dear Chaos People

[LOVWYRM]

I want to ask you for something:
Please do not discuss (in market) about the advantages of a server- merge,
about shutting down Order and Blight-
esp. not, if people who have their mains on Order are there.
And why? Because it hurts.
As I said in 1000 threads before: Playing on Order is another gaming,
not to compare with Chaos. Not better- not worse- different.
And people stay on Order for their own good reasons.
And its not only because of the plots or the costs for a transfer.
As I said in market yesterday: Every shard has a right to exsist.
Every player has the right to play where he/she wants to play.
Having only one server would weaken Istaria as a whole.

Do not get me wrong- I transfered my mains to Chaos recently, yes.
And its not that I do not feel as a part of Chaos community.
And thank you for the warm welcome and support. You made it easy for us to settle in.
But if you never played on Order - you might not know what people make want to stay,
keep their server alife- against all odds.

Thank you for listening

Flame and me wish you all
a blessed, happy, healthy NEW YEAR

[Racktor]

They started talking about it because it was being argued about in Discord... by Order players who support a merge.

Don't blame Chaos.

Also, I mean this in the nicest way possible, but you have no right to tell people what they can or cannot say. If they want to voice their opinions for a merge, they have just as much right as you do to voice your opinions against a merge.

[Machaeon]

A merge was brought up by Order players... because Order is so empty despite the double xp going on. And even though there IS a significant population boost now, we know enough to realize that the population on Order in particular will drop again once it's over to numbers that make dealing with endgame content more challenging than it should be or outright impossible. It took us several failed attempts over at least a month to go after Surtheim because pretty much all of us were double or triple logging to even be able to handle him for example.

What was discussed also didn't mean shutting down Blight, Blight is necessary still as a testing shard and as things are on both Chaos and Order, RP happens. More or less rarely depending on where you look and who's online, but it happens in both places so it's not like Order serves a singular function that can't be done elsewhere. And yes plots are a huge issue that would have to be resolved.

[Theeda Novelia]

Please do not blame Chaos if you do not know the full story! The Discord chat was a mess, it was Order players who brought it up and kept it going for awhile. Not that that's bad or anything, of course, just that know it wasn't Chaos trying to be mean or pick fights.

[Azath]

Plus some of those on chaos (such as myself) moved from maining on order to maining on chaos because of the low population - and in that conversation in MP i know for sure at least two who do/had mained on order for a long time were in the discussion. Some of us in that were well aware of how much it hurts (but being an EU player I for sure know why such conversations are becoming a necessity - the last 5 epic hunts on order, one of which was an impromptu raid, happened between 12am-5am for EU timezones)

When over a third of order's active population is in favour of a merge, and even more so of different solutions to the population problem to happen as soon as possible we cannot ignore these conversations because of sad feelings - though you are free to not participate, or ignore or temporarily leave chatrooms where discussion is happening. People are leaving the game because of order's low population.

In the next few months discussion of solutions - merge, free transfers, instance servers - will become more frequent. A large part of order is tired of staying in order, and worried about the future of the game/and order server if they leave - some of these will become the players who leave istaria outright, those who do not have enough money for incredibly expensive transfer tokens but no longer wish to play due low population.

[LOVWYRM]

I really apologize that my words came out so wrong,
I really did not mean to blame Chaos people- I am one of you!
I should have said: Handle the issue with empathy.
I had my reasons.
And yesterday e. g. I had the feeling that some felt forced themselves onto the defensive.

Obviersly I have complete wrong informations
about the number of players at prime time,
and that the majority of Order players support a merge. My bad.

edit: Lexia- I have no personal interest if there is a merge. I live on Chaos now.
And my feelings aren`t hurt by those discussions. Just saying..

[Dracaena]

I have to wonder where the "third of the active players" on order number comes from. Perhaps the players in discord that but is by no means all of us. Dangerous to throw around numbers like that. I lived through the server merge years ago, I don't wish that on anyone.

