I have a lvl 202 or 203 enf i don't remember since i canceled my account a while back. I however agree that some ppl did start alts i was one of them that did that before i quit. Thing is after a while u get tired of that too. After my ENF i started a doc...got the doc to lvl 160:ish and then i ahve to move to SL because no ppl in RK. then i started an Adv...got him to lvl 80ish i belive then ppl moved to SL to kill hecklers in Ely. Ok so i started a Agent. got him to lvl 100ish. From almost lvl 30 to lvl 220 if u want to lvl fast u ahve to be in SL. that's not a bad thing is actually great but there is one major problem. There is only ONE sort of mob to kill and that's hecklers!HEckler day in and day out! HEcklers here hecklers there. Nothing else...just hecklers! U get tired of it eventually..otherwize u ahve the brain of Holmer Simpson. U cannot kill same mob over and onver until u get to lvl 220. that's just stupid.
Now don't get me wrong i don't hate SL but i think is was designed the wrong way if u comepare it with AO. AO had originality SL doesn't - it was a EQ wannabe. SL was desinged to be a time sink. when u get to lvl 200 u'll understand exactelly what i mean. CUz in order for u to get pass lvl 200 u have to gather around 40k faction...this measn killing a single mob on a 50min spwan over and over with 23 otehr guys. During this u ahve to pray that noone in your team goes link dead cuz if it does u won't get any faction and u have to pray that the pull goes right if it don't it might despawn. And u ahve to kill this mob at least 40 times. This doesn't sound like much but trust me when u have only 10 ppl there and u're waiting on someone else to show up u will know is pointless. I thing i managed to get my faction to 40 during the second wave of players who did that. back then there were ppl at mordeath waiting for players to faction. Now there isn't anybody there. It's sad. But let's just say u do that...u get the faction....what next. Well u guessed it HECKLERS! Enjoy SL if u can!
I loved this game :Account Created 2001-09. But Crowen is right many ppl have left AO. I am a member in one of the biggest guild in AO - atlantean. and i have to tell that many have left. Many did before me and many still do!
CZ does his job. He tells us they ahve a larger player base then before. I don't buy that for a second. AO choosed not to show their account numbers after SL release. Why? I mean they say is still going strong. Then why not show it? AO had at it's peek 60k accounts, pre SL 40k, i'd be surprised if they have 20k now.
Originally posted by catalin CZ does his job. He tells us they ahve a larger player base then before. I don't buy that for a second. AO choosed not to show their account numbers after SL release. Why? I mean they say is still going strong. Then why not show it? AO had at it's peek 60k accounts, pre SL 40k, i'd be surprised if they have 20k now. http://pweb.netcom.com/~sirbruce/Subscriptions.gif the graphics above is a punch in the face to those that say "AO is the best MMORPG ever". Get real ppl! The numbers speak for themselves! SL is nice but when u go there as lvl 200 u'll only find frustration! Mark my words! U will tell me i'm right garanteed.
This information is incorrect. AO have more then 150,000 subscribers. It is a fact.
Its totally unplayable in present form...Sl is such a departure from what made this game great it should have been released as a Second game and called Shadwolands: Biaatch of Everquest... "In Shadowlands come experience the fustration and time consuming adventures that made EQ a boring mess.."
Too many time sinks to mention and the force feeding of the New GUI is atrocious..I got kicked from forums by CZ for arguing the destruction of old gui.. but thats another battle.
Im still holding out hope that maybe just maybe FC will come to their senses and realize they over-stepped and will give us back the game they made for us pre-Notum Wars..
Oh well going to go login and watch omni kill omni thanks to the PVP tag you get by hitting guards..
Dissapointed but still sticking it out. ---"crossing fingers"
Originally posted by lev-27 This information is incorrect. AO have more then 150,000 subscribers. It is a fact.
ROFL!!!
Stop it u're killing me!
