I get the general sense that vanilla pre-re is the most popular form of RO, yet all I see these days are Renewal/Classic/Revo servers. Am I wrong in thinking that pre-re is popular?
what really is vanille pre-re low rate?
In my opinion that's a server like an official one without any comforts, but they won't get a huge fanbase.
Some People may come and play, but then you'll see how SLOW leveling really is on 1x. Nowadays nobody wants to invest much time to level a character on a random private server for hours on end to reach maxlvl.
The Players will demand exp events, maybe some quests to level faster, so a server with 2-3x rates will go up to effective 5-10x rates. Maybe make that double with Bubblegums, nom nom.
Then they will complain about autoloot, warp, more/less cash-shop items, etc.
Don't even get started with WoE-usables.
And don't forget the Reseter. Don't even think of making a server without the f****ing Reseter!
Long story short: The fanbase for a true vanilla RO server is pretty limited. People are too used to comfort.