I was about to point this very thing out. The raider and pvp community is the most vocal but they are not the population of the game that keeps the lights on. It is the casuals that keep the lights on and if they do not want to move servers they should not be forced to move. Mega servers and server merges only help raiders and pvpers nobody else is helped with it. If those groups want to move so bad there is nothing stopping them from doing it now. 90 cc per toon is not that much. I have not seen any arguments for why there needs to be server merges beyond the crying from raiders and pvpers. Somebody please give me a good reason why I as a casual alt aholic should want a mega server or any server mergers? Yes I group for flashpoints, do pvp from time to time (usually only long enough to get the daily done and when the weekly is done I am done), and occasionally help in a raid when my guild asks. I do not see any reason for somebody like me to want a server merge or a mega server. If you want high populations nothing from stopping you from going to the Harbinger and enjoying their constant server issues.

Why? Because despite your and other posters bias reasoning that it's story/casual players that somehow keep the lights on it's actually players in general.

That is to say there will be people who love the MMO aspect of the game and there will be those that don't. No one side here can outright say "we are the majority cater to us" because you have absolutely nothing to support that view.

In truth there is probably a fairly decent balance between player numbers so if you cater to only one type of player you seem large decreases in number like we've seen since 4.0 (supported by reddit stats, torstatus and anyone with eyes in their head) - the less people playing the less content they are going to have money to develop for you to play.

So moving on from that assuming we want to cater to all player types than to cater to the MMO types we need to ensure they have as many people to play with as possible so they can get groups for whatever content they want to do as a group or just be social in general. The more retention and attraction of those sort of players there are as a result means more money for the game which means more content can be developed for you to play.

So whilst you might not specifically benefit from a merge directly the net result of getting more people hopefully playing and paying will have an on going positive for you in new content development.

If the status quo of post 5.0 remained and we continue to bleed players there just won't be enough justification for new content anymore from an EA perspective and from there it's maintenance mode and you lose out by having nothing new to do.

Gear itself is not the primary goal of PVE and PVP.

 

The reason population is down is because they spent 2 years catering to story only players, and producing content with almost no replay value. Most players here just for story left after finishing the chapters. The people that play the story on repeat are just as much a minority as nightmare raiders and ranked pvpers.

Completely agree. I've never seen the population as decimated as it has been these past few months (noted a small spike for Iokath/Tyth but that's dipped back off) and that's a net result of too long focusing on purely one type of content type and one type of player (and then slapping everyone with GC on the back of it).

The road out of this is long and difficult as no doubt there production budget has been slashed in recent years (the lack of content coming proves this) but the key is catering to as many people as possible which means more story content and more group content and this seems to be the direction which is good.

The problem many fail to realize is all the group content is pointless if you have people coming to give it a go and can't find a group. When this occurs you quickly move on out of boredom as any sort of grind involving group content seems far fetched and unachievable since half your time would be spent looking for groups.

Change that though with say merged servers and groups forming in a few minutes and all of a sudden that experience changes greatly and you've far more reason to continue on playing and paying both for old content and new content (back to the old 2.x days would be lovely and how easily I found groups then and where I spent the most money on this game personally solely because I could do group content easily in with the story content I liked to do). All the while new story content comes out and the story people keep playing and paying as they would regardless of mergers.

I just don't understand why people are so against having more players on their servers. I read some of the comments and think "but this is an MMO, there are supposed to be tons of people around you". Like, everyone has their own preferences to what they like and not sure, but an MMO is meant to be populated.

I understand that people are worried that during a server merge or conversion into a megaserver they could lose what they built up over the years they spent on and in this game. That is a totally valid argument, but I don't think it should be the reason to entirely stop it. It should be a reason for caution from the Devs side to seek out ways to perform a server merge or conversion into a megaserver with as little as damage as is possible.

Also, some goodwill from the playerbase will help the devs in a potential merge. Losing something is never nice but if we stand still and don't budge at all no one will be able to move forward eventually.

Does anyone actually know what is involved in getting cross-server to work? Is it hardware? Software? If software, is it something intrinsic to the game engine, or the server software, or both? (I'm assuming we are hosed if it's intrinsic to the engine.)

