On House Relocations...

[Sothis]

The Balmung players expecting special treatment simply for being Balmung are a textbook case of "have your cake and eat it too". So Balmung has a community and culture you don't want to leave behind, that's fine and totally your decision, but you don't get to have a tantrum and expect SE to cater to you when you knowingly choose to stay on a server that has consistently had a population problem for years now. Balmung's a resource-eating machine, everyone knows it's overcrowded, and if you choose to stay there because of the culture, then you are knowingly choosing to prioritize that culture over ease of purchasing housing.

Every other server is fine, and by expecting SE to dedicate even more resources to a preexisting resource drain, you are basically saying you deserve more because you're overcrowded and the other servers can just stuff it.

[Elamys]

I, again, invite anybody here to explain how they would solve Balmung's population problem because it's obviously not going away with incentives.

[Settiesama]

SE can't realistically keep the server locked forever or forcibly split the server without taking a huge PR risk. They could maybe end up doing the former, but a split isn't going to happen. It's too risky. There's no way they could realistically do it. Because all it takes is friends getting stuck on either side of the divide and everything goes up in flames.

https://www.engadget.com/2008/12/19/...-server-moves/

Don't be too sure on that. I would prefer them to lock it again so other servers have a much longer time to build up and take the heat off Balmung, even if it takes years.

[Enjuden]

I, again, invite anybody here to explain how they would solve Balmung's population problem because it's obviously not going away with incentives.

Bluntly, lock the server until the population requires it to be a preferred server to transfer to. I think the method before worked for its purpose. If it actually is unstable (again), then it wouldn't be as it was. What's funny is that Gilgamesh crashed harder than Balmung on Stormblood release. Still Balmung's fault though. Obviously.

[Elamys]

Bluntly, lock the server until the population requires it to be a preferred server to transfer to. I think the method before worked for its purpose. If it actually is unstable (again), then it wouldn't be as it was. What's funny is that Gilgamesh crashed harder than Balmung on Stormblood release. Still Balmung's fault though. Obviously.

I suspect Balmung gets the hate and Gilgamesh doesn't because roleplayers just attract a lot more hatred for whatever reasons.

I'm not sure that locking it actually was that successful because after this long, we are still far and above everyone else.

[Enjuden]

I suspect Balmung gets the hate and Gilgamesh doesn't because roleplayers just attract a lot more hatred for whatever reasons.

I'm not sure that locking it actually was that successful because after this long, we are still far and above everyone else.

If you want a permanent solution to it, it has to be something people don't like and will be divided on, a forced transfer, where you just don't get a choice and get divided by lottery. I do not think splitting the server will work, since the majority will probably move to one and abandon the other (Besaid before it turned into Balmung). Locking is pretty much the only solution that may do something instead of move the problem to somewhere else. Only other thing that can be done is infrastructure, which SE has showed time and time again they don't want to bother with.

[Hasrat]

Simple. Lock the server until it loses its reputation as most populated server. Players will give up and move on, complaining all the while about how "dead" it is.

Maybe instead of asking what all the other players would do about Balmung (the same way Balmung just expects other players to deal with their mess to begin with), perhaps Balmung players should be the ones coming up with an acceptable solution to Balmung's problems. One that doesn't amount to "give us everything we want because we deserve it."

[Elamys]

The problem being that 90% of the problems that get blamed on Balmung are not Balmung's problem at all, or at least, not exclusively (see: Gilgamesh at Stormblood launch). It's a bunch of players dogpiling on a server for no reason, the inhabitants of who have done nothing wrong by choosing to play on that server.

This problem isn't up to the players to fix. It's Square's problem, it's a problem with their server's infrastructure, and while players can certainly help make the situation better, it's odd that the players on Balmung are told to solve the problem themselves when every other problem that could have been resolved by the cooperation of other players is placed solely on Square to fix. (see: players exploiting the AFK kickout at Stormblood launch)

If you really do value housing above all else in this game, then you should leave Balmung. I won't deny that. But the majority of the players here have a history on the server. And they don't want to leave because of that. I don't find that particularly heinous. Again, there's nothing else in the game that is actively hindered by you being on a server. I wouldn't say it's asking for "special treatment." I would say that it's asking Square to find a way to properly allocate resources so that no matter what server you are on, you have at least sort of a fair chance at participating in all content in the game.

The answer to that, in regards at least to housing, is to improve apartments to be more than glorified and awkward FC rooms, and to unlink content like gardening from housing.

[Sothis]

Gilgamesh is also a resource drain and blaming Balmung alone for Aether's problems is a mistake on my part, I am sorry about that.

But I haven't seen any Gilgamesh players expecting SE to cater to them and their overpopulation problems, while 90% of the angry-at-housing-and-demanding-sweeping-changes threads are specifically from Balmung players. So while Gilgamesh is also responsible for other sets of issues, they really don't have any hand in the current problem. Which actually is an interest contrast - why is one heavily overpopulated server expecting to be catered to while another seems mostly content with the current situation?

[Enjuden]

Gilgamesh is also a resource drain and blaming Balmung alone for Aether's problems is a mistake on my part, I am sorry about that.

But I haven't seen any Gilgamesh players expecting SE to cater to them and their overpopulation problems, while 90% of the angry-at-housing-and-demanding-sweeping-changes threads are specifically from Balmung players. So while Gilgamesh is also responsible for other sets of issues, they really don't have any hand in the current problem. Which actually is an interest contrast - why is one heavily overpopulated server expecting to be catered to while another seems mostly content with the current situation?

The loud people are not the ones you should listen to.