I wish I had known that before.

We lost all of our thralls and pets the day before the update, and he did not manage to complete his Battle Pass. That double blow made him so frustrated that he was wondering if he wanted to play again. I barely convinced him to take it as a chance to start again with the new tavern system to recruit new thralls after the update, and we had some horses in the fridge which could have helped too.

The day of the update? I was banned with a negative balance of Crom Coins. My clan mate was not, but when he learnt about my case, forget about the chance to start again, his mind was back to being frustated.

Today? I learned that my friend would stop playing Conan. I was unbanned shortly after.
The blow is hard.

Since we were playing on an Official Server, I am now wondering if I should cut the size of our base by half, or just let it decay completely and head to a private server.