Tips for you:
What I mean? Bring them (players) closer, so they will actually talk to eachother (I will ignore everyone anyways). Making them think they have "friends",
they will invest more time and will do "Duo-events, Duo-Minigames etc." It's all about the
mind games, running/teleing to edge, barb, catherby each time you get bored of grinding is frustrating aswell.
"Kill the white knight and get a ticket then exchange it for a free member item from the cupboard". Again Gathering slaves to one place, makes them talk,
invest more in the game, and they
believe in something. It doesn't have to be a myth, maybe make the myth true, just don't blab about it, when someone makes a topic you'd say, "Some thing you must discover by yourself". Everyone likes surprises (take it as a hint).
Now you're thinking i've lost my goddamn mind. NO. There was a 1-ing item, that person became famous. Now everyone has a santa ring, boooring. You wanna get famous (ofc you do),
you will want that 1-ing item, you will overpay for it, you will invest 6 hours a day grind for it.
Again, making them invest more time in the game.You come online, maybe because you don't have friends, maybe because it's cold outside, maybe because you're parents are limiting you. I am actually happy with my parents, I don't need them in here aswell, we have actually pretty relaxed mods, but I've seen some pretty serious s**t they do. Ease it up, if someone really posts something that is out of hands, be my guest, but if someone is out here for trolling purposes, for christian sake, if they post 3 troll things don't go all ape on them, everyone has their own way of expressing themselves.
If they don't feel rejected or limited much they will see it can be fun here and
they might just invest their time here because they found a guy who jokes with them.
- It's not all about the game
People come and go because they get cleaned, die and rage, don't see the point anymore. They mostly go out of the game (afk or not logging in). There was a guy named "Mike" or "safe up kid", everyone knew he smelled like dirt, but he was only active in the forums because not everyone talked about the game,
people actually had fun in tinychat and in the shoutbox. They actually discussed about politics, everyday news and religion (not the best example). When newcomers came here, they stayed because someone listened to them
(let me do basic math ladies and gentlemen: you talk out of 3 people, that's 1/3 guys are talking there's a higher chance you will feel alone then if you're talking and 10 others are talking, no matter the discussion topic.) How would you feel if you're new somewhere and someone actually listened to you? You will come back because someone noticed you,
in other words, you'd start investing you time here.