A more effective means for achieving #1 is with shards, which they plan on having, also in having various locations in the world with similar drops which they have also mentioned having. It does NOT eliminate other groups from taking your spawns save for maybe those in the room or immediate are that your group is camped in. Should a name spawn outside that area you can bet there will be many times that another group/player happens upon it first and takes the mob that was otherwise a part of your groups pull rotation/in your groups "sphere of influence." I can't say I ever had the luck you have on Lockjaw in my years of classic EQ, I imagine it has to do with people not giving a damned about the server or their reputation and a feeling of having done it all before. I also don't know about making people more friendly either, especially if roaming named mobs become contested as I previously mentioned. At least not more friendly than your average camp setup.
As for cons, I will go over a few particularly weighty ones myself:
1) Dungeon design and "feel" suffers. It's much harder to set up cool thematic rooms intended for specific named mobs when they spawn anywhere anyway. It also takes away from the need to dive deeper while taking on all the risks involved with doing so in order to get to the better loot.
2) Tying into the above, it leads to a path of least resistance. Find the easiest and lowest risk camp and sit there, usually the earlier parts of a dungeon. Unless the whole zone is pretty much +-a level or two then it means every subsequent group that arrives is forced deeper and deeper into higher risk for no greater reward.
3) It makes everything take longer for everyone. Let's say there is a dungeon where a group (group A) would find a random spawn named every 2.4 hours and a dungeon where a static spawn group (group B) finds a particular named in the same time. Let's say there are 10 possible named mobs that can randomly spawn in the zone for group A. Over the course of one day both groups see 10 named mob spawns, so group A sees 6 unique named and 4 repeats and group B see's the same mob 10 times. Now let's assume the rare drop has a 30% drop chance which would mean an average of 3 rare drops per day for either group, but group B gets the specifc rare that they want 3 times where as the other group may not even see that particular named at all. What this means is that if you were to go to this zone looking only for "Robe of Power" then you would have to spend FAR more time in the zone trying to get the item than if you could actually go to where you know it will drop. With static spawns 3 wizards got their robe and are off looking for another item elsewhere which means 3 less people to take spots in the group/zone and 3 less people overall in the server to compete with. With random spawns those 3 wizards are likely still in there the next day hope that day is their day, along with 5 new wizards who leveled up the previous day and heard about some cool robe.
4) It leads to cheaper named mob fights, or boss battles. If they spawn in a particular room, then the fight can be designed around the room and cover available. If they spawn just anywhere randomly then players will find ways to abuse any potential mechanics with various corners, walls, drops, pathing, etc.
There are better ways to handle camps being locked down by one particular group than making named mobs spawn anywhere. Shards are a start and having similarly/equally desireable/powerful items for the same slot in other dungeons across the world.
Relevant information from the FAQ:
By creating plenty of content, a large world, not allowing shards to become overpopulated (for example, by quickly launching new shards), possible systems and rules within specific shards, and if things get out of hand to involve Customer Service (GMs). Above all, we want to use positive reinforcement by making sure that there is enough content and an epic enough world to minimize these issues.
We also want to make sure there will be plenty of great items and choices for adventuring all over the world – for example, we want to avoid there being just a single sought-after item for a specific class at a specific level. Similarly powerful and valued items will be available elsewhere in the world.
:
Mod Edit: To unbreak HTML in the thread
I agreed if some of specific room spawn and such like that so your only repeating yourself when i heard you the first time, and i agreed some should stay static but that doesn't mean all of them need to be static, plus a roamer is a roamer they generally travel through different camps all the time so if you didn't get him you simply didn't get him who cares. You can easily eliminate point 2 by me saying they are in the same genrally locatins which could make the it have the same amount of spawns in these rooms or camps and such to make them all just about as hard as another, honestly a pretty easy fix and usually they do this without thinking, remember trying to get the green metal in SSRA?
Honestly if you only on average get 10 "pops" a day in camp A and 10 in group B than that would be how VR made it and they did it for a reason becuase if you had it on static you would more than likely get less pops throughout the day when you add the 2 up. And to prove you wrong on the scenario of the "Robe of Power" if it is like the "GEBS" or "SMR" these tiems were camped by the same grps for liek a month straight literally just switching out toons that needed the robe til every caster in their guild had one, granted will this happen to pantheon in an alarming rate, of course not becuase we have no idea where such items exsist but once they need something like it will be camped and probably stay camped til they feel like they have enough of them if they are a hardcore raiding guild to satisify their casters. which means if you found out the sme time they did you will have to wait an entire month or so before you even get a chance to see him spawn if it was static as for if it was random at least you had a chance to see the namer for yourself in a differetn area but around the same area.
