Layering is not here to stay!

[zetitup]

No, layering is not here to stay, i don't know where people are getting these ideas from, still i see alot of people crying over it and go like "It will not be gone!".
Just thoght i'd post this to clear things up.

[Xalvia]

Because this topic needs a new thread right?

Blizzards will remove it (as they stated multiple times). Good enough for me - some people don't believe them (blizzard has been full of bs before)

We will see.

Edit: might have fallen for this bait but w/e

[Noxina]

Clear what up? You have no source what so ever, you're just stating something you see as a fact.


Personally I agree with you, and hope I am right about it. But that doesn't make it a fact. So unless you have a source from Blizzard it self saying "layering wont stay", then all we can do is sit down, wait and hope.

[Ryzael]

it wouldn't make sense to remove layering.

[CrawlFromThePit]

Clear what up? You have no source what so ever, you're just stating something you see as a fact.


Personally I agree with you, and hope I am right about it. But that doesn't make it a fact. So unless you have a source from Blizzard it self saying "layering wont stay", then all we can do is sit down, wait and hope.

I don't have the source on hand but they did say it's only here to make the launch smoother. They didn't talk about how and when it's gonna be taken out because it entirely depends on the population and popularity of Classic and it's not a good sell to say "when classic loses 80%+ of it's playerbase after the first 2 months layering will be useless and taken out".

Also, just because they said this doesn't mean that's what they will do lol.

[ellieg]

I dont get why people are so confused by layering.

Ion said they will remove layering when the initial rush drops off. Said by phase 2 at the latest.

To clear up more misinformation abt layering:
Regular servers have a cap of about ~3k. If they believe that 2/3 of players will be tourists and drop off by phase 2, they will release enough realms so that each one has 3 full realm size layers on it. 3 layers meaning 9000 players total on 1 realm. So in 2-3 months layering will be removed and a regular server population of 3k will be left on the server leaving it healthy. The only issue here is if blizz gets its predictions drastically wrong.

If there are more than 3k players regularly online at once after layering is removed, that server will have be a high pop realm and will have queues at peak times.

Layering is meant to fix "the tourist problem". It was not created to fix starting zone overcrowding on launch. They could alter the size of layers down to 1000 or 500 in the very beginning to help with the overcrowding, but they havent given any indication that they will.

[Noxina]

I dont get why people are so confused by layering.

Ion said they will remove layering when the initial rush drops off. Said by phase 2 at the latest.

To clear up more misinformation abt layering:
Regular servers have a cap of about ~3k. If they believe that 2/3 of players will be tourists and drop off by phase 2, they will release enough realms so that each one has 3 full realm size layers on it. 3 layers meaning 9000 players total on 1 realm. So in 2-3 months layering will be removed and a regular server population of 3k will be left on the server leaving it healthy. The only issue here is if blizz gets its predictions drastically wrong.

If there are more than 3k players regularly online at once after layering is removed, that server will have be a high pop realm and will have queues at peak times.

Layering is meant to fix "the tourist problem". It was not created to fix starting zone overcrowding on launch. They could alter the size of layers down to 1000 or 500 in the very beginning to help with the overcrowding, but they havent given any indication that they will.

Why not just create 3 times the amount of servers, then merge them when needed? Wouldn't that be a better solution?

I don't have the brain for this though, so I am most likely just wrong.


Here's hoping for a smooth start, and not too dead servers/layers.

[Kanadei]

Why not just create 3 times the amount of servers, then merge them when needed? Wouldn't that be a better solution?

Short answer is no. Merging servers creates issues like duplicate player and guild names which upset players. Imagine if you reserved your name on Aug 13 then in October your name was suddenly taken because Blizz merged your servers due to drop off. You would be deservedly upset, and this goes double for guilds who have to go through a whole rebrand if their name is taken.

