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Monday, April 21, 2008
Measuring server activity in WoW
In the past weeks I've been frequently complaining that I can't find groups to do 5-man dungeons, not even pickup groups, and that when I'm searching for other players with the Looking For More tool of the LFG window I never find more than one person for any given dungeon. In response I usually get a range of comments from "same here" to "LFG is working great". It is obvious that the ease of finding a group differs from server to server, and even from Alliance to Horde. So how can one measure server activity to quickly estimate how easy it will be to find a group?
In the past I've been using addons like CensusPlus, who with a series of /who commands just count anyone online. Unfortunately those only work well if you use them at prime time. But by chance I found an interesting way to measure general server activity overall, and you can use that any time of the day: Auctioneer. I haven't been unsing that addon very long, and I just use basic functions, I'm not playing the market. But several times per week I run a scan of the auction house, because without the scan you don't have enough price data. Having done that often enough, I know that on my main server, where I have my three level 70 characters, on the Horde side there are always between 7,000 and 8,000 auctions up in the AH. But as I mentioned I recently started a gnome rogue on a different server. And when I was running an Auctioneer scan there, I found over 18,000 auctions. The number of auctions must be proportional to the number of active players, it would be hard to explain why on one server there would be significantly more auctions per player than on another.
So if you use Auctioneer, I'd be interested to hear what number of auctions come us as total auctions scanned when you use it. Are there servers with even less activity than my Horde server? Or even more activity than my Alliance server?
- posted by Tobold @ 8:24 AM Permanent Link
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That is a neat idea :) I believe on my server I scan about 7000-8000 auctions. I know that this is not a very active server and finding groups and LFG is not easy unless you know a ton of people and can look via friendslist.
I think the most active (EU) servers are those that started in February 2005 (is it that long already?) when the game started in Europe ... but that's just my theory. I think realm hoppers tend to switch again. Those who stay ... stay. So the chance that you get more of those on the original realms is bigger than on newer realms.
I think the most active (EU) servers are those that started in February 2005 (is it that long already?) when the game started in Europe ... but that's just my theory. I think realm hoppers tend to switch again. Those who stay ... stay. So the chance that you get more of those on the original realms is bigger than on newer realms.
Hmm. That's an interesting point. I loathe Auctioneer with a firey passion, but I might download it to check my server.
In my opinion, auctioneer will definately tell you how active the AH is on any given server but I don't see how it can give you a very good idea about a population of a server.
Depending on what character I play I will use the AH more frequently and put up much larger numbers of items at a time.
After playing one of my alts I either sell everything green+ or DE them and put the shards up.
(20+ items)
When I play a 70 I usually accumulate less stuff to put in the AH during the day.
Also right before I last quit (february?) I put up about 200+ items to get rid of all of my recipe ingredients that I think would be less valuable when the expansion comes out.
Also there is probably a trend on smaller populated server for people to be less likely to put items up in the AH versus vendoring them because stuff may move slower on the AH.
I don't know.
Depending on what character I play I will use the AH more frequently and put up much larger numbers of items at a time.
After playing one of my alts I either sell everything green+ or DE them and put the shards up.
(20+ items)
When I play a 70 I usually accumulate less stuff to put in the AH during the day.
Also right before I last quit (february?) I put up about 200+ items to get rid of all of my recipe ingredients that I think would be less valuable when the expansion comes out.
Also there is probably a trend on smaller populated server for people to be less likely to put items up in the AH versus vendoring them because stuff may move slower on the AH.
I don't know.
# posted by 
: 21/4/08 15:58
: 21/4/08 15:58
I believe the difference you're seeing is the difference between Horde and Alliance, not between servers. Those numbers are in line with the number of auctions I scan in Orgrimamr vs. Ironforge on one server. I move items back and forth regularly, so I keep up on both AH's.
Keep in mind too that you'll see about 20-25% more auctions during the weekend than during the week, and it fluctuates somewhat during the day as well, so if this is to be used as a metric for comparing server populations, then you must be careful to do your sample scans at the same time and day of the week.
Keep in mind too that you'll see about 20-25% more auctions during the weekend than during the week, and it fluctuates somewhat during the day as well, so if this is to be used as a metric for comparing server populations, then you must be careful to do your sample scans at the same time and day of the week.
# posted by : 21/4/08 16:02
: 21/4/08 16:02
Friends recently cajoled me into starting a new horde and alliance toon on PvP servers that I have no presence on. I started using Auctioneer to make money on those servers since I didn't feel like starting from scratch the way I did when I first started playing. The Alliance server generally has about 100-120 pages of auctions, which I guess comes out to 5k-6k auctions assuming 50 auctions per page. The Horde one has 400-450 pages, which is over 20k auctions. And yes, the difference in activity between the two is quite noticeable. But I don't have to worry about finding groups on those servers.