Point 4 is the same as point 1 and like i said before some can still be static never said all of them to be randomed to begin with. you can prevent namers from being pulled into areas that would ruin their mechanic by making them perma rooted with summoning capabilties or if your looking about LoS issues make it to where if he cant hit you with his aoe capabilities than you cant hit him with your spells due to line of sight.
Never said making the random spawn spawn anywhere in the zone i said they were randomly spawning around the same area of the zone and also said that quite a bit of times as well. Plus the monopolizing is the biggest issue with static spawns and it will happen if they find this "Robe of Power" of yours. it happened once it will happen again, like the saying goes if you did it once the second time is only easier.
Bazgrim said:torveld said:Can anyone explain the difference between a shard and an instance? My experience with them on vanguard made them feel really similar. It seemed as if they were seperate instances of the same dungeon, but you could be inside them with other people from outside your guild or raid. So in a sense a permanant instance.
See the comment just above yours. It has different meanings depending on the game.
I was hoping someone clearly understood what they were in regards to this game. There seems to be different ideas about what a shard is on these forums.
torveld said:Bazgrim said:torveld said:Can anyone explain the difference between a shard and an instance? My experience with them on vanguard made them feel really similar. It seemed as if they were seperate instances of the same dungeon, but you could be inside them with other people from outside your guild or raid. So in a sense a permanant instance.
See the comment just above yours. It has different meanings depending on the game.
I was hoping someone clearly understood what they were in regards to this game. There seems to be different ideas about what a shard is on these forums.
A shard is how they'e been referring to servers. People who think this game will have instanced dungeons are mistaken.
Krixus said:A shard is how they'e been referring to servers. People who think this game will have instanced dungeons are mistaken.
Incorrect.
Kilsin said:
A Shard is an open world copy of the same thing, like a Dungeon, so for arguments sake we could have a loading screen that lets you choose between 50 copies of the same dungeon and you guild could already up and jump into shard 47, other players could still come along and jump in there too as it isn't locked like a normal instance but it just provides more copies to help with overpopulation.
I hope that helps :)
Riahuf22 said:Honestly if you only on average get 10 "pops" a day in camp A and 10 in group B than that would be how VR made it and they did it for a reason becuase if you had it on static you would more than likely get less pops throughout the day when you add the 2 up. And to prove you wrong on the scenario of the "Robe of Power" if it is like the "GEBS" or "SMR" these tiems were camped by the same grps for liek a month straight literally just switching out toons that needed the robe til every caster in their guild had one, granted will this happen to pantheon in an alarming rate, of course not becuase we have no idea where such items exsist but once they need something like it will be camped and probably stay camped til they feel like they have enough of them if they are a hardcore raiding guild to satisify their casters. which means if you found out the sme time they did you will have to wait an entire month or so before you even get a chance to see him spawn if it was static as for if it was random at least you had a chance to see the namer for yourself in a differetn area but around the same area.
Never said making the random spawn spawn anywhere in the zone i said they were randomly spawning around the same area of the zone and also said that quite a bit of times as well. Plus the monopolizing is the biggest issue with static spawns and it will happen if they find this "Robe of Power" of yours. it happened once it will happen again, like the saying goes if you did it once the second time is only easier.
I think you misunderstood the point of #3, which is that with random spawns it will still take longer to gear up which slows everyone down. Even if it is random spawns within limited areas that will become camps. It wouldn't take long for the areas to be figured out and camp claims to be adjusted to the entire area, which I am sure will come down to more arguing when the inevitable picks from other groups happen. The monopolizing is best covered, as I mentioned, by shards and multiple dungeons with equally desireable gear for any given slot.
Iksar said:Krixus said:A shard is how they'e been referring to servers. People who think this game will have instanced dungeons are mistaken.
Incorrect.
Kilsin said:
A Shard is an open world copy of the same thing, like a Dungeon, so for arguments sake we could have a loading screen that lets you choose between 50 copies of the same dungeon and you guild could already up and jump into shard 47, other players could still come along and jump in there too as it isn't locked like a normal instance but it just provides more copies to help with overpopulation.
I hope that helps :)
That can't be real. I want my money back if it is. WTH. That is beyond messed up. That is NOT what we were sold this game would be.
Krixus said:That can't be real. I want my money back if it is. WTH.
