About the World Merge and Character Transfers (02/09/2012)

[Vaen]

It's so easy to say "you're all QQing too much."

It's more challenging, and more intelligent and appropriate, to explain why you would still think that they should stick to option ④ when option ② fixes all of the legitimate issues players are pointing out, costs SE less, and still provides you with the "exciting chance to meet all new people" if you want.

[Sidious]

It's so easy to say "you're all QQing too much."

It's more challenging, and more intelligent and appropriate, to explain why you would still think that they should stick to option ④ when option ② fixes all of the legitimate issues players are pointing out, costs SE less, and still provides you with the "exciting chance to meet all new people" if you want.

It doesn't fix what I was saying earlier.

"I have no problem with people wanting to stay with their friends. The issue arrises is when these people don't want to move at all, keep their entire ecosystem, and have the rest of us try to fit in somewhere in that well-established equation. Every blanket merge I've been a part of hasn't yielded a cohesive community. It's yielded two communities trying to coexist, sometimes quite unsuccessfully. It sucks."

Option 2 doesn't alleviate that. It's still just a blanket merge, and I don't want that. No matter where I go, there will have been a blanket merge and the community won't be cohesive.

They simply trow away possibly returning customer until 2.0 ? Is this all the care that they can give to customers? People that don't assidly follow the game/forum atm, but that want to came back a bit after 1.21 , are simply not even considered..! End of the story...
Bah i hope that they pick option 1 or 2 ...

By the time 2.0 is out, they'll have the option to transfer to whatever world they please. Call it a "you weren't subbed, so you didn't get to choose" tax. Unsubbed people should never take precedence over subbed people in a world transfer.

[Vaen]

It doesn't fix what I was saying earlier.

"I have no problem with people wanting to stay with their friends. The issue arrises is when these people don't want to move at all, keep their entire ecosystem, and have the rest of us try to fit in somewhere in that well-established equation. Every blanket merge I've been a part of hasn't yielded a cohesive community. It's yielded two communities trying to coexist, sometimes quite unsuccessfully. It sucks."

Option 2 doesn't alleviate that. It's still just a blanket merge, and I don't want that. No matter where I go, there will have been a blanket merge and the community won't be cohesive.

Hmm... I see your point, but are the current communities really that cliquish as to not be able to bond with the new, incoming communities from merging worlds?

As a relatively new player, I've been able to integrate into at least a small part of the already existing community pretty easily, so I don't think it'd be that hard for two existing communities to merge successfully. I could be wrong and you could be right though.

I guess the "community total restart" aspect of option ④ would help in the case that you're right, but I'd still be unhappy about losing my old community and not having any control over my server name.

[Sidious]

Hmm... I see your point, but are the current communities really that cliquish as to not be able to bond with the new, incoming communities from merging worlds?

As a relatively new player, I've been able to integrate into at least a small part of the already existing community pretty easily, so I don't think it'd be that hard for two existing communities to merge successfully. I could be wrong and you could be right though.

I guess the "community total restart" aspect of option ④ would help in the case that you're right, but I'd still be unhappy about losing my old community and not having any control over my server name.

No solution will please everyone, but it seems like option 4 yields the possibility for people to bring their friends to a new place to meet new people and start an entirely new, cohesive community.

When you just smack to servers together, they just don't "fuse" like some people think. There's tension between people because each community may be radically different. It's fine for the people who were on the original server (in no small part because there are way more of them), but for the people coming in it's really not a positive experience. You're on Server A, but in a sub-community that belongs to server B. You'll never really be on the same page as the people you merged into. That's something that doesn't go away.

But if we all start over together, we can forge something entirely new. It sucks to leave what you have behind, but who's to say what you create next won't be even better?

[Mikita]

No solution will please everyone, but it seems like option 4 yields the possibility for people to bring their friends to a new place to meet new people and start an entirely new, cohesive community.

When you just smack to servers together, they just don't "fuse" like some people think. There's tension between people because each community may be radically different. It's fine for the people who were on the original server (in no small part because there are way more of them), but for the people coming in it's really not a positive experience. You're on Server A, but in a sub-community that belongs to server B. You'll never really be on the same page as the people you merged into. That's something that doesn't go away.

But if we all start over together, we can forge something entirely new. It sucks to leave what you have behind, but who's to say what you create next won't be even better?

This is so true.

If you have ever changed schools, jobs, communities, or countries, you will know how hard it can be to come into a new social system where everyone else already has established connections, heirarchies, feuds, etc.

Option 4 puts everyone on equal terms.

[BruceyBruceyBangBang]

No solution will please everyone, but it seems like option 4 yields the possibility for people to bring their friends to a new place to meet new people and start an entirely new, cohesive community.

When you just smack to servers together, they just don't "fuse" like some people think. There's tension between people because each community may be radically different. It's fine for the people who were on the original server (in no small part because there are way more of them), but for the people coming in it's really not a positive experience. You're on Server A, but in a sub-community that belongs to server B. You'll never really be on the same page as the people you merged into. That's something that doesn't go away.

But if we all start over together, we can forge something entirely new. It sucks to leave what you have behind, but who's to say what you create next won't be even better?

