145 replies to this topic

[Khalija]

Update for those wanting to know how guild influence works as you guest on other worlds:

Quote

[...] You still get influence for your home world guild when you are guesting.

Source.

[Minion]

So incredibly disappointing that I still can't play with the fifteen US server-based friends on my contacts list. I didn't give a toss about Guesting apart from that very reason, and it's still not a reality.

[leongrado]

Gilles VI, on 17 January 2013 - 10:12 AM, said:

• Gemstore is there because GW2 is a muuuuch bigger game than GW1.

Let's say that it's an agreed fact that GW2 is bigger than GW1. Why does it need a gemstore? Because it takes more money to maintain and develop? Does $180 million not pay for that? I thought Arenanet's philosophy was expansions. If you like the game then you buy expansions to support the game. Not taking gold away from people because they don't want to walk 15 minutes from point A to B. Gold sinks make sense but I feel they are put into the wrong areas. Would've made sense if they made cosmetic items cost a lot at vendors. Not charging people for retraiting, map traveling, and repairing. Stuff that was free in the first game(except repairing) that made the first game so appealing(and fun).

Edited by leongrado, 17 January 2013 - 08:56 PM.

[Gilles VI]

leongrado, on 17 January 2013 - 08:55 PM, said:

Let's say that it's an agreed fact that GW2 is bigger than GW1. Why does it need a gemstore? Because it takes more money to maintain and develop? Does $180 million not pay for that? I thought Arenanet's philosophy was expansions. If you like the game then you buy expansions to support the game. Not taking gold away from people because they don't want to walk 15 minutes from point A to B. Gold sinks make sense but I feel they are put into the wrong areas. Would've made sense if they made cosmetic items cost a lot at vendors. Not charging people for retraiting, map traveling, and repairing. Stuff that was free in the first game(except repairing) that made the first game so appealing(and fun).

• It's a fact that GW2 is muuch bigger than GW1, GW1 was made with what? 50 people max? While GW2 has 250+ people working on it?
  
• GW1 released all 4 boxes within 2,5 years I think? Maybe 3 year?
  They stated multiple times they want to take much more time for their expansions now, and not get an influx of cash every 6 months because of an expansion.
  This combined with point 1 makes for a much bigger amount of money needed for maintenance.
  
• Gold sinks are necessary to drain money from economy, and good money sinks are stuff that is used regularly.
  Should they remove all current money sinks, and just add some very expensive armor, it would be much less effective.
  
• Yes it was free in GW1, but the inflation was pretty steep, this was countered by making armor available for a fixed price on merchants, but other than that?
  Howmany goodlooking weapons could you buy under 100k + x amount of ectos?

[Barbieslayer]

borovnica, on 16 January 2013 - 09:35 PM, said:

We did have 5 months of free server transfers... so it's your own fault if you choose "bad" server... But I would like to say one thing, home server will only feel "home" if you make it on your own. What I mean by that is to try and meet people on your own server and get to know them, that is how you build healthy community. I'm on gunnar's and I met a lot of people, and after 5 months, Gunnar's Hold really feel like a home to me, and I'm enjoying community there, a lot of mature and nice people, good organized WvW even when our number rank among lowest PvE and WvW wise.

Try not to take what I said personaly and realise there are more than a million active accounts.  I'm sure you would like to think you speak for everyone, but I doubt that's the case.  If the idea of goodwill bothers you guys so much why not state your reasons for not likeing the idea, rather than hidding behind an assumed social norm where players are at fault if the dynamic of their sever changes.

A free transfer takes away the worry of being stuck while not actualy doing anything.  I'm sure most woulden't ever use it, but would always be there for them.  And giving a one-off every now and then would probably do more for gem sales for World transfer than not.  But I'm glad this is just a hypothetical...

I read a post, give my impressions off the top of my head, and all a couple of you can think about is what I said?  Why don't you grow your own opinion on the topic if you want to join in, but please don't assume I give a *.

[borovnica]

Barbieslayer, on 17 January 2013 - 10:16 PM, said:

Try not to take what I said personaly and realise there are more than a million active accounts.  I'm sure you would like to think you speak for everyone, but I doubt that's the case.  If the idea of goodwill bothers you guys so much why not state your reasons for not likeing the idea, rather than hidding behind an assumed social norm where players are at fault if the dynamic of their sever changes.

