I would love 2 see a merge with the other Oceania servers i have been on Gav since day one but with such little population its hard to organize teams for ranked warzones or endgame content

I really agree to the thread. The server is just so dead now, most of the time i am on i just spend them running around fleet aimlessly. The numbers are not enough for OPs and Hard Mode flash points has become so repetitive it is just boring. As for PvP. i usually get about 4 50s PvP from 8-11 PM AEST, and i am online since 12PM AEST. That is 8 HOURS of running around doing nothing much. Sure i made many characters to play so that i wouldn't get bored, but repeating game content so many times just makes it even more boring. I really would appreciate it if Bioware would merge the Oceanic Servers, many people who i knew from since i started the game have quit the game. If Bioware is reluctant to do a merger for the oceanic server, i only have ONE request and it is to make ALL the Oceanic servers available for transfers out AND in.

You ever done that for 5 hours+? I know I have.

Yeah this needs to happen earier rahter than later...

 

It has gotten to the point that its almost unplayable due to numbers and not enough variety of players, i dont enjoy constantly only hitting the same 8 people or constantly getting rep v rep games with my own guild cause no one is queing. Also absolutely no rated, it just doesnt exist.

 

This game promotes multiple characters but it is almost impossble to get your dailies done on 1 character let alone the 3/4 50s i have....

 

if this doesnt happen soon I will seriously be contemplating un-subbing for the time being till things are changed

I just agree that the ASPAC Servers need to be Merged to get the Population back to where all aspects of the game can be played.

The simple fact is at the moment we have people switching factions simply to try and make level 50 pvp pop. And this is at prime time friday night. If we cant consistent pvp pops on a friday night something is seriously wrong. And yes, as the nice Dawn man pointed out, there is organised pvp events between friendly guilds, but this happens maybe once or twice a week, which is unlikely to even get people their weeklies done, let alone for alts.

 

As for PVE, yes there are Ops being run. This is due to the hardwork of some individuals who take the time to organise and lead them. These are being organised in advance, so for people who cant committ to an ops several days ahead of time they have to hope that an operation has been planned when they are available and that there is a spare spot.

 

As for the group finder, for finding random groups it just simply doesnt work most of the time as several people have pointed out. I have spoken to several people who have spent hours queued with nothing happening.

 

So maybe, if you are one of lucky ones (and I do include myself in that list), with a good network of in game friends and you only want to pvp occasionally, things are just fine on Gav Daragon. But there are still a lot of people out there for whom it is just not working.

 

Kalari

Representing the Ilvantari legacy.

I would think they were deleted for spiralling off topic.

 

But here's the thing -- getting things organized is painful. We always have to work around busy schedules... that's normal. We do a lot of ops during the week specifically so we can involve as many people as possible. The problem is, that because we have such a limited number of people, we can't do just that -- the majority of people are available from 5 PM to 9 PM AEST on a Thursday or a Friday. What puts it off even further is the varied timezones -- 7 PM for me is about 5 PM for someone who lives in Singapore and 9 PM for someone who lives in New Zealand. That's too early for some -- they're still at work, and too late to start for others who need to get an early start the next day.

 

Ordinarily, this would be fine -- in fact, it'd be expected. The problem is, we simply don't have the numbers to make it happen at a time that's convenient for those people.

 

And to compound that... these "scheduled" maintenance times... they're downright horrible.

 

I'll feed you an example -- just this week, Thursday, 6 PM AEST we'd organized for an attempt on Nightmare Pilgrim. The people involved were eager -- so eager, in fact that, having planned it more than a week in an advance, they'd been working hard during their day job so they could be let off early on that one day so they can make it despite our varied timezones (getting off work and getting home before 4-5 PM for some), only to find out that the server is down. Yeah, okay... the launcher lets you know a good 20 hours beforehand and the notice for it here on the site is rarely put up before 2 days of the time itself. We only have a rough idea of when maintenance time is... for us, that's Tuesday 5 PM AEST to 7-9 PM AEST.

 

We know this. Despite how inconvenient it might be for us... in reality, it's fine -- but only when it's constant. Now, I'm not being reasonable (at least, I don't believe I am) I understand that you can't plan for when an emergency patch needs to be deployed to fix a potentially game-breaking issue. It's just that it happens so frequently that in two weeks, an emergency patch deployed on our Thursday operations slot. We decided to get wise, poisoned that day and said it would be volatile... we changed it to Wednesday. Then the next week.... an emergency patch was deployed on that exact day in that exact time slot. Call it a curse. Three times in a row, that's just horrible luck... yeah, we can accept that. But looking at the patch notes for when those were put down, the changelog lists some obscure performance fix that, from what we can see can't be called "mission critical".

