Megaservers and their consequences

Vrienda

Let me preface this by saying I love this game. I genuinely do. It's my favourite MMO on the market to date and I adore it.

But I've always struggled to 'main' it.

Why? Well, in a word: Megaservers.

Megaservers are a blight on MMO design that ensures that communities can only exist either in guilds or outside of the game entirely. You'll rarely, if ever, see the same player twice in the open world and that player might not even speak the same language as you, or have vaguely the same interests.

In a traditional MMO we would select a server. A community that shared our gameplay goals. Be it for a casual PvE experience, a PvP one or, in my case, a roleplaying server.

Megaservers offer none of this.

You're randomly sent to a phase with random people. Want to RP? There's a good chance you'll be disrupted by some clown jumping and clipping through you. If you can even find it. I've seen RP occurring in the world naturally TWICE and it was in French and German.

And if you want PvP? If you want the faction conflict to take place outside of Cyrodiil? Maybe you wanted ZOS' original plan for the bounty system? (I'm personally so glad they didn't include the PvP aspect, but others obviously aren't). You're kinda screwed. All the overland zones are PvE, which made sense at launch when we were all permanently separated by faction but with One Tamriel this is no longer the case.

So what can be done? Keep the tech. It's probably fundamental to how the game is built. But back in... what must've been 2013, you promised a toggle that would let us select a phase. The example used being if you wanted to RP, you could just click a button and you'd be phased with others who had clicked that button. That was a great idea. We need that in-game. And PvPers should be able to have a phase of their own too, where they can hunt down criminals for bounties or fight the enemy faction as they adventure through their zones. And perhaps most importantly, I'd like to see an option to join a phase based on language. On EU the language barrier is pretty damn immense given the variety of countries with different linguistic roots accessing the game, and I've had a few communication barriers recently that made me realise we all need our own homes.

I'm -so- very, very close to just flat out uninstalling World of Warcraft and making Elder Scrolls Online my forever home. But I want a place where I can see and join roleplay as it happens organically. Where I can see familiar names as I quest through Glenumbra to Murkmire. I don't want to have to rely on out-of-game tools and group invites to get that fix. That's not how a healthy MMO should function.

Anyway thanks for reading this rant. Hopefully it was more bearable than the last two.

EDIT: Removed the PvP part since people seemed to be bogged down by that and I honestly don't really care for it personally anyway.

_Zathras_

RP guilds will fix that for you.

You can even join a couple, so the available population when you are on is larger.

You'll never be able to change how the larger in-game world is. However, there is a robust RP community of like-minded people that took the reins and seems to be thriving.

This forum might be a place to explore, as well as on this subreddit.

Vrienda

_Zathras_ wrote: »

RP guilds will fix that for you.

You can even join a couple, so the available population when you are on is larger.

Kinda need those slots for selling stuff. I tend to max out all 120 of them pretty consistently.

VaranisArano

The last time I remember seeing familiar names from zone to zone was before One Tamriel.

A couple of major caveats though:

Those were only the relatively few players on my alliance who were progressing at the same pace as me - so if I was seeing level 30-40 players in Eastmarch, I wasn't seeing the vast majority who weren't EP level 30-40s. There were obviously a lot more of the same players in my first Alliance zones. By the time I did Cadwell's Silver, the herd had thinned. By Cadwell's Gold, Elden Root was a ghost town.

One side effect of this is that it made it nearly impossible to group with friends if they weren't within 10 or so levels of you.

Part of the reason players stuck together was because the quests had to be completed in a specific order. This was great for storytelling, but it was also a railroad.

I don't see ZOS reverting One Tamriel anytime soon.

..........

I'm on PC/NA so I rarely have that language barrier issue. I understand that PC/EU is a lot different in this regard.

..........

