ISn't it kinda stupid that...

[morPR]

First of all, I used to play Warhammer Online. And the original setup was that you couldn't have Chaos & Order characters on the same server. You had to play two servers if you wanted to play both sides. ANyway, before the great closure, they merged into one server and you had all your chars on the same server. Just one for USA alone.

Anyhow, UO basically has one server: Atlantic. Everyone plays there or is miigrating to there. I am waiting for it to come back online and sitting there thinking "gee all these other servers I could play and yet I"m waiting for one of what seems to be a dozen others that all say "LOW" populaton on them.

SO, really. This game is 20 years old. I love 2D and all. But another harbringer of doom for WAR was the Endless Trial. And what is UO waiting on now? An Endless Journey. WOW has had a F2P component for years now and now UO is finally trying it out. Or ?

 

[ShriNayne]

Some of us would rather not play than play on Atlantic, I'm very happy on Europa thank you very much! Also not everyone would be able to play on Atlantic due to lag from being so far away....not having a go at you or anything, just saying, not everyone wants to play on a crowded shard that's physically very far away!

 

[Merion]

Some of us would rather not play than play on Atlantic, I'm very happy on Europa thank you very much! Also not everyone would be able to play on Atlantic due to lag from being so far away....not having a go at you or anything, just saying, not everyone wants to play on a crowded shard that's physically very far away!

Dito. Living in europe, the ping to US shards is just too high for higher end stuff like pvp, where timing is immensly important.

 

[Spartan]

I like LA, thank you. I played Atl way back in the early days and it was not for me.

 

[Drakelord]

My home shard is Sonoma, I started on LS back in the old days. The only times I been to Atl is EM events, Deal no Deal, and shopping since no one sells stuff on Sonoma. I also Play on Siege, I really like the Em there

 

[Lore]

I like Chessy. The people there are great and there's space. Atl has good people too of course, but people generally already have their cliques.

 

[TB Cookie [W]]

First of all, I used to play Warhammer Online. And the original setup was that you couldn't have Chaos & Order characters on the same server. You had to play two servers if you wanted to play both sides. ANyway, before the great closure, they merged into one server and you had all your chars on the same server. Just one for USA alone.

Anyhow, UO basically has one server: Atlantic. Everyone plays there or is miigrating to there. I am waiting for it to come back online and sitting there thinking "gee all these other servers I could play and yet I"m waiting for one of what seems to be a dozen others that all say "LOW" populaton on them.

SO, really. This game is 20 years old. I love 2D and all. But another harbringer of doom for WAR was the Endless Trial. And what is UO waiting on now? An Endless Journey. WOW has had a F2P component for years now and now UO is finally trying it out. Or ?

Going to dispute this.

We have migrated half our guild to Atlantic before, and come back pretty quickly to Europa.
(We are quite a big guild when active).
We've had many go individually, and come back, myself included.

The reason being, is they don't actually play UO on Atlantic, they just all sit in Luna.
The PvP is rubbish there, and full of middle to average players, our PvP is far more consistent and fun, with bigger teams involved.
They don't PvM, they don't do anything - just sit there.

It's a market shard, nothing more, nothing less, it's for the traders - fantastic for shopping.
If UO implemented a cross shard auction house, Atlantic would die probably.

 

[Flagg]

Prolly worst post in a long time OP.

They'd love to close shards, no doubt about it. Even most successful MMOs do it all the time. As it stands, UO has way too many shards for it's playerbase. It's just that it is virtually impossible due to housing. On most MMOs, every server is virtually a copy of one another. Players own no property that'd not be conveniently instanced. In these games merging shards means virtually nothing besides seeing more names around you. In Ultima, merging shards would mean losing all of your homes. Most people would close most of their accounts on the spot. It can't and won't be done; it'd be the end of UO like as not.

 

[MalagAste]

I play on GLs have since pretty much the first day I started UO... really would rather quit than move to another shard and you wouldn't catch me actually "playing" on Atl... nothing against EM Bennu... but overcrowded and full of greed.... not really appealing in the slightest.

