Server transfer yes/no, payed/free, restrictions?

Recently got a new job, I'm going to be working 3pm-11pm NA Est or something like that so I'm going to be on a odd schedule compared to my time zone. If the game released right now I would have to find a server that fit my playable time zone or miss out on a large portion of the game. So I'm hoping I will be able to find a good English server that fits my needs. Now its possible my shift could be changed at any point, I'd prefer first shift "normal hours". Do you think we will be able to transfer servers at any point. Should we have to restart. Should it be a Payed service/Free if in the game at all. This could have bad consequences on server population and economies. IMO entire guilds shouldn't be allowed to switch servers whenever they want. It should be a charged service and on a player to player bases. Meaning you would request a server transfer, explain your reasons and AoC would approve or deny you. Certain servers would be restricted like recently fresh ones. Certain items wouldn't be transferable like the one of a kind legendary sword couldn't be brought to a diff server. If you owned a house at a node you would have to sell it since it might not even exist on a diff server. Crafting mats shouldn't be transferable, so ethior make gear or put the mats back into your current server before you transfer. This might be to much effort on the developers and they might just do a hard no. I've been considering/wanting to invest in the game for cosmetics and to support it. But not sure if I should. Do you think there will be a server that fits my needs? Also what are your thoughts on "Server transfer yes/no, payed/free, restrictions"?

Find more posts tagged with

Comments

Percimes

Ah man, I've had a work schedule rather similar years ago (5 pm to 3 am with a 3 hours hole from 7 to 10 pm) and it's hard to fit any game time with people in your time zone. If you think playing on a different server for the time zone is a solution, wait until the week-ends come and you can revert to a "normal" schedule and now that server population is completely different.

Depending on how adverse you are to play in low population time or how much you enjoy solo play, I can propose two general avenues of solutions.

1. Play on a server in your time zone. On your work days you concentrate on things that can be done in small groups or in solo. Gathering in low pop hours has its pros: less competition. Same thing for group content that can be done in a group but doesn't require many groups. Less crowded dungeons, less people depending on the same mob spawns for quest. During the week-ends you can do the big stuff. Raids, large scale pvp and so on. Finding the right people might be harder. If your schedule changes for the better, no need to transfer, but you may have to find a new crew.

2. Play on two servers in different time zones. One during the week, the other on the week-end. Not ideal, but you can ditch one later on, and not start from scratches again (having put all the noob awkward phase in the same period).

Low population hours have their good side too, but most of the popular activities are done during prime time.

Noaani

Sylvanar wrote: »

- Charged service for sure. To address what Noaani mentioned. I dunno how high it has to be but at least worth 2 months subscription fee. As this decision shouldn't be made lightly.

All this does is mean that those with excess money can act like dicks and transfer at will.

In my experience, people with excess money are the worst of the worst in MMO's (Steven is a perfect example of this - he was a complete dick in Archeage and he will attest to such - but he was not the only such player). As such, all this would do is make it so those rich brats are free to act as they like and then transfer at will, but those wanting to get away from them but don't have the money are stuck.

Basically, this would not only not fix the problem, but it would make it worse.

Server transfers should always be off the table in Ashes - with the exception of around a server merger.

Geronimo

For what it's worth, my vote is "no"

Anarchy1

I appreciate every ones comments. I could definitely see some people making up reasons to transfer servers, abusing it however they can and ruining it for other people. I personally wouldn't want to change servers if I could avoid it. All the players you meet, contacts you built, having to find a new solid guild, leaving the server you helped build as well as knowledge of the server itself. Add in limited gold transfer, no gathered/processing mats, Highish price to transfer, High time restriction on transfers or maby even limiting it to 1 per character, approval from gms, servers of the same age as your current, it could be a high barrior. On the other hand you had games like WoW that expedited transfers like they wanted it to happen. Leaving realms underpopulated imo on purpose just to rake in some more cash.

.

Ironhope wrote: »

No server transfer.

It makes people behave horrible because there is no consequence since you can just transfer and reset your reputation.

It ruins the moral and economic value of items since people can just use move gear around.

It's just a bad idea from start to finish.

