SBMM changes in regular crucible had absolutely no bearing on why people stopped playing trials. It had everything to do with Bungie's (intentional) design for trials. They wanted to make endgame pvp with a low chance of success that only the best could achieve. I think I read their goal was 12% success rate and stats have consistently shown it to be 15-16% success rate on any given weekend. Trials population suffers because of this design and it alone. No matter how many people try it, the ones at the bottom feel they have little to no chance for success (which is true) and stop playing. But the fewer people play, the lower the chance for success. This moves a new crop of players to bottom and they quit for the same reasons. Fewer play, fewer succeed. More fall to the bottom, more quit. See how this cycle just keeps going endlessly? Bungie drops content to bring people back, increasing the population, but only for a short time. Just as quickly as people jump back in, they leave again because the negative feedback loop created by Bungie's poor game design remains. In the current design trials will never be more than a niche activity for a very small portion of the population. It is impossible in the current setup to retain a large player base. The chance for success is too low to keep the majority interested. That's fine. No one has to play if they don't like it. But the people that like the status quo will suffer the consequences - low player base means increased matchmaking times, more frequent problems with bad connections, multiple matches against the same teams, imbalance matches on card wins (ultimate victory in game 1 anyone?), all from having to stretch the matchmaking algorithm to simply find a game. Can't have your cake and eat it too after all.