Server Merge

[Alisto]

Galde - I don't know if this is correct, but my best guess is that Calyn is suggesting an option to use loyalty tokens (you get one of the thingies per month) to pay for a character transfer/copy. And even if they're not, I think that's a great idea. There's no way I'm paying 100$ to copy my characters to Chaos, or even just my top five most played. Being able to use loyalty tokens to either eliminate or reduce the cost would go a long way towards solving the issue (for me at least). It's not right (nor profitable) to punish those who actually play because there are super old players holding onto their plots, yet never login.

And you know what I have begun to realise. Minus the people who migrated and are now arguing for merge.. the population on order is pretty much what it has been for the last couple of years. Which tells me you copied or transfered then complain about a situation which you exacerbated.

No, it isn't. Furthermore, the people who did copy/transfer (I only know of Mach's group, keep this in mind) did a LOT for Order in trying to get events together, do epic hunts, and so forth. You are 100% wrong. I know Schwarz has ran several RP events, and Mach has healed/led/whatever a significant amount of hunt groups, not to mention crafting a bunch of stuff for whoever asks when she can. When I did join a group, it was primarily Istara's Chosen members that I saw in there, or friends of that guild who also participated in the hunts/RP.

Now, I COULD comment on my thoughts as to why you didn't actually know the above details - or chose to ignore them - but that'd be making a baseless assumption and I try to avoid those, nor do I know if you've actually logged in with any regularity.

I firmly do not believe a player should have to pay twice, to be able to continue to experience the game content, because the population on one server they chose years ago, is slowly dying out

I second this. If it's between paying a not-insignificant sum of money in order to enjoy the second 'M' in MMO for a game I already pay for vs. just dropping, I'll take the latter option.

Additional Edit: Would any dev care to provide some numbers? In reading the thread, it's been brought up a lot that we don't...actually have any solid numbers on things. If said numbers are available/sharing them is allowed, I'd be very curious to know population numbers over the past years, current number of plots, who has a plot but never logs in, etc.

[LOVWYRM]

at this point-
are we rdy for a conclusion,
how about that?

- Some player of Order want to leave Order because of low pop
they ask for a free or massively price- reduced transfer
(pls Order people: Find out the numer of players.)
The chars, that have that special offer are limited to X
The offer is good for only one direction: Order => Chaos

- noone is forced to leave Order- (those who stay miss the chance of lower/no transfer costs)
and live their lifes there happly- until VI decides other.
there will be NO MERGE.

- Those who come to Chaos look for new plots and lairs there. There are still nice , big plots and lairs available.
They`ll get 100% of novians.
This and the "free" transfer evens out the loss of land on Order

- Those who paid for transfer or copies do NOT complain that others got it for free/or reduced price.
They further do not envy the 100% novians or claim to get all that too.^^

- "Copies" do not have to pay twice - if they decide to live on Chaos.

- all the above is valid for only 6(X) months / or for players that paid more than 2(X) years continually.

- Order shard gets a special info-flag that says interested new players "...insert text.."

- pls add short and precisely what I have missed here.
and pls^^ all agree on that??^^^

We NEED to make compromises- you all know that. This is a new situation- we can`t and should not compare with merges from the past or even other games.
If we make easy to implement, economical suggestions and speak with one voice- chances are good that we are heard.

[LOVWYRM]

ah I forgot:

pls check prices nevertheless.
I read about prices here that do not exsist.!!
150 USD something eg.

If you do not want yout latest hatchioe 5/5 transferred- its not THAT expensive.
To all who do not want to wait for a decision, we do not know when or if its made..

[Starstilanxs]

ah I forgot:

pls check prices nevertheless.
I read about prices here that do not exsist.!!
150 USD something eg.

If you do not want yout latest hatchioe 5/5 transferred- its not THAT expensive.
To all who do not want to wait for a decision, we do not know when or if its made..

I have checked the prices, yes. Idar (Serieth) and I live together. Our finances wouldn't cover the cost of our character transfers, as we have a lot more characters than 5/5.

