Why the Delay for Euro Merges?

If you are on Splitpaw or Runnyeye, Innovation or Valor, Rothgar has provided the reasoning for why your server merges are delayed until after the new year:

The EU servers need database upgrades and these have to happen before we do the merge. [Further] we take holidays here in the U.S. too and many people will be gone starting next week. We have a company wide “freeze” near the end of December where we don’t do any major maintenance or hardware work so as not to risk outtages for the holiday when people are on vacation.

We’re already pushing it with the U.S. servers but the sooner we get them done the sooner we can do the non U.S servers when we return from Christmas.