How Opticraft Has Been Doing Over the Years (In New Members)

[UnknownHedgehog]

This is basically a follow-up to a post I did here back when we were debating over whether there should be creative and basically the overall well being of the server in terms of the number of people online and new members.

There I posted a graph of the number of new members that have joined the server per month since the beginning (at least in terms of number of people to register an account on the forum) arguing for the case that Opticraft is losing people and Creative could help. It's been about 8 months since I posted that, and about 7 months since we have had the Creative server.

So how are things coming along?

*Note: I couldn't fit the first 3 months of Opticraft onto the graph like I could with the last graph.
Red 1: Opticraft SMP is launched. 1/2012
Orange: Member world for SMP is released. 6/2012
Cyan 1: Melons/Pumpkins/Cacti removed from the market. 6/2012
Black 1: Mojang first removes Classic from the main page of Minecraft.net. Re-adds it, but harder to navigate to. 8/2012
Blue: Official YouTube channel launched. 9/2012
*One I should've mentioned was the New Guest World being released on 12/2012, which explains the spike.
Pink: PVP maps released. 7/2013
Black 2: Mojang kills Classic. Permanently removes Classic from the main page at Minecraft.net. 7/2013
Cyan 2: Gold/Iron ingots removed from the market. 9/2013
Red 2: Opticraft Creative is launched. 9/2014
*The dots also do not account for Minecraft updates that may have boosted popularity.

It looks like after the Creative server was released, it was somewhat a slow start. But then a huge spike of people happened in December and January. I have no idea what from or how, but it looks like the number sharply fell back down in February and March. Whatever it was though, it seems we couldn't hold the momentum up for long though. It seems when you exclude the 2 outlier months that we still have retained relatively low new member numbers each month, which is a bit disheartening.

What do you guys think of all this?

[TarynMai]

That huge jump in december was when we started getting a bunch of spambots actually lmao.

But thats pretty cool!

Problem is with creative theres no need for people to sign up, since you dont get any rewards on creative for doing so. But theres not really much we can do about that lol

[raul7legend]

Spambots pretty much. The forums were never a good indication of the server activity anyways lol

[TheWholeLoaf]

Theres only been 1624 banned accounts on the website (spambots and players).

[UnknownHedgehog]

Spambots pretty much. The forums were never a good indication of the server activity anyways lol

Well, besides the spambots. But maybe overall server activity isn't completely accurately shown through the forum as most people who've ever played probably never made an account. However, I believe it can be useful to see how many people who at least plan on possibly staying since they've bothered to make an account.

[TheWholeLoaf]

Spambots pretty much. The forums were never a good indication of the server activity anyways lol

Well, besides the spambots. But maybe overall server activity isn't completely accurately shown through the forum as most people who've ever played probably never made an account. However, I believe it can be useful to see how many people who at least plan on possibly staying since they've bothered to make an account.

Or just people that know about opticraft.

[DeeKay]

Very interesting, stats like these have always interested me. While I agree with Alicia and Raul, I can still agree that the forum stats are the best source we have for determining the overall activity.

If it could have been done, I would love to have set up some really advanced statistic system that logs player logins per day, month, year, ect. And even log them based on things like location. I think knowing when and where your players come from is really important in keeping a server active.

Good job on the graph.

[gavin1928374655]

Server signup rate really plateaued after the removal of iron and gold.  It might not be related, but I think a fair amount of players were turned off by not being able to sell iron/gold.  I remember speaking to more than a few guests/members who got frustrated and left after learning they couldn't sell much of anything to market.  It's odd how new players to the server still want to make money that really has no value and is just some number on a database.

Anyway, cool chart.  I like how you highlighted key events in our server's history.

[TarynMai]

Server signup rate really plateaued after the removal of iron and gold.  It might not be related, but I think a fair amount of players were turned off by not being able to sell iron/gold.

Could also be because school started then for most people. Or both.

[VoreReznor]

Do we have records of the votes made monthly they may directly affect the memberships?

[daniblue182]

When we started to remove things people left, and then more things were removed, then more people left.. but I hardly see anyone new anymore, which sucks but meh, but i do see more people on smp than creative which makes me happy

[TarynMai]

When we started to remove things people left, and then more things were removed, then more people left.. but I hardly see anyone new anymore, which sucks but meh, but i do see more people on smp than creative which makes me happy

I dunno about smp, but on creative, in march alone, we've gotten about 500 new players. Just... not many stayed...

[daniblue182]

When we started to remove things people left, and then more things were removed, then more people left.. but I hardly see anyone new anymore, which sucks but meh, but i do see more people on smp than creative which makes me happy

I dunno about smp, but on creative, in march alone, we've gotten about 500 new players. Just... not many stayed...

Yeah, not many people stay long enough to get recruit, some thing is going wrong somewhere..

[TarynMai]

When we started to remove things people left, and then more things were removed, then more people left.. but I hardly see anyone new anymore, which sucks but meh, but i do see more people on smp than creative which makes me happy

I dunno about smp, but on creative, in march alone, we've gotten about 500 new players. Just... not many stayed...

Yeah, not many people stay long enough to get recruit, some thing is going wrong somewhere..

Part of the problem is most likely because our standards are too high for most people's liking.

[daniblue182]

When we started to remove things people left, and then more things were removed, then more people left.. but I hardly see anyone new anymore, which sucks but meh, but i do see more people on smp than creative which makes me happy

I dunno about smp, but on creative, in march alone, we've gotten about 500 new players. Just... not many stayed...

Yeah, not many people stay long enough to get recruit, some thing is going wrong somewhere..

Part of the problem is most likely because our standards are too high for most people's liking.

or maybe we lack something to keep them hooked?