Geronus' opinion came closest to my own. BM simply has no players left to spare, or Dwilight is not attractive enough. And yeah, I was not just hoping but also expecting that at least 10 nobles would join on each side of this war in the first few weeks. Obviously this was a gross miscalculation that I see now. However, BM always worked that way for such tense wars like this one is is a haven for the glory hunters which abound through BM universe. The latest example of Silnaria proves this formula still works, for due to good PR and the everlasting hatred for CE Silnaria has managed to gain impressive player reinforcements. I don't get it why Niselur didn't receive at least a tiny portion of that, for I believe the story is good and interesting and I am super sure that it has much more to offer than realms like Silnaria in both advancements and roleplay. In the end, it is quite same to me whether Niselur loses or wins, although normally I'd prefer to win. However, whichever way it goes I'd prefer it to be accompanied by much greater participation of many many more players than this.
I agree with that, but I would note that, until very recently, Dwiligjht's player retention track record was head-and-shoulders better than everywhere else except FEI. The continents formerly hemorrhaging players were Atamara and East Island. That may have changed now with the big wars in Atamara and a longish slow period for Dwilight.
I would suggest, however, that you may have misread what is attractive about "compelling stories." Compelling stories only attract new players if they are compelling stories
you can't get anywhere else in BM or with long and extensive histories involving many players (historical grudge matches like Rio/Enweil, for example).
What has historically drawn players to Dwilight is Sanguis Astroism's hyper-dominance and the wilderness/colonization paradigm which, coupled with one character rules, allows lots of position turnover and new opportunities for new players. I recall a while back slaving away on some data I never finished about the average time in-game of dukes and rulers and such and found that Dwilight and Beluaterra were about half as long as the other continents.
My point is: if your war is perceived by players as ADDING something exciting and unique (Silverfire does a good job selling the idea that his various and sundry project realms will be exciting and unique) or plays into a longstanding feud (CE vs. The World), then it'll get the usual war-seeker bump. But if your war doesn't play into a long-term grudge match or isn't obviously a war FOR something unique, you won't see big player influxes: and a war for a benignly secular monarchy with some goals of limited expansion alongside its gang-banging allies in a long-distance war with few battles isn't really a compelling sell.
