On a ship bound for nowhere

[Paelos]

I tried logging on tonight and getting around in the game, but alas, I stood at Theramore port for 20 minutes waiting for a boat that never arrived. Then I watched as my entire guild went offline at once, and yet I was still in the game. I joked to the guy next to me that Azeroth must have finally sunk into the ocean, and that it was our job to find some hot chicks and repopulate the planet. Then I tried to use my hearthstone to get to Booty Bay. Lots of flashing and cool animations later, I'm still standing on Theramore's dock.

So until further notice I'm stranded on Kalimdor. Has anyone encountered this kind of issue before, because I couldn't play at all tonight.

[Trippy]

I haven't seen that kind of continent split before (reminds me of IRC) but I'm not really surprised given all the problems they are having right now. Server stability is getting progressively worse each day now with even the "low" population servers like the one I'm on needing daily server restarts to fix AH issues and such. I really feel bad for those people on servers that still have 1000+ queues every day during prime time. Blizzard should offer those people a chance to transfer their characters to another server if they wish.

[Dren]

I've been working on quests, etc in Kalimdor for that very reason.  The population is way slanted for the other continent because the alliance ah is there.  Don't even think of going around IF during prime time.  Hell, the AH doesn't really work with all that lag anyway.

A group of friends and I tried working on newb toons around IF on Tuesday and got reset 4-5 times.  We finally gave up.  I went back to Kalimdor and had no problems the rest of the night.

[Jayce]

Come to Sargeras, where (as I've heard) there is a 2-1 Horde advantage in numbers.

Morphiend might can verify.  I'm sure it's all rumors anyway, but it sure seems to my level 24 perspective that there are more high level Horde than Alliance.

[Dren]

Hell, I'd move if they offered it.  I just can't stomach leaving my lvl 44 character behind along with my developing newbs.  

Blizzard seriously needs to start trying to even out their servers and figuring out ways to spread the masses out on each server.

They definitely need to put AH's in the other major cities (planned.)  That alone will make a big difference.  I hope they also put a linked AH to Gadget in BB.  That way people might actually use it.

[Paelos]

I still can't believe having the auction house in one place made it past the design stages. I mean if you paid any attention to SWG, which in my opinion had some great economic features, you saw that auction terminals in every city fostered a hell of a lot of trade. If you could only put crap up for sale on Naboo, I think that would have crashed the planet everytime.

[Dren]

I just hope they don't do it like FFXI and have each AH in each city be totally separate.  It was working for FFXI but only because population was full on the servers.  I have to wonder what happens in the game's mature state and populations start to dwindle.  The more remote and newb regions will start to be ineffective.

It makes the most sense to me to keep the AH's remote from each other but keep them connected like an Internet database.  It would promote the most amount of trading and keep the player economy fluid.

The AH is the only thing that is doing that currently, IMO.  The tradeskills are just too hard for full time vendoring so the only thing left is to go auction off some nice equipment you've found at some point.

However, when it takes 5 minutes for my search to show up on the screen, I just stop trying.

[bhodikhan]

In closed beta they had multiple un-linked auction houses.

Stormwind seemed to be the AH that everyone used and no one went to IF or Darnassus. There was nothing listed on those empty auction houses.

If they don't link them one town will get lagged out.

[Dren]

If they don't link them one town will get lagged out.

Exactly.  Once people figure out which houses have the most selection, they'll just go there without checking the others.  

Let's just hope they learn from the experience they got in their own beta test and do it right.

[Jamiko]

Lately I have been having odd problems as well. Once and a while all NPCs, mobs and players would disappear (including things like mailboxes - anything interactive). This also happens when I hearthstone with a pet out (as a Hunter) as well. I use the stone, and then I am at the inn and there is nobody else on the world. If I recall my pet everything appears again. Very spooky.

Last night I was fighting some alliance at the crossroads and everyone disappeared. I was chasing someone and then *poof* gone. Freaks me out.

[AcidCat]

Only bug lately I've had, a couple times I can't leave combat mode. Nothing is hitting me, but it still shows me as in combat forever until I ctrl-alt-del out and log back in.

[WayAbvPar]

My buddy was having some issues last night (freezeups, PCs and NPCs disappearing, etc) for a bit. I didn't have any trouble.

[Trippy]

Lately I have been having odd problems as well. Once and a while all NPCs, mobs and players would disappear (including things like mailboxes - anything interactive). This also happens when I hearthstone with a pet out (as a Hunter) as well. I use the stone, and then I am at the inn and there is nobody else on the world. If I recall my pet everything appears again. Very spooky.

Last night I was fighting some alliance at the crossroads and everyone disappeared. I was chasing someone and then *poof* gone. Freaks me out.

Yeah I've had the NPC/PC disappearing problem with my Warlock as well. Freaked me out the first time cause you can still chat on the zone channels but you can't see anybody and nobody can see you. It's a nice way to explore a zone without risk of encounters, though. I usually have to camp out to fix that problem but the last time it happened I was running from the tavern to the bank in IF and when I got near the bank it started sending me NPC/PC data again so everything poppped in front of me all at once.

