Population update year on year

Simon

Hey folks - Vanesyra's excellent site at www.excidio.net now includes a range of great graphs, etc., looking at balance (http://www.excidio.net/herald/stats/balance/). No need for me to do the full set of graphs. But just wanted to update on year on year character counts using the data from Vanesyra's site.

The graph below shows the population line for the last few years. This year started off promising, but has tailed off. Note this time last year we were in the middle of a Come Back to Camelot Campaign, which helped spike numbers a bit over the summer. No such boost this year so the summer is having a similar decline to what we saw in 2016. There is usually recovery over the summer, generally boosted by patches and Come Back to Camelot campaigns. Let's hope the same happens this year!

Population last week was down 29% on the same time last year and down 39% on the same period in 2016.

Staticc

Wow, in just 2.5 years the population has dropped by over half.... just under 9k to just over 4k....

Simon

Staticc wrote: »

Wow, in just 2.5 years the population has dropped by over half.... just under 9k to just over 4k....

Not really fair to compare different times of year - the population goes up and down by season. Summer is usually the low peak, which is why I tend to compare to the same period in previous years.

BurkleyRIP

Now let’s think of what occurred at these high peaks and try to replicate them. Your turn now BS

Simon

BurkleyRIP wrote: »

Now let’s think of what occurred at these high peaks and try to replicate them. Your turn now BS

basically it's mainly come back to camelot campaigns, rp bonuses, and patches!

i feel like there's a big patch with an rvr focus coming (but it might need a population to work...), which will probably coincide or precede a fall come back to camelot campaign, and i'm sure there will be an RP bonus in there somewhere.

long story short, i do expect the population to get a significant boost when all that comes along... depending on when the patch goes live. holidays are coming up so maybe soon?

Huehuaehue

thanks !

Staticc

Ok so if we take a direct correlation of March to July and compare 2016 to 2018. March 2016 we had appx 9k, in 2018, 6k. In March 2016, we had 6.5k, in 2018 we are at 4k. So I guess your right, its not a 50% drop, its only 30% and trending down at same rate. However in July 2016 it ticks back up, when is the new patch to get this ticket back up for this year?

Solicfear1

I fear that population will drop even further by the time this patch comes out. I mean we were hoping by fall that the Endless Conquest would come out to boost the server population a little but even that's not coming till next year now which is a disappointment.

We have **** 2 coming out soon and only in beta and maybe CU and I feel Broadsword are squandering this time to improve changes to both the PvE/RvR side. My fear Voldermort 2 will be better than the live servers and what I've seen of it so far has made me think of trying it out. So much of the content they are bringing out is what I loved!

I just don't see the live servers fun anymore!

Budikah

I've lost confidence and closed out my account for now. I'm having a blast PvEing mobs and just casually playing on a half-completed fan project rather than run around with the same stale action on EV night after night. Guess those 3fg~ of Mids are going to need to find a few other solos and duos to feed off of from now on.

Solicfear1

In my opinion I honestly think they need to start a fresh server. Ywain is just not DAoC, it's like seeing WoW and DAoC put together. I was dead against having WoW in DAoC but man the PvE is awful and I've mentioned this to Beib and they think the PvE is amazing. It's by far the worst implementation in DAoC history and sadly they won't listen to their player base that they would prefer to see nostalgia encounters than this buggy, pointless, headache, frustrating, random Campaign.

The sad thing is no player base will agree with me about the PvE side because everyone far to interested to get into RvR. However people forget that New/Returning players do have to do this PvE stuff and if they can't understand or get on a raid it discourages them. Everyone says well that's where leaders like myself come in but seriously a campaign that gives BG leaders headaches and can't even help a player if we haven't got grantcredit. I'm frustrated beyond belief and I'm really thinking of just stopping these PvE raids and just run RvR until Voldmort 2 comes out.

