I'm not a roleplayer, so I can't really say much about the first one. In my opinion, people have every right to roleplay until they get bored, and they also have every right to stop roleplaying whenever they want, as long as it doesn't serve harmful to other participating roleplayers.

On the issue of deviating from Spiral Knights, I actually appreciate literature that deviates from its source. I think that it's a critical part of the Treasure Vault. Of course, roleplay doesn't HAVE to do this, but it IS necessary that the type exists. It's fun, creative, and most of all, creates fresh stories.

TL;DR in case you're a lazy d-bag: I disagree.

The way i see lore/stories and its manipulation is categorized into two branches.
1) It sticks to the universe but goes more in depth then the current lore does. Ie: rather then say they went to the core and won, it details the unknown middle.

2)Then there is the WHAT IF side of lore/stories and that details of a path that the current universe did/didn't take. Ie: Instead of going to the core and winning, they missed the core entirely failing the mission, causing ramifications throughout the known universe/time period.

These are the two categories i like, both of them based on SK, both require sk and former lore to support it, and the mechanics usually stick the same except for minor details to help bring the story depth. For example we have "Aquilon Company: New Beginnings" is great, sticks to lore and mechanics. Its on cradle, talks about Cradle problems, and brings realistic scenarios in its story. Some of the char. apps. may be wonky or discuss a more realistic experience, but Colray (the author) plays with that to make it believable. Now i understand we are on the topic of Rp's but the same issue is spilling over into Fanfic district.

Fanfics are destined to go far, most apps submitted are well thought out and have pride placed into them. But the fanfic ends up dieing due to people not liking how there character is used ore the author is busy/lazy/out of ideas. These reasons are one reason why (IMO) people do rp's more often since they dont rely on a single person. Essentially, a RP is merely a fanfic with multiple sub-authors. A fanfic is a Monarchy while a RP is a council with some of its members dying off, taking breaks, or being fired.

One problem now with rps is that there are so many, that new ideas are hard to come by sticking in Spiral knights. And since Rps consist of multiple people, its hard to keep it in certain guidelines. These guidelines are set in stone from the start meaning if its deviating from SK, its gonna get far from it really fast.

And then there are those participating who are constantly changing their character, making them better then others. Its annoying, both in fanfics and rps. Both stem from the fact that we have a picture in our mind of how our character should be. In fanfics, the reader has no control over the character after submission unless the author ask for feedback. In rps, the character is controlled by the reader and can alter them as much as they want really, but there are "do's" and "donts,"which are not followed a majority of the time. We place an application of our character to say to the Author "This how the act, how they look, and there strengths and weaknesses. Use all to your advantage." So if your character is afraid of the dark as a weakness, keep it that way and play the part when the Author decides to turn the lights out. Unless you for a legitimate reason somehow have a flashlight, your character will be cowering in fear and weeping like a baby. Also, dont go changing the app on the Author after they've started writing it throws the off so much and it makes things harder for them and the wait longer for others (this mainly applies to fanfics).

Sorry for that, it may be totally off topic and seem garble but this is my rant.

@OP's argument
While having RP's dedicated towards Spiral Knights in all of its loreful glory is a nice thought, the scope of RP ideas within the world of SK as we know is simply too thin. I agree with @Critzer when it comes to this argument. There will be "Digger" RP's (RP's which delve into pre-existing Lore) and "Flyer" RP's (RP's which choose to focus on aspects not directly related to SK, but still pay homage to it as a "base construct").
The Treasure Vault is sort of like a Sandbox. There'll be people who will only use Sand, and there will be others who bring toys in, and build something with the sand in that way. Sand being SK Lore, of course.

I'd agree with your point if an RP found here had absolutely nothing to do with SK... But at this point, I have seen no proper examples of that. There are some that come close, but none which deviate too far to be seen by someone with SK-knowledge to say "That's just a bunch of random stuff."

TL;DR
Ahem.

