skyfire wrote:
I thought the number looked rather small considering the efforts folks were puting forth.
I decided to do a little math. I picked a conservative number of 20 for the average number of handsful of sand-- last I'd seen the highest number of piles carried by someone was 60 (though there was quite enough time after for that to have changed significantly), but figured to err towards the assumption that more people had slower pets. So 20 seemed a safe bet.
I took this and divided 104,034 by it and got ~5202 (5201.7). So with a conservative number of piles carried away, we only had 5200 people carrying? From all around the world? I found that difficult to believe (though it's feasable, I'm a skeptic).
I don't honestly know if my conservative number was too high, but if it's too low, that number of folks is even lower!
Which really leads me to two conclusions about 104,034: it's arbitrary or it's a clue.
Instead of whipping a number off the top of our heads let's do some averages:
3 hour wait time: 7 average
2.5 hour wait time: 10 average
2 hour wait time: 19 average
1.5 hour wait time: 33 average
1 hour wait time: 41 average
-------------------------------------------
7 + 10 + 19 + 33 + 41 / 5 =
22 average
Okay, so now we know a safe estimate is that the average player carried away 22 handfuls of sand during the repository dig.
104,034 / 22 = 4728 total people (rounded off).
Since only those who have translated their tablet, found their statue and read the correct scroll could participate in the dig this is a very believable number.
Also, let's not forget that roughly 39% of the people who would have been able to dig couldn't figure out the correct phrase
or weren't online / quit participating in the plot due to the long wait times.
4728 * 39% = 1844 (rounded off)
4728 + 1844 =
6572 total players
To me 4,728 total diggers and 6,572 total players who have completed all the steps seems to be an acurate number, especially since there are still a
lot of people who are still getting the tablet pieces.
I know we tend to think of these numbers in the millions, but we've seen it over and over that very few people have the ability to map their temple or follow clues even when people tell them how.