On my main server, where I actually do try to PUG, there are about 15000 auctions going normally. Most of the time I can find groups, but sometimes I can't, and certain instances are next to impossible. The Sunwell has made things difficult in my opinion, as many people are doing dailies or running Magister's Terrace rather than running other instances.
On my main server, where I actually do try to PUG, there are about 15000 auctions going normally. Most of the time I can find groups, but sometimes I can't, and certain instances are next to impossible. The Sunwell has made things difficult in my opinion, as many people are doing dailies or running Magister's Terrace rather than running other instances.
# posted by : 21/4/08 16:05
: 21/4/08 16:05
I think the least amount of auctions I've seen on my current server is ~18k after the weekend. Most I've seen is ~32k saturday afternoon.
I completely agree - over the last 6 months finding a PuG easily has become much harder. I agree partially that the new dailies quests and total/day (up to 25) has had an impact. However, I believe that the demise of the LFG tool is because of the generally poor experiences people have had with PuGs. Last weekend I had to run Slabs 5 times before we could finish - from tanks I forgot to inspect (fury!) resulting in healer aggro to bad dps (attack the SKULL!), it was awful.
However, my solution lately has been to be promiscuous with my friends list. Essentially, when running a PuG, "make friends" with the good player or two, and add them with some notes. People are willing to run instances they might not desparately need if they know that the group will be efficient (read: Fun!).
I guess, in other words, I am trying to AVOID the LFG tool and just spam /w's to my friends list for what I need!
However, my solution lately has been to be promiscuous with my friends list. Essentially, when running a PuG, "make friends" with the good player or two, and add them with some notes. People are willing to run instances they might not desparately need if they know that the group will be efficient (read: Fun!).
I guess, in other words, I am trying to AVOID the LFG tool and just spam /w's to my friends list for what I need!
As a side note to what edge said about PUGS, I know some guild mates of mine (warriors) had a perfect example of bad pugs. Each one managed to find their own MrT pug, and when I logged back on 4 hours later, they were both still in there. They had gone through multiple replacement pugs and contiuned to wipe on Kael... in normal mode.
They only finished when a bunch of us got back on line and came in to help out.
Incidentally, Tobold, you would like the one Prot Warrior. That man tanked Heroic Bot very well, and then dove right into an AV with us where he scored 4th damage and KB for our side. He does some amazing things with prot.
They only finished when a bunch of us got back on line and came in to help out.
Incidentally, Tobold, you would like the one Prot Warrior. That man tanked Heroic Bot very well, and then dove right into an AV with us where he scored 4th damage and KB for our side. He does some amazing things with prot.
# posted by : 21/4/08 21:11
: 21/4/08 21:11
I'd love more information and statistics... but I wonder what the conglomerate effect would be on server populations if it was easy to access.. would social people gravitate to the heavy pop servers and loners gravitate towards the low pop ones? certainly gankers like large pop servers cuz theres more targets, especially out in the boonies where help cannot arrive quickly. Pure pve'rs who cna move to a server with their guild though seem to prefer low pop because it has less lag and they already have a group for everything.
People interested in census statistics may wish to look at these pages compiled using the Census+ data:
US Servers
EU Servers
I have noticed that PVE servers usually have many more Alliance characters, and PVP ones tend to have more Horde characters.
US Servers
EU Servers
I have noticed that PVE servers usually have many more Alliance characters, and PVP ones tend to have more Horde characters.
12000 auctions here on Azshara EU (horde side) 10 min ago.
Azshara is one of the most active PvP servers in europe so i guess numbers get higher at weekends. I will check weekend numbers next days.
Azshara is one of the most active PvP servers in europe so i guess numbers get higher at weekends. I will check weekend numbers next days.
# posted by : 22/4/08 13:35
: 22/4/08 13:35
EU Crushridge, Horde
about 200+ auctioneer pages.
that is 10.000+ items on sell.
That server is considered as permanently full. And there's a server transfer about each month trying to get away players from that server. And can happen to have 500+ on queue between 8.30pm and 10.30pm
Also I suppose that Ally population in that server is bigger by many order of magnitude. Just by sight, at the new island (patch 2.4) was common to notice 5-7 ally every 1 horde.... roaming around quest givers and around.
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about 200+ auctioneer pages.
that is 10.000+ items on sell.
That server is considered as permanently full. And there's a server transfer about each month trying to get away players from that server. And can happen to have 500+ on queue between 8.30pm and 10.30pm
Also I suppose that Ally population in that server is bigger by many order of magnitude. Just by sight, at the new island (patch 2.4) was common to notice 5-7 ally every 1 horde.... roaming around quest givers and around.
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