A free transfer takes away the worry of being stuck while not actualy doing anything.  I'm sure most woulden't ever use it, but would always be there for them.  And giving a one-off every now and then would probably do more for gem sales for World transfer than not.  But I'm glad this is just a hypothetical...

I read a post, give my impressions off the top of my head, and all a couple of you can think about is what I said?  Why don't you grow your own opinion on the topic if you want to join in, but please don't assume I give a *.

Let's keep it civil. No need for offensive language, after all you are talking to another man who you never met. I'm sorry if you feel offended somehow. No need for knee jerk reaction. Like I sadi, with guessting system even if you don't enjoy your server you can guest  on other servers, if you really feel that you made a mistake than pay with gem and transfer to another server, we don't know what price of the transfer is. And like I said we had more than enough time to choose our server. WvW is important part of the game to me and I don't speak in the name of all players on my server, but all players that play WvW  think that paying for server transfer is a good thing.
I also think it will help foster better server community, that way WvW becomes even more meaningfull, and this is my opinion.

[surfboar]

Seems like a lot of fuss for realistic wind blowing.

[draxynnic]

shanaeri rynale, on 17 January 2013 - 05:59 PM, said:

I think all people are asking is for Arenanet to step up to the plate and try again and implement guesting.. when it’s ready

Hold up. Guesting being implemented between worlds in the same region is still infinitely better than what we have now. I'd much rather it be implemented as it is than not implemented at all.

However, I really don't buy into the idea that there's no way to allow people to play in both regions. The explanation is one of characters being stored on one region or another... the simplest way to account for that would be to do what Diablo 3 does. Your license gives you access to an account on NA and an account on EU which have the same login details and player ID, but are otherwise separate accounts, with their own character slots, banks, guild memberships, and so on. Yes, it will mean you have to build up your accounts separately and that will be it's own hassle, but it's a darn sight better than a "Thou shalt not", no?

[Daniel Frozenwind]

Well that's effectively cut off half the community from large community in-game events.

It's also cut off half of my US friends from being able to play with me.

How disappointing.

[Lordkrall]

Daniel Frozenwind, on 18 January 2013 - 04:57 PM, said:

Well that's effectively cut off half the community from large community in-game events.

It's also cut off half of my US friends from being able to play with me.

How disappointing.

And why can't these "large community in-game events" be mirrored in both regions?
It wouldn't be possible for every single player to guest to a single server to join that event anyway, so I don't really see how that is more of a problem than it is now.

They can play with you, they simply have to transfer to this region.

[Daniel Frozenwind]

Lordkrall, on 18 January 2013 - 05:04 PM, said:

And why can't these "large community in-game events" be mirrored in both regions?
It wouldn't be possible for every single player to guest to a single server to join that event anyway, so I don't really see how that is more of a problem than it is now.

They can play with you, they simply have to transfer to this region.

Why? Because that takes considerable logistics and managing that without being able to be there to shape loses much of it's quality.

It's true every single player couldn't join that server, however it wouldn't be every single player, just a chunk of the community that wants to turn up.

And that's the point, it's a problem full stop, either way you look at it.

Of course they can transfer to this region, for a price. That, and the fact they themselves have guild's of there own based in servers in the NA data center.

Edited by Daniel Frozenwind, 18 January 2013 - 05:13 PM.

[Mockingjay74]

draxynnic, on 18 January 2013 - 01:45 AM, said:

Hold up. Guesting being implemented between worlds in the same region is still infinitely better than what we have now. I'd much rather it be implemented as it is than not implemented at all.

However, I really don't buy into the idea that there's no way to allow people to play in both regions. The explanation is one of characters being stored on one region or another... the simplest way to account for that would be to do what Diablo 3 does. Your license gives you access to an account on NA and an account on EU which have the same login details and player ID, but are otherwise separate accounts, with their own character slots, banks, guild memberships, and so on. Yes, it will mean you have to build up your accounts separately and that will be it's own hassle, but it's a darn sight better than a "Thou shalt not", no?

Not to mention that guesting isn't even in the game yet. Its release was pushed back due to issues they had, so what is there to say that they didn't originally design it to work between regions? Maybe that's what didn't work, or one of the things that didn't work. Guesting might eventually become inter-regional once they work on it more.

Daniel Frozenwind, on 18 January 2013 - 04:57 PM, said:

Well that's effectively cut off half the community from large community in-game events.

It's also cut off half of my US friends from being able to play with me.

How disappointing.