If someone acts horribly on one server, I doubt they are going to be saints on the next one. They will just ruin their rep again, and if they do reform good for them. If you only get 1 transfer within a year or per character if needed would mitigate those 2 problems you have imo.

CROW3 wrote: »

Nope, reroll. One server is going to be very different from another. If you bring that silver bow of slaying from World A to B, you threaten the integrity of the space time continuum.

Stop threatening space and time, man.

Is that bow a legendary or just a crafted epic item? If its a legendary or maby even unique it shouldn't transfer. But if its a epic crafted lvl 50 bow I personally don't see the problem as long as the 2 servers are the same age. From what I know crafters get to customize their created gear however they want to make it. So there's no reason someone else couldn't have the "gold bow of slaying" that has the exact same stats as the silver bow of slaying.

daveywavey wrote: »

And, if they happen to open up brand new servers at some point, you're not going to want 3-yr-old max level characters running around the new server. New servers should be new characters.

I would be highly against server transfers if that was a option. Just a example but my thought process was if they open up 5 realms in Na, and 5 in EU on day one. Then 5 months down the line they open up 2 more on each as fresh servers. You could only transfer to a server as old as yours. You obviously couldn't be a lvl 50 maxed gear on a month old server. Even Wow restricts what servers you aloud to go to.

@ Percimes
I do like your view on the first suggestion. Your looking at it a better view then I was. Still only 2 days of higher population and having to change my sleep patterns for work on monday may be a bit much for me.

Noaani wrote: »

Sylvanar wrote: »

- Charged service for sure. To address what Noaani mentioned. I dunno how high it has to be but at least worth 2 months subscription fee. As this decision shouldn't be made lightly.

All this does is mean that those with excess money can act like dicks and transfer at will.

In my experience, people with excess money are the worst of the worst in MMO's (Steven is a perfect example of this - he was a complete dick in Archeage and he will attest to such - but he was not the only such player). As such, all this would do is make it so those rich brats are free to act as they like and then transfer at will, but those wanting to get away from them but don't have the money are stuck.

Basically, this would not only not fix the problem, but it would make it worse.

Server transfers should always be off the table in Ashes - with the exception of around a server merger.

I don't think a paywall is enough to deter transfers. Adding in restrictions like the ones I mentioned is what would stop it from being abused by majority of the player base. transferring between servers at will shouldn't be a thing. With no pay to win being rich will have no affect on someone being a dick or not. You shouldn't be leaving a server because you want to get away from a single or even multiple players anyway.

Ironhope wrote: »

1. Go to a server where materials are super super cheap or plentiful.

2. Level your profession to max super easy peasy.

3. Transfer to another sever where leveling profession is super hard.

P2W AOC

I don't believe it will be easy to level professions even if a server is med pop. Maby gathering and it will still take a while. If you can't take gathered rss to the next server you will still have to contend with a high pop server to gather herbs/ore, esc. I believe processing the items you gather takes a lot of time, its not wow where you can smelt 100 ore into bars in 10minutes. I don't know how long it actually takes but it wont be a quick process even if you have unlimited gatherables. Then for crafting you need those processed materials. Adding simple restrictions to server transfer would make this point completely invalid. I don't even feel like you read the topic or any comments at all.

Noaani

Anarchy23 wrote: »

I don't think a paywall is enough to deter transfers. Adding in restrictions like the ones I mentioned is what would stop it from being abused by majority of the player base. transferring between servers at will shouldn't be a thing. With no pay to win being rich will have no affect on someone being a dick or not. You shouldn't be leaving a server because you want to get away from a single or even multiple players anyway.

I don't see a cap on wealth transfer being a particularly good deterrent until the game has been out for a few years.

It is not a deterrent at all to people that are shit at making money in games. I think we can all agree on that.

To people that know how to make money, they know that they will still be able to make money on their new server. Losing what they have on hand isn't going to cause them any real issues.

The only people it will cause issues for are people that make money in game and don't use it.

Even then though, something I have seen a lot in games is like for like trading. I'll trade you 100 gold on this server, for 100 gold on that server. While this is more work, if you add in transfers, it will always be a thing and will render any wealth restrictions worthless.

