Previously: seasons 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11 and 12 (plus How large are squadrons?)
On each graph, points are on the Y-axis, and squadron position on the leaderboard is on the X-axis. Both scales are logarithmic. The light grey line (diamond marker) is the numbers for the previous season, the dark grey line (triangle marker) is the numbers for the same season last year (season 3), and all stats are PC only. As in previous seasons, the approximate power-law distribution continues, allowing estimates of total activity to be made without spending too long reading the boards.
(Political is excluded, because there are well-known exploits to allow very high scores, and because it's not clear even without the exploits what it's supposed to be measuring: the in-game description of "large and happy faction" is clearly wrong - possibly this will change if they ever implement BGS happiness properly)
Anti Xeno (157 pages)
Winners: AXI with ~10% of all points. Vampyr Ponies and Xeno Gamer Orden Syndikat take the other trophies.
An interesting result here with a very substantial rise in total squadron count, from just over 100 last season to just over 150 this season - the Witch Head AX CG likely attracting a lot of new players. Total AX points are only very slightly up on the last three seasons, but the distribution is very different, with a much smaller percentage of the total accounted for by the top squadrons.
Combat (1621 pages)
Winners: Erion Corp with ~1% of all points. Brazilian League of Pilots and Lavigny's Legion take the other trophies.
Moving on from their trade Bronze last season, new leaderboard competitors Erion Corp take the Gold in combat this season, with two regular combat groups taking the other trophies. As with AX, combat CGs may be having a very positive effect on this board, with a substantial rise in participating squadrons, a rise in points at all levels on the leaderboard, and a very substantial rise in total combat points making this the biggest season of all.
CQC (136 pages)
Winners: The Winged Hussars with ~12% of all points. CQC Discord and Artemis Corporation take the other trophies
Nothing much to say this time - the same three squadrons in the same three places as last time, and overall activity not significantly different to last time (though considerably up on last year)
Exploration (1892 pages)
Winners: Canonn with ~7.5% of all points. Hijos Del Caos and IGAU take the other trophies.
A very big gap between Canonn and the rest of the leaderboard - their estimated percentage of the board being the second highest so far. Overall activity outside the top few ranks is almost identical to last season and indeed last year - while the number of squadrons continues to rise, activity in the top 1000 places is very stable.
Powerplay (79 pages)
Winners: Federal Liberal Command with ~10% of all points. Great Starlight Brigade and Aisling's Angels take the other trophies.
A big rise in total points makes this the busiest Powerplay season yet. Two Aisling Duval squadrons take the second and third places. The rigidity of squadron-Power links means that this is always going to miss a lot of the Powerplay action, of course, so the total squadron count doesn't rise much.
Trade (1728 pages)
Winners: Cobra Wing with ~2.5% of all points. Dark Enterprise and Canonn take the other trophies.
While still down on the ridiculous heights of Season 10, this was still significantly up on last season, as a period of stability gives chance for the optimal earning routes to become more well-known. In general trade earnings are continuing an upward trend - if seasons 6, 9 and 10 are ignored as carrier-fuelled outliers, the others from season 3 onwards form almost a straight line in terms of total earnings.
Other comments
Total active squadron count continues to rise with no sign of deviation from the long-term trend of just over 100 new pages (1000 new squadrons) a season. You'd expect at some point - since other ways of monitoring player numbers don't show this sort of ever-increasing trend - that it would start to level off, but it seems like plenty of players are still joining and creating squadrons, and therefore more of the total activity is being tracked on the leaderboards.
The impact of the Return of the Plot on the leaderboards is very obvious on AX, and may be contributing to the record Combat results as well. It's also coincided - https://heatmap.sotl.org.uk/history - with a 40% increase in EDDN FSDJump events recorded in the bubble, taking those from the generic low of "between releases" for 2019 and 2020, up to the "between releases" trend of 2018 (or the "big release" trend of 2019/2020). Hopefully Frontier's own internal metrics are also showing similar increases in activity as a probable result of the storyline - future developments may also have significant impacts on the leaderboard totals.
