Could anyone explain how the void works? If someone visited my town, (and they only have 9 residents) would they get the last resident that moved out, or is that random? I have voided quite a few..
From what I've been reading, the void is where up to 16 of your previous villagers get stored on the cartridge so that they may visit your main street from time to time. Once a villager is in the void you then need to cycle through another 16 villagers to kick them out so that they can become your neighbor again.
If you would like to 'give' someone a villager, they need to talk to them when that villager is in boxes and ask them to move to their town.
If a resident moves out, they're in your void. If you visit a town with 9 or less villagers, they move into that town. It's the most recently moved out villager that's in your void.
A villager ends up in your void if they move out without having been adopted. If you let someone who wants that villager to talk to them while they're in boxes (on the last day before they move out), that person has the option to invite them to their town. When you do that, a villager doesn't get voided. They're voided if they just move out without a destination.
When a villager is voided, the game stores the data of the last 16 villagers to have been voided. When you connect to someone through wifi or StreetPass, they can get a voided villager from you. People used to say that you could clear your void by visiting someone with a full town (so that the voided villager would try to move in and fail), but recently, people have been starting to say that's not true. I haven't tested either myself, so just to be on the safe side, if you've voided any villagers, it's nice to let others know in advance.
I think that out of those 16, whichever moves into another town is randomly chosen. If you only have villagers in your void that someone in another town has or had recently, they won't move there.
You can keep voided villagers from moving in by plot resetting and time travelling to invite a villager who can overwrite the random move-in before they plot. I don't know if that clears the voided villager from the other player's void forever or not. You can also ask people beforehand (so that you'll know if you should take extra precautions to avoid getting unwanted villagers) and switch off StreetPass.
I can pretty much confirm how the void works because I've had experience in getting villagers out of the void for other towns.
Every town has a void of villagers that move out. (the only thing I can't confirm is the size of your void). When you visit another town or someone visits you, if either of you have 9 villagers in your town then you will each pick someone up from the other person's void.
The exception is when you visit someone with a full town. If you just had someone move out and you visit a town with 10 villagers (or they visit you) the villager in your void can't move to the other player's town, therefore he/she leaves your void forever. Your void is now considered "clear". However you can still pick up someone from the other town unless they have a clear void.
Once your online interaction is complete regardless of whether you've exchanged villagers or not, both player's voids become clear.
Understanding how this works is really useful if you have someone move out and a friend wants a villager from your town. As long as you haven't visited anyone else online and the villager in your void is the only one there and your friend has 9 villagers in his/her town they can still recover that villager.
