The producer’s letter tells us that Funcom wants to implements a way to travel between maps. However, not much else is said about this feature. So, it’s time for some wild speculation or educated guesses.
Technical: Will Siptah and the Exiled Lands merged into one database? Can one server run both?
Travel: How might the travel system work? A portal/boat/spell that teleports you from one place to another? Both ways? Will there be a cost, a cooldown, some other kind of drawback?
Items: What about items? Can you take them with you? Equipment only, or building material, too? Or event he other way round?
Thralls: Do you think it’ll be possible to take thralls with you, either as follower or as an inventory item (before placing)?
My guess is “no and no”. First, a bit of disambiguation: “server” has become a vague word, because it can mean either the server program or the server machine. Merging Siptah and Exiled Lands into one database is pointless unless the same server program can run both. I don’t know whether that’s something that you can make UE4 do, but I’m convinced that it would be too much work for Funcom
Of course, if you have a beefy enough server machine, you can make it run two instances of the server program and get both maps running. Maybe that can help with rental costs – I don’t know and I don’t care that much – but it makes no difference to players. To them, it’s indistinguishable from running two maps on two machines.
I’m guessing the servers will be paired somehow, i.e. “travel to Siptah” option on Exiled Lands server 1234 will take you to Siptah server 4321. The easiest way to implement it would probably be for the server admins to set up this pairing in the server config. The best way for the players would be to have each player choose their destination from the server browser upon initiating the transfer.
I’m dying to know that, too. Here’s what I would love to see:
Travelling from Exiled Lands to Siptah would involve a portal similar to the surge portals.
Travelling from Siptah to Exiled Lands would involve using a map room and would take you to the Exiled Lands obelisk of your choice.
I would prefer the answer to be “you can’t take anything with you”, but I’m convinced it will be “you bring your whole inventory”. Funcom’s idea of listening to feedback seems to have resulted in giving up on what makes Siptah unique and giving into the popular demands without any regard for Siptah’s balance. If they don’t let players take their inventory, the same bunch of people who kept throwing a hissy fit because Siptah wasn’t “more of Exiled Lands” will keep throwing hissy fits because they can’t take their stuff with them.
As I already stated, I believe you will be able to take unplaced followers in your inventory. I don’t think you’ll be able to transfer placed followers with you, mostly because it would be too much effort. I mean, if they decided to just throw into trash the things that make Siptah unique because it’s too much effort to make them work properly, why would we think they’ll do this?
I hope that the transfer feature will be done with some flavor, for example this way: There’s a boat or ship in the Exiled Lands that one can use to escape the lands… only to land on Siptah. The boat could be placed with the pirates, as that’s their plan anyhow.
On Siptah, the player character would realize that it’s just another trap, and discover a portal ore device that the ancient races of Siptah used to travel to the Exiled Lands. A kind of reverse-surge.
Thrall population should be separated, including tamed thralls in inventory. It should be possible to delete all thrall and pet items from inventory with an automated script upon transfer.
Why? First, it would leave some sense to the thrall gathering mechanics on Siptah. Second, it would fit better lore-wise in my view: escaping the Exiled Lands is a difficult feat, only achieved by rare heroes, i. e. player characters, not their level 1 Exile armorer thrall.
Instances and databases… A lot of players seem to run the game on private servers or in single player, including me. I hope their implementation will not add cost or effort to that section of players. Running or renting a second machine just to add more map would be a much in my opinion.
So, more speculation, more wishes? Come on, community, voice your opinions. The Devs do listen to feedback, so give them some.
