Funny thing is it can often be anti whatever threads that increase numbers. I remember the anti-HA thread that went on for pages and pages. Before that thread, there were around maybe 4-5 regular HA's on the EU servers. After that thread reached 15 pages or so, suddenly there was a huge jump in HA alts and we were suddenly regularly seeing 5 or more in a server at once. These 'zomg its OP and killing the mod' threads actually just make the situation worse because people gravitate towards something if it's said to be to strong.
Which is great, I have been recently convinced that making the ranged spam worse and worse is the only way devs are ever going to fix it. So look for my archer alt soon. If 50% of the server is archer and hundreds of players start leaving cRPG, they'll probably stop and think that something is wrong.
This thread is not at all a zomg its OP mod. AFAIK its actually underpowered individually, but should be nerfed further because the class is hugely popular and needs to be inferior to keep the percentage of archers reasonable.
If they would just remove the ladder 80% of my issue with this would be solved. The other 20% I'm able to live with. If the devs don't see the need for that, they should start playing their own fucking mod, alternatively they could listen to the community. I think the majority definitely thinks that ladders should be gone and have good reasons for that.