Is milking money from server transfers bad business by blizzard?

[Shadowbane]

It is somewhat necessary though. Low population realms would instantly be abandoned. High population realms would become even more crowded. Economies would go weird as gold is taken to and from the server all the time.

If they made race changes / etc free, people would just swap to human for PvP or to whatever class is best for their PvE racials. I imagine it would have some impact on the game if it were made free, though I agree it could do with being a little cheaper.

If we're talking business though, from a business perspective, I'm sure Blizzard are thinking no, this is very good for our business.

[Seranthor]

One day, people will look back at their super Blizzard defending comments and think, "Wow, I was such a tool".

its not defending blizzard, its pointing out the myriad of reasons of how free server changes can and would be abused, and no, I'm not going to insult or attack you for your point of view. Despite the fact that the entire purpose of your post was to attack opinions that differ from your own.

[PetersenIII]

To answer the question... it's great business for them. If people are still paying for the server transfers then it is a smart move by them.

Is it? You bring up an interesting question: How much more money might they make by reducing the price? I'm guessing their statisticians say "less". :Shrug:

[Seranthor]

Because it's rent extraction. They are charging many times what the service - which obviously, only they can provide - costs them.

The only defense Blizzard might have would be to argue that the $25 price point is necessary for balance, to keep people from swapping servers "too much" from either a balance or abuse perspective. I don't give this argument much credence though, because: 1) Blizzard is happy to let massively unbalanced or underpopulated realms languish for years, so obviously balance isn't that big of a concern for them, and 2) they could reduce the price to $5 or $10 for a month as part of some unique promotion and see how it works out. They certainly aren't timid about radically changing aspects of the game that don't have a direct price tag attached.

Questions you have to ask yourself before you continue to carry on...

1. Does Blizzard HAVE to provide this? answer. No.
2. Why should Blizzard provide it for FREE? answer, there isn't a reason.
3. Is it required to play the game? answer. No.


As far as your claim that they are happy to let realms languish for 'years' is flat out Horseshit, they routinely offer free transfers, its called migration.... check out the blue posts, they just recently offered to let folks from several realms xfer free.

---------- Post added 2012-11-11 at 11:56 PM ----------

Except that in an MMO, any mechanic that creates a wall between two friends playing together is detrimental by nature.

As has been mentioned already, other MMOs provide this service for free and it has hardly caused servers to go up in flames. Population imbalance is another problem entirely, and will never be solved by simply charging more money.

Real ID groups in world, and in dungeons... check into it... it already exists... you dont have to switch servers to play with your friends.

[ragemv]

is it bad business for blizzard? no, they make money for it, how can that be bad then? it have been like that for ever, why would it change, if people want to change server they will pay for it

[loki504]

Blizzard charges ridiculous fees for server transfers.

Players face a huge price if they have to transfer their main and alts if their server is dead for example, horrible population imbalance etc.

Question is....especially that games like GW2 have free server transfers..... is the fact that blizzard still charges money for this just a greedy tactic on their part to suck every last bit of money they can before WOW dies?

I vote yes because other games have free transfers making blizzard look greedy. Discuss.

OP why did you need to mention WoW and dies in the same sentence?

WoW is far from dead. and if you don't like it go to korea where they have free server tranfers.

its very normal for a business to ask money for a service.

so basicly what you want is to go to the gym with out paying for it.

---------- Post added 2012-11-12 at 08:30 AM ----------

One day, people will look back at their super Blizzard defending comments and think, "Wow, I was such a tool".

and i hope you for one day i was such a fool thinking because my PoV was diffrent doesn't made mine correct.

yes i'm defending blizzard. and that is wrong in what way? your hating blizzard. sure that fine by me. why not let me defend it then?

short sighted FTW

[Pancaspe]

So sick of Blizzard is greedy posts. What the hell kind of rainbow unicorn fantasy world do you kids live in?

[Basic Fail]

Yes, it costs too much for a server transfer + faction change especially when you want to transfer a couple of alts with your main character...
I get it from a business standpoint, they want to make money but what they are asking is a too much.

They easily could (and should) make a bundles with a discount, so instead of paying € 45,- for both a server and faction change now only €20,- to €30,- which is in my opinion still a reasonable price for both ends. I'd be even more happy if they include transfers for alts, heck even if it costs €5,- per alt its quite reasonable.

[jfuze]

It's disgusting, imo. Beyond milking at this point. All of those "services" are automated now and have been for years. It's rape. Who cares. They will pull their 1Billion profits and laugh all the way to the bank.

