Turtle WoW is expanding to the East!

[Ingameacc12345]

I also don't understand why they have to make a server for the Chinese.

Have you played on TWoW recently?

[Kremmen]

I strongly disagree with this decision.

In a world divided and increasingly aggressive twow was a great opportunity for cross cultural communication and humanization of the other.

It is difficult to communicate with other cultures, but in the context of a shared game it's easier than on some internet forum or relying on the media to do it for us... all the news tells me is "we are good and they are bad".

Since the influx I've learned some basic chinese phrases (pinyin), and I've observed that some of the chinese population have basic english words or phrases - no doubt we would all learn more while playing together.

What a shame to have thrown that away, and what for? ...so that a vocal minority of players don't have to make an effort to communicate in groups that are typically over-levelled anyway?

A WoW private server isn't the place for your "heal da worl" social messaging. I don't want the extent of my communication with a sizable portion of the playerbase to be one-word phrases like "pull now" or "poly moon" and I shouldn't be obligated to learn "Pinyin" when the server is advertised as primarily English-speaking. The other day I ended up in a raid group full of Chinese players and the party chat was just a stream of completely blank posts; what meaningful conversation was to be had there if the extent of their knowledge of the English language is short phrases that mostly pertain to game mechanics? It's just not good for the social health of an MMO to have that many people you literally can't talk to.

[Mac]

If groups are the issue why not add language filters to LFT? Then you can click on “English speakers only” if you want a group that is English speaking only.

[Jolikmc]

From my understanding – and do not quote me on this – but from my understanding, the sequence of events went like this:

• Turtle WoW got popular and became noticed by "certain types" of players, most of which allegedly rolled in from Russia or China, who were ruining the economy and the community for a lot of people. Players complained. Turtle Team tried to combat the problem. Nothing seemed to work.
• About a month ago, a representative from China – who may or may not have been affiliated with one of these "groups" – reached out to Turtle Team through these very forums, offering the idea of turning a third-party Chinese Turtle WoW community into an official, second-party one run and maintained by themselves.
• Talks were had and deals were made behind closed doors without any input from the player base.
• Finally, once everything was settled and the infrastructure was mostly established, Torta made the announcement of an official "associate" server for Chinese players.

Some Blah-Blah-Blah

Turtle WoW might've started off as this cute little server with a handful of roleplayers… but the thing grew to kind of a proper business with expenses and the like. So, when the businessmen from China came a'callin' with their honey of a deal… and could prove they had the means to do it… of course, Turtle Team accepted because, if I had to guess, it's a profitable arrangement for everyone involved and Turtle Team didn't have to do anything but sign some papers. How this will affect Turtle WoW going forward is anyone's guess. But my point is that maybe certain people were right, all along. You can "want" a server for Hardcores, or Russian players, or American players, or whatever all you want, but until you have a sound, solid business proposal and the hardware to back it up… your "wants" aren't going to manifest to anything more than noise. That's just how "business" goes, sometimes.

Again, don't quote me verbatim on some of this. I just remember some threads from about a month ago, or so, promoting the very impressive Chinese fan site, and that they were interested in talking to the high muckity-mucks at Turtle Team about some sort of "business proposition" or "agreement", or something.
Too lazy to track down the threads on this, but there was at least one in the Chinese sub-forum and one in the General sub-forum.

—

A thought just occurred to me while reading the recent Chinese announcement topic. Glaivesong made a post that basically translates to "this is a third-party server using the Turtle brand to make money". Well, at the risk of upsetting someone, I kind of agree with "Glaivesong". I feel like these Chinese server is going to be self-contained and have nothing to do with the original "Turtle WoW" service. This is both good and bad.

Further Analysis

• The Good
  Any problems that the server has will be limited to that server alone and have nothing to do with the European Turtle WoW server or staff. The Chinese server will be entirely automatous, self-sustained, and self-contained.

• The Bad
  For a time, the community may be divided and there will be some confusion as to which "Turtle WoW" server they should play on. Furthermore, who's to say that Chinese player will join China's server even if offered a free server transfer?

• The Ugly
  I'm not saying that this will happen, but there's always a chance this agreement may be terminated at any time. If that happens, the Chinese subsidiary could still run their server with all of the Turtle WoW game content up to that point and no connection to the Turtle WoW brand, which would be very dishonest.

These are the kinds of things I think about, and I'd like to think that Turtle Team had similar thoughts rather than blindly jumping in on all four feet. ('Cause, ya know, turtles.)

[Kremmen]

If groups are the issue why not add language filters to LFT? Then you can click on “English speakers only” if you want a group that is English speaking only.

