Sure we'll get more players , but after they find out that the "epic gold loot" is only given out to the richest players they'll leave.
And sure a competition of the "big boys" is pretty cool, But why make it in the middle of a crisis? How about you make events that boost new players to populate the server back to normal give it a good reputation ?
After all the restoration of the server , Then you can make competitions like that.

Sure we'll get more players , but after they find out that the "epic gold loot" is only given out to the richest players they'll leave. And sure a competition of the "big boys" is pretty cool, But why make it in the middle of a crisis? How about you make events that boost new players to populate the server back to normal give it a good reputation ? After all the restoration of the server , Then you can make competitions like that.