Talk about living in denial. if RK2 and RK3 ahve let's say 60k accounts that means that 90k woudl be on RK1. and considering time zones that means that on a normal working day RK1 woudl hold 45k ppl online! and on some hours of the weekends about 70k ....u really belive there are 70k ppl in that server on weekends? do u know what ur'e saying here man? do u ahve any idea on how big that number is?
A server cannot hold more than 20k ppl at the time! it simply cannot! get thet trough your head! that's why this MMORPG have only 3 servers. Because there an't that many subscribers! 150k ppl distributed over 3 server...lol! u have to be joking...u simply cannot be serious!
Why do u think Lineage 2 have already 8 servers? Is because they wanna let the ppl spred out more? LOL! dude wake up!
ROFL I'm gonna use your statement in my sig! Thanx tho...haven't laughed this hard in a long time!
Originally posted by Maximane That subscriber estimate on the GIF is several months out of date. -------------------- Alex "Maximane" De Line - MMORPG.COM Staff -
Yes is true but if u look carefully u'll notice that after the SL expansion FC refuse to show the subscribers numbers. So even if i gave u the uppdated one the AO line will still be on the same spot. Why FC doesn't show the numbers? Maybe is because they got so fast up (like the guy above was saying- 150k lol...still cracks me up), or maybe because they are loosing and they don't want ppl to see...who knows! but if i was the owner of that MMORPG and went from 30k to 150k subscribers i woudl certanlly use that and say that my MMORPG is the fastest growing MMO game outthere! They obviouselly don't wanna do that for certain reasons wich i can't understand *wink wink*.
ROFL!!! Stop it u're killing me! Talk about living in denial. if RK2 and RK3 ahve let's say 60k accounts that means that 90k woudl be on RK1. and considering time zones that means that on a normal working day RK1 woudl hold 45k ppl online! and on some hours of the weekends about 70k ....u really belive there are 70k ppl in that server on weekends? do u know what ur'e saying here man? do u ahve any idea on how big that number is? A server cannot hold more than 20k ppl at the time! it simply cannot! get thet trough your head! that's why this MMORPG have only 3 servers. Because there an't that many subscribers! 150k ppl distributed over 3 server...lol! u have to be joking...u simply cannot be serious! Why do u think Lineage 2 have already 8 servers? Is because they wanna let the ppl spred out more? LOL! dude wake up! ROFL I'm gonna use your statement in my sig! Thanx tho...haven't laughed this hard in a long time!
It is not a denial, it is a fact. My good friend is an Israeli game reviewer, who works for the biggest Israeli gaming site. They have direct connection with FC, so I asked him how many subscribers AO have. The answer was 150,000 +-. <?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" />
In mid 2002 AO had 120,000 subscribers. The number is only growing since.
BTW, EQ have much, much more then 500,000 subscribers.
My friend's grandma have a sister that work in Andorra, that have a brother that once ate a tuna sandwich in Canada and his sister's friend have a cousin that know everyone at FC and he said only 100 people subscribe to AO...
If you follow the server monitors at a big tower fight then you see that server load is around 11% when there are 300 people in that zone, that would mean that it would be around 3000 people online at RK1 during prime time, if AO had 150k subsrcibers there would most likely be ALOT more people online during prime time.
I have no idea if the server monitors are correct or anything ofcourse, but the world isn't that big and there are afew spots there people at diffrent lvls hang out and it's way to few people at those spot to be 150k active subscribers.
My friend translated it as good as he could, but he wasn't sure if it said 150,000 current subscribers or 150,000 subscribers total over the years, anyone else that know hebrew that can tell that?
I searched around abit and in an article from 2001 on GameSpot it said that they had 150,000 people registred for the game, but that Funcom didn't want to say how many active accounts.
With the free trial and everything I don't doubt that 150,000 accounts have been created total, but I would be suprised if they even had close to that many active subscribers since it wouldn't even fit on the 3 servers.