The game has other PC synchronization problems as well. Even something as basic auto-following somebody seems screwy. On the screens of the "followers" everything looks okay. You follow a few footsteps behind the "leader" -- about what you would expect given normal network round trip times. On the leader's screen however, the followers are lagging behind 2 or 3 seconds worth of running time. Another sync problem I've seen is where on one of the party member's screen one of the characters appears to be stuck in a spot running in place but on the "stuck" player's screen she's actually fine and moving around normally.

I've also had problems getting "stuck" riding the hippogryphs in Auberdine to Darnassus where one of my characters will be sitting on the hippo which is flapping his wings but she'll still be at the hippo platform. In all cases the other party members will see the stuck player flying along with them and you can target her, etc. However when landing on other side, sometimes the stuck player will dismount back at Auberdine and other times she'll appear at Rut'theran Village.

[murdoc]

Only bug lately I've had, a couple times I can't leave combat mode. Nothing is hitting me, but it still shows me as in combat forever until I ctrl-alt-del out and log back in.

I've had the sorta/kinda opposite of this problem. I was getting attacked by something, but there were no mobs on my screen. When I backed out of an area, the attacks promptly stopped, when I moved back in, I'd take damage again. Happened 2 or 3 times in one night and then hasn't happened since.

[Paelos]

I logged back in tonight, and I played for about 6 hours. The problems were gone. I was able to get back over to Azeroth and didn't encounter one disconnect. However, mail is still lagging like crazy. I really don't know if they even know how to fix the problem since it has been the one true lag issue in the game since launch. Also, they need to get rid of the fire sounds when people are standing in flames, or just remove all the flames from the AH. That's simply the most annoying thing ever for griefers to sit in a fire and have that loud sound going off EVERY TIME i'm trying to buy something 24/7.

[ahoythematey]

There is an option in the sounds menu to turn off such effects.  For a short-term fix, I suppose one could do so each time they intend to catass the auction house for a few hours.

[Morfiend]

Come to Sargeras, where (as I've heard) there is a 2-1 Horde advantage in numbers.

Morphiend might can verify.  I'm sure it's all rumors anyway, but it sure seems to my level 24 perspective that there are more high level Horde than Alliance.

I have heard people say that on Sargeras there is a big horde to allaince ratio. I havent seen this. At all.

Every time I take my guild in to battle, its a bunch of lvl 30-50 guys (my guild) vs a bunch of alliance lvl 50-60. Also, in ALL the lv 30 middle content zones, (STV, Arathi, Alterac, Badlands) the amount of alliance is insane. STV is a huge zone. Almost as big as the barrens for those of you who havent got there, with quests ranging from lvl30-52, and most of these are neutral quests, meaning both sides can do them.

I honestly can hardly ever NOT have an alliance on my screan. The god thing is, its sort of a unofficle truce zone, as in dont fuck with me, I wont fuck with you. There are SO many alliance in this zone, it absolutly boggles my mind. Same with Arathi, though not quite as bad.

Last night my guild went on a raid in Ashenvale, we had 2 raid groups, one of about 30 Dread Guard (my guild) and another raid group of about 20 randoms who formed up and followed us. We ran in to a group of 80+ alliance, most higher level than us.

Also, when questing in those above zones, I will often run in to group of 2 horde questing together, but I will run in to just as many groups of 5 alliance quest together.

In concluesion, people say the horde has way more but in my experiance the active people playing has advantage Alliance. The site they are getting the population imbalance form is already proven to be wrong on many counts. There is a thread on corp about it.

[SurfD]

Only bug lately I've had, a couple times I can't leave combat mode. Nothing is hitting me, but it still shows me as in combat forever until I ctrl-alt-del out and log back in.

I've had the sorta/kinda opposite of this problem. I was getting attacked by something, but there were no mobs on my screen. When I backed out of an area, the attacks promptly stopped, when I moved back in, I'd take damage again. Happened 2 or 3 times in one night and then hasn't happened since.

Ahh, this isnt really "attack of the Invisible mob" as such, rather this is usually "attack of the mob stuck under the floor, or stuck in a tree/rock".  Had this happen to me in 1k Needles the other day.

[Jayce]

Come to Sargeras, where (as I've heard) there is a 2-1 Horde advantage in numbers.

Morphiend might can verify.  I'm sure it's all rumors anyway, but it sure seems to my level 24 perspective that there are more high level Horde than Alliance.

I have heard people say that on Sargeras there is a big horde to allaince ratio. I havent seen this. At all.

Disregard what I said in the other thread then.  I believe you.

BTW I saw you guys raiding Darkshire last night.  I remember Dread Guard because I was pretty amazed that it was one big guild doing the raiding.  I don't read the server boards but I haven't noticed any big Alliance guilds who are that organized.  

Pity, because I might have gone Horde if some RL friends of mine didn't get there first and go Alliance.  I prefer to play "hard mode" if possible, which is why I hoped that Sargeras was different as it seemed..

I'll look at corp later, but it's now blocked from my work, so I'm effectively no longer posting there.