Are multi-box players delaying server merges?

[Diavolo]

No, you still have a choice. You can still group. Now you're just not forced to find a group for every single thing you do. I was a red mage at a time when you just had to pop on the server and get invites because 'every' group had to have a red mage. Sadly, the cookie cutter job mentality may be the biggest problem FFXI has. I remember how bad it was for the jobs that weren't tank, healer, refresher. I nostalgically miss the old days, but it doesn't mean it was perfect. If it were, people wouldn't have gotten so burnt out and left.

The irony here is that your point was that more choice is good, yet we're in a thread about server merges where that point is being shot down. More people open up more possibilities. More linkshells, more parties, more jobs of every kind, more crafters, a more active economy, more reasons for the dev team to expand Ambuscade past just the one zone and return to creating content for an open world rather than "instanced" content that isn't instanced at all.

People saw how bad the Ambuscade wait times were when it was first introduced and they don't want to go back to that again because, sadly, it has become the most popular part of the game. I've seen people play as many as seven characters at the same time so they can obtain their REM weapons as fast as possible. Do you honestly think those types of people care about healthy servers? Actual people would get in their way, slowing down their progress so they're all against the idea of larger server populations, nevermind the fact they could use those seven characters to make gil by other means and just buy their weapons instead. Everyone just wants things their way, screw everyone else, which isn't far off from what you said a couple of posts up. How about we all go back to wanting things the way they were meant to be: "Enter an online community of thousands of players from the US and Japan"

[detlef]

Multi-boxing also makes things possible that would otherwise not happen at all. 2-3 people can tackle a lot more content when you have a pocket healer/support.

[Diavolo]

Multi-boxing also makes things possible that would otherwise not happen at all. 2-3 people can tackle a lot more content when you have a pocket healer/support.

Why wouldn't those things happen at all? Why not bring an actual person to play support/healer instead of a dual-boxed account?

[detlef]

Why wouldn't those things happen at all? Why not bring an actual person to play support/healer instead of a dual-boxed account?

Are you always able to find a player on the right job at the right time who is interested in the event you want to do?

[Diavolo]

Are you always able to find a player on the right job at the right time who is interested in the event you want to do?

It's easy enough on a server like Asura. It would be even easier if people stopped playing into that "less is more" mentality, giving the dev team the impression that peak server sizes of 250 to 800 accounts aren't just acceptable, but preferred.

[Vae]

It's easy enough on a server like Asura. It would be even easier if people stopped playing into that "less is more" mentality, giving the dev team the impression that peak server sizes of 250 to 800 accounts aren't just acceptable, but preferred.

If the game had standards, that'd work. You can't count on randoms sometimes, they're just plan bad. The game needs a way to verify you're at least capable of performing at a tolerable level.

Yes, that's unfair, but if every event I ever did took an extra 5 minutes cause one player was bad, I'd have lost an EXTRA year of my life on this.

[detlef]

I don't play on Asura. I've heard there are other people who also don't play on Asura. If they are unhappy with the state of the game, I suppose these people could transfer to Asura and have their problems completely solved as you say, but maybe they don't view the game exactly as you do. Well I'm sure they'll do what's best for them.

Oh, and could you please outline the "less is more" mentality in greater detail? I think you're going to blame the mentality solely on the playerbase and I'd love to see you do that. Please follow that up by explaining how the players are the reason why server merges haven't happened yet. In the meantime, I will do my best to get by on my Podunk server.

[Diavolo]

If the game had standards, that'd work. You can't count on randoms sometimes, they're just plan bad. The game needs a way to verify you're at least capable of performing at a tolerable level.

Yes, that's unfair, but if every event I ever did took an extra 5 minutes cause one player was bad, I'd have lost an EXTRA year of my life on this.

Join a linkshell or create one that's made up of players that meet your standards? I can't imagine that's asking for much, which is why I tend to believe you'd stick to multiboxing regardless of whether or not the requisite number and quality of players were around for you to pool from. You don't have to share with a second account. I'm not sure why people are afraid to fess up to this. I've done it plenty of times myself and I'm not going to pretend it's because there weren't decent players around to help me.

I don't play on Asura. I've heard there are other people who also don't play on Asura. If they are unhappy with the state of the game, I suppose these people could transfer to Asura and have their problems completely solved as you say, but maybe they don't view the game exactly as you do. Well I'm sure they'll do what's best for them.

