Server Crossing FAQ

[bwg 537]

Hey everyone,

 

I'm looking for your experiences with regards to server crossing and any advice you may have to others attempting the trip, in order to build an FAQ for the Wiki.

 

If you've had an experience where you have had to call support or try self-help, please list the actions you've taken or have been advised to take which have assisted in your continued journey.  Please mention the borders you were crossing, the type of boat and cargo, number of passengers etc.

 

I'll combine the list into a user friendly troubleshooting guide which I guess may also help the developers to come up with a solution to any common issues.

 

Please don't post in my thread regarding incomplete support tickets, use the in-game support for this, please also keep on topic.

 

Thanks!

/Marni (CA)

Edited January 23, 2015 by bwg

[McGarnicle 1,463]

You can't cross a server border by boat unless you are the owner of the boat.

[SotG_is_OP 357]

If you cross a server border with enemies in local, you can teleport when you get to the other side as long as the enemies haven't crossed yet. This seems unintended.

[Samool 2,004]

If you get the teleporting message after crossing just spam embark as commander, should work eventually.

[Wurmhole 3,650]

You can't cross a server border by boat unless you are the owner of the boat.

Actually, you can, but it is tricky.  Something about being friends with the owner and you and owner are both members of the same deeds on both servers?  Someone can confirm?

 

AVOID crossing at the absolute corner - corners have mysterious dead zone traps, where you get stuck and can't move.  Requires GMs.

 

Can't cross with horses

 

"A shark scouts you" type messages are notifications of being too close to a border that doesn't connect to another server.

 

When you cross, you often get booted from your boat, so make sure you and all your pasengers are embarked again on the other side.

 

Sometimes you get stuck teleporting when crossing and have to relog

 

Your writs and settlement papers don't cross

 

You no longer see your alliance chat from the server you left

 

You can't PM your friends if you don't have cross server chat enabled

 

Huge ship loads of stuff can take a while to make the crossing, because of all the data that has to port from one server to the other.

 

Some server crossings are "one way", such as Pristine to Xan, but to get back, you go Xan to Release, to Pristine.

[solmark 546]

Some comments posted here:-  http://forum.wurmonline.com/index.php?/topic/117114-please-fix-server-border/

[SotG_is_OP 357]

If you get the teleporting message after crossing just spam embark as commander, should work eventually.

 

That's not what I'm referring to. It's an abuse of teleporting to avoid PvP while being chased across the server border. If you are in front being chased, you can teleport once you cross because enemies won't be in your local. They would otherwise block teleporting and would still be in local if there wasn't a server border separating the people chasing and the people being chased. Once the enemies cross, it is blocked properly again. The problem is that under normal circumstances, teleporting would have been blocked the entire time. The server border separates you, giving you a brief window to teleport. Other measures are in place to prevent teleporting in other situations, this one is still able to be abused.

[bwg 537]

That's not what I'm referring to. It's an abuse of teleporting to avoid PvP while being chased across the server border. If you are in front being chased, you can teleport once you cross because enemies won't be in your local. They would otherwise block teleporting and would still be in local if there wasn't a server border separating the people chasing and the people being chased. Once the enemies cross, it is blocked properly again. The problem is that under normal circumstances, teleporting would have been blocked the entire time. The server border separates you, giving you a brief window to teleport. Other measures are in place to prevent teleporting in other situations, this one is still able to be abused.

 

If you haven't already please raise this as a bug.  Discussion like this isn't the purpose of my thread.

[Aeris 3,764]

Here are some gathered experiences of mine, I hope they'll be of help:

 

• When going north from Deliverance, into Independence, you are sometimes taken to Xanadu despite not running into the east border. Go west for a while on the northern border to try to avoid this. Annoying since it impacts where on Independence you'll end up, but even more annoying is ending up on Xanadu.
  
• The northeast corner of Deliverance is a Bermuda triangle. You will very easily get stuck in it unless you steer clear of it. To be noted here is also that it's a bit curved so even if you're sailing straight north you might end up hitting it.
  
• The western border of Xanadu seemingly moves around. You may be able to cross high up on it one day but the next it's impossible and to be able to cross you need to sail further south.
  
• The northern border of Xanadu is much closer than what it looks like which means that tacking becomes a huge annoyance. Hitting the northern border will kick you off the boat, often without a warning.
  
• Upon crossing (any) border you might end up stuck in what I refer to as "Davy Jones' Locker". You end up standing at the bottom of the world all alone and the world never renders which forces you to relog.
  
• Everyone has to be logged in when crossing the server border of they'll be booted and end up swimming around in the water the next time they log in.
  
• When passengers get kicked off the boat and have to relog they don't always re-embark in the right position when logging in and if you're unlucky they end up in the commander seat. It has bugged out for me in the past so that a passenger accidentally reconnected in the commander seat which took the ship across the border while I was still swimming around in the water.
  
• Every time you cross a border the Freedom and the GL-Freedom chat tabs will become enabled if you have them turned off.
  
• Every time you cross your inventory will be scrambled into the way it looks when you're logging in, so I recommend locating the mooring anchor as soon as possible (especially if you have passengers that might've become kicked off).
  
• The water on some servers (for example Release) is very shallow and bringing any ship bigger than a sailboat might force you to take several hour detours while looking for a place where you can actually sail if you're not familiar with the routes.
  
• Some of the seats can't reach the hold so if you need to stop along the way to drink water or eat etc you need to disembark and swim closer.
  
• There is a "stamina restriction" bug that's been in place ever since they "fixed" stamina regen on slopes with horses that makes it so that if the bottom below the ship is too steep the captain won't regen stamina even when the ship is anchored. To get around this you need to disembark and re-embark, sometimes you might have to embark onto a passenger position.
  