How have they cut off half the community? Guesting isn't anything different from what is available in the game now. Most large events will have "back up" or overflow events on other servers other than their main one. Look at how Pink Day in LA was run this October, there were many servers participating and each had the same events. In-game events, whether they are run by communities like Guru or ArenaNet themselves, will usually have the appropriate set of servers. ANet wouldn't be stupid enough to actually cut off half the community like that; as a matter of fact, they would probably install events akin to the type of event I believe you are getting at on each server, not just one main server per region. You might be familiar with "The Great Tyrian Adventure" happening on the Sanctum of Rall server. I can guarantee that there are similar events hosted on European servers that players on US servers are unable to access, and vice versa. Again, nothing is truly changing in this accord except for the fact that US players will be able to play with more US players and EU players will be able to play with more EU players.

Again, this is no different than servers were before guesting, aka right now in this very moment.

[Daniel Frozenwind]

Mockingjay74, on 22 January 2013 - 11:29 PM, said:

Answered your points as best I can.

How have they cut off half the community?

European players cant play with NA server players.

Guesting isn't anything different from what is available in the game now.

Yes, that is the problem. It doesn't alleviate the issue of not being able to play across the Europe/North American divide.

Most large events will have "back up" or overflow events on other servers other than their main one.

That is true, however when event staff cannot be in a place, it kind of nulls the point of hosting an event no?

Look at how Pink Day in LA was run this October, there were many servers participating and each had the same events.

I am highly aware how Pink Day in LA was run. However what works for one community event, does not necessarily mean it will work for a different event model.

ANet wouldn't be stupid enough to actually cut off half the community like that; as a matter of fact, they would probably install events akin to the type of event I believe you are getting at on each server, not just one main server per region.

The fact is they have cut off half a community, if you have American buddies and you live in England, you tell me how I can play with them without out paying a fee.

Also how can Arenanet install something that is community run? It cant exactly be automated otherwise it would be run by Anet, not there fans.


You might be familiar with "The Great Tyrian Adventure" happening on the Sanctum of Rall server. I can guarantee that there are similar events hosted on European servers that players on US servers are unable to access, and vice versa.

That is a problem. Why should they not be allowed to take part in community ventures?

Again, nothing is truly changing in this accord except for the fact that US players will be able to play with more US players and EU players will be able to play with more EU players.

It's better than nothing, true.

[Mockingjay74]

Daniel Frozenwind, on 23 January 2013 - 02:50 AM, said:

How have they cut off half the community?

European players cant play with NA server players.

Guesting isn't anything different from what is available in the game now.

Yes, that is the problem. It doesn't alleviate the issue of not being able to play across the Europe/North American divide.

Most large events will have "back up" or overflow events on other servers other than their main one.

That is true, however when event staff cannot be in a place, it kind of nulls the point of hosting an event no?

Look at how Pink Day in LA was run this October, there were many servers participating and each had the same events.

I am highly aware how Pink Day in LA was run. However what works for one community event, does not necessarily mean it will work for a different event model.

ANet wouldn't be stupid enough to actually cut off half the community like that; as a matter of fact, they would probably install events akin to the type of event I believe you are getting at on each server, not just one main server per region.

The fact is they have cut off half a community, if you have American buddies and you live in England, you tell me how I can play with them without out paying a fee.

Also how can Arenanet install something that is community run? It cant exactly be automated otherwise it would be run by Anet, not there fans.


You might be familiar with "The Great Tyrian Adventure" happening on the Sanctum of Rall server. I can guarantee that there are similar events hosted on European servers that players on US servers are unable to access, and vice versa.

That is a problem. Why should they not be allowed to take part in community ventures?

Again, nothing is truly changing in this accord except for the fact that US players will be able to play with more US players and EU players will be able to play with more EU players.

It's better than nothing, true.

Just organizing by numbered lists - attempting to unleash the OCD!

1. This already happens. Once you're on a server, you can't play with people in other regions.

2. Like I said, guesting hasn't even actually come out yet and I'm sure they'll improve on it later on. However, I feel like the demographic that guesting was designed for isn't worrying about inter-regional guesting yet. If it's that major of an issue, people can just transfer now while it's still free.

3. When would event staff be unable to be in the designated location? Poorly planned events? xD

4. The two examples were separate. People are expected to transfer if it's that important to them.

5. They are allowed to do so, again, if they so desire. They just have to transfer to a different server. *shrug*

[Daniel Frozenwind]

Mockingjay74, on 23 January 2013 - 03:20 AM, said:

Just organizing by numbered lists - attempting to unleash the OCD!

