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Nostalrius Devs Ask New Server Hosts to Stop Using Code - World of Warcraft - MMORPG.com

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  • FrodoFraginsFrodoFragins Member EpicPosts: 6,057
    edited January 2017
    I decided to dive in head first on the Nost PVE relaunch and hit 60 within a week and a half.  I normally avoid private servers, but Blizzard only invited the Nost team as a PR move and I lost patience with them.  The fact that the elysium devs are located in russia means it's far less likely for Elysium to be shut down forever.  the servers are hosted in France but even if their ISP was pressured to disable those servers, Elysium could move them to another country within a  few weeks.

    As far as the Nost statement, I take offense with them touting the "only 10%" number.  They are pushing that number to delegitimize the Elysium server.  The only way that number makes sense is if they are counting EVERY account ever created even if they never reached level 2.  Protecting themselves from Blizzard doesn't justify the 10% number being included.  Maybe they had some additional philosophical differences with the Elysium team?  anyway, what matters is the percentage of the active accounts from when Nost shut down asked for a transfer token, Nost disabled the token system early on.  Some people decided to start fresh anyway, I think I may have had a low level account on Nost.

    I am curious as to what law is broken in creating and disseminating server emulation code.  It seems like it wouldn't be illegal until someone actually hosted or possibly even monetized it.  Vanilla WOW is basically abandonware at this point.

    Regardless, the Nostalrius team looks really bad after all of this.  They will no longer be able to carry the flag of being WOW legacy server champions.  They now are being considered cuckolds to Blizzard.  The more popular private Vanilla servers are, the more likely Blizzard is to move forward and host their own.  For every person that goes to a private server, there are probably another 5 that would only play Vanilla on an official server.



    Post edited by FrodoFragins on
  • HorusraHorusra Member EpicPosts: 4,411
    Kunai_Vax said:
    tawess said:
    Kunai_Vax said:
    tawess said:
    cura said:

    I dont see a point. I see that bliz makes shit load of money on wow and still wont invest in vanilla server, which is in demand. If all they care about is their money, i dont see a reason to take their side. Besides, im sure they wouldnt give a shit about my problems, untill they see profit in it.
    But that is the point... There is no HARD proof that there is actually a large PAYING customer base.. This mostly because of a few catch 22´s (mostly that the pirvate servers can´t charge a sub fee and that beyond P.99 no company have tried work with or on making a large scale legacy server work.)

    But making a shit ton of money is not the same as being able to invest that money willy nilly.

    I side with Blizzard because that is what makes sense at this point. No guarantee of return on investment for a vanilla server.. 

    But i guess they could set up a pre-order system... Lets say... 1 year subscription and a min number of customers of 100.000... That would then be the project budget. Yeah. also.. no refunds... My guess is that it would fall short of that goal.
    Proof.

    ((video))

    Proof of what @Kunai_Vax...? 

    Not that there is a large scale market for a legacy server at least. 

    Do elaborate what you think it is proof of, because i am curious. 

    I do agree with @MisterZebub that Blizzard flirting with the Nos team was... Stupid. 
    You were talking about lack of proof that there's a large paying customer base, but that hacker showed everyone that Elysium alone had over $1m in gold sales since last year just from the main gold sellers who were opperating on the server. I dont recal the exact details as its been a while since i watched it but didnt he also go on to show that the average spend per player was around $200 ? And this is just Elysium.. there's dozens more servers out there running vanila,TBC,WotLK and Cata versions too.
    You talk about Blizzard not having a guarantee of return on investment but when do buisnesses do anything with a guarantee? If there was always a guarantee then buisnesses would never go out of buisness. 
    The cost of putting up a legacy server must be a drop in the ocean for a company like Blizzard and what the video shows is the potential for millions of dollars to be made from a large player base that is happy to spend money on something they love.
    As large as the legacy servers are right now, they would be a whole lot larger if they were official and ran by Blizzard along with all the free publicity such a move would generate its obvious these servers would turn a profit.

    1) what is the average player churn time frame?

    2) what does the company do when the players start to bitch that they want "expansions" in the mind set of vanilla WoW? (which Blizzard does not seem to be interested in)
  • ste2000ste2000 Member EpicPosts: 6,194
    edited January 2017
    Scorchien said:
    ste2000 said:

    nothing is free , dont be naive , these Illegal servers are the same people selling Gold to there players ..  And i always find it funny how easily people can spend other peoples money ...

     And i dont even understand what your first sentence is referencing , They would be far from free, i thought i made that clear , But maybe not .. hmm maybe ill start using pictures
    Put your sarcasm away, I can assure you it's totally out of place in this case.

    I said "you were taking like if the Legacy Servers were going to be free...." because by listing all the costs in your post, it looked like you were assuming there would be no revenue coming in to offload the costs.
    As long as revenues are higher than costs, it doesn't matter how high the costs are, but I also explained to you that the actual cost would be minimum as the majority of the burden will be absorbed by the huge WoW infrastructure, and the code is already freely available (and Nostalrius code is really good).