 

How does this effect our... or, if some people will insist, my want for the Oceanic Servers to merge? Because, we are so bottle-necked with our population. Using above example, we came online anyway and decided to go ahead... only to find that we were down 1 DPS. We had a shortage of DPS! The amount of people who're geared enough to replace them are few -- so few in fact, we actually keep an active tab on the people -- even those who aren't typically involved with our activities. At that time, none of them were on. We decide to wait. Give it an hour -- finally one comes online, but now, one of our healers -- a New Zealander has to head off because it's already midnight for them. Effectively, a waste of a wednesday night. Crucial roles such as tanks or healers are worse... the amount of tanks who can replace me for example, can be counted on one hand (this includes the tanks from the 'other guild' that runs operations on our server for our faction).

 

Having a higher population... a larger pool of characters and players to pick from would have ensured that this wouldn't be a problem.

 

Now you might be thinking "Surely, there's enough people who are around but might not be geared"... well, yeah, you'd be right. In fact, we'll take anyone who's keen on doing these things with us... we'll help them, give them the tools so they can enjoy the content like we do... or want to. By the time we get those people skilled enough and geared enough to fill out that roll, the circumstances for one or more of a few others will have changed... meaning we'd have to replace them. Or wait for their circumstance to turn towards the rest of the group's favour... which it will -- in about a month. That's a long time to wait. But it doesn't stop there -- not for anyone. Someone else's circumstances will change. Hell, within the last month alone at least four of our active members were called into National Service.

 

And we can't help it... because there's so few players, that the rest of us can't get it to happen.

 

It's more effort than it's worth. It's been suggested a few times to me to just hit the unsub button, avoid the stress, and move on to greener pastures... or, my favorite "Reroll on Dalborra!"

Edited September 14, 2012 by TrueNovaZero

Well basically all I was saying is that people are obviously disagreeing on the issue, so a merge wouldn't make everyone happy. If a merge happened, the people protesting would be unhappy, if it didn't happen, the people for it would be unhappy. It's a lose/lose scenario.

 

So instead of a merge, free server transfers?

1) It would serve the same purpose.

2) It would give people a choice in the matter.

3) It's been done on European/American servers already, and for exactly the same reason, so why not Asia/Pacific?

 

I realise several people have already mentioned this previously in this topic, and a lot of people pushing the merge have also included this in the possibilities, but since most of those were deleted, I'm reiterating. I'm not against what's being proposed, but I - and I imagine a decent chunk of the population - would prefer to have the choice to switch to a higher population rather than being forced to. Free server transfers rather than a server merge changes it from a lose/lose scenario to a win/win scenario, where everyone gets what they want.

 

I believe that's both on-topic and so overwhelmingly placid that forum staff should have no reason to delete it this time.

Edited September 14, 2012 by ingenuityfails

You should all look at this page and the answer to RP server mergers

 

http://www.swtor.com/community/showthread.php?p=5160557#edit5160557

 

Naeolon/Firtahla

is anyone seriously against a server merge??!!?

 

i would prefer a cluster myself (all instancing and queing is done cross server but we retain our origin server) but if thats not possible then merging is the next best thing. our server is dead...if you think otherwise your brain is dead

SERVER MERGE please BIOWARE!!! we'll love you for it

Well basically all I was saying is that people are obviously disagreeing on the issue, so a merge wouldn't make everyone happy. If a merge happened, the people protesting would be unhappy, if it didn't happen, the people for it would be unhappy. It's a lose/lose scenario.

 

So instead of a merge, free server transfers?

1) It would serve the same purpose.

2) It would give people a choice in the matter.

3) It's been done on European/American servers already, and for exactly the same reason, so why not Asia/Pacific?

 

I realise several people have already mentioned this previously in this topic, and a lot of people pushing the merge have also included this in the possibilities, but since most of those were deleted, I'm reiterating. I'm not against what's being proposed, but I - and I imagine a decent chunk of the population - would prefer to have the choice to switch to a higher population rather than being forced to. Free server transfers rather than a server merge changes it from a lose/lose scenario to a win/win scenario, where everyone gets what they want.

 

I believe that's both on-topic and so overwhelmingly placid that forum staff should have no reason to delete it this time.

 

You're not alone, and it's unfortunate that the valid points you're speaking of were buried beneath unneeded comments relating to things that don't, for the sake of this proposal, matter. When I say you're not alone, I mean it -- quite a few don't want to "change home" as it were. In fact, those of us who're still here actually feel that way. But as it stands, the choices are either stagnation or unsubscribing. Right now, since many of us are still around, it's obvious we're picking stagnation.

 

I would like to draw people's attention to the title of this topic.

 

Merge/Transfers, that is, one or the other.

 

Last night we had a bit of a discussion so I'm going to put forward the points (as I remember them, mind you these are just general debates and not wholly addressing other points brought up by others -- the end is probably what most would be more interested in).