@Self Reflection of Problems
The problem with these forums is, in a word, Incentive. What do I mean? Well, think about it. If RP'rs feel that participating is becoming a chore, they stop posting. There isn't enough incentive to keep them going -- if there was, they wouldn't have felt it was a chore, and the problem wouldn't exist to begin with.
When a Fan-Fic dies, it's because the Writer didn't have enough incentive to continue. You can tell me that "Loss of Time" is different, but really... It's not. You never see a paid writer give up on his story because of a loss of time; if there's not enough time, the writer will apologize and (almost 100% of the time) continue. "Writers block" is only semi-permanent, and is really only show of not planning far ahead enough, so rather than incentive for writing that's needed, it's incentive for coming up with ideas. And people seem to be much better at coming up with ideas so long as they get a pretty penny...
But we here at the Treasure Vault don't pay out writers, so I'm sure at least one of you is already formulating a counterargument. Before doing so, however, I would like to say that not all Incentive is physical. "Willpower" can be seen as incentive. A "desire to create" can as well. This is probably why something like Machinauts has been going on for so long. In fact, Machinauts is a great example, so let's look at it for a moment.

Machinauts, as a Stat Based RP requires very little input from the players involved for things to happen. In this way, players require little to no incentive to participate -- it only takes a couple of seconds to write up "Attack x with y."
It's almost instantaneous.
Also, because of the Stat-based mechanic, the only true work needs to be done by the Dr. Flipping Dice, randomizing numbers, pasting out the combat-scenario, making short write-ups of character/enemy dialogue, etc.
I have yet to understand how Spacebar keeps up with all of it, but my first guess would be that he's insane (In the best way possible). I'd also hypothesize that without him, Machinauts would end weeks after his departure. Someone would take over. Someone would get bored. The baton would pass. No one would pick up the Baton.

End.

Sad, but true. So long as Dr.Spacebar is insane, and has a seemingly limitless amount of self-incentive, the game will continue.

Now back to the argument: Incentive.

1. We can't all be insane, can we?: Regular people have a limit to how much they can post without added incentive -- no matter what form it is. I've found that the average reach of this Forum's incentive is 200+ with the proper base, and proper liftoff. Then people start wavering... Then the thread drifts into the second page... Then it dies.
2. Most RP's aren't Stat-based: I mentioned that posting is near instantaneous. Writing in Free-form (which is the majority form here) is much more difficult, and requires much more incentive.

That's why Machinauts is a special exception. It meets conditions that allow it to move on with little to no incentive needed for the parties involved (other than the Dr, who is insane). So what do we do? Make a bunch of Stat-based RP's? Limit our creativity? Make a quota?

Incentive isn't so easy to give.

We can't just pay our RP'rs. Nor can we pay our Fan-Fic creators. To create a mechanism to allow proper in-game pay per post would ruin the free-RP community that is the Treasure Vault, but would be a solution.
I can feel your frowns through the screen.
Until someone comes up with a different solution (which, in my eyes, is impossible), incentive will remain a problem. It'll cause inactivity, lapses in creativity, and thread death. Diagnosis: Incentive is the Cancer of RP's and Forums.

We only have one Dr. who can cure the cancer, and he only works on specific patients... So for now, Incentive will remain cancerous. Fin.

TL;DR
Incentive = Cancer

I just think it takes a lot of prodding in the dark to find that these roleplays are usually just a hit or miss. It is rare that you get a roleplay that is worth dedicating yourself to. Much like the last roleplay, which was very enjoyable for me to read, you simply must have those who are interested in the subject itself instead of roleplaying for something akin to a personal vendetta. However, this is no reason to limit roles or players, or exclude thereof, but may be more of the fault in the subject itself, which is to agree with Archemiday-Thebard and Critzer.

We should focus more on subjects people take interest in, like expanding on the Gremlin or Morai debacle, or generally conflict, but must involve the basic Clockworks and the standard Lore structure in a way that it includes all characters of any background. My favorite characters are always the outliers, like Ember-Break's Tifa, or a Clockworks creature that is given an incredible amount of depth and personality despite the lack of in-game evidence to suggest they could ever be one way or the other.

The fundamentals cannot be forgotten. I only return to the forums to realize this romanticism about the Core being opened and the Clockworks being shut down. Very confusing.

The Core
The Clockworks
The Monsters
Conflict or War

Those should always be the fundamentals, and should be involved

I'm not convinced you saw through Condemned's plot. Lady Grey is a villain partway through; she sought to gain power over the Spiral Order using you player characters. However, she had an even greater goal in mind - to free her closest friends from the depths of the Underworld. Little did she know that doing so would also allow everything and everyone in the Underworld, both humans and demons alike, to enter the Overworld and devastate it. This is not an outcome she desired. However, it is precisely the outcome Ozlo wanted because he believes that everyone on Cradle deserves punishment. Ozlo has been using Lady Grey the whole time, and nobody knew it.

As for the players, you, Midnight-Dj, were intended to be the Celestial Arbiter, wielder of the *only* weapon able to banish demons to the Underworld: Executor. All other weapons just temporarily incapacitate them. However, Executor is as dangerous to its wielder as it is to its foes; it works by the wielder issuing judgment on his foes before condemning them to that judgment with Executor. If the judgment is wrong, the condemnation falls back on the wielder. Noel was going to be set up as Lord of Southaven, and Lady Grey planned to initiate a civil war between Midhaven and Southaven. Sona was intended to be an untrusting character who would eventually stab us in the back. Solomon and Max would have left Lady Grey at one point in the story. Amie was intended to be Flynn's mother before Liminori stepped out, and I toyed with the idea of having Jolt be Ozlo's son.

And at the end of the game, Lady Grey would try to atone for her sins and clean up the mess she made by deceiving the demons into returning to the Underworld just in time for the 7-Year Purge that they were trying to escape.

Lady Grey's true name is Winter Valentine. Grey was just a moniker.

Predict that, Midnight-Dj.

Now hold on, I was the sixth to last person to post.
I had a big elaborate post explaining what gear Flynn should use.
In my point of view, the RP had yet to even begin.
It's as if someone tried to do a Dark Souls RP- You get to Capra Demon, and quit, because there's just too much backlog of elaborate bulks of explanations of things that would become relevant weeks later, B̶e̶c̶a̶u̶s̶e̶ ̶y̶o̶u̶ ̶j̶u̶s̶t̶ ̶s̶u̶c̶k̶ ̶a̶t̶ ̶D̶a̶r̶k̶ ̶S̶o̶u̶l̶s̶ ̶t̶h̶a̶t̶ ̶m̶u̶c̶h̶.̶

I tried to have a role in Condemned, it's just that I was so invariably posting, as once again, I felt it unessacary to post.
I feel that our spark of creativity has dimmed even more than it once was.
We may get amazing ideas a while and again, But what then?
Like Dark souls 1+2 state, A new flame is a new age- When it starts out, it's flame is brilliant. But then, the light dims, and the darkness comes to destroy it. After that, the choice of letting the flame die out or creating a new flame means little- A new age will begin eventually, Time will pass. The cycle will continue.
Now, enough Dark souls metaphors.

Earlier, I mentioned that there's a backlog of storytelling.

Because of this, I'm thinking of doing something different with CbtC.
For a good amount of the story, I will make the beginning an Interactive Fanfic, So that nobody has to write more than they want to- when they want to.
However, this requires a good understanding of each character- Thus requiring amazing apps.
Why?
The author may make a mistake, an option the character him/herself would not make.
By making the beginnings of RP's Interactive Fanfics, the people who inserted apps will have a reason that their character would fight for by the time that they get to RP.
Ideas?
(Edit: Lady Grey = Winter Valentine: Too obvious for me. I've known you too long.)

@Liminori: Naming Lady Grey as Winter Valentine was actually a recent development specific to the Treasure Vault. Her original name was Victoria Grey, changed to Madeline Grey, then to Winter Grey, and finally to Winter Valentine here on the Treasure Vault.

Anyway.

I think it would help reboot forum roleplaying with some simple games based around opening the Core and stuff. But eventually, we'll want to move on to more mature and/or complex subjects without diverging too much from the SK setting. Games like Outnumbered and The Winter Kingdom were kinda like that. Another Clockwork Renegades or Return to Cradle might do the trick with that reboot.

