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[Toxicshadow]

sorry to chime in if I didn't read ALL the posts, but what this all sounds like is what type of subdir structure needs to exist for the modding forum.  I'm sure I'm not the 1st one to say it, but maybe there should be a formal request for subdir creation?  Possibly some sort of vetted proof (i.e. multiple threads covering a category) that a subdir should exist.

Try:

-snip-
If we have to have sub-boards, do it by genre.  Something like...

GFX/Tileset Releases
Total Conversion Releases
Major Mod Releases
Minor Mod Releases
Child Mod Releases (i.e. Masterwork-dependent mods)
Plug-In and 3PS Releases
GFX/Tileset Development
Mod Development
Plug-in and 3PS Development

Thoughts?

[MagmaMcFry]

-snip-
If we have to have sub-boards, do it by genre.  Something like...

GFX/Tileset Releases
Total Conversion Releases
Major Mod Releases
Minor Mod Releases
Child Mod Releases (i.e. Masterwork-dependent mods)
Plug-In and 3PS Releases
GFX/Tileset Development
Mod Development
Plug-in and 3PS Development

Thoughts?

Those are just too many boards for mod releases. Could you imagine anyone going to Bay12 with the intent of getting "One Major Mod, please"? The visitors of the minor mods forum will consist only of the people who made those minor mods, think about it. We shouldn't compartmentalize this any further than is convenient, four boards for mod releases are just three too many to browse.

[CLA]

Those are just too many boards for mod releases. Could you imagine anyone going to Bay12 with the intent of getting "One Major Mod, please"? The visitors of the minor mods forum will consist only of the people who made those minor mods, think about it. We shouldn't compartmentalize this any further than is convenient, four boards for mod releases are just three too many to browse.

Agreed.

I think these are enough

GFX/Tileset releases
Mod releases
3rd party/utilities releases

maybe give dfhack its own subforum

But all the development and question threads would do just fine in the base forum, I believe.
For further categorization (minor mods, major mods, TC's) I believe the community mods & utilities sticky (or an analogous sticky on the mod release subforum) is sufficient.

[Toxicshadow]

-snip-
If we have to have sub-boards, do it by genre.  Something like...

GFX/Tileset Releases
Total Conversion Releases
Major Mod Releases
Minor Mod Releases
Child Mod Releases (i.e. Masterwork-dependent mods)
Plug-In and 3PS Releases
GFX/Tileset Development
Mod Development
Plug-in and 3PS Development

Thoughts?

Those are just too many boards for mod releases. Could you imagine anyone going to Bay12 with the intent of getting "One Major Mod, please"? The visitors of the minor mods forum will consist only of the people who made those minor mods, think about it. We shouldn't compartmentalize this any further than is convenient, four boards for mod releases are just three too many to browse.

Yes, and the current setup has a similar issue. Anyone new to modding is going to come to this board, "with the intent of getting one major mod," assume that because of DF's complexity, modding will also be complex (They want something user-friendly), see that Masterwork has it's own subboard, think "Ooh, what's this?", see that's it's a very expansive mod, try it and never touch/try any other mod.  Yeah, I guess grats to Meph for putting together a modpack that has a lot of things, but it bothers me when people only play one mod. 

-snip-

-snip-
I think these are enough

GFX/Tileset releases
Mod releases
3rd party/utilities releases

maybe give dfhack its own subforum
-snip-

I do agree that just having those three/four(DF Hack) would be enough, would the other setup not help stimulate the growth of the modding community?  With the current setup, an ambitious modder could easily get discouraged because of the current mods that are popular, and their popularity, assuming that they won't be given a chance; with the suggested setup, there would be an initial lack of threads, which would give new modders an opportunity. 

Personally I favor Narhiril's suggestion, however I do support CLA's if Narhiril's suggestion is too many subboards.

[smakemupagus]

I certainly don't want anyone to feel un-included, but it has been really nice to have a Masterwork forum.  It gets a lot of posts, and the old way of having simultaneous conversations about updates, gameplay, bugs, Linux, tilesets, Orc fortress, future development plans, and etc. all going on in one thread was  a bit confusing and unpleasant. 

edit.
Not that I think there is anything particularly unique about Masterwork .. I would support any mod that wants it's own subforum.  I don't think it fractures the modding community.  It is a nice place for players, who might not be modders yet, to ask questions that would be out of place in the upper modding forum.

