First - thank you for server list way ahead of time.
Every MMO should have done that last 25 years. so simple to do and let friends / guilds / etc coordinate who can't log in all exactly the same time / phone call instant message. Big Win there.
Big Loss : there are way, way too many servers coming online to choose from at the start. This has doomed every MMO that came out with way too sparse of population I've seen it at least 5x the last 20 years - eg Vanguard. shut down how many servers how fast ? ya starting areas are crowded for a week, at most. last month it was nigh impossible to find the class / level you needed for the THREE zones available with only 5 servers. when a server was "red" (full) then maybe you could do "ok" finding groups / making one with classes needed. Now there will be SIX zones and 20+ servers ?
you guys are bonkers for starting with more than 8 servers and thinking enough people will be online to make grouping and levelling fun or possible.
Mark my words, within a month a different decision will be made (or have to be made) or this is going to end VERY fast with nobody playing because nobody can get groups and server count drastically reducing.
There aren't thousands (hundreds of thousands) of players looking to jump in like path of exile.
I really , really suggest you rethink 20+ servers and bring U.S. east / west coast down to 3 each.
Even now, even when Pantheon is opening up to the wider world, we still get posts saying "you are wrong...".
We don't have VR's figures, you have no idea what the uptake is going to be. Joppa has stated that it a pretty simple exercise for them to spin up and down servers as and when they need. Surely it is better to have too many and spin down than too few and spin up. No one, and I mean no one has a 100% idea of what is needed, but VR have the best idea and I am sure they will have discussed the best route forward, a lot. What is really "bonkers" is to get out a crystal ball and guess. What is really "bonkers" is to have too few and not have people able to get into game at all. What is bonkers is to have a queue of 100s of people waiting to get in.
I really, really suggest that VR spin up what they think they need based on their figures than listen to a finger in the air guess.
I think too many servers is better than not enough. If like they said it's easy to spin them up/down as needed. We don't know how many players each server can service. We have no idea how many people will play the game on launch. I guess VR does know how many pledges there are. So that gives them a baseline. No idea how many will buy the Steam version. It's going to be interesting on launch day for sure.
I do agree most mmos have too many servers wow half were never used.
I assume ill be either trying the same server as ive been playing on or ill take the top few listed id like a medium to high pop realm.
Im just hoping ill have character slots to try multiple classes like all of them lol.
Here is a list of the servers. It was posted on Discord. Put it here in case you don't have Discord. Not sure if there is a Roleplaying server.
List of Initial Servers
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Western United States
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Aellos
Havensong
Khadassa
Korcera
Lychandrell
Ossari
Runaway Reef
Syronai
The Sacred Six
Wovarren
Eastern United States
=====================
Aevos
Axecutor
Black Moon
Dark Trade
Ermos
Khaga
Lucent Tree
Revenant
Stormona
Veil of Azeris
Central-EU
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Whispering Lands
Oceanic
=====================
Bakamel
I know its only day 3 but I fear the OP may be right. I'm having trouble finding a group and hardly anyone is LFG server wide. Ill run by some popular newb camps and nobody is camping them. Last thing you want to do is take someone $40 and not have a good MMO experience with nobody around, especially when grouping is the best way to grind out some XP.
I bet BlackMoon and Havensong is a blast right now!
On BlackMoon myself. Got to level 12 (cleric), always someone is on and able to play. Our guild has constant 20 ppl on throughout the day and late into the evening. This game has been a blast for sure. I don’t blame them for starting servers big, they have data that these forum people do not.
I thought it was too many servers as well but I was wrong. I saw over the weekend that all servers were half full or more (and some of those were split over shard 0 and 1). They can always pare it back later but right now it seems fine and *hopefully* the servers will get busier as more people see the positive Steam reviews and give it a shot. Also you can imagine this will only magnify as they release more content.
with shards we dont need the huge list of servers, black moon and its shards have been more than enough for keeping most of the population together and forming groups, its dangerous for niche small pop mmos like this one to have too many servers that spread everyone thin especially a game that relies on players grouping and not soloing
I think the list is just right -- whenever I get on, Havensong is at 2 --- and first is full --
Black Moon is always full --- and others are often at 2 also ... don't see a problem --