The HC community (including myself) are clamoring for a SF-specific server. The reasons arent trivial: being away from bots, gold sellers, twinks, and getting to play with like-minded people on a level playing field. There is no point in continuing to respond to people who say “dur dur just follow your own restrictions on any existing server in the game!” as they are either trolling or so detached from what makes the idea of SF enjoyable that no meaningful conversation can be had. People want to play the game with others who are playing the same game as them. Twinks with BiS gear at every level are not playing the same game as a self-found character, which is relevant for everything from dungeon runs to competing for mobs and resources in the open world.
A single SF-enforced server would be nearly essential for the intended implementation of SF to be successful, as far as players engaging with it and getting a relevant experience. At the same time, I completely respect what the designers said in an interview back in December, something along the lines of “we want a player to be able to, at any point, decide that SF isnt for them, disable it, and go back to playing regular HC without losing their character.” Totally fair.
A solution: have a SF-specific server and allow each account a single free transfer from that server to one of the regular HC servers. If someone gets to level 20 and decides they hate SF, they have the free option to transfer to Nek’rosh or Stitches, no problem. If they do that AGAIN with a second character, well then thats on them. One free transfer per account. No person should need more than that. You either discover in your first longer-term character that you like it, or you don’t.
This option respects the desire of the game devs to give players the opportunity to flexibly try SF, but also respects the hardcore SF community and its essential need to have a server-wide implementation of the ruleset.
Or, if nothing else, at least create a single new Hardcore server once SF releases. As much as I am desperately excited for SF (it’s the best version of WoW, in my opinion - nothing else even comes close), the idea of only being able to roll a character on the existing servers with a million existing lvl 60s and gold-sellers everywhere is so disheartening that I’ll probably just skip SF altogether.
Thank you for your response, but that is the entire point of my post. I’m not complaining, I’m asking for what I think is important. The devs have said over and over in all their comms since BlizzCon that they are reading what we say and taking our desires/feedback into account, so to keep offering it and asking for what we want.
So that’s what I’m doing, in the hope that maybe a dev will see this and take it into consideration - or at least consider the sheer volume of people who are all insisting that SF needs its own server.
I don’t think the Devs ever come to the EU forums. The best we get is a Community Manager and they have said they cannot pass stuff on to the Devs.
I think the best (and only) way is to make a suggestion ingame, but I assume this suggestion has been made many times. I know I have seen threads about it here and on the US forums.
We’ve got a pretty good idea about what’s going to happen:
When creating a character on a hardcore server, players will have the option to click a ‘Self Found mode’ toggle: this is now live for all to see on the PTR, and pretty much excludes the possibility of a self found enforced server.
We also know that the new Self-Found mode will be arriving “in late February”
To OP:
In an ideal world, I would 100% agree. But is the hardcore playerbase really big enough to support two different rulesets on separate servers?
I’m sure when SF comes out later this month there’ll be an initial surge in numbers. But what about several months down the line?
I suspect the biggest factor for Blizzard was whether their analysis of the numbers suggested that healthy populations could be maintained for both SF and non-SF servers. The fact that they have gone for the toggle option suggests that they didn’t think the numbers added up.
However, I’d love to be proved wrong. Perhaps Stitches and Nek’Rosh could be merged for non-SF players, and a new SF server could be created?
I totally get where you’re coming from, and you’re probably right - the numbers don’t make business sense. I also love your suggestion to merge the two existing servers and make a new one.
Even if they don’t make a SF-specific ruleset server, I think it’s essential that they at least make a NEW Hardcore server (as per the last paragraph of my initial post). Giving us no option but to roll a new ruleset on the established servers feels like a punch in the gut. A new experience/ruleset deserves a fresh start, not just making fresh characters in established areas rife with botting and twinking.
I dont think we get seperate servers, sadly. My guess is that they just gonna slap that option on the existing HC realms.
My only wishes for SF HC are:
one separate realm. Let´s face it. A lot of the WoW players are unfit to do SF.
Make SF mandatory. No chickening out somewhere on the line.
Make all quests that require an item from a profession auto complete. Quest completionists do exist
and ofc, no bots etc. This should take care of itself although I dont know how its gonna be at max lvl.
Everyone I talked too hopes that is will be on the regular HC servers so they can play while being in their same guild they play hardcore in. Same goes for me. I hope it’s just a tick box on character creation that enables SF. There aren’t even enough people to justify 2 HC servers atm, they won’t open a new realm for an even smaller niche market. Most of the SF players are already on those HC servers anyway, so it makes even less sense to open a new one
I see your point as this would even or level the playing field as not to allow higher levels to mix in with the lower levels. So I agree with a new server.
He only want bot-free is why ask for separate SF server.