[Balmung] Server Issues, safety, and overcrowding

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Originally Posted by Bourne_Endeavor

According to the November unofficial census, Cactuar posted .41% clears of Creator compared to Balmung's .33%. That's a difference of a meager .8%. So... congratulations? You beat a non-raid focused server. :p

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Amusing that you assumed it was a pissing contest when we openly bash every server, including our own. Confirmation bias on our end is that ninety nine out of one hundred blizzard wizards are Balmunglers. Oh, and the handful of "Ruin" mages I've run across.

I generally don't use Moon Guard as something to aspire to. However, I believe Wyrmrest Accord is not quite as large. That aside, its been a very long time since I played WoW (I quite during Cataclysm). I'm speaking more from what I knew compared to what exists today. Considering WoW Hemorrhaged subs with the failure that was WoD, I couldn't begin to imagine when one server or another became highly populated or not.

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Originally Posted by Vexander

That aside, its been a very long time since I played WoW (I quite during Cataclysm). I'm speaking more from what I knew compared to what exists today.

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You're misremembering. During Cataclysm, they had one guild flirting with top 500 and then almost nothing else above 5000.

Edit - I only stress this point because this WoW server was used as an example of why a large RP server is a good thing, but there's really no basis for this opinion. If anything, it reinforces the opposite--a large RP server is a mediocre thing at best. There comes a point where the best decision is to close the server, even to paid transfers, and offer free transfers off.

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Originally Posted by Harmonea

There comes a point where the best decision is to close the server, even to paid transfers, and offer free transfers off.

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Yoshida wouldn't do this, and SE wouldn't let him do this, since Balmung prints banks, which then print money in the form of transfers in and fantasias.

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Originally Posted by NolLacnala

Yoshida wouldn't do this, and SE wouldn't let him do this, since Balmung prints banks, which then print money in the form of transfers in and fantasias.

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So you posit that people on, say, Faerie don't buy Fantasias? That RPers wouldn't buy them unless they play on Balmung? This reasoning doesn't make any sense to me.

Transfers I'll grant you, but I counter with an unquantified monetary disadvantage: how many people quit the game before they even start because they can't play with their friends? Or quit because they want to both RP and find available housing, or any of the other issues in the OP? Megaservers help no one.

So, as a hypothetical, if every server on the Aether Data Center was merged into a single Mega Server, would you consider that a good thing, or a bad thing? Such a merger would include stacking the Housing Districts so no one loses a home, so say, Gilgamesh does Wards 1-12, Balmung 13-24, Mateus 25-36, etc...

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Originally Posted by Harmonea

So you posit that people on, say, Faerie don't buy Fantasias? That RPers wouldn't buy them unless they play on Balmung? This reasoning doesn't make any sense to me.

Transfers I'll grant you, but I counter with an unquantified monetary disadvantage: how many people quit the game before they even start because they can't play with their friends? Or quit because they want to both RP and find available housing, or any of the other issues in the OP? Megaservers help no one.

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Probalby, but the current money speaks for itself. A dollar today is worth two tomorrow.

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Originally Posted by Vexander

So, as a hypothetical, if every server on the Aether Data Center was merged into a single Mega Server, would you consider that a good thing, or a bad thing?

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I fail to see what this has to do with OP, but I've already answered this question: Megaservers help no one. Surely you understand there are issues of economy, name uniqueness, massive crowding of the cities and overworld re: hunts, large scale FATEs.... There are other games that do this sort of thing (quite well, in fact), but they were designed with systems in mind to compensate for the inherent flaws from the beginning. You can't just smash everything together if it's not designed for that. Megaservers help no one.

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Originally Posted by Harmonea

I fail to see what this has to do with OP, but I've already answered this question: Megaservers help no one. Surely you understand there are issues of economy, name uniqueness, massive crowding of the cities and overworld re: hunts, large scale FATEs.... There are other games that do this sort of thing (quite well, in fact), but they were designed with systems in mind to compensate for the inherent flaws from the beginning. You can't just smash everything together if it's not designed for that. Megaservers help no one.

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Except for the legions of people transferring to the busy servers explicitly for the crowd. Its almost as if people want to be on a big server and theres a vocal minority who are trying to push a de-centralization agenda.....hmmmm

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Originally Posted by Harmonea

I don't even

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I posit nothing. Are you even replying to the right person? Stop reading between lines and jumping to conclusions based on your vacuous, pre-conceived bias.

Here, this will be the first time I have ever written the word "Megaserver." Phew, new words are hard, forgive me.

Bear in mind I am neither defending nor attacking, simply stating fact. Yoshi could very well announce cessation of all in-transfers tomorrow.

