Concerning Websites showing Server Population Graphs

[Kaelshi]

WoW never, ever had a single drop in subs until this last year. Sorry again/

 

you have access to blizzard sub information? Certainly overall sub's increased - it seems a reasonable assertion since they reached 11mil+ last year or whenever it was.

 

That does not indicate whether they ever had a drop in subs.

 

I would not be surprised to learn if there was a drop in subs mid-way between patches, for instance as the "new" content was being completed and the wait for the next patch began.

 

A lot of people likely dropped their subs and then re-subbed(along with thousands of brand new players) as new content was released resulting in the steady increase of subs until they peaked.

 

of course...that doesnt mean they never dropped in subs ever. Perhaps you should say they never had, until last year, a substantial,steady, lasting drop in subs.

[Lethality]

you have access to blizzard sub information? Certainly overall sub's increased - it seems a reasonable assertion since they reached 11mil+ last year or whenever it was.

 

That does not indicate whether they ever had a drop in subs.

 

I would not be surprised to learn if there was a drop in subs mid-way between patches, for instance as the "new" content was being completed and the wait for the next patch began.

 

A lot of people likely dropped their subs and then re-subbed(along with thousands of brand new players) as new content was released resulting in the steady increase of subs until they peaked.

 

of course...that doesnt mean they never dropped in subs ever. Perhaps you should say they never had, until last year, a substantial,steady, lasting drop in subs.

 

In the context of their launch period? Within the first 2 months? I would stake my life on it that subs weren't lost.

 

You couldn't even find the game on the shelves, they couldn't ship enough of them.

[Evuke]

funny how the fanbois always find some way to say all the graphs are wrong, all the stats are wrong, everyone seeing all their guild has left is wrong, everyone seeing <150 in the fleet instead of 220+ is wrong.

 

when the may ea quarterly statement comes out it should show the truth

[Kaelshi]

funny how the fanbois always find some way to say all the graphs are wrong, all the stats are wrong, everyone seeing all their guild has left is wrong, everyone seeing <150 in the fleet instead of 220+ is wrong.

 

when the may ea quarterly statement comes out it should show the truth

 

 

....you havent read the op or this thread have you?

 

I don't think I saw one person say any of the things you just said.

 

You are absolutely right - when the next quarter reports come out we will find out more information. I fear though it won't be very accurate for the very simple reason that they are doing releases in different areas of the world which will be reported. What you won't see if sales and subs are up is me in here saying "haha told you pop was rising" because that wouldn't necessarily be the truth.

 

The graphs - for what they are - are entirely accurate. They take a snap-shot of the server status(light/medium/heavy) and then post a chart. It does not track actual population numbers...since that information is not available.

 

My guild has steadily increased as has the number of people I've personally seen in zones/fleet(Pere Trade Routes) that does not in anyway indicate that population is rising on my server let alone the entire game.

 

If you want to argue that server population is dropping. Thats great, good for you. I don't have enough information the suggest otherwise. The graphs do not definitively represent a drop in server population because of their data-gathering technique. You may not like it, but its the facts m'am.

[Kaelshi]

In the context of their launch period? Within the first 2 months? I would stake my life on it that subs weren't lost.

 

You couldn't even find the game on the shelves, they couldn't ship enough of them.

 

ah - you don't have access to their sub numbers. You just believe it to be a case. So when you said it was a fact - you actually meant it's your opinion. Now I understand.

[Jett-Rinn]

funny how the fanbois always find some way to say all the graphs are wrong, all the stats are wrong, everyone seeing all their guild has left is wrong, everyone seeing <150 in the fleet instead of 220+ is wrong.

 

when the may ea quarterly statement comes out it should show the truth

 

Funny how the hate machine spends so much time with thier little graphs and spreadsheets trying to find fail when there is none.

 

Edited February 24, 2012 by Jett-Rinn

[Pattypuppet]

I'm not sure what the server population is because of all the instancing. What I can say objectively is my guild has slowly dwindled to a tribe of one. People seemed to lose interest, starting logging in less and then not at all.

 

After unsubscribing and then resubscribing after hitting 50, I think I made a mistake. Gonna unsubscribe again.

[Jett-Rinn]

I'm not sure what the server population is because of all the instancing. What I can say objectively is my guild has slowly dwindled to a tribe of one. People seemed to lose interest, starting logging in less and then not at all.

 

After unsubscribing and then resubscribing after hitting 50, I think I made a mistake. Gonna unsubscribe again.