I'm not a tech person, so I have no idea what is involved. Maybe it would help the discussion if we actually knew?

I just don't understand why people are so against having more players on their servers. I read some of the comments and think "but this is an MMO, there are supposed to be tons of people around you". Like, everyone has their own preferences to what they like and not sure, but an MMO is meant to be populated.

 

I understand that people are worried that during a server merge or conversion into a megaserver they could lose what they built up over the years they spent on and in this game. That is a totally valid argument, but I don't think it should be the reason to entirely stop it. It should be a reason for caution from the Devs side to seek out ways to perform a server merge or conversion into a megaserver with as little as damage as is possible.

 

Also, some goodwill from the playerbase will help the devs in a potential merge. Losing something is never nice but if we stand still and don't budge at all no one will be able to move forward eventually.

I think that the point is the story people have the most to lose in a merger and they want to be cautious while the group play (or more specifically the LFG and Groupfinder players) have much less to lose and seem to want to rush ahead and merge now. I see no reason why the concerns over mergers (chat, guild assets, personal assets) can't be resolved before we do server mergers. That's really all the story community is asking for (not more content this year, or better drops for GC crates, or even private servers). They just want to play the RPG aspect of the game without the headaches a high server population can bring.

I just don't understand why people are so against having more players on their servers. I read some of the comments and think "but this is an MMO, there are supposed to be tons of people around you". Like, everyone has their own preferences to what they like and not sure, but an MMO is meant to be populated.

 

I understand that people are worried that during a server merge or conversion into a megaserver they could lose what they built up over the years they spent on and in this game. That is a totally valid argument, but I don't think it should be the reason to entirely stop it. It should be a reason for caution from the Devs side to seek out ways to perform a server merge or conversion into a megaserver with as little as damage as is possible.

 

Also, some goodwill from the playerbase will help the devs in a potential merge. Losing something is never nice but if we stand still and don't budge at all no one will be able to move forward eventually.

The problem is some people think a server is dead when it is not. I don't disagree with some of the pvp servers but I will whole heartily disagree when someone tells me Ebon Hawk is dead and I will also whole heartily disagree that we all need on Harbinger. NO Thank you.

That is a totally valid argument' date=' but I don't think it should be the reason to entirely stop it.[/b'] It should be a reason for caution from the Devs side to seek out ways to perform a server merge or conversion into a megaserver with as little as damage as is possible.

The part I bolded is exactly the point though. I have been here since day one, since they first turned on the servers. If they cannot ensure I will not lose anything than they have no business doing server merges. Guilds do not want to have to rebuy guild strongholds and guild ships. Guilds do not want to have to regrind the frameworks to unlock parts on their guild ships. There should be NO server merges until those can be ensured. I have years worth of stuff if they cannot ensure I will not lose my stuff NO server merges. If you want a toxic game environment merge servers and have masses of people lose their guildships, guild strongholds, personal strongholds, legacy names, and character names. Until those issues are resolved NO server merges. Talk to those who had to go through all of that the last time they merged servers, it was a nightmare. Bioware said they would work with those who lost stuff and it was a nightmare. If a guild moves they have to start all over from scratch. No thank you, I will happily stay where I am and enjoy the game as it is right now. I am not against large populations, I am against being forced to move servers when I see no need for it.

OK I got some great ideas, here we go. Of course it should be said that BioWare needs to put systems in place so nothing is lost on migrations and somehow dealing with the whole name thing; like "origin" names, Blooper-Harbinger and Blooper-Shadowlands.

Mega servers, yes! BioWare should rename all current servers to things like "crapper zapper" and "the porcelain throne" and give players the choice, stay on the porcelain throne or join the mega server. Me, I would not stay on the porcelain throne, have to get off it at some point..... bazinga!

Now that that one is out of the way.

Multiple waves of Mega Servers. First wave is for RPers, they get their new mega server "Please Don't Grief Us". Second wave is for an East/West coast Mega server. BioWare sets something up on the forum where in the account settings there's a "Mega Server Migration" tab and checking "yes-East" or "yes-West" will automatically migrate all your characters there when the Megas are created, or be able to choose which ones you want to migrate. Third and final wave is to consolidate the remaining people on current servers to the new and potentially less populated mega server "We Don't Like Playing With Other People".