This would never make a difference no matter how it plays out. It makes no difference between two servers combining and LS collectively transferring and mixing it up in other servers. There is always going to be the potential of them clashing with one another.

This sounds like something from someone who has either lost touch with this community or comes from a server with a low population. So far, all of the major LS on MY server want to stay together. Which is another thing... it's not going to stop most of the server transferring to the same place. There really is not much difference in that sense. In other senses, as in the inactive players, option 2 is kinder to them. Everyone speaks of 2.0 and being able to transfer, but what about the time between then? They need to be segregated and live out the last days until 2.0 on a server filled with unfamiliar faces due to this insufferable dev team making unintelligent decisions? Uh, no. Think again.

[Sidious]

This would never make a difference no matter how it plays out. It makes no difference between two servers combining and LS collectively transferring and mixing it up in other servers. There is always going to be the potential of them clashing with one another.

This sounds like something from someone who has either lost touch with this community or comes from a server with a low population. So far, all of the major LS on MY server want to stay together. Which is another thing... it's not going to stop most of the server transferring to the same place. There really is not much difference in that sense. In other senses, as in the inactive players, option 2 is kinder to them. Everyone speaks of 2.0 and being able to transfer, but what about the time between then? They need to be segregated and live out the last days until 2.0 on a server filled with unfamiliar faces due to this insufferable dev team making unintelligent decisions? Uh, no. Think again.

I wonder which of us is out of touch. What is your basis of comparison, might I ask?

You say that it doesn't matter because everyone is going to transfer to the same place anyway. Then you say you want option 2 because it is "kinder" to the people who want to stay with the same group. Which is it going to be?

Option two is just a blanket merge, and that is unkind to everyone who is getting merged into a larger server. From what I can tell, you don't like option 4 because you want to force the community to stick together for your own selfish desire to resist change.

Option 4 is a real choice, option 2 is a faux choice because no matter where you opt to transfer to... It'll be two different communities trying to coexist.

[lackofwords]

Option two is just a blanket merge, and that is unkind to everyone who is getting merged into a larger server. From what I can tell, you don't like option 4 because you want to force the community to stick together for your own selfish desire to resist change.

Alright, so lets assume a player coming from a less populated world which has been decided to merge into a larger world.
The player could be either at the time being;

• Have a community established from previous world
• Been playing alone

I don't think a blanket merge would not affect the player who is already traveling with his established community. The player would stick to his existing social circle.

For the player who is playing alone, he is opened to more social circle opportunities to pick from. Oppose to the limited circles from the previous world, which the player did not wish participate for whatever reasons.

Now, Sidious mentioned problems of "two communities" trying to co-exist. It isn't that simple. There are hundreds of communities in a world. Just because a player is part of a world does not mean they partake in all the communities of the world as a whole. Besides, the hundreds of communities in the world itself has to learn to co-exist with each other. Adding more to it does not fundamentally change the dynamics of it.

Here's my personal example; (long story)

I was from Midgardsormr in FFXI, I was part of WeSH for my social outlet, and participated in several endgame shells, including some more specific shells like ShikigamiWeapon.

In 2010, Midgardsormr was merged to Quetzalcoatl. I kept together with WeSH, and a few of my endgame linkshell. ShikigamiWeapon, which was a shell in Midgard that helped people get their Yinyang Robe, was established in Quetzalcoatl as well to help the community.

Did it suck that we lost our world name? Yeah, a bit. But did that mean we didn't have fun together still? No, actually far from it. WeSH is having a great time on Quetz and picked up new members as well.

The only difference I remember noticing right after the merge was having more competition over endgame content, which is natural due to higher population density. Although as usual, over time some endgame shell dissolves, I join new ones, and still kept in contact with my circle back at Midgardsormr. However, I do not know if they were Quetz shells or Midgard shells or even a mix.

Never, have I personally asked new people I meet in game if they were from Midgard or Quetz, because I could care less. For me, a new face is a new face regardless if where they came from. Never was I ousted from a shell because I was from Midgard and not originally from Quetz.

Now, instead, if there wasn't a "blanket merge", where Midgard was merged to Quetz, what would have happened would be similar to when players being to choose a world on a new game. Since people have different circles of friends, they are forced to decide which ones they want to follow. Real life friends who plays, in-game friends, or in-game shells, etc.

To reference again to another personal experience;

I've played Ragnarok Online for while back while it was in beta and continued onto around 2004, which is when FFXI released. A few of the circle of players I knew in RO also wanted to move on to play FFXI.

Some decided to join the Ragnarok server, because of the name. However, some others decided to join other worlds. This essentially tore the circle apart and splitting into much smaller social groups, where the group isn't even sustainable by itself. Eventually what was a dozen players, dwindled down to three players. We had to find a new community to join into, instead of continuing from the one we've established from RO.

Now, if option 4 is picked, it's basically doing just that, forcing players to decide which circle of friends they want to follow. If option 2 is picked, no one needs to decide which circles to follow, because all their existing circles are there. Additionally, they also have the choice to pick another world if they wish. Such as if they don't want to merge into a particular world for any reason, they could try to convince their circle of friends to pick another world.