I PVP in Cyrodiil primarily. I'm not interested in open PVP being added to PVE zones because they're simply not designed for it. There are no objectives, and it would quickly degenerate into the sort of "stalk people doing their crafting writs and gank them" gameplay that just doesn't appeal to me. I mean, let's say my PVP guild decided to capture and camp out in Vivec for the night. All we're gonna do is slaughter the folks coming to shop at the guild traders or log on to do their crafting writs/banking. It's just not good gameplay even for a PVPer, compared to battling in Cyrodiil which is actually designed to create fights and reward players for PVP.

etchedpixels

Vrienda wrote: »

So what can be done? Keep the tech. It's probably fundamental to how the game is built. But back in... what must've been 2013, you promised a toggle that would let us select a phase. The example used being if you wanted to RP, you could just click a button and you'd be phased with others who had clicked that button.

That would be nice, also the ever requested never happened ability for RP groups to either be able to buy a tavern or even rent instances of existing ones for gold. Likewise a PvP everywhere would be fun for some as well.

There are IMHO problems with the non-megaserver approach though. In too many games you meet people A and B, discover they both play another game but are on different 'worlds' so you can't play together as a three. Then there are games like the currently in development Book of Travels where it's supposed to be possible to play with friends but right now all the small servers make this an exercise in futility.

At least in the ESO PC world I only have two groups of divided people (NA and EU)

Cardhwion

Vrienda wrote: »

_Zathras_ wrote: »

RP guilds will fix that for you.

You can even join a couple, so the available population when you are on is larger.

Kinda need those slots for selling stuff. I tend to max out all 120 of them pretty consistently.

Then you need to rethink your priorities. Because megaservers are a good thing: you always have people to play with and the world is never dead, even in the wee hours of the morning. As for the language barrier: I am also playing on EU and you get used to it. It's interesting that it is always someone from the English speaking community who demands that the other people do not post in foreign languages in chat.

Regarding a PVP phase with overland PVP - I'd rather not have that, because it will lead to demands to expand that to the normal phases.If they made such a phase, the please in a way, that playing there permanently bars these players from playing the normal PVE phase.

Vrienda

[quote="etchedpixels;c-7521497"There are IMHO problems with the non-megaserver approach though. In too many games you meet people A and B, discover they both play another game but are on different 'worlds' so you can't play together as a three. Then there are games like the currently in development Book of Travels where it's supposed to be possible to play with friends but right now all the small servers make this an exercise in futility.

At least in the ESO PC world I only have two groups of divided people (NA and EU)[/quote]

Aye, but in this case the megaservers would still be there, we'd just have more control over which 'shard' we get put on. So for example if you were to invite a friend they'd get a popup saying 'This player is in X phase, do you want to transfer to it?'.

etchedpixels

Port to player already does that - it will tell you they are in a different instance of X and ask you if you want to port to it.

Vrienda

Cardhwion wrote: »

Vrienda wrote: »

_Zathras_ wrote: »

RP guilds will fix that for you.

You can even join a couple, so the available population when you are on is larger.

Kinda need those slots for selling stuff. I tend to max out all 120 of them pretty consistently.

Then you need to rethink your priorities. Because megaservers are a good thing: you always have people to play with and the world is never dead, even in the wee hours of the morning. As for the language barrier: I am also playing on EU and you get used to it. It's interesting that it is always someone from the English speaking community who demands that the other people do not post in foreign languages in chat.

Regarding a PVP phase with overland PVP - I'd rather not have that, because it will lead to demands to expand that to the normal phases.If they made such a phase, the please in a way, that playing there permanently bars these players from playing the normal PVE phase.

I'm not married to the PvP idea, it's not something I'd ever use. But megaservers absolutely are not a good thing. The world is full of names and people you'll never see again. It's a shallow and meaningless shadow of what an MMO community should be.

Either way I'm not asking for that aspect to be removed. I just want the promised RP shard feature that was advertised back before the game's release. I want to be on a RP realm, phased with other roleplayers. The game is split into shards anyway so it'll hardly have an affect.

TequilaFire

So much misinformation in the OP, starting with not seeing the same people everyday.