In an interview with an FC employee he also said they had over 150,000 registred players, but didn't want to say how many active subscribers.
He also said that the servers could take 10,000 people each at the same time, that means max 30,000 people can play at same time, with 150,000 subscribers that would peak out every weekend for sure.
dude! how many chars u have in AO? Just answer me how many u got pls!
No! answer me how many char do u think there are /account! Do u undertsand what i'm saying? tell now many char do u think ppl create with one account...keep in mind that u can create on all 3 servers!
Don't gimme that 1char/account BS. BE honest and tell me!
Not at all, I would be very happy if AO had 150k subscribers, my guild are still active and I have tons of friends there so ofcourse I don't want AO to die out, I just want to see the facts since FC never told us how many active accounts they have.
Originally posted by Azzazzimon Not at all, I would be very happy if AO had 150k subscribers, my guild are still active and I have tons of friends there so ofcourse I don't want AO to die out, I just want to see the facts since FC never told us how many active accounts they have.
------------------------- Azzazzimon
I admit my mistake. I am going to have a little chat with my idiot friend. Nevertheless, AO still have a lot of subscribers compare to other MMORPG games. And I am sure that the number is growing.
I don't think AO is dying either, but I think its abit of "generation change", alot of old high lvls leaving at same time, but also many new players join.
Catalin, what do your question have to do with active accounts?
1 or 8 chars per account doesn't matter, still only 1 account.
Well since I posted a one word response I feel obligated to go into detail now. If there is the 150k registered characters then I count to about two of 'em; a strange mistake occured and I know have two unregistered accounts with funcom. Go figure huh? My incompetence overwhelms me. Lol
Azzazzimon i'm just trying to find out. Just a simple question! How many char do u think ppl make (average) with one account? Keeping in mind that making a char on the RK2 and RK3 counts too!
Can someone pls tell me how many do u think! i woudl like to ask lev-27 to answer that.
I belive max is 8*3=24 right? cuz u can make 8/server...right?
So pls just tell me the average of chars made by one account on all servers pls!
Originally posted by catalin Azzazzimon i'm just trying to find out. Just a simple question! How many char do u think ppl make (average) with one account? Keeping in mind that making a char on the RK2 and RK3 counts too! Can someone pls tell me how many do u think! i woudl like to ask lev-27 to answer that. I belive max is 8*3=24 right? cuz u can make 8/server...right? So pls just tell me the average of chars made by one account on all servers pls!
Most people only play on one server, but have several alts so I would guess average is 5-8.
I had 8 chars on my main account, 7 lvl 150-213 and 1 that I kept deleting to try diffrent profs.
Hit up Borealis for a cool community. Or outside Newland Grid if you want some high level action ! People are everywhere. AO is one sick game, ask me about it some time- I'll tell ya But for now, i must go Level !
Well...my brother told me he wanted to try this mmorpg. He's more into CS and Wolfenstain etc.
So i gave him the adress to AO and he downloaded and started a trial. He asked me what to do but i told him that he shoudl try to discover things on his own. He calls me 5 hours after he started and he told me it was the worse gaming expiriance ever. I know i'm a bit negative towards AO since the itroduction of SL but i didn't expect that reaction.... after all it's a good and nice game! Specially in the begining when you're a noob and you hang around subway and such. So i asked him what's wrong.
He tells me that he started in a place where he was all alone. that the ppl he met after he got out of that place were actually very helpful he actually got 1 mil creds from a guy who wanted to help him on the way. Problem was that there were no pps to team with. As he hit lvl 5 he was adviced to go to subway and he told me that it was deserted...there wasn't anyone there. Now that's odd...he was adviced to go to Omni Entertaiment (he started an omni - y? i donno ) and over there there were only high lvl ppl. He then joined an org and got instructed to use the channels to ask for team. He told me that after 3 hours he haven't got a team, he was told that ppl are hard to find to team with at low lvl and that ppl when they start alts they start together and when they do then if you're lucky you get sucked right in a group and lvl 30-40 times in just a few hours.
