Connecting Island NFI - SFI - Chaos

[Zuelatak 235]

14 hours ago, Keenan said:

I won't list them all here, but we need to review these changes and see what the results are.

As these mechanical differences are kind of the biggest reason for no merge could you list at least one, so that we have a better understanding of the teams struggles and have some room to discuss the features here? 

[wsrich 155]

On 4/26/2022 at 2:23 PM, Keenan said:

So, let me shed some light on the possibility of a merge and what it will actually take.

 

 

Thank you Keenan for putting a lot of things to rest, in the eyes of the people who don't want a merge its showing you are working on a way to make it work if it was to happen and are looking into options, and 2 for us that really want a merge its gave some hope that one day its a possible outcome. 

Just glad this is now settled and we can hope to see a vote or something like it in the future  

[Yggdrasil 231]

On 4/26/2022 at 9:23 AM, Keenan said:

So, let me shed some light on the possibility of a merge and what it will actually take.

 

There are technical challenges here that haven't been present in other clusters:

• NFI has a number of changes that have yet to be implemented on SFI. This was done intentionally to see the results long-term. I won't list them all here, but we need to review these changes and see what the results are.
• These changes have caused disparity in the code base making NFI and SFI currently incompatible with each other. A merge isn't as simple as opening the borders.

Then there are other concerns:

• What of the effects on the economies? In particular, SFI's economy would literally transform NFI's economy overnight - for better or worse.
• What of the effects on the people in both clusters? This thread is a testament to the fact that opinions are split.

These concerns and challenges are the primary reasons why a merge is not in the plans for the short term. Long-term remains to be seen, but we'd be talking beyond a 6-to-9-month timeframe if we do this. The sheer code work involved alone will require scheduling, and we have a lot of work on our plates already.

 

With regards to conducting a poll, one thing I've asked of the development team is to dust off the in-game voting mechanic and figure out a way to deduplicate votes from alts to have a more fair and accurate account of what the player base wants. I do not want a person with more money or silver to weigh more heavily than a person who simply keeps a single account going, so it's important to me to get that right. This isn't our highest priority at the moment, with the coming update taking precedence.

 

Edit: One other thing I would likely see us do before a merge is to allow travel to Epic first. Again though, there are code complications that must be handled first. This is why it isn't possible right now.

 

I hope this clears up my intentions with regards to a merge. The TL;DR is "it's not a 'never', but it's certainly not any time soon".

Then there are other concerns:

• What of the effects on the economies? In particular, SFI's economy would literally transform NFI's economy overnight - for better or worse.
• What of the effects on the people in both clusters? This thread is a testament to the fact that opinions are split.

The economy doesn't matter, it's like dropping a rock in a pond, it'll definitely generate waves but it will settle and stabilize

 

The effects on the people? The longer we're separated the more hostile people will get, tribal mentality and all that

[Zuelatak 235]

4 hours ago, Yggdrasil said:

The economy doesn't matter, it's like dropping a rock in a pond, it'll definitely generate waves but it will settle and stabilize

I believe you're forgetting that the economy also has an effect on the income of this games employees. If prices on NFI were as low as prices on SFI then they'd be making a lot less money. 

 

Not that this is a good reason for no merge, but that I'm sure the devs may feel their hands are tied behind their back. If this was the case I wish the devs would be more transparent about it, so that we can all help brainstorm better ways to provide them income. We all want this game to do better and we obviously want to support those that work on it. 

[Cecci 1,609]

2 hours ago, Zuelatak said:

I believe you're forgetting that the economy also has an effect on the income of this games employees. If prices on NFI were as low as prices on SFI then they'd be making a lot less money. 

 

Not that this is a good reason for no merge, but that I'm sure the devs may feel their hands are tied behind their back. If this was the case I wish the devs would be more transparent about it, so that we can all help brainstorm better ways to provide them income. We all want this game to do better and we obviously want to support those that work on it. 

 

Do you have evidence that people on NFI buy more silver?

[Zuelatak 235]

1 hour ago, Cecci said:

Do you have evidence that people on NFI buy more silver?

No. I don't believe any of us would have that hard evidence besides the dev team. Unless there's some public records somewhere, but I doubt the data would be divided up in a way that would tell us. 

 

Do you believe they don't? Do you have evidence to support it?

 

All I know is that it's a fact that the economy is cheaper on SFI, that the ingame economy also effects the paychecks of the devs, the market on NFI is healthy and that silver doesn't just appear from thin air.

I don't think it would take much of a leap to assume that NFI is producing them more money than if it's economy suddenly dropped tomorrow to the level that SFI is at.

