This I understand. But, I (also) understand that it’s not this way, for the Alliance which is why I specified that the Horde side was never as thriving as the Alliance side. Picking a minority faction, on a non-connected realm is expected to show low numbers. Flip it over to the other side via Alliance, it’s not this way. And, there’s truth to the blue post, in the sequestered community forums, regarding this, as well:
https://us.forums.blizzard.com/en/wow/t/state-of-tbc-servers/1148178/3
Overall, the data we have suggests that, broadly, players don’t seem to want an even playing field and/or they care more about having their faction be heavily populated and lively than they care about their realm being balanced
https://us.forums.blizzard.com/en/wow/t/state-of-tbc-servers/1148178/6
Again, using the data we’ve gathered over the past few years, it’s fairly conclusive that players do not take advantage of FCMs or paid transfers to move to the underdog faction. It’s just not something that happens to a degree to move the needle in a positive direction, and offering that move as the only option that players have for free transfers is likely not going to be positively received by players who are unhappy with their current realm.
Do you honestly expect people to freely and/or pay to move their characters to fix a dead side, for you? No, OFC not! I make it very clear that Horde side, on BB isn’t as active as the Alliance side since the very beginning (via even before the split happened) and acknowledge that difference. But, that doesn’t mean, as a whole, that’s the entire server. Just flip over to Alliance, and you’ll see a much more “livelier” (I do mean this lightly) community than Horde.
EDIT: Thread Link, so that thread can be referred to this discussion, as well: