Why is DC so underpopulated? [NA]

Lfehova · September 2014

I noticed something funny yesterday. I never really took into consideration how under populated DC is. Yesterday primetime pops were:
Chillrend: AD lock, EP lock, DC lock
Thornblade: AD lock, EP 3 bars, DC 1 bar (probably not even a real bar)

This isn't a QQ thread, I rather enjoy being the underdog faction. I'm just curious why the AD/EP both out populate us by 3-4 full bars of population.

I never played skyrim or anything, or eso beta. So is it because of lore? Some beta thing? Or some other factor unbeknownst to me?

Also, I see people rerolling between AD and EP. Is there a reason why very few people reroll DC? Are they scared of fighting the overwhelming odds? It's actually quite fun

maybe some more people should consider it.

Insurrektion · September 2014

Yea Idk. I rolled DC because I figured it'd be like most MMOs where people flood to whatever faction has the elves, or there'd be a lot of fanboys of Skyrim rolling Dark Elf or Nord for EP. I played the original Daggerfall rpg back in the day so I figured I'd be rolling with other old-schoolers. Oh well. For the record, AD has the most beautiful terrain for PvE, IMO. I've learned from years of experience, though, that you don't want to flood out one side of a faction. It literally kills pvp. The scenario on Thornblade this past campaign is history repeated for me. Now, there's no competition thus no pvp thus no fun. Go ahead and call me a QQer, because I am. I play this game to have fun and that was taken away from me. I don't want to be the only guy seiging a fort only to be zerged whats the fun in that lol

Agrippa_Invisus · September 2014

Lfehova wrote: »

I noticed something funny yesterday. I never really took into consideration how under populated DC is. Yesterday primetime pops were:
Chillrend: AD lock, EP lock, DC lock
Thornblade: AD lock, EP 3 bars, DC 1 bar (probably not even a real bar)

This isn't a QQ thread, I rather enjoy being the underdog faction. I'm just curious why the AD/EP both out populate us by 3-4 full bars of population.

I never played skyrim or anything, or eso beta. So is it because of lore? Some beta thing? Or some other factor unbeknownst to me?

Also, I see people rerolling between AD and EP. Is there a reason why very few people reroll DC? Are they scared of fighting the overwhelming odds? It's actually quite fun maybe some more people should consider it.

The biggest "blob" of DC we saw on Thornblade last night was about 40-50 players, so two full raid groups (approximated). On Thorn they were essentially unable to get anything going and stayed in the Glademist/Rayles/Warden area while periodically bouncing off Aleswell or Ash. The organized teams of them mainly ganked around wherever AD/EP were fighting when the blob quit/logged.

I think it comes from being the 'unknown' faction. Their game (Daggerfall) came out the longest ago. Skyrim was most recent, giving EP their numbers, and the online community pushed AD hard resulting in their current over whelming numbers.

Huntler · September 2014

I think your sampling is a little biased.....

Lfehova · September 2014

Huntler wrote: »

I think your sampling is a little biased.....

How so? Everytime I look at populations across all campaigns and add them up, DC is always the lowest. Always.

If you think otherwise then you're the one that is biased, considering you play for the largest most populated faction.

KariTR · September 2014

I do wish we had sub forums for EU and NA. Or posters would at least bracket NA in the title.

Lfehova · September 2014

Agrippa_Invisus wrote: »

I think it comes from being the 'unknown' faction. Their game (Daggerfall) came out the longest ago. Skyrim was most recent, giving EP their numbers, and the online community pushed AD hard resulting in their current over whelming numbers.

Ah, I didn't know the different factions were different elder scrolls games. That makes sense then. I guess the only people with this knowledge that would roll DC then are the sadist underdog fighters.

I love it, I had heard DC would be the underdog. But I admit half the reason I picked DC was because of the color blue.

Lfehova · September 2014

KariTR wrote: »

I do wish we had sub forums for EU and NA. Or posters would at least bracket NA in the title.

I edited it for you

Huntler · September 2014

Lfehova wrote: »

Huntler wrote: »

I think your sampling is a little biased.....

How so? Everytime I look at populations across all campaigns and add them up, DC is always the lowest. Always.

If you think otherwise then you're the one that is biased, considering you play for the largest most populated faction.

I meant sampling bias. I have introduced no bias. Looking at only 2 of the campaigns on one night and claiming "every time I look" is not exactly statistically significant.

People no longer play on Thornblade because there is the perception that there is no point to play on it due to night capping. Now if I was to bring up, say... the population of Chillrend during the day... oh wow.. man... DC has more than other people... man... ***... DC must be overpopulated... you see what I'm saying here? O.o

I am much more likely to believe populations are normally distributed across the 3 factions.

KariTR · September 2014

Lfehova wrote: »

KariTR wrote: »

I do wish we had sub forums for EU and NA. Or posters would at least bracket NA in the title.

I edited it for you

TY, very cool of you.

Lfehova · September 2014

Huntler wrote: »

I meant sampling bias. I have introduced no bias. Looking at only 2 of the campaigns on one night and claiming "every time I look" is not exactly statistically significant.

People no longer play on Thornblade because there is the perception that there is no point to play on it due to night capping. Now if I was to bring up, say... the population of Chillrend during the day... oh wow.. man... DC has more than other people... man... ***... DC must be overpopulated... you see what I'm saying here? O.o

This was just one snapshot that made me stop and think of the population of DC. I have been pvping ever since release, and DC has been underpopulated the entire time. So my sampling is within the period of "since release". Sorry I didn't mention it in the OP. Didn't realize someone was gonna nitpick me for that.

driosketch · September 2014

Yeah I noticed that too, it's been like that for a while. Personally I picked DC because I lover TES II, and I figured the other two sides would be flooded.

Huntler · September 2014

Anytime someone claims something like this I am gonna nitpick the *** outta it

sorry (blame what I do for a living). Unfortunately I am inclined to want to see the distribution of the PvP populations by server and time of day before we claim something is true instead of what we "feel." The reasons for varying populations can be very different from what we think they are.

Agrippa_Invisus · September 2014

Lfehova wrote: »

Agrippa_Invisus wrote: »

I think it comes from being the 'unknown' faction. Their game (Daggerfall) came out the longest ago. Skyrim was most recent, giving EP their numbers, and the online community pushed AD hard resulting in their current over whelming numbers.

Ah, I didn't know the different factions were different elder scrolls games. That makes sense then. I guess the only people with this knowledge that would roll DC then are the sadist underdog fighters.

I love it, I had heard DC would be the underdog. But I admit half the reason I picked DC was because of the color blue.

AD doesn't, technically, have it's own title. It features extensively throughout the game Skyrim and is essentially the mortal antagonist in the political storylines -- they manipulated and caused the Skyrim civil war, they sacked the Imperial City, they nearly ended the Mede Empire and are blatant Mer supremacists and racists. It's one of the reason that many EP players kinda dislike them. If they liked Nords/Skyrim, they usually despise the Thalmor and the Aldmeri Dominion.

Basically, if you did the AD questlines in ESO, the Veiled Heritance comes to power, takes over the Thalmor, and rules the AD.

Daggerfall was the second game of the series and is oooold. Late 90s old. It was a huge psuedo 3D world that would be the precursor for many 3D sandbox adventure titles.

EP is represented in both Skyrim and Morrowind, two of the most beloved games of the franchise. We have Viking subculture and the alternate fantasy world of the Dark Elves and Morrowind with having Guar and mushrooms and volcanos instead of the Not-Europe you usually get.

Sallington · September 2014

People want to play other races more than Brenton, Orc or Redguard.

Agrippa_Invisus · September 2014

Sallington wrote: »

People want to play other races more than Brenton, Orc or Redguard.

Many of us pre-ordered, so we can play any race we want. One of my guild's best healers is a Bosmer.

Lfehova · September 2014

Agrippa_Invisus wrote: »

Lfehova wrote: »

Agrippa_Invisus wrote: »

I think it comes from being the 'unknown' faction. Their game (Daggerfall) came out the longest ago. Skyrim was most recent, giving EP their numbers, and the online community pushed AD hard resulting in their current over whelming numbers.

