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Please merge Alexina and Nao Mk VI
The last time anything was mentioned, about this, was more than 30 days ago. So, I'm creating a new thread, as per site policy, because we wouldn't want the powers that be to think that this issue has gone away now would we.
Please merge Alexina and Nao.
Helsa0151 of Alexina
Comments
I've been essentially on strike from playing Mabinogi since the merge because Nexon NA has done a complete injustice to it's SURVIVING player base by not merging all four servers together. I've been a long time player who originally started on Mari during beta times and jumped ship to Alexina because my original server was dead after returning from hiatus (life gets busy). Now Alexina is essentially dead and I can't imagine Nao being much better, so why not simply make ONE BIG SERVER with hopes it could possibly revive this game? Please, staff of Mabinogi, just let us all be together and be happy. I have friends who have moved to Nao and old friends from my old days replaying on the Nao server. I'm alone on Alexina and it depressed me enough to "quit".
Jarvoren of Alexina... but it should be Jarvoren of Nao.
Seriously, I remember there was a point where seeing a new player in Tarlach was like finding a five-horned unicorn, while on Mari you'd run into like a small handful of new players each month. The state of Alexina sounds uncannily like what happened with the original three servers - and I'm pretty sure it's because the 'recommended server' thing is funneling players into Nao, new and old. I mean, a new player or a returning player won't have a lot of bearing on why the server is recommended, and the most they'd know at a glance is the relative population of each server... sooooo they'd probably just roll with the recommendation seeing as there's no obvious difference in the choices.
If they don't do a server merge, they should at least switch up the 'recommended' server every so often to keep the number of new/returning players joining both servers with a more even distribution, so they don't just starve Alexina like they did the original servers.
Yeah, it was heartbreaking; especially when so many of the advocates for it were Alexinans. I wouldn't say Alexina is quite dead . . . yet . . . though but it's certainly not better and probably a worse off.. Why they left us out and why they made separate servers in the first place seem to be things that Nexon does not want us to know because it has been asked for over ten years and they have said NOTHING. Nao, on the other hand is quite lively and thriving; I play on both servers since I have two computers. My main is on Alexina which is where I actually play the game. My Nao character just makes money since it is so much easier to do on Nao. I REALLY want that final merge now so my Alexina character can sell a dead bee to my Nao character.
To be fair to Nexon, when there are multiple servers and choice of residency is permanent, one of them will always end up dominating. For many years Alexina had the tag "New" attributed to it (not recommended) this is very likely why it became the favoured one. Without that tag, it still might've done so but my guess is it would've been Mari, since it was on its way to doing so before Alexina was fired up. Since you can often see 10-year-old characters in this game dressed in outfits you would find in a Victoria's secrets catalogue, whatever compels folks to do that would probably drive them to Mari, since Mari is a little girl.
So last year, it would have been Tarlach/Ruairi/Alexina making Nao and Mari left heartbroken. How's that old saying go? "Same POOP different pile."
Whether it said 'new' or 'recommended', the server was highlighted for new players, and regardless of what game it is, existing players will jump for more populated servers if they think they'll have a better experience on them. Regardless of whether or not a server is dominating, there are actions that can still be taken to make sure that server populations have a relatively balanced number of players; you see stuff like this in games like FF14 where certain servers are even locked off from having new characters made, and some lower-population servers have boosts given to new characters made on them, and these sorts of things are cycled rather regularly. With Mabi, people joining the game are either totally new or being pulled on by a friend - and for the former group, they probably just want to jump right into the game, so they'll choose whatever server seems easiest to click on if it's not already chosen for them. Something as simple as changing the default choice every so often would've made a big difference.
regarding Mari's server pop: Mari was the original server during the open beta IIRC, so it also makes a lot of sense that players from the beta would rejoin the same server to meet up with the friends they'd made - which pretty much established it as the most populated server from the get-go.
As for that last bit, I mean new players probably wouldn't know that about Mari at all, and that's also kinda running with the notion that that's not a thing that happens in a whole load of other J and KMMOs -which it does, unfortunately. So... I kind of have no idea what relevance that has here aside from being a drive-by dig at the Mari server. It doesn't add much to this discussion.
