Zeidan

I might still have this script from my old aeRO server. Shoot me a PM if you still need it.

Most of what you mentioned can easily be purchased. Once you're established, the only thing you really need is a GM Team. If your server has a lot of players, you can't be online 24/7 to answer all their questions. I personally managed a successful server with a friend a few years ago, and we both had very limited knowledge at the time. RO scripting is easy to learn, and modifying scripts and understanding the logic behind them really isn't hard. If you have at least some knowledge in the fields you mentioned, you'll be able to run a server by your own. You'll learn new stuff along the way as well. You don't have to be a master in every one of those fields when starting out.

I agree with a lot of what people here are saying, but the problem is, it's hard to learn how to successfully manage a server if you never make one public. I think many admins from the popular servers have gotten to where they are by trial and error. Yes, you can run a server on your machine, read guides and so on, but that's just not the same as making a server public and gaining real experience. It's much easier to find bugs and to learn how to fix them when you actually have players reporting them. I think at the end, it's the people that play on those obviously mismanaged servers that are at fault.

I've tried Frantech and a few other "cheap" hosting companies and I suggest you stay away from them. They're constantly getting attacked & have random "migration" processes which results in your server being down for a while. There's even a host that lost my files once; good thing I had a backup. If you really want a successful server, I suggest you pay for a good host. The last one I ended up using was a bit pricier than the others, but they were incredibly reliable. It's really worth the extra bucks to avoid the headaches you get when your server is constantly down. If you want their website, send me a PM. I'm not gonna post it here because I don't know if it's "legal" to advertise.

Yeah, frequent updates and promotions are important, especially when the server population is not too high. My players often complained that there was nothing to do. Good to know there's an old aeRO player here. What was your char name?

Nostalgia or simply love for the game? I mean, I could play almost any game with my computer's specs but I'm not really interested in any except RO.

Some of you might know me from the old aeRO server, where I was once a pretty well-known player. After the server suddenly died I recreated it with a friend so that the old community had a place to play; kind of like this forum I guess. Anyways, the server was going great and during it's prime time it had a bit over 400 players online on average. We ended up getting hacked by the guy in charge of our website. During our downtime, someone created a server using the "aeRO" name as well. Many of our players, who were unaware of what was happening, migrated there. Since then it kept going downhill until we eventually decided to close the server. Fast forward a year, after much request, we decided to recreate it. Things were going well the first weeks. We were at about 70 players online on average which I think was good considering how long we were open for. A few weeks later, people seemed to lose interest. Many ended up quitting and the players online average kept dropping until it reached the 10~20 range. New players were rare. Donations weren't coming in so after a while, we could no longer pay the server fees. We had no choice but to close, again. Now, feeling a bit nostalgic, I am wondering: Are private servers still worth making? With Ragnarok being an old game (that is now free), is it still possible to create successful servers? I think a big part of the initial success of my old server was the timing and the name. aeRO had died and the old players of the community (myself included) were looking for a new server to play. That made it easy to gain players at first. I believe the hardest thing when creating a new server is establishing a "starting community". Potential players will be reluctant to join a server that only has 5 persons online, so the beginning phase of a server's creation is the hardest. The reason I ask all this is because I'm thinking of creating a server from scratch. New name, new start. I'm just wondering if it's even worth it or possible to gain lots of players starting from scratch. I would like to know your opinions, and if anyone is willing to help with my idea, feel free to send me a private message. Thanks for taking the time to read this as well. It's a bit of an introduction too, I guess. P.S. Any old aeRO players around here?