Edited April 28, 2022 by Zuelatak

[Ekcin 2,404]

2 hours ago, Zuelatak said:

No. I don't believe any of us would have that hard evidence besides the dev team. Unless there's some public records somewhere, but I doubt the data would be divided up in a way that would tell us. 

Do you believe they don't? Do you have evidence to support it?

All I know is that it's a fact that the economy is cheaper on SFI, that the ingame economy also effects the paychecks of the devs, the market on NFI is healthy and that silver doesn't just appear from thin air.

I don't think it would take much of a leap to assume that NFI is producing them more money than if it's economy suddenly dropped tomorrow to the level that SFI is at.

I am sure that silver purchases at start of steam Wurm were a source of income for CC/GC. I am in no way convinced that they still are.

 

Initial player numbers on NFI were in the range of ten thousand up to 28k unique logins per week. Most of those players were subbed (2 months for 8€ most of them I assume), and in need of cash. As far as I know, there was not even the chance to sell to the token for a few irons. Not few players as i recall from conversations bought hundreds of silver.

 

Now most of those players are gone, some 2000-2500 subbed remaining (estimated from unique login count, daily logins etc). Where did all the silver go?

 

Sure, some was spent for creating deeds, and paying upkeep, or getting stuff from traders, that way removed from circulation. But that was just a fraction. Of course, some of the silver remained in the pockets of players who left forever. But especially with steam I doubt that those were all, or even many.

 

Since 2020, RMT is banned, so for a leaving Wurm player, it is not possible anymore to get RL cash in exchange for silver amassed. Yet, as far as I am informed, it is still possible to trade several kinds of stuff, items and subscriptions of other games, user generated content etc., between steam account owners on the platforms Valve created for. It is not unlikely that a number of leaving players traded their silvers for objects of interest in their steam accounts. In fact, I heard about those cases.

 

It is therefore not unlikely that much of the originally generated silver is still circulating in NFI. Much of the masses of silver gained by SFI migrants in trade and craft is also reused. And since kingdom coffers got introduced finally, it is doubtful that much new silver is needed to keep the overpriced economy afloat. So I fail to see that the company profits a lot from atm.

[Ecrir 887]

4 hours ago, Cecci said:

 

Do you have evidence that people on NFI buy more silver?

 

Looking at the graphs for number of deeds (main silver drain) and bank sizes (to get an indication of how much silver exists on the clusters) I don't see any indication that people on NFI buy more silver. It all really looks about the same on the silver side, even with how much silver is in the inventory of merchants and such. I guess the yearly graphs show a reasonable indication since a rise in those shows that more silver is being bought than is consumed by sinks (like deed upkeep, which is probably be the biggest sink by far). It all really looks quite similar to me, for example putting just Xanadu and Cadence next to each other gives a pretty similar picture with just those graphs, same with Independence and Harmony.

 

7 hours ago, Zuelatak said:

If prices on NFI were as low as prices on SFI then they'd be making a lot less money.

 

Hardly, mail/wagoner costs are pretty much non existant. Direct trade between players doesn't earn them anything either. Merchants take like 10%, but we only know prices, not throughput. Though the bank graphs do give an indication of how much silver is held by merchants (the difference between the green and blue line), in which case it's pretty much a draw between the two clusters, or a slight win for SFI.

Lower prices can for example easily cause people to spend more money as it makes things feel less expensive. It's far easier for somebody to buy a bunch of bargains than to buy one expensive item. Meanwhile higher prices can do the opposite and cause people to craft more stuff by themselves instead, especially with silver prices in the store, and with deed upkeep costs per tile, being constants.

The only ones who might win with higher prices are the players who sell stuff, as they get more money per item, thus more value for the effort they put in. Though even that is no guarantee that they actually earn more silver in the end.

[Zuelatak 235]

1 hour ago, Ecrir said:

Looking at the graphs for number of deeds (main silver drain) and bank sizes (to get an indication of how much silver exists on the clusters)

Could you link the supporting data too? Would love to see that myself. Only thing I can think of is if there's a way to compare land owned by each cluster then? As that'd create a bigger sink which if the banks are the same size would prove that NFI is buying more silver. 

 

1 hour ago, Ecrir said:

Lower prices can for example easily cause people to spend more money as it makes things feel less expensive. It's far easier for somebody to buy a bunch of bargains than to buy one expensive item. Meanwhile higher prices can do the opposite and cause people to craft more stuff by themselves instead, especially with silver prices in the store, and with deed upkeep costs per tile, being constants.

True I just haven't seen Trade chat devoid of trade on NFI, so I assumed there wasn't a lack of buying/selling. 

