Why not make Freedom and Virtue VIP too?
By
Acemace,
Posted on: 2011-07-09 09:37 in CoH and CoV General Discussions
No special privileges for Freedom and Virtue, sorry.
If Freedom and Virtue were turned into VIP servers, what happens to returning players who had created characters of Freedom and Virtue before they let their subscriptions lapse.
If part of the CoH: Freedom spiel to lure returning players back to the game is that they will be able to access their old characters, then turning one of the existing servers into a VIP server runs counter to this intent.
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Hmm. You raise some interesting points.
I wouldn't like this idea personally ; most of my alts are on Freedom, and I definitely want to play with the F2P crowd, as on the hours I play, the server is far from packed. I can't find a good, objective reason to argue against your proposal, though.
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I can find a good objective reason to argue, segregation is Bad mmmkay. As someone who only plays on freedom and virtue I for one welcome all the new people no matter free, premium or vip. I even think a vip only server is a bad idea but hey.
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Originally Posted by Nihilii
Hmm. You raise some interesting points.
I wouldn't like this idea personally ; most of my alts are on Freedom, and I definitely want to play with the F2P crowd, as on the hours I play, the server is far from packed. I can't find a good, objective reason to argue against your proposal, though. |
I'm mainly excited about CoH Freedom because it will let my friends who are still sort of interested in the game, but can't justify the monthly fee, to play again. And of course, I'd be able to play with them, too. I also play on Virtue.
If Virtue became a VIP-only server when CoH Freedom was released, I'd have to change servers in order to play with my returning friends. But then I'd also lose access to all the friends I've made on Virtue who currently play the game. That's one of the main reasons I dislike the idea of the VIP-Only server... why would I purposefully choose to play on a server that all my friends can't access?
If Virtue were made VIP-Only, I'd be forced to choose between one set of friends and another... as opposed to being able to play with both. This would be a horrible, horrible change, and would probably ruin the allure of the coming changes to me.
Don't worry, I'm sure the VIP server will feel like a hybrid of freedom and virtue.
As far as lag from high population, I think the way they've set up the servers now should dynamically get more or less hardware depending on each Server's load demands.
Spreading out the free population would be a good idea though. How about an Experience incentive instead for going to the lower populated servers? It doesn't have to be a large incentive. They could turn that off whenever they feel the servers are balanced.
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Because new faces should always be welcome on Virtue and Freedom.
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There's that too, plus some people prefer the larger and smaller server populations.
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Originally Posted by SpyralPegacyon
Because new faces should always be welcome on Virtue and Freedom.
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Playstation 3 - XBox 360 - Wii - PSP
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Samuel_Tow: Your avatar is... I think I like it
Why not make Union VIP 2?
Not everyone (like myself) like the NA servers..why should they be special just cos its the most.
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This is the most obvious and logical reason why old servers will not be VIP. Paragon would be shooting themselves in the foot by completely restricting old players from accessing at least some of their old characters.
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Originally Posted by Lightfoot
If part of the CoH: Freedom spiel to lure returning players back to the game is that they will be able to access their old characters, then turning one of the existing servers into a VIP server runs counter to this intent.
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As a Virtue player, I am really looking forward to seeing F2P people come to my server. Turning it into some kind of snotty gated community would suck.
*sighs*
Again, people, read the dang OP. I'm not afraid of the freebies, and I'm not trying to be elitist or snotty.
People WILL choose the most crowded servers to play on when they start a new game, almost without fail. Freedom and Virtue are ALREADY under heavy load and contain most of the game's population.
I just think that spreading the new influx of players to servers that NEED more players, instead of two that are already stuff to the gills, would be a GOOD thing.
If it gets too crowded, you could always go to the VIP server, no?
No special privileges for Freedom and Virtue, no locking, no gating. I say this as someone with a bunch of alternates on both servers.
Let's send all the new people to a ghost-town! Great idea.... NOT
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*snerk*|
Originally Posted by Verene
Don't worry, I'm sure the VIP server will feel like a hybrid of freedom and virtue.
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I think the point behind the somewhat mishandled stress test on Freedom a while ago was exactly this - to verify that whatever changes they've made to either Freedom's hardware or to the server hardware in general will hold up when loads of new players (hopefully) flood the game and head straight for those servers. I wouldn't worry about server loads. Yes, Freedom and Virtue are usually high-load servers, and that's generally not a goo thing, but historically, the developers have managed to keep up with their hardware. Besides, if there are too many people for the server to handle, you'll end up with a server queue, and VIPs get priority access on server queues.
I see no reason to worry.
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Originally Posted by Arcanaville
Samuel_Tow is the only poster that makes me want to punch him in the head more often when I'm agreeing with him than when I'm disagreeing with him.