1. Yup.

2. Yup..

3. No. It has nothing to do with how well planned an event is.

Plans can certainly be made to accommodate multiple servers in both regions, indeed it has happened and will happen again.

The point I am trying to make here is that if certain staff members need to flick between places out of necessity, they cannot. The more you disperse your staff the less rich the experience. I know this.

4. People are expected to transfer if it's that important to them.  This isn't directed at you, but this is wrong. People are expected to pick a select group of people at the cost of the rest of there friends/guilds/associates. This doesn't agree with me, personally.

5. Yup, for a price.

Edited by Daniel Frozenwind, 23 January 2013 - 03:35 AM.

[draxynnic]

2. People who have friends across the Guild Wars community are going to have a hard time getting everyone they know into one region. Whichever side of the immenent paywall divide such people choose to put themselves, they're going to end up with people on the other side.

5: The transfer price isn't exactly peanuts. I think they were talking about 2000 gems to transfer to a highly populated server - that works out to $25 if paid for in real money. Do that more than twice, and you might as well just buy a second account if not for the inconvenience of having two sets of login details and the loss of HoM stuff on your second account. In gold terms, it's about 32 gold to get that many gems - that's no inconsequential sum, and while event organisers are unlikely to be poor, they tend not to be the kind of people who spend their days grinding the most lucrative content over and over again either. While potential event participants may well be poor.

Now, let's be fair - the proposed system is, in most cases, still better than the current one of free transfers, but only once a week. However, I'd like to see some sort of stopgap brought in so people can temporarily jump across the Atlantic without it costing $50 or the equivalent of ingame currency to do so.

[Daniel Frozenwind]

Well said draxynnic.

[Lady Rhonwyn]

draxynnic, on 23 January 2013 - 04:11 AM, said:

5: The transfer price isn't exactly peanuts. I think they were talking about 2000 gems to transfer to a highly populated server - that works out to $25 if paid for in real money. Do that more than twice, and you might as well just buy a second account if not for the inconvenience of having two sets of login details and the loss of HoM stuff on your second account.

Hmm, good point... Maybe I should get that second account and put that on a NA server...  The HoM inconvenience is no inconvenience for me, as I do have a second full HoM....

[The Comfy Chair]

draxynnic, on 23 January 2013 - 04:11 AM, said:

2. People who have friends across the Guild Wars community are going to have a hard time getting everyone they know into one region. Whichever side of the immenent paywall divide such people choose to put themselves, they're going to end up with people on the other side.

5: The transfer price isn't exactly peanuts. I think they were talking about 2000 gems to transfer to a highly populated server - that works out to $25 if paid for in real money. Do that more than twice, and you might as well just buy a second account if not for the inconvenience of having two sets of login details and the loss of HoM stuff on your second account. In gold terms, it's about 32 gold to get that many gems - that's no inconsequential sum, and while event organisers are unlikely to be poor, they tend not to be the kind of people who spend their days grinding the most lucrative content over and over again either. While potential event participants may well be poor.

Now, let's be fair - the proposed system is, in most cases, still better than the current one of free transfers, but only once a week. However, I'd like to see some sort of stopgap brought in so people can temporarily jump across the Atlantic without it costing $50 or the equivalent of ingame currency to do so.

Maybe they'll add it over time, it just depends on how fundamental the problem is when it comes to the server architecture. If the NA/EU data centre basically have no real links beyond chat functionality, it may be difficult to add that post launch. But in the end i didn't make their servers, and how it's set up isn't exactly public knowledge (fairly sure their patents are for the streaming updates to prevent downtime, i don't think they have any patents for overall server architecture, and that only applied to GW1 anyway mostly)

Edited by The Comfy Chair, 23 January 2013 - 09:46 AM.

[shanaeri rynale]

The Comfy Chair, on 23 January 2013 - 09:43 AM, said:

Maybe they'll add it over time, it just depends on how fundamental the problem is when it comes to the server architecture. If the NA/EU data centre basically have no real links beyond chat functionality, it may be difficult to add that post launch. But in the end i didn't make their servers, and how it's set up isn't exactly public knowledge (fairly sure their patents are for the streaming updates to prevent downtime, i don't think they have any patents for overall server architecture, and that only applied to GW1 anyway mostly)

We know the state of the links between the datacentres. As they can quite adequatley transfer an account from DC A to DC B right now.