 

I found often that people lose guild members for reason other than the game is bad....about 30% of our new members come from failed guilds....just sayin.

[LeonBraun]

Not only this...

 

But a lot of those sites show activity, not accounts as well.

 

It's insanity to think that as many people are playing at this point now with the same frequency they playing in the first few weeks of launch...

 

The game was launched a week before Christmas for crying out loud...

 

Of course the amount of activity is going to be lower.

 

This DOES NOT MEAN that there are few player playing right now, or fewer accounts.

 

I for one took 3 weeks off during the Christmas break and spent a TON of time on this game.

 

Currently I have 14 toons and play mostly on the weekends, as I run a WoW guild and raid with my WoW team on weekdays.

 

So I for one am one of those who is playing with less frequency...

 

But I haven't left the game. I'm not going anywhere.

Edited February 24, 2012 by LeonBraun

[LordTie]

Funny how the link does not work????

[LeonBraun]

Also Fleet numbers are ridiculous to quote...

 

Does many people sitting around fleet mean that the game is doing well?

 

Likely many people are out doing things. Questing and other activities.

[LordTie]

Also Fleet numbers are ridiculous to quote...

 

Does many people sitting around fleet mean that the game is doing well?

 

Likely many people are out doing things. Questing and other activities.

 

Biggest mistake the y could have done. But it is low on soem servers when you only person there at peak times or like 5-10 people on one planet at a time.

[LeonBraun]

If there should be any numbers at all it should be entire server numbers... The zone numbers really mean nothing at all...

 

Likely there is no all encompassing server number, because people would just have exact information on which servers are really the most active or populated. Which would just lead to bigger server imbalances.

 

Of note, I have the impression on my 2 main servers of two things:

 

1) Most playing mains are not level 50 yet, and seem to be mostly in the mid 30's or so...

 

2) Many people are also playing low level alts as the first two zones are still packed with activity.

[iheartnyc]

 

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 ).

 

Wrong. Especially when initial population numbers were from the week before Christmas.

[iheartnyc]

Not only this...

 

But a lot of those sites show activity, not accounts as well.

 

It's insanity to think that as many people are playing at this point now with the same frequency they playing in the first few weeks of launch...

 

The game was launched a week before Christmas for crying out loud...

 

Of course the amount of activity is going to be lower.

 

This DOES NOT MEAN that there are few player playing right now, or fewer accounts.

 

I for one took 3 weeks off during the Christmas break and spent a TON of time on this game.

 

Currently I have 14 toons and play mostly on the weekends, as I run a WoW guild and raid with my WoW team on weekdays.

 

So I for one am one of those who is playing with less frequency...

 

But I haven't left the game. I'm not going anywhere.

 

NO! People like you can't exist, it's impossible!!

[Yogurt]

How are you not 50 even my mother who played one day a week 4 hours a day has hit 50 now and she is almost in her 60's. Their is casual and their is no one is logging in "." Fail *** Game. Also Fleet numbers do matter. When I play my repub with 4 man team ready we have sit as long as 20+ mins for a damn que. When we get on are Imps it is almost instant but it is hutball. Quit being fan Boi's. Seriously, they should of did a roll back on the ilum exploitation, done something with population, cross server ques or server merger.

 

My last month anywho my wife subbed me for some odd reason this month. Told her do not do it this month. Cause if I see no improvements I see no point to this PoS. The imbalance with population and gear compared to the lower number faction is insane. I solo que and sit in que for 10+ minutes at times. Then no one wants to heal or tank and all pew pew. Seriously fail game, the pvp could be great with some balance.

 

I also do not understand how the pve players who raid are not a little Pee'd off since 8 man is more profitable. Also fix the pure dps classes gunslinger, sniper, mara, and sentinel need to bring either more sustain dps to a PvE or PvP. Only reason a Sent or Mara is brought to any raid is because of Inspiration 15% damage/Heal buff. The Knights and Jugs have been getting buff because raiders preferred a range tank and dps. Sorry *** game with a sorry *** engine!

[iheartnyc]

How are you not 50 even my mother who played one day a week 4 hours a day has hit 50 now and she is almost in her 60's. Their is casual and their is no one is logging in "." Fail *** Game. Also Fleet numbers do matter. When I play my repub with 4 man team ready we have sit as long as 20+ mins for a damn que. When we get on are Imps it is almost instant but it is hutball. Quit being fan Boi's. Seriously, they should of did a roll back on the ilum exploitation, done something with population, cross server ques or server merger.

