Indom no longer the least populated server!

[Glacier Peak]

After years of hard (and behind the scenes) work, welcome to the Homecoming community!

 

[MoonSheep]

that’s a lot of shards 

 

do we know whether Vanguard / Breakout going to stay separate, or eventually merge with existing HC shards?

[Luminara]

14 minutes ago, MoonSheep said:

do we know whether Vanguard / Breakout going to stay separate, or eventually merge with existing HC shards?

 

Separate.  They're necessary to facilitate proper beta testing (can't go straight from alpha to open beta).

[MoonSheep]

7 minutes ago, Luminara said:

 

Separate.  They're necessary to facilitate proper beta testing (can't go straight from alpha to open beta).

 

ah, i think i’m understanding this thread incorrectly then

 

i thought there was another community run server that was joining the HC licensed instance in the near future

[Lunar Ronin]

11 minutes ago, MoonSheep said:

 

ah, i think i’m understanding this thread incorrectly then

 

i thought there was another community run server that was joining the HC licensed instance in the near future

 

There is, Victory.  It will be a permanent sixth shard for Homecoming.

[StarseedWarrior]

I think they need to add incentives to different servers I guarantee if you increase drop rates you will see huge spikes and stay. I also think we need incentives for gold side atleast.

[Lunar Ronin]

1 minute ago, StarseedWarrior said:

I think they need to add incentives to different servers I guarantee if you increase drop rates you will see huge spikes and stay. I also think we need incentives for gold side atleast.

 

Yeah.  Double XP is clearly no longer cutting it for Indomitable and Reunion.  Honestly, if the goal is to spread out players among the six shards, then a reward increase would be needed on Indomitable, Reunion, and eventually Victory.  Either increase drop rates, increase Infamy, and/or increase reward merits.  Honestly, I would increase reward merits so you would have to be outside of an AE building.

 

But there would be a few very good reasons for not doing any of that, so I very much doubt anything will change.

[Chris24601]

The biggest thing holding Indom back is it’s rep as the unofficial PVP server.

 

As has been found with virtually every MMO across genre, PVP is a <10% demographic. The fact that, given it’s reputation, it has roughly 10% of the players on it is about what you’d expect.

 

The best way to improve Indom’s numbers would be to stop pushing it as where to go for PVP. Maybe make it the TF/I-trial server by upping those rewards over there.

[arcane]

5 minutes ago, Chris24601 said:

The biggest thing holding Indom back is it’s rep as the unofficial PVP server.

I don’t think anyone believes it’s still functioning as the unofficial PvP server

[Lunar Ronin]

11 minutes ago, Chris24601 said:

The biggest thing holding Indom back is it’s rep as the unofficial PVP server.

 

As has been found with virtually every MMO across genre, PVP is a <10% demographic. The fact that, given it’s reputation, it has roughly 10% of the players on it is about what you’d expect.

 

The best way to improve Indom’s numbers would be to stop pushing it as where to go for PVP. Maybe make it the TF/I-trial server by upping those rewards over there.

 

That hasn't been the case in over two years, and its designation of being the unofficial PvP shard was officially removed in mid-February.

Edited March 28 by Lunar Ronin

[SeraphimKensai]

The Unofficial PvP Shard is Excelsior. The PvP community moved there around 3 years ago.

Edited March 28 by SeraphimKensai

[Zect]

I want to say that incentives are unlikely to cut it: the less-populated servers already dangle possibly the biggest incentive of all, unclaimed names. (And unlike xp, you can't take advantage of this one by doing your leveling on indom and then xferring off to excelsior at 50.) Few incentives can compete with that of a populated server.

 

Then again, I'm certainly not opposed to any additional measures to spread out the playerbase. Fire away!

[FFFF]

Could labels be added to each server?

 

Excelsior (Large teams, PvP)

Everlasting (RP here)

Indomitable (Cozy community)

 

Don’t take the labels above as gospel; they’re just suggestions. Maybe enable several tags instead of a single label. Something like this may inform player choice better.