Dygz

mcstackerson wrote: »

I think server transfers should be a thing but you can't take anything. All items, excluding cosmetics, stay on the server. You probably should also lose your social organizations and religion progression. Basically, you can't take anything that was unlocked because of the servers state. Probably just taking your artisan, adventuring, and weapon progression. There also needs to be a decent cooldown (1+ month(s)).

Probably can't take Artisan and weapon progression because those will be tied to quests and mobs and resources that may not have been opened yet on other servers.
Might not be able to take some augments either.

Dygz

Anarchy23 wrote: »

Is that bow a legendary or just a crafted epic item? If its a legendary or maby even unique it shouldn't transfer. But if its a epic crafted lvl 50 bow I personally don't see the problem as long as the 2 servers are the same age. From what I know crafters get to customize their created gear however they want to make it. So there's no reason someone else couldn't have the "gold bow of slaying" that has the exact same stats as the silver bow of slaying.

In Ashes, same age is irrelevant.
What matters is what has been unlocked on the servers - and age is not the determining factor.
The factors for what gets unlocked are which specific Nodes have been progressed to a specific Stage and which buildings each government has chosen to build and which services those governments have opened...some of that will be tied to which specific races were the ones to progress those Nodes.
Very well could be that the "Gold Bow of Slaying" could not be crafted if the recipe for "Bow of Slaying" has not yet been unlocked on a different server.

Anarchy1

Dygz wrote: »

mcstackerson wrote: »

I think server transfers should be a thing but you can't take anything. All items, excluding cosmetics, stay on the server. You probably should also lose your social organizations and religion progression. Basically, you can't take anything that was unlocked because of the servers state. Probably just taking your artisan, adventuring, and weapon progression. There also needs to be a decent cooldown (1+ month(s)).

Probably can't take Artisan and weapon progression because those will be tied to quests and mobs and resources that may not have been opened yet on other servers.
Might not be able to take some augments either.

Dygz wrote: »

Anarchy23 wrote: »

Is that bow a legendary or just a crafted epic item? If its a legendary or maby even unique it shouldn't transfer. But if its a epic crafted lvl 50 bow I personally don't see the problem as long as the 2 servers are the same age. From what I know crafters get to customize their created gear however they want to make it. So there's no reason someone else couldn't have the "gold bow of slaying" that has the exact same stats as the silver bow of slaying.

In Ashes, same age is irrelevant.
What matters is what has been unlocked on the servers - and age is not the determining factor.
The factors for what gets unlocked are which specific Nodes have been progressed to a specific Stage and which buildings each government has chosen to build and which services those governments have opened...some of that will be tied to which specific races were the ones to progress those Nodes.
Very well could be that the "Gold Bow of Slaying" could not be crafted if the recipe for "Bow of Slaying" has not yet been unlocked on a different server.

yea I agree. you both make good points. In the end I'm still going to give this game a shot. If I have to reroll I have to reroll, if I don't wanna restart I'll quit. Still hope they can figure out something to make it work well. This game is going to be a Time sink. gonna suck restarting after I put 8 months into a character. I still feel like there is a solution to everything but maybe its not worth it overall. The devs know the system in and out so I'm sure they will make the best call w.e it is.
But just for fun to go off that bow debate, maybe you lose your entire inventory but what's equipped. Then since the the gold bow of slaying isn't unlocked on that server it is broken down into the materials it took to craft it. Now you can get someone to make you the "elven bow of power" Yea prolly to much effort involved idk.

Noaani wrote: »

Anarchy23 wrote: »

I don't think a paywall is enough to deter transfers. Adding in restrictions like the ones I mentioned is what would stop it from being abused by majority of the player base. transferring between servers at will shouldn't be a thing. With no pay to win being rich will have no affect on someone being a dick or not. You shouldn't be leaving a server because you want to get away from a single or even multiple players anyway.

I don't see a cap on wealth transfer being a particularly good deterrent until the game has been out for a few years.

It is not a deterrent at all to people that are shit at making money in games. I think we can all agree on that.

To people that know how to make money, they know that they will still be able to make money on their new server. Losing what they have on hand isn't going to cause them any real issues.

The only people it will cause issues for are people that make money in game and don't use it.