 

[Finley Grant]

I play on GLs have since pretty much the first day I started UO... really would rather quit than move to another shard and you wouldn't catch me actually "playing" on Atl... nothing against EM Bennu... but overcrowded and full of greed.... not really appealing in the slightest.

lol sorry but "overcrouded"? Atlantic is pretty much empty, the other shards are dead.

not sure when you started UO but when i started 2001 on Drachenfels the Characters at Britain Bank were between 50 and 250 probably EACH DAY, weekend much more. on a small shard used by most likely germans only.

iam not sure why people always say, OHH i play on XYZ shard because i dont want over crouded Atlantic or whatever, GUYS YOU PLAY A MMORPG, that is what UO is.

honestly, sometimes i would like that all those players who actually "like" the dead shards either quit or play a single player game / a own freeshard with their 10 buddies so UO could finally move on but as long as players on dead shards dont accept a replacement house same size on merged shard i dont see hope anymore, same with the CC vs EC discussion, sure both clients suck but do we really want to go on with 2 when we only have 5 persons operating the game?

@MalagAste my post is not meant to insult you or anyone else, iam just a bit surprised how people actually think Atlantic is "overcrowded"

 

[SugarMMM]

I don't understand why the merging topic comes up soo often. I wouldn't think merging and closing shards would really save any money these days vs 20 years ago.

Computer equipment/servers are faster and more efficient now than 20 years ago and broadband is faster and probably cheaper!

 

[ShriNayne]

There just isn't enough room on any one shard for housing for everyone! One of the things people like about UO is it's lack of instanced housing, shard merges are just not an option here.

 

[Flagg]

There just isn't enough room on any one shard for housing for everyone! One of the things people like about UO is it's lack of instanced housing, shard merges are just not an option here.

Looking forward to getting " replacement castles" in Atl for all!! \o/

 

[MalagAste]

lol sorry but "overcrouded"? Atlantic is pretty much empty, the other shards are dead.

not sure when you started UO but when i started 2001 on Drachenfels the Characters at Britain Bank were between 50 and 250 probably EACH DAY, weekend much more. on a small shard used by most likely germans only.

iam not sure why people always say, OHH i play on XYZ shard because i dont want over crouded Atlantic or whatever, GUYS YOU PLAY A MMORPG, that is what UO is.

honestly, sometimes i would like that all those players who actually "like" the dead shards either quit or play a single player game / a own freeshard with their 10 buddies so UO could finally move on but as long as players on dead shards dont accept a replacement house same size on merged shard i dont see hope anymore, same with the CC vs EC discussion, sure both clients suck but do we really want to go on with 2 when we only have 5 persons operating the game?

@MalagAste my post is not meant to insult you or anyone else, iam just a bit surprised how people actually think Atlantic is "overcrowded"

Everywhere I've looked it is... but then I don't play there.. I run from Haven to where ever the whatever is and back... sometimes Luna etc... looks plenty crowded to me. Feels that way too with all the lag there.

 

[morPR]

UO itself is so under-used that a few times Norton's said it might be a virus because it was umpopular or someting......

Thanks for the replies. Mainly I wanted to say there was no reason I should or anyone else should be completely dependant on the Atlantic shard being active at all. There's so many other ones I could be playing on. I have several characters that are perpetually unfinished in some way. I won't name the tricks we used to build combat skills, but there was a time it was quite common to work at certain spawns as groups of lowbies. And I would just go to to those places and talk while getting my weapon skill of the place to of 90s or so...

But I always heard the Siren's Call to Atlantic. I have played PVP on Great Lakes. I bought a nice house on Europa. I bought a Fel house on GL. I bought a small Luna mall in Lake Austin. I had a "Fel Fighting Arena" I bought on GL. I've had so many houses its ridiculous because I kept getting bored of them. So I even briefly owned a castle which was payment for the Luna house.

And I recently bought so many Pink scrolls for imbuing that I went from GM to basically 119.9 artifcer nearly by accident. That's just how the cards were dealt. 20M in my bank to 1M afterward.

 

[celticus]

WOW! can the same account own different houses in different shards? Has this changed?

 

[morPR]

Did I say they were all still standing? Or that I've only ever had one account? I have my main.... and I have a secondary and I have used trials to temporarily subscribe just to hold a house.

Now that my rent and stuff is more expensive I can't even afford a car let alone ONE account to be consistently be subscribed.

Rest assured on the plus side I bough some nice houses and sold cheap out of impatience. On the bad side some were closed down because my subscription was cut for lack of funds that month while I languished in a hospital. Or something.

