The Mega Server = Over Population?

WellzyC · February 2013

I have read up on the mega server technology, I know it will phase areas and put you with ppl you know ect.

But I cant help feel like having hundreds of thousands of people on one giant server will diminish people and guilds. in DAOC it was 1500 people, roughly, on 1 server spread across 3 realms. It created a tight knit group, and tons of rivalries.

Do you think the mega server will diminish guilds and people where the community is just too large to for guilds and players to be known?

deakon · February 2013

Originally posted by WellzyC

I have read up on the mega server technology, I know it will phase areas and put you with ppl you know ect.

But I cant help feel like having hundreds of thousands of people on one giant server will diminish people and guilds. in DAOC it was 1500 people, roughly, on 1 server spread across 3 realms. It created a tight knit group, and tons of rivalries.

Do you think the mega server will diminish guilds and people where the community is just too large to for guilds and players to be known?

For pvp you get locked to a campaign of 2k people across 3 factions so it shouldnt be an issue.

Pve will lose some of that, but they did say they want their system to be intelegent and put you with people you have played with before, so if the system works it will be fine

Karteli · February 2013

Every instance of the world will be fully populated, but as a result, communities will suffer.

You'll almost never see the same faces (outside of PVP campaigns), so the effect will just be one giant cross-realm LFG/LFD scenario, with people nice at first, but becoming increasingly rude as time goes on. There are no consequences to anyones actions, and no personal reputation to maintain.

You can switch around PVP campaigns too if you play enough (switching costs some sort of PVP currency). So be a toxic jerk for awhile, then switch.

My take on it anyways. Some stuff could change here and there, but that's pretty much the game architecture going into beta, which can't be changed. GW2 is widely known as anti-social, and GW2 die-hard fans will eat this game up.

ShakyMo · February 2013

The mega server = xfaction cheesers & no alternative ruleset servers, which will piss off the the go anywhere crowd, of either the kill anyone or pick flowers with everyone variety

ShakyMo · February 2013

Copy the daoc server model with core, ffa, coop servers. It's the perfect server set up, use that.

syntax42 · February 2013

Guild Wars 1 implemented a mega-server similar to what is described by the OP. Guilds thrived on PvP because that was the game's long-term draw. I think it proves the viability of implementing the system.

In an empty room, nobody will hear you scream. In a crowded room, nobody will know who screamed. It takes the right balance to ensure it doesn't feel so crowded that your voice isn't heard, and not so empty that you're talking to the walls. That will be the true challenge for them to figure out, but likely easy to adjust.

KenFisher · February 2013

I think the big plus is that it scales well, up or down.

I'm curious how the shard / channel matching will work. If I sign in and 2 friends are on different shards, who which will I get assigned to.

redcapp · February 2013

Yes. This was an issue for me with GW2.

Quizzical · February 2013

Originally posted by WellzyC
But I cant help feel like having hundreds of thousands of people on one giant server will diminish people and guilds. in DAOC it was 1500 people, roughly, on 1 server spread across 3 realms. It created a tight knit group, and tons of rivalries.

Do you think the mega server will diminish guilds and people where the community is just too large to for guilds and players to be known?

AAA game budget + small game community = massive commercial failure.

If having too many players is a problem, then it's one that most game companies would like to have.

azzamasin · February 2013

Originally posted by Karteli
Every instance of the world will be fully populated, but as a result, communities will suffer.

You'll almost never see the same faces (outside of PVP campaigns), so the effect will just be one giant cross-realm LFG/LFD scenario, with people nice at first, but becoming increasingly rude as time goes on. There are no consequences to anyones actions, and no personal reputation to maintain.

You can switch around PVP campaigns too if you play enough (switching costs some sort of PVP currency). So be a toxic jerk for awhile, then switch.

My take on it anyways. Some stuff could change here and there, but that's pretty much the game architecture going into beta, which can't be changed. GW2 is widely known as anti-social, and GW2 die-hard fans will eat this game up.

Well some may look at it like that but there is zero evidence to support your theory.

My theory is more valid because everyone is helpful and mindful of their surroundings because the game first and formost supports cooperation in PvE, Looting and resource nodes. GW2 is a good indication that my theory is more sound. But again I wouldnt expect someone whos first MMO was WoW to think otherwise.

