Congestion solution: Make Early Access a Buff

[lezard21]

what about crafters?

also if after 40 hours only the new stuff gets locked, then people would just stay logged in in the old areas or doing old content just to prevent other EA people from logging in. Like it's currently happening with afkers and botters.

[whiskeybravo]

The problem of congestion exacerbates the problem of congestion, difficulties actually getting in the game contributes to finding more ways to avoid having to deal with it.

Yea, there are a lot of little details that would need to be sorted. The way I imagine it, once the buff is expired you simply wouldn't be able to advance the story. But I did consider open world activities in the unlocked zone would probably be too difficult to limit, fates/crafting/gathering/etc. Again, 40 hours is somewhat arbitrary, but it's about the time it takes to complete the msq. Somewhere around that time allowance where you are able to complete the story if desired, and spend some time exploring but not entirely.

Short of that, a much simpler suggestion would be along the lines of server resets. Just kick everyone off every couple of hours, rotate through the servers so there isn't a mad rush on all of them at once. They could do that today.


Upon further reflection:

It might at least be worth developing something to use as an emergency countermeasure. Perhaps a shorter buff for all users, 8-12 hours, that automatically logs out when depleted and replenishes while offline. Give it a cool icon and fancy name, "Aetherial Dissipation - interference with your aetheric density is limiting the stability of your presence within this realm "

I'm not suggesting SE shouldn't do everything they can to bolster capacity otherwise, but it's good to have options.