He's desperate trys to get a team got him nowhere. I think funcom should make the new ppl more welcome somehow. Make the low lvl ppl be in one place not spred around like that. The noobs have no chance to get into the game if they are to get to lvl 20 by themselves before ever got to team for the first time. What is the point of playing an MMO if u have to play alone.
In Lineage 2 there are ppl all over the place...there is kinda odd...cuz is not worth to team when u're low lvl but at least there are ppl u can talk with while u lvl up! AO beeing ghost town....i don't think that's necesarilly the truth...ppl are too widlly spred...the player base smaller? yes! alot smaller...i remember when i started this game and i had to go in a different BY to be able to kill something cuz there were ppl everywhere killing everything that moved!
I guess what i'm trying to say here is that it doesn't look like there are new players coming in the game when there aren't any ppl in the BY. So what you see is alot of ppl starting alts together when they get bored with killing hecklers. It's a sad sad thing. I am sure i could have helped my brother get in the game alot better by activating my account and starting an alt. But not all ppl have that luxury.
Ingame ppl you should all go to the BY and take a noob under your wing and help him get started. Not by handing him money but by eather staring an alt and help him, or just help him lvl to 15-20. This way you can help the noobs feel more welcome and they will hopefully stay ingame instead of canceling after a couple of hours like my brother did.
Everyone levels in shadowlands. It sounds like he was looking for a team in rubi-ka...which is a hard thing to do unless it is planned.
One thing that I think would help is something that city of heroes does. As bad as that game is there was one feature that was really cool. You could an option on your character that declares you looking for team. You name, level, and breed is then placed on a menu and people can invite you from anywhere. I think that would be a nice addition to AO.
As for going to a backyard and help some low level out, sure could be a nice thing, but some people like to figure things out by them selfs, hate it in neocron when someone jumped me as i was trying to figure out how to walk asking what kind of tradeskills i would do i was like what there are tradeskills, how when why
And there are a crap load of backyards to look in as well, i for one will not do that, but i do make alts and i try to be helpfull in the ot/clan newbie channel, or the ooc channel when i can, going to a backyard greeting people is what the ark greeters are for
Comments
I'm with Crowen al the way!
I have a lvl 202 or 203 enf i don't remember since i canceled my account a while back. I however agree that some ppl did start alts i was one of them that did that before i quit. Thing is after a while u get tired of that too. After my ENF i started a doc...got the doc to lvl 160:ish and then i ahve to move to SL because no ppl in RK. then i started an Adv...got him to lvl 80ish i belive then ppl moved to SL to kill hecklers in Ely. Ok so i started a Agent. got him to lvl 100ish. From almost lvl 30 to lvl 220 if u want to lvl fast u ahve to be in SL. that's not a bad thing is actually great but there is one major problem. There is only ONE sort of mob to kill and that's hecklers!HEckler day in and day out! HEcklers here hecklers there. Nothing else...just hecklers! U get tired of it eventually..otherwize u ahve the brain of Holmer Simpson. U cannot kill same mob over and onver until u get to lvl 220. that's just stupid.
Now don't get me wrong i don't hate SL but i think is was designed the wrong way if u comepare it with AO. AO had originality SL doesn't - it was a EQ wannabe. SL was desinged to be a time sink. when u get to lvl 200 u'll understand exactelly what i mean. CUz in order for u to get pass lvl 200 u have to gather around 40k faction...this measn killing a single mob on a 50min spwan over and over with 23 otehr guys. During this u ahve to pray that noone in your team goes link dead cuz if it does u won't get any faction and u have to pray that the pull goes right if it don't it might despawn. And u ahve to kill this mob at least 40 times. This doesn't sound like much but trust me when u have only 10 ppl there and u're waiting on someone else to show up u will know is pointless. I thing i managed to get my faction to 40 during the second wave of players who did that. back then there were ppl at mordeath waiting for players to faction. Now there isn't anybody there. It's sad. But let's just say u do that...u get the faction....what next. Well u guessed it HECKLERS! Enjoy SL if u can!
