*WARNING*
This post is EXTREEMELY long, there is no TL;DR becuase it takes a LOT of words to explore all the issues that you guys are failing to see. So read at your own risk. . .I will not be discussing/arguing/responding to anyone else's thoguhts here as I would just be repeating what I have repeated in this post many times over. So either choose to read it and accept it, read it and trash it, or not read it. Up to you. but just beware, a lot of this stuff is probably going to hurt feelings as I explain why pretty much all of you posting these ideas are failing - you are missing out on the big picture. So if you are Up to the challenge, be my guest. (also I didn't proofread this, so ignore spelling/grammar errors pleazee 
)So. . .Dutchy. Times have changed. People in general (except crazy Koreans) NO LONGER like grindy, pay-to-win MMOs the market for that is changing dramatically. it started with Guild Wars 1, and has reached it's peak with League of Legends. Most people now expect to get to the End Game of the grindy mmos: Objective Based PvP.
There's a reason why the MOBA's are extremmely popular right now, and theyve sucessfully added the "grind" aspect to that as well.
Honestly it would be just easier to make a new game with a lot of the best elements of sro (old Jobbing system mostly)
If you ever did go ahead with a sro Pserver you would have to keep the cap low (60 cap, no joke) but you could add in all of the Boss content from other caps, just scale it down.
SRO was based of the "virtual skinner box" type design, where they basically psychologically trick their players into giving them money (google skinne rbox and you'll see what I'm talking about)
no amount of messing with the game is really going to fix that. . .unless you create a whole new game out of it.
Anyway if you were to make an sro pserver, you'd have to allow botting. (if you want more than 100 people playing)
you could allow botting but REWARD those who grind by hand (about 2-3times more than botters get by 24 hours botting) of course you cant tell it to people like your punishing them, people dont react well to negative reinforcement (which is why "fighting against" stuff usually just makes the "stuff" bigger i.e. The Streissand effect)
you would have to figure out a way tomake botters feel like they are "Getting ahead" while allowing legits to be the ones who are actually ahead. that way you can have a bit of grind to cap and grind to get awesome gears.
Also you'll have to make it 100x easier for newplayers down the line 5-6 months to even a year later to quickly catch up to the older players and be on a decent footing with them. A server that has everyone at cap full sosun 200d gear is just going to one shot poor mr.newbie who likes the game but does not want to spend 3 years just playing catch up because they came to the server later, they will play another game. They are definately not going to play the "pay2win" scenario (which is really just "pay to play with other players") as its probably a lot cheaper (in time and actually money) to just buy someone elses character who got bored with the game, than to add money to YOUR pockets to keep yourself, and the server fed and healthy. . .(you gotta eat right?)
About the whole "make money off of visitor advertising"
you will be ve rylucky to have 10,000 viewrs visit the site everyday, unless you market in a different area entirely (look at those lame celebrety screenshot sites for an example). Basically you'd have to start your own business in somethign else entirely and funnel money into that. As unless you have something worthy while and ever changing (i.e. something like a free porn site just to cite an example) youre not going to keep those people coming back, and you're definately not going to grow your audience enough (think millions of views a month, and even then youve got to sell something like books, etc etc) to keep it up.
basically unless you get over "B0t0rs ar3 t3h eBils!" (botters are evil) mentality that youve had since. . .2006 you're going to end up alienating your source of income. the 100 or so legits left are not going to keep donating you money indefinately (Salvation ehem) to keep you and yoru server fed because yes, that will be a full time job + a team of people dedicated to the server on a full time job basis.
You have to adres the NEED for botting. and take away that need. Think about it, if you were a game designer and you took all this time to make a game, and peopel started botting in it, then youve failed as a game designer.
why?
BECAUSE PEOPLE DONT WANT TO PLAY YOUR GAME!
Don't mean to yell but I feel that the OP and many others are missing this point. . .which is why you'd probably need to make a whole new game, or maek a pserver in which you allow botters. . .but find a way to reward legits(without the botres realizing it) AND to make it newbie safe. . .or at least fun enough for the newbies LONG ENOUGH that they get to play on par with "the big boys" of the server. You'll also need to figure out how to make money on micro transactions that people want to buy that isn't buying power (there is huge potential for this if you get a critical mass of players. . .take a look at some of my previous posts for insight into that) <---this is important. . .commit this to memory.
I'm being extremely vague here (except for some tidbits of information) becuase you ahve to understand some of the fundamental problems of the game that Joymax built in the realms of actual game design before you build a server on it, or else those issues will shine through like a poison and kill your game. Fortunately for you, there are a few games that are pulling this off i.e. the most played game in the world right now - league of legends, there is a reason why they have reached a critical mass of players. Id say you take some of their ideas and appy it to your game (in the realm of game design, just because something is a different "genre" doesn't mean it can't or doesn't apply to the game you are making, that's not how game design works. . .there are RULES just like any other profession/trade/process etc. . .You cant call yourself a Doctor with just k-12 of schoolling. . .you have to actually go to med school etc etc etc.)
Look at it this way, If you have to BAN 98% of yoru player base (or potential player base) there is something(well usually multiple things) wrong that you, the game designer, and p-server admin need to fix.
Alot of thse grindy korean type mmos feed to a niche IN KOREA. They made a lucky break for a while because of the virtual skinne rbox idea, but eventually players realize theyve been fooled and leave the game. . .after parting with lots of money, the game shuts down, only for a new one to be made for the next group of suckers, and "The cycle of life and death continues"
I could write a whole book on this if I wanted. But I won't and this LONG ASS POST should be enough to realize why you would fail at making a p-server unless you fix the game itself/make a new game/or change how you would run the game as it is now. These are problems that will not go away unless you fix them. If you have no intention on fixing them, then all the other ideas here in the thread that do not address the problem will result in you losing time and lots of money. SO if a lot of you want to act on emotion instead of actual facts and common sense, then be myguest to make yoru own pserver banning your player base/customers while you bleed monmey and time.
If you decide try to make an entirely new game, with some of the features of sro that were great (jobbning, huge ass uniques to kill, the fun classes etc. . ), while fixing all the flaws I mentioned above takes lots of time and money You could always just hire some designers to help you design a game like that, put together a Bad-Ass proposal, and put it up on KickStarter. But realize this isn't going to be something you can really do after work, it's a full time thing. So its really up to you how you want to do this.