 

[Tyrath]

I can't think of a reason in the world to actually play on Atl., for me it is like driving to the mall 3 hours away to do some shopping and getting out of there as soon as I have obtained what I want or need.

 

[Finley Grant]

There just isn't enough room on any one shard for housing for everyone! One of the things people like about UO is it's lack of instanced housing, shard merges are just not an option here.

********.

Only because Tram and Fel maybe dont have enough space dont mean ITS Not enough room. The devs can Place Houses everything. Furthermore ITS Not hard to add a facet for housing of they would really want IT.

My OP ist that they given Up in that idea BE because of stubborn Players who quit when their "shard history" would BE gone and never consider a move. Honestly ITS maybe the best for Up that some people go

 

[Finley Grant]

I don't understand why the merging topic comes up soo often. I wouldn't think merging and closing shards would really save any money these days vs 20 years ago.

Computer equipment/servers are faster and more efficient now than 20 years ago and broadband is faster and probably cheaper!

ITS Not about only saving Money. ITS about having an MMORPG with shard have a proper Player Base and Not dead stuff. Furthermore less shards less EM = less Chance of another clops Situation

Lets Not speak about the Open Market when IT comes to Player Run vendor which Most likely only works on atlantic.

 

[ShriNayne]

Forcing merges or even forcing people to move from a home in a beloved spot would be the end of UO, they know that and we know that, to some people it's not just a game and it's not just pixels, in some cases it's 15-20 years of their life.

 

[Tyrath]

Forcing merges or even forcing people to move from a home in a beloved spot would be the end of UO, they know that and we know that, to some people it's not just a game and it's not just pixels, in some cases it's 15-20 years of their life.

Age 29 to 49 for me. I hate to say this but probably the best thing that could be done with UO is to shut it down at this point and build UO 2 taking the the best aspects of the last 20 years, implement better crisper graphics in one client that everyone can live with. And rebuild the world from the ground up with some serious anti cheating and scripting tools built in that can evolve to keep the illegal activity in check. Of course that would be a major undertaking and require a full development and art team and a couple of years of work. The pay off would be if done right a very well balanced game, with minimal cheating and completely new code that would be much more adaptive going into the future. And as a bonus would most likely put the Ultima Online brand back at the top of the MMORPG genre and rake in a whole lot of dead presidents for EA, downside is the huge investment and the risk that it would be a total flop. As it is though UO is dying and this EJ stuff is not going to change that, mainly because none of the fundamental issues that caused people to move on have been fixed and honestly at this point most of those issues can't be fixed. There is really nothing to interest and draw in young players and the learning curve in UO is insane. Not to mention all of the dead end content and fragments of temp content littering the landscape. Then there is the total RMT based economy that is not broken if you are one of the green gold folks and is totally fubar if you are just a player not trying to buy your groceries and pay your mortgage with a game. UO as we know it now would continue on free shards, which is another major problem. Makes zero sense to compete with your own game with free shards and the free shards do take a significant amount of subs away from the official shards. I love UO but it is dying and will continue to do so, and I just can't see where there is anything that can revitalize what we have now, just a constant stream of bandaids that slow down the inevitable.

 

[MalagAste]

I'm sorry but I'm part of a player run city... something I don't want to "give up" to move to any other shard... I give a rats rearend what the history of any other shard is... I know the history of mine. I've lived it. And moving to any other shard would not be the same.

One thing I've learned and witnessed first hand is that 9 times in 10 when a guild hops shards to go where they think the "grass is greener" it results in the collapse of the guild and a loss of many players. Don't ask me why I don't know I've never done it.

Sure maybe there are a few success stories but I know FAR too many unsuccessful ones.

Really it's friendships and community and a large part of that is history and such... every shard is different. The loss to many communities of LONG standing places they know and love for the memories they represent would be too great a cost. Merge them you say???? What DEV knows anything about the things on any particular shard???? My guess is that Kyronix might know a bit about whatever shard he came from... but the rest of them would be hard pressed to name a single place on a single shard that was "unique"... Save Mesanna if she happened to build them but even then she's done so much over the years I rather doubt she remembers where they are.

I for one would be pissed enough to want to quit if I had to move to another shard where I couldn't have my homes in the same place I do now... I started out being elected Secretary of Yew (by the people who lived in Yew and participated in the RP community) way back in 2002 or 3... Wasn't the Secretary long before the "Mayor" at the time quit... his name was Maximillian... if memory serves and it usually does... I was then informed that I was Mayor ... until the next election... I remained the Mayor of Yew for about the next 8 years... I think I took something like a 6 month break but the one who was Mayor in that time left as well and the job turned back to me... When Governors became a thing I was Elected Governor... I've remained the Governor ever since and plan to continue to be the Governor of Yew... it's my city... the City I love. Going to another shard I couldn't expect to remain Governor... likely that shard would have their own who also wants to remain Governor... can't really have 2... So again... would NOT be happy... I have a really nice prime living space near the Yew Gate... in Tram. Don't suppose I'd be able to keep that either... really don't want to give that up either.

I know many folk who'd feel the same way... just because all some of you care about is gold and sales and all that crap... doesn't mean the rest of us do... I wouldn't give up any of my homes or locations or my community and I don't care how much gold or cash I was offered.

You talk about smaller shards as if they are throw away... but you know the people on them more than likely love them every bit as much as I love mine. And no other shard will do.

There is only ONE thing that would get me to give it all up... that would be if they shut down all the regular shards and made shards that are specifically designed to particular playstyles... if they created a true RP server... but even then you have got to consider LOCATION of the Server. People in Europe or Asia or Australia are NOT going to be able to play on a US based server well... this is why shards were named by location in the first place. I for one know that I can't play on an Asian shard... the lag is HORRIBLE. I can't play on Europa either.

Before you get your undies in a bunch about merging and whatnot take a min to consider how preposterous it really is. Course those that say it's just pixels and all are the same ones that say that if a person loses things that are seriously sentimental and such... IMO stealing from me in-game and such is the same as if you broke into my home and stole things from my RL house. I see no difference. Theft is Theft... whether it's in a game or in real life.

 

[MalagAste]

Age 29 to 49 for me. I hate to say this but probably the best thing that could be done with UO is to shut it down at this point and build UO 2 taking the the best aspects of the last 20 years, implement better crisper graphics in one client that everyone can live with. And rebuild the world from the ground up with some serious anti cheating and scripting tools built in that can evolve to keep the illegal activity in check. Of course that would be a major undertaking and require a full development and art team and a couple of years of work. The pay off would be if done right a very well balanced game, with minimal cheating and completely new code that would be much more adaptive going into the future. And as a bonus would most likely put the Ultima Online brand back at the top of the MMORPG genre and rake in a whole lot of dead presidents for EA, downside is the huge investment and the risk that it would be a total flop. As it is though UO is dying and this EJ stuff is not going to change that, mainly because none of the fundamental issues that caused people to move on have been fixed and honestly at this point most of those issues can't be fixed. There is really nothing to interest and draw in young players and the learning curve in UO is insane. Not to mention all of the dead end content and fragments of temp content littering the landscape. Then there is the total RMT based economy that is not broken if you are one of the green gold folks and is totally fubar if you are just a player not trying to buy your groceries and pay your mortgage with a game. UO as we know it now would continue on free shards, which is another major problem. Makes zero sense to compete with your own game with free shards and the free shards do take a significant amount of subs away from the official shards. I love UO but it is dying and will continue to do so, and I just can't see where there is anything that can revitalize what we have now, just a constant stream of bandaids that slow down the inevitable.

While that's a nice sentiment and all and I wholeheartedly agree... we've seen how they have made attempts at this in the past and fubared it totally. I do not believe they are capable and even with 100 DEVs they could never pull it off... with 5 or 6 it's an impossibility.

Yes I would like it... Honestly if they could marry Sims, Landmark, and UO together they would have a game that would rival anything. Something that focused on UO and UO Lore... with Sims type character and housing customization and Landmarks open world concept and ability to manipulate terrain... and the true 3d world with voxel farm... etc... real water... all that would be a dream come true... but it really is just that... a dream. Even Sony with Landmark failed at making a true new sandbox.

And finally if they did... 1/2 the current player base wouldn't be able to run it on their antiquated rigs.