Layering is a smart solution providing it is only used sparingly and in the introductory zones. If it affects endgame resources and mobs then it becomes problematic, but virtually everyone has worked this out already as this topic has been beaten to death.

[ellieg]

Why not just create 3 times the amount of servers, then merge them when needed? Wouldn't that be a better solution?

I don't have the brain for this though, so I am most likely just wrong.


Here's hoping for a smooth start, and not too dead servers/layers.

As other poster said, duplicate names or the issue of everyone having their original server name listed as well.

Also with layering, everything on one server is linked throughout all the layers. Same AH. Same economies. And most importantly for some, same community.

Layers are dynamic. When you log on and are assigned to layer 1, its not as if you are permanently tied to it. You can group with players from other layers. Also even though its many more ppl, you will still run into some of the same ppl or see the same ppl typing in chat. It wont be as close knit as a regular 3k pop server in the beginning, but better than the alternative. Would suck if you knew your realm and then they merge servers and now 2/3 the ppl on your realm are now ppl you havent heard of at all.

Also, as pop goes down, number of layers will get reduced. Maybe at launch there are 5 layers, in a month 2 or 3, then finally removed.

- - - Updated - - -

Short answer is no. Merging servers creates issues like duplicate player and guild names which upset players. Imagine if you reserved your name on Aug 13 then in October your name was suddenly taken because Blizz merged your servers due to drop off. You would be deservedly upset, and this goes double for guilds who have to go through a whole rebrand if their name is taken.

Layering is a smart solution providing it is only used sparingly and in the introductory zones. If it affects endgame resources and mobs then it becomes problematic, but virtually everyone has worked this out already as this topic has been beaten to death.

Unfortunately, layers are continent wide, so wont be only in the introductory zones. Agree with everything else tho.

[Mukind]

No, layering is not here to stay, i don't know where people are getting these ideas from, still i see alot of people crying over it and go like "It will not be gone!".
Just thoght i'd post this to clear things up.

It's all based on pop assumptions

They told us no layering or sharing of high level instances. Yet here we are. This is either an experiment they want to use in retail or they're lying idiots.

Either way have no confidence in their stance on this

[Kanadei]

Unfortunately, layers are continent wide, so wont be only in the introductory zones. Agree with everything else tho.

Yeah I know, just saying what would be the smartest solution not what they are actually implementing. Still hopefully they turn it off before too many people are max level but who knows.

[Noxina]

Short answer is no. Merging servers creates issues like duplicate player and guild names which upset players. Imagine if you reserved your name on Aug 13 then in October your name was suddenly taken because Blizz merged your servers due to drop off. You would be deservedly upset, and this goes double for guilds who have to go through a whole rebrand if their name is taken.

Layering is a smart solution providing it is only used sparingly and in the introductory zones. If it affects endgame resources and mobs then it becomes problematic, but virtually everyone has worked this out already as this topic has been beaten to death.

and

As other poster said, duplicate names or the issue of everyone having their original server name listed as well.

Also with layering, everything on one server is linked throughout all the layers. Same AH. Same economies. And most importantly for some, same community.

Layers are dynamic. When you log on and are assigned to layer 1, its not as if you are permanently tied to it. You can group with players from other layers. Also even though its many more ppl, you will still run into some of the same ppl or see the same ppl typing in chat. It wont be as close knit as a regular 3k pop server in the beginning, but better than the alternative. Would suck if you knew your realm and then they merge servers and now 2/3 the ppl on your realm are now ppl you havent heard of at all.

Also, as pop goes down, number of layers will get reduced. Maybe at launch there are 5 layers, in a month 2 or 3, then finally removed.

Sure, I see your points. Some price their own, and guild name more than I do. I tend to just go with some goofy name in my mothertongue that no one except scandinavians would recognice anyways.

