What started the curtain call...

[mthrockmor]

Was it the 12-hour switch change? Seems to me this is when our numbers began to decline. A fight goes lopsided, you want to change to get in on some action on another country, but you're trapped, for hours. You log, numbers decline. I remember many times seeing a big mission forming. I didn't want to join the mission, I wanted to help kill it, so I switched. It was normal, healthy, flexible, allowed players triple the options to find a good fight. That 12-hour rule killed numbers. Thoughts?

Boo

[Shuffler]

I think doing what you used to do was a contributing factor to dwindling numbers. It is also one of the reasons the rule was pushed to 12 hours.

If I switched sides, if was to go to the low number side most every time. When I did I would never divulge info about anything i picked up on the other side. No CV locations, no missions. It is just not right.

That being said, the numbers are climbing again.... or so it seems.

[Lusche]

Was it the 12-hour switch change? Seems to me this is when our numbers began to decline.

The decline started years before that, without any direct, singular reason. It's just that many players noticed it only much later when it (subjectively) began to effect their playstyle.
Actually, the 12 hour rule was reinstated because the split LW arenas were merged again, which in turn was only done because the population had declined too much to sustain two separate arenas. Oh, and there already was a 12 hours rule before the great arena split of 2006, in a time when the numbers went up.

 

[CptTrips]

WwIIonline
Battlefield 1942
Battlefield 2
Battlefield 3
Battlefield 4
World of warcraft
World of Tanks
World of Warships
War Thunder


IMHO, i don't think HTC did anything wrong other than assume all those players that they had in 2006 were all hardcore WWII air combat addicts.  I think the majority of them were just gamers who wanted an online multi-player war and AH was the best game in town. 

As other games came available that fit their interest or skill levels better, they evaporated off over time. 

There is also a secondary effect of critical mass.  At a certain point players will leave a MMO when enough other players have left simply because it doesn't feel "massive" anymore. 

I still think they can turn it around.  Jump on the early days of VR.  Broaden the appeal of the game to more than just hardcore fighter pilots.

$0.02

[zack1234]

3 hours would have been enough

[DubiousKB]

My squad (56th) switched to Knights; but I missed the memo...

So there I was wondering why the Knights were absolutely rolling our bases and nobody wanted to defend....

Can't beat'em? Join'em!

[Wiley]

Competition.  The vast majority don't want an ongoing arena, they want some kind of quick action bite size gaming session that lasts a relatively short amount of time and allows them to "accomplish" something.  The melee arena generally doesn't provide that.

In the past people tolerated the open world because there wasn't an alternative that provided similar gameplay.  Once similar gameplay in a more structured framework came along, the people who'd been tolerating the open world jumped ship.

Wiley.

[lunaticfringe]

Was it the 12-hour switch change? Seems to me this is when our numbers began to decline. A fight goes lopsided, you want to change to get in on some action on another country, but you're trapped, for hours. You log, numbers decline. I remember many times seeing a big mission forming. I didn't want to join the mission, I wanted to help kill it, so I switched. It was normal, healthy, flexible, allowed players triple the options to find a good fight. That 12-hour rule killed numbers. Thoughts?

Boo

well for 1 its a 6 hour switch not 12

[lunaticfringe]

when did they switch it 12 hours

[The Fugitive]

when did they switch it 12 hours

Originally it was 12 hours. Then they added the second MA and changes the switch time to 1 hour. After they went back to the single MA we had a 1 hour switch time for a few months as an over sight. HTC changed it back to 12 hours. A lot of chat went on about how that was terrible and Hitech relented and dropped it to 6 hours which we have had for some time now.