Quote from Community Q&A: March 2nd 2012

Rtwozero - Any plans to implement region by region maintenance times?

 

Blaine Christine (Sr. Producer, Live Services): At this time there are no plans to implement separate maintenance times by region. Star Wars: The Old Republic is a global service with no restrictions on a player’s server choice.

 

Unfortunately the trade-off is that we have to maintain a single service environment, which leads to global maintenance periods. We are very sensitive to the fact that we are limiting play time once per week with a global scheduled maintenance.

 

We have carefully examined global peak times and the number of players affected by our planned downtime. Those of you that have been with us since launch may have noticed that the first few patches were scheduled at 4 AM CST; we very quickly adjusted to 2 AM CST. The reason for this adjustment was an analysis of the peak time play patterns by region that resulted in the current start time.

 

We understand that this is especially concerning to players in the European and newly opened Asia/Pacific server regions. We will always do our best to minimize the downtime, but it is the only way that we can perform critical service updates on the game client and on the game’s network infrastructure, underlying platform systems and so on.

 

Thank you for bringing your concerns to us – we will always listen and do our best to make adjustments when possible, but at this time, we have to move forward with a single global maintenance period.

 

TLDR - "We know it suck and we do really really feel bad for it, and we always listen to our players. But NO WAY (what we just said was only on words)."

P.S. I want to send special greetings to AUS for their new servers that will continue to have maintenance during their prime time indefinitely.

Quote from Community Q&A: March 2nd 2012

 

 

 

TLDR - "We know it suck and we do really really feel bad for it, and we always listen to our players. But NO WAY (what we just said was only on words)."

 

P.S. I want to send special greetings to AUS for their new servers that will continue to have maintenance during their prime time indefinitely.

Well the only other thing they can do is region lock everyone and have separate clients for each region. Instead they chose to have global service with no region locking so that players can choose what ever servers from any region to play on.

You'd think Aussies who play US MMOs should be used to this by now.

And the ones that didn't played US MMOs? Or the ones that still didn't get used?

Well the only other thing they can do is region lock everyone and have separate clients for each region. Instead they chose to have global service with no region locking so that players can choose what ever servers from any region to play on.

And how many prefer to play on other continent servers compared to the ones that want night hours maintenance? You think this is huge gain or?

That does suck for those in other regions besides North America.

But they did say they adjust it according to global playtime's. So if you all can get a bunch of your countrymen (and women) to fill up those servers, and play at opposite times then North America....maybe you all can tip the scale a bit.

And how many prefer to play on other continent servers compared to the ones that want night hours maintenance? You think this is huge gain at small price or?

I know when I was playing WoW, I would have loved to play on the EU servers because I was playing during their peak times, and many of the people I meet during my play time also mentioned how they wished they could play on the EU servers. Considering that only about 20% of the players actually play during their regions peak times, that leaves about 80% of the player base that might have wanted to play on servers that were in their peak time when they are playing.

I'm guessing that there would be more people in the 80% during the 20 hour period each day that would want to play on another regions servers, then there would be of people in the less then 15% who would be playing during the ~4 window for maintenance.

I know when I was playing WoW, I would have loved to play on the EU servers because I was playing during their peak times, and many of the people I meet during my play time also mentioned how they wished they could play on the EU servers. Considering that only about 20% of the players actually play during their regions peak times, that leaves about 80% of the player base that might have wanted to play on servers that were in their peak time when they are playing.

 

I'm guessing that there would be more people in the 80% during the 20 hour period each day that would want to play on another regions servers, then there would be of people in the less then 15% who would be playing during the ~4 window for maintenance.

Where did you get those numbers some dark moist place? I can guarrantee you that more than 20% players play during peak hours otherwise they wouldn't be peak hours.

Where did you get those numbers some dark moist place? I can guarrantee you that more than 20% players play during peak hours otherwise they wouldn't be peak hours.

