Warning: Philosophy

In order for the forum to get back to a good level of activity, I'm explaining here the multi-phase process I've come up with that should hopefully help this happen in a very natural and fair way. What I mean by that is that I'm not a fan of either trying to force people to post or kicking people out because they don't have the energy to do something that I know is really hard - this is supposed to be a fun game and not a chore or a job.

That being the case, we need to first recognize that the current problem is not that people aren't posting enough, the problem is that nobody is posting a lot - there isn't even a single plot by only two people that is going somewhere at a quick pace. That's a problem because it's much harder to have energy and ideas when you're starting from scratch than it is when there are other people to build from. And while I know that probably everyone reading this is definitely capable of making roleplay happen out of nothing, not everyone is in a place to be able to do that consistently all the time - it takes a lot of time, energy, and effort to do that and it's okay to not be in that place.

And that being the case I don't think it would be a good move to kick out everyone who isn't up to that right now. Because not only is that a lot of people, it's a lot of really good people that would be terrible to lose. While there will come a point where I'll have to lay down the law and say that people need to either get their posts done or get out, I don't think now is the time for that - now is the time to worry about getting something going that other players can get involved in. It may even be a slow process, but it's one that can be started by only a few people and gradually rope in pretty much everyone.

To accomplish this I've come up with a series of temporary adjustments to the activity rules to help ease us back into a good, active place.

Phase 1

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Main Focus: Getting 2 or 3 hyperactive players to roleplay with each other. What's a hyperactive player? One who could post several times a day if they have someone else to roleplay with, and who definitely does have the time and energy to start stuff from nothing, even if they're the only ones. We're already partway to this goal because I know that I could be one of them if I just had another - I don't know if we have anyone else who thinks that they could do this job on the forum right now, but other freaks like me exist and so we need find at least one more. If you think you're up to being a hyperactive player right now, let me know and we'll get stuff going!
Secondary Focus: To help ensure that the above happens, I'll be helping Jon do an extra-strong advertising push.
Activity Rules: Rather than using the point system to decide who is and isn't inactive, we'll only consider a player to be inactive if they go completely MIA - if they've been gone for a long time and they don't respond when I try to PM them on the forum or DM them on Discord and I suspect that they're simply gone and not coming back, that's when they're inactive. The point system will still be used to decide when someone can get a new character and such, and there will still be 2 points deducted on the weekends, but there's no consequence for not having any points.
All members are nevertheless strongly encouraged to post as much as they feel up to - every post you make helps the board be more active even if you're not a hyperactive player.
Phase Ends When: We have those 2 or 3 hyperactive players going well enough that they're keeping themselves entertained and are able to rope in any less-hyper players who want to play with them.

Phase 2

Main Focus: Spreading the activity. At this point there's definitely some stuff happening, so the goal is to expand upon it so that as many other players as possible can get in on the action - which other characters might be affected by what your character is doing, or what could your character add to what other characters are already doing? We want as many players as possible to have something solid available for them to do.
Activity Rules: We'll consider a character to be active if they've logged into the forum as that character within the past month. They don't need to actually post, but I will not give anyone any warnings if they're close to being deleted - at this stage we want to weed out anyone who needs to be reminded to be around instead of remembering to be around on their own or whose participation is strictly on Discord.
All members are nevertheless strongly encouraged to post as much as they feel up to - every post you make helps the board be more active.
Phase Ends When: We have a solid half dozen or more players who are posting consistently and reliably, even if it's at a more relaxed pace than the hyperactive players.

Phase 3

Main Focus: Site-wide plot time! At this point, we should have enough players to get a good site-wide plot going. We'll need to come up with something that is fun, affects everyone, encourages people to do new and interesting things with their characters, and is easy for any new members to get involved in. If well-timed, this sort of a plot should really get some solid, long-term momentum going.
Activity Rules: A character will be considered active if they have earned a point with that character within the past month - so actually posting is required. You've got to roleplay on a roleplaying forum, after all, and at this point we should start to get enough players and characters that we definitely need to make any unused canons available to people who would actually use them.
All members are nevertheless strongly encouraged to post even more if they feel up to it - every post you make helps the board be more active.
Phase Ends When: The forum is active enough that the people with canons who literally only post once a month start to really irk everyone because it's like they're not even there. Note: The end of this phase does not necessarily mean the end of the site-wide plot and vice versa.

Phase 4

Main Focus: Slowly raising the bar on activity. When we reach this point the forum should be active but perhaps a bit slower than we would really like. So we slowly increase our activity expectations to what they were before this whole multi-phase plan started, which is where I'd like them to end up staying for the foreseeable future.
Activity Rules: At the start of this phase a character must have earned at least 2 points during the previous calendar month to be considered active -or- they must have at least two points during the first weekend points update of the month. This number will gradually increase as the activity of the forum picks up.
All members are nevertheless strongly encouraged to post even more if they feel up to it - every post you make helps the board be more active.
Phase Ends When: The points required to be considered active is exactly what we required before this plan began, so everything is effectively 'back to normal'.

Disclaimer: Just to keep everyone's expectations realistic, I should say that I have no idea how long each of these phases will take. Some might be relatively quick, some might take several months. The whole plan could even take a year - don't really know. What I do know is that it should work - perhaps with some tweaking along the way, but I think it's definitely a solid plan and that's what we need.