[Azath]

I have to wonder where the "third of the active players" on order number comes from. Perhaps the players in discord that but is by no means all of us. Dangerous to throw around numbers like that. I lived through the server merge years ago, I don't wish that on anyone.

The server merge many years ago was a completely different situation than the one that is being called for - years ago, from what i can tell, it was the merging of relatively packed servers together with little consideration for plot ownerships. The suggestion is merging a dying server for which as much plot retainment as possible must be done. I'm not sure what the reason for the previous merge was, but it is not from a server population so low it's damaging the game.

And i take that from an average of 15-25 (15-30 uncommonly) players during double exp, less than 20 average outside of major events, and i know more than 8 active order people in favour of a merge. xD Which is just under a third for event active (the months of december to february, roughly) and over a third for normal times of the year (every other month.)
*and that player count includes all of the visible jstns, dual loggers etc which more than balances out the relatively few invisble people on player search. there is often less individuals on than player search suggests as a lot of order dual logs.

Granted, it is currently just an idea - to be discussed in depth elsewhere (imo- it's a massive debate that deserves it's own thread in the future when order's event population surge dies and it goes back to rarely hitting above 20 players per day, sometimes not even reaching 15 at peak times with less than half of that able to t6 content. Additionally 3 solutions - merge, free/cheaper transfers, instance servers - have been suggested to my knowledge. A merge is, in the opinions of some, the best of those 3 things especially as instance servers requires a dev telling us whether it is literally, technically possible to do- if it isn't there's only two options. I've seen a lot arguements made that hold little weight to them being thrown around and some points being totally ignored in game/discord because..it's fast. there are a number of things i and others have to say on the subject from both sides of the fence but a fast paced discord chat, and this thread, isn't the place to do it ideally xD granted I derailed this myself, so whoops.)

[Malicore]

They started talking about it because it was being argued about in Discord... by Order players who support a merge.

Don't blame Chaos.

Also, I mean this in the nicest way possible, but you have no right to tell people what they can or cannot say. If they want to voice their opinions for a merge, they have just as much right as you do to voice your opinions against a merge.

She was asking.. not trying to "tell" them what to say. you misinterpreted what she wrote

[Lillyjo]

I have been on Chaos with this toon since the merge, I just happened to be a shard that was place on chaos, my original toon was on a different shard then lillyjo and was placed on order, the server was small and offensive if you didn't use role play, so I worked on my characters that I had from the other shard I was placed on after the merge. I have almost always found Chaos much friendlier then Order, and much more inviting to players and helpful to new ones. but that is me and my opinion. thanks Lillyjo.

[Dacurly]

I had a thought reading this today (probably not possible, but I will put it out there anyways), I was thinking if there was a way to set up a special portal from one Shard to the other. Maybe this has been thought of before and its just wishful thinking. Could have special restrictions, but if its not possible this idea is out the window anyways.

[Solarrian]

That would solve most of the problems outside of char naming issues it think, if that could be done. It would be instancing but on a large scale, but with both servers having the same layout I would think it could be possible. That would allow either server to host events and be able to count on some from the other server joining in if they wish.

[Azath]

...I was thinking if there was a way to set up a special portal from one Shard to the other. Maybe this has been thought of before and its just wishful thinking...

...especially as instance servers requires a dev telling us whether it is literally, technically possible to do- if it isn't there's only two options...

That is essentially instanced servers (being able to freely travel between servers easily in some way with no cost of any sort aside differences in player owned property associated ((a cost in the form of being unable to access some storages)), it seems to be the most desirable option of all but also may be the most difficult to do- if it is a possible solution then I imagine it is the solution that would be pushed for instead.

