So What Happens Now?

[Maggott]

Where do we go from here? We've lost yet ANOTHER big (and great) player. It seems for every new player we get, we lose two - and every new player we get quits within a week or so.

So what can we do to get this place back up to the quality it was at before? I've thought about quitting quite a few times (for lots of different reasons - writers block, problems with now-ex-players, lack of time to write,etc.), but every time, I realized how much time and energy I put into this board and decided I'd regret leaving.

In that same vein, I'd also regret not doing anything to prevent it's death. I wouldn't feel as bad toward myself as if I had quit, but I think I'd be even more angry if it died. The last board I was at was completely shut down by two key players leaving (both of whom were main players here as well...and then left) and I was left with a whole bunch of anger over my time, energy, ideas, and emotions being both wasted and unfulfilled.

So, I ask again, where do we go from here? What can we do to help this board back onto its feet? Any ideas? Anyone?

[Iceman]

Anna and I have been emailing back and forth about this for a while now. We haven't come to a final decision now, but let me know what you think.

Right now, we are considering putting the site into a two month hibernation. There are many reasons for this. Anna is extremely busy with work; she told me she thinks about the site every day, and wants very badly to be more active with it, but she simply can't right now because of all the classes she's teaching. Rob doesn't have a computer at this time, but he wants to be very involved as well. Rah has also told me that things will be a lot better for her in two months, and things will be better for me as well, and probably Charlotte.

Also, taking two months off will give everyone time to get interested in the rp again - right now a lot of us are just frazzled about it, with everything that's happened - and moreso, everything that hasn't happened.

The largest reason we'd take a two-month hibernation is to re-vamp the site. We'll leave most of the old threads, but there are some that can easily be moved to archives. When people go to a site to see if they want to join, if they see hundreds and hundreds of posts they'll go 'oh wow there's no way I'll ever be able to learn everything I need to know to rp here' and they leave. If we cut down the numbers of posts, it'll help greatly. Also, we can re-do the character lists for sure. And a big thing is that we need to consolidate the threads people need to read before applying into a few threads, because right now it's disorganized and all over the place.

And then after we re-vamp all this stuff, we can start advertising. Majorly. I will invite every good rper I know - and I'll encourage all members to do the same. We'll have something of a clean slate, then.

Let me know what you think on the idea. Your character spots would be held, of course, during the two months, and you wouldn't have to re-apply.

[Animaux]

You guys both totally nailed it. *nods* I have one more reason to support waiting until May, and that's that a lot of people/students join new RPs at the beginning of summer, when they have more time in their schedules, so that would probably be a good time to recruit anyway.

Also, during hibernation - if we do that - I would still like to play small interpersonal things here and there (kind of like we're doing now, I guess), just without having any big plots/projects/agendas. Kind of keep things in limbo, I guess. Although that's up to you guys as well, we could also just close the site temporarily.

Whatcha think?

[Maggott]

Thanks for the suggestions, guys. I'm glad to see you're all still excited and interested in this board too!

I think we should just keep things as they are, now. We can leave it open for people to join, and the mods can start moving old threads into the archives like you suggested.

I agree we should just keep our threads going as they are now. None of the threads are moving fast (time-wise), so there's no threat of someone ending up in September while the rest of us are in July.

Once the total revamp happens (early summer?), again I think it's a great idea for that to be the time to start advertising.

Thanks again, guys.

And just to clear this in my own head, and maybe jump-start my own threads (I completely understand everyone's busy, really, this is mostly for me):

It's Jubilee's turn in Soaking Up the Sun (and I would love for Skin to jump in on it, I liked the post where he found his room thrashed)...

It's Rasp's turn in We Are Programmed to Recieve...but I think he might be gone for good? What happened there?

Liam and Sam were both tagged in Postcards From Home...

Rictor's open for anyone since Maddie dropped out (for now?)...

And if anyone wants to RP with Sabretooth, just let me know, cuz I'm out of ideas for him since Wolverine left.

Again, let me say, I understand if players can't respond (now or even soon) to these threads. And again-again, thanks for not letting this board die!