Your ideal Dream?

What Rayner said. Keep things simple and humble. If TheDream gets too complicated, it will scare away people and frustrate current users.

I would be sincerely sad if we tried to forget the comic and steer the forum away from it. While I know there is no active comic, shying away from it altogether and trying to keep the forum away from it is like setting fire to the foundation of MZDM as a whole. Instead of staying away from the comic, you should embrace the idea. Extract Master Zen Dao Meow and make him an even more active icon, make the Dream Directives the pillars, give them a bigger purpose or enhance their current purpose. He (and the supporting cast) doesn't have to be part of the actual comic to be part of MZDM; he doesn't have to involve himself in a whole new comic to involve himself with the basis of the forum. But at the same time don't forget that the comic started everything. Trying to inevitably rip the art and comic from the forum is going to end in chaos, so instead put the old stuff in a bigger, better museum and dust it off once in a while, then find a way to use it without using the art - without using the comic or the PA cards. Yes, this is written to a point that it probably wont make sense and it may be a little complicated, but it really isn't. More Zen Dao, more Val, more Quacky, more Mu, have them explain the site to new members on the front page, if possible have them show up in threads or adventures. Give them a more active life, dust them off and give them more of a purpose, shower them over the forum like water on a dying plant, detach them from 'being above everyone else' and give them a deeper story In the forums. Make characters (or bring back characters) that may have known them in the past and involve them as well. Where's the thread where Pigham looses his cookies and needs both a detective thread to find them again as well as a visit to Neema's Settle thread to help him make more temporarily to satiate the hungry populace?

As for making more funds for the site, shake off a few fleas at art forums. This may sound insane, but Fur Affinity and Deviant Art both have large open areas for new banners for advertising other sites and it's not a very large (or expensive) step to have a huge logo of Master with the large words "ROLEPLAY FORUM" in one of those spaces. It's a small loss of money and a backwards step, but it will go a long way to getting new members. New members means more people to fund the site (and/or sell mzdm t-shirts and hats). While you advertise MZDM on other major sites, have a large 'Please help keep MZDM alive' thread or notice somewhere (and not hiding at the bottom for people to ignore) asking people to help with funds.

Instead of a new layout for the site, I'd like to see (in my dream Dream) more open activities. There are 10,000 mods on this site, where are the 10,000 large poetry, adventure, comedy, mystery, and problem solving threads? The only activities I can openly see as a new user are those involved with the chat (which is not the forum) and the Haiku C., which is unapproachable. Does this sound fair? It isn't! It was brilliant when Furil made the Graveyard thread in Enter to involve members, where are more from other major members of the forum? Why aren't these threads featured on the front page to show that MZDM is, indeed, active and booming? Sitting and watching the forum, expecting the members to move it, isn't going to make it move fast enough to appeal to everyone. This place needs a gravitational focal point, a few specific choice threads that glow, made by those who run it to get people's attention that yes, this place isn't going downhill. You, Krinele, and you, Benor, and you MasterFlare, where are your huge threads that involve the members, where are your huge activities?

I've lectured myself out. *gets off the podium*