Party Finder needs to be unified across data centers

[Ardeth]

Oh sure. I mean they might as well both be unified. If they develop the technology to let you join premade groups across DC I don’t see why they shouldn’t also do that for matchmaking.

I'm to the point now that if the cloud datacenter isn't for this, I might stop playing in general. Don't worry, I'm not one of those gonna make a post because I quit type of people, but it's so frustrating wanting your DC to succeed and seeing the developers just ignore the core issues. And no amount of road to 80 buffs or vacant housing is going to save it. DC travel really has been one of the biggest blunders SE has ever come out with. It obliterated server culture and made it more attractive to let your home datacenter die so you can pop your queue in under 5 mins. And honestly, I don't blame those people. SE started this and gave them the tools to do it. It's not in our hands. And what can I do? Queue here and suffer and unsubscribe because it's so bad? Or leave and make the problem worse? Talk about being stuck between a rock and a hard place. What is right, and what is easy in that scenario? Am I wrong for trying to save it? Is it worth saving? I don't know these awnsers, but I do know that if they don't fix it, I'm out. All my friends quit. Every FC I join is mute and antisocial even after I join their discord. I'm tired, ya know? I'm just tired.

[UkcsAlias]

A party finder that allows all worlds from both dcs in the same region would be ideal. Since DC travel this step became small as there is now a clear connection that can be used to transfer the required data. If this now works directly in PF similar to CWPF's, that would be optimal. You get the benefits (more servers in pf), without its downside (no need to travel).

Those who disagree dont realize how much is already done cross-world and how smoothly that goes. Every dungeon is already a crossworld instance, making that crossdc would barely change anything here. It could even benefit for things like alliance raids and some pvp modes where getting the required player counts can be a struggle at times.

The main issue DC travel gave is that within DC's common behaviour can be very diffirent. Big communities are often cross world (and sometimes even crossdc). But when mixing DCs, habits can conflict massively (and usualy the more toxic habits are in a certain server, the more often it clashes). DC travel is quite a failure at this part sadly since it only takes 1 player to upset another world. But for instanced duties this should be far less of an issue, making it optimal for PF, even more since with PF it could be made clear which DC is ment to be the main one (or you use comments here if relevant).

[CidHeiral]

Again, by saying it's impossible you're just furthering the problem. It's not impossible. Peer pressure can be overcome. lol People make it sound like it's now impossible to find 7 other people on their server. People are autonomous beings. SE don't need to shepherd us all for every little thing.

I refuse to go to Aether out of principle and only make parties on Primal. It certainly takes longer to fill than it used to but it's not impossible. People saying it's impossible are just making excuses for being selfish and shortsighted.

If I meet someone new in real life who I want to play with on a different data center, you’re saying I should just make a new character?

Yes. Here is how that has gone in every MMO for the last 20 years.

"So you play (MMO)?"

"Yeah, I'm on (server)."

"Cool, I'll make an alt there and we can play together."

"Sounds good!"


Is DC travel a better alternative to that? Of course it is. If I were in that situation I would absolutely prefer visiting with my existing character to making a new character. But the community has proven once again why we can't have nice things and DC travel is causing more harm than not, so it should be severely limited or taken away entirely. The game isn't going to suddenly implode because everyone has to go back to doing what they were already doing for the preceding decade.

[WeebAlert]

I refuse to go to Aether out of principle and only make parties on Primal. It certainly takes longer to fill than it used to but it's not impossible. People saying it's impossible are just making excuses for being selfish and shortsighted.



Yes. Here is how that has gone in every MMO for the last 20 years.

"So you play (MMO)?"

"Yeah, I'm on (server)."

"Cool, I'll make an alt there and we can play together."

"Sounds good!"


Is DC travel a better alternative to that? Of course it is. If I were in that situation I would absolutely prefer visiting with my existing character to making a new character. But the community has proven once again why we can't have nice things and DC travel is causing more harm than not, so it should be severely limited or taken away entirely. The game isn't going to suddenly implode because everyone has to go back to doing what they were already doing for the preceding decade.

You do realize the point of this thread is to advocate for an improved DC travel system that fixes the “harm”, right?

[CidHeiral]

You do realize the point of this thread is to advocate for an improved DC travel system that fixes the “harm”, right?

Your original post advocated for cross-DC Party Finder, a feature which may not even be possible on a technical level, a point which you glossed over with basically "I dunno just do it lol." It's no different than people parroting "just do instanced housing!" It also doesn't account for any potential negative impacts such a feature would have on the game at large, a point which clearly wasn't fully considered with the current system.

I work in a technical field and these suggestions always remind me of when executives ask me for something completely nonsensical. I then have to try to explain to them why their ask is impossible and they too usually say "but can't you just do it?"

Until such time as it is proven otherwise I have no reason to believe Cross-DC PF is ever coming or even possible. Assuming restricting PF access isn't possible either the only real solution as of right now is to disable DC travel.

[DamianFatale]

I DC travel every day. It usually takes 30s each way. I don't know what you are talking about. You are trying to make something bigger than it as usual. Don't you get tired of doing the same thing based on nothing? I certainly would.

Obviously we can't relate, and thats okay, but the inconvenience of data center travel is too overwhelming for me mentally.

[TomsYoungerBro]

It is not just the logical next step, but a necessary next step. It can't come soon enough. The game needs cross-DC party finder to maintain health in all DCs as much as possible. It's either that, or they need to revert DC travel (not happening).

[Aco505]

Agreed. Party finder should become cross DC. This way so many people won't feel the need to change DC to get their parties filled. Duty finder could also be made cross DC in the future if the population problem still persisted, thus players would only travel to check market boards or play with a friend.

[Soulsolid]

I can confirm that EU is struggling similarly, most, if not all, savage, Extreme and ultimate pf's have all gone to light once Data-center travel became available. So doing Anything from just simple mount farms to doing reclears is just a huge hassle due to this if you happen to be on chaos.

We had a bit of the "illusory truth effect", where Chaos was always joked about being the "french and RP servers" and light being the "PF servers". Once Data center travel came into being, they actually BECAME that (for the Light server at least, as far as i'm able to tell).

Long story short; Agree, definitely would love to see PF become Cross DC if it is possible Infrastructure wise

[HyperiusUltima]

Pray to god that the Cloud Datacenter test is for Cross-DC PF, because I miss being able to have access to everything over on my own World. The reasons why they didn't allow us to use all those things was so that we wouldn't disrupt that world's Marketboard with our own prices - however, I think just disabling the Sell feature of Retainers as a Traveler or Wanderer is far more efficient than dealing with the crap before.

There's also the matter of Gathering and Timed Nodes. While each World has their own crafters and gatherers, I believe that they should remove this restriction to allow people to hit their timed nodes as well - Eorzea Time hasn't changed any when you swap DCs, and if they're gonna say "oh but you can World hop for multiple nodes!" as an argument, I think that doing that kind of thing is more difficult in process than it sounds. Keep in mind that people dump their GP on the first go, so anything you get on the second node(if you get back there in the window for a second or third) is literally not going to be much since you don't have any GP to boost yield or Boon chance. At the least they can remove these things to allow people to access more of the gathering content that's out there.