    Of course the Legacy Server will not be free, and that's exactly my point.
    A bunch of kids can do it for free (as in no initial budget) and Blizzard cannot pull it off by charging a Subscription and with all those Billions in the bank?
    That doesn't sound right.
    I hope you understand my point now.

  • FrodoFraginsFrodoFragins Member EpicPosts: 6,057
    Honestly, I'd like to give them props for sticking it to the man and all.

    But they called Blizzards bluff when blizzard was holding a full house. Ballsy, but not really a smart move. This is America, telling a multi-billion dollar company to go blow isn't a good idea. Sure you wont get disappeared like other places in the world, but good luck getting a job, or a loan, or anything really.

    Blizzard will tie them up in court until the lawyer fee's bankrupt them, then hang a picture of them flipping burgers up in the board room.
    Oh really.  What laws were broken by:

    1) sharing their server code
    2) allowing transfers of accounts from Nost to Elysium

    They already complied with the C&D letter.



  • FrodoFraginsFrodoFragins Member EpicPosts: 6,057
    cheyane said:
    The figures are about 30 thousand over 4 realms which means about 120 thousand in total if we are generous. Is that really a decent size community for Blizzard to bother with ? They would be better off trying to get the 100 million who quit WoW over the last 12 years. Besides most of those are playing Overwatch and the other game  ;)
    for every player willing to play on or even know about private vanilla servers, there are many more that would only play on Blizzard Vanilla servers ...
  • FrodoFraginsFrodoFragins Member EpicPosts: 6,057
    Aelious said:
    ste2000 said:
    Aelious said:

    Your feelings don't make any difference here other than to rationalize illegal behavior. Even if one agrees with your point between P99 and Nost... so? You think Blizzard is being greedy and not providing something to a particular playerbase... so? That doesn't change the laws and the rights of Blizzard regarding their IP.

    You are right, Blizzard have every right to do with their IP what they like.
    Having said that, nothing stop them to just allow their Vanilla code to be used freely as long as it is not for commercial reasons (like P99)

    The truth though is that Blizzard knows those servers are actually pretty popular, Nostalrius alone had almost 1 Million active players, and they know that those Servers steal lots of customers from their Live Servers.

    Blizzard knows that making their own Legacy Servers will be profitable, however they also know that if they do open such servers they will sell less expansions, which are expansive to make.
    I would honestly pay for all their crappy expansion to play in one of their Legacy Server and obviously I would pay for a subscription as well.
    It make sense to me that if you want to play any version of WoW you have to pay for the all package, expansions included, even if you don't play them.
    To me it is a win win situation, but Blizzard thinks differently.

    It's an assumption that Blizzard didn't want to go forward with a legacy server(s) because they didn't make it happen during the same time as a big expansion, which was an unreasonable expectation by legacy server fans. They should not be expected to be at the beck and call of anyone regarding their own IP anyways. Blizzard is known for spreading out big announcements so it wouldn't make any sense to do both at the same time. It was the hasty decision by the Nost crew to release code that has gotten the situation where it is now.
    1) They could create a small team dedicated to just handling the Vanilla relaunch
    2) they could at least come up with a plan - which they didn't - as they had none for Blizzcon

    If you've been paying attention at all, it's clear that Blizzard has no plans to relaunch vanilla legacy servers. 
  • FrodoFraginsFrodoFragins Member EpicPosts: 6,057
    Ah, so the entitled, petulant man-children who ran Nost are finding out that stealing somebody's work, then releasing the tools so others can also profit from thievery, can't be done without consequences.

    I hope both they and the Elysium folks get so tied up in litigation that their great-grandchildren are going to need lawyers. They're immature little thieves who are in desperate need of a few life lessons.
    it's not illegal or stealing to reverse engineer server code.  Hosting it and/or monetizing it is where the issues arise.

    Elysium devs are in Russia, Blizzard can't do shit all to deal with them.  Literally nothing.  the best Blizzard can do is get the French ISP to shut it down, but guess what, all Elysium has to do is host in another country.  Sure players will be pissed while the servers are down.  But many will just be pissed at blizzard and less likely to go to official Vanilla servers if they ever launch them.

    IMO, Blizzard launching vanilla servers would kill the private ones as they would:

    1) offer the 100% true experience
    2) no risk of them shutting down
    3) $15 a month isn't why most people are playing private servers.  I had enough gold to buy a years worth of tokens when i quit legion.  the game simply wasn't enjoyable after the first month
  • MadFrenchieMadFrenchie Member LegendaryPosts: 8,505
    SBFord said:

    Vanilla WoW, and modern WoW are two totally different games, it happens that some people like more the Vanilla version than the current one.
    Why that would be such an outrageous thing to accept?

    I'd like a Model T but doubt I can convince Ford Motor Company it's in their best interests to start a new production of them. They are moving forward and making the product they are more interested in making. They don't want to go back no matter how much a "blast from the past" might twitterpate Model T fans.

    Maybe I should make a petition.....

    :D
    But Ford isn't taking the existing Model T's away from those who already paid for them, nor are they forcing them to use "updated" parts, nor are they threatening to sue anyone who is using their older models because it reduces the potential base for the newer ones.


