Sunday, June 14, 2009

A Server By Any Other Name...

...is still just a server.

The bank in Dalaran and the AH in Ogrimmar are the same no matter where you go, it's only the names in Trade and General that ever change. But I found myself with an itch to scratch, and found Cho'gall wanting recently. I came to Cho'gall following my friend Tragedy, having never heard of it before he told me that that's where the crew was headed. Many of the people I've played WoW with over the years have come and gone... gone to a new server (Scilla), come back to the old server (Daggerspine), then even gone back to Scilla again in a strange twist that just gives me a headache even thinking about it. I went Oceanic for a while after having moved to Japan, and met a few cool kids on this side of the ocean (Aussies and New Zealanders, for the most part), and for a short while I was the only native English speaker in a guild called Band of Hawks that was all a bunch of folks from Singapore. I've spent close to (maybe over?) 500 dollars on paid character transfers alone... there's a statistic for the Blizzard Microtransaction crowd to chew on.

My old account with three end game 70s got banned, but I've built up a new stable of end game 80s. I fill the trinity nicely (prot tank, healing priest, warlock deeps), and enjoy being able to send "relogging, brb" tells to anyone in LFG regardless of what role they need filled. This tends to be a problem with the transfer costs, though, because that's 75 bucks to switch servers. That's 5 months worth of WoW. Then I get to my new destination and find it's the same as it ever was.

Plus I need to figure out how to go from this:

to this:


...on a number of toons, because bank alts are effectively disposable (minus the soulbound bags and/or purchased guild bank tabs, ugh).

At any rate, my priest has struck off to a new home, but I'm weary this time, and have sent her off to scout ahead. What has she found? Well, damn... medium pop PVE servers are dead as hell during my primetime. Oh yeah, and PVE to PVP transfers are doable now, so there's that, too. Kul Tiras, new new home away from home, is pretty... ummm... how can I put this lightly? "Noob". Cho'gall is pretty "OMFGLEETZ" which means you get told to GTFO of VOA10 if you're caught dead wearing an iLevel 174 trinket, god forbid it's green. My warlock pushes around 4700+ DPS on Emalon, but that seems normal to me. The three times I've tried VOA10 on Kul Tiras, the top DPS was a hunter pulling 2100, and needless to say we died. The attitude displayed was a fresh breath of air, though... here was a group willing to brush themselves off and throw themselves at it again, where the instant a tank dies on Cho'gall, rogues are vanishing and sprinting for the door, already out of the raid, before the wipe even begins in earnest. I was awestruck by the group of people that had no idea just how much they failed, and we tried it two more times, but to no avail. Wtf is going on here, I wondered.

The intersection by the Dalaran bank features never before seen [Tumbleweeds] rolling by, but the people you do bump into seem genuine. This could be something nice, but I'm still holding off bringing the warrior and warlock over for now. For one thing I can swap servers and find a zillion runs going on Cho'gall at any time of the night. When Kul Tiras sleeps, it SLEEPS, and I remember how 'in Japan' I am.

July 6th I head back home, though, so maybe everything will slide into place. Then again, in that case, I'd be back in Cho'gall prime time too... 7:1 Horde:Alliance ratio be damned. I've finally gotten Tenacity in Kul Tiras, even though it was only two stacks. On Cho'gall, anything less than 18 stacks on Alliance is cause for celebration. Horde will NEVER get Against the Odds on Cho'gall. Ever.

At any rate, we'll see how it pans out. I've been curious to poke around and meet other people in the WoW since Trag quit playing and GOT ALL EMO AND ONLY PLAYS FACEBOOK NOW. LIKE A BIG DUMB LOSER. Anyone else got a server worth checking out? I wanted to hijack Larísa's guild, but alas, Alliance side European was a bit too much of a hurdle. Any of you other noobs got a server that's worth a damn?

18 comments:

Larísa said...

