Petition to reveal Server names before transferring!

[Mychael]

Easy for you to say, you're not one of the eight servers that would essentially be misfits. It's not like we knew our servers were going to be dead when we picked them. Well, most of us anyway.

If you'd spend more time

meet[ing] new people and start[ing] an entirely new, cohesive community

after a server merge and less time

try[ing] to fit in somewhere in that well-established equation

you'd probably be a lot happier with the idea.

You can start a new community from a merge just like you can a shuffle. It may be harder, but it's entirely possible. Likewise, this shuffle could result in the same tightly-knit "You don't belong!" attitude you think is inherent to merges. That's all on the part of the community; if the community doesn't want to expand, it won't; I think that the XIV community would welcome expansion right now, though. I understand that you have negative experience in the matter from FFXI, but I have rather positive experience from FFXI. Fairy->Sylph worked well for me. My LS moved and gained new characters. I can honestly say that I didn't lose a single friend, and gained many. I was myself, and became part of the community. "Fitting in" shouldn't be something you have to try to do. And in my experience the destination server does not purposefully shun the new members.