Free Character Moves 12/6 until 12/13

[Xanthippe]

Don't get your hopes up - it's still high pop to low pop servers.

http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.html?topicId=3271178841&sid=1

We will be offering free character moves from selected high population realms to other, lower populated realms to assist in population dispersal. The ability to move a character on the selected source realms will become available on Thursday, December 6 at 12:01 PM PDT, and are scheduled to run until Thursday, December 13 at 12:01 PM PDT.

In the event that a realm meets our transfer goals before the scheduled end date, the transfers to that realm will be disabled. We highly recommend that if you are planning to transfer that you do so at your earliest convenience.

Once the transfers open you can begin your transfer by visiting the Character Move page located here: https://www.worldofwarcraft.com/account/character-move.html


Source Group A
Burning Blade
Warsong**
Laughing Skull
Arthas

Destination Realm A
Jaedenar


Source Group B
Spinebreaker
Mug'thol
Mal'Ganis
Tichondrius

Destination Realm B
Nazjatar


Source Group C
Sargeras
Dragonmaw
Bonechewer
Illidan

Destination Realm C
Maiev

**An error was made in the original posting, Kel'Thuzad will not be available for transfers. Warsong was the intended realm for that group.

Why would anyone want to move from a high population server to a low population server these days?  I know I wouldn't.  I'd rather have the problems associated with a high population than low.  I don't really expect the population of WoW to increase in the future.  Am I wrong in my prediction?

[lamaros]

You'd think that unless they change things somehow the barriers to entry with each expansion will become more annoying, that existing players will tend to stop playing more often than new ones start, and that other games will come out that will encroach on their gamers time, if not their exact market per se.

But then, WoW has proved me wrong before.

[Xanthippe]

Changing the xp gain (last patch) goes a long way toward lowering the barriers of beginning a new character.  But yes, I agree with you.

I would love to see charts on how long people played EQ or DAOC or any other MMO, and what sort of changes occurred just before major drop offs (I assume ToA drove a lot of people out of DAOC, for example). 

Until WoW, I'd play a game 2 years, roughly.  I've now been playing 3, but I am finding myself thinking about taking a break again (although not a permanent break - I've taken a couple over the 3 years).

[Montague]

They're doing everything possible to avoid the dreaded "server merge". All signs point to declining population in NA and Europe but as long as growth occurs in Asia, Blizzard can still point to sub numbers (over 9 MILLION!) to camouflage it. Blizzard is more afraid of players quitting due to the perception of the game declining than they are of people quitting over low pop servers.

[Morfiend]

They're doing everything possible to avoid the dreaded "server merge". All signs point to declining population in NA and Europe but as long as growth occurs in Asia, Blizzard can still point to sub numbers (over 9 MILLION!) to camouflage it. Blizzard is more afraid of players quitting due to the perception of the game declining than they are of people quitting over low pop servers.

I dont know about that. I play on Tichondrius, one of the servers that is offered free transfer off of. We fucking need it. This server is so full. At prime time now our queue is back in force, and the whole server is super populated. There are people everywhere, all the time. Its amazing. I like it a lot compared to lower pop servers as the world really feels lived in and populated, but the queues suck. At around 8 server time the queue got up to 40 minutes last week.

[Dren]

Just because you don't have a queue on your server anymore doesn't mean others aren't.  There are plenty like Morfiend says.

To those stating dropping numbers in Europe and NA:  Please to be showing proof.

Seriously, we can do without the strawmans.

MY STRAWMAN:  I think  they see a lot of spikes in populations on servers and they want to do another round of evening it out, especially before launching more new content since that will increase re-subs again.

[Xanthippe]

So for you people with queues - are you moving, or just hoping others do?

[Dren]

My queues dropped once they gave us a few weeks of transfers.  I know a few huge guilds jumped and that was big.  I haven't seen a queue for over 6 months.

Our population is still quite big though.  Even IF and SW are crawling during primetime.  While lvl'ing my alts I still run into trouble getting quests done due to others camping a key mob or spot.  I just had that at Hearthglen last night.

