rather take a financial hit than just do a better job of itemisation, then that says a lot for the kind of ego you're dealing with.

Being an occasional player and ignorant of what Isle of Refuge server was all about, I created a character there.

After reaching the lofty peak of level 12 or 13, I logged out to 'character select' and deleted said character. There was no way out (that was made clear when the toon was created), and the economy is so utterly, utterly screwed that there was no point continuing to play there. I think the breaking point was seeing an 'eagle feather' collectable for 5 pp on the broker, and a 'bronze cluster' (tier 1 tradeskill rare) for 3.5 million pp.

Good thing I had so little invested, and could just bail. For those snarling that "That. Was. Not. An. Exploit. It's perfectly normal behavior.": this is the bed you made. 'Bye now.

As you said you were "ignorant" about IoR.

Just a few points to be made. In the beginning when the server was made, it was hailed as a "Free Trade" server. This meant most items were tradeable and able to be sold on the broker. In the run up to it's release it was stressed that this server would NEVER allow anyone to transfer off the server. You could transfer on, but not off. Once they seen what cash they could make, they ended up reversing this decision. You could get on for a mere $5.00. You could transfer off, but pay the $25.00 fee to buy a transfer token.

This made them a ton of cash at the time. People were either transferring on there, or making a toon there, buying all the stuff they wanted off the broker (they bought krono to sell there for plat to spend on the broker), once they had gotten al the gear they wanted which was no-trade on their home servers, it would now be "heirloom" once they would transfer back.

When people started to complain about PTW, they made it so you could not transfer another toon off that server, unless you had been there at least 30 days. So people started making multiple toons on that server, and letting them sit for 30 days. Then as often as they had made toons to do this, they would just buy kono once again, sell it on IoR then buy what they wanted and transfer off with all their treasures they purchased off the broker. Now they had 4-5 characters they could transfer off, anytime they wanted.

Eventually, they made it so you could no longer transfer off the server. They did in all honesty give people access to transfer tokens for free, I think twice, if they wanted off. But if you were one of the unlucky ones who had not logged in in awhile, you just missed out on that bonanza, LOL. As did I, and I ended up deleting all my toons on that server. I sold everything I had, bought kronos, that could be accessed by other toons on different servers, and deleted all my toons there. I assume others have done the same thing.

There are people I still know there that are perfectly content to be there and stay there, and they enjoy the solitude away from the others. To each their own.

Was there an announcement made about IoR? I've looked in the forums but didn't see anything specific.

There was. Many weeks in advance.

This is from almost two years ago. There may have been something after this, but this is the announcement about no longer being able to leave IoR.

https://forums.daybreakgames.com/eq2/index.php?threads/character-transfers-are-back.603537/