Clarification on servers

[Black Rabbit.1365]

Apologies if this has been discussed before but I have been looking for almost an hour and could not find the exact answer to my question.

 

So I enjoy the RP aspect of GW2 and I have a few friends on a NA server who tells me there are more chances for casual RP as well. However I cannot transfer to that server because it is Full, so my question is if there is a way to work around it?

 

I understand the game has mega servers and whatnot but if I make home to a low pop server or one that is not unofficially focused on RP, whenever I log in I know I will likely never meet anyone and will suck the interest for this game right out of me.

 

Thanks!

[Aaralyna.3104]

To be able to play with your friends and the rp community on their server you need to play on a na server. It then does not matter which you pick as there are no seperate servers in pve content. This was somerhing from past but now its 1 big megaserver (with different map channels). So you will always be able to play with them no matter what. The only place where server matters is WvW. These are currently still server based but they are working on a system where this issue will go in future. I hope this answers your question :)

[Black Rabbit.1365]

Ah alight, thanks a lot, so I would not need to swap instances or such in order to be in the same place as them? The PvE world maps are all shared?

[Inculpatus cedo.9234]

They are shared until full, then another map instance is created. The MegaServer algorithm tries to put you with friends, guildies, server-mates first. If you find a friend in another map instance, you can always click on their name, and "Join in 'x'"...if the map is not full.

 

You can read more about how the MegaServer works in the Wiki (link above).

 

Good luck.

 

Edit: typographical error

[Black Rabbit.1365]

> @"Inculpatus cedo.9234" said:

> They are shared until full, then another map instance is created. The MegaServer algorithm tries to put you will friends, guildies, server-mates first. If you find a friend in another map instance, you can always click on their name, and "Join in 'x'"...if the map is not full.

>

> You can read more about how the MegaServer works in the Wiki (link above).

>

> Good luck

 

This is what I Am worried about, joining a low populated server with no RP at all, and then walking around and not finding anyone because they are all over the server actually known to be unofficial RP. I do not want to just RP with guilds or people I invite before hand, I would like to also partecipate in more casual experiences and I need to know if that is a possibility before I make my decision :)

 

 

[phs.6089]

> @"Black Rabbit.1365" said:

> > @"Inculpatus cedo.9234" said:

> > They are shared until full, then another map instance is created. The MegaServer algorithm tries to put you will friends, guildies, server-mates first. If you find a friend in another map instance, you can always click on their name, and "Join in 'x'"...if the map is not full.

> >

> > You can read more about how the MegaServer works in the Wiki (link above).

> >

> > Good luck

>

> This is what I Am worried about, joining a low populated server with no RP at all, and then walking around and not finding anyone because they are all over the server actually known to be unofficial RP. I do not want to just RP with guilds or people I invite before hand, I would like to also partecipate in more casual experiences and I need to know if that is a possibility before I make my decision :)

>

>

 

Population on servers doesn't matter, all active players from any server get into same map, until it's full. Others that want to join the map get offered another new map(instance) again regardless of their servers.

[voltaicbore.8012]

> @"Black Rabbit.1365" said:

> This is what I Am worried about, joining a low populated server with no RP at all, and then walking around and not finding anyone because they are all over the server actually known to be unofficial RP. I do not want to just RP with guilds or people I invite before hand, I would like to also partecipate in more casual experiences and I need to know if that is a possibility before I make my decision :)

>

Not sure you understood what the other posters are telling you - in NA it doesn't matter what server you join, for pve we're all in one big megaserver. The _only_ potential way for you to get separated from your friends and fellow RPers is when a map gets full, at which point the game starts separating players into different instances (still has nothing to do with what your home server is).

 

[Black Rabbit.1365]

Right, I think I get it, thanks a lot, that means I can make home on any server and still meet casually everyone :)

[Ayrilana.1396]

https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/introducing-the-megaserver-system/

 

To play with specific players, create a squad/party with them, hop onto the same map, right-click their portrait, and choose to join their map instance. Of course those steps are unnecessary if you end up joining their map instance in the first place.

[Black Rabbit.1365]

See what @Aryilana says to me contradicts what p@phs said. You either meet the people casually or you have to invite them to be on their instance, not both.

 

But after reading the article I guess I see that it doesn't matter at all since even if I did make my home on the server I want, I can still end up with a bunch of people from another server whom I have no interests with.