    The virtual space is one of the very few places that the producer reserves the right to revoke the usage privileges of the consumer at any date after purchase.

    image
  • FrodoFraginsFrodoFragins Member EpicPosts: 6,057
    kitarad said:
    Blizzard should release legacy servers and we can all watch the snivelling excuses from people who will then continue to play on the pirate servers. Just for the fun of watching them squirm when the numbers playing on them don't come anywhere near what they are on the pirated ones it would be worth it for that alone.
    most hardcore vanilla players want the official ones, not approximations.  They are just smart enough to realize that Blizzard is unlikely to host any in the next 5 years.  the current devs will look rather foolish if a large number of people return for official vanilla servers.
  • FrodoFraginsFrodoFragins Member EpicPosts: 6,057
    Horusra said:
    Kunai_Vax said:
    tawess said:
    Kunai_Vax said:
    tawess said:
    cura said:

    I dont see a point. I see that bliz makes shit load of money on wow and still wont invest in vanilla server, which is in demand. If all they care about is their money, i dont see a reason to take their side. Besides, im sure they wouldnt give a shit about my problems, untill they see profit in it.
    But that is the point... There is no HARD proof that there is actually a large PAYING customer base.. This mostly because of a few catch 22´s (mostly that the pirvate servers can´t charge a sub fee and that beyond P.99 no company have tried work with or on making a large scale legacy server work.)

    But making a shit ton of money is not the same as being able to invest that money willy nilly.

    I side with Blizzard because that is what makes sense at this point. No guarantee of return on investment for a vanilla server.. 

    But i guess they could set up a pre-order system... Lets say... 1 year subscription and a min number of customers of 100.000... That would then be the project budget. Yeah. also.. no refunds... My guess is that it would fall short of that goal.
    Proof.

    ((video))

    Proof of what @Kunai_Vax...? 

    Not that there is a large scale market for a legacy server at least. 

    Do elaborate what you think it is proof of, because i am curious. 

    I do agree with @MisterZebub that Blizzard flirting with the Nos team was... Stupid. 
    You were talking about lack of proof that there's a large paying customer base, but that hacker showed everyone that Elysium alone had over $1m in gold sales since last year just from the main gold sellers who were opperating on the server. I dont recal the exact details as its been a while since i watched it but didnt he also go on to show that the average spend per player was around $200 ? And this is just Elysium.. there's dozens more servers out there running vanila,TBC,WotLK and Cata versions too.
    You talk about Blizzard not having a guarantee of return on investment but when do buisnesses do anything with a guarantee? If there was always a guarantee then buisnesses would never go out of buisness. 
    The cost of putting up a legacy server must be a drop in the ocean for a company like Blizzard and what the video shows is the potential for millions of dollars to be made from a large player base that is happy to spend money on something they love.
    As large as the legacy servers are right now, they would be a whole lot larger if they were official and ran by Blizzard along with all the free publicity such a move would generate its obvious these servers would turn a profit.

    1) what is the average player churn time frame?

    2) what does the company do when the players start to bitch that they want "expansions" in the mind set of vanilla WoW? (which Blizzard does not seem to be interested in)
    most of the work is done once they figure out how to add vanilla to the launcher and meet their expectations.  Blizzard's plan should include eventually going up to WOTLK where they peaked.  Progression servers with paid transfers from say vanilla to BC once you've finished the content.

    All they have to say is they are starting with a few vanilla servers to gauge interest and if it's strong they will continue with TBC and WOTLK over the next few years.  TADA!

    And guess what, players of the latest expansion can also roll on a legacy server during downtime.  there's nothing limiting them to just one server type.
  • Kunai_VaxKunai_Vax Member RarePosts: 527
    Horusra said:
    Kunai_Vax said:
    tawess said:
    Kunai_Vax said:
    tawess said:
    cura said:

    I dont see a point. I see that bliz makes shit load of money on wow and still wont invest in vanilla server, which is in demand. If all they care about is their money, i dont see a reason to take their side. Besides, im sure they wouldnt give a shit about my problems, untill they see profit in it.
    But that is the point... There is no HARD proof that there is actually a large PAYING customer base.. This mostly because of a few catch 22´s (mostly that the pirvate servers can´t charge a sub fee and that beyond P.99 no company have tried work with or on making a large scale legacy server work.)

    But making a shit ton of money is not the same as being able to invest that money willy nilly.

    I side with Blizzard because that is what makes sense at this point. No guarantee of return on investment for a vanilla server.. 

    But i guess they could set up a pre-order system... Lets say... 1 year subscription and a min number of customers of 100.000... That would then be the project budget. Yeah. also.. no refunds... My guess is that it would fall short of that goal.
    Proof.

    ((video))

    Proof of what @Kunai_Vax...? 

    Not that there is a large scale market for a legacy server at least. 

    Do elaborate what you think it is proof of, because i am curious. 