I loved this game :Account Created 2001-09. But Crowen is right many ppl have left AO. I am a member in one of the biggest guild in AO - atlantean. and i have to tell that many have left. Many did before me and many still do!
CZ does his job. He tells us they ahve a larger player base then before. I don't buy that for a second. AO choosed not to show their account numbers after SL release. Why? I mean they say is still going strong. Then why not show it? AO had at it's peek 60k accounts, pre SL 40k, i'd be surprised if they have 20k now.
http://pweb.netcom.com/~sirbruce/Subscriptions.gif
the graphics above is a punch in the face to those that say "AO is the best MMORPG ever". Get real ppl! The numbers speak for themselves!
SL is nice but when u go there as lvl 200 u'll only find frustration! Mark my words! U will tell me i'm right garanteed.
That subscriber estimate on the GIF is several months out of date.
--------------------
Alex "Maximane" De Line
- MMORPG.COM Staff -
Played AO since the rough times.. Dec01..
Its totally unplayable in present form...Sl is such a departure from what made this game great it should have been released as a Second game and called Shadwolands: Biaatch of Everquest... "In Shadowlands come experience the fustration and time consuming adventures that made EQ a boring mess.."
Too many time sinks to mention and the force feeding of the New GUI is atrocious..I got kicked from forums by CZ for arguing the destruction of old gui.. but thats another battle.
Im still holding out hope that maybe just maybe FC will come to their senses and realize they over-stepped and will give us back the game they made for us pre-Notum Wars..
Oh well going to go login and watch omni kill omni thanks to the PVP tag you get by hitting guards..
Dissapointed but still sticking it out. ---"crossing fingers"
Great Website guys keep up the good work!
ROFL!!!
Stop it u're killing me!
Talk about living in denial. if RK2 and RK3 ahve let's say 60k accounts that means that 90k woudl be on RK1. and considering time zones that means that on a normal working day RK1 woudl hold 45k ppl online! and on some hours of the weekends about 70k ....u really belive there are 70k ppl in that server on weekends? do u know what ur'e saying here man? do u ahve any idea on how big that number is?
A server cannot hold more than 20k ppl at the time! it simply cannot! get thet trough your head! that's why this MMORPG have only 3 servers. Because there an't that many subscribers! 150k ppl distributed over 3 server...lol! u have to be joking...u simply cannot be serious!
Why do u think Lineage 2 have already 8 servers? Is because they wanna let the ppl spred out more? LOL! dude wake up!
ROFL I'm gonna use your statement in my sig! Thanx tho...haven't laughed this hard in a long time!
Yes is true but if u look carefully u'll notice that after the SL expansion FC refuse to show the subscribers numbers. So even if i gave u the uppdated one the AO line will still be on the same spot. Why FC doesn't show the numbers? Maybe is because they got so fast up (like the guy above was saying- 150k lol...still cracks me up), or maybe because they are loosing and they don't want ppl to see...who knows! but if i was the owner of that MMORPG and went from 30k to 150k subscribers i woudl certanlly use that and say that my MMORPG is the fastest growing MMO game outthere! They obviouselly don't wanna do that for certain reasons wich i can't understand *wink wink*.
It is not a denial, it is a fact. My good friend is an Israeli game reviewer, who works for the biggest Israeli gaming site. They have direct connection with FC, so I asked him how many subscribers AO have. The answer was 150,000 +-. <?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" />
In mid 2002 AO had 120,000 subscribers. The number is only growing since.
BTW, EQ have much, much more then 500,000 subscribers.
Show us the fact if you have something.
My friend's grandma have a sister that work in Andorra, that have a brother that once ate a tuna sandwich in Canada and his sister's friend have a cousin that know everyone at FC and he said only 100 people subscribe to AO...