Ah, I didn't know the different factions were different elder scrolls games. That makes sense then. I guess the only people with this knowledge that would roll DC then are the sadist underdog fighters.

I love it, I had heard DC would be the underdog. But I admit half the reason I picked DC was because of the color blue.

AD doesn't, technically, have it's own title. It features extensively throughout the game Skyrim and is essentially the mortal antagonist in the political storylines -- they manipulated and caused the Skyrim civil war, they sacked the Imperial City, they nearly ended the Mede Empire and are blatant Mer supremacists and racists. It's one of the reason that many EP players kinda dislike them. If they liked Nords/Skyrim, they usually despise the Thalmor and the Aldmeri Dominion.

Basically, if you did the AD questlines in ESO, the Veiled Heritance comes to power, takes over the Thalmor, and rules the AD.

Daggerfall was the second game of the series and is oooold. Late 90s old. It was a huge psuedo 3D world that would be the precursor for many 3D sandbox adventure titles.

EP is represented in both Skyrim and Morrowind, two of the most beloved games of the franchise. We have Viking subculture and the alternate fantasy world of the Dark Elves and Morrowind with having Guar and mushrooms and volcanos instead of the Not-Europe you usually get.

I don't normally give a *** about lore. I did some quests on my first character until I hit the vr6 zone, then got bored and power leveled off world bosses, dolmens, and others. And my second character I just straight up grinded to vr1 on mobs, then straight to craglorn grinding.

But this background lore explaining population imbalance is very insightful. Thanks for the history

at least I know why!

Plus I heard somewhere the kate beckinsale is the voice of the queen. And she is one foxy lady.

Lfehova · September 2014

driosketch wrote: »

Yeah I noticed that too, it's been like that for a while. Personally I picked DC because I lover TES II, and I figured the other two sides would be flooded.

Glad to have another brother fighting the odds

Insanity? Or bravery?

Lfehova · September 2014

Huntler wrote: »

Anytime someone claims something like this I am gonna nitpick the *** outta it sorry (blame what I do for a living). Unfortunately I am inclined to want to see the distribution of the PvP populations by server and time of day before we claim something is true instead of what we "feel." The reasons for varying populations can be very different from what we think they are.

Well if you find a way to track the distributions reliably throughout the day, please share, I'd be super interested

Otherwise, with this 1bar could be 1-50 people guesstimation crap, we will never know for sure outside of rough estimates. That probably drives you crazy if you're a statistician of some sort lol. Thank god I'm a mobile developer and could care less

starlizard70ub17_ESO · September 2014

Remember, AD also has Khajiit. Lots of people like cats. I know its strange but true, many people picked AD so they could be a Khajiit. <(not counting the people who paid more for explorer and higher game editions where you could be any race, starting any where.

Lfehova · September 2014

Sallington wrote: »

People want to play other races more than Brenton, Orc or Redguard.

Oh ***. I totally forgot. I preordered so I've never really thought of the race implications.

Lfehova · September 2014

starlizard70ub17_ESO wrote: »

Remember, AD also has Khajiit. Lots of people like cats. I know its strange but true, many people picked AD so they could be a Khajiit. <(not counting the people who paid more for explorer and higher game editions where you could be any race, starting any where.

Who the *** would want to be a cat? Lol.

Also I picked my races based solely on racial passives.

Agrippa_Invisus · September 2014

Lfehova wrote: »

Agrippa_Invisus wrote: »

Lfehova wrote: »

Agrippa_Invisus wrote: »

I think it comes from being the 'unknown' faction. Their game (Daggerfall) came out the longest ago. Skyrim was most recent, giving EP their numbers, and the online community pushed AD hard resulting in their current over whelming numbers.

Ah, I didn't know the different factions were different elder scrolls games. That makes sense then. I guess the only people with this knowledge that would roll DC then are the sadist underdog fighters.

I love it, I had heard DC would be the underdog. But I admit half the reason I picked DC was because of the color blue.

