Devblog: Server Merger 2020-10-01 16:00

Goals

It is now technically possible to bring together characters from multiple servers. Our goal is to offer you a better in-game experience by improving Wakfu's social dimension (group play, guilds, chatting, trade, etc.).

Dates and Duration

We've been conducting server merger tests over the last several weeks, and we continue to improve this process. We don't have a specific date to announce yet, but our goal is to merge the servers before Update 1.70. 

The game servers will be down for maintenance for about 8 hours, according to our estimates. This includes the time needed to complete the merger as well as the time needed to conduct checks before bringing the servers back online.

We're planning to compensate players for the server downtime during maintenance.

Server Clusters

The French-speaking servers (Aerafal and Dathura) will be merged into a single French-speaking server: Pandora.

The other servers (Efrim, Elbor, Nox, Phaeris, and Remington) will be merged into a new international server: Rubilax.

Character Names

If there is a naming conflict (multiple characters with the same name), renaming rules will apply:

• Out of characters who have been active in the last 6 months and are above level 50, the one that's been around the longest won't be renamed.
• All other characters will be automatically renamed, with a tag (diminutive) indicating their server of origin in front of the character name.
• A player whose character is automatically renamed will be able to rename them once at no cost.
• [Edit 14 October 2020] Characters rename at will will be enabled till December 31st.

If there is no conflict, the character won't be renamed.

Character Slots

By default, each account has 5 character slots per server. Additional character slots can be purchased to increase this limit.

When the servers merge, this limit may be exceeded (for example, an account may have 10 characters which are then grouped on a single server, but the account only has the default 5 slots).

If this happens, all the characters will be playable, but it won't be possible to create a new character as long as the number of characters on the server is the same or higher than the number of character slots on the account.

Example:
Your account has 5 character slots, and you have 5 characters on server A and 5 more characters on server B.

After the merger, your characters from servers A and B will be grouped on the new server C. So on server C, you'll have 10 characters and 5 slots.

To be able to create a new character on server C, you'll have to delete at least 6 characters to end up with 4 characters in 5 slots.

Guild Names

Same approach as with character names:

If there is a naming conflict (multiple guilds with the same name), renaming rules will apply:

• Out of guilds that have been active in the last 6 months (at least 1 member has logged in within the last 6 months), the one that's been around the longest won't be renamed.
• All other guilds will be automatically renamed, with a tag (diminutive) indicating their server of origin in front of the guild name.
• Any guild that is automatically renamed will be able to choose a new name once at no cost.

If there is no conflict, the character won't be renamed.

Guild Chests

No change; guild chests will remain the same.

Politics and Governors

The entire political system has been reset (as happens when a new server goes live):

• Nations' laws
• All kamas accumulated by nations
• The territories controlled by nations
• Governors and members of nations' governments

Battlefields

There will be new start times for battlefields on the international server.

Battlefield start times for the French-speaking server will not change.

Stasis Rankings in Dungeons

Characters' rankings in dungeons will be reset when the servers are merged.

The rankings will increase from 100 to 200 places.

Monsters

Groups of monsters will be reset (the position, number, and size of the groups).

Harvestable Resources

Resources planted in the world by players (trees and plants) will be deleted from the world when the servers are merged.

Resources not planted by players (ores and fish) will reappear 20% faster in order to increase their availability (to compensate for the increased number of players per server).

After the fusion, we will continue to keep an eye on the rarity of ores and fish, and we plan to make other changes if it becomes necessary.

Haven Worlds

Since 1.66, the number of Haven Worlds per server has been unlimited.

Characters can't belong to more than one guild and therefore can only have one Haven World at a time.

Haven Bags

Bags from Haven Bags have been removed from the world.

Please note: The prices of items in display windows in Haven Bags will not change.

Haven Bag Chests

If an account has Haven Bag Chests on multiple servers (which will be merged together), the Haven Bag Chest that contains the most items will not be modified, and the contents of the other Haven Bag Chests will be transferred to read-only tabs.

Kamas

When multiple servers are being merged, we calculate the average wealth of the accounts on each server.

A kama quantity index is calculated for each server, and the amounts of kamas owned are leveled upward.

Besides the kamas belonging to characters, this change will also apply to the kamas stored in guild chests, marketplace sales (ongoing and completed), and kamas waiting to be distributed (in the pending rewards interface).

Example pre-merger:

• Server A: Average of 1 million kamas per active account (active in the last 6 months)
• Server B: Average of 5 million kamas per active account (active in the last 6 months)

 

The accounts with characters on server B have an average of 5 times more kamas than those on server A.

The sums of kamas owned by the accounts on server A will be multiplied by 5 when servers A and B are merged into the new server C.

This process ensures equal purchasing power between characters coming from different servers.

Marketplaces

The kama factor (see above) will be applied to items for sale and items sold.

The kama factor will always be greater than or equal to 1.

Average Prices

All average prices will be reset.

Heroes

All characters on an account that are grouped together on one server will be accessible as Heroes (as long as the usual criteria are met).