Vorgarag109 · February 2013

Thought u had to Answer a Questionare which decides what mini server/phased one you will end up on. which in that case you are more likely to end up seeing the same faces of like minded people. in which case wouldn't that help promote community?

Not 100% sure information is True or up to date.

7:45 is where I got my information from

bingbongbros · February 2013

Originally posted by WellzyC

I have read up on the mega server technology, I know it will phase areas and put you with ppl you know ect.

But I cant help feel like having hundreds of thousands of people on one giant server will diminish people and guilds. in DAOC it was 1500 people, roughly, on 1 server spread across 3 realms. It created a tight knit group, and tons of rivalries.

Do you think the mega server will diminish guilds and people where the community is just too large to for guilds and players to be known?

Honestly no.

For years people have been complaining about games that launch with too many servers.

"My server is a ghost town!!! Merge the servers!!!"

Back in DAoC, EQ1, UO, Nexus, etc... there were few servers and they were moderately populated. Why? Because the scene was still mostly unknown by the masses.

Skip forward a decade and mmo's have become mainstream in the gaming scene. Now games launch with a million + and scale from there. Putting out 100+ servers sometimes to handle the load to prevent overpopulation and overcrowding. Which leads to isolation when it settles and the community that is going to stay sets in.

A "mega" server is a great idea. It eliminates the need for 100+ servers and should stop the ghost town effect once the game settles in. At least on paper.

"Tight knit groups" as you put it are still in existance but are not in the spotlight as they once were because of overexposure.

You will always have those groups in your games/servers if you choose to find/create them. Guilds large or small will still have opportunities to find fame in mmo's. It only takes these guilds to actually strive for it.

Thinking that a single server type is a bad thing is a terrible idea. We should be embracing the idea and or ability to make this happen. Goodbye shards/servers is what we should be saying. Goodbye ghost towns, goodbye bad server merger press.

Something of this calibur, if executed properly, should be celebrated. I am not educated in what this game actually has gameplay wise but just for the server tech they are promoting, we should be excited.

You want your guild/friends to stand out? Fight for it. You want fame? Work your asses of and the taste of this victory will be sweeter than anything you have every accomplished in mmo's before.

The spirit of your desires doesn't rest inside of isolated servers, it's inside of your motivation to set yourselves apart from the crowd.

Crazyhorsek · February 2013

Originally posted by WellzyC

I have read up on the mega server technology, I know it will phase areas and put you with ppl you know ect.

But I cant help feel like having hundreds of thousands of people on one giant server will diminish people and guilds. in DAOC it was 1500 people, roughly, on 1 server spread across 3 realms. It created a tight knit group, and tons of rivalries.

Do you think the mega server will diminish guilds and people where the community is just too large to for guilds and players to be known?

Server caps for daoc was 3000, cant remember very well cause it ended with a 2 or a 3... it was either 3002/3003 something like that across 3 realms. In its prime, daoc's servers were all above 2500 during peak, and several you actually couldnt get in - specially when the 3 "classic" came up, they were all 3002/3 all the time.

It was never 1500...

Abimor · February 2013

my only question is : If the pvp is capped at 2k how does that split evenly between three factions?

I played daoc for a long time maybe 5 years the pvp always seemed prety even there were times when one side would role the other two for a couple of hours or days depending on the time of the month. I know when there was a holiday here in the Americas that my guild would do some damage, but mostly it was even.

rojoArcueid · February 2013

1 mega server = best thing ever. The population problem will be if they lock faction maps away from players from other factions. If i cannot interact with the other factions out in the PvE world that is as bad as moving them to another server entirely, and only meeting them in a server vs server fight in cyrodil.

I really hope they consider letting every faction meet up in PvE even as friendly (and keeping pvp to cyrodil)

Crazyhorsek · February 2013

Ok... So whats the point of WAR if you can "meet as friendly in pve"? This makes no sense...

Damn.. WoW has really changed mmos... "factions at war meet as friendly". What next? /wave /smile /hug to your enemy?

Red is dead. Period.

