Interesting look at the number of players

[Laeti]

What really keeps players stay or attract new players is solely the Game itself. :P

One thing I honestly cannot understand is why scaling old content on active servers is something that was deemed an unnecessary waste of time, while clearly letting new people play any content with high level players is something that could easily deal with one of the major turn-offs for most new players: the feeling of an empty game on any level besides 70. Other games have various scaling systems that allow newer players to feel involved right from the start. Rift, on the other hand, while being a masterpiece in terms of lore and questing, completely leaves out the fact that most people in mmos want to play with other people starting with their very first levels, and do group content that isn't limited by repetitive IAs leaving out everything else.

Yet, a challenge server that would divide the existing population even more, is a thing to consider, instead of finding ways of making the game more attractive to anyone at any level. Surely we'd have more people wishing to stay if three conditions were met:
* the option for all levels to engage in the same content with a good variety (pvp, pve, casual and open world)
* no constant reminders that you are at disadvantage unless you pay an entry fee
* no misinformation from older players that buying a number of things is a must from the very start if a person wants to experience the game

I'm fairly sure if at least these conditions were met, along with good catch-up mechanics and a significant reduce in grind, we wouldn't be needing to figure out ways of checking Rift's population numbers.

[Semiso]

.........

4pm server... assuming you mean the 4pm pdt for both times?

means NY time around 7pm, EU real time midnight till some 4 am... On a working/school day...

people get home between 4pm and 8pm.. and often go to sleep between 10pm and 2 am, because of appointments, school, work...


week/working days are often less crowded, many (casuals, kids) only play certain hours or days.

Next you are missing out on the fact that we are with 3 major time zones... 4pm pdt = around midnight CET and around 8am Melbourne time

Different time zones, schedules and mixed timezones on each server.. any specific time of day for a calculation is off... Do the same for 10 days, 24/7, perhaps every hour.. take out the double counts of names... then you get a more reasonable number



sidenote/question.. you took this from the search menu?
searching each shard/zone per level/calling
and on name@shard for counting? so players hailol is actually players FROM hailol and not players from other shards playing ON hailol?

''I was arguing with the guildies about if the data collected were any reasonable. Few stated that the time the data was collected was not during peak time, so with that in mind lets throw in Another ''imaginary'' 500 people into the data to make it somewhat more accurate.''

Also on your question about shard by shard class by class level by level Letter by letter

Yes i did, except the letter by letter part, i Think i might do that

[Semiso]

I assumed it was somewhere around 3-4k.

What I find more interesting though is that Hailol seems to have so many players. Even at any time of the day I always assumed Hailol was Seastone levels of dead along w/ Wolfsbane and Laethys. I'm surprised Greybriar is so low as well.
.

I was actually more surprised when i started with Hailol, the amount of players in each level bracket was actually higher than any other shard.

What surprised me even more tho was that Faeblight had like 3 level brackets which were litterally empty, until you came to the last ones which accounted for the data you see on Faeblight.

[LucKeyHoleInOne]

include people from canada... that play on NA.

Canada is part of North America.

[Holyroller12]

Canada is part of North America.

Yes. I was more so referencing it as it's in a different time zone as other parts of the US are and EU are. My main point was there there are too many variables to consider when trying to track this kind of information. They're a privately owned company so they'll never tell us what the exact numbers are and even if they replied to this thread saying the numbers people are coming up with are way off. The immediate assumption from a lot of people is that they're telling us lies to cover it up or something.

[Semiso]

Yes. I was more so referencing it as it's in a different time zone as other parts of the US are and EU are. My main point was there there are too many variables to consider when trying to track this kind of information. They're a privately owned company so they'll never tell us what the exact numbers are and even if they replied to this thread saying the numbers people are coming up with are way off. The immediate assumption from a lot of people is that they're telling us lies to cover it up or something.

Well regardless of what they say, im not gonna take anything they say seriously unless proved otherwise. I genuinely did this to show the Community where we at, not starting some QQ warfare against trion xD

But yea i would go on with these numbers instead until i've done a better research (if i can be bothered)

[Benjamindavid]

Well regardless of what they say, im not gonna take anything they say seriously unless proved otherwise. I genuinely did this to show the Community where we at, not starting some QQ warfare against trion xD

But yea i would go on with these numbers instead until i've done a better research (if i can be bothered)

And then what? What is your goal here?

[Mrwidoes]

Yes. I was more so referencing it as it's in a different time zone as other parts of the US are and EU are. My main point was there there are too many variables to consider when trying to track this kind of information. They're a privately owned company so they'll never tell us what the exact numbers are and even if they replied to this thread saying the numbers people are coming up with are way off. The immediate assumption from a lot of people is that they're telling us lies to cover it up or something.