Sidekicks

Regarding duplicate Sidekicks after servers are merged:

• The XP of duplicate Sidekicks is added to that of the Sidekick with the most XP (up to max level 215).
• Duplicate Sidekicks are sent to a "read-only" tab in the Haven Bag chest.
• If there is an excess of XP, it is transferred to a duplicate Sidekick.
• The equipment of extra Sidekicks are sent to a "read-only" tab in the Haven Bag chest.

Linked Items

To the character: No change; items will stay linked to the character.

To the server: There will no longer be items linked to a specific server.

Game Server Performance

To accommodate as many characters on the two new servers at once, we've optimized software operation for the game servers, and we'll be using new physical servers with much better performance.

Conversion Stones

All active sales of Conversion Stones will be canceled.

The average prices of Conversion Stones will be reset.

Progrest Bar

The values of "Progrest Bars" from merged servers will be added together.

The top 500 scores will now be counted for calculating the Progrest Bar value.

You must reach 150 million points to calm Ogrest's wrath.

After the merger, we will monitor the ongoing changes to Progrest Bars and make adjustments if necessary.

Our goal is to count a much larger number of participations to increase the community component of this event.


[Edit 02 October 2020]
https://www.wakfu.com/en/forum/195-devblogs/240069-devblog-server-merger?page=2#entry1094316 

Kamas

We have read your concerns about this issue and provide more details. 

There should be no possible abuse with kamas as all kamas storages will be taken into account (guild chests, kamas on hold etc.).
Furthermore, the data we use is the data at the time of this devblog’s publication, so players can no longer try to influence this data.

We multiply (via a factor) the kamas of accounts on certain servers to ensure that accounts from merged servers have the same purchasing power.
We have preferred to harmonize upwards (multiplying factor greater than 1) because we believe that the community will more easily accept an increase in kamas than a decrease (which could be interpreted as an accident, a bug or a sanction).
The natural generation of kamas in the server will potentially become less significant compared to the money supply available on the server, but we do not consider this as an issue.
Players generally get richer through trading (obtaining kamas already in play) than through the generation of new kamas.

Marketplace

What will happen to the items on sale in the marketplaces after the merger? 

As mentioned in the article: " the kama factor will be applied to items for sale and items sold".As such, the items will remain in the marketplaces after the merger.

Haven-bag chest

What will happen to the HB chests’ tabs with removal only? 

Withdrawal-only tabs are not affected by the merger. They will keep their « withdrawal-only » mode. 

PvM Ladder

Is there a plan to double the rewards of the PvM Ladder? 

We do not plan to double the rewards of competitive dungeons. We plan to increase the rankings’ places of competitive dungeons in order to increase the number of rewards distributed and the number of characters that can be ranked on a game server-wide basis. Here's what we plan to do: 

Before:

• Gold -> 1-6
• Silver -> 7-30
• Bronze -> 31-100

After :

• Gold -> 1-6
• Silver -> 7-60
• Bronze -> 61-200

What will happen to the rankings before the merger? 
Here's what we plan to do to reset the dungeon rankings:

• Permanent Rankings: total reset
• Rankings of the previous month: total reset
• Rankings of the current month: merging the rankings of the servers that are merged together

So the characters will not lose the positions acquired in the rankings of the current month.
We have decided to reset the permanent dungeon rankings because there are many cases where players can no longer reach or exceed previous performances due to changes made to the game over the previous updates.
The server merger involves a new community start, so this is a good opportunity to reset the permanent dungeon rankings. 

Citizenship

What will happen to the character’s nation? 

No changes to the characters’ nation. 

Will citizenship points be kept? 

Citizenship points will be kept. 

Battlefields

Is it possible to get the schedules of the new Battlefields on Rubilax? 

The new time slots for the new Battlefields on Rubilax are not yet defined. 

Will the limit of authorized players be increased? 

We don't plan to increase the maximum number of characters allowed in the Battlefields at first.
We will pursue this possibility if we find that the Battlefields regularly do not offer enough places to participate. 

Miscellaneous

How will the characters be presented in the selection screen? 

Characters will be sorted by chronological order of creation date: the oldest characters will be displayed first and the newest characters last. 

Will low-level and old characters be imported? 

There was a misunderstanding with the "Character names" part. The level and age both apply for renaming and not for importing characters.
To be clear: all characters will be imported. 

What will happen with the gift interface? Is there any risk of losing items? 

Items present in the gift interface will be transferred during the merger. 

Will there be an increase in the number of characters in the friends list? 

The maximum size of the friends list will not be increased for the merger. 

What about the tools to help community gatherings? 

We don't have any concrete announcements to make at this time, but we would like to be able to make improvements to this aspect of the game in 2021. 

Specific case: renaming characters on Elbor? 

During the 2015 Rollback, for a part of the characters created before the Rollback, the creation date was lost and was automatically set to the date of the Rollback (2015).
The same renaming rules apply for the characters.


[Edit 09 October 2020]
https://www.wakfu.com/en/forum/195-devblogs/240069-devblog-server-merger?page=3#entry1094552