Player statistics calculation (Was: Re: [MUD-Dev] code base inquiry)

[Adam Wiggins]

On Thu, 18 Nov 1999, Petri Virkkula wrote:
> 	How others are calculating their player statistics? I have
> 	always seen people stating that a mud X averages between
> 	"100-200". I have been wondering whther other mud admins are
> 	not interested in more exact numbers at all. The statistics I
> 	have seen seems to show the impression of the player count as
> 	seen from players' point of view.

In the case of Arctic, they post very detailed stats each month.  The way
I was determining the peak-to-trough range on average number of players
was simply looking at that chart and seeing that the lowest number of
players was, say, 100 (at 6am) and the highest was, say, 200 (at 9pm).
Also interesting to players was the player time sorted by area.

Unfortunately I can't seem to find them now.  They aren't on the web page:
the admin used to just post "type help january_97_stats" on the in-game
boards each month.  Except now I can't remember what the exact syntax
was (I tried for a few minutes to figure it out).

All the others I listed were just guesses.  Although in some cases it's
easy to guess the peak: AnotherMUD, for example, had a cap of 100
characters and it hit that during peak hours all the time.

> 	Doesn't other muds are interested in statistics, or why they
> 	do not seem to collect/show more exact data?

Probably the admin feels that it's better to spend that time actually
adding to the game.  I, for one, feel that good statistic tracking is a
handy tool to have, so I had it coded into my mud from day one.  I've yet
to bother to make the data publicly available; currently it's just an
admin tool.

Adam W.




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