_Zathras_

Vrienda wrote: »

Either way I'm not asking for that aspect to be removed. I just want the promised RP shard feature that was advertised back before the game's release. I want to be on a RP realm, phased with other roleplayers. The game is split into shards anyway so it'll hardly have an affect.

Riiight, but that will never happen. The community has tools to RP, which would fulfill your desire. But, you'd rather

Vrienda wrote: »

Kinda need those slots for selling stuff.

..which then makes it a self-created problem on your end. The solution for what you need is there; you are choosing not to participate.

Vrienda

_Zathras_ wrote: »

Vrienda wrote: »

Either way I'm not asking for that aspect to be removed. I just want the promised RP shard feature that was advertised back before the game's release. I want to be on a RP realm, phased with other roleplayers. The game is split into shards anyway so it'll hardly have an affect.

Riiight, but that will never happen. The community has tools to RP, which would fulfill your desire. But, you'd rather

Vrienda wrote: »

Kinda need those slots for selling stuff.

..which then makes it a self-created problem on your end. The solution for what you need is there; you are choosing not to participate.

And why won't it happen exactly? Probably because this forum seems to want this game to be as stagnant as possible but beyond that, why?

It doesn't help that I've never really enjoyed starting off in guilds for RP because I like to build my character then find a guild that suits them rather than building a character just to fit in to a guild.

AlnilamE

I feel like a lot of RP has moved into houses once that became available, but it's still possible to find RPers in certain areas.

As for meeting the same people, I remember when a specific player was organizing World Boss groups in Wrothgar for months. She was there almost every time I went to the zone.

I think the problem is less that there are too many shards of the same zone, but more that there are way more zones now and people are more spread out.

freespirit

I see the same names day in, day out in the zone I do my crafting dailies in, the same names organising boss runs, the same names organising pug trials...

If you spend any reasonable amount of time, in any single zone you will see the same people popping up in chat. I'm on PC-EU and I think it's often a "time of day" thing with seeing the same people. 🙂

Elsonso

Vrienda wrote: »

Let me preface this by saying I love this game. I genuinely do. It's my favourite MMO on the market to date and I adore it.

But I've always struggled to 'main' it.

Why? Well, in a word: Megaservers.

Megaservers are a blight on MMO design that ensures that communities can only exist either in guilds or outside of the game entirely. You'll rarely, if ever, see the same player twice in the open world and that player might not even speak the same language as you, or have vaguely the same interests.

In a traditional MMO we would select a server. A community that shared our gameplay goals. Be it for a casual PvE experience, a PvP one or, in my case, a roleplaying server.

Megaservers offer none of this.

You're randomly sent to a phase with random people. Want to RP? There's a good chance you'll be disrupted by some clown jumping and clipping through you. If you can even find it. I've seen RP occurring in the world naturally TWICE and it was in French and German.

I would suggest that small server games are a bigger "blight" in that I seem to always find myself on the wrong server from where I want to be.

I think New World is an experiment to see if it is possible to run a large scale MMO on a cluster of AWS servers. Fail. It is an absolutely horrible situation from the perspective of playing with friends. Most of my time, I am on an empty server waiting for them to merge me with other empty servers. I basically just go where they merge me. The game itself is not bad, which makes the server situation that much worse.

Lost Ark does not seem as bad, but I am already on the wrong server. We will see how this plays out. I am expecting that it will be an expensive game to play, so it may not matter.

World of Warcraft now has my friends separated across three different servers. They do have a hidden "megaserver" like thing behind the scenes which links many of the realms. Sadly, my friends are now split such that this is not a help.

What I like about the megaserver concept is that I can log into one server and then find my friends. I don't have to poll them all and pick a server that is common to the the majority. At least with ESO, once I find them, the game will tend to put us together in the zones, which it also does with guilds members. I do see guild members in zones. Every day. Also with ESO, all my friends are long gone, so that does not matter.

I am hoping that the industry does more large scale megaserver MMORPG games. My feeling is that we desperately need a new megaserver MMORPG and all we are getting is a bunch of average ones built on small scale servers.

