When you have a 2 Faction MMO, there is no way for any Developer to decide which character will choose which faction. They can not force a player to play a faction that they don't want to play. Its as simple as that, but what are their options.

Solution :

Create a Faction 1 server and Faction 2 server

Reasoning: Since no factions can cross over to the starting towns of another faction to prevent griefing, if all the Faction 1 players play at their own dedictated server, you will have no population balance to worry about.

But what happen to the other faction? Will I ever see them in game? Answer is YES

When you que for Battlegrounds ( pvp instances ) Ques will be fast because its being drawn upon the whole Faction creating an instant que.

When you PVE/PVP its the same, those zones will have population caps where people can travel to, allowing an even population fight, creating a greater balance without having to deal with the population issues.

PVE players can choose to quest in dedictated PVP free zones where PVPer's can go into PVP enable zones, and since the population is drawn upon by the entire faction, you will never be alone. And when you are grouped up, you all travel to the same instance. And when people are tired of PVE they can go to PVP zones but with an alert telling them that they are about to enter an possible griefing zone.

RP players can go to RP zones

What do you all think?

It is late at night, so please excuse me if something slipped past me.

What am I missing?

I would call it "realm warfare", ala DAoC, but then people would demand a 3rd faction for no explicit reason.

*looks down*        "called it"

It's a good setup, for anything really, regardless of the number of factions. A example would be Wurm Online (even Aion does it, technically, where the new Epic server sets mimic the old setup of Home and Wild servers. Basically, every kingdom (read; faction) has their own map that *can* be attacked by other factions, but the distance to get there, compounded with having to pass through a centralized map where all kingdoms meet and build/war in the same area, make sure that attacks are very rare - and usually against undefended places out in the open (easy to get to ones).

So the idea is that "distance + contingent PvP areas between you and them = pacing"

There is always the problem with spy accounts though, who use a character to scout the map for targets. Then they relay that info to a greater force, and then organize for a hit. Sucks.

2 faction RvR style battles are doomed to sink in the sea. 3 Faction is the future.

Hypothetical situation: What happens if Faction X is "more fun" than Faction Y, so everyone leaves Server X to play on Server Y? Yeah, keeping the factions separate through servers is a decent idea, but it would make the potential lag and unfair disadvantage for larger Factions.

The number of factions is not the problem...the problem is what are the factions fighting over and what is actually able to be accomplished by fighting.

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Originally posted by GTwander
I would call it "realm warfare", ala DAoC, but then people would demand a 3rd faction for no explicit reason.
*looks down*        "called it"

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Yeah that was the best part of DAoC, in that it seemed like you were fighting something almost alien. Which is easy to convince people to do.

I personally prefer a more poltically / resource based system. But for PVE heavy progression games (with any number of factions, honestly 5 seems most reasonable to me) it's the best system because it's easy to handle.

Population caps with 2 opposing factions will ensure people on the most populated server/faction of the 2 will not get to see the light of PvP.

I think Aion did this, Where they introduced a Third NPC Faction, and this Invasion of the Third Faction is what you are fighting against.

Instead of fighting to control the other faction's land, you are fighting with the other factions on how much of the Third Faction's Lands you can acquire and Hold.

So imagine this : Faction 1 has 75% of population and Faction 2 only have 25% of population

Faction 1 invaded Faction 3, Faction 3 NPC fights with boosts due to the sheer zergness of Faction 1, While Faction 3 is fighting against Faction 1, Faction 2 Ninja controls the lands. So zergness actually costs you controls of the lands where gurilla tactics succeeded.

Scenario 2 : While Faction 3 is fighting off Faction 1, Faction 2 makes an alliance with Faction 3 and fights against Faction 1.

Having a NPC faction 3 will make 2 Faction MMO Work. And because its just an NPC faction its still a 2 faction MMO.

Originally posted by lionhairgirl

Hypothetical situation: What happens if Faction X is "more fun" than Faction Y, so everyone leaves Server X to play on Server Y? Yeah, keeping the factions separate through servers is a decent idea, but it would make the potential lag and unfair disadvantage for larger Factions.

"more fun" is an impossible situation unless one faction (or their home map) simply lacks some activities the others have, which would be stupid. To take a look at why one faction map would have more traffic is just bringing back my previous point - vanity. Look at Aion, every zone is a mirror of what the other side sees, but the Eylos side is the favorite because of the color palette used. Everything on the other side is the exact same, only blue, while the Eylos have what seems like the *original* version that got all the hard work, and My Little Pony color scheme.

Even if the maps were vastly different, you would see the same thing. Example; one faction has a bright forest map, another has a dark 'mushroomy' map. Depending on which one you already would prefer, the other will become a tired place to spend the entirety of your gameplay in. Themes are a smart divide, but still divide the playerbase based on taste... and everyone will still tend to lean towards a clear winner (in terms of aesthetic). I could use Ryzom as an example here, because most new players are most interested in the idyllic archipelago the Trykkers have, over the choice of forest, jungle and desert. Then they quickly realise how much of a bitch it is to get around those islands, and usually go to the runner-up.

late edit; I just realised I ported a mode over from another conversation, about one faction always being more popular because of vanity leading to a certain choice in faction (in the first place). Really doesn't fit the current convo... yet it does.