Season of Discovery had 436,239 players as of January 23, 2024 just one week before Blizzard announced the GDKP ban. By the time that announcement hit on January 30, the population had already dropped to 296,147, shedding over 140,000 players. Then, by Phase 2’s launch on February 8, it collapsed further to just 183,882. That’s a total loss of 252,357 players a 57.8% drop in just 16 days, not months.
This wasn’t natural churn. It was a direct reaction to the GDKP ban. Phase 2 didn’t reignite the playerbase it triggered the largest population collapse following a phase launch in WoW’s history.
Season of Discovery – Population vs. GDKP Ban Timeline
Date
Event
Player Count
Change vs Prior
Notes
Jan 23, 2024
Week before GDKP Ban Announced
436,239
—
Stable Phase 1 peak before Blizzard’s announcement
Jan 30, 2024
GDKP Ban Announced
296,147
-140,092
Mass player exit triggered by policy announcement
Feb 8, 2024
Phase 2 Launch + Ban Implemented
183,882
-112,265
Ban formalized; population collapsed with no recovery
Summary Highlights
252,357 players quit between Jan 23 and Feb 8
All within 16 days, confirming a policy-driven exodus
RMT and botting increased after the ban, directly contradicting Blizzard’s stated goals
Losses tied to content fatigue, not sudden phase changes
Bottom line? The GDKP ban did more harm than good. It didn’t curb RMT. It didn’t stop botting. It drove away real players and shattered engagement. Blizzard claimed it would protect the community but the numbers prove it failed.
Even one of the biggest advocates for the ban ended up admitting it didn’t work:
And the response said it best:
Thanks again to Volhance for linking the source:
This is why there should not be a GDKP ban in MoP. It failed in SoD and is continuing to fail in Anniversary.
Thanks! I figured using tables was the best way to keep the information clear and organized. It’s a lot harder to dismiss the facts when they’re laid out visually, instead of buried in paragraphs. Glad you appreciated it!
People hate GDKPs because the facts conflict with their biases. I’ve been stating the same data for quite a while, but it gets ignored when buried in paragraphs, so I shifted to visual format. Tables and timelines make it harder to dodge the truth when it’s laid out clearly.
This post will likely get flagged as spam by the anti-GDKP crowd because they dislike being proven wrong. Since they can’t refute the facts, they’ll resort to using the report system as a weapon instead.
I feel like this should be obvious but apparently it needs to be said. If people are buying gold from bots, it means they have something to spend gold on. GDKP’s were banned as being a reason people buy gold. They were never stated to be the only reason. Trying to imply that GDKP’s have no effect on RMT is simply wrong. Putting lies on a graph don’t make them come true.
Your post also fails to acknowledge how SoD was being recieved.
Phase 1 was okay but there was little for players to do at these low levels. The BFD raid was okay but didn’t feel worth doing more than a few times.
Phase 2 was poorly recieved. Phase 3 even worse. People did not like the new raids or events.
It really wasn’t until phases 4/5 that people started enjoying SoD again. But that was far too late to intrigue their audience and see larger participation numbers.
You’re absolutely right that GDKPs weren’t the only reason for RMT no one claimed they were. But they were a regulated and visible outlet, which ironically helped contain and detect illicit gold sources. Removing them didn’t eliminate demand it just scattered it into harder-to-track channels.
Saying “people buy gold, so there must be something to spend it on” ignores the post-ban spike in botting and RMT activity across servers without GDKPs. So the system clearly wasn’t the root cause the player behavior was. The ban didn’t cure anything. It made detection harder and gave botnets more free reign.
As for SoD reception? Sure, some content wasn’t universally loved but the steepest population collapse happened before Phase 2 even launched.
Jan 23: 436,239 players
Jan 30: GDKP ban announced → 296,147
Feb 8: Ban enforced + Phase 2 → 183,882
Net loss: 252,357 players in 16 days
You’re citing later-phase reception to explain a drop that occurred weeks before they were released. That’s retroactive justification, not data-based causality.
So until you can show another phase with a comparable drop tied to content quality rather than policy-driven exit this rebuttal doesn’t hold.
Players didn’t just leave. They left all at once immediately after the ban. That’s not opinion. That’s timeline-backed fact.
i left in phase 1 same with all my friends we didnt do GDKP so the ban would not have affected us as burgi said BFD was decent but not worth doing more than 3 times i didnt come back to SoD until naxx
I think an interesting point to be brought up, how many of the member drops were due to being bots for gold? If they cant RMT then they are no longer needed.
If bots were quitting because GDKPs got banned and RMT was supposedly no longer viable then why did botting and RMT activity spike after the ban?
Server-wide whispers ramped up
Shell guilds exploded
Gold spam increased across AH and trade channels
Player reports surged, not declined
GDKPs were a visible and centralized outlet. Removing them didn’t remove demand; it just fragmented the economy and gave bot networks more places to hide. Blizzard’s own enforcement metrics showed rising ban waves tied to post-ban botting.
So no the member drop wasn’t bots “packing up and going home.” It was actual players logging off because the system that rewarded their effort got nuked and in its place, botters ran wild.
SoM failed because of its launch timing. Nothing else.
Claiming
completely ignores that:
We’re talking about Season of Discovery, not Season of Mastery
SoM’s population decline was tied to launch timing, splitting attention with TBC Classic.
Dragging SoM into this convo is like citing the success of chess to explain why Monopoly needs fewer rules. It’s irrelevant to what happened in SoD, where GDKPs where suddenly banned triggering a documented, timestamped collapse.