[Ekcin 2,404]

You find the info here: https://www.wurmpedia.com/index.php/Server_graphs

 

[Yggdrasil 231]

8 hours ago, Zuelatak said:

I believe you're forgetting that the economy also has an effect on the income of this games employees. If prices on NFI were as low as prices on SFI then they'd be making a lot less money. 

 

Not that this is a good reason for no merge, but that I'm sure the devs may feel their hands are tied behind their back. If this was the case I wish the devs would be more transparent about it, so that we can all help brainstorm better ways to provide them income. We all want this game to do better and we obviously want to support those that work on it. 

I didn't forget, I don't care. 

 

Dividing the community like this drives players away over time because you start seeing X side is superior, X side should get priority.

 

Which leads to independent updates, which causes stagnation on the other community, and I've see this devolve into worse issues like separate game versions to separate dev teams

 

Less players = less money

 

If they want more money, make better updates, not cosmetic overrides and WU mods

[Zuelatak 235]

1 hour ago, Ekcin said:

You find the info here: https://www.wurmpedia.com/index.php/Server_graphs

These actually might prove my point. If both servers have the same bank funds then there's absolutely been a lot more money flowing through NFI in a shorter time. It may have balanced by now, but NFI has def been a good cash grab at least for the start.

 

1 hour ago, Yggdrasil said:

I didn't forget, I don't care. 

 

Dividing the community like this drives players away over time because you start seeing X side is superior, X side should get priority.

 

Which leads to independent updates, which causes stagnation on the other community, and I've see this devolve into worse issues like separate game versions to separate dev teams

 

Less players = less money

 

If they want more money, make better updates, not cosmetic overrides and WU mods

I agree with everything you're saying, but you not caring is a concern. You should care about all the reasons taking place especially if it effects the employees paycheck. We need them to be comfortable with opening up to us and allowing us to help them find better alternatives. I bet if they openly said that they aren't merging the servers so that they could continue to make money that the community would ###### explode. I don't think anyone would approach that discussion with alternatives or positives. There'd just be a boat load of toxic forum posters essentially hate raiding the devs and a lot of people would probably quit. It'd be ugggglly. Honestly separate games would probably get them more money and might allow them to be a bit more free to try changes without being scared of backlash from the community. 

Edited April 28, 2022 by Zuelatak

[Yggdrasil 231]

4 minutes ago, Zuelatak said:

These actually might prove my point. If both servers have the same bank funds then there's absolutely been a lot more money flowing through NFI in a shorter time. It may have balanced by now, but NFI has def been a good cash grab for the start.

 

I agree with everything you're saying, but you not caring is a concern. You should care about all the reasons taking place especially if it effects the employees paycheck. We need them to be comfortable with opening up to us and allowing us to help them find better alternatives. I bet if they openly said that they aren't merging the servers so that they could continue to make money that the community would ###### explode. I don't think anyone would approach that discussion with alternatives or positives. There'd just be a boat load of toxic forum posters essentially hate raiding the devs and a lot of people would probably quit. It'd be ugggglly. Honestly separate games would probably get them more money and might allow them to be a bit more free to try changes without being scared of backlash from the community. 

 

The devs making money is not the players concern, no matter how we dice it. It's their concern.

 

And it's a simple one to deal with, especially on wurm. Just have active updates and try to attract new players

 

That's it. It's not easy to do, but is IS simple

 

More players = more money

 

I don't want wurn to fail,  and I want the devs happy but our job isn't worrying about their paycheck. Our job is to enjoy the game and bring concerns/ideas to them

 

A good dev team considers player feedback.

 

If the dev team chooses to ignore us because they think we don't care about their pay, it means they're bad devs because they have their priorities wrong

 

A good product doesn't need advertising,  it'll advertise itself

[Zuelatak 235]

28 minutes ago, Yggdrasil said:

not the players concern

Not our concern yes, but we should still care. 

28 minutes ago, Yggdrasil said:

simple one to deal with, especially on wurm. Just have active updates and try to attract new players

What should be in those updates? How should they attract players? It's simple to say "Do better", but they probably don't know how to do better.

30 minutes ago, Yggdrasil said:

That's it. It's not easy to do, but is IS simple

Again saying it may be simple, but actually doing it is not. 

31 minutes ago, Yggdrasil said:

A good dev team considers player feedback.

So provide them feedback on how what updates to have and how to attract new players. 

32 minutes ago, Yggdrasil said:

I don't want wurn to fail,  and I want the devs happy but our job isn't worrying about their paycheck. Our job is to enjoy the game and bring concerns/ideas to them

Our job is literally to just pay the subscription to the game, but that doesn't mean we can't care for them as people and understand how their choices might be influenced by factors such as their income that allows them to live.