AD doesn't, technically, have it's own title. It features extensively throughout the game Skyrim and is essentially the mortal antagonist in the political storylines -- they manipulated and caused the Skyrim civil war, they sacked the Imperial City, they nearly ended the Mede Empire and are blatant Mer supremacists and racists. It's one of the reason that many EP players kinda dislike them. If they liked Nords/Skyrim, they usually despise the Thalmor and the Aldmeri Dominion.

Basically, if you did the AD questlines in ESO, the Veiled Heritance comes to power, takes over the Thalmor, and rules the AD.

Daggerfall was the second game of the series and is oooold. Late 90s old. It was a huge psuedo 3D world that would be the precursor for many 3D sandbox adventure titles.

EP is represented in both Skyrim and Morrowind, two of the most beloved games of the franchise. We have Viking subculture and the alternate fantasy world of the Dark Elves and Morrowind with having Guar and mushrooms and volcanos instead of the Not-Europe you usually get.

I don't normally give a *** about lore. I did some quests on my first character until I hit the vr6 zone, then got bored and power leveled off world bosses, dolmens, and others. And my second character I just straight up grinded to vr1 on mobs, then straight to craglorn grinding.

But this background lore explaining population imbalance is very insightful. Thanks for the history at least I know why!

Plus I heard somewhere the kate beckinsale is the voice of the queen. And she is one foxy lady.

Yup. Kate B. is indeed the voice of Queen Ayrenn (or Queen Kate as she's referred to).

Bill Nighy (also from Underworld, Viktor, the head vampire) is the voice of King Emeric (Daggerfall's NPC leader).

Peter Stormare (Gaer Gimsrud from Fargo -- the killer who stuffs Steve Buscemi in a woodchipper) is the High King of Skyrim.

Jennifer Hale (the lady Commander Shepherd of Mass Effect) is Lyris Titanborn.

Albert Molina (Doc Octopus from the second Tobey Maguire Spiderman movie) is Abnur Tharn.

Michael Gambon (Dumbledore from the Harry Potter movies) is the voice of the Prophet.

Huntler · September 2014

Lfehova wrote: »

Huntler wrote: »

Anytime someone claims something like this I am gonna nitpick the *** outta it sorry (blame what I do for a living). Unfortunately I am inclined to want to see the distribution of the PvP populations by server and time of day before we claim something is true instead of what we "feel." The reasons for varying populations can be very different from what we think they are.

Well if you find a way to track the distributions reliably throughout the day, please share, I'd be super interested

Otherwise, with this 1bar could be 1-50 people guesstimation crap, we will never know for sure outside of rough estimates. That probably drives you crazy if you're a statistician of some sort lol. Thank god I'm a mobile developer and could care less

Indeed this is the problem. But that whole kate beckinsale theory I can get behind... thats why I joined AD

Lfehova · September 2014

Agrippa_Invisus wrote: »

Lfehova wrote: »

Agrippa_Invisus wrote: »

Lfehova wrote: »

Agrippa_Invisus wrote: »

I think it comes from being the 'unknown' faction. Their game (Daggerfall) came out the longest ago. Skyrim was most recent, giving EP their numbers, and the online community pushed AD hard resulting in their current over whelming numbers.

Ah, I didn't know the different factions were different elder scrolls games. That makes sense then. I guess the only people with this knowledge that would roll DC then are the sadist underdog fighters.

I love it, I had heard DC would be the underdog. But I admit half the reason I picked DC was because of the color blue.

AD doesn't, technically, have it's own title. It features extensively throughout the game Skyrim and is essentially the mortal antagonist in the political storylines -- they manipulated and caused the Skyrim civil war, they sacked the Imperial City, they nearly ended the Mede Empire and are blatant Mer supremacists and racists. It's one of the reason that many EP players kinda dislike them. If they liked Nords/Skyrim, they usually despise the Thalmor and the Aldmeri Dominion.

Basically, if you did the AD questlines in ESO, the Veiled Heritance comes to power, takes over the Thalmor, and rules the AD.

Daggerfall was the second game of the series and is oooold. Late 90s old. It was a huge psuedo 3D world that would be the precursor for many 3D sandbox adventure titles.

