Extracted from Jon Woods article on MMORPG.com last week.
"Even the game's Open Beta is, in the footsteps of the IP itself, more epic in scope. Beginning on April 6th, Turbine and Midway are kicking off their World Tour of Middle Earth. Billed as "One of the largest North American MMO pre-launch events ever", this open beta event will see over
1,000,000 players invited to take part in the game. This
enormous free-for-all will be capped for players at level 15 (you can't give everything away), but will provide potential players with the opportunity to get a flavor for the game, and to explore the different game play elements available."
Last evening Brandywine had a queue marked as "medium" and I'm told it was about a 15 minute wait to get in. If we really see over 1 million players in this game (or even half that number) how in the world will our current 7 severs handle this sort of load.
Can we expect a host of new servers to open up this weekend? (I'm hoping?) or will we find the servers completely full with massive queues to get in for the next 2 weeks.
If anyone can shed some information about this I'd appreciate it. (yes, I know, might be posted over on Turbine forums, but here at work they've figured out that is a "gaming" site.... I guess MMORPG.com isn't about gaming in their eyes....
)
Regardless, expect massive lines of people camped around certain key places (like Bauman's farm, home to 2 quests, one of which you have to kill the target for every person in the fellowship...on about a 2 minute timer....its like a massive battle royal to tap the mob there)
I may just craft for two weeks
(and I hate crafting)
"True friends stab you in the front." | Oscar Wilde
"I need to finish" - Christian Wolff: The Accountant
Just trying to live long enough to play a new, released MMORPG, playing New Worlds atm
Fools find no pleasure in understanding but delight in airing their own opinions. Pvbs 18:2, NIV
Don't just play games, inhabit virtual worlds™
"This is the most intelligent, well qualified and articulate response to a post I have ever seen on these forums. It's a shame most people here won't have the attention span to read past the second line." - Anon
Comments
The good news is that Pre-Orders get priority in the queue (for beta). The bad news is that the purpose of the open beta is to test server loading... so expect lag. They will (most likely) not be adding servers, but they will be upgrading the hardware, and fine tuning as needed to allow each server to handle the maximum load.
Most people will hit Lvl 15 in a week, so it should calm down in about 10 days or so... then people will be grinding crafting, monster chars, and making alts.
I'm not worried about it at all. With how well Turbine has been doing with LOTRO, I'm sure they're more than prepared for the influx of players. There are limitations on the number of people allowed on each server, so I'm sure they have another batch just ready to go, as they've already stated.
I'm more worried about the TYPE of players that will be coming into the game. Thank goodness I'm already out of the starting area with all my toons and can shut /ooc off with a click, if needed.
_________________________________
JonMichael
Currently: AION, an MMO Beta under NDA
Played: WAR, LOTRO, Hellgate: London, CoX, GW, SotNW, DAOC, EQ2, SWG, WoW, AO, Horizons, Second Life, There, TSO
Beta'd: There, Second Life, EQ2, DAOC:LotM, LOTRO, Tabula Rasa, Gods and Heroes, Hellgate: London, Requiem:Bloodymare, AoC, WAR, DDO, Fallen Earth
--
psyconius Cthulhu
Gothika Studios
Well, yes and no. Pre-order customers get the ability to to roll their character over into retail. Non pre-order customers do not. This is directly from the official LOTRO Faq:
Participation in the Pre-order Program grants access to the exclusive Founder’s offer which includes a package of benefits including special pricing, open beta privileges and unique in-game items. Highlights of the Founder’s offer include:
Special Membership Pricing:
Well, from a technical standpoint, wouldn't it be easier to have :
7 worlds, with pre-order characters only, that do not get reset at release
X number of other worlds, for the world tour people to play around on, that at release get a complete character database wipe.
From release, thne have 7+X servers available for new subscribers to make characters on.
Of course, who knows what they are planning to do.
If pre-order gets priority in the queue, thats great for us pre-orderers, but I don't see how its going to let that many people experience the game. And is it going to boot people off if the server is full and a pre-orderer wants to get on?
Gaming? That's not gaming!
That's just people sat 'round in costumes drinking...
One final question. Go-live date is the 24th right? (a Tuesday...ugh) Will they need 3.5 days to set things up like they did when they cut over to the Open beta from CB? I'm trying to figure out what day they might cut everyone off before they reconfigure the servers....
edit (or...maybe there's no need to reconfigure.... the game is good to go as it is really)
"True friends stab you in the front." | Oscar Wilde
"I need to finish" - Christian Wolff: The Accountant
Just trying to live long enough to play a new, released MMORPG, playing New Worlds atm
Fools find no pleasure in understanding but delight in airing their own opinions. Pvbs 18:2, NIV
Don't just play games, inhabit virtual worlds™
"This is the most intelligent, well qualified and articulate response to a post I have ever seen on these forums. It's a shame most people here won't have the attention span to read past the second line." - Anon
And back to topic. I cannot imagine Turbine trying to handle more players than they have at present on the same seven servers.
The servers do very well at the limits they've set, and as a result they may experiment with increasing the limits a bit, but I'd also expect more servers. We'll see real soon now.
No roll overs for people just having a go at it and later purchase the game is a bit crappy I suppose...
Well I think its exciting they're expecting a million people. If only one of the current seven servers is having any wait, thats not such a biggie. They have stated they have additional servers ready to fire up, and if they say they're ready, you can believe they really are.
If you need a mob that a bunch of others do, just fellow up and get the kill as a group then move on. I was concerned about a couple of the quest mobs being a problem when large groups came in but so far its been smooth.
If you have questions while you're playing there's an Advice channel I recommend you use rather than the OOC which is currently a bit crowded with Troll-talk. Just a few individuals, but they don't seem to have much to do with their time besides wolfing pizza, scratching themselves, and being...not so helpful.
The main thing is, the game is really fun and the devs and community staff listen to players concerns. Enjoy.
Right now they have only 7 servers so I wonder if that will increase tomorrow... Seems like they will have to.
At least this game does easy this overcrowding a bit by having certain races start in certain areas...
I just hope everyone has a chance to enjoy this game as I have been for the past 6 months.
"True friends stab you in the front." | Oscar Wilde
"I need to finish" - Christian Wolff: The Accountant
Just trying to live long enough to play a new, released MMORPG, playing New Worlds atm
Fools find no pleasure in understanding but delight in airing their own opinions. Pvbs 18:2, NIV
Don't just play games, inhabit virtual worlds™
"This is the most intelligent, well qualified and articulate response to a post I have ever seen on these forums. It's a shame most people here won't have the attention span to read past the second line." - Anon
Meridion
If you wish, but there was a stress test, and LotRO passed with flying colors. A second unofficial stress test took place when preorder "open" beta opened. 7 servers filled in one day. Went fine. Some queuing, so the servers really were full.
In addition, Turbine are very responsive, and have more servers waiting beyond the added four they just announced. But if you're really worried, wait a few days, until Tuesday or so, and if there were problems, they'd be sorted out by then. Or, in the unlikely event not, the forums would warn you.
I don't see this as a stress test, they have already done that. This has been the best beta I have ever seen, there are still a few bugs here and there, but the game stability (at least for me) has been great. This is a "get people to try the game before release" type of thing, so I hope that they try to show people the best side of the game that they can.
Meridion