Cross-server Queueing

Quite honestly, cross-server queuing would do much to remedy the problems we feel comes with doing any of the content. I don't mean just end-game, I mean anything, be it group finder to PvP. Level a character and queue yourself for... say, Colicoid Wargames. It won't pop for hours (if at all). The only true way to gather up enough people to get through it are putting yourself in a guild and asking for people to come with you, or asking/guilt tripping/badgering a friend to go and get it done. The express purpose behind group finder was to forego that, to streamline the process to enjoy the content and meet new people. If either of those objectives were being met, then no problems... but it's not (that is, people are still having to do it the hard way and new players who don't join up with any of the guilds will still find it almost impossible to even get into the game), and that brings us to the current problem. Cross-server queuing has been alluded to and asked for for months now (look further in suggestions -- hell, do a forum search and you'll find quite a few). For whatever reason, people have expected it to be out now... whether they misread and misinterpreted something one of the Devs said or if it was just wild conjecture from an active forum user making a fuss, the points is... it's not here.

 

But certain things can only be done locally -- that is, only within the server. World bosses, for example. It's a nightmare to even organize a Nightmare Pilgrim run (go figure). Your heroic missions being another... it's easy enough to get numbers to do them for the planets from levels 10-30, but from 30-50 it's annoyingly scant.

 

Free to Play

The thing that everyone is hoping for is that free to play will bring some much needed life back into the game. Social profiling, wild (apologies, I might mean "educated") guesses aside, my current disposition to that sentiment is both wary and skeptical. Yes, a horde of new players WILL be good for a server. But that's not a guarantee. But let's assume, in the best case scenario, we have a horde of new players coming in and they all decide to subscribe.

Consider the questions --

1. How long will that be? When is free to play going to happen? Let's say, best case scenario, that it starts NOW.
   
2. How long will it take for those new players... with or without our help, be able to get themselves to level 50, get geared and experienced enough in their roles to reach our stage of progression so we can consistently clear and enjoy the end-game content? About a month. Lockouts ensure you can only do so much every week -- this is assuming PvE. But we're not big on power-gearing for people's first time into the game so if they're completely new, we'd be wary of just rushing them through it (we'd actually encourage them to get into a regular group and progress on a group/organisational level)... which for me personally would feel like having a child, forcing them to turn into an adult, expecting them to get a job, find a spouse and settle down with a big house and white picket fence... in just a month. Essentially, that sucks the fun out of the game for the people involved.
   
3. What will we, who're at that end point be doing in the mean time? We've already had breaks from the game. Right now, we're just trying to keep things going. Ops and the like still go, and we have at the minimum, 3 a week. 4-5 would be a better number, but outside of Ops... honestly? We just try to keep anything going. The top tier stuff takes time to work to and currently there's a very short list of people who can even attempt it meaning, essentially, the low population is still driving us down. PvP is a good distraction and often times it's the big thing that keeps us around between Ops and helping each other out.
   

With the amount of time I've just pointed out, I want to put a hypothetical forward. It's currently the 9th month of this year... on the 11th and 12th will be the Holiday season. Assuming that 1.4 comes in with a resurgence of new activity with new content... there's also the rough patch of numerous games drawing people away. What keeps most in our corner around, is each other. I find it hard to see us staying subscribed with the climate of things unless there's some kind of change to the community itself. A numeric one, would be great.

 

Transfer or Merge?

Let's break it down;

Transfers are one-time. You choose your origin server, your character and designate a destination server . After a period of time, transfers close. It's also one-way. It lets you pick what you want to do, if you want to send a character over. It lets you pick what goes where, if you wish to have it done at all. Free would be great. Most won't transfer unless other familiar faces express their wish to go with them.. Which is fine. Most mates who stick together will do it in a group. But logistically I don't see how'd they do it unless the transfer system was automated... because it's unlikely that this feeling will be one-off.

As for being against a merger... I don't see why you would, to be honest. What's so bad about it? Understandably, you'd want to stick around the same crowd that you know and love. A merger wouldn't stop that... you'd just have the chance to meet more people. If MMOs are a social game, I don't understand why you'd be against that.

is anyone seriously against a server merge??!!?

 

i would prefer a cluster myself (all instancing and queing is done cross server but we retain our origin server) but if thats not possible then merging is the next best thing. our server is dead...if you think otherwise your brain is dead

 

Yes we are against a server merge.

 

We are on the RP server for a reason, RP.

 

I know I'm not the only one who has seen how RPers are generally regarded on PvE servers in other games.

 

Basically, my opinion is that if you're not on Gav Daragon for the RP primarily, why did you roll on this server? If you're so keen on PvP, why didn't you roll on the PvP server? (I also note that the request is to merge with the PvE server yet the concern is with PvP?!)

