On the subject of more servers.

[Einstein]

Hello. This post will be to explain the teams plan on dealing with additional servers, and our reasoning behind it.

At this time we will be waiting a month or so before reevaluating the need for a new server. This is due to how the influx of new players can ebb and flow, and how well staffed we are at the moment. Also we are limited by the funds required to run and protect 3 game servers that can support the growing amount of players we have. At this moment our primary focus will be on stabilizing our current servers, and adapting the the environment of a multi-server community.

These are some quotes from other staff and players regarding this situation to provide further insight into it.

 

  MayElesa said:

136713

  TheKarateKid said:

136712 I understand and agree with the OP's point of this thread. It is a discussion that should be ongoing.

Most of the people posting in this have no technical knowledge whatsoever and are not admins, so to knock the idea down "because the servers are not stable" or "we just got a new one" are useless because you don't know the real situation or understand it from an engineering standpoint. Let the admins speak for those reasons.

 

IMO, this game is brilliant but my initial experience was hindered by being kicked offline 10+ times per session on my first few days, while having to wait in a queue. If the Blue server didn't launch around the time I joined, I may have given up on PRO for a while because I couldn't play it half the time. I'd totally be willing to donate a higher amount if it meant a better gameplay experience/stability. If money is the real issue right now, perhaps alternate ways to fund the project should be discussed instead of just saying the upkeep cost is too high.

 

This pretty much explains all why a new server wont be added in a short while after the last one just was released. You say yourself you play the game now and maybe now in a few months, and thats exactly the reason. A lot of streamers recently showed the game and while it gives a massive hype in the short run, those fanboys wont stay around for long. So while it might solve the problem now, maybe there will a great loss in the numbers of players in a few months and the results would be small groups of the playerbase distributed over different servers that arent fully populated. That argumentation isnt really well thought through and only sees what is now and not what might be in the future. - Sesshomaru

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Tons of this suggestion.... it's obvious that would be nice to allow all people to play, but this game survives with donations and, if you check the forum, the staff already said lots of time in the last few days that, in the short time, due to lack of funding, they will not be able to add any new server. This is not a big company, but just a bunch of friends building this from nothing. We just need to wait. And just a consideration from me: asking to implement new servers is not a suggesion; there are everyday more players and the staff will try to fill them in the game. You joined on March 17th: I am here from when there were only 400 spots in just one server; this is just to show you that time will carry more spots. We just need to be patients. - Riccat

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Opening a new server is far more complicated a decision than the ability/resources to do it. Creating a new server will inevitably effect the games community and cause more splits amongst the playerbase, and with the introduction of the blue server so recently and it still not having a proper PVP scene you may risk splitting the community even more and causing two servers to have mediocre end game scenes for a very long time.

If that happens we will be in a situation where Red is the only server that's had time to establish a community, which means new players all want to go on red. That leaves these two new servers under utilised and defeats the point of having them. The Devs know when to add new servers, it's based on community just as much as resources. - Reth

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I'll explain clearly my POV, this games is totally free, even the donation system is not a "pay to play" is a "pay to improve". due some legal stuff they can't earn 99% of the money and the server must go on with donations. The main thing that the staff and Shane himself need to understand now as far as i can tell, is how many of these newbies will become active players, because if they rent another server/make these bigger and people leave the game we could say bye to pro. another point is staff, they need bigger staff to manage bigger/more servers. that's all, easy i think - Nostazz

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Our 2 current Game servers run on 8 core Xeons, with 32GB RAM, and 2x512GB SSDs in RAID. These cost ALOT to rent. We had barely enough to buy hardware DDoS protection last month as well as pay for our 3+ servers (2 game servers + webserver).

Bear in mind we aren't a company, we are just a few people making a game we like.

7 months ago we had 400 capacity, now we have 3600 capacity across 2 servers. That shows you how quickly we have grown. Yes, the queues aren't ideal, but it's better than not being able to connect at all.

Image - Arnie

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it's being worked on, but for now stability is priority - my point

 

  Frenzy said:

136715 Straight on the point, no beating around the bush. It's not recommended to bite off more than one can chew. Our current staff count is rather low when you look at number of active players. It is a very big bite that staff are struggling with on regular basis. On top of that, we are talking about fans where real life has priority over a game. Current team was originally designed for one server. Any effort they put into the second one is their own bonus courtesy towards the community.

 

To show you an example, Red server is being moderated by the moderators while Blue one is not being moderated that much. We even have admins moderating ignoring their duties which eventually puts things on a halt and all that to please players. From my point of view, there wont be 3rd server and we aren't far away from scenario where blue server is slowly shrinking playerbase wise.

 

USA would be the majority of the playerbase. However, there is a 29% shrink in past 15 days. Two months ago, French were the majority, today they got reduced by more than 75%. By the time moderator manages to get on another server the troll player already did their portion and scammer already traded away Pokemon several times over. Having that in mind, the management team is constantly working on training new staff to fill the gap. Not many of them will make it staff mostly due to passing interest and lack of passion. Trusted staff is hard to find. It becomes even worse when a possible candidate comes from a server that lacks moderation and management. Eventually, you get staff that are choking. They are are wonderful people but sometimes they simply have it too much. That is all normal and it was expected to happen.

 

Same way staff are doing their best to make you feel wanted and needed in the community and the same way you need to return them that favor. Without them nothing of this would be possible. Our community is yet to be polished and this is one of those times where quality is more important than quantity. Be assured that it is being worked on the server stability as well as getting some quality staff in.

 

As you can see we are working very hard so that everyone can enjoy this game, but due to the limitations of being a non-profit, volunteer game we must do what we can in the most efficient way possible. I hope anyone who has this question or suggestion understands our reasoning and is willing to work with us while we try our best.