Ah, gotcha. Have you done any of that? Since you probably have, how much?
The problem lies in the fact that the brush sets that I find only come in packages of 2 or 3, and it looks too plain to be using that many, so I try and incorporate more. As for the drop shadow, I understand, and the gradients were plain, but they were kind of emphasized a bit much after I put some other brushes on the text. I'll try, though.
As for the text, I just noticed. I don't know how I could've missed that, I am so dumb... The character on the right only had 1 render, and the outline was white, so I tried to do a black inner glow to replace it. I guess it kind of interfered with the fading out at the bottom, although I did my best to try and remove it. It looked a lot worse before. As for the white brushes, I just always have liked the way they look, but I think I understand what you're saying. Thanks for the advice man, I really appreciate it. As for the PM though, did you see?
EDIT: Taking your advice into consideration, here is a more full version of the banner, which basically has everything changed that you pointed out.