Concerning Websites showing Server Population Graphs

[Goretzu]

how can you show a trend when they moved the benchmarks a 1/3 of the way thru the data collection? It doesnt make sense

 

Because so long as it's not done constantly it's still pretty easy to account for it.

 

 

 

What you stated is exactly why you are wrong and the data is meaningless.

 

We know they have varied statuses to manipulate where new people create new characters and we also know standard on one server is not equal to standard on another.

 

Based on those simple facts - assigning a numeric value to statuses and then averaging them gives you nothing of value.

 

We don't know that at all.

 

If in fact light on one server is 1000 player and light on another server is 100 players then yes it is meaningless.

 

But why would they do that? There is absolutely no reason as it doesn't control which servers people roll on it just means ALL server statuses become meaningless. If they wanted to control which servers people roll on they likely get rid of all server status (bar full) and simply have thier prefered ones (the low ones) a different colour - as many MMORPGs have done before.

 

Currently there is zero evidence that Bioware doesn't have exactly the same server status on every server.

[LordZanos]

Great post showing that the doomsayers don't have any concrete data yet. Only thing real so far is that the game has 1.7 mil subscribers and 2mil sold copies released a few weeks ago.

 

 

When server pop caps stop increasing, the website OP posted might be useful in determining subscriber growth/shrinkage.

[DarthSabreth]

best thread ever regaurding this topic.

+ 100000 to the OP

[Aepervius]

The OP has a point regarding the SWTOR server statistic.

 

But this is not the only statistic and not the msot reliable one can point to.

 

XFIRE shows the number of hours played by people using XFIRE.

 

http://www.xfire.com/games/swtor/Star_Wars_The_Old_Republic/

 

They are NOT, and I want it to be clear, NOT at all using the server load.. They simply measure who is playing which game using their own program.

 

Now *ALL* you can say with 100% surety using the XFIRE statistic is that the XFIRE using population dropped in number of hours played. What is on less strong footing is to have the assumption that the XFIRE user population has the same behavior than the general SWTOR population. It is not so a strong assumption IMHO, but certainly not one I can demonstrate. But if you have the assumption, then indeed SWTOR population is dropping. The second assumption and this IS the big one, is that the drop of number of hour played reflect that people number are dropping. IMHO this is the one I do not buy in. Why ? Because it could very well be that "hard core" player are dropping out and replaced with casual player. See, if you have somebody playing 11 hours in average, and 9 people playing 1 hours, then in average all player play 2 hours. But if that first guy drop, and is replaced by *2* player with 1 hours average, the numbers of hours drop dramatically but the total number of subs increase (by 1). Which is why total number of hours played does not say anything, you would need the number of UNIQUE player as statistic rather than number of hours played.

 

my gut feeling is that a lot of those hardcore playing 24/7 , level 50 by mid january dropped, being replaced by much more casual player which is why by first week of january February BW announced their subs increased to 1.7 million (1 million end of december IIRC).

 

Anyway even if you buy in BOTH assumption, if you look at SWTOR XFIRE statistic , it certainly is NOT dropping as fast as the doom & gloom poster would pretend it is (worst case scenario is that number of hours played dropped by 1/4 since head january and 1/3 since head start).

 

TL;DR : xfire is only showing number of hours played which can be misleading.

Edited February 29, 2012 by Aepervius

[Paxmendacium]

I have noticed what seems to be a recent influx of players. Although, that's hardly scientific.

[oursacrifice]

Wow, I'm surprised a thread like this would be buried, it's a very good read.

 

That's because nobody cares.

 

Most of the servers are losing players, most of the population can see this.

 

The super popular servers will remain that way because even when those people quit, the people leaving other servers will roll there.

 

By the end of the year this game will pretty much only have around 10 servers in the US, they don't need to keep all these other servers up and running. Just merge and be done with the whole mess.

[Warjhinn]

The conclusions just aren't true though.

