Are you in for a MASSIVE realm merge?

[Gimlix]

Basic straight forward question, i think the sharding and CRZ need to be removed from the game personally and we need to bring back communities.
We are playing a MMORPG and we shouldn't be divided in 500 realms.

It is good to have many realms, but WoW has TOOOOOO many at this point, we could easily merge 80% and still have a good chunk of realms.

I think the point of "Well people might lose their name and hate it" is a very bad reason to not merge realms at this point. Most people are adults and should understand these things may happen in a game's lifetime.

[Chadow]

Im in for a REVAMP on CRZ/Sharding to bring back server communities.

So far it seems completely random who happears on your screen.

[Julmara]

would like to be connected to other continents would like to play with na while on eu ping isnt that insane

[Gimlix]

would like to be connected to other continents would like to play with na while on eu ping isnt that insane

Hell imagine if they could fix a Global World of Warcraft, but i doubt that is impossible due lag.

[AngerFork]

Merges & the like can happen in a game's lifetime, but you have to remember that some people have had that name for nearly 20 years at this point. Telling someone that something they've had for 20 years is no longer theirs because we want to merge realms is a terrible idea, especially for something that pushes the idea of character ownership the way WoW does. Plus, we've already seen the soft realm merges where we can have things like "Name-Stormrage" that fixes most of that issue.

I'm all for connecting pretty much every realm & bringing back some of the server community, but I'm not in favor of something where I could lose a name I've had for years simply because "community" needs to be better.

As for sharding/CRZ, I'm split on that. Both absolutely hurt the community & have weird bugs, like when you switch realms halfway through fighting a rare. But there are definitely load issues as well for people with lower computers. Perhaps something like FFXIV has where you have Instances of zones that you can switch between at specific points would work better than sharding/CRZ?

[Twdft]

I think the point of "Well people might lose their name and hate it" is a very bad reason to not merge realms at this point. Most people are adults and should understand these things may happen in a game's lifetime.

I am an adult but to be honest having a lottery of who gets to keep their names would be a gargantuan turn off for me. I chose every name for a reason.

Btw why merge realms and not connect?

[Rucati]

Doesn't really matter, as long as CRZ/Sharding exist the game will essentially feel the same regardless of how big the servers are.

Which is good, by the way, the game would be absolute garbage without CRZ/Sharding because there would be 100 people going for every mob in the game on huge servers, which would just be a nightmare. Infinitely better this way, the game is actually playable.

[Julmara]

Hell imagine if they could fix a Global World of Warcraft, but i doubt that is impossible due lag.

i can play hots with na friends without any lag
i donnu i think 200 ping is still acceptable probably even lower with starlink

[Gimlix]

Doesn't really matter, as long as CRZ/Sharding exist the game will essentially feel the same regardless of how big the servers are.

Which is good, by the way, the game would be absolute garbage without CRZ/Sharding because there would be 100 people going for every mob in the game on huge servers, which would just be a nightmare. Infinitely better this way, the game is actually playable.

My question to this is, why do you play a MMORPG then? Sorry but the feeling of having to fight over a quest was for me a big reason why i loved WoW.
You really had to fight for stuff and had that proud feeling when you did it. Making it streamlined and easy removed that part of the game.

CRZ/Sharding is NOT healthy for the game.

[Slowpoke is a Gamer]

You know I'd just been thinking about this the other day. We like to say that what killed "Server Identity" was the loss of "hard walls" between servers via the LFG Tool, Cross-Realm Zones, Realm Transfers, Character Renames...

Honestly, I'm increasingly of the opinion that what killed "Server Identity" was the fact that when things started getting bad for the game Blizz said "No matter what we're not going to merge servers."

So instead they came up with magic tricks and smoke and mirrors to make servers not seem dead. More CRZ, the introduction of Sharding, pro-active use of these features masquerading as "population control."

If WoW's sitting where we think it is, around 3 million players, with enough servers for 10-12 million players, that means more than half of all servers right now are "dead" and only being kept alive through nebulous and copious use of these tricks. And when those players ask in a server chat "hey is anyone even left playing this game" the answer they get is "no" because for their server that's the truth.