But, on that same note, I completely agree with your prior post. It is excellent and well written. Thank you, Lov.

[Serieth]

ah I forgot:

pls check prices nevertheless.
I read about prices here that do not exsist.!!
150 USD something eg.

If you do not want yout latest hatchioe 5/5 transferred- its not THAT expensive.
To all who do not want to wait for a decision, we do not know when or if its made..

I have three characters I would want to transferred over, one required with a transfer token. That's 25 dollars. If I transferred three characters, it would be 75 dollars. If I did the same for Stars, it would be another 75 (25+25+25) dollars. I suppose we could supplement that with copy tokens, so it would be 45 (25+10+10)dollars a piece, still 90 total. I would much rather put 90 dollars towards another game, than to dump it on Istaria to play with other people. I've done my math, don't assume I have 5/5 hatchling characters. My characters have a wealth of effort put into them.

Anyways, I would be down with a migration system. I would rather not use my loyalty tokens because I want those for my vault, but I could compromise for that.

Also, Teto, It's because the population is too low at this point. Sars mentioned that future content produced might not be accomplished by Order's low population. For some, that's frustrating when they want to do the group aspects. For others who like to solo, it's not a big deal. I think this thread is steering away from a merge and asking for more of a migration system.

[LOVWYRM]

Serieth- if we do not talk about complete different things- here are the prices I was talking abbout

Char transfer token:

1 char= 24.95 USD
2 char= 34.95 USD
3 char= 44.95 USD
unlimited chars= 99.95 USD

but maybe I missunderstand something you say

and I surely do not assume you have low level chars.. it was more as an example.
And I surely did not talk about you in my post:-)
peace,-)

[Serieth]

Serieth- if we do not talk about complete different things- here are the prices I was talking abbout

Char transfer token:

1 char= 24.95 USD
2 char= 34.95 USD
3 char= 44.95 USD
unlimited chars= 99.95 USD

but maybe I missunderstand something you say

and I surely do not assume you have low level chars.. it was more as an example.
And I surely did not talk about you in my post:-)
peace,-)

I understand. That's still a 90$ minimum cost to transfer both my characters and my partner characters. And that's leaving behind characters that still have a bit of work done in them. I think my argument isn't about the exact amount I would have to spend, but being forced to spend that to play with other people. It all adds up pretty quickly.

However, we have discussed some good ideas about compromising, so hopefully VI will take that into consideration.

[Sarsilas]

The fact that we at VI have not brought up server merges doesn't mean that any discussion on it should be silenced. Concerns are concerns and suggestions are suggestions, which is what this board is for. If you do not like the idea, it's perfectly fine to voice it, but there is no reason to try to silence your peers. Just because the topic has come up does not mean it is inevitable or going to happen any time soon, just like any other suggestion in this forum.

That being said, we currently don't have any plans to fully merge the servers. There are not enough unowned plots on Order to justify consolidating the two servers into one. However, we do hear your concerns and are discussing a plan of action for the future of our Order players that currently feel stuck or unhappy. It is not my place to announce anything related to what we are discussing, but we understand your concerns and we are listening to both sides of the conversation.

For clarification:

• "Pop" in the launcher refers to the maximum population of the server, not the current population. "Good" simply means the server is still accepting connections. However, we are looking to rename this to something less confusing to avoid this in the future.
• Order itself does not cost us very much to keep running, so don't worry about that. When I inquired about it, I was informed that we pay for the servers per database and not per server. Since Order and Chaos share a database, it would be minimal savings to close Order.
• We do not have any sort of list of total players on both servers as of right now nor do I know whether that's information we would be willing to share; it's not my place to decide. However, I can tell you that including invisible players, I have seen approximately 3-20 online on Order at varying times, the higher end only being on Friday evenings. On Chaos, I've seen it range from 40-80. These are only active and online connections and not the entire playerbase, though, and does not include players who own plots but do not log in.

Thank you all for playing Istaria and thank you for being civil.