It's just an option being considered at this point from what I can tell, but there are enough mentions of it in the FAQ etc to where I think it is something they will want to try. Being entirely honest, having an open world like EQ would mean they would have to have at least twice as many zones to prevent overcrowding and loot monopolization or just very limited max characters per server. I don't think sharding is a bad compromise for having healthy server populations and less guilds controlling specific spawns/drops.
Yes, shards are referring to copies of the same open dungeon that are automatically created when a zone's population becomes too high. It's not traditional instancing in the sense that there's 60 groups each with 60 instances (one for each group). It's more like three "shards" with 20 groups each or something like that, so there's still competition but everyone isn't at a standstill.
NEXTLEVL said:Yes, shards are referring to copies of the same open dungeon that are automatically created when a zone's population becomes too high. It's not traditional instancing in the sense that there's 60 groups each with 60 instances (one for each group). It's more like three "shards" with 20 groups each or something like that, so there's still competition but everyone isn't at a standstill.
That is sickening. Say goodbye integrity of the items and the world. That is a straight up dealbreaker for me and something they said OVER AND OVER would NEVER be a thing.
Krixus said:That is sickening. Say goodbye integrity of the items and the world. That is a straight up dealbreaker for me and something they said OVER AND OVER would NEVER be a thing.
They said no instancing, shards are still technically open world.
https://www.pantheonmmo.com/content/forums/topic/5495/optional-hardmode-encounters/view/page/2
Iksar said:Krixus said:That is sickening. Say goodbye integrity of the items and the world. That is a straight up dealbreaker for me and something they said OVER AND OVER would NEVER be a thing.
They said no instancing, shards are still technically open world.
https://www.pantheonmmo.com/content/forums/topic/5495/optional-hardmode-encounters/view/page/2
Whatever, it's still garbage. There should NEVER be multiple copies of a mob in a game like this. This undermines the entire basis of having a real living breathing virtual world. This is fakery nonsense and I'm disgusted. Shame on them if this is the case.
Sorry to kill your hopes and dreams Krixus. Personally, it put a bad taste in my mouth too. I was hoping for 100% open world, but I'm still gonna give it a chance in hopes that they only create new shards when there is extreme overpopulation. Like 20-30 groups per shard. If it's like every few groups get their own shard then they might as well just do instancing because as you say, if there were that many copies of the same mobs in the game it's going to ruin item integrity.
Krixus said:NEXTLEVL said:Yes, shards are referring to copies of the same open dungeon that are automatically created when a zone's population becomes too high. It's not traditional instancing in the sense that there's 60 groups each with 60 instances (one for each group). It's more like three "shards" with 20 groups each or something like that, so there's still competition but everyone isn't at a standstill.
That is sickening. Say goodbye integrity of the items and the world. That is a straight up dealbreaker for me and something they said OVER AND OVER would NEVER be a thing.
this isn't anything like instancing
Instancing: you walk into a zone and you see 5 namers with 200 other mobs all these mobs are your to kill along with the 5 namers
Shards: you walk into a zone and you see 5 namers with 200 other mobs with 60 other people in the zone (10 groups) so you might find a camp that might support 10 mobs and have no namers.....in otherwords completely different
NEXTLEVL said:Sorry to kill your hopes and dreams Krixus. Personally, it put a bad taste in my mouth too. I was hoping for 100% open world, but I'm still gonna give it a chance in hopes that they only create new shards when there is extreme overpopulation. Like 20-30 groups per shard. If it's like every few groups get their own shard then they might as well just do instancing because as you say, if there were that many copies of the same mobs in the game it's going to ruin item integrity.
I appreciate you and Iksar correcting me. I had no idea. This flies in the face of the core tenets of this game. I'm shocked, frankly. This is horrible, horrible news for those of us who thought this game was going to be different.
Riahuf22 said:Krixus said:NEXTLEVL said:Yes, shards are referring to copies of the same open dungeon that are automatically created when a zone's population becomes too high. It's not traditional instancing in the sense that there's 60 groups each with 60 instances (one for each group). It's more like three "shards" with 20 groups each or something like that, so there's still competition but everyone isn't at a standstill.