EP is represented in both Skyrim and Morrowind, two of the most beloved games of the franchise. We have Viking subculture and the alternate fantasy world of the Dark Elves and Morrowind with having Guar and mushrooms and volcanos instead of the Not-Europe you usually get.

I don't normally give a *** about lore. I did some quests on my first character until I hit the vr6 zone, then got bored and power leveled off world bosses, dolmens, and others. And my second character I just straight up grinded to vr1 on mobs, then straight to craglorn grinding.

But this background lore explaining population imbalance is very insightful. Thanks for the history at least I know why!

Plus I heard somewhere the kate beckinsale is the voice of the queen. And she is one foxy lady.

Yup. Kate B. is indeed the voice of Queen Ayrenn (or Queen Kate as she's referred to).

Bill Nighy (also from Underworld, Viktor, the head vampire) is the voice of King Emeric (Daggerfall's NPC leader).

Peter Stormare (Gaer Gimsrud from Fargo -- the killer who stuffs Steve Buscemi in a woodchipper) is the High King of Skyrim.

Jennifer Hale (the lady Commander Shepherd of Mass Effect) is Lyris Titanborn.

Albert Molina (Doc Octopus from the second Tobey Maguire Spiderman movie) is Abnur Tharn.

Michael Gambon (Dumbledore from the Harry Potter movies) is the voice of the Prophet.

What the ***. This game is like the ocean's 11 cast of video game voice acting.

Agrippa_Invisus · September 2014

Lfehova wrote: »

Agrippa_Invisus wrote: »

Lfehova wrote: »

Agrippa_Invisus wrote: »

Lfehova wrote: »

Agrippa_Invisus wrote: »

I think it comes from being the 'unknown' faction. Their game (Daggerfall) came out the longest ago. Skyrim was most recent, giving EP their numbers, and the online community pushed AD hard resulting in their current over whelming numbers.

Ah, I didn't know the different factions were different elder scrolls games. That makes sense then. I guess the only people with this knowledge that would roll DC then are the sadist underdog fighters.

I love it, I had heard DC would be the underdog. But I admit half the reason I picked DC was because of the color blue.

AD doesn't, technically, have it's own title. It features extensively throughout the game Skyrim and is essentially the mortal antagonist in the political storylines -- they manipulated and caused the Skyrim civil war, they sacked the Imperial City, they nearly ended the Mede Empire and are blatant Mer supremacists and racists. It's one of the reason that many EP players kinda dislike them. If they liked Nords/Skyrim, they usually despise the Thalmor and the Aldmeri Dominion.

Basically, if you did the AD questlines in ESO, the Veiled Heritance comes to power, takes over the Thalmor, and rules the AD.

Daggerfall was the second game of the series and is oooold. Late 90s old. It was a huge psuedo 3D world that would be the precursor for many 3D sandbox adventure titles.

EP is represented in both Skyrim and Morrowind, two of the most beloved games of the franchise. We have Viking subculture and the alternate fantasy world of the Dark Elves and Morrowind with having Guar and mushrooms and volcanos instead of the Not-Europe you usually get.

I don't normally give a *** about lore. I did some quests on my first character until I hit the vr6 zone, then got bored and power leveled off world bosses, dolmens, and others. And my second character I just straight up grinded to vr1 on mobs, then straight to craglorn grinding.

But this background lore explaining population imbalance is very insightful. Thanks for the history at least I know why!

Plus I heard somewhere the kate beckinsale is the voice of the queen. And she is one foxy lady.

Yup. Kate B. is indeed the voice of Queen Ayrenn (or Queen Kate as she's referred to).

Bill Nighy (also from Underworld, Viktor, the head vampire) is the voice of King Emeric (Daggerfall's NPC leader).

Peter Stormare (Gaer Gimsrud from Fargo -- the killer who stuffs Steve Buscemi in a woodchipper) is the High King of Skyrim.

Jennifer Hale (the lady Commander Shepherd of Mass Effect) is Lyris Titanborn.

Albert Molina (Doc Octopus from the second Tobey Maguire Spiderman movie) is Abnur Tharn.

Michael Gambon (Dumbledore from the Harry Potter movies) is the voice of the Prophet.