You seem to lack basic geography knowledge if you think Canada and the US do not share time zones.
http://www.westcanadatours.com/images/zone.gif

Please educate yourself. Professor google is available to you if you require further information.

[Goddessdavida]

Population is not lower, it's very low. Facts we know that:
1. Automatic teleport to highest player shard on log in to make game looks like more alive
2. 20 man raid deleted

The numbers posted do not show automatic teleport having much effect on the shard populations. With the exception of Laethys (Oceanic) and Seastone (PvP) the numbers on each shard are in a fairly narrow range.

I believe the automatic teleport is not to highest player shard, except in way off peak times. Otherwise, there would have been a clearly larger number of players on one of those shards at the time the OP sampled it.

[MisakaMikoto]

The numbers posted do not show automatic teleport having much effect on the shard populations. With the exception of Laethys (Oceanic) and Seastone (PvP) the numbers on each shard are in a fairly narrow range.

I believe the automatic teleport is not to highest player shard, except in way off peak times. Otherwise, there would have been a clearly larger number of players on one of those shards at the time the OP sampled it.

I never said that part are related to the numbers, they are ways or techniques in which the company uses to make the game looks more alive.

The teleport on log in more specifically moves you to a shard that has the highest player or population at that time including players whether they are from that shard and player that are not from that shard but are on that shard at that time.

(Refer to patch notes in the Patch Notes section for more info on the teleport part) Because i understand not everyone read every patch notes.

[Lyshkami]

The numbers posted do not show automatic teleport having much effect on the shard populations. With the exception of Laethys (Oceanic) and Seastone (PvP) the numbers on each shard are in a fairly narrow range.

He was using the Social Search menu, which shows players by the 'home shard' their character is created on. Not the shard they are currently playing on.

That is a Big NO LOL, i mean, unless they are preparing to close the game down, releasing the actual population ranging between few thousands only isn't gona help in bringing more players in or keep older players stay.

What really keeps players stay or attract new players is solely the Game itself. :P

I agree with both of you- I really wish that all games would release accurate player data, merely because I'd be curious to see it. But no one wants to admit they only have a few thousand active players, so no one does it. That, and fears of being labeled a 'dying game' based on the numbers they themselves released.

[Ongar]

Considering what kind of game Rift is, its certainly doing ok, especially for 2017 and the times we live in.

There is a reason why there are zero western - AAA - raid - themepark MMOs announced for several years. These kind of game are not what the majority of people play these days. They play Mobas, they play Battle Royals and Shared World online games.

In any kind of those games, you login for 30 mins, 1 hour, 2 hours, whatever and you can do something exiciting. A themepark game like Rift on the other hand has a hard time directing players and getting players to the fun in a reasonable amount of time.

[Poshy]

I always thought there were more people than this. I've seen 70 plus people standing at crossroads for a VP boss to spawn.

What surprises me the most is how much we have available on our AHs if these numbers are really that low. TBH I really haven't had any issues getting groups and my guild is pretty active. So the only reason these stats would mean anything to me is if they impact game economy, which they dont seem to be doing really.

[sirdiggy]

I always thought there were more people than this. I've seen 70 plus people standing at crossroads for a VP boss to spawn.

What surprises me the most is how much we have available on our AHs if these numbers are really that low. TBH I really haven't had any issues getting groups and my guild is pretty active. So the only reason these stats would mean anything to me is if they impact game economy, which they dont seem to be doing really.

70 people is not lot considering people just shard hop and vp currency is the only game in town. thats actually pretty low.

these numbers will only go down more, i heard boase quit? dude was quite a holdout with silver loyalty.

lastest patch was just insulting and seems people are responding to it, seen some other long timers say they were done as well.

[Laeti]

What surprises me the most is how much we have available on our AHs if these numbers are really that low. TBH I really haven't had any issues getting groups and my guild is pretty active. So the only reason these stats would mean anything to me is if they impact game economy, which they dont seem to be doing really.

I can't say anything about the general AH, I don't really buy anything besides occasional costume unlocks or lower level mats, but I have noticed one thing that is very different from any previous event time. There are literally no event dimension items on the AH whatsoever. Laethys is a low pop shard, but every single seasonal event all the items from all the people who don't do dims flood the AH, to the point where by the end of the event they're selling so cheap you could buy everything even if you're plat poor. I have been monitoring our AH for a week, every night, and there's been but a couple event items on sale in all this time. While I also get minion missions relatively often, and they usually bring back at least several dim items, I'd imagine non-dimmers would be selling stuff as usual. If not, then dropping stuff in trading dims is also a thing, but, there's nothing there either.

Again, this is what happened every previous event so there's no reason for anything to change this year, yet it's my first Autumn harvest when I can't find anything event themed to spend my plat on. I don't know if it has anything to do with the pop numbers but regarding the "nothing changed on the AH" - it's obviously not the case, at least in one tab.