A few days ago, on August 31 Jester, aka Ripard Teg, published a post on his blog, with the title "Some curves aren't".

First of all:
Relevancy of the numbers, none.

lets look at this, the two numbers he pulls are:
29,113 to 29,841 - which is a difference of 728.
Which brings me to another conclusion, math is not his strengh.
29113 / 100 * 2.4 = 698.712
29113 / 100 * 2.5006 = 727.999678 (so you could say its about 2.5%)

lets make an assumption [GǪ] lets also assume he has two accounts

23 / 2 = 11.5 * 728 = 8372 * 2 = 16 744 new accounts * 17,49 USD

So why all the number juggling?

except that the subscription numbers have always shown a pretty darn strong correlation with the online numbers. Go find one of the graphs from back when they dared publish those numbers and superimpose them over the monthly averagesGǪ

I am concerned with reduced PCU, but I don't automatically assume that it means reduced subscription numbers.
I would welcome CCP releasing the current subscriber numbers.

Tippia, I agree with most of your post, but I think that the introduction of Incarna has had an impact on people logging in multiple accounts, which would probably have a noticable effect on the correlation to which you refer.

Possibly, but on the other hand: if people can't keep all those accounts logged in at the same time (and weGǪ sorry for this after my previous tiradeGǪ assume that they got them to have all of them logged in at once) won't they simply close those useless extra accounts down and/or transfer the characters to how many accounts they can run at once with the new requirements?

At any rate, the main point was that the OP starts out by rejecting any kind of direct correlation between online accounts and subscription numbers, and then goes on to make a direct correlation between online accounts and subscription numbersGǪ

Tippia, I agree with most of your post, but I think that the introduction of Incarna has had an impact on people logging in multiple accounts, which would probably have a noticable effect on the correlation to which you refer.

I am concerned with reduced PCU, but I don't automatically assume that it means reduced subscription numbers.
I would welcome CCP releasing the current subscriber numbers.

According to the May CSM minutes, at that point subscribers were rising while we see that PCU was falling. I'm not sure how much credibility to give that. But if it's the case, then it's not clear why the CSM is getting so excited about the new Jester plot, since they've seen the lack of correlation themselves (which we haven't). Well, one can imagine all kinds of reasons for CSM excitement, but they're not data based.

And now for some constructive criticism:

LOUD NOISES.

*FRANTIC POINTING AT NUMBERS*

SCREAMING ABOUT GRAPHS.

YELLING ABOUT UNSUBS.

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As long as EVE has players it will go on.

Does it have players? Yes.

Do you not like it? Get out.

This is where I remind people that we used to have 55K + on Sundays and 45K on Weekdays.


When that happens again I might try to eat a sock. Otherwise numbers in Eve are down.


Revelant for the slow

Quoted for epic irony.

No, it was posted on July 20GǪ
(...)

29,841 ++ 29,133 = 1.0243GǪ GåÆ the former number is 2.43GǪ% higher than the latter. This is properly rounded to 2.4%.
(...)

Why? With nothing to back it up, it won't lead you anywhere good. Especially since, no, two accounts per player is not the average. The best anyone has ever been able to guesstimate, it's somewhere in the region of 1Gàô per person. But more importantly, the number of accounts per person is entirely irrelevant to what you're calculating: each online character (and each subbed account, which is what you're trying to derive) isGǪ wellGǪ one account. The number of players (and the number of accounts per player) is not a factor in determining the amount of money they earn. It could be one person owning all 350k or 700 people sharing them with one character slot each GÇö the final amount of accounts and final earnings is the same.

OkGǪ so not only are you assuming a completely unfounded number of playing hours per day, for a completely unfounded number of accounts per player, for a thoroughly unreasonable (and entirely irrelevant) global distribution of server load.

GǪand all of that to come back to the exact same number you had before: a 2.4% growth over a very long period of time. You get the same number because you use the same data as the basis for your calculation GÇö a 2.4% growth in that number ends up as a 2.4% growth in the final result as well. Multiplication and division is funny that wayGǪ

Oh, and by the way, what you're doing here is assuming that the number of accounts can be calculated from the average number of online usersGǪ but you started out by saying that we can't do that, so your whole exercise is, according to you, pointless. So why all the number juggling?

Erhmm ... OP, rather than (trying to) debunk the irrelevant niggly bits in the graphs (which I'm seeing as pure sophistry), I'd like to see your entire analysis that can provide strong proofs and arguments that EVE isn't dying.
Lay it on the table and we'll see if it survives peer review

OP is so obviously a CCP alt.

to show how silly the interpretation is 'its a flat line'. People are saying eve is dying since i started playing in 2006, while in fact its very much alive and growing.

[quote=Peter Powers]
to show how silly the interpretation is 'its a flat line'.

I mean seriously. What exactly are you defending here?

if you calculate growth you go from the base number, not from the result. so its 2.5

the number of accounts has relevance to get to the result, you have to account for people with multiple accounts not having them logged in at the same time.

and i stick with that 2 is a pretty low number

serverload? i dont know where you get that from

also its not about if growth is 2.5%, its about what that means. [GǪ] to show how silly the interpretation is 'its a flat line'.

