Incentives for joining less-populated servers

[AOR Nova]

(2019-01-16 06:19)Chuck Wrote:  I actually prefer one full server and one empty one over two half-filled servers as the tracks would look awfully empty.

Exactly what Chuck said, I could've phrased it better but meh

[SO•Audiojack]

(2019-01-15 22:14)Adam Wrote:  just promotes server jumping, the bonus idea does

I was thinking about that, if done correctly it shouldn't be like that if you have it only as the incentive to get a few players on (which itself is an incentive to join after that) and then you cut the bonus.

Let's think of the ruleset how I see it (these numbers can be adjusted for balance, I'm just throwing examples)
- The incentive will give a static amount of bonus cash regardless, most likely included in either your mileage bonus or mileage income.
- The incentive for other servers will only be activated when a server has +30 users.
- The incentive will only work on a server populated by less than 10 people.

Considering Server One will, at the busiest times, still most likely be full and definitely more than 30 players.

Server Two might have 0 players to begin with but if you give an extra money income on that server until 10 people join, then some people may move from Server One purely to grind or some people might more easily choose Server Two when One is full.

This in turn would kickstart the population of Server Two and cut off the bonus, and the population of 10 or more users will instead be the incentive to join. This would potentially be a time for some entirely new players to join more who are put off by both a full server and an empty server.

In my mind this should result in Server One still being relatively full, and around 10 users (or at busy times maybe more) on Server Two. At which point in the cycle would you imagine the server jumping to happen?

Of course there are still other problems to consider like moderating willingness and such, but this is only brainstorming at this point after all.

[Metagross]

I also thought that, if server two is gonna be empty anyways, why dont we use it for track day? I mean, when there's no trackday configuration on server one, we could put it on server two (Blackwood or Weston).

In any case people would mostly prefer the non-trackday one cause it gives them more room for cruising, earning money, take part on chases... And for the few people who joins the server two, a trackday configuration would probably make no difference, but for those who like to play on the racetrack, it would give them (assuming a Blackwood/Weston rotation) 2 weeks per month to try and beat their own personal records, or even the world records.

Right now, if we want to play on a certain racetrack with a certain car (for example if you wanna beat the current record), if we don't manage to do it for the week when that track is on, we will have to wait about 5 weeks for another chance, which i personally think is too much waiting ._. Having server two only with trackday configs would fix that too.

[SO•Yukine]

I agree with the idea of having one server dedicated to cruise and the other as trackday (if available).

In my opinion, it could provide "peace" to those who are dedicated to set new times.

[[TC]►Carl◄]

That idea is slightly going off topic and defeats the purpose of having a race license for track days. May as well just open a dedicated racing server, or drive on one that is already available imo.

Different maps or having a trackday on one server, both which have been tested still creates an imbalance. There are simply not enough LFS players at one given time for this to happen on a regular basis either.

Disagree with that idea.

[OldGuy]

Right now I'm stuck in map 2, with no tow or cop to ask for help. One incentive can be having some way to send a cop to spice up the empty server, or a tow to help people. IDK, just an idea.

[[TC]»Pete«]

The solution to this problem is not simple, and anyone who was around in LFS' heyday will remember that we used to have 2 full servers on a regular basis. The reason was simple:

LFS had a larger active player base back then.

Nowadays, the only time when we reach a critical mass of players to naturally fill more than one server is during a special event like Gumball. Unfortunately, no incentive will reliably fill multiple servers on a regular day because there simply aren't enough players to do it anymore.

[bowler]

maybe bit off topic but i agree with chuck it would be a lot better if we could have more than 40 cars

[[TC] TAZxx]

Ganji, the limit is set as it is due to LFS limitations, the number we have is the maximum allowed by LFS unfortunately.

[[TC]»Pete«]

Yeah, if LFS would up the car limit, that would be great, but Scawen's already mentioned that it's unlikely to rise by much for various reasons, reasons I can't find on the LFS forum anymore.

[THE WIZARD DK]

could be the "missing" link

Highway servers

sorry for small bump