[Swish]

I like to look up what's going on elsewhere...maybe this'll answer a few 50/50 questions:-

Prime time evenings, I see 130-160 on at times, but overall it's way less than a few years ago. You really notice it if you play anyone under 65. The other night I was trying to get people together for a simple map in the 50-59 range... there were only 8 people total in that level range (this was about 9 or 10pm ET which is usually a fairly "busy" time in game).

Some of the oldest members there have a 2005 join date. Has the server been up 9 years?

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wut?

population decline has been pretty steady since 2009, and here is why i think it is:

1) no one knows about this game. the vast majority of people in the emulated everquest scene use eqemu, and we do not use that client and are not on that little server list that everyone sees when they log into project99 or PEQ or EZserver. the effort required to find this game, download the archaic client, jump through all the hoops etc deters people. i think this is the biggest problem by far, because a higher population would help the next 2 things:

2) "unpopular" dev decisions. i'm trying to be diplomatic here, but i think it's undeniable that some people have quit the game due to various nerfs of the past few years: exp, items, pets, riposte, crystalis, marza, etc. the list goes on. just to give two simple examples, although there are many - there are zero tier 13 items with a Bane on them, except a tank helm with humanoid monster. six encounters, 30+ items, and it's been this way for a year now? - another is blazewind gloves: received the following nerfs: -2 fire damage | -15 h2h mod | proc changed from a very good pbae to very bad single target DD. the item is now worse than silence, an item from four tiers lower. it has remained this way for a year now? i'm sorry, but these are things that would take fifteen minutes to fix, and do SO MUCH to improve goodwill with the playerbase, but almost seemingly in a stance of defiance, on we go.

3) stagnation. the release of ikisith was amazing, all this new content to explore, but since then... most of the devs moved on, most of the new devs have given up due to various frustrations with script learning or the tedium or the politics, whatever.
overgrowth was a big deal but due to drama a lot of it remains unfinished and was nerfed to an incredible degree.
thaz was a big deal but was and still is incredibly broken and unfinished, well over a year after it's release.

i hope things change, i enjoy this game a lot and i would like to see it return to prosperity, but first we need to accept that the current path is not working.

I tried EpicEmu, I was skeptical but I gave it ago. I'm now more skeptical than ever about trying anything else, and their forums speak volumes about the box.