Server Transfer vs Server Merges and the Great Hypocrisy

Yesterday was already late.

If you merge, you may have problems with names and legacy.
If you transfer, you will have problems with names and legacy, with people already on the server.
If you transfer to a super server, if two people transfer from different servers you will have problems with names and legacy.

You have to have the mechanisms in place if you do transfers or merges, so probably the same amount of work.
With the exception of guild name, if you assume that transfer stripes your guild affiliation, then the only difference is guild name on server merge.

If you use transfers to improve numbers, then there will always be people that don't transfer so you don't get as big as improvement. You may also fragment existing communities with transfers.

But looks like you already made your decision and bioware and people that remain will have to live with it.

Looking forward to next quarter sub numbers now the free month is up!

Today on my EU server:

09:00am Republic Fleet = 5 people & Total found by search on all worlds = 55 people
10:00am Republic Fleet = 9 people
12:00midday on Imperial Fleet = 7 people
13:00pm Republic Fleet = 9 people

Other MMOs i can get a 20/25 man PUG raid at 10:00am. Here I cant even get a 4 man NM FP in the daytime.

COORDINATION

OP you talk about community but some basic coordination ( within guild ) and ( between guild's ) could easily overcome the negative aspects. On my server we are already taking steps within our faction and also starting to communicate to Imperials to make sure most of us end up in same place in event we are not a destination server.

Either way there is a larger underlying population issue now and it doesn't matter if it is transfers or merge Bioware need to do something soon. The friends list is gonna mean squat if it ultimately leads to no one logs in. Those that are taking " breaks for RL reason" are small in number compared to attrition from the game. Decisions can't be made based on ppl that are " taking a break " who might / might not come back while the game itself is on life support.

The choice of server transfer over merges will hurt the game more then it will help.
For those that think merging is more difficult or more trouble you are wrong.

And for those that thing they won't face the same issues of names legacy etc with a transfer I really don't know what to say to you just lol

IF they do it wisely it may not be too bad (ie having set servers to transfer to) SO no one can transfer to the heaviest servers but instead can go to lets say the next 10 populated servers, therefore making 20 viables servers.

if they open it to every server, they will completely destroy the game because every single person will try to xfer to the top 3 or 5, which not only ruins may more servers but will ruin those servers with way too much population, unacceptable queue times etc

They should have taken the bottom 20-25 servers and merged then into the next from bottom 20-25.

Also keep in mind full server merges have been done in quite a few games, the first I remember being EQ and that was probably 7 years ago now. And I was one of those who got moved. No issues with guilds and no one in our guild of 160 had name issues, but then again back then people were original no one named their character Legolas or Boba Fett or anything like that we made up our names, we didnt name our selves after something in a book or movie

Sadly, I think it is too little too late. The window of opportunity for a game like this to take hold becomes smaller and smaller as we become less patient and more ADD as a society. People are not going to wait around for server transfers or mergers at some point later in the summer. No. An MMO needs to be able to quickly adapt to whatever happens with their server population or just suffer the consequences of what is happening here. Maybe this will be a lesson to future MMOs, It is too bad. Could have been a great game. Now it won't have enough people to support it becoming that.

Mega Servers are a better solution to bring the population together. A character transfer service is not a bad idea. If we are going to move toward character transfers first, then server merges second, most likely it is to give people choices. Then BW will analyze the data and make a fair population decision. There is also the issue of Legacy names. So a database solution is needed. And to make it perfect it takes time, testing, and time.

Another issue I want to bring up is that a lot of us don't really have a back ground in software development. Nor do we understand that development cycles take time. You can't rush content out, it has to be tested and perfected. With that in mind I would love to see BioWare and Lucas Arts take more of a CCP approach such as Eve Online does with an almost daily dev blog. http://community.eveonline.com/devblog.asp

We also have to separate definitions between developer and manager. Programmer, artist, QA, vs Manager. We need to make intelligent communications instead of rants. Rants will be ignored.

Game development is not instant. I know that is frustrating to hear. It is just the truth. I am not saying the game is perfect besides the PvE. I am saying BioWare knows, and the developers know. Now we need to see the solutions added and communicated. I believe this is where we get frustrated is that communications are always cryptic. LA's need to lighten up. BioWare needs more independence. Let's not make the same mistakes SWG did because of the license.

All I see are community members who seriously want this game to be top dog. Lets unite under that banner.

Now this post is not pertaining to anyone-

I think mega servers should have the following:

1.) Population capped at 10k-20k
2.) Solution for Legacy Names.
3.) Almost daily developer blogs.
4.) Web or VTC meetings with the player population. -Monthly
5.) Dueling arenas like KOTOR in social areas.

Age of Conan, Rift, Aion, Warhammer, and I think City of Villains.

Word! How many MMO's offer transerf? Almost all of em. So, EA has about a million models to emulate. A quality MMO would have a transfer system in place at launch.

NA has over 120 servers, transfers by themselves are not a good idea. You need to reduce the server limit by about half (who knows maybe more). If during the merge multiple guild/char names exist give them the option to transfer to another server.

There is no magic way to make all the bad go away. There are way too many servers, reduce that and you should bring people back and bring more here.