It was stated by MMO developer as the industry standard in an interview. About 20% play during the peak hours which is a 4 hour window. Then about 80% play somewhere in the other 20 hours of the day. So yes, having about 20% playing in a 20 hour window when the average play time is 4 hours, can still be considered peak since that is when you have the most amount of people concentrated onto 1 set of 4 hours.

You'd think Aussies who play US MMOs should be used to this by now.

Don't know about "Aussies" but we Europeans are used to a higher standard of service then this.

Where did you get those numbers some dark moist place? I can guarrantee you that more than 20% players play during peak hours otherwise they wouldn't be peak hours.

Wanted to show this as well to add my previous statement above

http://www.g4tv.com/thefeed/blog/post/719569/star-wars-the-old-republic-350000-peak-concurrent-users-indicates-a-healthy-mmo-market/

This is about 20% give or take depending how many they sold with in the first 2 weeks, playing during peak times.

Personnally I think they could very easily make a compromise for all regions.

Simply put, a rotation, one week it suits US times, the next Europe and the next Asia/Oceanic, while obviously trying pick times that limit the impact to the other regions as much as they can, but whoever turn it is, it works out best for them that week.

That way they don't have to have 3 seperate maint times each week, but every region gets equal treatment, it may not please everybody, but you would know at least one week out of three you will not be effected that much.

Don't know about "Aussies" but we Europeans are used to a higher standard of service then this.

Well since the Op was complaining about aussie times... here let me revise it for you:

EU/Aussie/Asian players of US based MMO's should be used to having downtime set in a time frame that the significant portion of the player base is not playing.

Personnally I think they could very easily make a compromise for all regions.

 

Simply put, a rotation, one week it suits US times, the next Europe and the next Asia/Oceanic, while obviously trying pick times that limit the impact to the other regions as much as they can, but whoever turn it is, it works out best for them that week.

 

That way they don't have to have 3 seperate maint times each week, but every region gets equal treatment, it may not please everybody, but you would know at least one week out of three you will not be effected that much.

no matter what, it will always effect someones play time. best to choose a standard time where globably there is less people playing. They picked a time where globably there is the least amount of players playing.

Solution is pretty simple. organize a blackout.

If EA thinks they stand to lose money they might just rethink their stupid stance. Because ultimately that's the only language Bioware and EA speak.

no matter what, it will always effect someones play time. best to choose a standard time where globably there is less people playing. They picked a time where globably there is the least amount of players playing.

Well it certainly doesn't work out at all for Aus region, 6:30pm to 10:30 pm or even later when it's longer, that's prime time and for those that work, the only time they can play.

It doesn't effect me as much and I ain't that worried about it as I catch up on things, but it does some people

Solution is pretty simple. organize a blackout.

 

 

 

If EA thinks they stand to lose money they might just rethink their stupid stance. Because ultimately that's the only language Bioware and EA speak.

And what they might just find out is that perhaps most players don't even care. They know maintenance are needed for MMOs and it just so happen to be during their play time 1 time per week, so they just made other plans for that 1 day per week.

I played WoW for 2 years with always missing 1 day per week cause the maintenance always happened during my playing time, and I didn't complain about it, I just either played my other games or did something else not related to gaming. I don't remember hearing complaints from people who played during my time as well in game.

So it is possible that most people are not to worried about it.

I know when I was playing WoW, I would have loved to play on the EU servers because I was playing during their peak times, and many of the people I meet during my play time also mentioned how they wished they could play on the EU servers. Considering that only about 20% of the players actually play during their regions peak times, that leaves about 80% of the player base that might have wanted to play on servers that were in their peak time when they are playing.

 

I'm guessing that there would be more people in the 80% during the 20 hour period each day that would want to play on another regions servers, then there would be of people in the less then 15% who would be playing during the ~4 window for maintenance.