[Threash]

All signs point to declining population in NA and Europe but as long as growth occurs in Asia, Blizzard can still point to sub numbers (over 9 MILLION!) to camouflage it.

What signs exactly? i don't think this is the case at all, i think they simply listened to too many "we dont want to play on any of those low pop servers that are a couple months old, we want a brand new one!" whines and are now paying the price of having too many low pop servers that nobody wants to play on.

[Jayce]

So for you people with queues - are you moving, or just hoping others do?

I'm on Tichondrius as well. Staying and hoping other people transfer.  I hope the grass is greener effect is enough to move people off, but I heard that Tich is one of the hot PvP servers that people want to be on.  Maybe some big guilds will move.

[Montague]

All signs point to declining population in NA and Europe but as long as growth occurs in Asia, Blizzard can still point to sub numbers (over 9 MILLION!) to camouflage it.

What signs exactly? i don't think this is the case at all, i think they simply listened to too many "we dont want to play on any of those low pop servers that are a couple months old, we want a brand new one!" whines and are now paying the price of having too many low pop servers that nobody wants to play on.

Well that's kind of my point. I'm not saying that the NA/Europe populations are plummeting and ZOMG WOW IZ DYINGZ, I'm just saying they have too many servers and there's no population growth to fill them all. Back when there was a steady influx of new players this wasn't a problem, but now the game has matured and all they're doing is playing a shell game with the servers. I experienced this first hand when I transferred off a high pop server back in June. Slowly but surely that server decayed and many of those who transferred there transferred back to the old high-pop server, including myself.

As it is now, you have those servers that are crying out for people placed on the "recommended" list, they start getting peeps but then like clockwork a couple weeks later on the forums there's 2 or 3 other servers that are "dead" and people are complaining.

Now do I have the hard numbers? No, of course not. But it looks to me like Blizzard is doing everything they can to avoid merging servers, which seems to me would solve a lot of the low pop server problems but be bad PR.

[Xanthippe]

Now do I have the hard numbers? No, of course not. But it looks to me like Blizzard is doing everything they can to avoid merging servers, which seems to me would solve a lot of the low pop server problems but be bad PR.

I don't understand why it would be bad PR.  Blizzard can always open new servers if they need to.  Merging servers seems like it would be good PR.

"See, players, we listen to you!"

[Hutch]

"See, players, we listen to you!"

Convincing players that they're listened to is good PR.

However, merging servers is always bad PR, no matter how you spin it. Merged servers are a sign of low population, and low population means low subs and low popularity, and that's bad for PR.

Even in Blizzard's case, where they have some low pop servers, and some other servers that are so full that they're bursting at the seams.

Blizzard's problem is a good problem to have.

(edit: "pop" means more than one thing)

[Dren]

Now do I have the hard numbers? No, of course not. But it looks to me like Blizzard is doing everything they can to avoid merging servers, which seems to me would solve a lot of the low pop server problems but be bad PR.

I don't understand why it would be bad PR.  Blizzard can always open new servers if they need to.  Merging servers seems like it would be good PR.

"See, players, we listen to you!"

I agree with Montague on this point.  It really isn't good PR.

However, I much rather they be in the position they are in than having the possibility of queues again.  I can handle low population.  I cannot handle queues.

Keep a good margin of space in total and let the players shift around to balance it out.  Actually, I've always supported free moves with long timers.  That would help promte that "natural" balance.  At some point mergers are going to have to happen, but I'd rather they be late than early with that move.

I would be amazed if you saw any mergers prior to the next expansion.  No way.

[Nebu]

Low pop is good from 1 - 70.  Low pop is bad at 70.  Now convince me that you can reconcile the two without more instancing.

[Montague]

Now do I have the hard numbers? No, of course not. But it looks to me like Blizzard is doing everything they can to avoid merging servers, which seems to me would solve a lot of the low pop server problems but be bad PR.

I don't understand why it would be bad PR.  Blizzard can always open new servers if they need to.  Merging servers seems like it would be good PR.