    I do agree with @MisterZebub that Blizzard flirting with the Nos team was... Stupid. 
    You were talking about lack of proof that there's a large paying customer base, but that hacker showed everyone that Elysium alone had over $1m in gold sales since last year just from the main gold sellers who were opperating on the server. I dont recal the exact details as its been a while since i watched it but didnt he also go on to show that the average spend per player was around $200 ? And this is just Elysium.. there's dozens more servers out there running vanila,TBC,WotLK and Cata versions too.
    You talk about Blizzard not having a guarantee of return on investment but when do buisnesses do anything with a guarantee? If there was always a guarantee then buisnesses would never go out of buisness. 
    The cost of putting up a legacy server must be a drop in the ocean for a company like Blizzard and what the video shows is the potential for millions of dollars to be made from a large player base that is happy to spend money on something they love.
    As large as the legacy servers are right now, they would be a whole lot larger if they were official and ran by Blizzard along with all the free publicity such a move would generate its obvious these servers would turn a profit.

    1) what is the average player churn time frame?

    2) what does the company do when the players start to bitch that they want "expansions" in the mind set of vanilla WoW? (which Blizzard does not seem to be interested in)
    Private servers have been running Vanila for years now. The people wanting to play vanila are not going anywhere. 
    If a group of individuals can put up a server then there's no reason Blizzard cant. There's evidence to strongly suggest that there is a large paying customer base waiting to be tapped. 
    I really dont get all this negativity from so many people.
    I dont play on a private server, and doubt i ever would as i doubt i would enjoy vanila as much as i used to back in the day, but it baffles me why so may people are getting but hurt over a private server they have probably never tried, from a retail game they probably stopped playing years ago. 

  • tawesstawess Member EpicPosts: 4,227
    edited January 2017
    Kunai_Vax said:
    1: You were talking about lack of proof that there's a large paying customer base, but that hacker showed everyone that Elysium alone had over $1m in gold sales since last year just from the main gold sellers who were opperating on the server. I dont recal the exact details as its been a while since i watched it but didnt he also go on to show that the average spend per player was around $200 ? And this is just Elysium.. there's dozens more servers out there running vanila,TBC,WotLK and Cata versions too.

    2: You talk about Blizzard not having a guarantee of return on investment but when do buisnesses do anything with a guarantee? If there was always a guarantee then buisnesses would never go out of buisness. 

    The cost of putting up a legacy server must be a drop in the ocean for a company like Blizzard and what the video shows is the potential for millions of dollars to be made from a large player base that is happy to spend money on something they love.

    As large as the legacy servers are right now, they would be a whole lot larger if they were official and ran by Blizzard along with all the free publicity such a move would generate its obvious these servers would turn a profit.
    So by their own numbers that equals out to about what... 6$ per customer/year... And even soo.. that is about 20 mil less than needed to run a server going by what Blizzard charges at this point.

    Blizzard as a company ofc only do the guarantee bit for the entire company (that is how they actually could carry the massive loss that was Titan.. A smaller company would have gone down in flames at that point) but if a project form the start only look like it is going to cost money.. not make it. That project will not be greenlit. This leads us in to the last point. 

    No... Putting a legacy server online is fairly costly. First off you need to send it by legal to make sure that the code is A-OK to use and not stolen from some other place (besides the things they reverse-engineered from Blizz) and then it has to be given over to the code monkeys to be de-loused and put in to a shape that will not burst in to flames when plugged in to Blizzards own infrastructure... Then you need at least one developer to work over the thing and make sure it is usable and to un-fuck anything fucked up by the coding version of a home guard militia... 

    So now you go off on the web and look up salaries and costs for that... Just to get a baseline... 

    Then you need to get the marketing dept on the case, both to market it and to craft a good camping to put a positive spin on when you need to cancel the service. That also cost money... 

    Then you ofc have the poor saps of the CS team that have to learn another new skill (skill here being what a product is usually called) that just so happen to be sort of similar to another. 

    Now you go out and look up more salaries and costs... 

    Now we come to hardware and bandwidth. I guess that also cost money. 

    And then finally we have the live team that keeps the service running. That alos cost money. 

    So a drop in the ocean.... No... Not backbreaking.. but far from nothing. 

    Also there IS NO POTENTIAL OF MILLIONS... You can point to about a million.. and that is when people are free to pay if they like... Being forced to pay.. each month... Very much a different story. 


    Finally.. Yes legacy servers are "big" but understand that in a few years the WotLK expansion will be the hot nostalgia item... Because nostalgia is a result of aging. But go ahead, as you seem to be so sure that it will turn a profit.... Take the info i gave above.. calculate the monthly cost of running a server.. put that against the 100-200.000 potential customers and see what the sub fee will be. 


    cura said:

    It only makes sense for bliz, not for us, gamers. If there is no money in it or they have no intention to find out, let fans run their shit. Its not like they are going to lose much anyway.
    You never ever let fans run anything that carries your brand... Not without oversight. 

    Because people in general can´t be trusted with a sponge without fucking it or things up. 

