Definitely a bug. I've seen this too many times: You start the match with 7 people, a few minutes into the match a player leaves and their spot is back filled almost immediately, but we still only have 7 people. Broken.
Do what I did, drop Nvidia and go AMD. The catalyst drivers work a LOT better with this atrocious rendering engine. It's a piece of junk, nvidia knows that, and does not care. Why should they?
Nvidia has known all along what a hunk of crap the Hero engine is and that is why they've been so reluctant to make changes on their end. I don't blame them at all.
I wouldn't be surprised in the least if Everquest (the original) has more active players right now. You'd be surprised how many have gone back to good ole EQ.
They're not interested in explanations. They're too busy trying to blame their incompetence on the gamer's vitriolic nature. heh EA and the founders of Bioware have already written this fiasco off as a loss. We should as well.