[quote=@Dynamo Frokane]But I feel somewhat uncomfortable talking about what should be done with Nation and Tabletop forums without people from those forums giving their point of view, I think there are probably a ton of other nuances about what makes their niches special that I could only speculate about.[/quote]

Fair. I wish we could get some people from NRP and tabletop in here but they've never really seemed like people to participate in constructive chatter. NRP people are usually in spam, shitposting about communism ;)

[quote=@Dynamo Frokane]As far as Arena, I could brainstorm with some of the other frequent posters.[/quote]

Good. I'd be very interested to hear a more representative view from arena. There's generally not many of them around, bar maybe you, that actively participate in the community. And when they do, it seems to be in, what you called 'arena style'. 

[quote=@Dynamo Frokane]Like I said I think advertising more eclectic fights instead of just Dante Vs Sephiroth style match ups could go a long way. Maybe we could have a detailed article in the criminally underused 'News' Sub-forum about what Arena really is and what it entails and how interesting you can make it beyond just a simple fight. We could also start hosting tournaments in our signatures. To be honest I'm just shooting ideas out, but I know that while the Arena lot can be very protective of their space they are ALWAYS looking to improve, so it shouldnt be hard to get some more ideas floating.[/quote]

Perhaps, the one issue I'd have with the news thing is that just like the reason RPGnews always failed is that just nobody reads it. There's nothing moderately interesting in there that I can't read myself. So while that sounds good in theory it might not really have the effect you might be looking for? 

Maybe this is a bit of a far reach but I've thought about doing give away's. Although I have no interest personally in RPG arena, it might be an idea to attach more than just 'eternal internet fame' to a tournament. I get that it's not meant to be serious (and arena already has a reputation for being kinda gimmicky powergamers that get mad when you start beating them) but perhaps it's an idea to add a more.. physical prize. Or at least something worth remembering. Gives people a reason to participate. It's far fetched, but it'd be something to think on.

[quote=@Dynamo Frokane]But it must be said, while I don't condone the language Xavier used I can understand his frustration. Its quite irksome when an essential 'outsider' to arena starts flippantly disparaging the forum that a lot of us take seriously as 'dead' and 'useless'. I imagine those who only do romance 1x1s on this site would get annoyed if we started claiming they are just a bunch of horny lonely cyber-sex people especially if it was something we knew little about.  Again these small measures of respect are important if you really want to have a productive conversation.[/quote]

I get that, but you have to understand, while arena is still 'alive' somewhat, it's close to dead. It's like, 2 seconds away from dying if we don't give it heart presses. I'm not saying that to shit all over your parade/arena, I'm saying that to make you/people/the moderators realize that not everything is OK. Arena, as a forum, is more or less dead. We can do something to fix it, or we can pretend it's 'just a phase' and not address it, right? Between those two what would you prefer? 

[sub]As for your last line, I already characterize romance roleplayers like that, so more power to me, right? The point is also that I don't really care what people roleplay on here if it makes them happy, and I obviously support arena roleplaying as a thing, I'm just saying I'm not sure if it warrants its own forum if it continues to decline like it is now. :)[/sub]