    This have been a good conversation

  • Kunai_VaxKunai_Vax Member RarePosts: 527
    tawess said:
    Kunai_Vax said:
    1: You were talking about lack of proof that there's a large paying customer base, but that hacker showed everyone that Elysium alone had over $1m in gold sales since last year just from the main gold sellers who were opperating on the server. I dont recal the exact details as its been a while since i watched it but didnt he also go on to show that the average spend per player was around $200 ? And this is just Elysium.. there's dozens more servers out there running vanila,TBC,WotLK and Cata versions too.

    2: You talk about Blizzard not having a guarantee of return on investment but when do buisnesses do anything with a guarantee? If there was always a guarantee then buisnesses would never go out of buisness. 

    The cost of putting up a legacy server must be a drop in the ocean for a company like Blizzard and what the video shows is the potential for millions of dollars to be made from a large player base that is happy to spend money on something they love.

    As large as the legacy servers are right now, they would be a whole lot larger if they were official and ran by Blizzard along with all the free publicity such a move would generate its obvious these servers would turn a profit.
    So by their own numbers that equals out to about what... 6$ per customer/year... And even soo.. that is about 20 mil less than needed to run a server going by what Blizzard charges at this point.

    Blizzard as a company ofc only do the guarantee bit for the entire company (that is how they actually could carry the massive loss that was Titan.. A smaller company would have gone down in flames at that point) but if a project form the start only look like it is going to cost money.. not make it. That project will not be greenlit. This leads us in to the last point. 

    No... Putting a legacy server online is fairly costly. First off you need to send it by legal to make sure that the code is A-OK to use and not stolen from some other place (besides the things they reverse-engineered from Blizz) and then it has to be given over to the code monkeys to be de-loused and put in to a shape that will not burst in to flames when plugged in to Blizzards own infrastructure... Then you need at least one developer to work over the thing and make sure it is usable and to un-fuck anything fucked up by the coding version of a home guard militia... 

    So now you go off on the web and look up salaries and costs for that... Just to get a baseline... 

    Then you need to get the marketing dept on the case, both to market it and to craft a good camping to put a positive spin on when you need to cancel the service. That also cost money... 

    Then you ofc have the poor saps of the CS team that have to learn another new skill (skill here being what a product is usually called) that just so happen to be sort of similar to another. 

    Now you go out and look up more salaries and costs... 

    Now we come to hardware and bandwidth. I guess that also cost money. 

    And then finally we have the live team that keeps the service running. That alos cost money. 

    So a drop in the ocean.... No... Not backbreaking.. but far from nothing. 

    Also there IS NO POTENTIAL OF MILLIONS... You can point to about a million.. and that is when people are free to pay if they like... Being forced to pay.. each month... Very much a different story. 


    Finally.. Yes legacy servers are "big" but understand that in a few years the WotLK expansion will be the hot nostalgia item... Because nostalgia is a result of aging. But go ahead, as you seem to be so sure that it will turn a profit.... Take the info i gave above.. calculate the monthly cost of running a server.. put that against the 100-200.000 potential customers and see what the sub fee will be. 


    cura said:

    It only makes sense for bliz, not for us, gamers. If there is no money in it or they have no intention to find out, let fans run their shit. Its not like they are going to lose much anyway.
    You never ever let fans run anything that carries your brand... Not without oversight. 

    Because people in general can´t be trusted with a sponge without fucking it or things up. 
    You make a lot of assumptions about a lot of things. Im not going to argue with you over numbers you seemed to have pulled out of your ass.
    I dont know how many people are playing on private servers, no one does. 
    As ive said over and over, there's obviously a demand for this service and this isnt about people just wanting to play a free game.
    If anyone can make a profit out of this its Blizzard. 
    You talk about in a few years WotLK will be the new hot item.. there's already WotLK servers, they are very popular and have been around for years now. 
    I also never commented on how Blizzard would make its money. You just assume its going to be a monthly sub and use it as an argument against my post, but i never once said anything about a monthly sub.
    If one private server could generate over a million in gold sales in a year then imagine what Blizzard could do with a vanila cash shop, imagine if they made it B2P and each year they re-release the next expac which is also B2P.. they could make millions. 
    Or maybe they cant. I dont have all the info and neither do you. My point was that the potential is there.

  • tawesstawess Member EpicPosts: 4,227
    Kunai_Vax said:

    You make a lot of assumptions about a lot of things. Im not going to argue with you over numbers you seemed to have pulled out of your ass.
    I dont know how many people are playing on private servers, no one does. 
    As ive said over and over, there's obviously a demand for this service and this isnt about people just wanting to play a free game.
    If anyone can make a profit out of this its Blizzard. 
    You talk about in a few years WotLK will be the new hot item.. there's already WotLK servers, they are very popular and have been around for years now. 
    I also never commented on how Blizzard would make its money. You just assume its going to be a monthly sub and use it as an argument against my post, but i never once said anything about a monthly sub.
    If one private server could generate over a million in gold sales in a year then imagine what Blizzard could do with a vanila cash shop, imagine if they made it B2P and each year they re-release the next expac which is also B2P.. they could make millions. 
    Or maybe they cant. I dont have all the info and neither do you. My point was that the potential is there.
    And my point is that until someone does have the info... Nobody will make the move because nobody want to dump money in to a lake in case it turns out that people don´t like to pay for their nostalgia. 


