Should we really work our a**es off just to keep some of the settings we've tailored to our own needs over the years? And should we really lose all of our BP names as well, because "it can't be saved along with the merge"?
You guys at FunCom have the best possible insight into the way client-(prefs)-server communication works, so why can't you do it automatically along with the merge? It obviously is possible, just look around:
http://forums.anarchy-online.com/sho...3&postcount=20
http://forums.anarchy-online.com/sho...d.php?t=603454
Regular players have found a way to do it. Without even taking a peek into your "legacy" code.
And you would probably know how to do it automatically. Hell, when merging, just put an old CharID in a temp DB, compare it with the new one and run those scripts... voila!
As you said, there is only one chance to do this server merge without failing terribly. You should really consider saving character prefs as a "release-blocking" issue.