[Slimey]

I play with 5 to 6 average players on my chat channel. None of us want to move but we are all bi-peds. Seems to be a dragon problem. Even though on Order, we do not RP on this chat either. Slimey on Order

[Romirez]

just for the record i do not want a merge. i'm quite partial to Order, been there for 11 years. what the game honestly needs is something to reinvigorate it, not a server merge.


every game i saw merge their servers died shortly after. good example: Navyfield. also, Chaos and Order have two totally different atmospheres, as was said before.

[neva]

I am... 50/50 on this honestly.
Order has been my home since I've joined this game, ye long days ago when people were rping their characters talking about the shards they once came from, when the major merger happened to only have the 3. I love Roleplay, even though I don't do roleplay as much as I once did, because it has been a bit broken out of me by the mass community who play MMOs like any video game.

So, I do love Order. Yes, however, I also can see the other side of the argument, even if not something I like. New players may come to Istaria and if they know their favorite youtuber or twitch streamer is on Order, that is where they will go, but if Order is not even active or willing to place on the face of activity, then these players wonder why they even came here; As in Istaria itself.

If the severs were merged, you would have a higher population, yes, BUT then you mix roleplayers in (who these days are a small minority) with the non-roleplayers and that... That can create interesting culture clashes and massive drama spills. WHICH... Is also not healthy.

You then have to wonder which is worse... The lack of sight of active players on Order giving Istaria a possible "dead" look to new eyes or a sudden, possible toxic drama outlash between two cultures.

I love this game and while I don't play it often... rarely even... I support this game. I support it. I give it money. I stream it over on twitch and place those videos up on youtube. I speak highly of its history and of its people. I speak highly of the staff and jokingly call this the game of the Phoenix.

So, I tend to fear both outcomes and even I am not really sure which is worse. If anything... I fear the day we all get a notice saying Istaria is going to shutdown... And I don't want to ever see that notice.

[Racktor]

I spent about 3 hours arguing about this on Discord so I'm not about to delve into another discourse now as I know it won't go anywhere (it's way too polarizing of a topic atm) but I do want to say one thing here...

If the severs were merged, you would have a higher population, yes, BUT then you mix roleplayers in (who these days are a small minority) with the non-roleplayers and that... That can create interesting culture clashes and massive drama spills. WHICH... Is also not healthy.

You then have to wonder which is worse... The lack of sight of active players on Order giving Istaria a possible "dead" look to new eyes or a sudden, possible toxic drama outlash between two cultures.

I think everyone is highly overestimating both
a) the amount of random RP on Order that normal Chaos players would even see if it were to happen on their server
b) how different RPers and non-RPers are

For a, I have not seen any random public RP between people who do not previously know each other or OOCly agreed upon it in many years. Yes, this is my personal experience, so it likely has happened, but do note I play very similarly to the average Chaos player (and again, Chaos players aren't very different from Order players, we're all people, but I digress). I fly around killing mobs, turning in quests, idle on roofs when I'm not paying attention, sit in NT if I'm bored and have nothing to do (though NT is empty so I tend to sit in Chic so it's at least pretty around me in the silence, lol). Doing this, I have seen nothing. Zip. Zilch. Nada. The only thing I noticed is Kaliuga, Mithent, Narith, and/or Azayan sitting in Chiconis and doing their own RPs over by one of the portals but, again, these people know each other.

If I ran up to someone on Order who I did not know and tried to RP with them, I am very confident that they would write a short excusing post in reply and zip off to doing something else.

There's quite literally only one person I know of on Order who is active that is constantly in-character. Marketplace is always OOC. Dragon chat is usually OOC. New Player has been a mix of IC/OOC lately, but was previously dead or entirely OOC.

99% of RP I have seen and/or participated in has been in the designated Role-Play channel. And you know what? There's a player-made one on Chaos, too. I know multiple people on Chaos who RP. You would be meeting more RPers from a merge, funnily enough! When I started an RP on the Istaria Discord, it was 2 Order people including myself and one Chaos player. Another Chaos player wanted to join but got pulled away by her family.