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Originally Posted by CookieMonsta

Its almost as if people want to be on a big server and theres a vocal minority who are trying to push a de-centralization agenda.....hmmmm

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Some people want to be on a big server. Some don't. Don't pretend everyone thinks like you, or that anyone who doesn't think like you has some hilariously paranoia-feeding "agenda." You addressed none of my points about the game limitations that prevent megaservers from being a positive and jumped straight to accusations.

OP of this thread is on Balmung pointing out their many issues, and while he may have different solutions in mind, come on, it's clear there are problems. Do you think he has an agenda too?

Now that I've had about 1000% of my RDA for paranoia, back to lurking....

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Originally Posted by Harmonea

So you posit that people on, say, Faerie don't buy Fantasias? That RPers wouldn't buy them unless they play on Balmung? This reasoning doesn't make any sense to me.

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Less others buy/don't buy and more Balmung puts such an emphasis on characters + playing dress up that people fanta like crazy here. I'm already wondering how many people will swap come 4.0 for Ala Mhigo-esque rp :P

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Originally Posted by Harmonea

I fail to see what this has to do with OP, but I've already answered this question: Megaservers help no one. Surely you understand there are issues of economy, name uniqueness, massive crowding of the cities and overworld re: hunts, large scale FATEs.... There are other games that do this sort of thing (quite well, in fact), but they were designed with systems in mind to compensate for the inherent flaws from the beginning. You can't just smash everything together if it's not designed for that. Megaservers help no one.

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Not sure what the economy issues are. Balmung does pretty well. Plenty of stuff on the Market Boards, good prices, etc...
Name Uniqueness isn't very hard given that we has a first name and a surname. There can easily be a hundred Bobs or Sarahs or what have you.
Massive Crowding of the cities isn't a problem either considering there is a setting to reduce the number of players who appear on your screen. Fates scale with participants.

Seems to me like the game is already well adapted to the idea of singular mega servers.

Someone was keeping track at one point the transfers to Balmung were more then some of the dead servers had active. Also except for a few poor design (hunts,diadem,housing) the game is pretty open to a mega server if the hardware could handle it.

You should see Uldah when an event is going on and everyone is logged in and doing the event. Server doesn't melt. The cities could use some touch ups splitting and addig more to decrease load. The biggest problem is the mhor dhonnas and idylshires. They would have to be instanced to get multiple versions, or better yet decentralize the token npcs. Does Rowenas lackeys need to sell gear in one spot?

Now that the forums aren't hating my computer for some odd reason, I can finally post on this.

Hello, my name is Kai, and I started on Balmung shortly after Heavensward dropped.

I also transferred OFF of Balmung quite some time ago for a lot of reasons, all of which are, in my opinion, rather serious problems.

1] The ridiculous amount of ERP and harassment about it. If you haven't encountered this problem, awesome. More power to ya. But I was getting folks trying to poke me for it and getting called a prude when I told them no. And no, I didn't report it, because I'll be honest with the fact that at the time I had VERY little faith in GMs and moderation and folks in power actually doing something about reports because of forum sites I've been on. [tbc in part 2]

[part 2]
2] LAG. omfg LAG. Even with my settings turned down, I lagged a lot. And gods forbid I log out in Mor Dhona or Idyllshire or Ul'dah or Limsa. It literally took me 15 minutes one day for me to actually ZONE INTO LIMSA.
3] People just being ridiculously rude! I've had multiple instances where I'm just minding my own business, both on my main when I had her on Balmung and alts I've since managed to make or transfer on for the sake of friends, and folks will bitch at me, ICly or OOCly, for being in the same damn area as them. Including in MSQ-required areas!
4] The sheer 'exclusiveness' of it. You've managed to get onto the server; you're a special snowflake of awesome! You got a house; how did you manage?! You got an apartment; HOLY CRAP! Honestly? That's BS. Complete and utter BS. The latter two are problems on other servers, too.
[tbc in part 3]

[part 3]
5] Hunts and FATEs. Just...good luck if you want anything that involves Allied Seals, Centurio Seals, or requires a FATE; it'll be dead before you even notice it popped in the shout chat or your map.
6] You're a new player and your friends are on Balmung? Good freakin' luck. Even back when HW dropped, I literally was awake shortly before the maint finished so that I could leap in, just so I could play with the person who finally got me to play the game.

Aside from the housing and apartment issues, I've not had problems on any of the other servers I've played on along these lines. The closest I've come is if I'm zoning into Idyllshire on Sargatanas, it can take a couple minutes on a bad day. But that's it. If it weren't for a few friends who don't have characters anywhere other than Balmung that they play with any regularity, I would honestly delete all my Balmung alts. The server has just left me with a sour taste in my mouth for a long damn time.

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Originally Posted by Bourne_Endeavor

Smaller communities cannot afford to splinter off as easily, hence why most MMOs have only one or two servers dedicated the "unofficial RP server."