I didn't say moving servers would solve everyone's problems, that's ridiculous and you know it.

You present the idea that a party of 2-3 people can tackle a lot more content with a dual boxed account tagging along in a support/healing job which implies a number of things, including the possibility that you find it difficult to put together a competent party of 3-4 players on your server. If that's the case, why is it so?

Oh, and could you please outline the "less is more" mentality in greater detail? I think you're going to blame the mentality solely on the playerbase and I'd love to see you do that. Please follow that up by explaining how the players are the reason why server merges haven't happened yet. In the meantime, I will do my best to get by on my Podunk server.

Well, now that I've wiped the sarcasm off my screen... it's right there in the first reply to the OP. The blame goes both ways or are you suggesting that's not the case?

These games are run like businesses and, like most businesses, if the customers are unhappy with the product the developers can choose to do something about it or not. The developers behind the game, at some point, became far more receptive to customer feedback, hence the creation of these forums and the staff's (albeit limited) participation. They probably don't pay much attention to other forums, but they do read what goes on here and let me tell you, if I was on the development team and I made my decisions based off the feedback received here there isn't a chance in hell I'd want to go to the trouble of merging servers either - there's too much push back against it. In a perfect world everyone playing the game would make their voices heard here and you could say, without a shadow of a doubt, whether or not the existing subscribers would tolerate server merges, as well as whether or not the larger server(s) would draw back both old and new customers, but that's not the case, not even close. So here we are, using personal preference to argue for/against server merges, some of us wanting the game to go back to being the large scale, challenging open world it once was and others preferring it stays small/easy.

I hated the idea of paying a monthly subscription fee to play an MMORPG with thousands of other people, but I gave it a chance and fell in love with it back in 2004. I've seen my server go from supporting over 8,000 simultaneous accounts down to a pitiful 250, forcing me to move because I want to be part of something more than a ghost town. There are probably a decent amount of newer players among us that didn't ask for that, who enjoy playing in solitude or with a small group of friends on a quieter server, but I'm just not one of them. In this case, bigger is definitely better - a-holes, crowded CP camps, overflowing auction houses and everything that may come with it. Variety, inherent with larger populations, keeps things interesting, so I'll keep pushing for server merges even now that I'm on Asura.

[kylani]

Multi-boxing also makes things possible that would otherwise not happen at all. 2-3 people can tackle a lot more content when you have a pocket healer/support.

It actually helps with quite a bit. I never really understood the allure of multi-boxing till we had a fellow in our linkshell with a pocket WHM. He was a fun and helpful guy, always willing to join in and help others. He pulled out his other account when needed, and it was very helpful with farming items for our ls members. Nowadays, it may be easy to farm umbral marrows, but back when we farmed them for members who needed them, it took a bit of effort. We had 8 with his pocket whm, and it was pretty helpful to put his WHM in the alliance as an extra healer. I'd change groups after singing songs to join his WHM, so while he helped heal, I balladed him to keep his mana up and helped with what I could. Even for events that were popular when we shouted for members like Delve and Voidwatch, his whm would help when there was room in one of the groups. I can think of many events he made better by being so flexible.

I wouldn't want to go thru the hassle, but I can understand folks who do. It certainly was very nice having him in our ls.

[Nyarlko]

Multi-boxing also makes things possible that would otherwise not happen at all. 2-3 people can tackle a lot more content when you have a pocket healer/support.

^ I agree.

The addition of a dualboxed BLM cuts my old soloing times as BST by more than 1/2, and they weren't overly long to begin with. For stuff that is magic resistant, I switch the alt to GEO and cut my times by more than 1/2 by neutering the mob and switching to a physical damage trust team. My soloing go-to/default strategy is Patrick-Fusion > Fire MB from trusts. Replacing a trust w/ a real BLM or GEO allows me to safely/reliably/quickly run other players thru Escha-Zitah T1s on a single radialens. Downside where?
I've done this many times for newer ls members to get them a starting foundation for vorseals and hopefully pick up at least a couple of useful drops for them along the way. Just because I like to help newbies. Dual-boxing has made it even easier to help. Again, downside where?

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The impression I got from the AMA was not that server merges are not happening because of account numbers, but because there hasn't been a widespread enough crying out from the player base in favor of them. If what the devs are hearing is not "Server merge my server please!" from a large chunk of that server's population, then they probably aren't likely to do one, citing the "If it Ain't Broke..." concept.