Solicfear1

Hell even RvR bad at the moment but I guess running a battlegroup on the weekend won't be to bad but I'm really thinking of pulling back my time for this game. Its lost!

BurkleyRIP

If they were smart they would have put in a minor patch with some changes, just to spark some interest. We haven’t had anything essentially since like Valentine’s Day. To some it might seem BS has abandoned us as they have had little to no action besides words and empty promises. Most assumed f2p or some aspect in the producers letters would have happened by now but to release absolutely nothing in 6 months is just unacceptable. I myself have cut my play time in half and am contemplating canceling my bot account since the little I do play I can just use supp pots for anyway. Please BS, put something out before you lose more people, even if just minor stuff, it will show good faith and possibly keep some of us addicts around hoping for more.

Stoertebecker

Budikah wrote: »

I've lost confidence and closed out my account for now. I'm having a blast PvEing mobs and just casually playing on a half-completed fan project rather than run around with the same stale action on EV night after night. Guess those 3fg~ of Mids are going to need to find a few other solos and duos to feed off of from now on.

The problem is that the freeshards die faster as they were build up, on live i have all my toons...from release til today. I´d stop playing DAoC at all before i go back to a freeshard, but i would start over on a new live server.

Budikah

Stoertebecker wrote: »

Budikah wrote: »

I've lost confidence and closed out my account for now. I'm having a blast PvEing mobs and just casually playing on a half-completed fan project rather than run around with the same stale action on EV night after night. Guess those 3fg~ of Mids are going to need to find a few other solos and duos to feed off of from now on.

The problem is that the freeshards die faster as they were build up, on live i have all my toons...from release til today. I´d stop playing DAoC at all before i go back to a freeshard, but i would start over on a new live server.

To some people that is part of the fun. I don't mind if I don't have ten years of holdings. A fresh start brings new things, people come and go, those on top get tossed back into the shuffle. Some people love it, others clearly hate it.

Current DAoC live in like some bloated corpse. Bloated power creep on items. Bloated economy. Bloated RP's/RR's. It feels like it's lost it's meaning and has become a subpar version of the idea that made it special in the first place.

Essentially, all my stuff on live isn't worth a damn if there is nobody to play against in my timeslot. Only so much running around you can do. Late night PST is always low pop - so when famine hits, you feel it even harder.

Amadeus

Ty for the graph simon !

I just found out that granks has a lot of weekly statistics too, so if anyone is only looking for the weekly stuff it might be worth to check their site too https://www.granks.com/daoc/statistics

I really hope that the population goes up with the next patch, as mentioned above those summer drops were always countered with an Event or even a patch, so it is about time for one of those I guess

Stoertebecker

Budikah wrote: »

Stoertebecker wrote: »

Budikah wrote: »

I've lost confidence and closed out my account for now. I'm having a blast PvEing mobs and just casually playing on a half-completed fan project rather than run around with the same stale action on EV night after night. Guess those 3fg~ of Mids are going to need to find a few other solos and duos to feed off of from now on.

The problem is that the freeshards die faster as they were build up, on live i have all my toons...from release til today. I´d stop playing DAoC at all before i go back to a freeshard, but i would start over on a new live server.

To some people that is part of the fun. I don't mind if I don't have ten years of holdings. A fresh start brings new things, people come and go, those on top get tossed back into the shuffle. Some people love it, others clearly hate it.

After 3 toons to 50, you know where...sorry, there isn`t anything new. Even on a fresh new server there will be nothing new, but i would prefer a new live-server. It would be simply fair to returning and new players 'if' f2p kicks in, and it would be full.Currently playing ppl would still have Ywain, or they join the fun....

BurkleyRIP

Honestly I’d quit if I had to old school grind to 50 as I do not have the time, much like a lot of others I’m sure. With an older population of players, a lot of the time we had during original release when we were mostly in our 20’s is gone to real jobs and families.

Everz_aka_Sam

Fresh server, a progression server.

Save live by doing that, don’t be fools otherwise.

