Please consider merging the two lowest pop servers for grouping!

[Merrillman]

Why:

1. It’s impossible to get LGS for people on my server because no one runs shroud, and even if they do, it’s usually times I cannot. Can count on one hand how many times in last 2 years I’ve even seen a LFM for shroud. PUT AT LEAST THE 1ST 2 OF THE ALTARS ON THE SHIP!!!

2. It’s extremely hard to find anything other than the most recent raids, and even that is very sparse. Unless you’re on at the exact right pre-prime time to early prime time (eastern) time (which is not possible for me) you will wait 2-3 hours even on weekends just to attempt a grouping. If you can only play an hour to 90 minutes, this is unworkable.

3. Lower raid groups to 6 or 8 vs 12. Scale accordingly. I would be happy to accept lower drop rates if I am able to have any chance at threads, materials or raid items that are for all intent and purpose unattainable to me now.

4. Before anyone says it, I am not going to leave my server. These are real life friends and we are all in the same guild, and have additionally built friendships with people online. It would be disloyal and unfair to leave good people and actual friends behind. Isn’t going to happen. All servers, IMO, should be viable at most times. I’m not saying you should get everything you want at 3AM, but between 8-11pm I don’t see any reason why servers shouldn’t be made viable and more populous (lag aside).

My 2c. Thanks for listening.

[dredre9987]

What server are you on? What two servers are you referencing?

[Merrillman]

What server are you on? What two servers are you referencing?

I’m on Orien. According to some things I am reading online Orien and Ghallanda are consistently under 150 people total, PER DAY, and under 1% of them LFM at any one time. If this is true, the chances to raid or get GS for me at any particular time are infinitesimal.

[dredre9987]

The two lowest population servers are Orien and Wayfinder. Third is usually G-land but that depends on day as some days Cannith is worse. Most of the time every server barring Wayfinder is over 150 people. Wayfinder rarely gets over 50.

Argo is the default server atm I believe and they are consistently the top population. As the default changes so too does the top population spot.

I can tell you personally your play times are a bit of a problem. I stop playing at 8pm. I know quite a few who stop around that time as well. Not too sure how to fix that. Prime time always has more people on.

Merging servers in some way would definitely be better for some servers so +1 and /signed.

Orien earlier today had over 300 people/lfms

https://www.playeraudit.com/

[MistaMagic]

If they were to merge servers (and they won't) then listing the most populated from 1- 6, 1 should merge with 6, 2 with 5 and 3 with 4. But hey you can always transfer to Khyber

[dredre9987]

If they were to merge servers (and they won't) then listing the most populated from 1- 6, 1 should merge with 6, 2 with 5 and 3 with 4. But hey you can always transfer to Khyber

There are 8 servers but yes overall server populations should more closely match each other.

[Oxarhamar]

Mega server or cross server grouping would fix this

[dredre9987]

Btw there are currently 199 players on Orien and 8 LFM's where as Wayfinder has 55 players and 0 LFM's. By contrast the highest population is Argo with 325 and only 11LFM's...


So it isn't just a population issue but a lack of LFM's.

[apocaladle]

Mega server or cross server grouping would fix this

I know ssg has put some time into speccing the scope of this and sev has talked about what challenges would be involved in what order to do the mega server. Unsure if any work past that was done though.

Early this year sev did an ama and talked about how they expanded their engineering and they were cleaning up old tech debt so if they were to make progress on this front I doubt it would be until after whatever tech debt is done.

[SpartanKiller13]

3. Lower raid groups to 6 or 8 vs 12. Scale accordingly. I would be happy to accept lower drop rates if I am able to have any chance at threads, materials or raid items that are for all intent and purpose unattainable to me now.

I won't speak to the rest of these, but most raids are pretty reasonably completable with 6 peeps (THTH aside). Not saying it's easy, but most raids require a few roles and the rest as filler (often a tank and someone doing the interactables). A first-life tank or a slightly-more-invested offtank is more than sufficient for LN/EH raids, and the talking/interacting person is experience/research which you can usually watch a few walk-throughs or read a guide and be fine.

