Early on server merges/queues on launch

Something for the devs to consider im sure they have already but i do want to mention it aswell as opening discussion to the community if they have a good way to deal with it

Majority of MMO has a population drop of 20-50% in the first month depending on how well the game is however ashes does look like it be a great game so we may not have this issue however it is good to plan for just incase it is needed before nodes get built up too much

Couple of ways to deal with this is we happen to deal with it i hope not though but something that should definelty be considered

Suggestion 1
If server pop gets to low open up free transfer to other servers then close the server after a couple weeks of merge being opened and give player an option when they log in next what server to transfer too

Suggestion 2
Have world groups and if servers get to low merge them together or a couple (This is what new world kinda did but they were super slow and unprepared which didnt help the population, although that wasnt the game only issue :P

Suggestion 3
To deal with initial queues instead of opening up more world add a temp alternative server to log into while server are full this will just be a copy of the actual server however nodes cant be leveled on alternative servers it just a mirror world where you log into the game if the server is full it funnels you here to play while your in queue when you finish the queue in the background you get a pop up to enter the real world. This just allows players to play the game/progress while queues are an issue without adding way to many servers then having alot of them become dead

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Goalid

There will be player dropoff after launch no matter the game. Eventually, the game's population, if wildly successful, could go higher than their launch numbers, but they need to make sure that there's a dedicated population that stays and spreads the word about how good the game is. I'd guess that population is around 100k concurrent throughout the first year.

1) That's just abandoning the server instead of saving it. That should be the last resort, as it makes all the node progress you did on that server meaningless. Which is the problem we're trying to solve.

2) Basically just the same as 1.

3) I agree people should be able to play something while they are in queue, but I'm against your suggestion. It goes against the game design for there to be different instances, and allows people to gather the rarest resources without the competition.

My solution for this problem from a couple of weeks ago was to increase the server reservations to 20,000 instead of the planned 15,000. But obviously, Steven is just throwing out the number 15k, Intrepid will make the server queues as long as they think is necessary for the game to succeed. My other suggestion was to allow people to play a part of the game while in the queue, partially like your suggestion, but to only have them in taverns or a beginner area zone on Sanctus where you can hang out with people, test your skill rotation against a dummy, do some tutorials for the numerous systems in the game, play tavern games, recruit for your guild, etc. Hell, maybe even arenas. Just something for people to get to interact with other people, while not dropping queue and then subsequently the game itself.

Veeshan

Goalid wrote: »

There will be player dropoff after launch no matter the game. Eventually, the game's population, if wildly successful, could go higher than their launch numbers, but they need to make sure that there's a dedicated population that stays and spreads the word about how good the game is. I'd guess that population is around 100k concurrent throughout the first year.

1) That's just abandoning the server instead of saving it. That should be the last resort, as it makes all the node progress you did on that server meaningless. Which is the problem we're trying to solve.

2) Basically just the same as 1.

3) I agree people should be able to play something while they are in queue, but I'm against your suggestion. It goes against the game design for there to be different instances, and allows people to gather the rarest resources without the competition.

My solution for this problem from a couple of weeks ago was to increase the server reservations to 20,000 instead of the planned 15,000. But obviously, Steven is just throwing out the number 15k, Intrepid will make the server queues as long as they think is necessary for the game to succeed. My other suggestion was to allow people to play a part of the game while in the queue, partially like your suggestion, but to only have them in taverns or a beginner area zone on Sanctus where you can hang out with people, test your skill rotation against a dummy, do some tutorials for the numerous systems in the game, play tavern games, recruit for your guild, etc. Hell, maybe even arenas. Just something for people to get to interact with other people, while not dropping queue and then subsequently the game itself.

with 3 you can remove any bosses/rare thing on there we dont want people farming on there its just a temp solution to the initial queue where people get fed up waiting in queues to play and wont go to ther server cause there guild based there before queues happened, this isntance would just be temporary for the intial launch and will be removed when pop stabilises. the purpose is to allow players to player in some way while they wait to get on the proper server, if you dont let them progress nodes/find rare resources or bosses for example it will serve that purpose for launch to get people in the game while they wait for queue

1/2 sometimes u need to abandon server otherwise you just haemorrhage population due to no players on the server your on, sometimes it best to cut the server and shuffle people onto other servers have an enjoyable population for example in new world they went months with 50-200 people on some server where they couldnt realy do anything cause lack of players, alot of people dont like starting again where there set up so they either wait it out painfully or quit

unknownsystemerror

While feedback and suggestions are always appreciated by them to be sure, there have been discussions by them and an internal plan for a couple years now on how they plan to address that issue. You may not like their plan, you may think yours is better, but you gonna get what they have decided on. The wiki is always a great source of information to find out what background work has already occurred.