Well it's not just that; the server is hitting all-time high peaks at the moment, to the point where some people are having to wait in queue. New players are streaming in which is (according to my guildies) making it increasingly difficult to get quests done due to overpopulation in the starter zones, especially on Alliance. Of course, hardcore players aren't helping much in that department either, and I would have preferred they get their own server first before Chinese players. At least if me and a Chinese player are in the same area we can intuit that we're probably on the same quests, maybe link what we're doing in chat, group up and get shit done with no real communication required, while there's almost never any positive meaningful gameplay interaction to be had between a hardcore and normal player; they're forced into direct competition with each other, which is counter-intuitive in a game where making impromptu groups to overcome challenges basically undergirds almost everything you do, from the very first zone to endgame raids.

[Xerilin]

From my understanding – and do not quote me on this – but from my understanding, the sequence of events went like this:

• Turtle WoW got popular and became noticed by "certain types" of players, most of which allegedly rolled in from Russia or China, who were ruining the economy and the community for a lot of people. Players complained. Turtle Team tried to combat the problem. Nothing seemed to work.
• About a month ago, a representative from China – who may or may not have been affiliated with one of these "groups" – reached out to Turtle Team through these very forums, offering the idea of turning a third-party Chinese Turtle WoW community into an official, second-party one run and maintained by themselves.
• Talks were had and deals were made behind closed doors without any input from the player base.
• Finally, once everything was settled and the infrastructure was mostly established, Torta made the announcement of an official "associate" server for Chinese players.

Another less tin foil aspect might be that, according to what I read on the forum, a fan made translation of the entire Turtle client is basically more or less done already. Somebody made it, somebody leaked it, something like that. Don't know, don't care. I am just glad Turtle is looking into solutions to make things less crowded and improve communication between players.

[Xuezz]

will there be a world buff vendor?

[Winthrop]

It would be great, if you startet spamming Chinese System Messages to this topic to initiate Discussions within the Chinese Playerbase. That way, everyone would be on the same Page when it Codes to Server Transfers.
Maybe have a Window Pop Up on the Login Screen as soon as the Server Transfers are avaliable.
The idea behind this:
As a Chinese Player I would be unsure if everyone else is transfering, thus maybe even staying in this Server.
If needed, you can use my Guild list to out the Chinese Guilds.

[Pijiake]

I am a Chinese player and I strongly hope that the Chinese server will open up soon. At the same time, I would like to thank the staff for their tremendous efforts!

[Allwynd01]

I also don't understand why they have to make a server for the Chinese.

Have you played on TWoW recently?

Last I played was in late May-early June.

[Wowplaya69]

I strongly disagree with this decision.

In a world divided and increasingly aggressive twow was a great opportunity for cross cultural communication and humanization of the other.

It is difficult to communicate with other cultures, but in the context of a shared game it's easier than on some internet forum or relying on the media to do it for us... all the news tells me is "we are good and they are bad".

Since the influx I've learned some basic chinese phrases (pinyin), and I've observed that some of the chinese population have basic english words or phrases - no doubt we would all learn more while playing together.

What a shame to have thrown that away, and what for? ...so that a vocal minority of players don't have to make an effort to communicate in groups that are typically over-levelled anyway?

A WoW private server isn't the place for your "heal da worl" social messaging. I don't want the extent of my communication with a sizable portion of the playerbase to be one-word phrases like "pull now" or "poly moon" and I shouldn't be obligated to learn "Pinyin" when the server is advertised as primarily English-speaking. The other day I ended up in a raid group full of Chinese players and the party chat was just a stream of completely blank posts; what meaningful conversation was to be had there if the extent of their knowledge of the English language is short phrases that mostly pertain to game mechanics? It's just not good for the social health of an MMO to have that many people you literally can't talk to.

Actually I think this is the proper forum for my relevant comment.

For me, a wow private servers primary purpose is for people to come together with a shared purpose, otherwise what is it for... chasing higher numbers on a digital dice, omg purple item!?? No, it's about people.

I like socializing across cultures and pushing through communication boundaries, and I recognize the important social value of that. If I understand you correctly you like to stay inside your tribe and don't recognize the value in cross-cultural communication.

We can all coexist in turtle-wow, the opportunity here is that the vast majority of communication in wow is non-verbal.

In regard to your specific experience, it's easy to find a raid with English speakers, pick up groups it might be harder sometimes but those only require simple communication and there are other technical solutions that could be implemented regardless. There are, amongst others, German and Russian speaking guilds and groups on the server already and yet you've managed.

This forum reports your location as Australia, your opposition to "social messaging" on East-West relations in general seems foolish given how in the thick of it Australia could be should the international situation continue on course, not that I expect we little people could do much anyway.

[Rezanator]

We could do with a date on this new chinese server, the game is going to lose a considerable amount of players to other private servers mainly Felmyst 3 as this Chinese player base is truely a pandemic, Not racist I love the Chinese culture & especially their food but ffs its impossible to get anything done when there are hordes of chinese farming like.. well..like they do lol.
It has nothing to do with communication either they can communicate just fine on the majority & when in groups they are fine, but trying to farm any kind of mats for crafting is a complete joke.