32 minutes ago, Yggdrasil said:

If the dev team chooses to ignore us because they think we don't care about their pay, it means they're bad devs because they have their priorities wrong

In the case of a small game like this where the smallest change on their part could have massive effects on their income and livelihood I absolutely think it's fair for the devs to prioritize their income first. Once they're comfortable though yeah I think they should focus on appealing to their buyers. Also, I didn't say they'd ignore us I said they'd be distant from us and less transparent. Meaning they'd still see and hear us, but we wouldn't see or hear them which is equally as important! 

35 minutes ago, Yggdrasil said:

A good product doesn't need advertising,  it'll advertise itself

Tru. I hope they don't spend any more time/money on advertising for at least a few years.

[HawkHawk 299]

24 minutes ago, Zuelatak said:

59 minutes ago, Yggdrasil said:

A good product doesn't need advertising,  it'll advertise itself

Tru. I hope they don't spend any more time/money on advertising for at least a few years.

I think theres actually a big asset for advertising the game in the form of player creations.

 

Theres some really impressive deeds in particular on SFI (although NFI is catching up) Why not showcase them more often? It will make the builders feel appreciated and potentially give new viewers something to be excited about "you could build something like this one day"

 

Doesn't have to be big budget or anything, just pick a random map square and then do a simple stream or Youtube video from an official Wurm channel, or even a regular blog on the frontpage of the website.

 

 

Another option is to increase support for existing Wurm streamers, why not have selected streamers appear on the launcher front page when they are live? Maybe work with some streamers to clip and repost highlights from their streams onto an official source such as the forums or Twitter that more people may see?

 

Theres a a good amount of people who love to show of not only their creations but also Wurm in general. Give them as much support as possible and let their efforts advertise the game.

Edited April 28, 2022 by HawkHawk

[Zexos 468]

Maybe a different idea to allow exploring but not the ability to effect the world could be a  tourist pass with a portal or some other means.

 

In other words: You can travel between sfi and nfi.  You get put into a new class called "tourist" 

 

With the tourist class you can move around the other server but you are only a tourist. You can't gain any skills. The monsters will not attack you. You can't make anything or chop, dig, mine..etc.  you are like a walking camera who can observe the surroundings but not effect them.

 

You could also get special tourist clothes with a mini tourist label near your name or something so people know that you are just visiting.

 

When you are finished looking around you could either click an icon in the menu, find a portal or even click on an item in your inventory to head back.

Edited April 28, 2022 by Zexos

[wsrich 155]

2 hours ago, Zexos said:

Maybe a different idea to allow exploring but not the ability to effect the world could be a  tourist pass with a portal or some other means.

 

In other words: You can travel between sfi and nfi.  You get put into a new class called "tourist" 

 

With the tourist class you can move around the other server but you are only a tourist. You can't gain any skills. The monsters will not attack you. You can't make anything or chop, dig, mine..etc.  you are like a walking camera who can observe the surroundings but not effect them.

 

You could also get special tourist clothes with a mini tourist label near your name or something so people know that you are just visiting.

 

When you are finished looking around you could either click an icon in the menu, find a portal or even click on an item in your inventory to head back.

 

 

Doesn't address the situation of accounts being mothballed on the other clusters though, you can just make a new account up and do this Explore without being a tourist. 

Just seems like a lot of coding to go into something completely new instead of just waiting 6-9 months for a merge "Maybe"

good idea but kinda pointless in a sense of solving anything 

Edited April 28, 2022 by wsrich

[Yggdrasil 231]

2 hours ago, Zexos said:

Maybe a different idea to allow exploring but not the ability to effect the world could be a  tourist pass with a portal or some other means.

 

In other words: You can travel between sfi and nfi.  You get put into a new class called "tourist" 

 

With the tourist class you can move around the other server but you are only a tourist. You can't gain any skills. The monsters will not attack you. You can't make anything or chop, dig, mine..etc.  you are like a walking camera who can observe the surroundings but not effect them.

 

You could also get special tourist clothes with a mini tourist label near your name or something so people know that you are just visiting.

 

When you are finished looking around you could either click an icon in the menu, find a portal or even click on an item in your inventory to head back.

Make visitors look like spirit guards and I'd be happy with this as a temporary thing while we wait for a merge

 

 

[Ekcin 2,404]

I am skeptikal if not opposed to all "temporary solutions" creating more complexities, bugs, or roadblocks for an eventual merge. We already have differences in code bases which is disastrous enough (I don't blame or scold the devs, they may have had reasons for, but would love to learn more about).