Most unorthodox!

Anyway, maybe there should be a limit to how long posts can be and how a position should be presented. The forum format makes it so that there are practically 50 posts per page, each of those allowed to the maximum character limit. However, there shouldn't be the pressure to stretch everything out so much that there is no longer anything personal held to the character and everything is just laid out on the table for other roleplayers to peruse without having their own machinations about the character.

A great roleplay is one where you generally shouldn't have to worry about how many pages it is going to make or how much text is in each of those pages. If your character is big enough, you should be able to both portray them enough to be In-Character, and still hold a lot back.

You can't live an entire life within the confines of a year, otherwise what else is there for that character in later times?

I also think character backgrounds may be more of telling a story rather than exposing the character for why they act, maybe they aren't supposed to know everything about their past, or maybe you just figure that out on the way.

((Also, agreed that Doctorspacebar is crazy, though that is the appeal of them. :D))

@Kaijuhunter Well that is a dream RP, however i can't think of a lore that is 'Un-Explored' in SK until now. The only thing i know of unexplored is the devilites, however their lore is too vague and little it is sometimes hard. There is also the crimson order, but we kinda need to make something up to cover all 9 seats. Oh yeah! There is also gloaming wildwood, the only boss level that –If i remember correctly– are not used a lot like the other.

While that's a good idea in theory, in practice it has a high possibility of flopping on its face. Deciding on a story as a group will yield the greatest amount of storyline-possibilities... But part of the whole appeal of RP's is that you don't know where the storyline will take you -- only the lead and/or a select few participants should know the entirety (or at least a great deal of) the plot.
If the Treasure Vault had more people, then the idea would work extremely well; we'd be able to make an idea and set it out among the "Lab Rats" to see how well it would go down, and then base future RP's off in a similar manner. In fact, with a proper balance of oblivious players and players who helped forge the story's idea, eventually, anyone could play (as those who made the story wouldn't just be posting line after line of a predicted story for no reason: they'd have people that want to read the story -- people who wouldn't know where it was headed).
But... We don't exactly have a highly populated Forum here.

We could divide into sub-groups and make something like a "mock group project RP", but that may also fail. Who wants to make a project just to test something out? I, myself, am not dedicated enough to story-telling to come up with an idea for that reason alone.

If you can make it work, do it. I'll gladly be one of the oblivious players who participates in the story. 'Till then, I'll just be looking for good RP ideas, and participating in those that appeal to me.

Oh, and do you want to know why all these roleplays are dying and people are getting sick of them?

BECAUSE THERE ARE TOO MANY OF THEM. I know I might be overreacting, but sheesh. This is the kind of "follow the leader" that will lead to this whole subforum going down the drain in a spectacular case of Sturgeon's Law.

My ideas was just a proposal. Doesn't seem as bright of an idea as I initially believed, though. Oh well, I suppose Ember-Break has a logical approach. We just have to hope that a good idea will come along. Although, when I talked about discussing RP ideas, I simply meant preliminary, vague ones such as the Crimson Order or Feron. Just to find a piece of SK lore that we COULD base an entertaining RP around.

@Oroseira: How so? I can count only two RP's on the front page: Machinauts and Chosen by the Core. I understand that it may seem like there are too many, but in retrospect, there aren't. There was a time (I believe) when RtC 2 and Finders Keepers, along with one or two other RP's, were on the forums.

With summer coming on, and my last day of school being in two days, I've been thinking about starting a new RP. So, I guess I can just throw some ideas out for everyone to see and maybe help me decide. I like the overall way that Outnumbered ran, but I might be a little stricter with this one, just to keep it under control. So, here are my ideas, and feel free to come up with new ones.
Knights stationed at the Rescue Camp shortly after the Skylark crash.
Each RP'er controlling their own guild, with more of a political basis.
Hunting down and assassinating/capturing Herex or Tinkinzar
A quest to Almire to find out what destroyed it
Anyways, if I make up my mind, I should have it started by the end of the week!

We should do a separate thread for that. I'll get that started.