Looking For More Players On Cerberus.

[Sirmarki]

And also this whole "GO TO ASURA!" thing.... *sigh* you realize you guys are making the problem worse, right? We shouldn't be encouraging everybody to all pile on the same server. Asura already has problems with crowding whenever campaigns come up and during Ambuscade, do we really want to add to the problems? We SHOULD be trying to encourage people to balance the other servers out some..

Not really. People want to go where the action is, and with no sign of mergers happening at this stage - they don't really have a choice. It's that or stare at the Auction House all day.

There are a lot of newbie players on Asura, yes. Obviously with a larger population and the 'recommended place to start' you're going to get that. PL certainly doesn't help the situation.

Trying to encourage people to 'balance the other servers some' will never work in practice. Really, it should not be about us 'working around it'. SE should look at the possible options. Whether or not its merge the smallest populated server to Asura then double up the rest. The problem is with that, is that it will upset a few people due to the fact they have gotten use to playing on their own/with multi-box.

[Aysha]

The problem with trying to mash everybody onto Asura is, again, crowding problems.

The newest content was not designed for high population servers, because other than Asura, we don't HAVE high population servers. I mean, look at how the Apex Camps or even Ambuscade is designed, it's designed assuming there's no more than 50 people at it at any given time (for Ambuscade) and each Apex Camp looks like it could support, at most, 2-3 full groups. Maybe 4-5 if a couple of them were a little slow in pulling, and that's assuming the groups are willing to pull the crap no sane person would want to fight willingly (Matamatas for example).

So trying to glomp everybody into 2-3 mega servers I don't think would really do the game a whole lot of good. Yes, you want endgame options, you want there to be linkshells and you want to have enough people to actually clear content... but yet again, a lot of this stuff was designed around a small number of people doing it at any one time.

[DarkValefor]

I was in Asura for around 6 months and got a lot less done than when I came back to Carbuncle, even tho there were actually shouts, the PUGs I joined in most cases were terrible.

Also people asking for the one specific setup that first beat every monster, people never wanted to try something new, to let me play the jobs I really enjoy, to let me play the game as if it was a Final Fantasy game.

BLU for NMs I can 1-shot as DNC, BLU for almost every UNM, BLU for Reisenjima, even the T1, BLU for Ambuscade.

I feel much more confortable in other servers where people are just willing to try the battles in any available setup, careless they think beforehand they're going to win or not, and actually we get more wins because there's a lot of noob BLUs around.

I also noticed this happened to me more at european times than at late nights but I can't usually play at american times except on weekends.

My whole point is that moving to Asura is not allways the best option.

[Sirmarki]

The problem with trying to mash everybody onto Asura is, again, crowding problems.

The newest content was not designed for high population servers, because other than Asura, we don't HAVE high population servers. I mean, look at how the Apex Camps or even Ambuscade is designed, it's designed assuming there's no more than 50 people at it at any given time (for Ambuscade) and each Apex Camp looks like it could support, at most, 2-3 full groups. Maybe 4-5 if a couple of them were a little slow in pulling, and that's assuming the groups are willing to pull the crap no sane person would want to fight willingly (Matamatas for example).

So trying to glomp everybody into 2-3 mega servers I don't think would really do the game a whole lot of good. Yes, you want endgame options, you want there to be linkshells and you want to have enough people to actually clear content... but yet again, a lot of this stuff was designed around a small number of people doing it at any one time.

Which is why capacity needs to be expanded. Just think of the amount of players online at once time when this game first came around. tens of thousands.

[Aysha]

Which is why capacity needs to be expanded. Just think of the amount of players online at once time when this game first came around. tens of thousands.

Problem is, the areas themselves are more streamlined with less "filler".

There's only so many places you can realistically place these enemies without them getting in the way, or having to make them all non-aggressive (which would make them too easy to camp near).

And it's more than JUST Capacity... again, things like Ambuscade are a problem too.

[Kylos]

Cerberus never has congestion in any content. In fact .. I often have to do /yells to get people to do Domain Invasion, otherwise no one will do it. Ambuscade we rarely have to wait for, unless there's a lot of players soloing. I honestly can't think of any other place where we have to wait to enter. The only reason why CP camps would be congested is the fact SE rarely gives us CP campaigns .. so everyone waits on the campaign and gets it all done then. It's not a matter of server numbers, it's the fact CP campaigns are not frequent enough.

I would like to conduct a yes/no questionnaire for any players who are not currently playing on Asura, Odin, or Bahamut (I assume these have healthy populations). This is more for players on Cerberus, Carbuncle, Shiva (heard it's quiet there too), and other servers which have players facing a similar issue in EU/NA times.

