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[Garath]

Can we please add a sticky to this forum dealing with frequently asked questions? It's all nice and well redirecting people to the wiki, but answering the same questions time and time again isn't making only me a bit agitated, though I might show it more than others. Putting the answers to some questions that are often asked here will reduce traffic on the wiki, which for me is occasionally hard to load, and stop some recurring questions.


I'm nominating someone else for making the Q&A page

[Seikatsukan]

I feel your pain and (at times) share your ARGH!, however, given the nature of the game('s developer style), I get the feeling a FAQ thread would suffer the same fate as the Wiki: rapid outdate and obsolescence. The maintenance of a FAQ thread for DF can easily turn into as much of a chore.

I see the nature of this sub-forum as another "quirk" of the game. I'll tell you a story: I used to play Eve Online, a game that, like DF, is renowned for having an unforgiving learning curve, and it also had returning players that were confused by how much the game had changed. I was a regular at the in-game chat's "help channel" and, along with several other more-or-less experienced users, devoted quite a bit of game time to answering the same questions once and again. It was more of a competition to see who would post the most accurate/helpful answer first; in the end, it was still kind of fun, and it was not surprising when we turned out to be the players that learned the fastest, thanks to all that wiki-diving.

In other words, I'm more annoyed by a single thread by some dude that insists in posting dark purple text, than having to fix "dwarves say there's no X but I have dozens" ten times in a row. But this is just my style; if you think a FAQ thread would help, by all means, go make one. I'll stay down here, below the stickies, dealing with the people that don't bother reading the FAQ first

[Garath]

In other words, I'm more annoyed by a single thread by some dude that insists in posting dark purple text, than having to fix "dwarves say there's no X but I have dozens" ten times in a row. But this is just my style; if you think a FAQ thread would help, by all means, go make one. I'll stay down here, below the stickies, dealing with the people that don't bother reading the FAQ first

actually, on the purple thing, I'm all behind you, maybe in front throwing bricks, got a temper occasionally.

I may not be clear on the issue myseld, but I think if there was a sticky with common questions "throughout the ages" and links to specific wiki pages, it'd just solve so much clutter. At least for the questions asked by people who bother to read a forum before posting.

[Urist_McArathos]

There is a FAQ under construction in general construction:  http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=100506.msg2974764#msg2974764

I'm still coordinating with Toady about that one, but I'm open to making one for this forum as well if that's necessary.

[wuphonsreach]

Ultimately, FAQs work better on the wiki rather then buried in a forum post.  The only information that should be in the forum stickies should either be non-public (sticky topics related to those with limited access) or directly related to the forum (rules of conduct).  Information in wiki's can be more easily bookmarked, found, updated, etc.  Plus you get built-in version history for what has changed in the article.

But discussion about said FAQ page on the wiki works far better then trying to discuss things on the wiki's discussion page.

(Plays EvE and is one of the staff/managers of E-UNI.  It's a constant battle for us to move information out of the forums and into the wiki, then get it all cross-linked.)

[Finn]

Garath, I am 100% behind you on this and was going to suggest it myself.  There are several, if not dozens, of frequently asked questions.  We could just make a wiki page and paste the link to that, if we can't get a sticky.  Just go ahead and start a FAQ thread, you answer a lot of the questions anyway.  I'll add to it if I can and we'll see if it doesn't get stickied, I think it will.  Let's start with "Q: Why isn't my dwarf doing X". That covers at least half the questions.

[Laurin]

I doubt that people would really read it.
Lots of the questions could easily be answered if people would use the wiki and do a quick search there in the first place. Only they don't. 

[Seikatsukan]

I doubt that people would really read it.
Lots of the questions could easily be answered if people would use the wiki and do a quick search there in the first place. Only they don't. 

Lots, certainly. But do take a look at the wiki. Or ask Quietust, for that matter; only a few days ago he found most of the "Melt item" page was an outright fabrication that had been overlooked for years. Fact is, this forum receives much more attention than the wiki does, both from askers and answerers.

[wuphonsreach]

There are even FAQ templates on the wiki.  Such as:

http://dwarffortresswiki.org/index.php/DF2012:Digging_designation_canceled

(The above shows up at the bottom of the Magma page.)