[PeregrineFalcon]

1 hour ago, FFFF said:

Excelsior (Large teams, PvP)

Why are you trying to kill Excelsior?

[Ironblade]

20 minutes ago, PeregrineFalcon said:

Why are you trying to kill Excelsior?

 

As Yogi Berra might have said: No one goes to Excelsior any more.  It's too crowded.   🙂

[Scarlet Shocker]

The first rule of Vanguard is: you do not talk about Vanguard. The second rule of Vanguard is: you DO NOT talk about Vanguard! Third rule of Vanguard: someone yells "LFG!", post in chat, streets sweeps, the conversation is over. Fourth rule: only two PCs on the shard.

 

Don't let it bother you. Go about your business citizen. There is nothing to see here.

[KMadeleine]

7 hours ago, Lunar Ronin said:

 

That hasn't been the case in over two years, and its designation of being the unofficial PvP shard was officially removed in mid-February.

“10 - Which shard should I play on?

If you are in Europe, we highly recommend you play on Reunion as it’s physically located in Germany - the rest of the shards are in Canada.

 

If you’re into roleplaying we recommend you take up residence on Everlasting (the unofficial RP shard), and if you’re into PvP you should try your luck on Indomitable (the unofficial PvP shard). Alternatively, Torchbearerand Excelsior both have a good mix of different types of players on them.”

 

It’s listed in the FAQ still.  I know because I just read it this week haha.

[Lunar Ronin]

3 minutes ago, KMadeleine said:

“10 - Which shard should I play on?

If you are in Europe, we highly recommend you play on Reunion as it’s physically located in Germany - the rest of the shards are in Canada.

 

If you’re into roleplaying we recommend you take up residence on Everlasting (the unofficial RP shard), and if you’re into PvP you should try your luck on Indomitable (the unofficial PvP shard). Alternatively, Torchbearerand Excelsior both have a good mix of different types of players on them.”

 

It’s listed in the FAQ still.  I know because I just read it this week haha.

 

That needs to be updated then.  Excelsior is now the unofficial PvP shard as all of the PvPers on Indomitable migrated there in 2021.  Indomitable is now just a regular ol' PvE shard, but with double XP for the moment.

[Glacier Peak]

The server unofficial status was changed on the forums. I didn't check whether discord uses that. I'll have to check any other areas I missed when I suggested the status change a while back.

 

 

[Ukase]

This reminds me of a movie where a janitor tells young Pondo Sinatra in much fewer words, the more success you have with women, the more success you'll have with women. (paraphrased for a pg audience)

People play on Excelsior for one primary reason only - there's more people playing on Excelsior. 

Perhaps it's because Stan Lee used to use the word in his sign-off. It is certainly part of what attracted me to the server when it first opened. 

I did a posi 2 this week, and was level 14 when it started. When it was over, (i had 2xp buff running), I was level 20. With XP that easy to get running normal content, I don't see 2xp on Indom as incentive. 
Increasing drop rate for various items..well, maybe, but maybe not. It would likely be a short term solution to a long term problem. If purples dropped like rares, yes, a fair number of people would be on Indom to collect. But, once they have what they want...they may go back to excelsior. 

Or, everyone runs to Indom, and then Excelsior is in the same shoes that Indom is in now. I don't pretend to have a solution. But then, I don't really see it as a problem. 
The shards are identical. I guess what I don't get is why the folks on Indom who want more people to team with don't just play on Excelsior? Granted, it'd be annoying have a base with all your stuff on another shard, I get that. But, we get a fair number of transfers. Use an alt with access to your loot, load it up and transfer it with the loot. 

[Scarlet Shocker]

3 hours ago, Ukase said:

This reminds me of a movie where a janitor tells young Pondo Sinatra in much fewer words, the more success you have with women, the more success you'll have with women. (paraphrased for a pg audience)

 

Same Janitor moved to Cap Au Diable and now works in the university there.