What the ***. This game is like the ocean's 11 cast of video game voice acting.

Yup. Quality voice acting is not one of my complaints about this game.

TBH, Molina as Tharn had me cracking up at times.

Ezareth · September 2014

I picked AD because I was familiar already with the storyline from playing it in Beta and wanted to use my experience to get ahead of the zerg blob of players. I picked Altmer for a sorc ( which is best for a sorc) and didn't have the option originally of choosing the other sides if I recall.

LonePirate · September 2014

I'm not disputing the widely accepted belief that there are fewer DC players than AD or EP players. I simply think it is not a massive difference. DC hit 3 bars on Thornblade NA last night while being pop locked on Chillrend. It's possible DC was pop locked for a brief time last night on Thornblade. A few days ago, DC was pop locked on both during prime time so there are plenty of DC players, even if they are fewer in number.

I have no idea how the DC pop stands on the EU server. I suspect it is similar to the NA server, though.

Huntler · September 2014

LonePirate wrote: »

I'm not disputing the widely accepted belief that there are fewer DC players than AD or EP players. I simply think it is not a massive difference. DC hit 3 bars on Thornblade NA last night while being pop locked on Chillrend. It's possible DC was pop locked for a brief time last night on Thornblade. A few days ago, DC was pop locked on both during prime time so there are plenty of DC players, even if they are fewer in number.

I have no idea how the DC pop stands on the EU server. I suspect it is similar to the NA server, though.

You must understand its all about perception and I'd be curious about the comparison of PvP population to total population. Is the perception that DC is underpopulated mean less DC players will PvP because they don't want to lose? What if all three sides have equal overall population, but unbalanced PvP population, what would that mean? Less PvP player chose DC? Unlikely, farm more likely people were normally distributed in each faction and thus your portion of "PvP" players should be near equal. So as I said could it be perception? Thats once again if there is an imbalance to begin with, but I think as an example the whole reason Thornblade is dead right now isn't that there weren't fights, its the perception of not being able to win because of night capping.

Lfehova · September 2014

Huntler wrote: »

LonePirate wrote: »

I'm not disputing the widely accepted belief that there are fewer DC players than AD or EP players. I simply think it is not a massive difference. DC hit 3 bars on Thornblade NA last night while being pop locked on Chillrend. It's possible DC was pop locked for a brief time last night on Thornblade. A few days ago, DC was pop locked on both during prime time so there are plenty of DC players, even if they are fewer in number.

I have no idea how the DC pop stands on the EU server. I suspect it is similar to the NA server, though.

You must understand its all about perception and I'd be curious about the comparison of PvP population to total population. Is the perception that DC is underpopulated mean less DC players will PvP because they don't want to lose? What if all three sides have equal overall population, but unbalanced PvP population, what would that mean? Less PvP player chose DC? Unlikely, farm more likely people were normally distributed in each faction and thus your portion of "PvP" players should be near equal. So as I said could it be perception? Thats once again if there is an imbalance to begin with, but I think as an example the whole reason Thornblade is dead right now isn't that there weren't fights, its the perception of not being able to win because of night capping.

Wasn't it population? On chillrend, EP heavily outnumbered DC/AD prior to the reset, and on Thornblade, AD heavily outnumbered DC/EP. In addition to both those factions being able to poplock at 5am (I know because I've been insane enough to try to defend)

I remember defending on Thornblade at glademist. It was 10DC, literally 10, vs poplock AD, I counted around 80ish inside the keep courtyard. All the while, EP was at 3 bars on chillrend pvdooring the keeps and resources all red.

It's insane that people enjoy pvdooring so much. That's the whole reason I brought No Mercy over to chillrend on reset. To try to chase the EP back to Thornblade. To have at least one campaign that's competitive. Hopefully with us there helping the cause, we can stir enough trouble for the EP that the DC/AD pops won't just give up the campaign and we can have some nice big fun fights all over the map. It appears we've unintentionally brought over the DC and AD from Thornblade. But at least we can have some good competitive fun pvp

Pixysticks · September 2014

Spoiler: You're not the underdog faction