Even then though, something I have seen a lot in games is like for like trading. I'll trade you 100 gold on this server, for 100 gold on that server. While this is more work, if you add in transfers, it will always be a thing and will render any wealth restrictions worthless.

yea I agree to a extent. Some people that particular restriction might not be affected that much or at all. But there could be 4 other reasons that make them not want to do it. There should be no benefit to transferring servers . You should need a good reason to want to do it. But if the deterrent is to big what's the point. Being 50 alone would save you 200 hrs of leveling give or take. I'm still hopeful they will find a way to do it. In the end with every problem there is a solution. Just whether or not the devs will put the time in. Or like I said before maybe it will be to much trouble/effort/time that they could put into better areas of development and it will be a no.

SirChancelot

daveywavey wrote: »

And, if they happen to open up brand new servers at some point, you're not going to want 3-yr-old max level characters running around the new server. New servers should be new characters.

Honestly that's the best argument against them I've heard on here.

Anarchy1

SirChancelot wrote: »

daveywavey wrote: »

And, if they happen to open up brand new servers at some point, you're not going to want 3-yr-old max level characters running around the new server. New servers should be new characters.

Honestly that's the best argument against them I've heard on here.

I honestly see that as a given. That would never be aloud to happen.

SirChancelot

I've used the server transfer a lot over the past 10 years. Being in the military and moving, changing commands, having friends/coworkers come and go... Being able to move is super helpful for playing. Hell, I lived in Japan for 3 years and transfered to Oceania servers to join an AU guild since my servers we always dead during my gaming hours (5/6 AM eastern, so it made since no one raided at that time of day)

If you're also pushing for leveling to be a challenge and meaningful, rerolling so often just wouldn't be feasible.

I'm sure you could make enough restrictions to prevent people from bouncing too often

Noaani

Anarchy23 wrote: »

Just whether or not the devs will put the time in.

I don't think it is about whether they will put the time in, honestly.

We have already been told no to server transfers, for economic and reputation reasons. I don't think it would be in Intrepids best interests from a PR perspective to add in server transfers with heavy restrictions, as it would be a bad look for the company, and it would make many people think Intrepid are just encouraging people to sell their possessions on third party sites if they transfer servers.

This is because if people see that it is an option, they will just assume it is an option like it is in other games. The restrictions will just reflect badly on Intrepid in most players mind, even if there is a good reason for them.

Intrepid are thus best served by simply not allowing them.

This sucks for people that have a need to transfer, this is absolutely true. Some situations simply do not have a solution that is acceptable to all parties.

TheDarkSorcerer

I'm fine with server transfer. But add a time penalty. Like X hours or X days to be able to transfer again. I would personally prefer a 7 day penalty to change server again.

Anarchy1

Noaani wrote: »

Anarchy23 wrote: »

Just whether or not the devs will put the time in.

I don't think it is about whether they will put the time in, honestly.

We have already been told no to server transfers, for economic and reputation reasons. I don't think it would be in Intrepids best interests from a PR perspective to add in server transfers with heavy restrictions, as it would be a bad look for the company, and it would make many people think Intrepid are just encouraging people to sell their possessions on third party sites if they transfer servers.

This is because if people see that it is an option, they will just assume it is an option like it is in other games. The restrictions will just reflect badly on Intrepid in most players mind, even if there is a good reason for them.

Intrepid are thus best served by simply not allowing them.

This sucks for people that have a need to transfer, this is absolutely true. Some situations simply do not have a solution that is acceptable to all parties.

That's unfortunate to hear they already said no. I suppose it has its own reasons for being good for the aoc community but still disappointing. Feel like its one of those things people hear and immediately reject it.

Noaani

TheDarkSorcerer wrote: »

I'm fine with server transfer. But add a time penalty. Like X hours or X days to be able to transfer again. I would personally prefer a 7 day penalty to change server again.

If they did add in server transfers (which they haven't ruled out adding post release), I would expect to see more like 6 months between transfers, not 7 days.

Your server is supposed to be a meaningful choice, just as your primary class is.

Ironhope

Anarchy23 wrote: »

If someone acts horribly on one server, I doubt they are going to be saints on the next one. They will just ruin their rep again, and if they do reform good for them. If you only get 1 transfer within a year or per character if needed would mitigate those 2 problems you have imo.

