Locking Balmung/Gilgamesh is not working

[Rokke]

I'm not trying to claim that's not the case, as I mentioned in the latter half of that post--just if there being "empty" servers was actually an issue as one person was alleging as a reason against creating an RP server, merges could be an obvious solution. If the servers aren't empty, so be it! That was never my claim and never my argument.

If anything some of those JP servers might be on the chopping block should SE decide server merges to be a thing. So many 6-7k populations :0

For RP on Aether, Mateus seems to be growing like a weed. It being sold as the new RP server feels like its become semi common knowledge amongst rp sites/reddit/tumblr/here in the forums. That said, I wouldn’t mind an officially tagged RP server (though Im not moving till they force me to lol) but I'd be against it if it came at the expense of merges or splits.

[Kazgrel]

The locks are still a necessary evil. I started on Goblin, but after playing for a month or so and deciding this would be my MMO of choice, I moved to Balmung because the friend that recruited me to play the game had friends and FC there. Played all of HW while there, basically. We all decided to take the free transfers during SB early access due to the 2+ hour log in queue that plagued Balmung (among other servers) at the time. Part of me didn't want to move, but since then, I've been able to get 2 more folks I know to give the game a try; had I remained on Balmung, they would've never bothered (since they couldn't join me there). Here we are 4 months later and I can say we don't regret the move one bit...and yes, we did have to leave a FC house behind, so it wasn't like we left nothing but contacts/friends. SE is wanting more examples like what my FC and I went through...easier said than done, of course.

[Alien_Gamer]

The lockout is there for a reason, to stop Balmung from imploding, literally. The server was so big the hardware was having trouble handling it so SE needed to put a stop to it. Closing the inflow of new characters was one step, incentivizing leaving is the second and its been working; Balmung has shrunk a little and other servers are bigger now but its not enough for Balmung to be in a healthy state at the SERVER level. Until it shrinks to where SE is comfortable with it Balmung will remain closed. If you don't like that its closed then move because you're part of the problem with the server. Its a simple choice: stay with a full server and not see new characters or move to a new server, both have their consequences.

Making an RP tag doesn't solve anything, it only recreates the problem. Players created the unofficial RP tag for Balmung and everyone flocked to it and now its locked. Players made Mateus a second RP server and players flocked to that and now its closed. If SE creates an official RP server what do you think is going to happen? People will flock to it until it gets full and closed and then you'll do what? Complain its closed just like you're doing with Balmung and demand another RP server? The problem is players trying to all consolidate on one server, you need to spread out and establish RP communities on multiple servers and put the effort into making them grow then you won't have this problem of stacking on a server and forcing SE to close it. SE can't force this fix, this needs to come from the people voluntarily spreading out.

[BigRed5392]

If anything some of those JP servers might be on the chopping block should SE decide server merges to be a thing. So many 6-7k populations :0

For RP on Aether, Mateus seems to be growing like a weed. It being sold as the new RP server feels like its become semi common knowledge amongst rp sites/reddit/tumblr/here in the forums. That said, I wouldn’t mind an officially tagged RP server (though Im not moving till they force me to lol) but I'd be against it if it came at the expense of merges or splits.

6-7K servers are normal for them. 14K+ servers are abnormal.

ff11 servers were 4-5K ppl across a 500K population.

also korea servers try to do a merge, they found it nearly impossble due to the way housing works.

[ElHeggunte]

No one wants a big server.

Where are you getting this?

Well what on earth do you think is going to happen if SE were to make an "official" RP server? Either you expect most RPers to rush to it, which will wind up causing another unsustainable mess that will just be locked again in short order or you don't think many people will move at all, which would make the new server pointless. Just going by what's being said in this very thread, I'm willing to bet that the majority of the people in here in agreement with the OP are expecting an official RP server to balloon in population. I don't think anyone is expecting it or hoping or to stay small at any rate.