The RPers should be happy that they still have their own server. The people that like the idea of mega servers in general and those that want better que times should be happy because of increased server population. And the people that like logging in and seeing the planets they're on as ghost towns are happy because nothing really changed for them.

Cross server ques are like putting a band aid on a cut that needs stitches in my opinion so I'm not an advocate of it. But of course what's most likely going to happen is nothing will happen and we'll get more Cartel Market stuff to temporarily placate the masses, that's about par for the course right?

Does anyone actually know what is involved in getting cross-server to work? Is it hardware? Software? If software, is it something intrinsic to the game engine, or the server software, or both? (I'm assuming we are hosed if it's intrinsic to the engine.)

 

I'm not a tech person, so I have no idea what is involved. Maybe it would help the discussion if we actually knew?

I don't know exactly what the server set up for this game is but in general you would have to transfer the data representing the character and his inventory to the destination server and then transfer it back again. You would also need to transfer any ancillary data such as achievements gained back. My understanding of the issue is that there were at least a few occasions where the test character got returned to the wrong server. Its a database update question for the most part. You are adding a character to one database for the duration of the event and then removing it and sending it back to another database (sort of like a character server transfer but a little less complex since you don't need to transfer everything associated with the character to the destination server). The problem with databases is that the bigger they get the more prone to corruption they are. Computer games are notoriously unforgiving of database corruption. the answer to your question I guess would be all of the above: game engine, server architecture (hardware and software)

I just don't understand why people are so against having more players on their servers. I read some of the comments and think "but this is an MMO, there are supposed to be tons of people around you". Like, everyone has their own preferences to what they like and not sure, but an MMO is meant to be populated.

 

I understand that people are worried that during a server merge or conversion into a megaserver they could lose what they built up over the years they spent on and in this game. That is a totally valid argument, but I don't think it should be the reason to entirely stop it. It should be a reason for caution from the Devs side to seek out ways to perform a server merge or conversion into a megaserver with as little as damage as is possible.

 

Also, some goodwill from the playerbase will help the devs in a potential merge. Losing something is never nice but if we stand still and don't budge at all no one will be able to move forward eventually.

You have not been listening to player comments in these threads then.

As it stands currently....guilds literally get destroyed in the process, because in the last mergers done more then 4 years ago.. the studio forced guilds to disband, gather up all their items from cargo and move and reform on the destination server..... and it did not go well for a lot of guilds. The studio has never disclosed any process to address this concern, nor any indication that they are working on a process that keeps guilds whole.

NOW.. TODAY... 4 years later... guilds have a lot more assets to lose in a move unless/until the studio addresses moving guilds intact in any merge operation. When... when the studio addresses this issue, most players won't really care if servers get merged... though some will because some consider name losses to be a big issue for them personally.

TL;DR ----> guild destruction is why.

If you want a toxic game environment merge servers and have masses of people lose their guildships, guild strongholds, personal strongholds, legacy names, and character names. Until those issues are resolved NO server merges. Talk to those who had to go through all of that the last time they merged servers, it was a nightmare.

Guild ships and strongholds didn't exist last merger.

Guild ships and strongholds didn't exist last merger.

AND.. these are guild assets. No ability to move guilds intact = all those assets lost.

Guild ships and strongholds didn't exist last merger.

Exactly my point. There was a lot of anger and lost stuff last time and there is so much more now than there was. People start loosing all of their strongholds and guild ships and it will turn toxic really fast.

I know the rp'ers are deathly afraid of intrusion, but giving them there own server for it seems so needless for such a small amount of them. What if we had the rp instance like the pvp instances on the normal servers, but to transfer from the pve/pvp instance to the rp instance players would have an artificial wait time like 30 to 60 minutes?

Honestly, I don't think they will get griefed all that much to begin with like they claim now, but having a big wait time just to go to that instance would be a turn off to the majority of impatient trolls. And those that it wouldn't dissuade would already be griefing rp'ers on their own server anyway.

OR

Have the rp instance layered like the pvp instance, but only players that create a new character in that instance (selection at creation screen) can be there. The initial server merge would send them to this instance by default.

