Identifying the source of the problem is the major component of fixing it. You give such bad analogies i cannot help but think your analysis of the problem here is similarly flawed XD.

Im sorry but global poverty is not gonna get fixed with the average joe donating money to charity and not caused because the average joe is not donating money to charity. Global warming is not caused by people not recycling. Ill leave it at that cuz i dont wanna derail the thread more than it already has been. XD

I think it is you who completely misunderstood what I meant. Of course global warming etc will not be changed as a result of people recycling - only an idiot would think so, that's why I thought it would be obvious that it was only meant as an example of the kind of flawed logic used in the argument that "if only people [x], then [y]" and why things don't work that way in the real world. The analogies are completely valid, because they all concern problems that to a very large degree can be fixed if people change behaviour (although those issues are obviously much more complex, but as this isn't a debate on how to fix the climate or poverty it isn't relevant to go into detail). Making people change behaviour is much easier said than done, illustrated in abundance by human history.

I completely disagree, I have no problem finding groups in off peak time, in fact I find it easier than during peak times when everyone is competing for that last slot in the most desired group.

Turn on LFG and you will get an invite sooner or later, just be patient.

The only thing global chat really helps is people LFG for their alts or characters they aren't on at the moment, which may alleviate some of the issues, but it won't be a panacea like some of you want. The only thing that will really help is more recruiting of people that play those odd hours. If you don't help this server grow, who will? They(devs) can't really advertise the server themselves since most EMU communities have unwritten rules not to recruit from each other - and thats normally the best place to advertise on the internet for stuff like this. I went around to old guild forums from guilds on my old Live server and posted threads about this game. No telling if it helped but it cannot hurt.

PS I play in non peak hours.

The global chat is not only just to help people find groups. I'm not sure how you came up with that idea?

One of the first things I did when I logged in was to ask a simple question in ooc. Now I can't and im stuck in a silent void.

It's kinda like some of those really old computer games you have fond memories of. Mine could be my first lan experience playing Doom and Warcraft 2, those games were beyond AWESOME back then. Today they just suck.

Another classic is the "man i could play diablo 1 all night" and you download the game, install it, load it up and you just stare at that 640*480 resolution for a few seconds before you ALT + F4 / CTRL + ALT + DLT.

Kinda like were this game went.

I 'came up' with that idea because its almost the only reason people spout off when they are supporters of global chat.

If you want to ask a question, try the forums? Send a tell to somebody? Ask your guild? Your zone you're in? Why does it have to be a question that EVERYBODY logged in has to see?

Can I have your stuff?

Jify... read my post again... OFF PEAK... not PEAK time when there are 700 people on.
OFF PEAK, has typically 200 odd players, with a good chunk of lvl 50 AFKs camping a raid target... a completely different situation to your 700 in peak time.

Benefits of global ooc in low pop times:
- Yes for finding groups for yourself or an alt.
- LFM.. that chanter who is trading town might no have his LFG flag on but could be interested to join a Magus group if he sees it advertised.
- Buying / selling, because with 200 people on server EC isn't really exciting
- General help / questions etc... with 200 people on, you are likely to be lonely in your zone, if you are not in one of the 6 or so zones that are the most popular or SOLB / Permafrost when Naggy/Vox are being camped.

Channels would help a lot. And why not have a global channel that is disabled when the population (in a perfect world it would actually be the non afk population) of the server reaches a certain limit.

I agree with this, but being that global chat was enabled because of low population, at least initially, I think the debate is a valid one because this is about off-peak hours. As we all know, population is low at off-peak hours and is like a thorn in the side of those who like this game without global chat. But for some people, it's not a question of like or dislike. Instead, it's do or die. It can be game breaking.

The tension that's going on here is similar to the one that happened on live. In 1999, the game experienced its highest rate of incoming new players. In the years that followed this rate shrunk in response to a crowd of new mmorpgs. People want to play new games. EQ code and gfx were getting old as well. This all resulted in a shrinking total population. SOE had to make a choice. Either they find a way to reduce the difficulty of the game so that people can play it in a lower population environment, or they attempt to increase the population. They chose to reduce the difficulty, and no one can blame them because who wants to invest in an old product? At that time, they were putting their hopes in everquest 2. It's infinitely easier to reduce the difficulty a slight amount than it's to pay for advertising.

So this led to a game that had the appearance of reduced difficulty even though the difficulty, from a relative standpoint, had not changed at all. Most of the veterans in this forum, while I respect them and value their opinions, often mistake the changes to live, that were necessary, as an example of soe dumbing the game down. That's not what happened, and anybody who thinks that is fooling themselves.

Now we face similar circumstances here. Do we attempt to increase off-peak population, or do we give them global chat or make similar changes that can reduce some of the difficulties that make their lives hard? Keep in mind this is a group-based game, and in a low population something like this can be game breaking. Reducing the difficulties means finding a way for them to survive in a group-based game in a low population environment.

If you want to be proactive and do something about this without the help from developers, be generous and help out off-peak players somehow. Save some items for them. They need the help. The game they play is more difficult than the one you play at peak-hours. Have some sympathy.

Note: When I say 'low population environment', that also includes indirect processes that lead to something similar (i'll call it low population mechanics). For example, if you increase the number of zones in the game then you also spread out players more widely, thus putting them into a position where they experience low population mechanics. So when new zones entered into the game over the years in the many expansions, they had to respond to this. Their answers tended to be new traveling mechanisms, like the luclin spires or the pok books or the guild portals or the guild lobby summoners. Sure, if they could have increased the population by a significant amount, than people could have got ports from casters, but it would have to have been a large increase, thusly making it expensive and even risky. All of these things had (and have) the effect of lessening the difficulties, but the difficulty itself, from a relative perspective, was (and is) still the same. Players still had to work a long time to reach max level, max aa, max gear, and so on. Faster ways of traveling and leveling mean little when there're more places to go and more levels to gain.