The statement they made does not add up both logically and technically. For example. What kind of best in class architecture for a global audience gets worse the further people are away from a datacentre? This being the case why allow Ocenanic and Asia players to connect to the NA datacentres and not have a third hosted in that region?

If performance is so bad they can't let guesting happen how come they allowed people from the US roll on EU servers and vice vesa in the first place. Why even let people transfer there if their experience are going to be so poor especially when since they have transferred to a server their experience is more permanent than it would be had they guested?

There have been a number of suggestions on the official forums as to how they could get guesting between regions working without having to touch a single peice of hardware.

I.e the mechanics are all there right now, the changes required are all inside the game code.

I suspect this is one of those things like hairdressers and reconnects that Anet said were impossible but given some time to think and the go ahead from management made it work anyway.

Edited by shanaeri rynale, 23 January 2013 - 10:04 AM.

[Lordkrall]

But we don't KNOW how the transfer works. It is quite likely that two exact copies of a specific account can't exist at both data centers at once.
When you transfer from a EU server to a NA server you delete the data from the EU server upon completion of the copy to the NA server. Thus it is possible to do that transfer.
When you guest however you only copy the account, but don't remove the original version.

[shanaeri rynale]

Lordkrall, on 23 January 2013 - 10:05 AM, said:

But we don't KNOW how the transfer works. It is quite likely that two exact copies of a specific account can't exist at both data centers at once.
When you transfer from a EU server to a NA server you delete the data from the EU server upon completion of the copy to the NA server. Thus it is possible to do that transfer.
When you guest however you only copy the account, but don't remove the original version.

yes I get that As far as I can work out, the only things stopping that from being how the guesting system works are:
WvW (seperate your WvW server choice from the server you reside on)
The economy (restrict gathering and certain world drops from your non home server)
Perhaps Bandwidth (give a cool down on server transfers, perhaps even sell cooldown reductions from the gemstore)

All of which can be solved within the game code and many people have suggested how this could happen on the official forums.

My point being is that the basic mechanics are already there and that stuff they previously said was impossible they found a way to.

What we don't know is the willingness or timescales for investigating these suggestions or if they are prepared to change the way certain things work to get this implemented.

I.e is it important enough for them to try again from a different angle.

[Lordkrall]

But that is just the thing. It is not something that can easily be solved within the game code. Not without completely reworking how the whole server system is set up, and that takes both loads of time and loads of money.

It is not as easy as people seems to think.

Edited by shanaeri rynale, 23 January 2013 - 11:51 AM.

[The Comfy Chair]

shanaeri rynale, on 23 January 2013 - 10:01 AM, said:

ample. What kind of best in class architecture for a global audience gets worse the further people are away from a datacentre?

Maybe i'm reading this question wrong or it's been worded badly: but any datacentre which relies on physics. So, all of them. At the speed of light the time it takes to send a signal to seattle is far longer than the time it sends for me to send one to brighton (which i'm just guessing that's where the EU datacentre is seeing that's one of Anet's offices i think). Come back to me when someone fixes that, because that team will deserve a noble prize for achieving FTL data transmissions. It'd also be just generally exciting for all of science and by extension humanity. Anet are a bunch of good developers, sure, but somehow i don't think they're the most brilliant scientific minds of the 21st century so far. So they can't do any better than speed of light transmissions

I don't see any fundamental reason for not having one datacentre other than the fact US and Europe is 'where the money is' so they likely wanted seperate server clusters for each because 200ms ping is a LOT in GW2*. Unfortunately the server cluster architectures don't seem to play ball well for simultaneous play. Transferring is easy, i can copy a game to another computer no problem, but i can't wield both of those computers to power the same game using the same data in sync. It's a ridiculously simplified analogy, sure, but somewhat relevant. Remember that GW1 was just a load of instances really, so it may have been much simpler to handle.

In the end, you can't argue monetisation (note, i didn't suggest you did, it's a 'this would be only other reason other than genuine technical ones') or anything such as that as a reason either, since the transfers were free when the restrictions on player movements (no guesting) would have been far more 'profitable'. So there is obviously some technical reason that we don't know about because we didn't make their server architecture. Theory crafting is all well and good, but this is like a discussion about what red is amongst people who've never been able to see.