 

I call BS. Utter BS.

 

4 hours a week = roughly 40-50 hours of play. Unless she is powerleveling not going to happen.

[Emeda]

WoW never, ever had a single drop in subs until this last year. Sorry again/

 

WoW had a drop in subs during wrath and that was more than a year ago

[Goretzu]

I believe he's more in the context of trying to measure someone's age without a birth certificate being problematic.

 

No he's trying to say measuring someone's age gets more reliable with time (whether he realises it or not). It doesn't.

 

 

 

 

 

 

They do vary - a lot and often. How do you think they are trying to load balance the servers until character transfers come online? There is no exact number because Bioware won't provide one to use as a reference. There is no constant with server status and won't be until the population imbalance issue is resolved and everything settles in. Even then it will still only be a top level snapshot.

 

The real underlying question is "why is this data even important?"

 

 

Are you trying to say that Bioware is shifting the server cap status for each server individually constantly?

 

Because that is both complete conjecture and frankly highly unlikely.

 

 

 

 

If you're not and just saying data varies, then yes it does, but beside being a co-founder of whatever it was, you don't seem to understand how data works or can be compared. Cyclical changes are irrelevant, and so long as the servers are measured in the same way they give decent trends, just not exact trends.

[Goretzu]

They only give reasonable trend analysis if you know, for a fact, that server limits haven't been changed. Assuming they haven't only leads to bad interpretations of data.

 

I'm just saying that without knowing that all the variables are static any interpretation of the data isn't going to be much beyond speculation, but you can try if you want.

 

 

 

Again unless they are changing them all massively constantly (which they cannot be or we'd have servers with 1,000,000+ caps by now) or setting the server cap for each server differently (which would be bizzare and pointless and frankly disingenuous), then yes you can.

 

 

But your right if one or both of the above is true then any trend data is meaningless, but then if one or both of the above is true any server status is also UTTERLY MEANINGLESS to!

[iheartnyc]

WoW had a drop in subs during wrath and that was more than a year ago

 

WoW had massive catastrophic drops at least beginning early 2011. Lost over 2 million subs last year. And these are sub numbers, not misleading population numbers.

Edited February 24, 2012 by iheartnyc

[Goretzu]

Yeah it does. Again, you seem to think the holidays have no impact on this data and getting more data points outside of that time frame will not lead to a clearer picture.

 

No I know they do, I'm saying it doesn't matter, because the point of the data is to measure relative change.

 

Holidays aren't an outlier they are just part of the trend of overall population, any more than launch data is.

 

Otherwise how can Bioware claim they have XX subs? Because by your incredibly strange definition that figure would be utterly meaningless due to holidays and launch.

 

 

 

Also when determining trends, time is certainly a factor. I am a trader of both currencies and the stock market. Trends on a 1 minutes chart are less significant than trends on a daily chart.

 

Good grief if you actually are a "currency trader" and don't understand how a population comparison data set works...... well maybe that explains the whole banking crisis.

 

Your age comparison is so far out in left field, I am not sure how to respond to it.

 

You don't know how to respond to it because it's correct, I guess.

 

SWTOR population data doesn't become any more or any less reliable over time, it's always as reliable (or unreliable) as it's going to get.

 

You can't make an estimate of what population SWTOR will have in 10 months time form this data (it would be a wild guess as all such estimates would be), but then that's not the point.

 

What you can quite easily and reliably do is see if CURRENT population is going up or down compared to historic population.

[iheartnyc]

No I know they do, I'm saying it doesn't matter, because the point of the data is to measure relative change.

 

Holidays aren't an outlier they are just part of the trend of overall population, any more than launch data is.

 

Good grief. Holidays are major outlier which has a material effect on the trend of overall population. Do you have any idea how statistics work? Or any formal training or experience in it? I doubt it. Because you don't seem to grasp the fact that outliers in a data set can greatly skew overall results in surveys such as "trend of overall population."

 

Otherwise how can Bioware claim they have XX subs? Because by your incredibly strange definition that figure would be utterly meaningless due to holidays and launch.

 

Simple. Because population numbers are not directly correlated to subscription numbers. These are two separate things. EA likely obtains subscription numbers by calling up their internal business guys, who have an accounting program that tracks the active number of paid subscription accounts at any given moment. They won't look at "server population" when determining subscription accounts."

 

Good grief if you actually are a "currency trader" and don't understand how a population comparison data set works...... well maybe that explains the whole banking crisis.