That is sickening. Say goodbye integrity of the items and the world. That is a straight up dealbreaker for me and something they said OVER AND OVER would NEVER be a thing.
this isn't anything like instancing
Instancing: you walk into a zone and you see 5 namers with 200 other mobs all these mobs are your to kill along with the 5 namers
Shards: you walk into a zone and you see 5 namers with 200 other mobs with 60 other people in the zone (10 groups) so you might find a camp that might support 10 mobs and have no namers.....in otherwords completely different
lol, you can say that all you want but the effect is very similar, if you can't see that, well obviously I can't explain it to you. They are EXTREMELY SIMILAR, and you think they're completely different? You're completely missing the point if that's the case. You will now have multiple people in different realities of what is supposed to be one world, doing the exact same content. No more will you gain a feeling of accomplishment for doing something rare on your server, because 10 other people are going to be doing it at the same time in their own virtual shard of your world. You can argue the semantics of what the literal industry meaning of 'instance' vs 'shard' is, and while I agree there is a specific distinction, they are both garbage and have no place in this game. It does NOT MATTER if you're in an instance locked to your group, or if you're in an open "shard" spun up away from other people doing the same content, the integrity of the immersive world and rare items in it is completely undermined by this lazy "solution". It is a solution worse than the issue it attempts to resolve. It basically means they've been lying to us if they go this route.
Krixus said:Riahuf22 said:Krixus said:NEXTLEVL said:Yes, shards are referring to copies of the same open dungeon that are automatically created when a zone's population becomes too high. It's not traditional instancing in the sense that there's 60 groups each with 60 instances (one for each group). It's more like three "shards" with 20 groups each or something like that, so there's still competition but everyone isn't at a standstill.
That is sickening. Say goodbye integrity of the items and the world. That is a straight up dealbreaker for me and something they said OVER AND OVER would NEVER be a thing.
this isn't anything like instancing
Instancing: you walk into a zone and you see 5 namers with 200 other mobs all these mobs are your to kill along with the 5 namers
Shards: you walk into a zone and you see 5 namers with 200 other mobs with 60 other people in the zone (10 groups) so you might find a camp that might support 10 mobs and have no namers.....in otherwords completely different
lol, you can say that all you want but the effect is the same. You will now have multiple people in different realities of what is supposed to be one world, doing the exact same content. No more will you gain a feeling of accomplishment for doing something rare on your server, because 10 other people are going to be doing it at the same time in their own virtual shard of your world. You can argue the semantics of what the literal industry meaning of 'instance' vs 'shard' is, and while I agree there is a specific distinction, they are both garbage and have no place in this game. It basically means they've been lying to us if they go this route.
This game can not be like old EQ for one the player base of MMORPG has increased in an alarming rate since the launch of EQ so if we didn't have something to control it would get out of hand with no where to go and exp becuase everything would be dead by the time it came up within seconds. EQ did a ton of things right which is why we bring it up alot along with VG but at the same time it had a bunch of flaws and not saying this is one of of them at its time but in todays world i just don't see it working without it, due to the increae of interests its gained over the years. this is just my honest opinion and i can say who knows you might like it
Krixus said:Riahuf22 said:Krixus said:NEXTLEVL said:Yes, shards are referring to copies of the same open dungeon that are automatically created when a zone's population becomes too high. It's not traditional instancing in the sense that there's 60 groups each with 60 instances (one for each group). It's more like three "shards" with 20 groups each or something like that, so there's still competition but everyone isn't at a standstill.
That is sickening. Say goodbye integrity of the items and the world. That is a straight up dealbreaker for me and something they said OVER AND OVER would NEVER be a thing.
this isn't anything like instancing
Instancing: you walk into a zone and you see 5 namers with 200 other mobs all these mobs are your to kill along with the 5 namers
Shards: you walk into a zone and you see 5 namers with 200 other mobs with 60 other people in the zone (10 groups) so you might find a camp that might support 10 mobs and have no namers.....in otherwords completely different
lol, you can say that all you want but the effect is very similar, if you can't see that, well obviously I can't explain it to you. They are EXTREMELY SIMILAR, and you think they're completely different? You're completely missing the point if that's the case. You will now have multiple people in different realities of what is supposed to be one world, doing the exact same content. No more will you gain a feeling of accomplishment for doing something rare on your server, because 10 other people are going to be doing it at the same time in their own virtual shard of your world. You can argue the semantics of what the literal industry meaning of 'instance' vs 'shard' is, and while I agree there is a specific distinction, they are both garbage and have no place in this game. It does NOT MATTER if you're in an instance locked to your group, or if you're in an open "shard" spun up away from other people doing the same content, the integrity of the immersive world and rare items in it is completely undermined by this lazy "solution". It is a solution worse than the issue it attempts to resolve. It basically means they've been lying to us if they go this route.