Vrienda

At that point they're hardly MMO's. I'm not sure where you're having issues playing with friends on WoW because you can invite people cross server and soon cross faction too. Though WoW has it's own issues like Cross Realm zones kinda killing realm communities.

Megaservers make it incredibly hard and frustrating to form any sense of community in-game outside of guilds. Particularly in the ESO format where you don't even get to choose what shard they dump you into.

Wolfpaw

I remember the days of PvP/PvE/RP servers, & they were fun to a point. Eventually named servers were given free/paid transfers, merged/closed over the years to keep populations healthy.

I do wish ESO mega servers were region(s) locked and not global though.

_Zathras_

Vrienda wrote: »

And why won't it happen exactly? Probably because this forum seems to want this game to be as stagnant as possible but beyond that, why?

Yeah..I think you're getting disproportionately agitated over the wrong thing, and at the wrong people.

You originally said you were anti-megaserver, and quoted something from 2013. So, on that point, you don't have to like megaservers, but here they are. Also, anything said pre-launch is marketing, and promises to hook as many people as possible. I remember around that time (a bit earlier) they said there wouldn't be a Cash Shop. Then they put one in with a single brown horse to gauge the community reaction. Everyone went mental. And then the Crown Store was born.

So, if you are hanging onto a "promise" from 9+ years ago..you might want to find something else to focus on. What we have is what we get.

The other part about looking for a RP community, as I have said a couple of times now, is that there is one. But you are willingly choosing trader guilds over the ESO RP guilds. So..

My final remark here, as I feel this discussion isn't really going anywhere, is that if your chief gripe is about megaservers..love it or leave it. There are a lot of pros, but, yes, there are cons as well. But it is here and the only thing we have. If their goal was to make pocket shards for RP, or PvP, they would have years ago. It is a little late to ask for changes of that magnitude.

So good luck, wherever you end up landing.

Elsonso

Vrienda wrote: »

At that point they're hardly MMO's. I'm not sure where you're having issues playing with friends on WoW because you can invite people cross server and soon cross faction too. Though WoW has it's own issues like Cross Realm zones kinda killing realm communities.

Megaservers make it incredibly hard and frustrating to form any sense of community in-game outside of guilds. Particularly in the ESO format where you don't even get to choose what shard they dump you into.

I am a little confused by this reply.

In ESO, you are automatically placed in a zone layer (not going to use "shard", as this has a larger meaning that does not apply) that tends to favor friends and guild members. If you find yourself in a different layer than a specific player you want to be with, you can travel to them and this problem is solved.

But, yes, there could be thousands of players in your zone, separated by these layers, so you will frequently come across people you have never seen before, and will never see again.

On the other hand, I have seen the same people over and over again. I have seen someone named " @ValoAven " so much that it isn't even surprising when they run past me. We don't even share the same guilds, AFAIK, so I have no idea why this one player is around me so much more than everyone else, including guild mates. I've been seeing them in game for years. Literally! It took me a while to notice, but since at least 2016. They are my ESO server-chosen soul mate, and I have never even said HI. Hmmm. I should do that next time. (they are on the forum... HI! )

So, the main thing here is that many people here on the forum can run into me while playing the game and say HI. (Thread) I don't have to invite them, but yes, in the crowd of players it is hard to remember everyone. That will rarely happen in small server games.

As for WoW... I can run into people on cross-realm when in certain places in the game, and invites and group finder basically works like the ESO megaserver does within the geography. Compared to ESO, it is the next best thing (in my stable of games) in megaserver/server-connected MMO games.

Gaebriel0410

I think megaservers are great, for me the positives of always being able to play with friends quite equal the negatives of not having a fixed server community.

As a roleplayer I too wish they'd implement that RP toggle they originally intended, for what I remember hearing there were some complications with it and it was eventually not to be.