Also, it's not like you will know everyone on your server, even if we're all sharing the same layers etc. Sure, you'll pick up a friend here and there. But it's not like you will know the name of everyone, and vice versa. It wasn't like that back in Vanilla, it is only like that on pserver with small knitted societies (mostly from active members who write on forums, participate in events etc).
And if servers merged you wouldn't lose any of the friends you made, you'd just get a chance at creating new ones. So the only trouble with multiple servers at the beginning, and then merging as needed, would be duplicated names. Which I agree, would suck for a lot of people who price their names, and most likely have been using the same name for a decade (Not looking at you Îllìdándh).

[AceofH]

i have no faith in blizzard actually following through on removing layering asap.
after all they have moved the goal posts a few times already.
first we weren't supposed to have sharding at all.
then we were supposed to shard only low level zones, for a limited time of a few weeks, so people couldn't abuse them.
now were basically getting continent sized shards that are in all zones and clearly have been shown multiple times to be abusable

[Tehterokkar]

Why not just create 3 times the amount of servers, then merge them when needed? Wouldn't that be a better solution?

I don't have the brain for this though, so I am most likely just wrong.


Here's hoping for a smooth start, and not too dead servers/layers.

The issue with your solution is the human element. Servers have different communities and player interactions. Some servers might be more influenced by Twitch memes, some servers might have a really big streamer with a full guild, which some try to avoid for whatever reason.

Now if you start merging these servers, first up is the name availability, there can only be 1 Legolas on a server. Someone is going have to give up their name.

Second issue is the community clashing. Some server might have a good community of the top guild's of the server and they work together to do events/etc., now you introduce new top guilds that might not want to do that and server gets fragmented with different people that weren't used to having 1 big coalition of guilds working together and doing events in the server.

PvP balance can be another thing, some server might be slightly in favour of 1 faction in world PvP dominance, but merging servers causes the balance to flop to 1 side completely, other side quits the server and things get even worse.

Economy would break entirely, some servers might have Mithril Ore stacks selling for 4g/stack, while other have it at 8g/stack due to more hardcore PvP population who needs to level Engineering.

Also lastly, recognizing people. You want to know who is the top guild or top mage on your server, you see them sometimes sitting in Ironforge, or with you in Alterac Valley or some world PvP event. If servers are merged, it turns into a modern-WoW-like shit fest with "random" people all over at least for 6 months, during which time people would quit.

[SinR]

Its only there for the first weeks when the Classic Tourists show up. Once they realize how bad it was back then and they leave, Blizzard will disable Layering

[Thage]

Clear what up? You have no source what so ever, you're just stating something you see as a fact.


Personally I agree with you, and hope I am right about it. But that doesn't make it a fact. So unless you have a source from Blizzard it self saying "layering wont stay", then all we can do is sit down, wait and hope.

They've been saying since introducing the concept that it's a temporary measure to relieve early-game bottlenecks in the starting zone, and quests like the one in Redridge where everyone's crowded just outside Lakeshire to kill an elite boar that takes five minutes to respawn. Anyone who thinks it's going to be permanent hasn't been paying attention.

[Kanegasi]

Who keeps calling it layering? It's sharing.

[Noxina]

They've been saying since introducing the concept that it's a temporary measure to relieve early-game bottlenecks in the starting zone, and quests like the one in Redridge where everyone's crowded just outside Lakeshire to kill an elite boar that takes five minutes to respawn. Anyone who thinks it's going to be permanent hasn't been paying attention.

I simply don't trust Actiblizz. They've moved the goalpost a couple of times allready, what stops them from keep doing it.

"Ah, we noticed the servers just ran so much smoother with layering, so we'll keep it for a little while longer", that message wouldn't surprise me at all to be honest.

[Thage]

Who keeps calling it layering? It's sharing.

The Classic team does, probably because a) Sharding has negative connotations in the community, and b) there's minor functional differences between the two, with layers being more static than shards unless you jump layers with groups.

[zetitup]

Who keeps calling it layering? It's sharing.

Blizzard does, they even call the technology Layering, cause it works different than Sharding :P