Solicfear1

BurkleyRIP wrote: »

Honestly I’d quit if I had to old school grind to 50 as I do not have the time, much like a lot of others I’m sure. With an older population of players, a lot of the time we had during original release when we were mostly in our 20’s is gone to real jobs and families.

[edited]

Stoertebecker

BurkleyRIP wrote: »

Honestly I’d quit if I had to old school grind to 50 as I do not have the time, much like a lot of others I’m sure. With an older population of players, a lot of the time we had during original release when we were mostly in our 20’s is gone to real jobs and families.

There were different stages for xping-speed. The speed on Gareth/Lamorak was ok, imho.

Muylae

i have two characters that are just weeks away from rr 13, a reset and i'm out. that would be the worst thing that happened to me in 30 years of gaming.

tald

Muylae wrote: »

i have two characters that are just weeks away from rr 13, a reset and i'm out. that would be the worst thing that happened to me in 30 years of gaming.

I agree, resets lose more than they gain.

But i didn't see anyone mention reset, a fresh server isn't a reset and whilst some may think it will split the population - it would probably bring more people back and have limited effect on the ywain core. Obviously a fresh server would need to be semi targetted at the huge player base that is missing and the reasons they are missing.

Fateboi

Best way to implement a reset would be a limited duration Ladder or Season like In POE.

Season could last say 3-6 months and limited to say Classsic. New toons only and once finished would dump them back into Ywain.

This aligns with not gutting Ywain, gives you classic progression, injects new players who play and pay for DAOC.

Stoertebecker

I think i know enough ppl that would play classic from....somewhere....but they don`t want to play Ywain, not after 3,6 or 12 month. Some would play if it is f2p, but 15$/Month for Ywain..after some time? Nope.

Staticc

I personally do not see a seasons type system, similar to Diablo being looked on favorably by anyone in game atm.

Fateboi

Just offering up a viable alternative idea. They won’t technically be on Ywain because they are Ladder/Season. You also now get the new toons/reset/classic progression or even Mordred play you desire.
John said they will never gut Ywain this will at the end inject them back into Cluster after the season ends.

Don’t wanna be play Ywain great let your sub drop until next Season starts. If you wanna stick around and pay and play even better welcome home.

GL

returningplayer

being a returning player I thought I'd throw in my 2 cents. returning players have a difficult time in this game. people dont openly group with returning players in 8mans. so if ur on at a time with no bg zerg up u have no choice but to log or go feed all the stealthers hanging out at maze /boxes.

heaven forbid if you unknowningly rolled a class that isnt desired for the main game meta.. people exile you so fast regardless if your a guildy or not.

the bottom line is no one enjoys playing a game which stomps on ur face because ur new/returning for an extended period of time. My gutt feel is the community needs to change if they want this game to stay alive. there also needs to be something in place to encourage more grouping between various classes/rr levels.

i have played on all three realms so far and found midgard is the worst for these atrributes while hib is the least for these attributes.

Stoertebecker

Fateboi wrote: »

John said they will never gut Ywain ......

Maybe good ol John is wrong with his concept and thoughts for f2p. New/returning players are not going to play cannon fodder for all the rr10/11+ veterans for long, not with alternatives around. The pool of potential players isn`t endless, and f2p isn`t even around the corner

BurkleyRIP

F2p will flop. They’re better off coming up with ways to get players to return/stay. Trying to get new players to this old game will probably get similar results to those jehovas witnesses who knock on the door at the ass crack of dawn on a Saturday. You might convert 1 or 2 but 99% aren’t interested.

returningplayer

this is the same scenario warhammer online was in shortly before they brought servers down. returning/new players wont stay to be constantly farmed. the elites would scream they need to earn it like they did. thats probably why the return player campaigns dont work.

they need to look at the game in ways to level the playing field between returning and long time players and skip the f2p model. f2p will not keep players it will just bring a bunch in and they will leave because of the same issue.