Note that it'd be nice to be able to guest to NA, and i've nothing against the idea, but we have no idea of the complexity that would entail. Considering Anet haven't exactly made a copy-paste game, i somehow don't think they mind shying away from complexity, but if it's something fundamental with the servers, what can they do? **

*and remember, GW2 is a primarily NA and european game with pretty equal weighting for each, you don't want to give half of your playerbase a mediocre connection in a game like this where timing is important. 200ms can easily be the difference between me being able to hit an attunement swap to apply protection and get my blast finishing dodge roll for a nice 2.5k area heal, bleed and cripple, or just missing it entirely and only apply protection.

** second edit, sorry, i tend to build up posts over time: Obviously we could say 'just do what happened before with world transfers but call it guesting!' But again, we don't know the ramifications of the move. It may be even more complex to add the restrictions to WvW and set up a moved player as a 'guest' than it would be to work on making the data centres sync up! As a software developer myself (financial industry, rather boring, but y'know, coding is coding), i know what it's like when someone says 'oh, can you do this? it seems like an easy change!' and knowing that it really really isn't anything close to being simple despite appearances.

Edited by The Comfy Chair, 23 January 2013 - 11:26 AM.

[shanaeri rynale]

Lordkrall, on 23 January 2013 - 10:29 AM, said:

But that is just the thing. It is not something that can easily be solved within the game code. Not without completely reworking how the whole server system is set up, and that takes both loads of time and loads of money.

It is not as easy as people seems to think.

If I may ask, did you read any of the suggestions people have made on the official forum? Most of them seem very do-able, assuming ofc that Anet use modular code based libraries rather than hard coded conditions which would need to be changed each time.

@comfy

My comment was a semi-sarcastic view of the way they seem to have set things up because if I read the statement right lag and unpredictable gameplay is a real issue for them (welcome to the internet). This being the case i'm amazed other games and commerical companies manage it at all on less money and less staff

This being the case and lag and quality of service being so poor it's stopping guesting (from the ZAM interview) then why allow people from one region to even create an account on another. Surely it's going to be worse for them as any lag etc will be ruining their game all the time rather than for a few hours when they guest. If QoS is so important, then would'nt it be better to stop cross region play at all?

Why not just let people choose. I've seen the argument that Anet don't want people moaning at them for lag and thats kinda understandable. But, just like in GW1 people would accept it as part of the price you paid for wandering to a different region.

Coming from a software backgound i'm sure you'll know you can do a heck of a lot to resolve issues by software  without even needing to touch a single server or switch. Your views on the various proposals put forward by people on the official suggestion forums would be good too.

So yes we don't know the precise details, what we can do is say 'Hang on that does'nt seem to fit, or that seems a really odd/daft way of doing things' and postulate how they can be improved. I rarely accept a 'Because it is' statement from any company. My usual reply is 'Why is it?, what are you doing to make it better? Have you tried X?' Yes it makes me an awkward so and so, but companies (and governments) so often use spin and deflection to detract from issues I think it's a sensible sort of awkward. An accepting sheep I am not

I suspect the guesting design teams were given a brief with technical (you cant add any more hardware), gameplay (WvW is a sacred cow and cannot be touched) and commercial (you have this much budget and no more)and this is the best they could do given those rules.

What i'm saying(and many others judging by the size of the posts around the net, guild chats and talk between players) is that in GW1 we were told Reconnects were'nt possible due to server architecture, Account restorations and hairdressers were impossible due to the databases using blob structures and yet by changing the parameters and rules. Plus a passion for the community and game these all happened.

That being the case. Prove how community focussed you are and go back with fresh eyes look at how the guesting system works, throw away the rulebook and try again.

Edited by shanaeri rynale, 23 January 2013 - 12:27 PM.

[draxynnic]

Lordkrall, on 23 January 2013 - 10:29 AM, said:

But that is just the thing. It is not something that can easily be solved within the game code. Not without completely reworking how the whole server system is set up, and that takes both loads of time and loads of money.

It is not as easy as people seems to think.

If nothing else, here's a simple answer that requires no cross-server communication at all:

Give people a second account on the opposite datacentre tied to the first, possibly as an account upgrade that is paid for with gems (like extra character slots or the Digital Deluxe upgrade). From the character select screen, players can choose to switch to their NA account or their EU account, each of which has its own selection of characters, its own bank, and is, well, completely independent from the other apart from login details and HoM linking. It'd mean people would have to level characters on both datacentres, but it'd mean they can play with people in both regions and hey, it's better than having to pay four thousand gems each time you want to switch regions.

Blizzard does it with Diablo 3, after all. If they figure out a way to make it work, then they can merge the accounts, but having a stopgap in place is still quite a bit better than nothing at all.