I've run a big text adventure for thirteen years (at one point briefly it was the biggest text adventure!) and if there's one thing I've about managing a big online community in that time that I'd choose to pass on as a warning to others, it's this: remove the people who don't like being there.
Some folks just don't like the place, or they liked it once and they don't anymore, and that's fine.
You'd think they'd just go somewhere else, and most do, but some don't, and those folks are AWFUL.
Some folks can come in, have fun for a month or so then stop having fun but keep coming back for YEARS. They're always negative enough that nobody likes them, and they'll complain about being so unliked on this awful website that used to be great for two weeks in 2009, and everyone wants them to leave and they hate it here but they JUST. WON'T. LEAVE.
Ban them! It sounds straightforward but it's really shockingly easy to roll your eyes and move on and not ban them, but you've gotta ban them!
Bucause if you DON'T ban them, then they find each other! They set up gross unhealthy little quicksand cliques of misery, and they try to suck others in too!
I don't have any of these players on Improbable Island right now, they've all migrated to a Discord server devoted to being unhealthily obsessed with the game that they don't like, but I was just reminded of this weird mestastisized social failure state by /r/watchredditdie, which is probably the most miserable place I've ever seen
@ifixcoinops I am really sorry for a bit of offtopic,, but its first time I hear of Improbable Island, and looking it up, I realized this is the exact kind of thing I was looking for. (Which also has led me to finding out about Interactive Fiction in general)
And its simply, perfect for my usecases :D (e-ink devices)
So, thanks awawawawa
(Again, sorry for off-topic)
Dan moved, see pinned toot
Nyoelle