    Also... Another cost... 

    Legal trying to chase down the pirate servers that offer a free alternative to your product (legacy server)

    As for pulling numbers... i just split that 1 mil from gold sellers with the 150.000-ish reported activated nost accounts. 

    This have been a good conversation

  • ScorchienScorchien Member LegendaryPosts: 8,914
    ste2000 said:
    Scorchien said:
    ste2000 said:

    nothing is free , dont be naive , these Illegal servers are the same people selling Gold to there players ..  And i always find it funny how easily people can spend other peoples money ...

     And i dont even understand what your first sentence is referencing , They would be far from free, i thought i made that clear , But maybe not .. hmm maybe ill start using pictures
    Put your sarcasm away, I can assure you it's totally out of place in this case.

    I said "you were taking like if the Legacy Servers were going to be free...." because by listing all the costs in your post, it looked like you were assuming there would be no revenue coming in to offload the costs.
    As long as revenues are higher than costs, it doesn't matter how high the costs are, but I also explained to you that the actual cost would be minimum as the majority of the burden will be absorbed by the huge WoW infrastructure, and the code is already freely available (and Nostalrius code is really good).

    Of course the Legacy Server will not be free, and that's exactly my point.
    A bunch of kids can do it for free (as in no initial budget) and Blizzard cannot pull it off by charging a Subscription and with all those Billions in the bank?
    That doesn't sound right.
    I hope you understand my point now.

       Well we know what assuming gets people , and it got you here , Blizz does not have Billions in  the bank to start throwing a round , They have investors to answer to and ATVI , They would have to hire and train dozens of people to bring these Legacy servers up to there standard of operation , The revenue would not be there to support these server/servers...The fake numbers are just that .. even the 300k sigs on the petition they know that over 1/2 were not going to be revenue coming in , ANd after they did launch (if they did) they know that 2/3rds would dissapear .. (going back to there free servers they can cheat on ) Leaving Blizz with just a few % of the orginal people hanging on...

      And the its funny becuase we now know that a vast majority of illegal server users are Buying Gold , which goes against the Vanilla experience the crave so much .. (Gold which is being sold to them from the Pirate Hosts )  the irony ...

      Its this same cheating mindset that drives the majority of bottomfeeding thieves to the pirate  servers , they want there game free and they want to Cheat at it also .. Really the types of customers that most co. know to avoid, Blizz player base has grown every year since they began , becasue they create and cater to them .. Not to the less than .01% of thieving cheaters.. that area active in Pirate servers..

      The server Admins are thieves the users are thieves and misrepresenting an IP that doesnt belong nor do they have any right to

     
  • Kunai_VaxKunai_Vax Member RarePosts: 527
    edited January 2017
    tawess said:
    Kunai_Vax said:

    You make a lot of assumptions about a lot of things. Im not going to argue with you over numbers you seemed to have pulled out of your ass.
    I dont know how many people are playing on private servers, no one does. 
    As ive said over and over, there's obviously a demand for this service and this isnt about people just wanting to play a free game.
    If anyone can make a profit out of this its Blizzard. 
    You talk about in a few years WotLK will be the new hot item.. there's already WotLK servers, they are very popular and have been around for years now. 
    I also never commented on how Blizzard would make its money. You just assume its going to be a monthly sub and use it as an argument against my post, but i never once said anything about a monthly sub.
    If one private server could generate over a million in gold sales in a year then imagine what Blizzard could do with a vanila cash shop, imagine if they made it B2P and each year they re-release the next expac which is also B2P.. they could make millions. 
    Or maybe they cant. I dont have all the info and neither do you. My point was that the potential is there.
    And my point is that until someone does have the info... Nobody will make the move because nobody want to dump money in to a lake in case it turns out that people don´t like to pay for their nostalgia. 


    Also... Another cost... 

    Legal trying to chase down the pirate servers that offer a free alternative to your product (legacy server)

    As for pulling numbers... i just split that 1 mil from gold sellers with the 150.000-ish reported activated nost accounts. 
    The server we are talking about is Elysium not Nostalrius. 
    A large amount of Elysium players have only recently moved there from Nostalrius in the last couple of months. So its not even been anywhere close to a full year. Out of whatever number of reported activated accounts, how many are actually active? How many people made an account and left soon after?
    How many gold sellers are active on Elysium? I only mentioned the 2 that were hacked who's total came to over 1 mil. Out of how ever many active players that are on Elysium, how many who havent purchased gold would do so if it was from a trusted source ?(Blizzard) and how many more who dont purcahse gold would still be willing to spend money in a cash shop?

    ''So by their own numbers that equals out to about what... 6$ per customer/year... And even soo.. that is about 20 mil less than needed to run a server going by what Blizzard charges at this point.''

    So how do you come up with this $6 per customer/year ??

    Come back to me with solid answers to my questions. Until then your numbers are pulled from thin air.

