Square, I beg you. I've lost a dozen friends signing up already. Please open Balmung.

[AvalonBright]

I know this will probably fall on deaf ears, but after turning away another friend this evening I broke down and came to make a hopeful thread. Over the past several months I have had more than a few friends eager to play the game and yet they inevitably turn away because Balmung is never. Open.

No matter what time of day I've looked, no matter when THEY'VE looked, never open. And we're adults, with responsibilities and jobs and so on. None of us can sit around all day hoping to catch the 20 minute window the server might actually unlock for, if it even DOES anymore.

As far as I know we're not even the most populated server anymore, not by half. Of course we are fairly active which plays a part in things but STILL.

Why don't I just leave? Because I'm a roleplayer, and many of my friends are roleplayers. We want to stay where the RP is. I also have a FC and a Linkshell here that I enjoy very much. They have become my friends as well. I am not going to just up and leave server because I haven't known them as long as I have other friends.

Just, please, Square. I'm begging you here, stop leaving Balmung under permanent lockdown, it's ridiculous. ESPECIALLY when you aren't even decent enough to tie the server limits to accounts instead of characters. God forbid any of them ever want to make an alt in the future...

[Ilenya]

I just made a new person on Balmung not three days ago. Granted, I tend to look in the early morning my time (Central Time, 5-6 hours from the time of this post).

Simplest option, really, is to just try and look at times where people aren't often on, like early morning US time.

[Sakuraluna]

Pretty sure that for the busier servers, new players can just wake up a bit early to create a new character on that server before going to school or work. Maybe see if they could try between about 6-8am server time, idk otherwise.

[Anarnee]

I made a character on Balmung not too long ago~ You just need to have them be on at the right time XD Believe me, it took a long time to get a character there, but it is not PERMANENT. XD It was about 5-6am CST

[Korilynn]

Have they tried making a character on another server and then transferring them over to Balmung? When my friend started again, she was on Balmung, I was on Cactaur. I tried to make on on Balmung, it said it was full, so I xfered my original character and I was in.

[AiChyan]

Balmung is almost always open at 11 am GMT.

[rbrogue]

I can sympathize. I had a friend start up the game but due to our work schedules (we work late shifts so we're usually asleep when the "windows" are open) it took him two weeks to make his character. If I ever invite another friend to play this game then I'll probably just leave Balmung for a low pop server.

[Michiko]

I can sympathize. My bf was having a hard time getting 3 of his friends to join us on Balmung. They were all able to transfer/create characters but it was in the wee hours of the morning (2-6am EST) which seemed to work best then. Might be the only way. Good luck =3

[Sadana]

You want to stay on Balmung, so does everyone else who plays on that server. :/ SE can't do a thing about player activity. You have a couple options, as others have mentioned:
1. Put your friends before server and move elsewhere. Start your own rp there.
2. If they are determined, they can wait for the open window during a weekday (as in take a vacation day from work or go home during lunch). It actually does open. You can check here: Character Creation Restrictions (it is open right now actually, 1030 am EST.)

Good luck!

[AvalonBright]

I just made a new person on Balmung not three days ago. Granted, I tend to look in the early morning my time (Central Time, 5-6 hours from the time of this post).

Simplest option, really, is to just try and look at times where people aren't often on, like early morning US time.

Fortunately this recent attempt is a friend in Europe, so trying at 3am EST was no big deal for him. ... Except in the span of 20 minutes when he first looked and the time it took to make his character, it closed again. It's not like he even missed the end of a window, it literally opened and closed in the span of 20-30 minutes. It's ridiculous. :\