I get the impression that there isn't enough regulars on Multiverse to expect an entire set to create itself (Note: I used the word 'expect'. It's possible. I just wouldn't put money down on it.) You would think that with seven people actively working on a project, that this wouldn't be the case. But based on experience, my best guess is that you need about 50 active participants which whittle down to five rotating designer/developers by projects end.

Speaking as head designer from the first project, it is a lot of work. I was putting in at least an hour per day working on the project... mostly editing and writing, with very little actual designing. I was in it up until the point we burned out, and in theory I could have grabbed the reins of the project and completed it myself. But the nature of the project... I didn't want to complete it only to have other people tell me that's not what they wanted to happen. As head designer, I pushed toward some things, but tried to remain a neutral arbiter when appropriate. It was a balancing act. Designing most of the rares, half the uncommons and developing the commons didn't seem very neutral, so I stopped.

That said, Multiverse is a great opportunity to start up community projects. I just don't think a third community set is one of them if the first two didn't succeed. I suggest taking a different approach: Optioning ideas for the design of the set from the community, but planning to make the bulk of the set yourself. That way, you get a strong set with a lot of interesting and interactive ideas (too many of them, in fact. You'll have to parse what's important and what isn't) while maintaining the direction and initiative that a single individual can bring to a project (and without constantly being dragged around by other people's schedules. Cripes, I remember sitting at the computer and having three pages of reading to do, and must be done, each day. It was amazing and awesome, and I learned from the experience. But it sure wasn't the optimal way of doing things.)

That doesn't give us much to go on. The first thing to decide isn't what races will be present, but whether the set would be bottom-up or top-down. Note that there are at least two other attempts at community sets here on multiverse, one of which failed to take off and the other of which petered out after a while. I was a fan of a lot of the things we had going in our first attempt, but I think some of us got burned out, and we lost our direction a bit.

Story/flavor ideas? My ideas: White: Rhox? Blue: Merfolk? Squid? Black: Horrors? Shades? Red: Viashino? Green: Elves? Beasts?