Tippia, I agree with most of your post, but I think that the introduction of Incarna has had an impact on people logging in multiple accounts, which would probably have a noticable effect on the correlation to which you refer.

summertime has always been the period when some people go on holidays and spend time in the sun.

so this whole discussion based on numbers over the summer is silly.

(... stuff about comparing incarna to previous expansions ... )
I mean seriously. What exactly are you defending here?

We haven't had a genuine expansion since Apocrypha and its fairly easy to compare what we get now with what we had before:

This is what an expansion looks like

This is what we got this summer

Incarna

It doesn't matter how much you spin it: 2.5% over 30 months is still flat as hell.

This argument doesn't work since the client has the option to turn off the loading of station environment.

Me again..

LINKAGE HERE!

LINKAGE THERE!

LINKAGE EVERY WHERE!

GRAPHS!

NUMBERS!

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You guys are all mathematical geniuses, how come you are all still playing EVE?

Shouldn't you be analyzing the stock exchange - with all that brain power?

Eve has died ever year I've been playing. Every expansion has been the expansion that will kill Eve. Every patch is the final straw that will break the camel's back. Every promise is a lie, and every suggestion is a promise, and no plan may ever change.

When the sky does finally fall, my ship will come down with it, and not a moment sooner.

i prefer a healthy 2.5% over a boom of 25% with the associated problems on a setup thats not supposed to grow that fast ;)

Really, when the argument gets to the point where you find yourself saying things as dumb as this

Yes, I agree, saying that 2.5% growth isn't actually growth is pretty dumb.

I do as well, that's why I didn't actually say it. I also think that lying about what people have actually said is even dumber.

0.8% annual growth is as near to flat as makes no difference - especially when the trend this year isn't growth but contraction. It is definitely an unacceptable growth rate when the amount of resources that have been expended on these ill-considered, unwanted, shamefully wasteful expansions (Dominion, Tyrannis, Incarna) is taken into account.

I do as well, that's why I didn't actually say it. I also think that lying about what people have actually said is even dumber.

unacceptable growth rate when the amount of resources that have been expended on these ill-considered, unwanted, shamefully wasteful expansions (Dominion, Tyrannis, Incarna) is taken into account.

you are indeed totally right with that aspect.
for once, i've been saying for YEARS that i dont need no walking in stations
and that the focus should be on spaceships - however the community of whine,
the same people making posts about how eve is dying now etc.
where the same ones that a year ago, half a year ago etc.
have been bitching about CCP not delivering walking in stations...
if i was to make any wishes about what should be done

we talk about supercap rebalance
(not the nerf everything to **** way that alot of people are crying for,
more in making shield / armor more even, and adding NEW SHIPS / Weapons
in roles that allow them to efficiently attack supercapitals). we'd talk about adding PVP and PVE content (New Ships, new Modules, more INTERACTIVE stuff todo)

... and this discussion here isn't about that, is it now?

what you should be focusing your questions on to CCP is.

how come that walking in station is so hard to implement?, Earth & Beyond had that from their launch before eve was in beta.
are people at CCP so inept at programming or have they any programmers left?

we talk about supercap rebalance
(not the nerf everything to **** way that alot of people are crying for,
more in making shield / armor more even, and adding NEW SHIPS / Weapons
in roles that allow them to efficiently attack supercapitals). we'd talk about adding PVP and PVE content (New Ships, new Modules, more INTERACTIVE stuff todo)

Yep fully agree. I want Exodus scale expansions with entire new ship classes, professions, meaningful iteration on earlier unfinished content and stuff you can genuinely get excited about. Thats why I made the comparison between Exodus and Incarna. The difference in content and feature-density is shocking absolutely shocking.

Eve players are amazingly short sighted, at times. As we speak, CCP is working on something never before done in gaming: A cross platform, cross genre network of players. Dust 514, if even remotely successful, will be groundbreaking for a number of reasons, not the least of which will be the logistic complexity it adds to Eve, and already complex game. Literally, CCP will have created the first complete sci-fi war simulation ever conceived.

And yet I am almost entirely uninterested in Dust 514 because its been revealed its a MicroTransaction Greed model thing from the ground up and CCP have demonstrated through NeX in Eve they don't have the faintest idea how to deliver such a thing in a way that doesn't insult the intelligence of gamers.

Pay to play per round of Dust ammo? No thanks.

At this point I'm extremely anti-Dust because not only does the proposed payment model fairly reek of money-grubbing profiteering but because it has the potential of corrupting the Eve sovereignty system into a pay-to-win obscenity also.

You can say "hell jade you just don't like change!" and I'll reply: "I don't like change where subscription turns to pay to win and damages the integrity of an established game universe no."

Bottom line. I don't like Pay to win for Eve. I don't like it in Dust either. I don't like the NeX shop and I consider all these things regressive and bad for the game.

Dust 514 will have a system exactly like we have in Eve. Everything you can pay cash for can be bought by simply earning the isk in game. CCP even admits that some Dust players will be spending most of their time playing the market, just we do now in Eve. Dust starts you with free isk and you earn more by playing. It is no different than Eve...except that you start with money already.
Knee jerk reactions have a habit of making you look silly.

I think you are making a lot of assumptions there, but fair enough, so am I. Ultimately we won't know how they intend to run Dust until it roles out but as I said, judging from the NeX experience I don't have a good feeling about the business model.