 

Quote

These actually might prove my point. If both servers have the same bank funds then there's absolutely been a lot more money flowing through NFI in a shorter time. It may have balanced by now, but NFI has def been a good cash grab at least for the start.

The fact that both clusters have a similar level of silver supply "proves" everybody's point if massaged enough. It "proves" that there is no higher need of purchasing silver at the shop on either cluster. As I already wrote, it was a need initially on NFI. That is hardly the case nowadays.

Edited April 28, 2022 by Ekcin
addendum

[Zuelatak 235]

On 4/28/2022 at 6:07 AM, HawkHawk said:

I think theres actually a big asset for advertising the game in the form of player creations.

 

Theres some really impressive deeds in particular on SFI (although NFI is catching up) Why not showcase them more often? It will make the builders feel appreciated and potentially give new viewers something to be excited about "you could build something like this one day"

 

Doesn't have to be big budget or anything, just pick a random map square and then do a simple stream or Youtube video from an official Wurm channel, or even a regular blog on the frontpage of the website.

I mean anytime they show off the game I def think they should off builds from NFI / SFI I just feel like the game needs to spend all of its time/money on polishing at the moment. Advertising will just be wasted because people will quit.

 

On 4/28/2022 at 6:07 AM, HawkHawk said:

Another option is to increase support for existing Wurm streamers

Yes please tho. This is an easy passive marketing ploy for them that involves no money or time.

 

On 4/28/2022 at 11:31 AM, Ekcin said:

The fact that both clusters have a similar level of silver supply "proves" everybody's point if massaged enough. It "proves" that there is no higher need of purchasing silver at the shop on either cluster. As I already wrote, it was a need initially on NFI. That is hardly the case nowadays.

If it can prove everyone's point then I don't know why either of us are allowed to use it as supporting evidence then. I agree that it may not be hardly the nowadays As I already wrote, NFI has def been a good cash grab at least for the start.

[puro 43]

Hello. 

 

I like idea for connecting servers but for a condition making diferend currency on them. 

 

Like NFI coins can be only used on NFI, and NFI coins. Maybe npc exchange on starter Towns for swap coins + some fees. 

 

Maybe someone will be more able to dispel the idea of a different currency on NFI and SFI servers. I believe that could solve the problem of price differences. 

[Sheffie 1,120]

1 hour ago, puro said:

Hello. 

 

I like idea for connecting servers but for a condition making diferend currency on them. 

 

Like NFI coins can be only used on NFI, and NFI coins. Maybe npc exchange on starter Towns for swap coins + some fees. 

 

Maybe someone will be more able to dispel the idea of a different currency on NFI and SFI servers. I believe that could solve the problem of price differences. 

 

That will never fly.

 

It won't be considered for the simple reason that a silver coin costs the same, in the shop, whether the buyer's account is based on NFI or SFI. Since the coins cost the same in RL money, they must be worth the same in-game. Otherwise you're creating first and second class servers

[puncher 322]

On 4/20/2022 at 12:38 AM, Etherdrifter said:

The server merges were done after a community vote if my memory serves.

 

The joining of Release and Pristine to Xanadu wasn't detrimental.  What was detrimental was stale mechanics and promised updates/content that never materialised.

 

Player gods drove out the priests, and priest ALTs exploded into the scene.

 

The real killer was WU, it irrevocabley split the playerbase as WU was adding all the QoL updates that WO was not.

 

The merge didn't harm the cluster communities.  Join the world's, end the slow rotting death of the old cluster, and the rampant decay of the new one.

I cant stop laughing Ether stop it !!

[TheTrickster 2,283]

On 4/26/2022 at 11:23 PM, Keenan said:

There are technical challenges here that haven't been present in other clusters:

• NFI has a number of changes that have yet to be implemented on SFI. This was done intentionally to see the results long-term. I won't list them all here, but we need to review these changes and see what the results are.
• These changes have caused disparity in the code base making NFI and SFI currently incompatible with each other. A merge isn't as simple as opening the borders. (bold added)

@Keenan May we know where you will list the changes?  This could be good information to have.  Actually, this would be good information to make available to new players before they commit to a cluster (unless the ongoing funnelling of new players to one server on one cluster is intentional and set to continue, but then that would be good to know, too).

[Sheffie 1,120]

15 hours ago, TheTrickster said:

@Keenan May we know where you will list the changes?  This could be good information to have.  Actually, this would be good information to make available to new players before they commit to a cluster (unless the ongoing funnelling of new players to one server on one cluster is intentional and set to continue, but then that would be good to know, too).

 

Just to clarify, Keenan did also say that the UI directing new players to NFI / Cadence was something that would be reviewed.