Thanks for weighing in @pfunk!
Honestly I hope there is a better way to do it as well, but being too easy is also a nightmare in my opinion. A nominal fee is also already possible, given that users can create accounts with the reg fee, but limiting to that is a barrier to entry that we may not want. I don't know if the community will be able to come to consensus on the best way to approach this.
In regards to the post count, maybe it would be better solved with the interface; perhaps we should have a simplistic visual view in the webpage of "vote power" and "post power", so to speak, so people are better informed.