Exactly my point. There was a lot of anger and lost stuff last time and there is so much more now than there was. People start loosing all of their strongholds and guild ships and it will turn toxic really fast.

and a lot of that anger would be aimed at the PVP and OPs players, fairly or not, that pushed for the merge creating an even worse situation than we have right now. A bad merge would probably be the death of this game at this point.

I know the rp'ers are deathly afraid of intrusion, but giving them there own server for it seems so needless for such a small amount of them. What if we had the rp instance like the pvp instances on the normal servers, but to transfer from the pve/pvp instance to the rp instance players would have an artificial wait time like 30 to 60 minutes?

 

Honestly, I don't think they will get griefed all that much to begin with like they claim now, but having a big wait time just to go to that instance would be a turn off to the majority of impatient trolls. And those that it wouldn't dissuade would already be griefing rp'ers on their own server anyway.

 

OR

 

Have the rp instance layered like the pvp instance, but only players that create a new character in that instance (selection at creation screen) can be there. The initial server merge would send them to this instance by default.

I don't know how many times I have to say this Ebon Hawk is not dead nor do we need to be merged with Harbinger. We are doing fine. There is no reason at all to merge Ebon Hawk.

There is something else I sure in the hell don't want to start over on my command rank again and the way it sounds that is what you would have to do considering your command rank is not legacy wide.

I do realize for those of us who play on multiple servers, we'll need to buy it and transfer a toon (which is cheaper than the cost of the perk) - it's how I personally handle keeping my Legacy current on all servers. There are a number of Perks and Achievements I'd like to see us make account wide, but we haven't fully investigated the effort, so I'll add that our growing list of ideas.

You have not been listening to player comments in these threads then.

 

As it stands currently....guilds literally get destroyed in the process, because in the last mergers done more then 4 years ago.. the studio forced guilds to disband, gather up all their items from cargo and move and reform on the destination server..... and it did not go well for a lot of guilds. The studio has never disclosed any process to address this concern, nor any indication that they are working on a process that keeps guilds whole.

 

NOW.. TODAY... 4 years later... guilds have a lot more assets to lose in a move unless/until the studio addresses moving guilds intact in any merge operation. When... when the studio addresses this issue, most players won't really care if servers get merged... though some will because some consider name losses to be a big issue for them personally.

 

TL;DR ----> guild destruction is why.

Maybe read more of the thread yourself because there are posters who actually seem anti having more players on their server be it because "I like empty server why force me elsewhere?" or "It's RP server nad merging will kill RP".

So it's not ALL about the actual technical issues that are currently known around server merges.

I don't know how many times I have to say this Ebon Hawk is not dead nor do we need to be merged with Harbinger. We are doing fine. There is no reason at all to merge Ebon Hawk.

 

There is something else I sure in the hell don't want to start over on my command rank again and the way it sounds that is what you would have to do considering your command rank is not legacy wide.

 

I do realize for those of us who play on multiple servers, we'll need to buy it and transfer a toon (which is cheaper than the cost of the perk) - it's how I personally handle keeping my Legacy current on all servers. There are a number of Perks and Achievements I'd like to see us make account wide, but we haven't fully investigated the effort, so I'll add that our growing list of ideas.

Well I don't think EH merged to Harb would ever be a good idea until the game is all but dead due to latency issues that would cause to the server's ex players being consumed.

In saying that imagine a EH merge to all east coast servers where you lose nothing and they address the issues around people ruining RP somehow (which is still an issue right now if people so choose to do so on those RP servers) ... if that could be done then server merges are almost a no brainer positive for all concerned.

I normally shy away from forums for various reasons. I find that I need to bring my thoughts to the table and let them be sorted for what they are worth.

