Except for short delays in both regions, the server mergers for ArcheAge Unchained were completed without major issues back on March 6 while the land rush also occurred back on March 13th. I’ve been busy resetting back up and only got around to posting this now.
I personally did not expect to get much land back so I went in with fairly low expectations. I prepared ahead of time and packed furnishings into purchased furniture crates (100 diligence tokens) across all my characters, and expanded them to 70-slots. I stored whatever important I could in character inventory and warehouse. I left whatever that could not fit in each characters otherworldly storage chests (those who would be sent back as demolition mail which the system keeps intact for up to an year); most of that was a lot of raw materials (raw stones, ores, logs, gathered plants) that I just had no additional space for.
This would at least leave my demolition mail manageable in the event that I ended up without a plot (again, I planned for the worst). I also did check out the other servers (right after the merger announcement and then the days leading up to the actual merger) to see where players there were situated. The location I had been on Wynn in Solzreed wasn’t exactly built out even on Tyrenos so I decided to try to reclaim that spot for the land rush. My first choice would’ve been to try for a spot in Two Crowns (housing area north of Moonswept Homes) since that is my favorite scenic spot on Nuia BUT that applies to many others where it would be extremely contested.
I placed all my designs on a different skill bar setup (including removing anything that could put my character into combat since you cannot place a design down until you are out of combat) from highest to lowest preference and made sure to hit the lock button.
Around 20 hours prior, some players were already begin to camp out on the spots they wanted so I did the same at around the t-minus 18 hour mark. I also had my other PC to log into my second alt account and had my laptop logged into a trial account I had created (so I had three characters spaced out over the corner spot I was hoping to at least get something down).
Fast forward to the next morning when I woke up; I expected to see more players camped out where I was but most were vying for the “more desirable” locations (closer to the processing stations, the trade outlet, less hilly terrain). I planted 4 bamboo stalks so I could at least see the border for where I wanted to at least get my beanstalk down (again, low expectations to be able to secure anything more than that). I spent most of the next couple of hours AFK. Activity around where I was only began to pickup closer to the 3 hour mark (as players began moving out from the more contested areas). Even then, the next closest player I saw camping out near me was at least 72m away.
Fast forwarding again to the 30 minute mark until land would be opened; there still weren’t many players near me so I was feeling more confident that I could get something down (so long as there weren’t any land hackers or those using undetectable macros to throw down a bunch of stuff quickly/last second sniping).
At around the 5 minute mark, a quick cursory check around showed no one camping out behind me in a spot where they could potentially snipe the land I was planning to at least get my beanstalk down. Closer to the 1 minute announcement, I hit the record button (to capture any potential shenanigans) and simply got ready. The problem with larger designs is you can easily lose placement when your cursor moves even a little. So I decided to take a more riskier approach and actually place once I saw the land opening announcement. As it turned out, I was able to get my beanstalk down without issues. I expected a hoard of properties to begin popping up in the surrounding space so I was surprised that I was able to get several of my 24’s and 16’s down in the process (taking my time in the process to get them lined up as close to each other so as to not take up needless space that others could use).
What surprised me more is that I was able to then switch to my alt, and get a 24 and several 16×16 farms down as no one was claiming a bunch of open property in between my beanstalk and set of miners from one of my neighbors. I actually waited a bit (watching several players right past these spots) and decided to just grab them before the squatters snagged them for reselling. Basically, I ended up making the right choice for my original spot (low initial desirability) as just a few properties over, someone had dropped over 10 miners and 4 mansions. My video unfortunately did not capture the moment those came up because I had left my character facing the opposite direction while I was on my alt placing some properties.
Most others who had property before in this area also were able to get back at least 50% of what they previously had (I managed around 65% which I clearly did not expect; I at least can demo some of the farms to create cottages for two alts I am leveling since they upped the amount of character slots and characters available for the non-fresh start servers to 4).
I realize the experience did not go well for others depending on where they were or if they had been able to get online by the land opening time. I heard that a huge bot operation camped Ahnimar (the large western housing province) and not even the usual land grabbers and resellers managed to get much except for most of their own housing. And after the first week, certified listings for a single story 16×16 has averaged around 10K gold (some of them are actually a 24×24 grid once demoed). It’s supply versus demand BUT also one constrained by way too many high tax exempt structures/farms from a full kit land rush with NO constraints.
It’s going to take at least 4-6 months (at minimum) of the usual population attrition for spots to open up with a more normalized demand where 16’s and eventually 24’s, remain free for the grabbing. I don’t expect the new (as of today) fresh start to alleviate things (character slots opened up meaning more alt housing). And by that time, we’ll likely be looking at the new fresh start servers being merged into one of the two existing servers in each region (likely the lower population ones for the next merger).
