Sorry that you feel like you're shouting into the void. Truth be told, erotica and ERP isn't quite my cup of tea so I'm unlikely to engage on your posts(I'm also not your gender preference). Chat in general is always an exceptionally hit or miss things. For me it feels very much like a feast or famine scenario. There are some days where I end up with multiple quality conversations in my inbox at once and then months at a time without anything at all.

the centralized ownership and domain allows for easy community growth vs fragmentation of fediverse. /r/ had that community niche for a while until the mass exodus. sure there are ones that remain, but they have to find roots elsewhere eventually so I'd say dig in and try. if not lemmy then where? if user base is important then lemmy isn't the answer. that's more Mastodon for fediverse.

i don't post much here but I do comment and get ok interaction levels. sure lower than reddit but every community there was vastly larger.

Don't know if it's what you're looking for, but you might want to check out communities specifically devoted to NSFW chat and RP (for example, Elliquiy).