they havent lied to us at all they mentioned shards and what they were like almost a year ago
Well it doesn't go against any of their listed tenets and is pretty much addressed at the beginning of the FAQ:
Pantheon is most definitely a modern MMO with modern graphics and new and exciting features and mechanics. There are already emulators out there that are clones of earlier MMOs and Visionary Realms has no desire to make another emulator. That said, we also feel that many of the features and mechanics of previous MMOs have been abandoned in more recent games, resulting in a less challenging, compelling, deep, and social experience. Pantheon, therefore, will indeed bring back some of these conventional mechanics and ideas but with a fresh perspective, some tweaks and revisions. We also understand that while gamers’ tastes don’t fundamentally change over time, their situations, lives, and responsibilities do. Likewise, some game mechanics often associated with earlier MMOs involved inordinate amounts of downtime, overly severe penalties, too much competition over content and resources, and even downright boring or overly repetitive gameplay. Our intention, therefore, is not to bring back ‘everything’ from the old days, but rather to pick and choose those which make sense and are needed to make a fun, social, cooperative, and challenging game.
The old EQ model of just one single open world just wouldn't fly without an absolutely massive world with many redundant item copies throughout. I don't imagine items will suffer with the amount of incentive they are putting in to get them out of the economy, and with augmentation/enchants making items no-drop then most higher end drops will likely end up harder to buy than EQ so you will end up farming them yourself.
If VR puts it in the game, then yes it absolutely belongs here. This is their game and their vision as well as the fact they have more experience making MMOs than anyone else here.
Shards are literally multi-group instances, one cannot say that they are completely different. I guess the biggest factor to me is how many groups will be allowed per shard? It has to be at least 20, if not 30, or the world is going to feel very cheap. I really hope they only add shards in extreme cases.
Iksar said:Well it doesn't go against any of their listed tenets and is pretty much addressed at the beginning of the FAQ:
Pantheon is most definitely a modern MMO with modern graphics and new and exciting features and mechanics. There are already emulators out there that are clones of earlier MMOs and Visionary Realms has no desire to make another emulator. That said, we also feel that many of the features and mechanics of previous MMOs have been abandoned in more recent games, resulting in a less challenging, compelling, deep, and social experience. Pantheon, therefore, will indeed bring back some of these conventional mechanics and ideas but with a fresh perspective, some tweaks and revisions. We also understand that while gamers’ tastes don’t fundamentally change over time, their situations, lives, and responsibilities do. Likewise, some game mechanics often associated with earlier MMOs involved inordinate amounts of downtime, overly severe penalties, too much competition over content and resources, and even downright boring or overly repetitive gameplay. Our intention, therefore, is not to bring back ‘everything’ from the old days, but rather to pick and choose those which make sense and are needed to make a fun, social, cooperative, and challenging game.
The old EQ model of just one single open world just wouldn't fly without an absolutely massive world with many redundant item copies throughout. I don't imagine items will suffer with the amount of incentive they are putting in to get them out of the economy, and with augmentation/enchants making items no-drop then most higher end drops will likely end up harder to buy than EQ so you will end up farming them yourself.
Shards are going to get abused to hell, just like they always are. People are going to tip zones over to the shard population and then have free run in a brand new zone . Hey everyone, zone out and zone back into shard 17, there are only 3 people in there!
That sounds like great gameplay to me. Gag
Iksar said:Well it doesn't go against any of their listed tenets and is pretty much addressed at the beginning of the FAQ:
Pantheon is most definitely a modern MMO with modern graphics and new and exciting features and mechanics. There are already emulators out there that are clones of earlier MMOs and Visionary Realms has no desire to make another emulator. That said, we also feel that many of the features and mechanics of previous MMOs have been abandoned in more recent games, resulting in a less challenging, compelling, deep, and social experience. Pantheon, therefore, will indeed bring back some of these conventional mechanics and ideas but with a fresh perspective, some tweaks and revisions. We also understand that while gamers’ tastes don’t fundamentally change over time, their situations, lives, and responsibilities do. Likewise, some game mechanics often associated with earlier MMOs involved inordinate amounts of downtime, overly severe penalties, too much competition over content and resources, and even downright boring or overly repetitive gameplay. Our intention, therefore, is not to bring back ‘everything’ from the old days, but rather to pick and choose those which make sense and are needed to make a fun, social, cooperative, and challenging game.