I like the idea of locking off one server for a short time to help boost population. some players may not like the idea of being restricted to when you can join a certain server though so I think if Nexon did try locking off a server the server you can join should change every week when they do maintenance. this way you wouldn't be stuck waiting a very long time to get into the server you want. nothing wrong with trying the idea for a month or two at least and if it works out keep doing it. Alexina may not be what it once was and it would take time for it become more lively like Nao but with something like this it could eventually even out the population on the servers.
Nexon either needs to give us a full server merge or try to do something to help them balance out. when the nexon merchandise store returns it would also be nice to see Mabinogi shirts and hoodies, some would just have the mabi logo and some could say Nao Server and Alexina Server on them. this way players could support their own server if they wanted to. I would gladly wear a Mabinogi shirt advertising my server almost every time I go grocery shopping if Nexon would sell us anything like that. problem is not many people even know Mabinogi even exists cause it is not advertised much at all, so let the players do the advertising. Nexon doing nothing and unwilling to talk about it or answer any questions is having a negative impact on both servers.
The game need not have been deployed the way it was. The game need not remain the way it is. Unfortunately, due to the naming issues, there is now no "fair" way to make a full merge without being unfair to the population of one of the servers. You can say that Alexinans automatically get a tag and Naowegians don't since they've suffered already. This penalizes Alexinans since they were deliberately left out of the original merge in the first place. Or you could run the merge like last time where EVERYBODY gets a tag, but that puts Naowegians through the wringer once again, which is not fair to them. There is an added complication because paid name change is a thing and so you have folks, on both servers, that have paid for the names they now have.
Nexon, painted themself into this corner. It's no one else's fault but theirs. Now, in order to have a fair final merge, they will have to allow for unlimited name duplication, by changing the primary key, of each character record, to record number, instead of name with server of residence. This in and of itself would be a good thing because then everyone can have exactly the name that they want rather than using near spellings or numbers after the name.
I think server-locking wouldn't work too well for the playerbase without more than just two servers, so maybe it's a bit too late for that - or too early, if you think Nexon may consider a third server again, eventually. I think it would be better to do something like this: the server needing more players/more activity is highlighted, and they also throw in some form of character boosts up to like total level 3000 or something, only for that character and only if that character was made when the server was a 'priority' server. It would probably help make Alexina and Nao's server populations even out a bit. New players would want to take advantage of an apparent edge when starting out, returning or existing players would feel the same, and it may even encourage cross-server play for anyone who plays regularly by giving them some temptation to establish regularly-used alts on the other server. (side-note: AP boosting across servers might be neat: play a low-level character and send AP to your main while playing on the 'priority' server... idk)
In my view, it'd be healthier in the long-term for the game if they just double down on trying to get server populations to equalise and have competitive player activity - we would have double the playerbase capacity between two servers, and new players might not view the game as 'dying' anywhere near as much as if there were only one server. In contrast, merging the servers might not be so great for anyone except for existing players - games tend to die off if new players stop coming in regularly enough, and while it'd be great for the existing community in the short-term, it might not be very attractive to new players to see that the game has only one server.
Merging the servers does have one distinct advantage though: if it pays off and they can somehow really get new players to flood in, then there's an increased possibility of another server being made... But I don't see Mabi as being close to a position where an absolute deluge of new players join. Plus we already have two servers - if they did a merge, we'd be right back to where we are right now if at any point Nexon decides a new server is a good idea.
It'd be better if the servers we already have were just given some chance at being equally viable.
let Alexinese play with Naowegians!
can i keep the names Mizuli and Crowy though tyvmFor THAT reason? Probably not many. Some that moved here have probably moved back. In my own case I play on both servers. My question is how many who said they prefer a "quiet" server have moved to Alexina? My guess is probably not many also.
They didn't, they moved back.
Everyone is fishing right now.
5.
Cause Alexina server, up till then, was populated enough.
Or too many people multi-cliented with their cousins.