Most of DDO's raids have been soloed, and with 3-4 peeps who have an idea of what to do you can do the rest. Start with the easier ones and ones that require less coordination (like LHoX, LTS, DoJ, ADQ, Chronoscope) and move on to the more complex/coordinated ones later. Having a raid leader using voicechat helps a lot as well; raids like Project Nemesis go from difficult yoloing to easy with someone calling out lasers, for instance; or like calling out torches in Strahd.

Older raids in general are really smashable with modern DPS. DoJ was a struggle to get enough DPS for higher difficulties back in the day, but a strong DPS toon now will be afk for half the raid today. I was curious about ZR last year so I farmed out some gear and was soloing it EE on a Silvanus melee life - I'd spend 5 minutes with a thrower getting her to 90% and then like 30s finishing the raid.

Spend 2 minutes at the front of each raid covering the main raid mechanics and talk about complex parts for a few seconds before each. If you have some less-detail-oriented peeps keep an eye on them and/or assign them more straight-forward tasks

Try shortman raiding out! It's not nearly as bad as you'd think, just requires some communication/coordination. Feel free to hit me up with questions or specific things you're struggling with

[Dark_Lord_Mary]

Mega server or cross server grouping would fix this

I agree - cross server grouping is in other MMOs and works great or a mega server, though I understand the issues with guilds that there's no fix for yet (I have posted an idea for moving guilds)

[Oxarhamar]

I agree - cross server grouping is in other MMOs and works great or a mega server, though I understand the issues with guilds that there's no fix for yet (I have posted an idea for moving guilds)

Yep I agree which is why I think cross server group would be a good workaround could leave guilds in place & let groups merge

[Cybersquirt]

Why'd they kill Reidra? Wayfinder is the deadest server I know.

I know ssg has put some time into speccing the scope of this and sev has talked about what challenges would be involved in what order to do the mega server. Unsure if any work past that was done though.

Early this year sev did an ama and talked about how they expanded their engineering and they were cleaning up old tech debt so if they were to make progress on this front I doubt it would be until after whatever tech debt is done.

"Tech debt" ? You mean finally paying pros and eventually being in the green?

[Seph1roth5]

I'm on Orien too, and would love if they cut it down to 2 servers. I love when hardcore comes around because it's so populated. I've heard various reasons why they can't/won't do server merges/megaservers, but I think the main one had to do with being unable to transfer guilds for some reason?

Now I'm not codeologist, but that seems silly. They've added guild level rewards before, just add a new one that gives a coupon item, and after transferring, gives you the same guild ship and whatever astral shard stuff you bought? If copy/paste doesn't work...

[JOTMON]

Merging servers is too problematic.

Server transfers are too expensive at 2495/character.
Reduce the cost of Server transfers and make server transfers free for VIP.

[SoulDustar]

Open up 2 or 3 new servers eliminate tr cache figure out guild transfer and leave the old dead weight behind allow free transfers and be done with it

[bryanmeerkat]

What if I told you the reason they don't merge the servers is because they can't handle server populations much beyond what currently exists.

Merging the 2 smallest servers would still be more than argo and that barely functions as is

[Zavina]

I’m on Orien. According to some things I am reading online Orien and Ghallanda are consistently under 150 people total, PER DAY, and under 1% of them LFM at any one time. If this is true, the chances to raid or get GS for me at any particular time are infinitesimal.

I'm on Orien too..

1. It’s impossible to get LGS for people on my server because no one runs shroud, and even if they do, it’s usually times I cannot. Can count on one hand how many times in last 2 years I’ve even seen a LFM for shroud. PUT AT LEAST THE 1ST 2 OF THE ALTARS ON THE SHIP!!!

I'd agree that we could do with another amenity that is for legendary green steel, and have all 4 altars. We have one for heroic, so why not legendary? It's not like it'll break anything, just be a lot more convenient.

As for running LShroud itself, this is a you problem to do with time/schedule. There are raids that go up. Are you on ORD (Orien Raiding Discord? https://discord.gg/PKDxEtg). You might have better chance there at joining in raids.