[Synstir]

Blizzard charges ridiculous fees for server transfers.

Players face a huge price if they have to transfer their main and alts if their server is dead for example, horrible population imbalance etc.

Question is....especially that games like GW2 have free server transfers..... is the fact that blizzard still charges money for this just a greedy tactic on their part to suck every last bit of money they can before WOW dies?

I vote yes because other games have free transfers making blizzard look greedy. Discuss.

Blizzard is a business so whatever they do to make money, is okay as long as their customers are paying for it.
If everybody stopped using it, then it would be a different story, then Blizzard would make it cheaper perhaps or even free (i don't know). But as long as players are willing to pay for it, it is just business.

Nowadays we have the issue of empty servers. I think this is an issue Blizzard needs to deal with. Players are using server-transfers to solve their issue but Blizzard is offering FCM if aq server is dead. So I think if you are playing on an empty server, just be patient; FCM will be coming. Or if you want it now, well then there is the transfer service, which will cost you.

[Sacrelis]

I will just leave this here

As long as Blizzard has kept it's subscription fee at a stable $15 despite inflation, economy woes and raising costs of manpower, they can charge all they want for optional services.

Don't like it? Don't use it. I have used it a fair number of times myself, and I have no problems with it.

[Sznur]

Nah. Its a deterrent. They don't want people to change servers. But if you really want to, you can pay for the privilege. Fine by me.

And that worked so great, as there is absolutely no dead or extremely imbalanced servers, right ? And rerolling plus gearing a character takes time, time = subscription fee, they are not allowing heirloom items transfer between servers for a reason. Blizzard is a cynical and greedy corporation, you people thinking that their prices are so high for a good of the game make me laugh.

FYI Asian WoW, run by another company, offers free character transfers and they recently performed many server merges to deal with population issues. Blizzard isn't doing anything about huge population imbalances and dead servers because they're thriving on poor addicts that would rather transfer than quit.

[ridish]

I think blizz said something like "We charge this much for server transfers because we don't want people to change server all the time". Probably because they want people to think of their servers as a permanent home rather than something they can just abandon the second they get bad server rep.

[Baalb]

I used to think that they are wrong charging for server transfer, but if the service was free, there would be a lot of other problems, like non-stop jumping from realm to realm. I think they are right to charge for it, but I also think that every account should get one free server transfer of the whole account.

[Windfury]

I've paid twice to transfer my toons off of servers that have gone from roughly balanced to 99% horde (another side effect of the fac change policy- they charge us to kill our servers then charges us to gtfo the broken server). I'm over my current server and want to move, but fuck paying to move 23 toons + guild banks. It just isn't going to happen, I'm just gonna end up giving up and stopping playing tbh. Can't possibly reroll and recreate everything I have on another server without 7 years of free time.

I used to not have a problem with it, but by now it seems like they're double dipping, the fac/server changes kill servers, and then they profit off of that more rather than fixing the issue. At the very least there should be some sort of 'move all' type deal/system, or some sort of imbalance trigger point that lets everyone trapped on a shitty server go elsewhere.

[Skyduke]

High fees?

Last I checked 20 Euros was not a high fee. Well, maybe if you are a jobless basement dweller it might be. Or if you think you need to transfer all of your leet 8 level 90s AT ONCE OR ELSE.

[Windfury]

High fees?

Last I checked 20 Euros was not a high fee. Well, maybe if you are a jobless basement dweller it might be. Or if you think you need to transfer all of your leet 8 level 90s AT ONCE OR ELSE.

It would cost me $815 to change servers. I feel that's high.

And it's the same amount of money, whether you pay it now or later/over time.

[Metallikiddd]

yup bad business practices being cheap greedy youknowwhats. it should be a crime that gets you thrown off this rock.

[Kelesis]

Good business is about being as greedy as you can get away with.

[smokii]

considering that the entire process of moving a character from one server to another is completely automated these days, i do think blizz need to sort out the prices a bit.

i think they should:
A. reduce the price per transfer to something like £5 per toon - not £15!
B. add more "bundles" like buy one get one free, or an entire server move for £20

but tbh, i wonder if blizz are trying to move towards a "mega server" type strategy, it's what the elder scrolls online are aiming for - everybody on the same server. obviously blizzard are still going to have to split the pvp/pve realms, but they could still be quite successful if they pull it off. question is, will they. it could just be laying groundwork for titan.