Will Balmung ever open again?

[Raim]

It will most likely open once more between the datacenter changes and the expansion launch for a week or so, but don't expect it to open again during most of Shadowbringers after it fills back up.

[kamikrazy]

It’s awful, I wish I could send an invite to balmung. I have a friend who I introduced to the game, but he can’t even get on either of the roleplay servers because of them both being locked (yes Mateus is usually locked too). I have a house and an apartment on Balmung and there’s no way I’d ever compromise my place in the most popular RP server regardless, but because I want to be with the other RPers, I can’t play with my friend in my main other then just making an alt.

There really should be a better solution, the current status quote sucks.

[Anselmet]

If you will be on crystal data server, it won't matter. But to answer the question if you really wanna be a Balmungian, probably. I know most ppl have said no but as someone who just transferred off Balmung for a house, ya prolly will happen. Small servers will most likely have housing again once ppl transfer around and gain 3 mil or more due to data center split. Those on Balmung will see that and move to get a house. Or down the road when we get new wards or housing this too will happen again. Balmung is over populated and there is a strong hunger for housing. So evetually, yes, most likely.

Or you can just cheat and try making a char in the middle of the night-

[Final-Fantasy]

Why bother with that overcrowded world, though.

[Virtuso]

I've heard tales of people being able to sneak a new character into congested servers in the dead of night. Like 1am-3am in the morning during NA times. I've seen it happen before but unfortunately it seems quite rare. Just tried to create one now at around 11pm and WOW, not just balmung but 4 other servers including Mateus are all clogged up and refuse to allow new characters. This is truly horrendous. 5 out of 13 servers are filled to capacity and are under lockout. Almost half a data center. Did SE buy discount servers or what?!

[Hasrat]

I've heard tales of people being able to sneak a new character into congested servers in the dead of night.

Pretty sure this was more a thing prior to the redistribution efforts. Once it had been declared officially congested, all such attempts ceased.
As of now, it's the only NA world officially designated so. All other worlds you may have trouble on (designated with an x instead of an o under the Standard Worlds) are only ever temporary. In effect, being similar to what Balmung was previously. They're usually pretty full, and you'll likely have to check back during dead hours for any hope of getting in.

[LaylaTsarra]

I've heard tales of people being able to sneak a new character into congested servers in the dead of night. Like 1am-3am in the morning during NA times. I've seen it happen before but unfortunately it seems quite rare. Just tried to create one now at around 11pm and WOW, not just balmung but 4 other servers including Mateus are all clogged up and refuse to allow new characters. This is truly horrendous. 5 out of 13 servers are filled to capacity and are under lockout. Almost half a data center. Did SE buy discount servers or what?!

You need to try early morning. Server congestion is based on how many are logged into the server at the time and choosing the busiest times will result in a server lock. Balmung and Chocobo and possibly some others are locked regardless of the time of the day. They simply won't allow any new players until SE removes the lock.

[MistakeNot]

I've heard tales of people being able to sneak a new character into congested servers in the dead of night.

That is not possible to do.
All servers are occasionally subject to temporary disabling of character creation. This usually only happens during prime time when the servers are their busiest, but for some servers this temporary disabling can be active most of the time.
Back before the concept of Congested servers was introduced Balmung was locked for character creation almost all the time, except a minute or two right after a maintenance.

This temporary lockout of character creation is not so much because the servers can't handle more people, but mainly to direct new players to less populated servers so players get spread out more evenly, and as a measure to prevent servers actually becoming filled - at which point they get declared Congested.


Congested servers are different however. You cannot create a character on a congested server at all. Not at any time of the day. Nor can you transfer a character to a congested server.

[Shougun]

I've heard tales of people being able to sneak a new character into congested servers in the dead of night. Like 1am-3am in the morning during NA times. I've seen it happen before but unfortunately it seems quite rare. Just tried to create one now at around 11pm and WOW, not just balmung but 4 other servers including Mateus are all clogged up and refuse to allow new characters. This is truly ridiculous. 5 out of 13 servers are filled to capacity and are under lockout. Almost half a data center. Did SE buy discount servers or what?!

Used to be you could bypass any restrictions by paying to server transfer. Can't recall but I want to say that stopped a little while after the time Shirogane was released and then was full in literal minutes after opening lol. Hard to hype content that dies in minutes .

SE: "NEW HOU-- jk nevermind... WHY IS THAT SERVER SO FULL!?" "Because we let people bypass the limit..." "...." "lock down and let people leave, asap!"



I imagine the reason why they are so tight though beyond housing is also to reduce waiting in line. Before there were tighter server restrictions I almost always saw a queue to get into the server, and it wasn't like the expansion just dropped lol. The lock and free offloading has helped log in smoothly, and there are sometimes smalls which I guess is an improvement. Imo until any FC or player can access any size they want though it's not a fixed system lol (preferably at any ward too, or some other new system that doesn't destroy the old but is like Wild Star / etc).

Though I do want to say I appreciate them creating the preferred/new world free transfer system, sincerely I think that was a good call and a nicer one than many companies would have done ("no I wont give you something I normally charge you for at no cost!" ).

[Linadae]

Honestly, I don't understand the complaints about Balmung. While yes the Quicksand can be...painful to go through at the best of times...The rest of the server is pleasant. I haven't seen an rmt shout since 2.0. There's always people somewhere doing something. And as for these supposedly terrible players...we have the same ratio as EVERY OTHER SERVER. I honestly...most of my bad player experiences tend to come from other worlds.

As for when we might see an unlock? SE will likely wait till after the free transfer period is over to see where the dust settles. Because I know there's a LOT of raiders who are panic transferring because they are under the impression that raiding will be doa on Crystal. So expect to pay if you want to transfer to Balmung proper.