Question 1: Do you feel there are a lack of players at the time you play? (Yes/No)
Question 2: Do you lead an event LS? If yes, do you find it difficult to get players for the events you lead? If no, do you know any event LS who struggle to do events due to lack of players? (Yes/No)
Question 3: Do you encounter severe congestion when doing events? (Yes/No)
Question 4: Do you multi-box? If the answer is yes, do you join other groups for harder content? If no, do you see lots of players multi-boxing on your server? (Yes/No)
Question 5: Have you thought about a server transfer, but have yet to do so (or can't due to other circumstances)? (Yes/No)
Question 6: Do you feel it is unfair to have to pay more money on top of your subscription to get a healthy server with a sustainable population? (Yes/No)
Question 7: If SE wanted to merge your server with another similar server, would you oppose the idea? (Yes/No)

Seven is enough for now. I'd love to hear your feedback. Cheers.

[Shiyo]

As aysha said, telling everyone to just go to asura is just an AWFUL solution. This game, as he said, does NOT support that type of player numbers and nothing is designed with a huge server like asura in mind.

Multiboxing is a pretty decent suggestion, but kinda expensive. However, the "you need multiple computers" excuse makes no sense, how do you need multiple computers to run a game that uses like 150 MB of ram and ps2 graphics card? lol

Question 1: Do you feel there are a lack of players at the time you play? No
Question 2: Do you lead an event LS? If yes, do you find it difficult to get players for the events you lead? If no, do you know any event LS who struggle to do events due to lack of players? No
Question 3: Do you encounter severe congestion when doing events? No
Question 4: Do you multi-box? If the answer is yes, do you join other groups for harder content? If no, do you see lots of players multi-boxing on your server? No Not many multiboxers, I play with a few people but my server has NO shout groups.
Question 5: Have you thought about a server transfer, but have yet to do so (or can't due to other circumstances)? No
Question 6: Do you feel it is unfair to have to pay more money on top of your subscription to get a healthy server with a sustainable population? Yes
Question 7: If SE wanted to merge your server with another similar server, would you oppose the idea? Yes

[DarkValefor]

Question 1: Do you feel there are a lack of players at the time you play?

Yes

Question 2: Do you lead an event LS? If yes, do you find it difficult to get players for the events you lead? If no, do you know any event LS who struggle to do events due to lack of players?

No, but I have a LS who struggle to do events at the time I play, and they allways end up running at 2am or 3am

Question 3: Do you encounter severe congestion when doing events?

No, no congestion at all

Question 4: Do you multi-box? If the answer is yes, do you join other groups for harder content? If no, do you see lots of players multi-boxing on your server?

No

Question 5: Have you thought about a server transfer, but have yet to do so (or can't due to other circumstances)?

Yes, In fact I transfered to Asura, but ended up coming back, I can't stand not being able to play the game how I like because people are way to stubborn. Between struggling finding people and not being able to enjoy the game I choose struggling finding members and playing solo.

Question 6: Do you feel it is unfair to have to pay more money on top of your subscription to get a healthy server with a sustainable population?

Yes, we need a merge like now.

Question 7: If SE wanted to merge your server with another similar server, would you oppose the idea?

No, I approve world merge.

[Sirmarki]

And it's more than JUST Capacity... again, things like Ambuscade are a problem too.

Yep, I meant them too. As in expand the allowed instances. It's more Ambuscade though, because with HTB, you can just go to another zone and fight stuff for stones (as people like to go for mainly in Campaigns).

[Aysha]

Yep, I meant them too. As in expand the allowed instances. It's more Ambuscade though, because with HTB, you can just go to another zone and fight stuff for stones (as people like to go for mainly in Campaigns).

Right, so just like that they can flip a switch an add more instances.

I am not sure if you are aware, but a popular player theory (one I happen to agree with), is that there is one-and-only one Abhaljs-Legion zone with multiple rooms in them, as many rooms as they think the server can handle simultaneously.

Adding more would mean creating another zone, or upgrading the servers.

C'mon now... they won't even give us a community representative and they've shelved pretty much all development on the game, heck they won't even give us the Windows UI that was in beta a long time ago, what makes you think they are going to spend money on upgrading the servers to handle more Ambuscade load? They are very clearly in the 'maintenance mode' where they want to the game to run with as few resources spent on it as possible. They are not interested in trying to entice more players to join up; they just want to keep the current paying ones there as long as possible to get monthly sub fees.