About a server merge...

[Nayus]

Turbine:
Admit we lost players...
Admit DDO is not the same when you can't barely join a group...
Admit a group is not the same when it only has 2 or 3 people...
Admit a group is not the same when we're all but soloists gathered together...
Admit you gave self-healing and survivability to everyone but Fighters so no one absolutely needs to join a group...
Admit even Fighters can multi-class and get some self-healing (Barbarians can't by the way)...
Admit that hirelings exist...
Admit even if you hadn't done that, we would still be better off solo'ing because Heroics are mostly easy for a veteran as long as they take it cool...

Admit we lost players (again)...
Admit DDO is not the same when there are so few PUGs... again...


Merge some servers for the sake of Lady Vol... Pretty please... do it :/

[Teh_Troll]

better idea . . . release more than 2 quests in a 6 month period.

There are always lulls between updates. The problem is these lulls keep getting longer and longer.

[Nestroy]

Instead of a server merge, just make grouping better, imho:

+ Do away with dungeon scaling for the 5th and 6th player so these can marginally contribute.
+ Do away with making it easier for soloers. Give them the full broadside inside the dungeons. This especially means traps!
+ Increase the level ranges a dungeon might be run in.
+ Give a bonus for players leading groups thru dungeons. Give a 5% XP incentive or a +1 loot incentive for the group leaders upon completion - or give them better end reward loot lists. Alternatively, if group members die, the leader retains the 10% no-dead bonus, only void if he himself dies.

All these are easier to acomplish than a server merge and would go a great length for opening more LFMs.

This even could lead to more players retained because they find help and advice in groups.

[FranOhmsford]

My Suggestion for how to do this...Yet again:

Merge Lowest Population Server with highest till you have 4 Servers!

Wayfinder with Ghallanda
Orien with Thelanis
Cannith with Khyber
Sarlona with Argo

Add "of Ghallanda, Thelanis, Khyber etc. etc. to Player and Guild Names.

Add 2 Character Slots to every f2p account
Add 4 Character Slots to every Premium account
Add 6 Character Slots to every VIP Account {this last one would hurt me if Cannith and Sarlona were to be merged as I have 12 characters on Sarlona}

For people who do have more than 6 Characters on a Second Server and that second server is merged with their main server {which is also maxed out on characters} - Halve the Price of Extra Character Slots for 3 Months!

Also allow 2 FREE Character Transfers per Account.


Finally Advertise this PROPERLY!
Use the opportunity to Bring in Brand New Non-Laggy Servers {4 of them} and Transfer 2 old Servers to each New one!

[Teh_Troll]

When comm drops were "doubled" pugging was AWESOME. EE groups for everything, filled fast and was a ton of fun.

Do something like that again.

[Seikojin]

better idea . . . release more than 2 quests in a 6 month period.

There are always lulls between updates. The problem is these lulls keep getting longer and longer.

^This^

Even if they are small arcs that have no central plot tied to the core plots. The more variety, the more people will be happy. Imagine if you could run a few different sets of low level quests to get from 1 - 10?

Or a bunch of solo only quests that carry you to 3 in your 3rd+ life? Maybe some solo epic quests (more than there currently are)? Or very long dialog based quests? I know how much people would love that. In all honesty, there is room for every playstyle to be quested. If you never had to think about it, sure, people would leap at the shortest to biggest gains per minute. Clearly Turbine knows how to fix that.

It only sucks on content creation because Turbine doesn't have the tools to just pump out content, even custom. On the back end they don't have the right tools to do it quickly.

[Vint]

Turbine:
Admit we lost players...
Admit DDO is not the same when you can't barely join a group...
Admit a group is not the same when it only has 2 or 3 people...
Admit a group is not the same when we're all but soloists gathered together...
Admit you gave self-healing and survivability to everyone but Fighters so no one absolutely needs to join a group...
Admit even Fighters can multi-class and get some self-healing (Barbarians can't by the way)...
Admit that hirelings exist...
Admit even if you hadn't done that, we would still be better off solo'ing because Heroics are mostly easy for a veteran as long as they take it cool...

Admit we lost players (again)...
Admit DDO is not the same when there are so few PUGs... again...


Merge some servers for the sake of Lady Vol... Pretty please... do it :/

You can make any class a half elf or bladeforge. Problem solved with a person not being able to make a survivable toon.

Number 2, The game has moved away from needing a full party and I do not think it will help if you tell people that they have to group or have to be full to survive. It might be fun to have it this way, but many people cannot be bothered to deal with puggers even though this is an MMO.

And C, Thelanis was laggy as Hell last night. I had to DC 3 times as I was unable to log in at different times last night. Adding more people to the same laggy servers sounds like a nightmare. No thanks.

[Loromir]

My Suggestion for how to do this...Yet again:

Merge Lowest Population Server with highest till you have 4 Servers!

Wayfinder with Ghallanda
Orien with Thelanis
Cannith with Khyber
Sarlona with Argo

Add "of Ghallanda, Thelanis, Khyber etc. etc. to Player and Guild Names.

Add 2 Character Slots to every f2p account
Add 4 Character Slots to every Premium account
Add 6 Character Slots to every VIP Account {this last one would hurt me if Cannith and Sarlona were to be merged as I have 12 characters on Sarlona}

For people who do have more than 6 Characters on a Second Server and that second server is merged with their main server {which is also maxed out on characters} - Halve the Price of Extra Character Slots for 3 Months!

Also allow 2 FREE Character Transfers per Account.


