Well it's lovely and all and I think that like...It's been long enough and I was wondering when they'd do this. But really? In this way?

They would have been better off just taking low count servers and merging them with medium-quantity servers. ): Isn't that what they did with 11? They should have done this before they started charging. Not everyone who wants to play can play, and first come first serve?

I've made a lot of great friends and allies in XIV and to know we may all be split up, well it's just as good for someone who doesn't have friends, to someone who has a lot of friends and/or appreciates a friendly face.
While you get to meet new people, just realize you could have been making friends or could have made friends IF YOU HAD STARTED EARLIER. I don't mean that in a way that says "it's your fault for starting so late" I mean that in a way that says "You haven't been around long enough to even make friends"
So I don't see how this will be suddenly helpful to new players.

All this is doing is causing a degree of anxiety for people who are friends but who may not share the same shell. Or perhaps are being pulled in different directions?
A better way of handling this would be to initially have 2 servers merge but give people the option of switching their current classes over to one of the new merged servers.
not axe all current servers and put everyone in one big shuffle box. :/