If you keep the server and merge it by linking it to other servers, names aren’t a problem anymore. Just need to start adding in more servers to the already existing groupings.
I think the easy fix to that would be surnames. They wouldn’t even have to be displayed on the characters, except on certain tabs or something. Could even take it a step farther and use it as a start of family, heritage, or clan systems that encourage alts.
I also agree merges are needed. Connected Realms were a nice try, but my Horde are on one of them and Alliance is dead on that realm. CR are failing.
Ideally sure, if you cluster them it’s a non-issue as long you make the clusters big enough.
Abolish faction restrictions for end-game. It’s an outdated system. People will always flock to the majority and tip the scales over time unless you mechanically restrict people from joining the other faction.
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I don’t think connected realms failed, I think they need to start connecting more. A mass Connected Realm of 50 low-med pop servers would save them all.
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I agree, we can’t just keep playing ping pong with faction power and rely on paid transfers to switch power. I think there are 2 real possibilities. Either allow cross faction grouping in instances, like they currently do in BGs but unrestricted, or to introduce a 3rd faction to balance the other two which would be far more involved.
That’s not going to work. Believe it or not more people play Blood Elf even though there are other races with stronger racials. Even if Blizz were to undo the nerfs to mechagnomes I’d wager not even 1% would switch over to alliance.
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Exactly. Instead of 5 connected realms, take 20 or 30 low/med pop and BAM massive server.
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There’s probably a lot of reasons, It’s bad PR, makes the game look like it’s dying, maybe even something as bone headed as “let’s see how many people we can get to pay for transfers first.”
All a server is now is a default shard for the current capital city, an AH and a restriction on who you can guild with. In every other aspect we are in battle groups not servers.
So I suspect they’ll just remove the restrictions on guilds and combine the AH’s. Which is a perfectly fine solution.
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That’s basically connecting all of them…not a bad idea. It’d be like a megaserver and the high pop servers could remain untouched.
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this
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9.0 larger character customization might address some of this. Especially if Void Elves get a large addition.
Stopping nerfing Alliance racials on ARs would be a great start!
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Pretty sure Shadowlands customization isn’t going to be applied to Allied races unless I’m remembering it incorrectly
I think Alliance really need a story/characters to drive them back. I know I don’t play Horde for the racials…but for the aesthetics and general theme.
When Alliance had Varian as leader…well, Alliance was nice n populated. Could be coincidence, since there were better racials for humans (at least) at the time. Though I really think it’s as simple as “add an awesome character, draw players in.”
Anduin must die. When Horde spent this expansion led by Sylvanas and Saurfang…there was no Alliance badass equivalent.
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If Void Elves are given the Alleria treatment, I could see our Blood Elves leaving.
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- Add a surname field.
- Default this field to the user’s previous server name.
- Let users change them or choose to not display them except under inspect.
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The question was what can be done to maintain end game participation. Unfortunately, end game participation is subject to a negative feedback loop. Some people move from Alliance to Horde so they can more find groups. This makes the Alliance even less attractive, so then even more players switch. And so on…
The most sensible solution is to allow cross-faction grouping…
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That’s already been solved. I’m on a previously merged and still dead server and my name is actually Thequixote-Staghelm.
So every one just gets the surname of their original server.
If that’s the case, that’s going to go very poorly. A high increase to Void Elf customization like non blue skin would increase alliance pop by a lot.