Even if SE labeled or made several new "RP" servers, you're still very likely going to have most of your players dog-pile onto only one of them, and then you'll have the rest of them come and complain that the big server is locked instead of just going to one of the other open ones. That's exactly how Balmung and Gilgamesh ended up being so bloated in the first place; instead of trying to foster more communities elsewhere, everyone kept trying to force their way onto servers that were on the verge of catching fire.

People just want direction from SE on what sort of communities they should foster on what servers.

It's a basic tagging of servers.

But why does SE need to give you direction? Don't be lemmings, decide for yourselves. Having tags would be exceedingly pointless as the community has already done a good job on its own of deciding where to gather for RP (probably too well, considering how Balmug and Greg ended up) and there's nothing at all that would make them follow the tags anyway.

[Rokke]

Making an RP tag doesn't solve anything, it only recreates the problem. Players created the unofficial RP tag for Balmung and everyone flocked to it and now its locked. Players made Mateus a second RP server and players flocked to that and now its closed.

Mateus no longer qualifies as a preferred server, but its open to new characters and transfers :0

6-7K servers are normal for them. 14K+ servers are abnormal.

ff11 servers were 4-5K ppl across a 500K population.

also korea servers try to do a merge, they found it nearly impossble due to the way housing works.

I meant it as a general comment on how the only small pop servers are now JP servers. I remember reading the fallout from the korean merges on reddit which is why I'd rather have the lock then any "solution" involving merges.

[Theodric]

I've always stood behind the firm belief that role-players only need a handful of things from the developers of an MMO:

- A large, richly detailed game world.
- A variety of emotes and the ability to create custom emotes.
- A coherent story and expansive, interesting lore.

It's up to role-players themselves to create places for them to gather. Almost every major MMO has a community of role-players associated with it and they typically decide on a server to settle on around the time of any given MMO's launch. Depending on how popular the game becomes, though, it isn't possible for every role-player to exist on the same server. Especially not if they want a decent chunk of players there who are focused on the PvE/PvP side of the game.

[uvuvwevwevweonyetenyevweugwemu]

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I blame hollywood and youtube. It's not so much as a place but the crowd to worship them. Every dog and their moms want to be a star, that's basically what they mean by "unified". A real community knows to separate their RP on each server and their community work outside the game. It's purely their false notion of famehood (a.k.a how good their RP is) that got them in this mess in first place.

[ArmachiA]

Wait, I'm so confused. I haven't heard any "rper" make the argument that Balmung needs to open but all I'm seeing is a bunch of people going "Balmung needs to stay locked!". Where is this argument?

Rpers seem to want a new server with an RP tag so they can get OFF Balmung, which would basically be a server split - which some people said needs to happen while making fun of RPers for wanting a new server? What even is this thread.

[D-chan]

I blame hollywood and youtube. It's not so much as a place but the crowd to worship them. Every dog and their moms want to be a star, that's basically what they mean by "unified". A real community knows to separate their RP on each server and their community work outside the game. It's purely their false notion of famehood (a.k.a how good their RP is) that got them in this mess in first place.

what even ???

Edit: Okay, I wasn't going to dignify this with a real response, but I'll bite. Our community can't "work outside the game" when the activity we're doing is inside the game. We're doing all that we can outside the game. We have RPers coming together on the FFXIV RP coalition site, or tumblr, or Discords, or even twitter and FB groups. But for people who prefer in-game RP over Discord/Skype/Tumblr/whatever RP, we have to be on the same server(s) to RP in game, unless people just want to RP cross server, which prevents characters from being face-to-face and having avatars to interact which... is kind of the point of MMORP as opposed to RPing via a forum or IM's.

Your reasoning doesn't even make sense, because people wanting notoriety and attention is often how RP hubs get started on other servers. It's easier to get attention when you're organizing the movement, it's easier to be a big fish in a small pond. Balmung is a sea of RPers; you have to work hard and stand out to be "popular." That's easy in smaller RP communities. Your assertions are way off base and you obviously know very little about the game's RP community.