"See, players, we listen to you!"

Well to levelheaded people like us, yeah it would be a good move. In the wider arena of MMOG-tardom it would give ammunition to doomsayers and the competition to claim that WoW has peaked, is losing players left and right and is dying a slow painful death.

Merging servers in general is not seen as something that is a good sign for an MMO. Though in Blizzard's defense in their case I would say it was overestimating retention after TBC, not that they're leaking subs like a sieve.

I agree with Dren, you won't see any merges before the expansion. Some of that could be Blizz is expecting another huge surge with the expansion. I don't feel the same level of expectation among the players I know for the next expansion, but that hardly counts as quality market research.

[AngryGumball]

Now do I have the hard numbers? No, of course not. But it looks to me like Blizzard is doing everything they can to avoid merging servers, which seems to me would solve a lot of the low pop server problems but be bad PR.

I don't understand why it would be bad PR.  Blizzard can always open new servers if they need to.  Merging servers seems like it would be good PR.

"See, players, we listen to you!"

Frankly I see very bad decision makers by following the worry that bad PR is something to worry about in a MMO situation I don't' see them leading the pack and not caring. I see worry wart decision makers, not brave and brash leaders, if they really are worried about bad PR.

With regards to these free transfers, man I want to either kick the Playerbase or the Devs in the nuts hard, Devs for making me think how gracious they are by doing this when they spent most every other moment ignoring low population servers. I take it as well we rode the paid transfer to the max filled up with gluttoy all the POPULAR servers and now we are ready to open the dam to lighten them up a bit with those players foolish enough to leave a completely packed server.

Meanwhile we still have about 25 North American servers dying due to low population, but that's ok we don't' see those servers under the heels of our feet. We are here to Save Illidan, TIchondrious. *grin* joke incoming.....Tichrondrious told me they weren't for me. :P end joke...

Unless as another person stated above...unless entire established guilds are taking this chance to transfer off and that guild stays together thru the move, its a absolute waste of time to transfer off and doom yourself to a low population server unless your gaming habits have changed, IE. you do feel the server is to packed and you want a low population server, but if you transfer and expect to have the same game or same pug situation you are fooling yourself mightily

[Morfiend]

So for you people with queues - are you moving, or just hoping others do?

My guild will be staying on Tich. I would much rather have queues, and a very populated server than a dead one. I played on a low pop server for a little while and it sucked. On Tich, the AH is always moving fast, you can find decent groups, lots of people to recruit for raiding, and a strong community. Queues suck, but not as bad as low pop shit. Some people like to feel alone in the world. I like having the other people around. It makes the world feel alive. If I want to play totally by my self, I will play some thing with a stong story, like The Witcher.

[caladein]

All my sometimes-queue'd at primetime server gets me is spending time in SMC because the Org/Shatt battlemasters are a clusterfuck.

That, and PuG Heroics during the middle-of-the-night Pacific Time, which are glorious I must admit, but more a function of having a critical mass of people on funky timezones than raw population I'd imagine.

Really, if our Alliance-side wasn't so crippled by transfers I'd half-seriously suggest moving to a low-pop in the same battlegroup.

[Selby]

I would much rather have queues, and a very populated server than a dead one. I played on a low pop server for a little while and it sucked.

Seriously.  This is why I went back to Stormrage on characters I haven't played seriously since release.  The server the other half chose to play Alliance on (Uldum) sucks for grouping and AH materials, which means you are going to be playing by yourself gathering materials you can't sell to anyone.  No thank you.  I prefer to play where the population is consistently high so that when I stick some low level stuff on the AH I don't have to wonder if it is going to sell or if I just wasted my time.  Buying mounts and whatnot is expensive without a pimp-daddy feeding you and when you can't sell anything besides vendortrash for vendor prices, it puts the hurt on cash flow.

[Hutch]

I didn't see this posted anywhere:

Server Transfers open 12/21 to 12/28.

Source Realms: Arthas, Warsong, Mal'Ganis, Illidan

Destination: Azshara