As for b, we really aren't that different. We are all players of Istaria. You aren't going to log onto Chaos and get attacked because you're an RPer or an Order player. That's not how the world works. Chaos and Order gets along just fine in casual conversation and interaction - the only issue I've ever seen between the two nowadays is outdated stereotypes ("Order is an extremely strict RP-only server, god forbid you say a single OOC word!!!!" and "Chaos is a huge drama fest of 12 year olds who have no idea how to play the game and are all PLed!!!!"). The average crowd of both servers doesn't really care where you come from, they only care if you're a good apple or a bad apple.

When the merge was argued in Discord, some Chaos players were upset that some Order players assumed they wouldn't be able to detect when someone was role-playing. They argued that it's just fine if people RP and they'd be able to detect it. They know what RP is, they just don't do it; it's not their cup of tea. Saying there's a huge different 'culture' between the two is saying that you can't be friends if you play a game on Xbox while someone else plays it on PS4 despite cross-platform multiplayer. It's a weird idea.

The only big "Chaos v Order" issues that would arise if a merge occurred is if some Order players tried to sit in NT and role-play amidst the usual Chaos crowd, demanding them to use brackets or move if they didn't want to participate. That's a generally unfair situation and a bad move by the Order crowd if it were to happen. The reverse is true too - Order players trying to RP somewhere out of the way only to be crashed into by a Chaos player who refuses to respect that they were there first. Again, a bad move by the Chaos player and a generally unfair situation - not something that's going to happen literally everywhere and every time.

We are all Istarians.
We all play the same game.

[Teto Frum]

Since every time I log in to play I get questioned about a possible merge I'll add what I think here in the hopes I can discuss it less during my limited play-time. I assume the fact that three guild-mates and two other close friends recently moved to Chaos is what is driving the curiosity.

My preference? Stay on Order. While merging would definitely save me money by not needing to hold multiple plots, currently two for our guild and one other that the shard needs. So a merge would allow me to drop two subs(I still don't have one sub worth of characters) by reducing the plots I need to carry. That is not enough motivation for me.

As players I don't see why everyone is so concerned about it. If VI says they want to merge than I will I give it more thought. I have not seen anything from VI saying it is necessary or even being contemplated. I am not sure there will even be any savings from it. Almost everyone I know carries multiple subs for plot owning reasons. Increased population makes needing to hold multiple plots unnecessary.

When you add together those that will leave if forced to merge and those of us that would go from multiple subs to one. Are we even sure there is net positive dollar figure to be gained by a forced merge? I am not so sure.

[Beryl]

To be completely candid and perhaps even a little blunt, I would love to see server merges for the simple fact that the lack of economy and/or access to it is slowly frustrating me to the point of maybe taking a break (already!!).

The game was created to have much higher population than it does at present.
All sieves, economy, and in-game merchants are tailored to this end.
All mechanics and systems are tailored to this end.
And it's all grand when you have 500-1500 people on a server/shard any given 24 hour period.

We definitely don't have that and it means:

- Consigners are woefully empty.

- Attempting to make money by gathering/selling resources is an utter waste of time.

- Drop rates on needed upgrades (i.e., scales in particular but also primal techs it seems) is frustratingly low.

- No one is selling/trading in market channel. (I'm thankful for those who offer to make them for me, but it doesn't change that I cannot make them for myself and, to the extent that these are not supposed to be "rare" - expert formulas, scales, techs - they sure do refuse to show up!)

If we had a higher concentration of players, the likelihood that economy could actually function would go up by more than a little.

And since it doesn't seem there's any leeway on tuning things a bit for the reality of population levels, a merger would be an excellent way to kickstart the economy.

Mind you, I started life on Dawn and it was long gone when I returned. It, too, was a roleplaying server... so I "get" the whole "my life is here" thing.

That said, things change... I'd much rather see a single, healthy server than multiple languishing ones.

My $0.02 worth, your valuation may differ (and I'll be ok with that!).