There are certain things that can lower or raise the population for servers for sure. FV loot is top of the list, bonus loot is as well. However things that lower population are things like vaniki rules, 2 box limit. If these things did not exist on the server the population would be higher.
I think most people accept they cant do FV loot servers every year but they certainly should not hurt the yearly server with failed server ideas.
I'm honestly not interested in the "reasons" why they have abandoned the classic model of TLP that brought them most of their TLP success. The "reasons" usually amount to a few hours of roundtabling by people who I wouldn't even want to drink with in a bar, and who I consider my intellectual inferiors. Then comes phase 2: a bunch of cucked internet heroes putting on their tights and capes, who then proceed to overanalyze decisions that amount to the dropping of a hot shit on the lawn for weeks on end. After 25 years of listening to the helmet wearing, cape wearing, keyboard stabbing, retard infested antics of grownups obsessed with ancient video games, I've come to the same general conclusion about them I came to about the human race long ago - most of them are fucking retarded anyway. And this is partially why FOH exists, to excise "some" of the retard out of the conversation, and because it was recognized long ago that the internet was being infiltrated by flowers of censorship, flowers of sadness, and flowers of absolute autism. Soy points were farmed, and the mind virus won. The evidence is that the world can only get more retarded from here on out. OH YEA - the point.
Elderan is correct. The 2 box limit hurts the server severely, because these rules will be asymmetrically applied to regular players, while the PL/inhouse "white listed" favs of the company continue to sell PLs, box farm, and raid farm with virtual impunity, as they have done since Darkpaw took over the game.
The "restrictions" will be policed however the fuck they want to police them, and regular players will be the ones that suffer from the weaponized petition system, just as they were the only ones who suffered on Aradune. GMs decide it, and they have been receiving guidance to leave these operations alone since the beginning.
So they want players who were initially attracted to the classic EQ experience, which literally means classic-kunark-velious eras primarily, to just sit in Luclin for a year, and deal with increased boxing restrictions that only apply to them, and not to the PLers and company farmers and in-house favs of the producer/devs, and deal with an autistic rule system that already has a history of being asymmetrically and haphazardly enforced. Sounds like an awesome fucking deal.