Shadanwolf · February 2013

I wonder how the auction house is going to work on the mega server ? As a crafter ...will I have the whole server to sell too....and a lot of other crafters to compete with ?

Unknown · February 2013

The marketing line for the Megaserver is BS. But it's a great solution for the problem all MMOs these days face a few months after launch.

nate1980 · February 2013

Originally posted by azzamasin
Originally posted by Karteli
Every instance of the world will be fully populated, but as a result, communities will suffer.

You'll almost never see the same faces (outside of PVP campaigns), so the effect will just be one giant cross-realm LFG/LFD scenario, with people nice at first, but becoming increasingly rude as time goes on. There are no consequences to anyones actions, and no personal reputation to maintain.

You can switch around PVP campaigns too if you play enough (switching costs some sort of PVP currency). So be a toxic jerk for awhile, then switch.

My take on it anyways. Some stuff could change here and there, but that's pretty much the game architecture going into beta, which can't be changed. GW2 is widely known as anti-social, and GW2 die-hard fans will eat this game up.

Well some may look at it like that but there is zero evidence to support your theory.

My theory is more valid because everyone is helpful and mindful of their surroundings because the game first and formost supports cooperation in PvE, Looting and resource nodes. GW2 is a good indication that my theory is more sound. But again I wouldnt expect someone whos first MMO was WoW to think otherwise.

Except in GW2 people were anti-social, would run past you if you needed a rezz, would never respond to questions or pleas for help in /map chat, and wouldn't say a world in DE's. They'd just AoE for max credit and move along, nothing said, and everyone dead at the end be damned. Not to mention all the bots just auto casting and attacking at well known DE respawn points. I think you chose a very poor example of a game to emmulate a good cohesive communicative community.

ShakyMo · February 2013

Bingbong nailed it

"goodbye bad server merging press"

Icewhite · February 2013

Bigger isn't always better. But running in circles chanting "the doom is falling" is premature.

Alberel · February 2013

Originally posted by Axxar
The marketing line for the Megaserver is BS. But it's a great solution for the problem all MMOs these days face a few months after launch.

This. The ONLY reason they're using the megaserver tech is so they can hide the server populations and prevent players from noticing when the population inevitably plummets a few months after launch.

This will bring with it all the problems that cross-server tech did in other games. The most obvious is that no one faces any consequences for their actions as they will never see the same player twice; sadly this tends to lead to most people trolling or being otherwise anti-social simply because they can get away with it.

It's all well and good using tech to maintain high numbers of concurrent players but when it sacrifices any kind of persistence in the community and prevents a close community from actually forming I can only think it's going too far in the other direction.

Bladestrom · February 2013

Originally posted by nate1980
Originally posted by azzamasin
Originally posted by Karteli
Every instance of the world will be fully populated, but as a result, communities will suffer.

You'll almost never see the same faces (outside of PVP campaigns), so the effect will just be one giant cross-realm LFG/LFD scenario, with people nice at first, but becoming increasingly rude as time goes on. There are no consequences to anyones actions, and no personal reputation to maintain.

You can switch around PVP campaigns too if you play enough (switching costs some sort of PVP currency). So be a toxic jerk for awhile, then switch.

My take on it anyways. Some stuff could change here and there, but that's pretty much the game architecture going into beta, which can't be changed. GW2 is widely known as anti-social, and GW2 die-hard fans will eat this game up.

Well some may look at it like that but there is zero evidence to support your theory.

My theory is more valid because everyone is helpful and mindful of their surroundings because the game first and formost supports cooperation in PvE, Looting and resource nodes. GW2 is a good indication that my theory is more sound. But again I wouldnt expect someone whos first MMO was WoW to think otherwise.

Except in GW2 people were anti-social, would run past you if you needed a rezz, would never respond to questions or pleas for help in /map chat, and wouldn't say a world in DE's. They'd just AoE for max credit and move along, nothing said, and everyone dead at the end be damned. Not to mention all the bots just auto casting and attacking at well known DE respawn points. I think you chose a very poor example of a game to emmulate a good cohesive communicative community.

Rubbish, your mindlessly repeating some rubbish churned up in this forum as fact, if you played GW2 you would know that is not the case. That asside, his arguements that sharing nodes and quests is a lot better than having people fight over nodes and npc's is obviously valid.

