World of Warcraft®

I am posting this under my brothers account as I can't post without a sub.

I have not played wow for over a year now but had learned of this new fangled connected realms thingy blizz is starting to immplement.

<Note my understanding is that after the connection you will be able to see and interact with other players from other realms in the world as though the realms were one realm. So this post is based on that understanding>

As someone who played on SoE (Leep toon) since mid BC until last year there was something to be said about playing on a low pop realm.

I got familiar with many of the regular toons and guilds even though I hardly ever communicate with them. Running instances and raids (before the ill fated LFR system) with people you came to have a kind of unspoken comradery with. The kind of close knit feeling of community that can only come from a low populated realm.

Some of the fondest memories I have are sitting in a obsidian sanctum 25m raid trying for Sartharion with 3 drakes (so close to success you can taste it) discussing what strategies other guilds were trying, because at the time there were only a handfull or less of other guilds in competition for the 3 drakes achievement.

I got a general sense of friendly comradery between guilds/players who were compeating for the achievement and bragging rights. The kind you only get when you know the guild and the people on those other guilds.

Something that gets lost when you find your self compeating against dozens of other unfamiliar guilds or toons. You loose this sense of comradery when there are dozens of guilds compeating for glory.

I find it to be less personal and more agressive/hostle towards each other with guilds having a more emo drama cut throat attitude to be the best. Make the guild be the first in raid progression or gtfo of raid attitude.

So with blizz forcing realm connections without players on a realm being able to vote on weather or not they want there realm to participate I am asking SoE forums what they think about connected realms and how they think it could affect SoE short and long term.

Will SoE still feel like SoE, will we still see as many familiar faces/guilds around town or will they be drowned out in a sea of new toons.

Personally if I had the chance to vote I would lean on the side of no. I don't want to be connected. I like the homey feel the server has had.

... BUT ...

Last year before my sub ran out I toon transfered over to Proudmoore a medium to high pop realm for a few months and I got to say. Whoa.

The difference in activity and toons running around was a bit staggering, and exciting. The AH was a wash in epic raid drops cheap prices and full to the brim of anything you can imagine.

On SoE I struggled to make and keep over 5k gold on the AH, on proudmoore I was making orders of magnitude more IE: 85k+ gold in about 2 months work mostly from crafting and gathering mats.

A constant stream of "looking for more" posts (for end game content) being made in trade chat all hours of the day. Contrast that to SoE and more often then not late nights there may only be less then a dozen toons in stormwind.

Raid progression wise only say 10+/- guilds on SoE running end game raids and on Proudmoore dozens and dozens.

-------------------

It was a stark contrast. And a sign of things to come should blizz decide to connect SoE to other realms.

My heart wants to vote no on connecting SoE to other realms to save the sense of community and small village feel, but my coin purse screams yes yes YES! Cha-Ching!

So what are your thoughts, feelings, or worries on this connected realm dohicky! Good? Bad? Potentially ugly? /GreedyGoblinsBeDroolin

I'm really hoping they do it soon. In Cata, my friends left SoE horde for WrA Alliance. When I rejoined the game in MoP, I joined them on WrA, but I'm just a hordie at heart, so recently I started playing on SoE again. However, I really wish there were more people here.

Like you said, the AH is crappy. It's hard to sell things and if you want to buy something, you either can't, or you're at the mercy of whatever price the few sellers decided to set.

I haven't be able to really make new friends to RP with or do any kind of more casual raiding. There's just not many people around. I'm looking forward to the eventual (hopefully) announcement that SoE is getting connected to another realm. While crowded realms can have their negatives, empty realms are far worse. It feels like playing an MMO in single-player mode unless I queue for a dungeon or battleground.

Yeah, back after a 4 year gap here. How dead it's become is honestly disgusting, I remember back in the days when SoE had a decent population... now it's just... Dead. I'd move all of my characters right now, but I'm in a bind for cash, so I'll wait until Blizz does something about it.

And like hell I'd move to Alliance. If anyone remembers me from back in the day, they'd know why. <3

The personal feeling gone or not, I hope they either connect the realms.. or just kill SoE and merge it with another. I still like RP, PvP, and PvE.. and I reaaally don't want the RP aspect to be drowned out honestly. Hard to drown out the two latter, but it's very easy to kill the first..

So what are your thoughts, feelings, or worries on this connected realm dohicky! Good? Bad? Potentially ugly? /GreedyGoblinsBeDroolin

There's nothing saying that you can't make friends with "off server" players. Otherwise, there's nothing here. I play on a high pop server and come back occasionally to check things out, and count a dozen - if that - people in Stormwind. The AH is a joke.

I occasionally level a human paladin here and saw CRZ in effect in Elwynn, and aside from the Goldshire craziness, I encountered off realm players that were friendly and helpful. LFR - as you brought up - has been one of the best things to happen to this game, because it's allowed me to see content I'd most likely not see otherwise. There's a difference between small town and ghost town.

tl;dr the sky isn't falling.

I have to chime in even though this topic is a little old. I joined Sisters of Elune shortly after its creation around the time BC launched and recently returned after being absent for years.

Yes, this server is in a horrid state. The AH is terrible. The community is practically non-existent and the few active guilds are so insular now half of the time you don't even know they exist.

However, my main issue is Moon Guard.

In the old days if a server had gathered a toxic community then at the very least it stayed on that server. Now thanks to CRZ Moon Guard's problems are now our problems. Oh, and it goes beyond Pornshire. I've seen plenty of jerk behavior [I would use a stronger word...] in areas you normally would not expect it.

Yes I am aware that there are decent people on Moon Guard but they are hidden away, avoiding the very same filth that has given their server such a notorious reputation. Thus, we overwhelmingly see the worst of their community and the only people attempting to police the MG trolls in any organized fashion are members from Wyrmwrest Accord... and their efforts do not appear to have any effect.

So in summary SoE is now a low pop realm with a broken economy that has to deal with high pop problems out in the world and is connected to the most infamous WoW RP server. All of this is thanks to CRZ of course. I honestly would rather be merged with Moon Guard than CRZ with them. At the very least we would get a better economy from being on a bigger server.

Still, Blizz should just ditch CRZ and merge servers but they won't for... some reason. Probably because telling their investors WoW still has hundreds of active servers looks good on their annual reports.

Sigh... My recommendation is to transfer/reroll to a different server. Either find a low pop server that has maintained a strong community despite CRZ or go to a high pop server where you will enjoy a bigger community.

There are barely. And it looks like SOE finally made it on the low pop list. Nice to see it labeled the way it should be. Hope they merge it soon so that all the people who keep trying to sucker people into paying real money to transfer here to a dead server, won't have a leg to stand on anymore. =DDD

Still no signs of SoE being a priority for Connected Realms. I don't wanna repeat everything that was already said. I grew up on this realm...literally. Such a shame to see it pass away like it has. I'm afraid it is far too late for any revival. Maybe WoD may bring back some population but it wont be people native to this realm, more those from it being connected way to late.

12/15/2013 10:54 AMPosted by Horim

So what are your thoughts, feelings, or worries on this connected realm dohicky! Good? Bad? Potentially ugly? /GreedyGoblinsBeDroolin

I will take the bad with the good... Really, really looking forward to when we get connected...

I'm still amazed that neither our server or my old server Spinebreaker have been merged yet. Stop slacking blizz! Servers are dying!

01/28/2014 02:17 PMPosted by Greaterdale

I'm still amazed that neither our server or my old server Spinebreaker have been merged yet. Stop slacking blizz! Servers are dying!

I forget where but I do recall Blizzard claiming that merging servers does not solve population issues... even though it totally does and we can look at other MMOs to prove it.

Best we can hope for is to get connected to another realm rather than simply crz with them. Of course that could be years from now and, with our luck, we'll end up on Moon Guard.

Meh, at this point I almost want to stick around on SoE rather than transfer off just to spite Blizzard. Paying them extra so I can access the MMO part of their game is stupid.

Trust me. I'm a goblin so I know a scam when I see one. WoW no longer has 12 million subscribers so it does not need so many servers. Blizzard should start merging the dead realms en masse asap.

Not sure if you guys saw the news yet, but saying hi from Cenarion Circle. :)

http://us.battle.net/wow/en/blog/11393305/connected-realms-update-131-1-31-2014

The Realm List reports us as Medium pop, but it feels like Low pop most days here. So hopefully there'll be further connections down the road.

I for one am super glad our turn is finally coming up. Cenarion Circle may not be one of the bigger realms, but hopefully with two low-med together it will feel somewhat alive.

01/31/2014 03:04 PMPosted by Theire

Not sure if you guys saw the news yet, but saying hi from Cenarion Circle. :)

http://us.battle.net/wow/en/blog/11393305/connected-realms-update-131-1-31-2014

The Realm List reports us as Medium pop, but it feels like Low pop most days here. So hopefully there'll be further connections down the road.

Well that certainly happened sooner than I thought it would. I was absolutely convinced that Blizzard was going to sit on their hands and let SoE stagnate for years. Hopefully SoE and CC will get connected soon.

We are your choice.

You are ours, and we will not share you. Cenarion Circle calls you, and there's nothing you can do to stop our coming.

This connection can't come fast enough but I can't help but wonder if connecting two essentially dead realms is going to adequately resolve these issues. Personally I think connecting 4 or 5 low pop RP realms together would be a much better and longer lasting solution to this problem. It would be an adjustment for everyone at first but the initial shake up would be well worth it if it brings a thriving economy, progression for raiders and just more energy/activity in general. Perhaps Blizz has come to the same conclusion and that's what the connection delay announcement is about. *crosses fingers*

I've *heard* that the connection between CC and SoE is only the first step and that we probably will get a third and maybe even a fourth dead RP realm merged into us. I personally agree that CC and SoE together will not equal a Moon Guard or Wyrmwrest Accord but I do hope whatever realms we get merged with will also be good matches for us.

SoE was very fun back in BC and Wrath. There was always something to do and people to play with. Now we are dead, and with the merger with CC postponed I really wonder what the hold up is.

*sigh*

I was back on SoE during BC before I took a long break from WoW and you're right about it being very active during those days. It is actually rather depressing to see how low the server has fallen.

*sniff*

CC was also thriving in Wrath days, so much activity of all kinds going on almost 24/7 and even though the Alliance had (and still does have) way more people, Horde side was very active and full of toons as well. Now most of the raiding guilds have transferred off, people have left for other games, and the ones who can't afford to transfer their toons off realm just simply don't come back. Even for someone as introverted as I am, the silence and emptiness of the world is quite depressing and a stark contrast to the way it used to be. It's difficult to even make a decent amount of gold anymore because there's no people around to buy anything, which was one of my main reasons for taking a 6 month long break from game recently.