Finally Advertise this PROPERLY!
Use the opportunity to Bring in Brand New Non-Laggy Servers {4 of them} and Transfer 2 old Servers to each New one!

Cannit with Khyber??? No thanks!!!!

[FranOhmsford]

Cannit with Khyber??? No thanks!!!!

Perhaps Orien has a slightly larger population than Cannith atm - this would end up with Cannith being Merged with Thelanis - Would that suit you better?


Honestly - There's good and bad people on every server - There's good and Bad Players on every server - There's good and bad Guilds on every server!

The Reason I suggest merging lowest to highest until we have 4 servers rather than 8 is so the 4 servers we do then have have roughly equal populations!

Consider if they merged Ghallanda with Thelanis and Orien with Wayfinder?
The difference in population between those two new servers would be Insane!



Current Server Populations based on Hearsay and conjecture would leave us with this list - Highest first:

Ghallanda
Thelanis
Khyber
Argonessen
Sarlona
Cannith
Orien
Wayfinder

Though from my own personal experience recently on Sarlona and Cannith I'd suggest that Cannith is now ahead of Sarlona Population wise - Something that would have been unthinkable 18 months ago!


Cannith with Argo and Sarlona with Khyber would be FUN! For me!

[phinius]

Change the 'No deaths bonus' inside quests to a personal bonus and not a group bonus. This has gone around many times and I have seen many arguments stating something like, '10% only amounts to this much XP or this much time.' This may be the logical argument but logic does not mesh well with something that is supposed to be FUN. Most players I know do not stop with a single TR. With a death in every quest and a plan to TR at least 10 times this equates to needing the XP for a complete additional life. This is NOT fun.

With the friends and guilds I usually run with this is the single most common reason for not opening up the group and posting an LFM. Deaths happen and most players will die at some point and no one I run with will care about an occasional or accidental death or deaths because of external forces. However, each player added off an LFM really does seem to double the chance for stupid (avoidable) deaths regardless of the amount of hand-holding or explanations of tactics or strategy.

To a lesser extent and as others have posted already, dungeon scaling is also another factor for not filling a party. I have thought about this often and I am not sure there is an optimum balance. Perhaps changing it to just two modes; 1-3 and 4-6 (or even three modes; 1-2, 3-4 and 5-6). This puts a little more pressure on soloers but does not make it anymore difficult to allow at least a couple other players to come along, especially if the Death Bonus is only lost because of a personal death.

Forcing players to group is not the answer but there should also be no disincentives to allowing other players into the party.

[Memnir]

About a server merge...

No.

[FranOhmsford]

No.

Yes Mem cos we all know your word is law on Server Merges and a One Word Statement is all that's required from you for the Devs to throw any such suggestion in the bin!

Come on Now!

Give us a reason why you're so set against the very idea of a Server Merger that the only way you can put this into words is by typing the same two letters in every single Thread about said subject!

[gordgray]

Not going to happen UN-till a lot more leave the game.

[Memnir]

Give us a reason why you're so set against the very idea of a Server Merger that the only way you can put this into words is by typing the same two letters in every single Thread about said subject!

No.

[Chai]

yes mem cos we all know your word is law on server merges and a one word statement is all that's required from you for the devs to throw any such suggestion in the bin!

Come on now!

Give us a reason why you're so set against the very idea of a server merger that the only way you can put this into words is by typing the same two letters in every single thread about said subject!

lag

[Deadlock]

+ Do away with dungeon scaling for the 5th and 6th player so these can marginally contribute.

This was done some time back. Has something reverted back so 5th and 6th slots make a difference? Dev quote to confirm from way back.

[jalont]

Cannit with Khyber??? No thanks!!!!

And this is the problem right here.

Where would Cannith, a place many of us escaped due to the people and culture, actually go. You're just going to shove that negative culture down a bunch of our throats again? No thanks.

For the most part, struggling servers are struggling because of the people on them. This can't be said about Wayfinder, and I'd gladly have Wayfinder merge with Ghallanda, especially with our already large population of non-US players. Other servers? Not so much.

[Gremmlynn]

My Suggestion for how to do this...Yet again:

Merge Lowest Population Server with highest till you have 4 Servers!

Wayfinder with Ghallanda
Orien with Thelanis
Cannith with Khyber
Sarlona with Argo

Add "of Ghallanda, Thelanis, Khyber etc. etc. to Player and Guild Names.

Add 2 Character Slots to every f2p account
Add 4 Character Slots to every Premium account
Add 6 Character Slots to every VIP Account {this last one would hurt me if Cannith and Sarlona were to be merged as I have 12 characters on Sarlona}

For people who do have more than 6 Characters on a Second Server and that second server is merged with their main server {which is also maxed out on characters} - Halve the Price of Extra Character Slots for 3 Months!

Also allow 2 FREE Character Transfers per Account.


Finally Advertise this PROPERLY!
Use the opportunity to Bring in Brand New Non-Laggy Servers {4 of them} and Transfer 2 old Servers to each New one!

Meh, I don't think Gland would be helped much from Wayfinder and most of us left on Wayfinder are still there because we like it that way.

[Tscheuss]

No.

I agree with the dancing bear.

[Chai]

And this is the problem right here.

Where would Cannith, a place many of us escaped due to the people and culture, actually go. You're just going to shove that negative culture down a bunch of our throats again? No thanks.

For the most part, struggling servers are struggling because of the people on them. This can't be said about Wayfinder, and I'd gladly have Wayfinder merge with Ghallanda, especially with our already large population of non-US players. Other servers? Not so much.

So Cannith is now the Park Place of DDO?