Incentive to transfer must be increased

[Marluxia]

Said this before and Ill say it again the RP community is its own worst enemy. RP'ers won't move unless their friends and connections move, if their friends and connections don't move then they don't move. So slapping a RP Tag on a server won't do a damn bit of good until the RP community itself puts some fire under its own REAR END and encourages people to move.

The reason RPers are hesitant to move is because an unofficial, fledgeling RP community is incredibly hard to sustain. An "official" designation means that anyone who wants to RP will create a character on that server, guaranteeing some measure of new community members, which is helped by Balmung being closed. The additional acknowledgement and stratification also makes an officially designated server quite appealing to RPers, since Balmung's population problems are because of the lack of organization to begin with, having been created via server merge.

The premise that this is solely the community's responsibility makes the assumption that the community has given the proper tools to enact a smooth transition between worlds, which has been blatantly untrue since people started roleplaying on this game in 1.0.

[NanaWiloh]

The reason RPers are hesitant to move is because an unofficial, fledgeling RP community is incredibly hard to sustain. An "official" designation means that anyone who wants to RP will create a character on that server, guaranteeing some measure of new community members, which is helped by Balmung being closed. The additional acknowledgement and stratification also makes an officially designated server quite appealing to RPers, since Balmung's population problems are because of the lack of organization to begin with, having been created via server merge.

The premise that this is solely the community's responsibility makes the assumption that the community has given the proper tools to enact a smooth transition between worlds, which has been blatantly untrue since people started roleplaying on this game in 1.0.

Making a new character has the same issues as not moving. People won't stay or play long if their friends and connections don't follow. What does the RP community value more a Tag or the Community? A tag is appealing but a already strong community is more appealing. A dedicated RP tag will relieve some of Balmung stress but it is forever the goto RP server no Tag will change that. I played WoW for 6 years and watched Blizzard open new RP servers people still flocked mainly too the most established RP server. I am not againt putting tags on servers just don't expect a mind blowing population shift.

[Marluxia]

Making a new character has the same issues as not moving. People won't stay or play long if their friends and connections don't follow. What does the RP community value more a Tag or the Community? A tag is appealing but a already strong community is more appealing. A dedicated RP tag will relieve some of Balmung stress but it is forever the goto RP server no Tag will change that. I played WoW for 6 years and watched Blizzard open new RP servers people still flocked mainly too the most established RP server. I am not againt putting tags on servers just don't expect a mind blowing population shift.

I've thought of that, which is why part of the proposal to make a new RP server is to keep the transfer-character creation restriction on Balmung for an extended period of time.

As long as the restriction exists, Balmung's RP community is guaranteed to get smaller over time, not bigger, because anyone who leaves Balmung can't return, and new people can't transfer or make characters on Balmung. While this will certainly drive some people to plant their feet and stay on Balmung no matter what, I think most people will gravitate to an open server that doesn't have the restriction. People who feel that Balmung has nothing to offer them or who want to recruit new blood for their FC or group are hamstrung by the restriction, so it would be in their best interests to move to an officially designated RP-server that does not have this restriction.

The purpose of the increased incentives (housing, gil, whatever etc.) is to convince people to move so they don't have to suffer the Balmung Land Rush and 3-hour queue times. The RP-designated tag provides some measure of guarantee that RPers will be on the server, which is a security that people don't have when they think about transferring to Mateus and stuff.

The purpose of the restriction is to make sure the population sticks, by forcing a siphoning Balmung's RP population until Balmung is no longer seen as an accessible RP hub, thus evening out the populations to a more acceptable degree.