LuckyBancho data shows that FF14 is in decline

[Jojoya]

That only applies to the last bar which is why it's all green. I specifically discarded that outlier from the discussion. Even just looking at the first few bars of EW it's clear the ratios are changing.

In other datasets LB released, we see that the churn rate of FF14 is now at 20% per quarter.

And why I'm posting this is none of your concern.

How much of that churn is due to the WoW exodus that bloated the Endwalker numbers in the first place? As I said to Boblawblah, that exodus through the numbers into chaos so it's hard to say exactly what is going on with player numbers.

It's up to you if you don't want to mention what prompted you to start this thread. It would have been smarter to ignore my question instead of state that you're not going to answer. You've drawn attention to your desire to hide your reason. That's going to leave others with even more doubt that your intent was innocent.

Also in saying that all of ShBs growth was due to the wow exodus when that was only, like, the last patch or two.

The WoW exodus started before Shadowbringers launched though the number of players quitting BfA and trying FFXIV was a fraction of those who followed the content creators after Shadowlands tanked. I can remember helping a lot of former WoW players adjust to the ways the two games differ and helping a few of them set up their own FCs.

COVID would have also affected the numbers with most of the first world stuck in lockdown. I'd still put the vast majority of the increase due to the WoW content creators trying FFXIV. That's what got players from a number of games to stop dismissing FFXIV as a "dumb weeb game".

Otherwise, the numbers probably would have been closer to the pattern seen in the other expansions.

Dawntrail starting out at approximately the same numbers as Shadowbringers is what the stable growth line would predict. We'll have to see how close it is to the reality next summer.