Thanks Jordan for posting the whole text for dpotts
I think the last paragraphs contained the most memorable things for me:

keep in mind virtually all reef inverts can slowly starve over a period of months/years.

It's tough to tell if something is really doing well since it takes them so long to visibly not do well.

if it’s not growing, it’s starving!

I guess that could be a better indicator rather than just seeing if it's still in the same shape, see if it grew.