The old EQ model of just one single open world just wouldn't fly without an absolutely massive world with many redundant item copies throughout. I don't imagine items will suffer with the amount of incentive they are putting in to get them out of the economy, and with augmentation/enchants making items no-drop then most higher end drops will likely end up harder to buy than EQ so you will end up farming them yourself.
If VR puts it in the game, then yes it absolutely belongs here. This is their game and their vision as well as the fact they have more experience making MMOs than anyone else here.
This is something i can agree and back up Iksar 100% we might not agree on everything like static/random spawns but this is something i will support everytime
Krixus said:Iksar said:Well it doesn't go against any of their listed tenets and is pretty much addressed at the beginning of the FAQ:
Pantheon is most definitely a modern MMO with modern graphics and new and exciting features and mechanics. There are already emulators out there that are clones of earlier MMOs and Visionary Realms has no desire to make another emulator. That said, we also feel that many of the features and mechanics of previous MMOs have been abandoned in more recent games, resulting in a less challenging, compelling, deep, and social experience. Pantheon, therefore, will indeed bring back some of these conventional mechanics and ideas but with a fresh perspective, some tweaks and revisions. We also understand that while gamers’ tastes don’t fundamentally change over time, their situations, lives, and responsibilities do. Likewise, some game mechanics often associated with earlier MMOs involved inordinate amounts of downtime, overly severe penalties, too much competition over content and resources, and even downright boring or overly repetitive gameplay. Our intention, therefore, is not to bring back ‘everything’ from the old days, but rather to pick and choose those which make sense and are needed to make a fun, social, cooperative, and challenging game.
The old EQ model of just one single open world just wouldn't fly without an absolutely massive world with many redundant item copies throughout. I don't imagine items will suffer with the amount of incentive they are putting in to get them out of the economy, and with augmentation/enchants making items no-drop then most higher end drops will likely end up harder to buy than EQ so you will end up farming them yourself.
Shards are going to get abused to hell, just like they always are. People are going to tip zones over to the shard population and then have free run in a brand new zone . Hey everyone, zone out and zone back into shard 17, there are only 3 people in there!
That sounds like great gameplay to me. Gag
I believe its the population of the server that determines if a new shard is popped not how many people are in a specific zone
I liked the system of sharding APW and lockouts on the overworld encounters on vanguard.
For me, I like cooperating with the fellow players against the npcs, not so much fighting against them in a competition to kill the npcs. That said I feel sharding could easily be exploited to basically create your own new instance. Lock out timers seem better to me, with shards being a last resort.
Okay i give Iksar you are kind of right on point 3 and in time people would figure it out and would only more than likely cause a bigger problem than static spawn, plus another thing i thought of is if only one could be up they could simply just lull him over and over again and make sure he doesnt get pulled by him all day if they wanted and never get a spawn up anywhere else. so in this manner you are correct.
It seems you have not played on EQ TLPs (Time Locked Progression) . I think that there must be a thread somewhere about the lessons from the EQs TLPs .
They use exactly the same system but they call it "pick" instead of "shard" .
The principle is that above a certain number of players in a zone (variable with the size, level of the zone), a copy is created automatically . The system introduced with the last TLP (Ragefire), appeared to be a HUGE success because it solved many problems with a single and simple concept .
1) The initial rush. During the first 2 weeks there were log in queues because it is impossible to predict how many players will appear at release . Imagine Greater Faydark with 300 people ! It would be unplayable and every single skeleton would be slaugheterd as soon as it spawns . This would be a very bad first impression and would deter many players to continue . But with this system, there were several copies of G Faydark (I think the limit population to create a new shard was 60 or something like that) so that every player could find a playable yet populated environment .
2) The toxic players. If you had a camp and would be trained, KSed and harassed by a toxic player, you could change the shard and get rid of him . If he followed and harassed you again, it was easy to flag him and report. It is one thing to say "nobody owns a camp" and quite another to follow somebody wherever he goes and to destroy his gaming fun . It significantly decreased the toxicity .
3) A shot at interesting camps. This one may be debatable but the experience showed that the result was positive . Some zones/camps have interesting loot and tend to be monopolised by "no lifers" 24/24 . Here however if a casual guild wanted to have a shot at that camp, they came with enough numbers to create a new shard and to take the camp in the new shard .
Of course not all zones could be duplicated . I seem to remember that the top level raid zones stayed open world , single "non shardable" zones . I think they changed that on the last TLP, Phinnigel by instancing (some) high level content too but as I didn't play on Phinnigel, don't quote me on that .