 

There are different rulesets on servers for a reason, merging servers is going to make people unhappy just to please a few. It may not seem much to those who don't RP but for those of us who do, the community you play with is everything. Merge us with a community with people who generally abuse us for enjoying our gaming time and we'll all unsub. Simple as that.

 

There are also a lot of people who are very happy on Gav Daragon and have none of these such problems. Dawn runs along smoothly and rarely do we have trouble finding people to fill raids. In fact we are usually forming two Ops groups despite a number of us playing Guild Wars 2. We plan our stuff and log in when required. People are more than welcome to ask us for assistance or join us, dawnaus.enjin.com.

 

As for PvP, well speaking for myself I used to PvP a lot. I stopped because people started QQing about losing and asking us to sandbag. I'm all for PvP but I will not deliberately allow people to cap points or get kills etc. If you want to PvP, come PvP without the chips on the shoulder!

My previous game was Dark Age of Camelot and I was on a RP server, I personaly dont RP i just find the RP servers have more mature ppl in general and less FPS people. The game started to die and they merged all of us together and we were a bit annoyed even thou the game was dieing. But it completely revitalized the game and its doing fairly well again.

 

To be honest this server RARELY does RP at all, I know the RPers love there RP but you can still do your cantina things on normal servers, this is hardly a RP server as it is with people naming there characters stupid things...

 

Another thing just cause this is a RP server doesnt mean its ONLY a RP server, we still need all aspects of the game, PVE is only fine if you have a normal grp makeup. just cause Visz and Dawn CAN run ops this means nothing, two guilds/alliances only is pathetic...what about pugs and new players its way to hard to que for FPs or OPs and either wait for 5 hrs with nothing or get a group that takes 5 hours to achieve anything. PvP is also the other 50% of this game, and being unable to even get your daily done on prime time on a weekend is pathetic....and for ranked dont get me started on that.

 

If someone annoys you there is a /ignore option

Just because you're not involved in RP doesn't mean it doesn't happen. We have several members in Dawn who RP all the time, from the moment they log in. It doesn't need an event to be RP

 

Also, yes there is an ignore function. You can also re-roll to a server where you are happy. Personally from my perspective it won't change anything.

Edited September 15, 2012 by Ailie

idc about a merge, just give people the damn option to transfer OUT, i am not enjoying this game wit hthe current population I DONT want to re roll and spend all the time gearing up a char, just let me G T F O , ppl who want to RP can stay here and RP their hearts out.

I know about all the RP things that are actual events, theres not very many. I have no problem with RPers I think its cool I just dont do it. But just cause this server is called a RP server doesnt mean its only RP, this server is dieing and RP cannot save it. would you like to sit on fleet talking to 5 people for 15 a month...

 

the polish on the server is gorn, it needs an injection of people

I talk to dozens of people every night... again I don't have a problem with the server pop and those who want off I don't think I'd miss

you obviously dont take advantage of all aspects of this game, if they give us server transfers you do realise this server will end up becoming so low they will close it, and your precious RP server will not exist anyway....

I do everything this game has to offer that interests me, again as many others already do.

 

I'm not against anyone who wants to move to transfer, go right ahead. All I'm saying is leave those who want to stay here behind rather than try and drag us along.

I do everything this game has to offer that interests me, again as many others already do.

 

I'm not against anyone who wants to move to transfer, go right ahead. All I'm saying is leave those who want to stay here behind rather than try and drag us along.

 

A problem would arise being that if those people left.. it would leave maybe 200 active players left on the server. There would be more for more people to complain about. Each to their own but there are two sides to preferring a transfer over a merge. You'd be doing the same thing with the same people every day until you unsub.

Edited September 15, 2012 by Aedey

unfortunatly the greater outweight the few, if they give the option to leave over cluster you will end up unsubbing or getting forced to move due to them closing the server

if bioware comes to that compromise im fine with it, i just want off this dead server, but at the same time the ppl who want to stay should be left.

Again, two sides to it. Yes it's their decision & they probably should stay if they want to.. but it may not be what they're expecting..

 

* You can RP on any server..

* There will be very few left as already seen with European & U.S Servers..

* Bioware will then have an entire new complaint thread about the same thing dealt with months ago.

 

If it merges that doesn't mean the end of all RP. Hell you'd have more people to RP with.

Edited September 15, 2012 by Aedey

Again, two sides to it. Yes it's their decision & they probably should stay if they want to.. but it may not be what they're expecting..

 

* You can RP on any server..

* There will be very few left as already seen with European Servers..

* Bioware will then have an entire new complaint thread about the same thing dealt with months ago.

 

If it merges that doesn't mean the end of all RP. Hell you'd have more people to RP with.

 

look mate i dont want a dispute cause it will take bioware AGES TO DO ANYTHING with a dispute in it, instead just open transfers and let us **** and rpers can stay here and do w.e the hell they want..