Servers were populated first week or two but due to this 9d being the most p2w in history, most players quit soon. EXP rates are very high but skill and drop rates are garbage. Even during events, the drop rate isn't as good as GC base drop rates. Unless you're willing to play 9d like it's your job or spend thousands of dollars, I wouldn't bother.
Just like Hegemonic said, servers were populated only the first 2 weeks. Now majority of players who stayed are playing during weekends only for the events. Skill and drop rate is true that is garbage But, i never understood why everyone looks grateful for RedFox EXP Rates offerings. Unless we are talking about Questing where it had major boost. We need to take into consideration the side effects that relate to survival of the game. Comparing EXP Rates to other publishers, lets take acclaim - Acclaim premium was giving something around 20% exp bonus (correct me if I'm wrong), RedFox premium gives +100%. Here RedFox wins, but is a win from item mall that is against the survival of the game. Expensive premium for a very good bonus for a non paying players to miss. - Acclaim exp cards were having multiplicative effect (a x5 event would be turned into x10 in acclaim), but in RedFox are additive (a x5 event which we never get will become x7) Here Acclaim wins. - Acclaim didn't have Kunlun map like we have here in RedFox where most players just grind there in shared parties from lowest levels. Hitting HG in few days. RedFox wins here. But is it really good thing for the game? People only login during weekends to grind in Kunlun. It is killing the game. No one is enjoying other maps any more (LD/Icy/Tibet..) - Acclaim events were for only 2 to 3 hours max. Here are 4 days straight. RedFox wins. But is it good to the game to have such events? Who is going to grind during other days? we already see empty maps during weekdays. In acclaim you would reach nowhere if you play only during events, so you had no choice but to grind also during weekdays. - Acclaim questing was meaningless as the exp rewards were ridiculous. Here in RedFox they received major boost. RedFox wins. While RedFox is true that is offering more EXP, is not doing it in proper way. I would personally prefer Acclaims model in this area except the questing part where RedFox has it better.
You get some things wrong, events are not additive, just because it says in the golden time event description that experience points increased by 100% or 200% does not mean you get a bonus card effect on the base rate, it just increases the base rate by that much and any item increase bonus works on that from that point, so the past 3x event using a 2x card and prem would net you 9x total compared to no event time, not 5x like you mentioned. Also the comparation between acclaim and redfox is partial, as for acclaim grinding would be just for xp mostly, usefull items were from dungeons mostly, the only things you could get from grinding in acclaim was gt/fs/BE/some elixirs and weapons to NPC while in redfox you have 2 situations, like high xp that temples/kunlun offer or lower xp and the items the other maps offer. What I am saying is that if you compare a power level for a char on acclaim versus here what would be the difference? On acclaim it would be very little difference between someone who rushed to level and those that wouldn't they would actually be doing better cause they broke the level barrier to do GCM/srs back then while on redfox you would miss out on most of the items to make your banners and even a substantial amount of gold from npc'd weapons. Is this really a bad thing? Probably not, depends on the person more than anything, on redfox you still have a alternative since the important items would still drop at any level but with some penalty if you're level is to high compared to the mob or one could sell item mall and get the items by buying them. All in all redfox 9dragons has a more complex touch to it compared to acclaim.