[Toady One]

The particulars have been covered above.  People are welcome to take offense, but I don't think I've been unreasonable or biased.  Anybody that asked for anything has been given it so far, and as I have no feel for which child boards would alleviate clutter/confusion and which ones wouldn't, I've honored each request.  Of course, now that we've seen how things are playing out, the situation can be evaluated.  It seems the Masterwork subsection was necessary, unless some moral obligation requires me to send them off to their own site.  I'm not convinced at this point that having that subsection is more harmful than helpful.  The other individual boards haven't seen as much activity.  I don't recall if Deon had some plan or other that would cause a disruption if left in the regular area -- depending on how often that sort of thing comes up, a better solution would be called for to avoid the proliferation of child boards.  If that means evicting the popular mods from the forum -- well, that seems extreme but I have no idea how to approach the problem.

I've created boards for graphics and utilities.

[Hugo_The_Dwarf]

I was just thinking. Is there a chance to have child child boards? Maybe have Masterwork a Child Board in Mod Releases, and authors can use a Category ID on mods to tell what one is a major and minor or total

[MA] - major
[MI] - minor
[TO] - total
example would be:
[MA] Regeneration:FE
[TO] Fallout
[MI] Quarry Mod

and the descripton text for the mod releases board can have this legend or a revamped one

other then that, I really have no problem with the setup right now.

[MagmaMcFry]

I was just thinking. Is there a chance to have child child boards? Maybe have Masterwork a Child Board in Mod Releases, and authors can use a Category ID on mods to tell what one is a major and minor or total

[MA] - major
[MI] - minor
[TO] - total
example would be:
[MA] Regeneration:FE
[TO] Fallout
[MI] Quarry Mod

and the descripton text for the mod releases board can have this legend or a revamped one

other then that, I really have no problem with the setup right now.

If the mods want to add those tokens to their topic subject, they can do so themselves, but that would raise the known problem of people not looking at minor mods. Let's just leave it like it is now for a while, we can still change it later (if we see the need).

[mastahcheese]

I was just thinking. Is there a chance to have child child boards? Maybe have Masterwork a Child Board in Mod Releases, and authors can use a Category ID on mods to tell what one is a major and minor or total

Yo dawg, I heard you like Child Boards, so I put Child Board in your Child Boards so you can...

Yeah, I don't know where I was going with that.
But I think that the idea would be cool. The new subsection are nice, at least in my opinion.

[Boltgun]

It is good to have a masterwork board, this one mod has a lot of activity and this will take away a lot of confusion.

Thank you for the GFX and utilities boards too, if they tend to have low activity it may be best to merge those two but let's test it for now.

I think we reached an optimal number of sections now, it is now up to us to organize around this.

[CLA]

So, will threads be moved automatically, or should we request this somewhere?

[jwest23]

I've created boards for graphics and utilities.

Thanks, Toady!

[Meph]

The author of a thread has to move it. The button for it is at the lower left, when you scroll all the way down. Maybe writing a PM to the more prominent authors (phoebus, ironhand, mayday, japa, zwei, lucas, splinterz, peterix) will be sufficient.

What about the open question posted by narhiril, about favourism, masterwork/deon/putnam boards, instead of "mod releases" ? I can understand the problem, that new players come here and only go to masterworkdf, instead of looking for any mod, because they have the preconcieved notion that it is somehow more official then the others. I dont think its a problem with TotalConversions (people that want Zombie mods, or Warhammer, or LotR, they know what they want), but people looking for general fantasy mods, like Masterwork, Genesis, Regen or LfR.

One thing that comes to mind is that the bundle of GUI and utilities make my mod more popular. A simple solution would be to add the GUI and utilities to other mods too. I think many people that play MasterworkDF are so used to workflow and quickfort and fancy custom dfhack scripts, that they dont try other mods, because these are missing. The GUI as well, it can be easily fitted to any mod, because the source code is always the same, only keywords are replaced. Deon can confirm this.

I am not saying that I would like to force a VB-GUI on every major mod, but it seems like the one feature that sets MasterworkDF apart from other mods. The simple fact that modding-noobs can alter it without modding-knowledge.

[Rose]

I've moved the threads for the two utilities that I own the threads for. Thanks toady for the sub-forums.

[CLA]

The author of a thread has to move it. The button for it is at the lower left

Ah, thanks, didn't look all the way down, and the smf wiki said you need admin rights.