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As someone who has been thinking of making alts on another server once Freedom goes live, I'm also concerned about this. If the huge influx of -new- players decide to play on the Freedom or Virtue server, and not on the others, well these other servers will surely become underpopulated.|
Originally Posted by Feycat
*sighs*
Again, people, read the dang OP. I'm not afraid of the freebies, and I'm not trying to be elitist or snotty. People WILL choose the most crowded servers to play on when they start a new game, almost without fail. Freedom and Virtue are ALREADY under heavy load and contain most of the game's population. I just think that spreading the new influx of players to servers that NEED more players, instead of two that are already stuff to the gills, would be a GOOD thing. |
Really, from a first glimpse at the replies, I think some may have missed the point (possibly blinded by the 'idea' in the OP).
Oh and yea, that's how I chose to play on Freedom when I first started playing. Pick the highest populated server and roll. Granted it wasn't specifically my idea (to roll on Freedom) at the time, but still, I can see many new players making that same decision and leaving the other lower populated server, well, with a lower population.
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So none of the others are worth that same consideration?|
Originally Posted by Feycat
I know that the devs have repeatedly said they value and are going to be protective of the interests of people who are already playing and paying (and have been) - why not preserve the interests of what is probably your largest chunk of customers by preserving those two servers? It would keep the "culture" of both servers intact, prevent them from becoming completely overloaded every night, and would have the added benefit of helping the population grow on some of the smaller servers.
Thoughts? |
No.
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Originally Posted by Narkor
As someone who has been thinking of making alts on another server once Freedom goes live, I'm also concerned about this. If the huge influx of -new- players decide to play on the Freedom or Virtue server, and not on the others, well these other servers will surely become underpopulated.
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Oh lord....|
Originally Posted by Verene
Don't worry, I'm sure the VIP server will feel like a hybrid of freedom and virtue.
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"healer needed 4 group sex rp"
you left out submissive, but i guess that's implied
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Originally Posted by Feycat
*sighs*
Again, people, read the dang OP. I'm not afraid of the freebies, and I'm not trying to be elitist or snotty. |
And you *just happen* to play on which server..
..ah, yeah.
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What? Do something intelligent rather than going off half-cocked and spewing nerd-rage? You must be new to the internet. |
Originally Posted by Feycat
*sighs*
Again, people, read the dang OP. I'm not afraid of the freebies, and I'm not trying to be elitist or snotty. |
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People WILL choose the most crowded servers to play on when they start a new game, almost without fail. Freedom and Virtue are ALREADY under heavy load and contain most of the game's population. I just think that spreading the new influx of players to servers that NEED more players, instead of two that are already stuff to the gills, would be a GOOD thing. |
Maybe the devs could make Virtue and Freedom Premium servers so existing communities would remain intact.
Or the devs could do something similar to what they did with GR and require new free accounts make their first character on any server other than Freedom and Virtue. Once they do that then they are free to make a character on Freedom and Virtue.
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It would be a logistical nightmare, which would only garner negative press for something that would really rather not have it. [/thread]
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Originally Posted by Feycat
Thoughts?
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Free transfers? Aren't we talking about new players coming in for the first time?|
Originally Posted by Memphis_Bill
Riight. Just like all the free transfers would have everyone RUSH to Freedom and Virtue.... which didn't happen.
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There is a huge difference between those, to be honest.
Players who are, well, already playing are less likely to change servers, considering there are many factors which may hold them onto their existing servers (friends, supergroups, the general community, etc.).
On the other hand, new players? New players don't want a half-dead server. I'm pretty sure everyone can be quite guilty of that. Just try a free to play game. Pick one, any of them, as long as it has multiple servers. Which server would you choose? The one that only had a single bub out of three? Isn't that server less likely to have players running around, forming groups and providing help than the one who has two or three bubs out of three?
The main reason behind a new player's server selection is generally the population of said server. Since, really, there isn't anything else that the new player can base himself on.
It really feels like CoX:Freedom will be relying on the returning players to boost up the population on the low-pop servers and make them attracting to new players.
I have a better idea. How about we DON'T have a VIP server at all. Dividing the community further is a stupid idea and the devs are stupid to implement it. Instead why not implement cross-server instancing for platinum or VIP members and a VIP/platinum only channel for the elitists to chew the fat.
Now, don't get me wrong. I'm not posting this because I fear the freebies, and I'm not posting this because I don't feel like moving my characters to the Freem server, or whatnot.
I'm posting this because, every night, Freedom and Virtue have three red bubbles through most of the evening.
It seems to me that driving traffic to the other servers would be a lot more beneficial to the game than bogging down the two most already-populated servers with a lot more people. Because, and you can check the forums of just about any game, F2P or not, the first post most new people make is "what server has the most people, so I can play there?"
Those servers already have issues dealing with the lag (not all the time, certainly) and places like WW, train stations, RWZ and Oro are already crowded and lagtastic.
I know that the devs have repeatedly said they value and are going to be protective of the interests of people who are already playing and paying (and have been) - why not preserve the interests of what is probably your largest chunk of customers by preserving those two servers? It would keep the "culture" of both servers intact, prevent them from becoming completely overloaded every night, and would have the added benefit of helping the population grow on some of the smaller servers.
Thoughts?