 

 

You can't tell exact populations with that system, but you can still see over all population trends with it.

 

And from the trends extrapolate that into over all subs, at least in correlation, if not absolute terms.

 

 

 

 

Its almost impossible for subs to be going up long term IF server status is going down long term (unless an MMO company is constantly changing the server status levels), because that would be on par with inventing a perpetual motion machine (which I'm sure game companies would want to do in both cases if it were possible, of course ).

 

So saying that because you can't tell exact numbers therefore you can't tell anything is just patently false.

 

Long Term... your words.

 

So, we are back to what OP said. They are not accurate, because the population caps and such are in flux.

 

Sooo... when all that stabalizes, maybe then it will mean something.

 

On behalf of the OP I thank you for providing further support and clarfication for his post.

[Goretzu]

Long Term... your words.

 

So, we are back to what OP said. They are not accurate, because the population caps and such are in flux.

 

Sooo... when all that stabalizes, maybe then it will mean something.

 

On behalf of the OP I thank you for providing further support and clarfication for his post.

 

 

"Long term" = over a couple of weeks. Anything over about 2 weeks of contiguous data would be enough to show overall trends.

 

At the moment we've got a lot more than that, even given a couple of changes to the actual server cap limits (which again don't matter so much so long as they aren't all different for each server and it's not continuous - doing either of which doesn't make much, if any, real sense).

 

So like I've repeatedly said this data will show trends, and furthermore trends that will likely correlate with actual absolute data that Bioware has.

[Ancaglon]

Imperial: I had the idea of flying to each planet and getting those pop levels, ship, then to fleet. See what ya have. Then by a gross figure, perhaps double that to include Republic or rather if you have a Republic character, doing the same. Of course it wont be correct but you can see it visually what the planets are at. Honestly, I have not done this. It will grossly only show current connections but the planets I am seeing, they rarely have 50 or more people on them.

 

There's absolutely no need to fly around to do this check -- just type "1-49" into the /who box where it defaults to listing your current "world" to see all the level 1-49 people, "50" to see all the level 50s. If there are more than 200 of any given category, you will have to do other stuff e.g "50 jedi" or "50 sith", then each of the others, although since they are less played, I doubt that "50 commando vanguard scoundrel gunslinger" will exceed 200 on many servers.

[Drewser]

Because so long as it's not done constantly it's still pretty easy to account for it.

 

 

 

 

 

We don't know that at all.

 

If in fact light on one server is 1000 player and light on another server is 100 players then yes it is meaningless.

 

But why would they do that? There is absolutely no reason as it doesn't control which servers people roll on it just means ALL server statuses become meaningless. If they wanted to control which servers people roll on they likely get rid of all server status (bar full) and simply have thier prefered ones (the low ones) a different colour - as many MMORPGs have done before.

 

Currently there is zero evidence that Bioware doesn't have exactly the same server status on every server.

 

Nope. There was a thread earlier where someone did counts of some light and standards, there was a server with 675 people on it that was standard and one with 750 that was reading as light. Along with other inconsistencies that makes this whole 'trend' meaningless.

[Drewser]

"Long term" = over a couple of weeks. Anything over about 2 weeks of contiguous data would be enough to show overall trends.

 

 

LOL! Two weeks = long term?

 

You get funnier with every post.

[Zemoney]

You must be a horrible economist. Citing one and only ONE flawed population site for your whole argument which is probably damn close to one of the last sites anyone would use to guage population standards in a MMO.

 

I do not need a website to tell me how the game is doing. I know what the population was on the Fleet and Ilum the latter part of December, middle of January, and end of February. I know how many guild memebers have unsubbed, how many friends have unsubbed, and how long it takes to pop a PvP que now.

 

I would like to hear your argument vs. a site like xfire that uses a very substantial amount of players that has realized a near 50% drop in players and an even bigger drop in hours logged since December?