If you follow the server monitors at a big tower fight then you see that server load is around 11% when there are 300 people in that zone, that would mean that it would be around 3000 people online at RK1 during prime time, if AO had 150k subsrcibers there would most likely be ALOT more people online during prime time.
I have no idea if the server monitors are correct or anything ofcourse, but the world isn't that big and there are afew spots there people at diffrent lvls hang out and it's way to few people at those spot to be 150k active subscribers.
-------------------------
Azzazzimon
-------------------------
Azzazzimon
I actually have a friend that do, so post an offical link that state AO have 150k active subscribers and that's good enough:)
I don't say you are lying or anything, but I think it sounds abit too good to be true, so would be nice to see.
-------------------------
Azzazzimon
-------------------------
Azzazzimon
No problem.
http://www.vgames.co.il/website/vgames_news_page.asp?platform=main&seqNewsID=4544
0WNED!
Thanks:)
My friend translated it as good as he could, but he wasn't sure if it said 150,000 current subscribers or 150,000 subscribers total over the years, anyone else that know hebrew that can tell that?
I searched around abit and in an article from 2001 on GameSpot it said that they had 150,000 people registred for the game, but that Funcom didn't want to say how many active accounts.
With the free trial and everything I don't doubt that 150,000 accounts have been created total, but I would be suprised if they even had close to that many active subscribers since it wouldn't even fit on the 3 servers.
In an interview with an FC employee he also said they had over 150,000 registred players, but didn't want to say how many active subscribers.
He also said that the servers could take 10,000 people each at the same time, that means max 30,000 people can play at same time, with 150,000 subscribers that would peak out every weekend for sure.
Gamepost Article: http://www.gamespot.com/pc/rpg/anarchyonline/news_2872623.html
Interview: http://www.homelanfed.com/index.php?id=11821
-------------------------
Azzazzimon
-------------------------
Azzazzimon
lev-27 are u for real?
dude! how many chars u have in AO? Just answer me how many u got pls!
No! answer me how many char do u think there are /account! Do u undertsand what i'm saying? tell now many char do u think ppl create with one account...keep in mind that u can create on all 3 servers!
Don't gimme that 1char/account BS. BE honest and tell me!
0WNED!
Not at all, I would be very happy if AO had 150k subscribers, my guild are still active and I have tons of friends there so ofcourse I don't want AO to die out, I just want to see the facts since FC never told us how many active accounts they have.
-------------------------
Azzazzimon
-------------------------
Azzazzimon
Lev-27 pls answer my question!
See previous post! Pls!
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Originally posted by lev-27
This information is incorrect. AO have more then 150,000 subscribers. It is a fact.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I don't think AO is dying either, but I think its abit of "generation change", alot of old high lvls leaving at same time, but also many new players join.
Catalin, what do your question have to do with active accounts?
1 or 8 chars per account doesn't matter, still only 1 account.
-------------------------
Azzazzimon
-------------------------
Azzazzimon
Well since I posted a one word response I feel obligated to go into detail now. If there is the 150k registered characters then I count to about two of 'em; a strange mistake occured and I know have two unregistered accounts with funcom. Go figure huh? My incompetence overwhelms me. Lol
Azzazzimon i'm just trying to find out. Just a simple question! How many char do u think ppl make (average) with one account? Keeping in mind that making a char on the RK2 and RK3 counts too!
Can someone pls tell me how many do u think! i woudl like to ask lev-27 to answer that.
I belive max is 8*3=24 right? cuz u can make 8/server...right?
So pls just tell me the average of chars made by one account on all servers pls!
Most people only play on one server, but have several alts so I would guess average is 5-8.
I had 8 chars on my main account, 7 lvl 150-213 and 1 that I kept deleting to try diffrent profs.
-------------------------
Azzazzimon
-------------------------
Azzazzimon
http://auno.org/ao/stats.php
Keep in mind that those numbers include chars of the ppl that left the game less than 3 months ago.