• If you're thrown into a cliffside you can (if the ship is not too heavy) pull it out, but if the ship IS too heavy you need to push it. You cannot push the ship if there are passengers embarked, even if they are offline.
  
• You can sometimes manage to get a ship unstuck from a piece of land by embarking as commander repeatedly while pressing two directions simultaneously (for example right+forward or right+back).
  
• If you're sailing in a large ship I'd recommend tossing all the dead weight before heading out, ie. remove all rafts or crates that you're not going to use since every KG means added frustration if you do end up getting stuck somewhere.
  
• If the wind is against you you might end up having to disembark after crossing the border to drag it for a while to avoid being thrown back into the server border. This is an especially serious risk when in one of the bigger ships since they perform so poorly against the wind.
  

 

I apologize if I accidentally wrote down something that has already been mentioned. Some of them are more "general sailing tips" involving getting stuck but still relevant since pretty much anything can happen at the borders.

Edited January 23, 2015 by Aeris

[Samool 2,004]

That's not what I'm referring to. It's an abuse of teleporting to avoid PvP while being chased across the server border. If you are in front being chased, you can teleport once you cross because enemies won't be in your local. They would otherwise block teleporting and would still be in local if there wasn't a server border separating the people chasing and the people being chased. Once the enemies cross, it is blocked properly again. The problem is that under normal circumstances, teleporting would have been blocked the entire time. The server border separates you, giving you a brief window to teleport. Other measures are in place to prevent teleporting in other situations, this one is still able to be abused.

I wasn't answering to you, was just one of tips on the thread.

Edited January 23, 2015 by Samool

[Wraithglow 787]

• If the wind is against you you might end up having to disembark after crossing the border to drag it for a while to avoid being thrown back into the server border. This is an especially serious risk when in one of the bigger ships since they perform so poorly against the wind.

 

This is very common. Also, if there are strong winds try to stay extra far from the corners of the map, since the wind may push you off the wrong edge as/after you cross.

[zorako 178]

The crossings between servers are scaled. Look at the in game maps , the edge coordinates between the servers match up regardless of server size.

Depart from J on one map and you end up at J on the other map.

When you get the first warning that the server border is near, slow down, turn 45 degrees away from the direction. If you cross border at an angle you usually avoid getting disembarked. This also works for cave canals.

You can speed up some travels by using the scaling of the crossings, try to do most travel on the smaller server.

[Wurmhole 3,650]

The crossings between servers are scaled. Look at the in game maps , the edge coordinates between the servers match up regardless of server size.

Depart from J on one map and you end up at J on the other map.

When you get the first warning that the server border is near, slow down, turn 45 degrees away from the direction. If you cross border at an angle you usually avoid getting disembarked. This also works for cave canals.

You can speed up some travels by using the scaling of the crossings, try to do most travel on the smaller server.

Can't wait to try the 45 degree thingy!

[Mordraug 2,542]

Check your ship locks after server crossing.  They fly off sometimes.

 

A good idea also is to open your ship, "expand all", and screenshot your entire cargo when nearing the crossing.  This last one's never given *me* issues, but can't hurt.

 

Keep precious stuff (that supreme oak mallet you always carry around) in your inventory, not in the ship.

[Jaz 2,666]

I got stuck on NE Deli border once, half of my passengers thrown over to Independence.

Could not embark the ship as commander and could not push it towards the inside of Deli as well, after 3-4 pushes the ship popped back to its original location.

Finally a few relogs and the same technic as mentioned above with the ship stuck on land (forward/backward + direction simultanously) saved my day, although had to play with it a few minutes.

Getting stuck in limbo (world is not loading) is quite common, I experience it about 20-25% percent of crossings, a simple relog helps.

[Clatius 455]

You don't even need a boat to go from one server to the other. You can swim. When your stamina reaches zero stop swimming and log off. Log on about six hours later and your stamina will be full again. Repeat as often as you need to. Going from the west coast of Cele to Xanadu took a full stamina bar and part of the next. Not bad if you don't have a boat. Also depends on how much of a load you are carrying.

 

When swimming from one server to another it helps if you have a friend with a deed in the server you are going to. Once you cross over he can send you a village invite and you can teleport to his village saving you from having to swim to land on the new server. 

[Cista 429]

This is very common. Also, if there are strong winds try to stay extra far from the corners of the map, since the wind may push you off the wrong edge as/after you cross.

 

I am curious how winds pushing you back onto the "old" server can be very common. never happened to me in maybe 500 server crossings. I am puzzled because you always spawn far away from the border into the "new" server, and the wind only can push you back with 1 kmh.

 

A couple of tips:

1) Never cross a border where an island could be on the other side (Xanadu to Deli, and Exodus to Deli). Ship can get stuck in the middle of the island.

2) Likewise, when walking around on these border islands, you will get teleported to the other server, middle of the ocean, with no ship.

3) If cast off at one of the "shark" borders of your map and not allowed to embark, pulling the ship away from the border will eventually help.

4) If stuck swimming in water with flickering screen after crossing a server border, pressing forward while embarking (a couple of times) will get you unboard.

[Daolin 894]

If you have writs in a container and you cross, the container will cross but the deed/writs will not.

 

Make sure you DO NOT lose that container whilst on another server or it can result in deleted deeds/writs/buildings.

[bwg 537]

If you have writs in a container and you cross, the container will cross but the deed/writs will not.

 

Make sure you DO NOT lose that container whilst on another server or it can result in deleted deeds/writs/buildings.

 

Wow!  I think I'll put that in big red writing on the FAQ.  Cheers!