[Eighty Swords]

What would work is if these 30 active players would decide that instead of logging on and going AFK they'd all gear up, go hunt in groups, or just go gank in groups. If 30 people would be ganking at once then it would feel pretty much as active as a shard with 200 players (because usually even at shards with 200 players there's like 30 ppl ganking and the rest hunting or macroing or whatever).

The only problem with this is that some people are just so good at hunting or the hunting is too easy (however you want to look at it) that these people don't have to go in groups to hunt. Even with this really hard skill gain some people are still independent and don't have to interact with others. Just my two cents.