Oh how I wish I could snatch you into my guild. But you know that... Sigh.. That ocean of time differences and the Blizzard non-breakable wall is so annoying.

I remember from my server transfer to an unknown new world that it felt weird. Stormwind was stormwind... but still. It WAS different. I really felt lika a stranger for quite a while, not used to the unknown guild tags.
Now after more than a year here I'd be just as lost if I went back to my old server. You ajust. But it takes time.

Feel sorry for you about the fees. Can't help thinking that you should be able to have a trial week or something, being able to move again without any extra charge if it just doesn't feel right. LIke you can return a car (if you've agreed about it.)

Kyir said...

I hear Moon Guard's cool.

Except for the fact that I can't kill whoever I want.

I forgot why I transfered to a RP server.

oshin said...

Expensive habit, i spent about a year of my wow career server hopping as alliance ( having started as horde). its interesting seeing different servers (one had a decent set of people who`d pug heroics, was nice)

Ultimately though the whole thing is a farce people impose on each other. Sometimes its because theres not viable raiding population, sure, but alot of the time its grass is greener syndrome

Klepsacovic said...

Wow, that's a mess. I suggest a bag mod I use called Baggins. By default it has several categories such as different types of trade goods, armor, weapons, BoEs, trash, etc. I've customized mine to search tooltips and sort out different types of gear, such as different virtual bags for items with defense or spell power.

I know the feeling of strangeness on a different server. I feel very isolated knowing no one, not knowing where the server is on progression. Sometimes they even use different acronyms or other terms and it can be confusing to communicate.

Rich said...

my bags are done with Bagnon. I prefer to have just one big grid of squares, and then I drag things to various locations in that grid. Gear is on the bottom, potions, foods, and reagents line the right hand side, hearthstone and things like thieves tools or skinning knives are in the bottom right hand corner. It looks like a huge mess just because I needed to grab everything out of my mail, too (I keep a LOT of stuff just sitting in the mailbox, for easy access from anywhere).

I've used other bag adons that create 'virtual' bags, but in the end, Bagnon (and before that "All in one bag") just feel about right.

@Larisa: A trial move would be good, but you're always free to make an alts and scope out trade chat (although you can't see what a raid pug chat will be like). The biggest issue I have is this: We all KNOW were paying 25 dollars to modify one cel in a big, glorified spreadsheet... change value Z from "Daggerspine" to "Scilla" .... that's all a transfer REALLY is.... I don't care about the 25 bucks, it keeps people from hopping every time the cooldown is up... but why not pay a one time fee, and xfer every toon from Server X to Server Z, all in one transaction, for 25$? That would make more sense, and not feel so 'wallet rapey'.

Krunchy said...

I dunno, I'm kind of fortunate in that I have pockets of friends on different servers. Yeah, it's kind of tough to balance out characters on 2-3 servers, but at least you're not forced to random reroll on a server with random people you don't know (not that it can't be fun sometimes).

I don't see myself reactivating my account anytime soon (don't worry though, Iso, I'll still get those game cards to you, I swear), but even though a bunch of people I know have since quit, I still have some left on random servers or I may even just do the random reroll thing. Shit, that's partially how I ended up with the Exhumed group since my friends didn't want to play with me (said I was too nub or something). Just do what's fun. Isn't that what MMOs are about?

Jong said...

welcome back to US! though i enjoyed stories you put up about japan. have a safe trip and i hope you find a nice server.

Alcaras said...

Mal'Ganis might be to your liking.

Anonymous said...

Well, since you've been all around the world, you should try Europe for a while, i don't know how Asian or US servers are, but i can vouch for at least two EU servers that have the right amount of seriousness, retardness, raiding, pvping, economic stability and overall fun for you to enjoy -- Jaedenar and Bloodfeather (at least). Horde side, of course.

Zupa said...

Ixo... I know the feeling.

After reactivation following several months of... well warhammer... I found my home server ( frostmourne ) wasn't quite the same.