So roleplayers had to improvise instead, what we do in this game is join one of the huge RP hub guilds, to ensure the megaserver's sorting hat prioritizes your phase to be the same as other guild members. Those umbrella guilds are also where you can find public RP events advertised, where you can meet other characters and perhaps eventually join an 'actual' RP guild (not needed of course).

If this is not your main MMO as stated, do you really consistently need 150 trade slots? I think it's worth giving up 30 slots for a better shot at doing the thing you like, you can always give it a try.

hafgood

I'm loving the inconsistencies across the threads you started. In one you want PvP removed from the game, in this one you want it openworld.

Oh well, I'm all for global megaservers, the world is a large place and we should embrace its diversity rather than trying to limit it to specific areas.

Megaservers are not the problem, everyone can teleport to any one else to get to their instance. If you have to sell that much the answer is simple second account. Do your selling from that account and use your main account for the RP guilds. And yes you are allowed multiple accounts.

etchedpixels

Wolfpaw wrote: »

I do wish ESO mega servers were region(s) locked and not global though.

As someone who plays with both US and EU friends that seems a very weird thing to want

phaneub17_ESO

Thankfully the game caps out at three instances per zone and if you're an altoholic you do generally see the same people every day, just not with the same character you saw them last each time. So every time you login on a character it can be placed in one of three instances of that zone depending on the population. The game tries to balance them out rather than filling one instance first before moving onto the next so that one isn't overcrowded and the next one is barren of all but the newest logins. Of course that can backfire as well if there aren't enough players around, splitting even three can feel barren at times unintentionally.

With the introduction of Dark Convergence, it has made easier to somewhat tell which instance you're on if you reside in a popular city. Dark Convergence can move NPC guard's reset leash position, like if their normal position is on either side of an entry way, someone with this set can change their reset position because of the way it pulls enemies into a center. If you log on different characters and go to the city gates like in Mournhold you may see on instance A the guards are in their right positions standing to the side of the steps, while in instance B the same guards you have one or both standing directly in the center of the entry way facing weird directions (Dark Convergence pulled them there).

Each instance also has their own separate zone chat, I use the guard positions to tell which instance I am currently on when logging on a different character. This generally changes back with a server maintenance that resets their position back to the rightful place until another player escaping the law with Dark Convergence comes along. So far most people haven't realized this and exploited the guards to move them away from the entrance or aren't willing to put in the time to learn how it works. You could use it to pull the guards far away from the entry ways, giving them awkward and meaningless reset leash positions and server maintenance is every 2 weeks so on the first day you could make them utterly useless for the next 14 days.

Danikat

I've never found the different languages on EU to be a problem. Yes I often see messages in languages I don't understand, but that just means they're not talking to me. It's not really any different to when you hear someone talking a different language in real life.

Besides even if they did split the game by language they'd probably only offer servers for the officially supported ones (English, French, German, Russian and soon Spanish). So all the people who speak other languages (I've seen Dutch, Italian, Portugese and I've heard there's at least one Arabic guild on PC EU, I'm sure there's others too) would have to pick a server based on other factors and then you'll still see them speaking in chat.

zaria

freespirit wrote: »

I see the same names day in, day out in the zone I do my crafting dailies in, the same names organising boss runs, the same names organising pug trials...

If you spend any reasonable amount of time, in any single zone you will see the same people popping up in chat. I'm on PC-EU and I think it's often a "time of day" thing with seeing the same people. 🙂

Yes, see plenty of the same people doing crafting writs in the morning in Rawl, its also obvious that its multiple instances of Rawl.
I say megaservers has mostly benefits: main benefit is no dead servers and no critically overfilled zones who has them to limit the size of server population because endgame, new zones and event draw people to one or a few zones.
Because you have to limit the size of populations on servers most of the world will feel very empty, say you have an 10.000 player limit, say 2000 is online, you now has to be spread over the map and all sort of instanced stuff from dungeons to housing.
More problems is like if you need some nice people in an dungeon using the finder, well they are likely on another server so you don't see them again. You will need multiple alts on different servers if you are on an specialized one and want to do other stuff.
Megaservers solves most of the problems with some downsides like world divided into zones and risk ending in other instances. It should be an option to travel to people from the chat window like some ask for help on an world boss.