If Blizz had bit the bullet at any point before now and started merging servers that were in danger of going belly-up, maybe we'd have more servers with a community and an identity now. Because you'd have people from your own server to play with, instead of everyone you see having a different server attached to their name.

[gd8]

I like using dead realms to farm certain things

[Gimlix]

I like using dead realms to farm certain things

Because you like to live the easy life. Makin' things that are value have 0 value basically.

[MoanaLisa]

No, I'm not. Most everything I ever engage with is already cross-realm. It's fine.

[Gimlix]

No, I'm not. Most everything I ever engage with is already cross-realm. It's fine.

Cross-Realm does not fix issues of dead areas. Still plenty of dead zones that i still think can be fixed with a PROPER server merge.
Like 3 full realms merging. Instead of 1 full realm being connected to 10 dead realms.

[MoanaLisa]

I think the point of "Well people might lose their name and hate it" is a very bad reason to not merge realms at this point.

It's a great reason. If you've had toons for ten years and be forced to change their identity because someone thinks they should just grow up and be an adult, that's insulting. Anyway, like I said, make guilds and mythic cross-realm and there's no real reason to do this. I'm not sure that even mythic is worth doing it seeing as how so few players relatively do it.

I would like to see cross-realm guilds though.

[Gimlix]

It's a great reason. If you've had toons for ten years and be forced to change their identity because someone thinks they should just grow up and be an adult, that's insulting. Anyway, like I said, make guilds and mythic cross-realm and there's no real reason to do this. I'm not sure that even mythic is worth doing it seeing as how so few players relatively do it.

I would like to see cross-realm guilds though.

Insulting seems like a bit far fetched. I feel like chosing between dead servers or your name, it should be a very obvious pick. But each their opinion ofcourse.

[Tziva]

I don't care about there being a massive merge, but they need to get back to merging the low pop realms which have so few people there's no economy to speak of. You can't buy lots of basics and on the rare occasion something you want is listed, it's usually insanely overpriced because there's like one seller to own the market forever because of lack of competition. It's ridiculous, and we shouldn't have to pay Blizzard real money to get off these realms so we can play.

Btw why merge realms and not connect?

The distinction is really just semantics. Connected realms basically are merged realms; you just keep the "-server name" only for the sake of dealing with name duplication.


edit: well I guess some people want to get rid of even that shallow difference and I don't understand why. I support keeping the -servername so people don't lose their names. I don't really see the advantage of eliminating that, as long as multiple realms can function as a single unit in every respect why not let people keep their names?

[Blackmist]

Just connect them all. Nobody needs to lose names.

[ElDoorO]

It's a great reason. If you've had toons for ten years and be forced to change their identity because someone thinks they should just grow up and be an adult, that's insulting. Anyway, like I said, make guilds and mythic cross-realm and there's no real reason to do this. I'm not sure that even mythic is worth doing it seeing as how so few players relatively do it.

I would like to see cross-realm guilds though.

Add in trading goods between realms and I'm with you - or at least allow it within cross-realm guilds.
Although add in cross-faction and I'm double interested. It'd be nice to be able to play with my Horde friends too.

[EyelessCrow]

Doesn't really matter, as long as CRZ/Sharding exist the game will essentially feel the same regardless of how big the servers are.

Which is good, by the way, the game would be absolute garbage without CRZ/Sharding because there would be 100 people going for every mob in the game on huge servers, which would just be a nightmare. Infinitely better this way, the game is actually playable.

You know, back when the game was good and tons of people played. Now the game plays like a ghost town even on launch days. Sure it sucked to have to compete but that was part of the game. This and the 100 other ways they brought this game down to mongoloid levels is a big reason why it's in the state it is in.

The only people left in game are mostly anxiety ridden anti-social players who recoil at any interaction with strangers and lash out or rage quit groups when their on rails dungeon hits a slight bump.