 

[ShriNayne]

@Tyrath it's a nice idea, but would you trust the current small dev team to actually deliver that? Of course not! You would be making a whole new game and that would take a large team and a lot of money. EA won't invest, they will just milk the subscription from the players they have left until there aren't enough to be making a profit. Then we will have little to no notice and it's goodbye UO.
A whole new client seems logical to some of us, but you have to remember that there are some UO players who have never played any other MMO, in some cases no other computer game. Making a more modern client with a decent UI would not be their idea of a good change. In some ways UO players are their own worst enemy. Everyone's idea of what is good is so different, how to please everyone?

 

[Tyrath]

Of course that would be a major undertaking and require a full development and art team and a couple of years of work.

I think you guys missed this part of my post

 

[Tyrath]

Everyone's idea of what is good is so different, how to please everyone?

Revisiting KR would be a good start. The look and feel of KR was generally liked. It was all of the problems after the look and feel that made KR a nightmare and unplayable. Lets be honest the EC is total steaming garbage and the CC is so out of date and limited. In order for UO to live both clients must die

 

[ShriNayne]

I thought everyone hated KR?! It was a bit washed-out and vague looking, although some of the art was really nice, but the lag in Luna was horrendous...

 

[Lady Kyo]

With all these crashes and drama on Atlantic, I have actually started transferring my things to my Catskils 17 yr old account and reconnected with my old friend and guildie @AnneNomilly . WHAT LAG!! lol Attitude on Catskills is actually one of HELPFUL not meh figure it out for yourself.

 

[Tina Small]

Anyhow, UO basically has one server: Atlantic. Everyone plays there or is miigrating to there. I am waiting for it to come back online and sitting there thinking "gee all these other servers I could play and yet I"m waiting for one of what seems to be a dozen others that all say "LOW" populaton on them.

I tried playing on Atlantic about 11 years ago, joining a guild of strangers, quickly becoming an emissary and trying to help the guild grow and also keep the peace between players and deal with the thieves who joined and then caused all kinds of chaos while using disguise kits. I lasted a couple of months and finally had enough of the daily drama and quit that guild. Ever since, unfortunately, that's been my most distinct impression of Atlantic: It's full of drama.

I have kept a house there for about 12 years now, but don't really "play" there much. Might go fishing or mining once in a while, but the shard has little appeal for me because it's just too crowded and too full of drama.

 

[Tyrath]

I thought everyone hated KR?! It was a bit washed-out and vague looking, although some of the art was really nice, but the lag in Luna was horrendous...

That is beyond the look and feel and into the huge memory leaks

 

[Uriah Heep]

I thought everyone hated KR?! It was a bit washed-out and vague looking, although some of the art was really nice, but the lag in Luna was horrendous...

yeah to me most of the landscape looked like watercolors someone had tried to clean with a wet rag...

 

[morPR]

I wonder where I said server merges were good. My example of Warhammer Online was of it being bad and contrary to the game's design.

I recall it being advertised in 9th Anniversary box along with Dark Age of Camelot. EA by buying Mythic castrated the WAR game (which was the only MMO I liked a lot that was of its kind) and EA just let the license be taken from them at the end of contract by Games Workshop. True the owner decided to not let EA renew but I think it was mainly EA's bungling that caused them to decide the way they did.

 

[Drakelord]

WOW! can the same account own different houses in different shards? Has this changed?

Only on Siege can you place a second house on the same account and not hurt the current status of your main account housing.

 

[Tina Small]

Only on Siege can you place a second house on the same account and not hurt the current status of your main account housing.

Siege or Mugen.

 

[Drakelord]

Siege or Mugen.

I never played Mugen so cannot say, but Siege yep you can place a second home there and not lose your Prodo house.

 

[morPR]

So we're allowed three houses? Siege, Mugen, and a regular shard?

 

[Tina Small]

So we're allowed three houses? Siege, Mugen, and a regular shard?

Not quite. We're allowed one house on a shard other than Siege or Mugen. Then we can have a second house on either Siege or Mugen. You could also place a house on Test Center.

I do not know if you could have a house on Siege and a house on Mugen if you do not have a house on that account on any other shard (other than Test Center).

 

[Victim of Siege]

Not quite. We're allowed one house on a shard other than Siege or Mugen. Then we can have a second house on either Siege or Mugen. You could also place a house on Test Center.

I do not know if you could have a house on Siege and a house on Mugen if you do not have a house on that account on any other shard (other than Test Center).

placing a house on Siege with a house already on Mugen will condemn the Mugen house. i tried it out when i was closing accounts earlier this year.