We've replace Xipe's player for now, things should roll along more smoothly.
It's always a crap shoot with PbPs. The first month of SDS, we had one group that was a joy to GM for, one group that was cruising along with most participants, and then one group that I literally had to nudge each person for every post and then at the end I said 'f it' and just wrote a narrative on how the run ended.
This time around it look like this is the slowest group with both Pennies and Xipe's players dropping out (at least Pennies player gave me a head's up). M.Merchant and Stoneglobe are both a big reason why Tri Tri Again is cruising along at 17 pages of posts so I am confident that this one will pick up as they grow more comfortable playing characters that someone else imagined.
So hang in there, the biggest killer of the PbP is the snowball effect of drop outs. 1 person drops, and then more people drop as we wait for that one person, which in turn causes more people to meander away.
-----
In the meantime, I'll leave the IC alone for the moment, while you guys RP out your plan of attack.