  • AlbatroesAlbatroes Member LegendaryPosts: 7,671
    edited January 2017
    I see a common assumption that people cannot prove, which is: if blizzard set up legacy servers, then the people on the private servers would just go to them. This is very inaccurate, mainly because one is free and the other (official) will not be. Say Blizzard did set these up. The illegal ones would still exist because a majority are the ones that feel that they should not have to pay for something that is old and wont receive real updates. You can't really use timewhatever servers that EQ/2 utilize because there honestly isn't a big enough base to stand on with those. Point is, regardless of whatever blizzard did/does/will do, there's always going to be illegal servers to counter what blizzard still isn't doing, whatever that turns out to be. This is why you shut them all down. Its just a can of worms.
  • Kunai_VaxKunai_Vax Member RarePosts: 527
    Torval said:
    ste2000 said:
    tawess said:

    But that is the point... There is no HARD proof that there is actually a large PAYING customer base.. This mostly because of a few catch 22´s (mostly that the pirvate servers can´t charge a sub fee and that beyond P.99 no company have tried work with or on making a large scale legacy server work.)

    But this is the actual point.

    Why Blizzard don't acquire the Nostalrium code (which is free) set up a couple of Servers, and see how that goes.
    They have nothing to lose, worst that can happen they will have to shut the Legacy Servers after a couple of months, but that would also shut up all the Vanilla fan base for good.

    Instead they are making the issue worse, blowing it out of proportion, and in all this mess they also risk to be seen like the bad guys.

    They could have everything to lose. You don't know that. You know nothing about the risks and benefits from the perspective of Blizzard.

    They aren't making anything worse. The entitlement crowd is making the deal out of it. Their customers, outside of a few attention seekers, don't view them as the bad guys. Their customers are paying for their games right now. The freeloaders aren't. I can't see their customers even giving a shit about the freeloaders and what they want.
    You make valid points but i will just add this.. i was playing WoW (retail) when Nostalrius shut down and for days it was all anyone was talking about in general and trade chat, there was actually a fair few people who claimed to have accounts on Nostalrius. Also when Blizzard asked on their official forums what questions they would want answering at Blizcon, the overwhelming response was questions about Legacy servers, so much so that the devs had to make a statement on the forums a few hours later saying that they would not be addressing Legacy questions at blizcon. (you can only post on the official forums if you're an active sub)

  • AnirethAnireth Member UncommonPosts: 940
    Private servers can and do/did work. Just because some guys messed up doesn't mean the concept in itself is borked (besides the obvious legal aspect).

    Not that many private MMO servers out there, but hundreds of thousands for all kinds of multiplayer game. Heck, you can troll people in Minecraft way more than you can do so in any MMO.

    And private UO servers where the thing back then.

    If someone wants you to have a bad day, they will find a way. You playing on their server makes it easier, sure, but it also makes it easier to get rid of them (stop playing there), compared to having to play on the same server, because the game only has one, or because they are region locked, or because you have to pay $10 for a server transfer despite paying a sub.

    The reason private servers do not work well often enough is because it's a ragtag team running it, with little to no previous experience, and because they cater to their own wishes (thats why they are running one in the first place), and do not try to appeal to a greater public.

    A company like e.g. Blizzard both has lots of experience by now, and a lot of money to hire people who do. And yet, from what i hear about anything Smedly touches, or Star Citizien, you'd hardly believe they are supposed to be professionals with (compared to a private team) basically unlimited time and money.

    And the horror stories about WoW barren chat in the first 10 years or so..

    I'll wait to the day's end when the moon is high
    And then I'll rise with the tide with a lust for life, I'll
    Amass an army, and we'll harness a horde
    And then we'll limp across the land until we stand at the shore

  • ste2000ste2000 Member EpicPosts: 6,194
    edited January 2017
    Torval said:
    ste2000 said:
    They could have everything to lose. You don't know that. You know nothing about the risks and benefits from the perspective of Blizzard.

    They aren't making anything worse. The entitlement crowd is making the deal out of it. Their customers, outside of a few attention seekers, don't view them as the bad guys. Their customers are paying for their games right now. The freeloaders aren't. I can't see their customers even giving a shit about the freeloaders and what they want.
    I am sure they think they have something to lose otherwise they would have set up the Servers already, mine was a rhetoric question.

    Since we are discussing the matter and Blizzard is not going to tell us the real reasons why they refuse to open Legacy Servers, except the vague "Blizzard wants to look forward" (who doesn't), we are trying to figure out what the real reason is.
    I don't think there is nothing wrong in debating that.

    I am giving my opinion, and in my view Blizzard have nothing to lose by making those Legacy Servers, not financially (for the reasons I already explained) and even less in terms of PR, they actually might benefit, even though you are right, the majority of their customers don't really give a shit.
    I would like to know what other people think Blizzard has to lose by opening such Servers, "they must have a good reason" is not really a good answer or material for a debate.

  • tawesstawess Member EpicPosts: 4,227
    Kunai_Vax said:


    So how do you come up with this $6 per customer/year ??

    Come back to me with solid answers to my questions. Until then your numbers are pulled from thin air.
    1 mil $ split over 150.000 accounts.... Since the 1 mil was over a year.. that makes the average per customer per year... ~6$ (or more exact ~6.6...) 