Man start using some reasoning. Peak hours are the hours when most ppl play - simple as that. It doesn't mean that 80% play off peak. How ever you came to this conclusion is totally out of my head. Or you simply think that ppl are stupider and can't get what it means. It only means that not everyone plays everyday. Not that peak hours are the hours when minority play. Having 20% of subscriptions during prime time does not mean that more than 5% will log in the whole rest of the day. And how many of "off-peakers" will actually want to play on other region. And how many have play-time that fall in other continent's prime time and will have better population there. How ever you come with your conclusions is totally out of any reason or at least a bit of thinking in advance.

Simple reasoning tells that the amount of ppl that don't want to schedule their RL to fit SWTOR maintenance will always be times and times greater than ppl that want to play with high ping on other continent servers. No amount of skewed and out of reason numbers and conclusion will ever change this.

Well since the Op was complaining about aussie times... here let me revise it for you:

 

EU/Aussie/Asian players of US based MMO's should be used to having downtime set in a time frame that the significant portion of the player base is not playing.

Not sure there is even a debate here....

their money is just as good (if not better currently) then our currency. BW/EA will cash it all just the same. Why would people in the EU and Aus accept this? If they want to keep taking their money they should treat everyone equally.

and wow someone said to run it at 9 am texas time so the poor employees dont have to work through the night....just simply lol. Im a firefighter and I work 2 nights shifts during my 4 day rotation. I clearly knew what I was getting into before I applied.....

Well since the Op was complaining about aussie times... here let me revise it for you:

 

EU/Aussie/Asian players of US based MMO's should be used to having downtime set in a time frame that the significant portion of the player base is not playing.

You clearly don't know much on the topic you comment.

SWTOR is not US based MMO. Bioware stated many times that this is GLOBAL SERVICE.

Even if its not, its irrelevant where the games is created when their EU branch (Ireland) takes Euros as payment for EU based servers (Ireland). Where the creators of the game live is totally irrelevant for absolutely EU based service that bioware offers and EU plays on. And again to repeat myself in the hopy yo will understand me - when Bioware advertised the game they never ever stated its US based MMO but instead said its OFFICIALY supported in EU with local servers and Customer service.

BTW I don't want to ruin your sense of entitlement but US population is probably around 55% of the total population.

If a server goes down people can still log into other servers.

therefore

If they take a server cluster down then people can still log into other server clusters therefore they can take down US on it's own and other people will still be able to log into other server clusters.

The only problem would be if they patch the client.

I do not see why they cannot perform maintenance at different times for diferent servers as long as they are not updating the client.

Furthermore

To perform maintenance at different times and patch the client would mean the client would have to check it's version when first contacting the server and update or downgrade it's according to what the server required. Would take some programming work but not that hard.

Conclusion (or tl:dr)

We should expect at a minimum different maintenance schedules as long as they are not patching the client.

To say they have to do it because of global service is just bad design.

There seems to me, not much point in continuing this whole maintenance debate. Bioware evidently don't care as much as they've stated they do, and these threads are full of american players telling everyone to stop whinging( with the exception of a few).

If you really really feel so strongly about it, cancel your sub. Make a stand. The game isn't going anywhere, so you can always resub if you can't live without it.

most analysts say most players are in Europe.

meaning most money comes from European players...

now go check the Dollar/Euro ratio. I'll give you a hint: Europeans pay more than US-Americans (yes, we earn more money as well in Germany or France, but the servers are in IRELAND, and Ireland is on the lower end of costs in Europe - surely not as low as some former Sovjet Russia countries, but it's bad enough...)

the bad thing is, though, if the maintenance was during the night in Europe, it would be during definite peak hours in the USA, and I guess the USA is more important than Australia

There seems to me, not much point in continuing this whole maintenance debate. Bioware evidently don't care as much as they've stated they do, and these threads are full of american players telling everyone to stop whinging( with the exception of a few).

If you really really feel so strongly about it, cancel your sub. Make a stand. The game isn't going anywhere, so you can always resub if you can't live without it.

Exactly what I just made. I'll re-sub only if most ppl say that 1.2 Operation are really challenging and with fun and complex mechanics - this is the only thing that can make me play despite current "single player-ish" planet design and lack of respect toward EU customers.