I have issues with very low pop servers. I used to be on Jung Ma, and I can honestly say as someone who isn't hardcore about this game anymore and is 99% solo, I don't mind it EXCEPT when I want to do something like flashpoints. For the longest time I dreaded moving to another server for high pop due to the obvious reasons: costume slots reset, my Yavin 4 stronghold won't be there ( not that I'm into strongholds anyway but still this cost me a pretty penny to unlock nearly all the area's), and of course all the other things like cargo slots etc... The ONLY reason I moved a higher pop server was to buy things off the GTN that has not been on Jung Ma in a VERY long time. Once I have everything I need I'll probably be moving back to Jung Ma. I don't like having to wait for spawns and sometimes the solitude in playing missions and such are actually kind of serene. But the point I want to make is I don't think scrapping the servers and forcing those of us who prefer to remain on these low pop servers is a good idea. Unless they plan to reimburse or transfer our strongholds, etc... I really don't relish the idea of redoing everything over again. I just don't have that kind of money anymore. I do think, however, there is an issue that definately needs to be addressed. When I'm on Jung Ma pops for Flashpoints and whatnot are all but non-existant. I read somewhere that there was talk of possibly having cross-server queueing. I'm all for this. It not only allows us to keep our servers, but allows those of us who do like to group every once in a blue moon to have the opportunity to do so without being forced to join a higher pop server, or a mega server as some people are suggesting. I can only hope they come up with a solution that is favorable for the majority of people, especially those of us who prefer to remain on lower pop servers.

Well I don't think EH merged to Harb would ever be a good idea until the game is all but dead due to latency issues that would cause to the server's ex players being consumed.

 

In saying that imagine a EH merge to all east coast servers where you lose nothing and they address the issues around people ruining RP somehow (which is still an issue right now if people so choose to do so on those RP servers) ... if that could be done then server merges are almost a no brainer positive for all concerned.

The problem is that is a big IF. Merging server databases is not like cutting and pasting an excel spreadsheet. There are a lot of things that can go wrong and that is the concern. Imagine if someone said, when you enter this area there is a 99% change you won't lose all your rating 248 gear and you happen to be in the 1% that does. Then someone says, well, don't worry about that you can just re-grind for it. And oh by the way, your command rank was also set to 0 so you have to start at Tier 1 again too. You would be one very unhappy camper wouldn't you.

That is the kind of issue that losing personal assets is. Imagine that multiplied by 100 for guilds. My guild unlocked most of its flagship with the schematics or encryptions (I don't recall which it is) that we got for finishing in the top 10 in Conquest for many months (that is a tremendous amount of work for a relatively small guild). In a merged server situation we would have no chance of repeating that and would have to grind out the billions of credits it would take if the flagship did not transfer. That is just a tiny part of what guilds could lose. Add in guild strongholds expanded with credits and all the decorations in them and the cost to guilds becomes astronomical. That is why story players, who tend to be in guilds, are so afraid of server mergers.

These are issues that could be worked out but as far as anyone knows right now, the problems from the last server merge still exist and are compounded by the vastness of guild assets now.

Gear itself is not the primary goal of PVE and PVP.

 

The reason population is down is because they spent 2 years catering to story only players, and producing content with almost no replay value. Most players here just for story left after finishing the chapters. The people that play the story on repeat are just as much a minority as nightmare raiders and ranked pvpers.

You may believe that story content has no replay value, and that might be true for you, but it's not true for me. Story is the only reason I play this game. I have no use for PVP/OPS/FPS. And I have remained in this game through thick and thin supporting it through my sub and through purchases from the shop, even when things were slow. It wasn't the story people that picked up and jetted off, it was the raiders when they went 2 years without a raid. Gear is their goal and when they were done and there were no new raids to get things they left.

I can't see how you can call story players that are altholics as a minority, where are your numbers? If we are such a minority, then why was it a priority to give more character slots, because we needed them, that's why!

I get that people like their raids and pvp, and I'm not against them getting that. I'm capable of waiting my turn. There was a long span after the vanilla content where there was little to no story, and raiders and pvp got it all. It comes in turns, because it seems they don't have enough staff to keep all the focusses happening and new.

This isn't even the point of this discussion. It doesn't matter, what you love, or what I love. What matters here is that ok, some pvp servers are dead as doornails and some people want more people to play with but won't solve their own problems and are screaming for merges where none are needed.

There are people here who don't play on RP servers and yet stomp their feet demanding they be merged, even though people who play those servers say there is no need. There are people on both Shadowlands, like me and others on JC that actually play there and think there is no need for a merge on those servers at this time or anytime, until they sort out how to transfer people's private and guild assets intact with no loss.

