zGrim, you beat me to the punch, i was just logging in to say something very similar.
How I think this world SHOULD progress.
The skilled players in TSF should start banding together in their own mini-tribes, eat the inactives, teach the actives, form bonds of comradeship with players in their areas, The tribes being created who have no "enemy" tribes nearby form alliances with those on the fronts with BIG and UTF, sending support to them. try for NAPs or alliances with other existing tribes. BIG will continue to march across the map, but the number of inactives in TSF mean that cannot be prevented, the method I spelt out will slow us down untill you have a skilled cadre to form around, and fight back. The final battle has not happened yet, and TSF does not have the discipline or cohesion to survive untill, let alone take part, in that final battle.
How I think this world WILL progress
As things stand, the final showdown looks like it will be between UTF and BIG. the rest of the world will have crumbled to dust long since, and then the true titans will stare each other down, the alliance will decay as the two tribes solidify their borders, then all of a sudden both tribes will launch at the same time, it will be a battle the like of which has never been seen. And unlike TSF and any of her enemies, UTF and BIG will banter about it in good fun knowing that this was the natural progression of the world, there were no cheap shots, no cheap shots, just two great tribes battling it out for supremacy for lack of any other challenge.
TSF, loyalty to a doomed tribe is not honourable. It is foolishness. Your leaders have driven you into the ground for the sole purpose of bragging rights. Dont believe me? why is it that TSF didnt want Retribution for so long, then the moment they started to lose ground to BIG, they brought in all those players they didnt want? The only reason I can see is that they wanted the points so they could still say they were the best tribe, despite losing territory to both BIG and UTF. Why else would they keep the inactives instead of internalling them? Heck, BIG is internalling more TSF inactives than TSF is!
Look to your brothers, see which ones have the ability to hold on to this world, band those together, then look for the brothers who may not be able to hold on alone, but are active and willing to learn, then bring them into the fold, help them grow fat on internalled villages, teach them to fight. This world will not be won on numbers of players, villages, or points. But on the activity and teamsmanship of the tribes in the final battle. This is how BIG grew up on the RIM to knock out the top core tribe, by taking anyone willing to learn, and helping them become the biggest fish in the pond, then throwing them into the larger sea.
This world need not end for TSF players, but it does need to end for TSF the tribe. The name has failed, the reputation is shot, you are LAUGHED at by even the smallest of tribes. and you can not regain that reputation as TSF.
I want a challenge, and TSF has failed to provide one. The closest they have come is to turtle up to slow our advance, I have had a better challenge with Transcendants than I have with TSF. If it werent for transcendants tendancy to bite of more than they can chew, Id say they have more chance of taking part in the final battles than TSF have of surviving as a cohesive force another fortnight.