 

Both you and the OP are foolish on this point. A currency trader (in the finance industry we say F/X trader) would not make you an expert in statistical analysis, and furthermore had nothing to do with the banking crisis. You can blame the structuring folks and ABS traders on that one.

 

SWTOR population data doesn't become any more or any less reliable over time, it's always as reliable (or unreliable) as it's going to get.

 

Yes it does. You need to study the data set. The data set will always be more misleading around holidays...always. Unless sites like TORHEAD uses sophisticated statistical analysis to reduce that risk (which they don't).

 

 

What you can quite easily and reliably do is see if CURRENT population is going up or down compared to historic population.

 

No, because you haven't even properly defined population. Does it mean, "overall players who logon in given period" or "logged on at any given moment" or "logged on x amount of hours per given period" or do you simply mean "subscribers?"

 

Trying to make any kind of meaningful inference from statistical data that is far from robust is a fool's errand.

[Goretzu]

I am not going to rehash them all but there are enough differences between the Rift launch and this one for me to dismiss the current data as inaccurate/incomplete.

 

How can a set of relative population data ever be "complete"?

 

The servers would have had to have close for that to be the case.

 

 

 

How can a data set measure relative population change ever get more accurate with time?

 

Unless you can rewind and rerun time itself, it cannot!

 

 

 

I want to see what the trend line looks like from about Jan 24 to March 24 before drawing any conclusions.

 

All that will show is what any relative population change is from Jan 24 to March 24.

 

Just like all it shows from 15 Dec to now is any relative population change from then to now.

 

 

The data doesn't become any more or less accurate or reliable between the 24th of Jan 24.

 

It won't magically make more people be playing (or less for that matter), it will simply show the population change between those two date points, as any set of data between two date points will also do.

 

 

 

 

 

 

You are trying to argue that if a currencies value is at £10 on 15/12/11 and you have daily data for it's value every single day till the 24/02/12.... that actually you have no idea what value of that currency was between the 15/12/11 and 24/02/11.... until you have daily values up until the 24/03/12.

 

It utterly makes no sense.

Edited February 24, 2012 by Goretzu

[Goretzu]

Good grief. Holidays are major outlier which has a material effect on the trend of overall population. Do you have any idea how statistics work? Or any formal training or experience in it? I doubt it. Because you don't seem to grasp the fact that outliers in a data set can greatly skew overall results in surveys such as "trend of overall population."

 

What exactly are you looking for in a relative population data set that makes holidays or launch an outlier?

 

They have effects on the population, yes, but that is not the same thing as an outlier.

 

I would like you to explain to me how you believe they are.

 

 

 

Simple. Because population numbers are not directly correlated to subscription numbers. These are two separate things. EA likely obtains subscription numbers by calling up their internal business guys, who have an accounting program that tracks the active number of paid subscription accounts at any given moment. They won't look at "server population" when determining subscription accounts."

 

They are, but launch and holidays also effect subscription numbers (or are you saying they don't? ), which would make them "outliers" by your and Drew's argument.

 

You can't have your cake and eat it, it is one or the other.

 

 

 

Both you and the OP are foolish on this point. A currency trader (in the finance industry we say F/X trader) would not make you an expert in statistical analysis, and furthermore had nothing to do with the banking crisis. You can blame the structuring folks and ABS traders on that one.

 

On this we completely agree, the evidence is in this thread.

 

 

 

Yes it does. You need to study the data set. The data set will always be more misleading around holidays...always. Unless sites like TORHEAD uses sophisticated statistical analysis to reduce that risk (which they don't).

 

Misleading has nothing to do with data reliability.

 

You might draw a wrong conclusion from the data, but the data remains as reliable and accurate is it ever was or ever will be.

 

Don't confuse the two things!

 

 

 

No, because you haven't even properly defined population. Does it mean, "overall players who logon in given period" or "logged on at any given moment" or "logged on x amount of hours per given period" or do you simply mean "subscribers?"

 

Trying to make any kind of meaningful inference from statistical data that is far from robust is a fool's errand.

 

 

Again no, you cannot make any sort of exact measurement (as I have repeatedly said), but so long as all servers are measured by the same rod (as they seem to be, and it would make no sense for them not to be), it will clearly show overall relative playing population trends.

 

As I said if overall playing trends are down long term then almost inevitable so are subs, just as if overall playing trends are up then almost inevitably so are subs.

 

Anything else is like inventing perpetual motion!