The old guild was still there, as were a few old mates... but I didn't know everyone who was everyone anymore so I went and rolled a DK on another server. That server didn't do it for me to I then transferred that DK over to Aman'thul for the single purpose of joining Gnomeaggedon & co for friday night raids.

A few weeks later and we have already raided together! Best decision ever!

The server overall seems a bit less... hardcore than frostmourne was, but I don't really have a good perspective yet, so that could be a false impression.

I had the same problem as you before transferring. Full bags, full bank, full mailbox and a full alt. Thankfully in the space of 2 days I managed to hock most of it and pack the rest and I was on my way!

So maybe consider aman'thul?

If you are after a prostyle server that is full of aussies and kiwis, another good option is Blackrock. The original unofficial oceanic PvP server, where my little mage was born all those years ago. It's the kind of server that doesn't take kindly to newcomers and everyone knows everyone, but in terms of raiding guilds I believe they are right up there.

Otherwise look us up on Aman'thul :)

- Zupa

Crucifer said...

Moving from London to West Australia, I now have the unfortunate problem of being 17,000 miles, 800ms latency and 7 hours of time difference from people that I've played with for years and years. I used to get up at 5am and go Gruul raiding before my wife politely reminded me how insane that sounded. So I moved to Oceanic and got confused by people sending me messages of "nw" (no worries).

How I wish I could get Blizzard EU to send Blizzard US a cd of my character so I could carry on playing...

silkworm said...

The biggest problem is time difference so your home is now US. Try to find a guild with mature people. They are out there.
As for EU or people wishing to go US from Oceanic to EU, why don't you consider ebaying an account with characters already in. As you can change name/sex and appearance, its easy to get a lvl80 insertyourclasshere in EU or US or wherever. If anyone is interested I can help with EU. There are tons of forums dedicated to trading accounts. And before you ask if it safe, yes there is a risk involved but there are people selling their accounts and there is always a guildie who has a friend thats selling one. I do have one frozen EU account. Ixo if you would like to try it send me an email. Just add your payment and go. There is a lvl 80 alliance rogue in chromaggus EU and 70 undead warrior and 70 undead priest (my old chars) in Xavius. For all I know Xavius is a dead server now.

Dink said...

Area 52 US is a nice full server. Plenty of groups Horde side. Good economy. Some top raiders.

Pretty cocky group which is nice.

We've went 4 defends on WG in a row.

Our group does, however, suck at bg's.

Darraxus said...

I like Scarlet Crusade US. Its a pretty old server and has a pretty nice balance on both sides.

Anonymous said...

When you get back to the states and some 9-5'er job, why not put some time in on some long lost "new content" toons with your Beta homies!

Deafour 80 NE rogue
Deasix 77 Dranei OPally
Frosticorn 80 freezer
blah blah blah

Rich said...

Fuck jacob, I would if you guys played horde at all. I was leveling that huntard on ZulJin until my eyes bled, and then I just gave up. I was the only one on, unless pletus was awake smoking crack in the bathtub or whatever. But yeah, it's gonna be on, fo sho. July 6th baby. I'll probably just show up with my kid at your place and we'll go get 40s and teach him how malt liquor works.

Good times incoming, for sure.

Lantana said...

It's funny how changing servers really is somehow different. I confess there was a part of me that was almost expecting to see different things, different cities, different banks, different NPCs....

But the atmosphere *was* different going from a full server to a low pop one. I've gotten used to it now, and we're growing, but sometimes i pop back to the old server on alts and get all nostalgic. I'm a lunatic, probably.

Tragedyx said...

LOL I didn't get lame. I needed to quit wow because if I showed up to my incredible job training out of shape or addicted to a time sink of a game I would have been sent back to the shithole known as Erie, PA. I was working full time, going to the gym full time, and catching up on sleep i'd lost over the past 3 years. I might come back, someday, but no idea.

I'm sorry I had to quit, but opportunity only knocks once and where I come from, alot of times it doesn't knock at all.