Maybe give them char transfer options also so they dont lose their progress?

Give us an estimated date please.

[Jolikmc]

Here you go, Rezanator:

Additionally, we will be providing gradual free transfers from the EU realm to the CN realm. This means that those who wish to play in their native language can join the leveling community on the Chinese realm after a specified lockout time which depends on the character's progression and the progression of the new realm. More details on this timeline will be published with the launch date of the new realm.

Also?

Not racist I love the Chinese culture […]

And there's the kiss-of-death to this thread. (,:

[Baoya]

I believe that as long as we can solve the problem of buying and selling coins, advertisements, studios, etc., these behaviors can be strictly controlled regardless of whether we can open Chinese servers or not. But currently, the agent you are looking for in China has a poor reputation. I believe that servers in China will be occupied by studios in the future. So most real players still stay on EU servers.

[Warche]

Why are people getting all high on their horse about this?

No one is booting Chinese people from the current server. They can stay if they want to.

THEY now have an option to play on a server where the vast majority understands & can communicate with THEM if THEY want.

What is the point of forcing a bunch of people who can't communicate with the current player base to play on this server if their is another option? So you can feel good about yourself, crying about your projected view of the racism of others and give yourself a little pat on the back?

Go for it. It has gotten you this far.

[Trangoul]

Unnecessary splitting of the community.

[Hctwowfan]

Unnecessary splitting of the community.

Well it also has the neat effect of solving overpopulation. What'd your solution to that look like?

[Sylveria]

Unnecessary splitting of the community.

Actually necessary. But yeah, turn a blind eye to the current problems. :)

[Jolikmc]

I mean… I think it's a little ignorant to say that the server is overpopulated purely because of players from Asian or even Eurasian regions. You have to remember, not too long ago, there was a pretty popular PvP server that shut down, so we got a pretty hard influx of players from there, too.

Actually… is there, like, a statistic or a graph or something showing where all the players who play Turtle WoW hail from? I think that'd just be neat to see, as well as informative.

[Hctwowfan]

I mean… I think it's a little ignorant to say that the server is overpopulated purely because of players from Asian or even Eurasian regions. You have to remember, not too long ago, there was a pretty popular PvP server that shut down, so we got a pretty hard influx of players from there, too.

Actually… is there, like, a statistic or a graph or something showing where all the players who play Turtle WoW hail from? I think that'd just be neat to see, as well as informative.

I didn't say it was overpopulated purely because of players from asian regions. Moving a sizeable amount of players to a different server still solves overpopulation for now.

I mean sure, you could move people based on their acc creation date or some other metric, but would that make more sense than what we 're getting now?

No matter, it solves overpop and for some players it's a two birds one stone solution.

[Warche]

Joli is clearly superior. Just admit you are a raging racist and move one. Maybe pay some reparations to some random person for no reason. it will make him feel better and that is what is important.

[Redmagejoe]

Samsara is clearly superior. Just admit you are a raging racist and move one. Maybe pay some reparations to some random person for no reason. it will make him feel better and that is what is important.

Fixed that for you.

[Jolikmc]

[…] superior […]

Whoa, wait a minute now… I hope that's a translation error. I mean, I know I occasionally come across as egotistical and even quarrelsome… mostly because I can be, at times… but when I said it was "ignorant" to blame the overpopulation on one group of people, I absolutely didn't mean to suggest that the people I was replying to were stupid. I just mean that, at the moment, I don't think there's been any hard evidence of one group or another being the primary cause of the problem. It's all anecdotal.

At this time, we are "ignorant" – or "unknowledgeable", if you prefer – of hard numbers and without some graphs or spreadsheets from Turtle Team… it's hard to say if any one group from any one region of the world is the primary cause of the population swell. I don't see that happening any time soon because Turtle Team is all about inclusiveness and would be daft to had out some high-caliber ammo like that to the forum trolls. (:

Anyway… Ultimately, there's no real downside to this move in terms of population. In fact, I think Warche nailed it on the head:

No one is booting Chinese people from the current server. They can stay if they want to.

THEY now have an [additional] option to play on a server where the vast majority understands & can communicate with THEM if THEY want.

[Kiersteadmo]

what about the player's that live in China but do not speak chinese?

[Skumbanana]

Unnecessary splitting of the community.

People surely are not paying attention... How can this be a splitting of the community, if we already have a major split between English speaking players and (mostly) Chinese players who are unable to communicate in English and only talk to each other in chinese? Plus, the migration is OPT-IN. Chinese players who feel at home in the current server (I have met a bunch) can stay here. This will also have the extra benefit of solving the overpop issue in the server now. It's a win-win. The decision is driven by inclusion and diversity principles, not exclusive or discriminatory ones. I haven't seen a single reasonable argument against this.