I persoanlly have 12 chars! 8 on the RK1 , 3 on RK 2 and 1 on RK3.
But hey! 150k accounts is a fact as lev-27 says!
AO Is No Ghost Town....
Hit up Borealis for a cool community. Or outside Newland Grid if you want some high level action ! People are everywhere. AO is one sick game, ask me about it some time- I'll tell ya
But for now, i must go Level !
-Farseen-
" Faruka ! "
- Farseen
Current Game: Panzar
Well...my brother told me he wanted to try this mmorpg. He's more into CS and Wolfenstain etc.
So i gave him the adress to AO and he downloaded and started a trial. He asked me what to do but i told him that he shoudl try to discover things on his own. He calls me 5 hours after he started and he told me it was the worse gaming expiriance ever. I know i'm a bit negative towards AO since the itroduction of SL but i didn't expect that reaction.... after all it's a good and nice game! Specially in the begining when you're a noob and you hang around subway and such. So i asked him what's wrong.
He tells me that he started in a place where he was all alone. that the ppl he met after he got out of that place were actually very helpful he actually got 1 mil creds from a guy who wanted to help him on the way. Problem was that there were no pps to team with. As he hit lvl 5 he was adviced to go to subway and he told me that it was deserted...there wasn't anyone there. Now that's odd...he was adviced to go to Omni Entertaiment (he started an omni - y? i donno
) and over there there were only high lvl ppl. He then joined an org 
and got instructed to use the channels to ask for team. He told me that after 3 hours he haven't got a team, he was told that ppl are hard to find to team with at low lvl and that ppl when they start alts they start together and when they do then if you're lucky you get sucked right in a group and lvl 30-40 times in just a few hours.
He's desperate trys to get a team got him nowhere. I think funcom should make the new ppl more welcome somehow. Make the low lvl ppl be in one place not spred around like that. The noobs have no chance to get into the game if they are to get to lvl 20 by themselves before ever got to team for the first time. What is the point of playing an MMO if u have to play alone.
In Lineage 2 there are ppl all over the place...there is kinda odd...cuz is not worth to team when u're low lvl but at least there are ppl u can talk with while u lvl up! AO beeing ghost town....i don't think that's necesarilly the truth...ppl are too widlly spred...the player base smaller? yes! alot smaller...i remember when i started this game and i had to go in a different BY to be able to kill something cuz there were ppl everywhere killing everything that moved!
I guess what i'm trying to say here is that it doesn't look like there are new players coming in the game when there aren't any ppl in the BY. So what you see is alot of ppl starting alts together when they get bored with killing hecklers. It's a sad sad thing. I am sure i could have helped my brother get in the game alot better by activating my account and starting an alt. But not all ppl have that luxury.
Ingame ppl you should all go to the BY and take a noob under your wing and help him get started. Not by handing him money but by eather staring an alt and help him, or just help him lvl to 15-20. This way you can help the noobs feel more welcome and they will hopefully stay ingame instead of canceling after a couple of hours like my brother did.
Everyone levels in shadowlands. It sounds like he was looking for a team in rubi-ka...which is a hard thing to do unless it is planned.
One thing that I think would help is something that city of heroes does. As bad as that game is there was one feature that was really cool. You could an option on your character that declares you looking for team. You name, level, and breed is then placed on a menu and people can invite you from anywhere. I think that would be a nice addition to AO.
That lfg thing sure sounds like a rip of from eq
As for going to a backyard and help some low level out, sure could be a nice thing, but some people like to figure things out by them selfs, hate it in neocron when someone jumped me as i was trying to figure out how to walk asking what kind of tradeskills i would do
i was like what there are tradeskills, how when why 
And there are a crap load of backyards to look in as well, i for one will not do that, but i do make alts and i try to be helpfull in the ot/clan newbie channel, or the ooc channel when i can, going to a backyard greeting people is what the ark greeters are for