There are numerous low population realms in TBC Classic that are almost akin to a single player experience, that have been abandoned by Blizzard for far too long. The fact we play $15 a month for this experience without any developer support is quite disappointing, although we love this game and our tight-knit communities nonetheless. We have previously found these types of servers are appealing to those that want something similar to the old days of WoW, free of the issues that plague some of the mega servers. However, there’s a point where our player bases get frustrated due to the ability to do ANY content, and either fully quit, or shell out a transfer and abandon us here behind.
For example, my realm, Arcanite Reaper is doing everything we can to keep our server alive. From helping each other out with any dungeon and quest we can, to giving away almost any material out for free - our server means a lot to us and we have been stubborn enough to see it through for as long as possible. However, we don’t have a pool of players to recruit from as our raid roster is thinning out due to attrition and will struggle in a few weeks to start progression raiding in SSC/TK. I’m sure this is a similar issue for other realms such as Thalnos, Anathema, Deviate Delight, etc. We are the ONLY guild on our realm that raids, and have done everything possible to stay afloat since forming in March.
Prime time hours on our server don’t usually exceed 40-50 players. Players find it very hard to reroll here / boost, etc. I cannot expect players to transfer here unless they are very keen on a small, close group of community oriented raiders that love the game as much as we do. Simply put, this type of WoW TBC experience is extremely frustrating most times - we are not able to do much content in all level ranges due to lack of players. While we enjoy the challenge in making things happen at times, this isn’t feasible for us any longer.
Players continue to burn out and quit, and most of our player base cannot afford to transfer 3-6 main characters and alts to a new realm as an option, on top of our monthly subscription.
Blizzard, we’ve been holding our breaths for a server merge / transfer assistance for so long. We know other things are higher on the totem pole of priority for your team. If our realms continue to be ignored, you will continue to lose monthly subscriptions from players that love WoW and TBC and may never return due to the lack of attention and care for realms that have less than 100 players a day.
Please help us. We cannot afford to leave.