On each graph, points are on the Y-axis, and squadron position on the leaderboard is on the X-axis. Both scales are logarithmic. The light grey line (diamond marker) is the numbers for the previous season, the dark grey line (triangle marker) is the numbers for the same season last year (season 3), and all stats are PC only. As in previous seasons, the approximate power-law distribution continues, allowing estimates of total activity to be made without spending too long reading the boards.
(Political is excluded, because there are well-known exploits to allow very high scores, and because it's not clear even without the exploits what it's supposed to be measuring: the in-game description of "large and happy faction" is clearly wrong - possibly this will change if they ever implement BGS happiness properly)
Anti Xeno (157 pages)
Winners: AXI with ~10% of all points. Vampyr Ponies and Xeno Gamer Orden Syndikat take the other trophies.
An interesting result here with a very substantial rise in total squadron count, from just over 100 last season to just over 150 this season - the Witch Head AX CG likely attracting a lot of new players. Total AX points are only very slightly up on the last three seasons, but the distribution is very different, with a much smaller percentage of the total accounted for by the top squadrons.
Combat (1621 pages)
Winners: Erion Corp with ~1% of all points. Brazilian League of Pilots and Lavigny's Legion take the other trophies.
Moving on from their trade Bronze last season, new leaderboard competitors Erion Corp take the Gold in combat this season, with two regular combat groups taking the other trophies. As with AX, combat CGs may be having a very positive effect on this board, with a substantial rise in participating squadrons, a rise in points at all levels on the leaderboard, and a very substantial rise in total combat points making this the biggest season of all.
CQC (136 pages)
Winners: The Winged Hussars with ~12% of all points. CQC Discord and Artemis Corporation take the other trophies
Nothing much to say this time - the same three squadrons in the same three places as last time, and overall activity not significantly different to last time (though considerably up on last year)
Exploration (1892 pages)
Winners: Canonn with ~7.5% of all points. Hijos Del Caos and IGAU take the other trophies.
A very big gap between Canonn and the rest of the leaderboard - their estimated percentage of the board being the second highest so far. Overall activity outside the top few ranks is almost identical to last season and indeed last year - while the number of squadrons continues to rise, activity in the top 1000 places is very stable.
Powerplay (79 pages)
Winners: Federal Liberal Command with ~10% of all points. Great Starlight Brigade and Aisling's Angels take the other trophies.
A big rise in total points makes this the busiest Powerplay season yet. Two Aisling Duval squadrons take the second and third places. The rigidity of squadron-Power links means that this is always going to miss a lot of the Powerplay action, of course, so the total squadron count doesn't rise much.
Trade (1728 pages)
Winners: Cobra Wing with ~2.5% of all points. Dark Enterprise and Canonn take the other trophies.
While still down on the ridiculous heights of Season 10, this was still significantly up on last season, as a period of stability gives chance for the optimal earning routes to become more well-known. In general trade earnings are continuing an upward trend - if seasons 6, 9 and 10 are ignored as carrier-fuelled outliers, the others from season 3 onwards form almost a straight line in terms of total earnings.
Other comments
Total active squadron count continues to rise with no sign of deviation from the long-term trend of just over 100 new pages (1000 new squadrons) a season. You'd expect at some point - since other ways of monitoring player numbers don't show this sort of ever-increasing trend - that it would start to level off, but it seems like plenty of players are still joining and creating squadrons, and therefore more of the total activity is being tracked on the leaderboards.
The impact of the Return of the Plot on the leaderboards is very obvious on AX, and may be contributing to the record Combat results as well. It's also coincided - https://heatmap.sotl.org.uk/history - with a 40% increase in EDDN FSDJump events recorded in the bubble, taking those from the generic low of "between releases" for 2019 and 2020, up to the "between releases" trend of 2018 (or the "big release" trend of 2019/2020). Hopefully Frontier's own internal metrics are also showing similar increases in activity as a probable result of the storyline - future developments may also have significant impacts on the leaderboard totals.