[GlockBoy.2134]

> @"Black Rabbit.1365" said:

> > @"Inculpatus cedo.9234" said:

> > They are shared until full, then another map instance is created. The MegaServer algorithm tries to put you will friends, guildies, server-mates first. If you find a friend in another map instance, you can always click on their name, and "Join in 'x'"...if the map is not full.

> >

> > You can read more about how the MegaServer works in the Wiki (link above).

> >

> > Good luck

>

> This is what I Am worried about, joining a low populated server with no RP at all, and then walking around and not finding anyone because they are all over the server actually known to be unofficial RP. I do not want to just RP with guilds or people I invite before hand, I would like to also partecipate in more casual experiences and I need to know if that is a possibility before I make my decision :)

>

>

 

It doesn't actually matter which server you join as far as playing with the Guild Wars 2 community because of the Mega-server algorithm. What the poster was trying to say is that within the mega server are multiple map layers. Consider it "alternate universes". When one map fills up, the next one becomes available. When a map is running low on players, you will get a pop up asking you if you would like to move to the next map with a higher population. After 1 hour, it will automatically move you over to that map anyways.

 

Point is, regardless of the server you choose, you will be able to play with anyone in the game (any server). You'd only run into an issue if you had a friend playing on a map layer that was full, but he can easily right click your name to join into your map, however GW2 already has an algorithm to sort of automatically put you in the same map that your friend(s) might be on. Your server choice only matters in World Vs World because it is a literal Server Vs Server type PvP mode. So if you were on one server and your buddy was on another server, the problem would be that you can't group up with your buddy to play WvW.

 

Hope that clarifies it a little bit.

[Danikat.8537]

All servers share all the maps at all times, but there can be more than one copy of each map meaning people are split - but not based on which server they're on.

 

It's not that you'll be in a map only with people from your server until that's full and then you're put into one with people from other servers. You're always in maps with people from all the other servers. The game will prioritise putting you with people you know, but because there's no guarantee that you will always be in the same copy of the map as the specific person you want to play with there is another mechanism to move you to their map. It doesn't put you onto their server's map, and won't guarentee you meet total strangers from their server instead of yours, it's just a way of finding that specific person or group.

 

As a result of the above there are no dedicated RP servers and no way to guarantee you'll only meet RPers and will never be around players who aren't interested in RP. Everyone shares the maps and is free to play on them in any way they choose (as long as it doesn't break the rules of course).

 

Basically as long as you're in the same region as your friends you don't need to worry about which server you're on. The best way to make sure you end up in maps with them is to be in the same guild and add them to your friends list but you cannot control which strangers will also be on those maps with you.

[joneirikb.7506]

Short version: Servers is NA or EU.

 

More reading: https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/April_2014_Feature_Pack#Megaserver_system

 

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The way Servers Worked before 2014:

 

NA had 24 servers, each server (example Kaineng) is its own existence, and players on that server can only play with others on the same server (PvE). You would not meet anyone from any other server while playing (PvE). (WvW and PvP worked their own ways).

 

(There was a feature to let you guest to other worlds, which was useful back then. Nowadays it does next to nothing.)

 

This resulted in a lot of maps being underpopulated, so ANet decided to change it.

 

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The way MegaServer works:

 

So they added MegaServer, which basically does away with servers for PvE. Instead ALL 24 servers in NA fill the same maps.

 

* For unpopular maps, it means you'll usually find a few people, instead of being all alone like you used to.

* For Popular maps this means they can fill up, so they made a system to make copies of maps, so if it goes full pop another copy and start putting people into that as well.

 

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Now for some oddities:

 

Since there exist a *chance* that you might be put in a different map copy than the one you might want to be in, ANet added a few calculations. So if it has the option to do so (map isn't completely full), it will try to put you in the map copy that has someone you know (*) and thus it

prioritizes iirc in this order: (* Relatively speaking)

 

* Party

* Friend list

* Guild

* Language

* Server

 

Let's just put it this way, the impact of that last one is miniscule. Generally the first tree will trigger and decide your map instance before the last one triggers anyways.

 

Anyways, should that too fail, which can happen. Then you have the manual way of selecting a party member in that other map copy, right click and select "join in that map".

 

For this reason/system the "Guesting" mechanic has become pretty useless all over, except for some pretty corner case uses that most people likely isn't going to bother with. Ask IWN for details.

 

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TLDR: Don't panic, relax, and read my first line.