I think just also the presence of an authority and moderator is comforting. Like technically that's Ana's job, but because she doesn't really frequent it doesn't have the same effect.
Well I will put some time into some of those emblems, probably run them by you, Gav just to make sure they're all good and if anything needs tweaking.
Another thought on the teams enlightenment, it will be like an actual working version of the Battle / Collabs social group that was made multiple times and failed miserably every single time without fail... Not sure if you were ever part of them, but they were a great idea, just needed the prominence and structure of actual threads and prefixes...
Also, after stalking the threads from the past year in G&P, I noticed that all the battles voting threads were held in Competitions rather than the actual G&P section. Do you think this is a better idea for getting more views and votes from people given that it is shared by artists and pixel artists as well, but given it is a smaller sub forum, maybe not.
I don't really know, but just a thought that if moved might generate more activity as well...