[Samsara]

Samsara is clearly superior. Just admit you are a raging racist and move one. Maybe pay some reparations to some random person for no reason. it will make him feel better and that is what is important.

Fixed that for you.

You are obsessed with me.
And here I came to offer some balance of my opinion:


I still think a separate layer with International channels would solve both overpopulation and people not respecting the speak only English in chat rule, without splitting the community though. Yes it would take more work to implement, but it would be healthier for the community imo.

[Samsara]

Unnecessary splitting of the community.

People surely are not paying attention... How can this be a splitting of the community, if we already have a major split between English speaking players and (mostly) Chinese players who are unable to communicate in English and only talk to each other in chinese? Plus, the migration is OPT-IN. Chinese players who feel at home in the current server (I have met a bunch) can stay here. This will also have the extra benefit of solving the overpop issue in the server now. It's a win-win. The decision is driven by inclusion and diversity principles, not exclusive or discriminatory ones. I haven't seen a single reasonable argument against this.

The community is the chatting yes but it is more than that. It is the in-game economy having sufficient ebb and flow, it is being subjected to different cultures and behaviors, there being many guilds of all walks of life, etc... What I fear is that the Chinese people who do like the international community and can participate in it will still feel peer pressured to migrate with their friends who don't. I'm not against keeping the people who don't speak English in their own channels, but I think there are better ways to pull that off, as mentioned in my previous comment. Every day I run into people who type Cyrillic in public chats. And yesterday some guy was literally typing "хуй"s in chat. These guy won't migrate to the Chinese server.

[Ctxfenris]

This server used to be so comfy and wholesome and the Chinese have ruined it. Simple as.

[Hctwowfan]

8k players, 5 min queue time on login. Everything's slightly lagging. Will we get more info by the end of the month or will this be solved by then? Opt-in for migration might not be enough to alleviate this by then.

EDIT: 9k players

[Samsara]

This server used to be so comfy and wholesome and the Chinese have ruined it. Simple as.

Racist
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ELUzZIiUQKg

[Hctwowfan]

So Asmon has a giant Chinese fan base, good for him. Check the comments under your YouTube video, this has nothing to do with the guy.

Srsly tho, why allow everyone and their mother to create more and more accounts when the entire player base is suffering due to overpopulation? Cause not allowing everyone in is racist =) Problems solved: zero

[Redmagejoe]

Racist

You're just making my point.

[Jolikmc]

I mean… I'm not exactly agreeing with Samsara? But I mean, it is a bit of an unfounded blanket statement to say that any single ethnicity is the cause of a problem in a group or community. If you're going to say things like that, you could at least have something better than anecdotal evidence, Ctxfenris.

As for Asmon? Yeah, according to the comments of the video, Asmongold was playing Classic or something, and he was actually talking down Turtle WoW only for his chat to counter him and say how awesome it is. Further, the guy who made that video is clearly ignorant about a lot of things. (Yeah, I know. That word, again.)
Sidebar about Chat Moderation

Anyone who's been on the server, paying attention to World Chat or Newcomers Chat for more than five minutes will realize that the chat moderators are absolutely not Johnny-on-the-spot when it comes to vulgarity and vile speech. Even with the population being high enough to cause queues (open another general realm, god damn it), I've seen a severe lack of moderators telling people to "change the topic" in chat. Sometimes, yeah, there's a moderator kicking about.

 
Anyway… this probably isn't going to fix the population problem. Turtle Team has made it clear as crystal that no one's getting "kicked out" – Chinese players can go to their own subsidiary server when it opens, or they can stay here. But, the option is there for the Chinese folks… and I guess people who just happen to have a verified Resident ID Card from China. Or something.

[Samsara]

Racist

You're just making my point.

I'm making the point that my accusations are not more far fetched than blaming the population issues on China. As Jolikmc mentioned, you can't blame a nationality without stats to back it up. Sorry you don't have the IQ to draw the correct conclusions from my sarcasm. My bad I guess.

[Redmagejoe]

Your floundering, disjointed backpeddling and grasping at straws does little to distract from the fact highlighted by your own post that you've forgotten what strawman you were even pushing. Calling it sarcasm all of a sudden at the eleventh hour doesn't exonerate you of diminishing your perceived opponents with ad hominem and strawman arguments while throwing those phrases around hypocritically.

I don't care about the "population issue", and I never stated I did. I merely provided context for the dissent among the community regarding mainland Chinese players, and you took it as a personal crusade to label myself and everyone else with opinions on the matter as racists. You try desperately to belittle those you oppose as if you are being personally attacked and do nothing but make yourself look like an irrational and unhinged malcontent in the process.



I predict your next move will be to play it off as a joke or respond to me with further ad hominem.