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The RP community here is already splintered due to the nature of Balmung being locked and overcrowded to the detriment of other game mechanics. Sure, almost everyone that makes RP an absolute top priority will eventually pony up for a transfer to Balmung, but that is a subset of players interested in RP. The RP community in FFXIV is losing a constant stream of new players by focusing on a locked mega server. Those players are going to start on other servers, put down roots, and likely never go to Balmung. I don't think there is a good solution at this point, since Balmung has established itself and the sentiment of 'don't promote RP on other servers, it will splinter our community!' runs deep here (as you've demonstrated again!). Tagging a medium population server as an RP server might eventually give a chance to form a new RP community outside of Balmung, but it won't be quick and I'm sure the Balmung community will fuss about it. If nothing is done, Balmung will stay locked, and the grand RP community there will be missing out on a steady stream of new players interested in RP. Of course, they probably won't care, since the community is big enough I guess. *shrug* Maybe someday the servers will merge and we'll just have data centers with zone instances, making these server population issues go away.

Sorry to hear you had that experience, Corvidkai. I can't say I've ever been propositioned for ERP but then again, as you can see by the avatar, I have a male character so its a lot less likely to happen. I also tend to dress in non-revealing, non-sexual clothing because it just ruins my immersion and wouldn't be something my character would wear in general. I can't say I've had a problem with Lag on Balmung either. I don't know many people who do. Might depend on where you live I suppose. For the most part the Balmung community I've interacted with have been quite friendly and helpful. I can only remember -1- time I had a bad run of Dun Scaith with some real jerks. The lack of housing is BS, I agree with you there. I've never had a problem doing Hunts or Fates. Party Finder lets you know about Hunt Parties, and Fates don't tend to end that fast. Yes, getting into Balmung is night impossible outside of a paid character transfer. Thank goodness the game isn't alt friendly.

Transfer to Famfrit \(^_^)/ It's pretty quite most of the time... and lonely... but we always have new players and there's usually often housing for sale for 2-7 mil (as of last night I bought a W1 small plot for 3mil)

Sure there are hunters hunting hunts almost immediately but there are also often times big gaps when Noone is hunting at all too.

Limsa only had 30 people last night :o

Balmung and I am guessing Gilgamesh as well. If you have a really old pc/ps3 or questionable internet some zones are hell. A few people I know have created characters on other servers because it takes them over a minute to load into towns or heavy event areas.

This is partially the RP community's fault. SE does not have an RP tag on any server. "We" (going to use We to refer to those who are into RP) did that. We are so heavily invested in that one damn server that it's very difficult to find RP outside of it. What we really need to do is take it upon ourselves LIKE WE DID THE FIRST TIME and choose another, maybe low pop server even, to have as a second RP server. We can't depend on SE to do everything, some things we need to come together ourselves and do. We know there are limitations because of how the game was developed. Work with the system, not against it.

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Originally Posted by Aamalthea

This is partially the RP community's fault. SE does not have an RP tag on any server. "We" (going to use We to refer to those who are into RP) did that. We are so heavily invested in that one damn server that it's very difficult to find RP outside of it. What we really need to do is take it upon ourselves LIKE WE DID THE FIRST TIME and choose another, maybe low pop server even, to have as a second RP server. We can't depend on SE to do everything, some things we need to come together ourselves and do. We know there are limitations because of how the game was developed. Work with the system, not against it.

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Like I mentioned earlier, it has been tried multiple times. Very few people want to be apart of building an entirely separate community when a massive alternative exists since it's a somewhat thankless job.

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Originally Posted by Rinari

The RP community here is already splintered due to the nature of Balmung being locked and overcrowded to the detriment of other game mechanics. Sure, almost everyone that makes RP an absolute top priority will eventually pony up for a transfer to Balmung, but that is a subset of players interested in RP. The RP community in FFXIV is losing a constant stream of new players by focusing on a locked mega server. Those players are going to start on other servers, put down roots, and likely never go to Balmung. I don't think there is a good solution at this point, since Balmung has established itself and the sentiment of 'don't promote RP on other servers, it will splinter our community!' runs deep here (as you've demonstrated again!). Tagging a medium population server as an RP server might eventually give a chance to form a new RP community outside of Balmung, but it won't be quick and I'm sure the Balmung community will fuss about it. If nothing is done, Balmung will stay locked, and the grand RP community there will be missing out on a steady stream of new players interested in RP. Of course, they probably won't care, since the community is big enough I guess. *shrug* Maybe someday the servers will merge and we'll just have data centers with zone instances, making these server population issues go away.

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Mayhaps it would, but like I said, Gilgamesh actually managed a decently sized RP community only to inevitably be cannibalized by Balmung. No one fussed over it nor would most Balmungian's care if there were another server. I just don't see it working because the majority of roleplayers gravitate towards the largest communities. Would I like to be proven wrong? Absolutely. Not having to pay a transfer fee to get more RP options would be nice for people. I just think it'll go the same route we've already seen.