SoD’s timeline is clear:
Jan 23: 436,239 players
Jan 30: GDKP ban announced drop to 296,147
Feb 8: Ban enforced with Phase 2 down to 183,882
Total: 252,357 players gone in just 16 days
And still no response to the core questions:
Why did the drop happen so suddenly?
Why did botting and RMT spike after the ban?
Why did Phase 2 fail to recover player engagement?
Until those get addressed, this
claim is just empty repetition. And let’s not forget you keep referencing the infamous #1 GDKP Ad "LF AFK buyers” but where is it?
No screenshot No realm name No link, timestamp, or log
If you’re going to lead with anecdotes, at least back them up. Otherwise, all you’ve proven is that your argument collapsed harder than the server population.
Because suddenly, 400k people had to level from 25 to 40. Yeah the sweats might have power leveled. But the graph you use showed the casuals took their time, and phase 2 eventually peaked at 327k raiders.
Phase 1 even took 4 weeks for its peak.
The real question is, why were you expecting the same amount of logs the first week of phase 2 knowing full well people had to level and find the new runes.
Let’s slice through this deflection one line at a time:
You’re pointing at a gradual Phase 2 climb weeks after the drop and calling that a win, while ignoring what happened right before.
Jan 23: SoD population = 436,239
Jan 30: GDKP ban announced → down to 296,147
Feb 8: Ban enforced + Phase 2 launch → 183,882
Total loss: 252,357 players in just 16 days
That’s not “casuals leveling” — it’s a population crash timed directly with a policy change. The fact that numbers slowly crawled back to 327k weeks later doesn’t undo that exodus, and it never reached pre-ban levels again.
And let’s talk leveling: Going from 25 to 40 in Classic for a player who finished BFD, prepped quests, and had gear takes 2–3 days max. Not weeks. Not “eventually.” And certainly not a full month+ of inactivity.
So while you’re busy asking why we expected raid logs week one, here’s what still hasn’t been answered:
Why did over 250k characters vanishbefore Phase 2 launched?
Why did RMT and botting spike right after the ban?
Why did new content fail to restore even 75% of the playerbase?
The timeline isn’t confusing. It’s inconvenient. And until someone answers the actual questions, these leveling excuses are just air cover for a failed policy.
Because they weren’t a high enough level to run Gnomeregan. Some ran BFD for the world buff but thats about it. And maybe the sweats got into Gnomeregan the first week.
Let’s not get distracted by half-answers. Your post claims players vanished because they “weren’t high enough level to run Gnomeregan.” But that doesn’t explain:
Why they quit instead of leveling
Why dungeon and log activity cratered across the board
Why casual or mid-tier play didn’t hold steady despite BFD still being available
More importantly this still doesn’t touch the other two questions:
Why did botting and RMT spike after the GDKP ban? You ban the most visible gold system, and suddenly there’s more whisper spam, shell guild activity, and AH manipulation. That’s not coincidence that’s redistribution.
Why did Phase 2 fail to recover player engagement? Even weeks later, the population never returned to pre-ban levels. No surge. No bounce. Just fragmentation and silence. If people were “just leveling,” they would’ve come back. They didn’t.
So until those questions get actual answers, this isn’t a rebuttal. It’s just filler wrapped in speculation. The numbers are clean. The silence around them? Deafening.
Before I dig up additional data, how about you start by answering the ones you’ve been dodging for ten straight posts:
Why did 252,357 raid-active characters vanish in just 16 days after the GDKP ban?
Why did botting and RMT spike, not decline, following that ban?
Why did Phase 2 fail to reignite engagement, even with new content and leveling incentives?
These have been laid out clearly, backed by timelines from Ironforge and population graphs and yet your side continues deflecting, speculating, and cherry-picking around them. Now you want dungeon activity reports? Not until you hold up your end and address the collapse your side refuses to own.
Show up with answers, not excuses. Until then, this conversation stays one-sided with the receipts on my side.
Because you mentioned dungeon activity. If you are going to reference data you need to also provide the sources.
Just like how Ironforge completely shows the first week of phase 2 only had 183k raid logs. And I keep telling you because people had a new goal, get to level 40 and find their new belt and boots runes. Why some people did it way slower than others is a whole new question none of us will have the answers for.
You really should think about this question. Because it actually goes against GDKP alot more than you may think.
Why would gold sellers revert back to botting after their source of easy gold was banned?
This is the exact trend we see time and time again over on Retail throughout each expansions content patches.
Season of Discovery – Population vs. GDKP Ban Timeline
Week before GDKP Ban Announced
GDKP Ban Announced
-140,092
Phase 2 Launch + Ban Implemented
Summary Highlights
252,357 players quit between Jan 23 and Feb 8
All within 16 days, confirming a policy-driven exodus
RMT and botting increased after the ban, directly contradicting Blizzard’s stated goals
Major drop
Stable
Slight growth
Mixed
We’re talking about Season of Discovery, not Season of Mastery
Jan 23: 436,239 players
Feb 8: Ban enforced with Phase 2 down to 183,882
Total: 252,357 players gone in just 16 days
No screenshot 
Jan 23: SoD population = 436,239
Feb 8: Ban enforced + Phase 2 launch → 183,882
Total loss: 252,357 players in just 16 days
Why they quit instead of leveling
Why casual or mid-tier play didn’t hold steady despite BFD still being available