Vrienda

hafgood wrote: »

I'm loving the inconsistencies across the threads you started. In one you want PvP removed from the game, in this one you want it openworld.

Oh well, I'm all for global megaservers, the world is a large place and we should embrace its diversity rather than trying to limit it to specific areas.

Megaservers are not the problem, everyone can teleport to any one else to get to their instance. If you have to sell that much the answer is simple second account. Do your selling from that account and use your main account for the RP guilds. And yes you are allowed multiple accounts.

You’re making an awful lot of assumptions there pal. As for the rest. Being able to jank an ‘answer’ to my problem is in no way an actual solution to it.

hafgood

I made no assumptions, I merely commented on the inconsistencies within your posts. And to put the record straight I am certainly not your pal.

And an alt account is actually a solution for your problem. You sell.via the guilds on your alt account, you RP via the guilds on your main account.

I have 3 alt accounts for selling, my main is in private guild, 3 social guilds and a PvP guild. It works for me

Vrienda

hafgood wrote: »

I made no assumptions, I merely commented on the inconsistencies within your posts. And to put the record straight I am certainly not your pal.

And an alt account is actually a solution for your problem. You sell.via the guilds on your alt account, you RP via the guilds on your main account.

I have 3 alt accounts for selling, my main is in private guild, 3 social guilds and a PvP guild. It works for me

Yeah, sorry but that's jank. I shouldn't have to make a brand new account because there's an arbitrary limit on guilds and the promised roleplay phase from 2013 never materialized. That's not an okay solution in the slightest.

colossalvoids

Phasing would be an actually pretty nice addition, be it guild and friendlist prioritisation or full fledged rp tag for a separate "shard", but as they've scrapped it this probably wasn't working well or as expected.

Different servers for pve, pvp, language zones though would be a disaster imo, I'd certainly won't be supporting any development move like that and I'm glad it's in a same cauldron so to speak.

Cardhwion

Vrienda wrote: »

hafgood wrote: »

I made no assumptions, I merely commented on the inconsistencies within your posts. And to put the record straight I am certainly not your pal.

And an alt account is actually a solution for your problem. You sell.via the guilds on your alt account, you RP via the guilds on your main account.

I have 3 alt accounts for selling, my main is in private guild, 3 social guilds and a PvP guild. It works for me

Yeah, sorry but that's jank. I shouldn't have to make a brand new account because there's an arbitrary limit on guilds and the promised roleplay phase from 2013 never materialized. That's not an okay solution in the slightest.

Then we are back to: re-think your priorities. I really doubt that you "need" all your guild slots for trading, free up one or two and join RP guilds and things should improve. Friendslist your RP pals, and join them in their shards, when they are online. I run across a lot of the same people while playing, I even managed to take a break for a year and land straight back in the same trading guild I was in before my break.

Another great thing about Megaservers: the community is huge. So there's room for all kinds of people and it's not so easy for a few cliques to gang up on someone. I saw that happen in WoW and certainly am not in the mood to see it again.

hafgood

Vrienda wrote: »

Yeah, sorry but that's jank. I shouldn't have to make a brand new account because there's an arbitrary limit on guilds and the promised roleplay phase from 2013 never materialized. That's not an okay solution in the slightest.

It's your choice. I've offered a perfectly viable solution to your issue. There has always been the limit on the number of guilds. Take it, don't take it, the choice is yours.

As to something promised in 2013, let it go. Thats 9 years ago. My guess would be Zos couldn't get it to work how they wanted it to and so it got dropped, just as spell crafting got dropped, just as Pre One Tamriel got dropped.

Lots of things will be looked at behind the scenes, some will make it to the game, some won't. Some won't go beyond being an idea but something promised in 2013 that hasn't happened is unlikely to happen now, why? Priorities change, developers change, players change.