We also have two ingame channels that are open to everyone (have to rejoin after TR):
(1) /joinchannel Titan - LFM's do get posted on there. And.. they chatter a lot there..
(2) /joinchannel EEraids endgame

Slotting this in here, since I saw another post from you (below), and it's relevant

Yeah I can’t play till 10 pm eastern at earliest and its only luck when I can play. Job is very demanding. Run 1.4 billion in assets. I sometimes work till midnight. No one on then. If you follow the charts of activity, orien is dead last consistently (I mean ALWAYS) with the high being no more than 300 “LFM” at the HIGH of the day (and no guarantee it’s even a raid, let alone that it’s a raid I want something from on top of that, like Shroud for Greensteel). So it’s not as easy as it may look. Other servers have double that regularly. Orien is dead last but that’s where my guild is and my friends so can’t leave. They need to merge the two lowest pop servers. I am not going on discord with 800 members. The bing bing of notifications would frikking kill my ability to work.

"10pm EST, Only luck when you play" - Orien isn't dead, and there are raids at those times. More at the weekend when people have more time.

As for discord, we do have the opportunity to 'mute' a server do you don't get the bing bing bing of notifications. (Right click, scroll down, mute server, choose: until you decide to turn it back on). Then you visit the server when you can.

2. It’s extremely hard to find anything other than the most recent raids, and even that is very sparse. Unless you’re on at the exact right pre-prime time to early prime time (eastern) time (which is not possible for me) you will wait 2-3 hours even on weekends just to attempt a grouping. If you can only play an hour to 90 minutes, this is unworkable.

Yeah, this is a you time schedule. I'm on GMT, and I can find raids. Now I've seen Nemesis sometimes struggle to fill the VON raid he often posts a request for, but it's down to time/schedule.

If playing for 60-90 minutes is your time window, then it's an LFM issue, and not an SSG/Server issue.

3. Lower raid groups to 6 or 8 vs 12. Scale accordingly. I would be happy to accept lower drop rates if I am able to have any chance at threads, materials or raid items that are for all intent and purpose unattainable to me now.

I don't think anyone else would like that.

4. Before anyone says it, I am not going to leave my server. These are real life friends and we are all in the same guild, and have additionally built friendships with people online. It would be disloyal and unfair to leave good people and actual friends behind. Isn’t going to happen. All servers, IMO, should be viable at most times. I’m not saying you should get everything you want at 3AM, but between 8-11pm I don’t see any reason why servers shouldn’t be made viable and more populous (lag aside).

Cross-server grouping would be the best remedy. Each dungeon that we enter is a brand new instance, so I don't see why it couldn't work.

We do a lot more guild raiding at the weekends, though we are looking at putting together more of a schedule so it's better for guildies. If we have any slots left over, I can always add you in (PM me your character name/guild). However, you might have to suck it up, download discord and put it on mute so you are more easily notified. Compromise does work, and can't be all in one direction.

[Chilianna]

On Cannith no one runs THTH or Legendary Shroud anymore (difficulty issues being the reason of the former)
Except the couple big guilds that run scheduled raids but are almost always full by reserving to guildies and friends, friends of friends.
And even then THTH is very rare. They don't always run it.

I wish they would at least give Leg Shroud the same treatment heroic Shroud got.
Add a quest like Devil Assault in which Leg Shroud mats could drop.

[Merrillman]

On Cannith no one runs THTH or Legendary Shroud anymore (difficulty issues being the reason of the former)
Except the couple big guilds that run scheduled raids but are almost always full by reserving to guildies and friends, friends of friends.
And even then THTH is very rare. They don't always run it.

I wish they would at least give Leg Shroud the same treatment heroic Shroud got.
Add a quest like Devil Assault in which Leg Shroud mats could drop.

I would be pretty good with that. I just feel like unless you’re playing ddo 24/7 (not possible for me) large swaths of the game are just completely unavailable to me and to many of the people I play with. Greensteel is a huge pain point for me, and I’m admittedly maybe more annoyed than I ought to be but for gear power, it’s something I want, but remains unavailable— and it’s never going to be available to me in its current iteration. Raid gear is the same. We should be able to purchase raid gear or get raid mats in other ways — maybe at 1/10th the rate of raids, dropping only in reaper quests or in elite. Some servers just don’t have the population to make it possible, so either server merge or start changing the reqs. The longer it goes with no resolution the more frustrating it will become.