I heard dropping anchor migrates you to a full server or something like that is that true?
Dropping anchor
The only requirements, that I’m aware of, for a server merge is to be on your ship and be 15-30mins from another player ship. For me it does happen while I’m stopped at an island, but I don’t always have my anchor down. A server merge has happened while I was moving but not for a long time.
Here is a article on how the servers work. It is from back in the day but I don’t think they have changed it.
Sea of Thieves Has a Very Smart Approach to Server Size - IGN
Rare's been clever with how it handles player encounters in its shared world.
Makes no sense.
Server merge occurs when a server is empty therefore migrating the last players to a more populated server. I see no reason why an anchor drop should suddently migrate a crew from a healthy populated server...
The article shared above is unconsistent as possible. Quote:
The upshot is that, practically, there's no hard-and-fast maximum or minimum number of players in one Sea of Thieves server as long as everyone's still hitting that magic number
What??
There is definitely a hard cap for servers in SoT. Devs adressed that multiple times already: the maximum number of ships available in one server is 6. Whenever it's 6 galleons, 6 sloops or 6 brigs therefore capping any server to a maximum of 24 players (6 galleons)
Also there should be a minimum capacity too since the server auto migrate crews from empty servers to more populated ones. So there's got to be a value somewhere triggering a server merge action..
@dotcomrobots I think they are referring to the fact that any Ship/Player numbers are based on encounter rates.
They have said previously they didn't want it too busy or too quiet and were aiming for an encounter every 20 mins or so.
@triheadedmonkey The magic number could be that 15 minute encounter.. but they are clearly wrong about server capacity when saying that "there's no hard-and-fast maximum or minimum number of players in one Sea of Thieves server"
Also while the old map size (along with it's 6 ships max capacity) allowed a 15-20 min encounter probability, the new one doesn't.
Devil's Roar greatly expanded the map size but the ship capacity per server hasn't scaled up accordingly therefore killing that 15 min encounter concept...@dotcomrobots I believe their point was that the numbers were set by themselves to try and preserve the encounter rate they wanted, rather than actual server limits.
I could be entirely wrong, but that is just what I understand from listening/watching.
@corrupt-fellow No it doesn't.
Server Migration occurs when there are too few ships and from the looks of it can't fill the 20 min encounter quota. So in theory as long as you stay within a 20 mins of another ship it shouldn't Migrate.
For me I've rarely been migrated (UK) and the amount that I can't remember last time I was migrated; perhaps even months since it happened. In that time I've become legend and done every thing so dropping the anchor has no affect on the migration.
@triheadedmonkey All i'm saying is that Rare using the words "no hard-and-fast maximum or minimum number of players in one Sea of Thieves server as long as everyone's still hitting that magic number" is kind of odd because:
- There is a player max cap: 6 boats is the biggest ship scenario possible per server whatever the boat type.
- The magic number is actually never hit: The whole "dynamic filling according to a 15-20 min condition" isn't relevant anymore since the map has increased with DR but not the ship count.
- There is a player low cap: Server merge happens when the server isn't populated enough.
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