I absolutely agree. Too many characters across more realms and islands means more opportunities to gain positions, there being more of them and less folks to hold them. Thus, the positions aren't as challenging to acquire and thus less exciting to gain. Too many characters means player focus is diluted between more characters meaning less emphasis on each character, which then affects the other characters playing with them. Especially when considering how many of our players lead busy lives and must delay responses, thus delaying IC events.
More indirectly, with all the continents and realms we have for these additional characters, it just means more places for new players to join, find uninteresting, and leave.
I firmly believe that all continents should be capped at one unpaused noble and one unpaused advy per family. Even with that, I think we have too many continents. I think War Islands and Colonies have purpose with their unique reasons. Other than those, I don't think we need any more than a stable and testing island of small to moderate size. Somewhat related, I also think new players should start with three nobles, not two, and no advies until after the first couple months.
PS: I do my best to actively play all my characters, but it absolutely affects the focus I'm able to give each one. My War Island character is meant to take my least attention, but I still do more than just check orders too.