Simple analagy, 2 people want that last loaf of bread on the supermarket shelf at the same time and they know there wont be another loaf for hours - 1 person loses out as a direct impact of the other person taking that loaf. For a % of the time when this happens there will be conflict and anti-social behaviour . Same shelf but now there are 2 loafs, now we never have conflict. 2 Loafs does not encourage social behaviour, but it removes anti-social behavior, which is excatly why the the shared node approach helps a community.

Karteli · February 2013

Originally posted by Bladestrom
Originally posted by nate1980
Originally posted by azzamasin
Originally posted by Karteli
Every instance of the world will be fully populated, but as a result, communities will suffer.

You'll almost never see the same faces (outside of PVP campaigns), so the effect will just be one giant cross-realm LFG/LFD scenario, with people nice at first, but becoming increasingly rude as time goes on. There are no consequences to anyones actions, and no personal reputation to maintain.

You can switch around PVP campaigns too if you play enough (switching costs some sort of PVP currency). So be a toxic jerk for awhile, then switch.

My take on it anyways. Some stuff could change here and there, but that's pretty much the game architecture going into beta, which can't be changed. GW2 is widely known as anti-social, and GW2 die-hard fans will eat this game up.

Well some may look at it like that but there is zero evidence to support your theory.

My theory is more valid because everyone is helpful and mindful of their surroundings because the game first and formost supports cooperation in PvE, Looting and resource nodes. GW2 is a good indication that my theory is more sound. But again I wouldnt expect someone whos first MMO was WoW to think otherwise.

Except in GW2 people were anti-social, would run past you if you needed a rezz, would never respond to questions or pleas for help in /map chat, and wouldn't say a world in DE's. They'd just AoE for max credit and move along, nothing said, and everyone dead at the end be damned. Not to mention all the bots just auto casting and attacking at well known DE respawn points. I think you chose a very poor example of a game to emmulate a good cohesive communicative community.

Rubbish, your mindlessly repeating some rubbish churned up in this forum as fact, if you played GW2 you would know that is not the case. That asside, his arguements that sharing nodes and quests is a lot better than having people fight over nodes and npc's is obviously valid.

Simple analagy, 2 people want that last loaf of bread on the supermarket shelf at the same time and they know there wont be another loaf for hours - 1 person loses out as a direct impact of the other person taking that loaf. For a % of the time when this happens there will be conflict and anti-social behaviour . Same shelf but now there are 2 loafs, now we never have conflict. 2 Loafs does not encourage social behaviour, but it removes anti-social behavior, which is excatly why the the shared node approach helps a community.

When there is only one loaf of bread and I fought over it, that is something that would keep me entertained, and something I would remember. Always having 2 loaf's of bread leads to monotony, and makes everyday just like the last - boring and uneventful. Games that use the 2 loaf of bread syndrome may successfully avoid conflict, but at the expense of making a game worth re-logging back onto. GW2 avoids conflicts and social interaction at every turn, and I can't stand to log in; it's a drab game.

MMORPG's should have conflicts. There are already too many carebear single-player games disguised as MMORPGs continually creeping into the market. I'd just as soon play single-player games than a single player MMO.

ps - I don't think you understand anti-social behavior. 2 people going for the same loaf of bread would be aggressive greed, including social actions through behavior, even without words. 2 people ignoring each other as they swoop up their personalized loaf of bread then moving on is anti-social.

fat_taddler · February 2013

I'll be curious to see how this will affect the economy. My guess is that we'll see something similar to GW2's TP debacle where it was nearly impossible to make any money due to the sheer number of auctions for a particular item.

I would also think that gold farmers would find it easier to manipulate the economy when there's only one server.

Crazyhorsek · February 2013

Originally posted by fat_taddler
I'll be curious to see how this will affect the economy. My guess is that we'll see something similar to GW2's TP debacle where it was nearly impossible to make any money due to the sheer number of auctions for a particular item.

I would also think that gold farmers would find it easier to manipulate the economy when there's only one server.

Thats one side of the coin.

The other side is since theres only one server, its easier to keep gold farmers/ sellers in check.

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