 

For those of you trying to defend server populations, you need to seriously wake up and lose the SWTOR sheeple attitude, because this was a great idea that really needs to be fixed asap to save.

 

For those of you that are now on the "this is an alt game", if I wanted an "alt" game, I would keep re rolling toons on Skyrim. There is no such thing as a successful "alt" MMO.

[Goretzu]

Nope. There was a thread earlier where someone did counts of some light and standards, there was a server with 675 people on it that was standard and one with 750 that was reading as light. Along with other inconsistencies that makes this whole 'trend' meaningless.

 

 

 

Occum's Razor would suggest that it was probably a flawed method in that case rather than each server having it's own status.

 

But it's completely bizarre you'd believe that and not believe this... but then I'm pretty sure now that you believe what you want to believe and nothing else.

 

 

LOL! Two weeks = long term?

 

You get funnier with every post.

 

 

Yup two weeks can be long time in population dynamics, certainly long enough to see a trend.

[Drewser]

Occum's Razor would suggest that it was probably a flawed method in that case rather than each server having it's own status.

 

But it's completely bizarre you'd believe that and not believe this... but then I'm pretty sure now that you believe what you want to believe and nothing else.

 

 

Yup two weeks can be long time in population dynamics, certainly long enough to see a trend.

 

Nope, there were numerous inconsistencies in the server numbers and statuses. You can't dismiss it, just because you don't like the fact that it makes your "trend analysis" meaningless. Bioware stated they had different numbers for the same statuses on different servers, so why wouldn't I believe someone that took the time and posted some numbers confirming it?

 

No, two weeks is not "long term".

 

But hey, keep thinking that trend means something is it makes you feel better.

Edited February 29, 2012 by Drewser

[Lankybrit]

Spot on OP. Totally agree.

 

Cheers.

[Goretzu]

Nope, there were numerous inconsistencies in the server numbers and statuses.

 

Yes there would be if someone was using that method, that was my point.

 

 

You can't dismiss it, just because you don't like the fact that it makes your "trend analysis" meaningless. Bioware stated they had different numbers for the same statuses on different servers, so why wouldn't I believe someone that took the time and posted some numbers confirming it?

 

I'm not dissmissing it I'm saying it's far more likely that it is an artefact of his method (which is a method that simply cannot get exact figures any more than server status does), than because Bioware varies server status on a per server basis (why would they do that? For what reason? )

 

 

No, two weeks is not "long term".

 

But hey, keep thinking that trend means something is it makes you feel better.

 

 

It's long enough to see a trend appear, whether you like it or not.

[Drewser]

Yes there would be if someone was using that method, that was my point.

 

Bioware stated they were not all the same

 

I'm not dissmissing it I'm saying it's far more likely that it is an artefact of his method (which is a method that simply cannot get exact figures any more than server status does), than because Bioware varies server status on a per server basis (why would they do that? For what reason? )

 

 

You are trying to dismiss it.

 

It's long enough to see a trend appear, whether you like it or not.

 

Nope, not long enough to see anything of value.

 

But carry on. I am done here. You refuse to accept the facts.

Edited February 29, 2012 by Drewser

[Goretzu]

Bioware stated they were not all the same

 

By all means link that statement saying that server status on all servers are different.

 

Until then it's just plain make believe.

 

 

You are trying to dismiss it.

 

No. I'm saying that the methodogy use is likely flawed as it's impossible fpr him to get a count on every server at the same time, and indeed even if it was possible to do that the counts would be off (as you can't count everyone).

 

What I am saying is that that using a flawed method like that to try and support a spurious idea is frankly rather daft.

 

And that I believe you'd probably argue the sky was green at this point.

 

 

 

Nope, not long enough to see anything of value.

 

But carry on. I am done here. You refuse to accept the facts.

 

You can SEE the trends in their data by that long, if you don't want to believe your own eyes that's up to you. It doesn't mean everyone else can't see it though.