Wordpress Membership Plugins

OK warriors, need your help.

I'm looking for a WP membership plugin. I've done research on a lot of the most common out there. They're good, but pricey. And have too many options!

What? Huh? I hear you thinking it. Too MANY options? Yes, too many. Things like Wishlist Member are great, but have too many options and ways to configure it, plus the cost. s2Member is a great free one, but there are so many things to configure that it gets overwhelming.

I guess I better explain what I want first, then you might understand where I'm coming from.

I'm starting a site where I will have members, but it's not a paid membership site. It's a fun take on zombies and what I want is that different people get different access to the site based on their group. So me and my other top people are in some high level group with access to everything (pages/posts). Then some other people may be of a lesser rank with access to most things, but not all. On down the line, the newbies get access to a lot of stuff, but it's basic. They can contribute by commenting and posting stuff and through the forum, and they can move up in rank, thereby gaining access to more stuff.

I might also have the option to pay-for-access if someone wants a higher group level access, but I can do that without the need for any payment integration in the plugin. Even just a PayPal button would take care of that.

I've seen free plugins where you can define groups, but I haven't seen one where you can restrict pages or posts based on that group. Ideally there would be a hierarchy, where I could specify a certain level for a page/post and then everyone with that level or higher group can see it and no one else can.

Sounds easy, right? And this might be able to happen with other plugins, but I'm cheap, so I want something free. And yeah, s2member can probably do this, and maybe I should just dig in and configure only what I want. But ideally I want a plugin WITHOUT all the extra crap. I don't want it, or need it. If I ever do I'll change plugins. You try to be everything to everybody and soon you're as complicated as I DON'T want to be.

If anyone wants to develop this (maybe I should!) I think it would be a great cheap option for a membership plugin. Sell it for $7, not a penny more.

So...if anyone can help or offer advice, please join the discussion. Thanks!