While I imagine most people would prefer little more than a 'warning adult content' splash (myself included), to any admins I think the core of what people are most concerned about, and would most value in a compromise, is the following:
1. A way to at least show some content to visitors. This serves a few functions: letting them know the UBEA's not dead if they're linked to episodes, allowing authors to share their work more widely and keeping the site attractive to potential new authors, which in most imagined compromises where you need an account to post is potential new accounts.
At the very, very,
very[/i] least - so least I don't even consider it a compromise - we need a 'create a free account to get access to the Unending Breast Expansion Addventure' message on the login prompt, so people finding i from links or google don't assume the site is dead or paywalled, as I've read some have.
Point 1 is the most important, but I imagine regular users would also value...
2. Being able to quickly and easily access recent episodes from multiple devices. I know I used to check in a lot more often before having to login. Checking the recents for follow-ups to or comments on your episodes, checking what's new to be thinking about following, leaving quick comments - all this little stuff that makes the community feel like a community, people are less likely to bother with if they'll have to log in multiple times each day across different devices. And given the nature of the site, the 'people can log in once and they'll stay logged in' argument doesn't really work when many people will be using private browsing.
-Another take - for regular users, at least being able to
see what's been posted easily is important. If no storylines you're part of or following have updated that day, or no titles grab your interest, then there's no reason to go to the hassle of logging in. It can be frustrating to wait all day for your one login only to discover this, rather than being able to check in in under a minute multiple times a day and make a note to log in later as something interesting has come up.
The recents and comments being the heart of the community, much more than the forums, is why all my compormise ideas in my last post focus on leaving some form of it in tact. Ultimately though, that's probably less important than new visitors being able to see
something, as they aren't going to decide to make an account based on nothing.
Make it possible to read the Addventure without having to sign in. Some of it, at least. Perhaps make episodes readable to anyone, but hide their options, or something.
This is another good compromise idea, particularly if it's made possible for google to search the addventure without being logged in again. A modification on this might be that users can see the options, and which are starred (taken). This would give a sense of where the story does or could go, but if not logged in the links would be either plain black text like the body text, or every link just leads to the login screen.
This way, visitors can still discover the content here by searching for certain fetishes or phrases, or being linked to good episode that'll appeal to them from elsewhere, but still have motivation to sign up (inconvenience). While it would technically be possible for someone to read a whole long thread this way with direct links to every episode, the effort on both the poster's and the reader's part to copy/paste or click through from another tab every single link in a chain that could be dozens long would hopefully motivate people to get accounts. But that's the thing, people are at least able to share
something to motivate this.
I'm also not a fan of having to log-in twice if you don't go straight to old.bearchive.com/~addventure - I've been asked to log in to the main site, then asked to log in again when I click the Unending BE Addventure tab at the top.