    I took these numbers because those are the number we happen to have at hand... 

    as for the "blizz" numbers i did the same in reverse.. just bumped the number from 6 to the 12.99 that blizzard charge (as it is safe to assume that at that price the cost of the servers and others are covered)

    This have been a good conversation

  • ste2000ste2000 Member EpicPosts: 6,194
    edited January 2017
    Torval said:
    ste2000 said:

    Of course you can have an opinion, but in order for it to carry any weight in the discussion you have to back it up with something more concrete than believing it.

    All the people who want it believe Blizz has nothing to lose, but saying so doesn't make it true. You gotta prove it.
    I wasn't asking to be allowed to have an opinion, I said that the matter deserve a debate, which involves people with different point of view (not just mine).
    I hope you see the difference.

    Providing you can't prove anything unless you are actually sitting on the Blizzard Board, one can only make and educated guess.
    Which is what I actually did if you read my previous posts (and of course you are free to disagree with it), but I have yet to hear a sound theory from people who sides with Blizzard, apart from them repeating Blizzard official stand which is not really telling much.

  • tawesstawess Member EpicPosts: 4,227
    ste2000 said:
    but I have yet to hear a sound theory from people who sides with Blizzard, apart from them repeating Blizzard official stand which is not really telling much.

    And all i can get out from that is "they do not say what i want them to say"

    Especially as me and many others have explained over and over again why any normally functioning business in good standing would not invest in such a project... As well as try to explain why it from a purley logical point is also a bad idea. 

    I agree that you win the emotional one... From that point it makes perfect sense, but that in turn is another strike... You never really let emotions run a business. 

    This have been a good conversation

  • NephethNepheth Member RarePosts: 473
    edited January 2017
    Rhoklaw said:
    Torval said:
    ste2000 said:
    tawess said:

    But that is the point... There is no HARD proof that there is actually a large PAYING customer base.. This mostly because of a few catch 22´s (mostly that the pirvate servers can´t charge a sub fee and that beyond P.99 no company have tried work with or on making a large scale legacy server work.)

    But this is the actual point.

    Why Blizzard don't acquire the Nostalrium code (which is free) set up a couple of Servers, and see how that goes.
    They have nothing to lose, worst that can happen they will have to shut the Legacy Servers after a couple of months, but that would also shut up all the Vanilla fan base for good.

    Instead they are making the issue worse, blowing it out of proportion, and in all this mess they also risk to be seen like the bad guys.

    They could have everything to lose. You don't know that. You know nothing about the risks and benefits from the perspective of Blizzard.

    They aren't making anything worse. The entitlement crowd is making the deal out of it. Their customers, outside of a few attention seekers, don't view them as the bad guys. Their customers are paying for their games right now. The freeloaders aren't. I can't see their customers even giving a shit about the freeloaders and what they want.
    You realize the original petition Mark Kern presented to Blizzard had over 275,000 signatures. That's more than just a few people interested in legacy servers. The fact you call them freeloaders when Blizzard doesn't offer them an official alternative is also unfair. If they want a product and Blizzard ignores them, of course they will go where the product is available. The fact it happens to be freeshards has nothing to do with who these people are. Blizzard is ignoring them, so I don't have a problem with what they are doing.
    You do realise that many of those people didn't even play wow in their life right? The Nost community worked their ass off for that petition. They basically begged for signatures on every damn stream on twitch, forums, youtube etc. A lot of big streamers signed that petition just to make them shut up. Even I signed it up and I don't wanna play on any legacy server to be honest. That petition was a pretty funny joke. Even with all that hype and the begging they could only get 275k signatures. If u really think that number is big enough for Blizzard, you are delusional...
  • ste2000ste2000 Member EpicPosts: 6,194
    edited January 2017
    tawess said:
    ste2000 said:
    but I have yet to hear a sound theory from people who sides with Blizzard, apart from them repeating Blizzard official stand which is not really telling much.

    And all i can get out from that is "they do not say what i want them to say"

    Especially as me and many others have explained over and over again why any normally functioning business in good standing would not invest in such a project... As well as try to explain why it from a purley logical point is also a bad idea. 

    I agree that you win the emotional one... From that point it makes perfect sense, but that in turn is another strike... You never really let emotions run a business. 


    I am only interested in a good discussion, and since you brought up a couple of good points, and you seem keen to discuss the matter more in detail I will ask you a couple of questions, in order to make some clarity and consolidate this thread which is all over the place.

    1) Why making Legacy Server is not economically viable?

    2) Why on a logical point of view is a bad idea?

    I actually don't care about the emotional motives believe it or not, I am perfectly happy playing other games.
    If Blizzard makes Legacy Server or not, doesn't really bother me personally.
    I am just puzzled by their stubbornness of refusing to explore that option as Daybreak seemed perfectly capable of making Legacy Servers for a much smaller game which has a fraction of WoW player base.
    So I want to understand why making WoW Legacy Servers is such an issue for Blizzard, you are telling me that Daybreak is a better organized and more competent company than Blizzard?
    That would be a first.

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