I refuse to lose billions of in game credits and real life US dollars just because people want a queue pop in under 2 minutes....people who won't even give up their 90CC they get free to transfer themselves. They know that they don't want to lose things, and yet they expect everyone else to throw away their assets like nothing. And that's all I have to say about this topic anymore. It's going round and round and accomplishing nothing except arguing with people who don't want to understand that people have things to lose.

If they merge by coast, 66% of people lose their names.

 

Some of those people will quit.

 

So why would they go to all this expense to LOSE SUBS?

 

Whereas XServer queues might even bring people back.

(1) This is actually why I created my merge JC and Shadowlands thread, so people wouldn't keep offering up straw man arguments like these (merging all into two coasts or all into one server). So first let's dispense with the 2 server thing, and let's say Ebon Hawk stays its own server.

(2) Your 66% statistic is made up.

(3) The appeal of a server merge is obvious, it is a game based on group activity, and you can't do those group activities if there are insufficient people for them.

(4) Xserver sounds technically problematic. Sounds harder to do than an actual server merger. It also doesn't solve the problem for operations, as you can't cross queue for HM/NiM operations.

(5) I think the obvious answer is to find a way to alter people's names (with allowable symbols to be put in people's names like *) so that they can be preserved to some extent.

(6) The problem will be mitigated because I'm willing to bet that the vast majority of names in general belong to people who haven't played this game in over 6 months. I used to run an internet discussion forum, and that's kind of how that worked.

I know the rp'ers are deathly afraid of intrusion, but giving them there own server for it seems so needless for such a small amount of them.

How do you figure there are a small amount of RP'ers given that EH is a RP server?

and a lot of that anger would be aimed at the PVP and OPs players, fairly or not, that pushed for the merge creating an even worse situation than we have right now. A bad merge would probably be the death of this game at this point.

Fabricating emo people tearing into each other is silly. So it's obvious then, as with any other human activity, a good job should be done on a server merge.

A bad merge would be as much a death of this game as a bad expansion. There's a risk to doing anything, so is the solution to do as little as possible? Any one of us can be killed if we leave our homes. An airplane engine might fall on you. You could get run over by a car. You might get mugged. So I guess don't leave home then?

I normally shy away from forums for various reasons. I find that I need to bring my thoughts to the table and let them be sorted for what they are worth.

 

I have issues with very low pop servers. I used to be on Jung Ma, and I can honestly say as someone who isn't hardcore about this game anymore and is 99% solo, I don't mind it EXCEPT when I want to do something like flashpoints. For the longest time I dreaded moving to another server for high pop due to the obvious reasons: costume slots reset, my Yavin 4 stronghold won't be there ( not that I'm into strongholds anyway but still this cost me a pretty penny to unlock nearly all the area's), and of course all the other things like cargo slots etc... The ONLY reason I moved a higher pop server was to buy things off the GTN that has not been on Jung Ma in a VERY long time. Once I have everything I need I'll probably be moving back to Jung Ma. I don't like having to wait for spawns and sometimes the solitude in playing missions and such are actually kind of serene. But the point I want to make is I don't think scrapping the servers and forcing those of us who prefer to remain on these low pop servers is a good idea. Unless they plan to reimburse or transfer our strongholds, etc... I really don't relish the idea of redoing everything over again. I just don't have that kind of money anymore. I do think, however, there is an issue that definately needs to be addressed. When I'm on Jung Ma pops for Flashpoints and whatnot are all but non-existant. I read somewhere that there was talk of possibly having cross-server queueing. I'm all for this. It not only allows us to keep our servers, but allows those of us who do like to group every once in a blue moon to have the opportunity to do so without being forced to join a higher pop server, or a mega server as some people are suggesting. I can only hope they come up with a solution that is favorable for the majority of people, especially those of us who prefer to remain on lower pop servers.

If BW finds that the cost of merging them is too high, then on the server selection screen they could label low population servers as such and put them at the bottom of the heap with a nice little dividing line from the remaining 3 American servers: Harb, a JC-SL merge, and Ebon Hawk.

Or if they find that having such low populations servers don't justify the cost of maintaining them, they could merge the low pop servers at BW's convenience. It's not reasonable to expect a company to maintain a server that's operating at single digit capacity.