Population limits will be enforced on each server.[32]

Around 8-10k concurrent users per server is projected.[33][13][34][35]
Initially there will be a limited number of registered accounts (approximately 15,000) per server to help mitigate login queues.[36]
This limit will increase over time to around 50,000 registered accounts per server.[36][37][38]
The developers intend to carefully manage server populations via the use of character creation throttles to avoid the need to merge servers.[37][39] There may be queues to get into high population servers, but the aim is to avoid excessively long queues.[38]
Part of the equation of essentially watching to make sure that we don't over populate the server selection, but at the same time making sure that there's not a queue system in place that's so long it's detrimental to the concurrency of the player's will to play so to speak. It's a tough balancing act.[38] – Steven Sharif

Veeshan

unknownsystemerror wrote: »

While feedback and suggestions are always appreciated by them to be sure, there have been discussions by them and an internal plan for a couple years now on how they plan to address that issue. You may not like their plan, you may think yours is better, but you gonna get what they have decided on. The wiki is always a great source of information to find out what background work has already occurred.

Population limits will be enforced on each server.[32]

Around 8-10k concurrent users per server is projected.[33][13][34][35]
Initially there will be a limited number of registered accounts (approximately 15,000) per server to help mitigate login queues.[36]
This limit will increase over time to around 50,000 registered accounts per server.[36][37][38]
The developers intend to carefully manage server populations via the use of character creation throttles to avoid the need to merge servers.[37][39] There may be queues to get into high population servers, but the aim is to avoid excessively long queues.[38]
Part of the equation of essentially watching to make sure that we don't over populate the server selection, but at the same time making sure that there's not a queue system in place that's so long it's detrimental to the concurrency of the player's will to play so to speak. It's a tough balancing act.[38] – Steven Sharif

there choice on how the go about it i didnt see that on the wiki so thanks.

Tbh though unfortunately thats a bad system but most used system since unless ur entire guild on within the first 2 hrs of the launch you wont be on the same server :P which then leads to people twiddling there thumb waiting for a spot to open up to play with there guild.

maybe doing this system but opening up servers early for character creation on servers will give time for population to spread out and guilds able to all get on a server before opening up.
Guilds are less likely to start on a new server if they already started so if u have work on the hour of release or something or something stops u being on at the release date u get screwed :P this may or may not help get guilds on the same server though

Caww

They could consider selling the game, the $15/month, 6-8 weeks just before official launch and let people start choosing a server in-advance which would give them a start on server balance, at least as far as accounts are concerned. They need to figure out time zones as well, maybe cap-out timezones by account (honor system) to avoid having log jams.

unknownsystemerror

"Tbh though unfortunately thats a bad system but most used system since unless ur entire guild on within the first 2 hrs of the launch you wont be on the same server :P which then leads to people twiddling there thumb waiting for a spot to open up to play with there guild."

Again, you need to get a more comprehensive look as to what has been discussed already. There will be guild reservations for servers either sold or awarded before launch. If you are one of those that is worried about such things, you will have a chance to register and reserve X number of spots on a particular server for your guild.

Server reservations allow guild members as well as unaffiliated players to reserve character slots on a server starting in the Beta testing stages of the game.[1]

This would likely be utilized more so by guilds than that would be solo or unaffiliated players; and I believe that the solo player they may have friends that they want to play with. That's fine, they can also still with those friends do the reservation system, but the player who is just joining the game fresh and doesn't have a community that they're part of, I don't think they really mind in that regard and will not utilize that system.[1] – Steven Sharif

Happymeal2415

Goofy suggestion but maybe while in que you could play rounds of APOC

Shoelid

When Lost Ark launched they just straight up told people that they can't make characters on overpopulated servers. I kinda prefer that. The people who really want to get on that server eventually will. The people who just wanna play with Asmongold will go somewhere else.

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