A lot of toxic gamers, probably most, are toxic not because they're actual savages but because they're trolls. They misbehave to have fun, not because they have no alternative behaviour. We're talking about a bulk of people who can be civilized or not like on the switch of a button.

So yes for a lot of people if not most this would be decisive.

Also, as you said (which is correct), infamy takes time to build. Even people who can't change and are intrisincly toxic would just switch servers every few months.

The fact is, if you make being polite worth the while for gamers, they will be polite.

tautau

Perhaps to some degree, @Ironhope but I think that the activities of the game character reflect the true nature of the person at the keyboard, whether they realize it or not.

In a game, the social and interpersonal constraints are relaxed compared to real life. You suffer more from being a jerk in real life than you do from being a jerk in a game, so that jerk behavior comes out in a game more easily. I think toxic people are toxic gamers, gamer trolls are trollish people, jerks are jerks even if they hide behind the excuse that they are just 'having fun.' People who are nice and caring in life are the same way in a game.

Character reputations mitigate toxcidity a bit, at least if the player cares about their character and is invested in the game. If server transfers are allowed, then even this reputation effect is diminished.

Digging a bit deeper, people are complex. We are not purely good nor are we purely bad. Maybe that is why alts are so attractive an option since a person can play an alt differently than they do their main, giving play to different aspects of their personality. I'm just playing with ideas here; I have no real evidence to back up my theory. Though I do think it is unlikely that we can invent a significantly new personality for a character when we don't know that personality in our own lives.

Wasn't there an old Star Trek show where Spock, as a good creature, was able to pass himself off as an evil Klingon while an evil Klingon was unable to pass himself as a good person since he had no concept of good (while a good person did have a concept of evil)?

TheDarkSorcerer

Noaani wrote: »

TheDarkSorcerer wrote: »

I'm fine with server transfer. But add a time penalty. Like X hours or X days to be able to transfer again. I would personally prefer a 7 day penalty to change server again.

If they did add in server transfers (which they haven't ruled out adding post release), I would expect to see more like 6 months between transfers, not 7 days.

Your server is supposed to be a meaningful choice, just as your primary class is.

6 months is a little much in my opinion. Make it 30 days then. But not six months. Ex, if i find out a friend of mine is playing but on a different server, do i need to wait six months to be able to play with him/her?

CROW3

TheDarkSorcerer wrote: »

6 months is a little much in my opinion. Make it 30 days then. But not six months. Ex, if i find out a friend of mine is playing but on a different server, do i need to wait six months to be able to play with him/her?

No. One of you just has to reroll on a common server.

Azherae

CROW3 wrote: »

TheDarkSorcerer wrote: »

6 months is a little much in my opinion. Make it 30 days then. But not six months. Ex, if i find out a friend of mine is playing but on a different server, do i need to wait six months to be able to play with him/her?

No. One of you just has to reroll on a common server.

So, for my data, what exactly is the thing we're trying to avoid here?

We acknowledge that a player can 'just reroll', and I would generally assume this means any reputation or whatever they have 'lost', is lost. Is it just 'no, you have to spend all the time you spent originally, again'. I agree with and understand all the 'you can't take it with you', but I'm wondering if, for example, you could give a character some ease in terms of how quickly they can level, or access to certain specific things like their Affiliations. Not necessarily as 'you get to take this with you', but moreso 'you can choose to ReRoll character A' (as like, an explicit function) and get Tokens or something that will increase your rate of leveling your profession, Archetype, reputation with X organization on the new server if you use the same name or some assigned name based on it.

Disallowed for newer servers obviously.

I'm thinking that there is a middle ground between 'protect us from people who will reroll to get out of social jail' and 'nope it doesn't matter what your previous invested time was', so I'm wondering where that middle ground is for others, if any.

For me, I don't really care if people can server change, other than the obvious negative effect it has on economies and similar, so accelerating their growth back to 'where they were', even if it allows some people to 'jump ship' off a server that they gave up on for some reason, more easily, doesn't strike me as bad.

As long as they have to participate still, to re-level, to do the work again, just more quickly (i.e. costing less resources outright), is it still bad, and if so, why?

Child Item