Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[Toady One]

No need for strident arguments in the sticky.  Please adopt neutral tones and cut the rhetorical questions or whatever you want to call them.

What's the thought on a forum suggestion header that encourages necromancy for this particular board?  Toady, it sounds like you favor short and sweet, front loaded suggestions to long merits and flaws threads.  Would you prefer that someone with a 'here's a different way of accomplishing this' idea append that to a previous discussion or just start a new 'X has been discussed, but what about X WITH Y!?!?' thread?  Doesn't matter too much to us (although new repliers are just as bad as new OPs for repeating threads, IMHO)  Maybe encourage Necro-linking?  (Post a new thread but link to the old discussion in the OP)

Yeah, thread necromancy (as opposed to necro-linking) has the slight added problem of the date jump in the series of posts which can be very, very confusing, especially if it jumps from 2D or 3D or something like that in the overall discussion.  In any case it's always one thread being brought up top by it or by a new topic.  Necro-linking is probably best.  I could add a note in that direction.

[Neonivek]

Currently I am just confused to as the point of this Topic

I thought it was a topic about splitting up the forums to prevent all those forum suggestions about it (all 5 of them)

So things arn't exactly adding up.

Can someone fill me in?

[Mikademus]

What forum in an alternative universe have you been to? People lump ANYTHING and EVERYTHING into magic. Thus it is too vague.

It is unfortunate that threads go off a tangent but in context utterly irrelevant. A thread is about magic, but that someone posts about about bunnies in it does not mean it can't be placed in the magic forum. In fact, if threads were kept apart then they would likely stay more on-topic: it is (partly or fully?) BECAUSE they're in a non-specific kitchen sink suggestions forum that they will stray.

[Sinergistic]

Posting before really reading the thread in a state that would allow me to comprehend it in a logical fashion.

First, I think a forum like the following might help cut down on repeat threads (if people would at least look at it first)

* Common Idea Forum (READ FIRST)
    - Contains megathreads like Underground Diversity and other threads dedicated to discussing a common idea or ideas, such as the common mine cart/move ore suggestion threads. New topics should be rare, and only occur if we see a common trend in suggestions that aren't consolidated yet, but should be. In order to keep discussions on track, I think locking threads when they get long and creating a 'Part 2' thread would be good. [Opens can of worms] Perhaps a moderator or two to remove the obvious off topic posts, and manage locking the bigger threads and creating new ones. (Perhaps restrict new topic creation to mods in this forum?)
   
 

And then a couple ideas for how to break up the suggestions forum.

* Suggestions
    - The Kitchen Sink. Much the way it is now. Ideas that are already covered in the CIF should be provided a link there, and locked.
    + Core (and Ark?) Expansion (Expansion Discussion?)
        - A forum for expanding/adding to Core (and Ark?) game elements.
    + Bloat and Power Goals Expansion (Expansion Discussion?)
        - A forum for expanding/adding to Bloat and Power Goal game elements.
    + Eternal Suggestion Discussion
        - A forum for discussing the various 'ideas' put up for voting. Overlaps with the 'Common Idea Forum'
    + Fluff Suggestions
        - A forum for "I think this would be cool, but other things should be done first". (To vague? Not focused enough? meh.)
    + More subforums from granites list.
        - Who knows.

[Jay]

Another note:  Subforums are hampered by the broken search function (it won't search subforums from suggestions)

My question on this, copypasted from my shiny new link repository...

These are types of forums that we do not actually have yet, so how do we know this is the case?

[Footkerchief]

^^^ Huh?  Try using the top right search bar in Forum Games & Roleplaying to search for threads in its Roll to Dodge subforum.

[Jay]

^^^ Huh?  Try using the top right search bar in Forum Games & Roleplaying to search for threads in its Roll to Dodge subforum.

Blah.  Completely didn't notice that there was a RTD subforum there.
Goes to show just how much I care about those forum games to begin with.

Maybe I should have been clearer: We don't have those kind of forums yet for anything related to DF.
This is the DF suggestions forum, after all.

Oh!  That brings up an entirely new subject!  Bay12 Suggestions!
All these [FORUM] - suggestions can go there instead.

[Fieari]

How difficult would it be to add tags instead of subfora?  And here's the kicker... don't make it mandatory to tag your own thread, but add a mod who can tag threads for people.  I know the tagging idea has come up a time or two before, but I have no idea how complicated actually implementing it would be.

I think tagging plus a "common suggestions" forum would work well, with a mod moving common suggestions to the common suggestion forum, and tagging everything else.

[Kanddak]

When someone makes a thread about mine carts or whatever, the mantra is "this has already been discussed, here are the two or three huge threads that we already had about it, we don't need more threads about it", so I don't see what the point of making topic-specific subforums would be, since they would be places designated for making more threads about things that we don't need more threads about. Do we really need that?
And if subforums break searches, then you can't search for all the things that have been said about mine carts, and you can't find out what's been said by reading the mine carts megathread, because now we have a whole forum full of threads about different aspects of mine carts, which may be redundant because their posters couldn't search either.
I'm not convinced this would actually serve to make things more organized.
I'd rather do things that streamline the process of finding out what suggestions are common. In addition to or instead of a wiki-based index of important threads about common topics, it might be nice to have a "commonly suggested ideas, read before posting" sticky thread, posted by some community-minded volunteer, stickied by Toady, then edited to stay up-to-date by the aforementioned volunteer. Yeah, that kind of indexing will take work, and controversial editorial decisions about what ideas deserve inclusion, but that would make things more organized. Adding more complexity by splitting things up into a maze of subforums is something Toady could do with less work (if possibly no less controversial editorial decisions), but it would not make things more organized on its own.
I'd also see some potential in strictly janitorial moderators, who don't ban people or intervene in disputes or otherwise engage in dramatic assertions of authority that stir up discontent, but just go to redundant threads and paste some kind of "Welcome to the DF forums. Your idea's been posted before and discussed at length, check out these threads: (links taken from common-suggestions sticky list)" boilerplate message, and then lock the thread so that it doesn't keep getting bumped and attracting a crowd.

We have a sticky thread for the cat bug in the bug reports forum and there's no reason it shouldn't work the same way for the most common suggestions. Come to think of it, Gameplay Questions could use the same kind of thing. I've been paying attention to it this week and it seems like every day there is a brand new "I can't get the hang of the game because in every fort I suddenly get a hundred migrants in my second year, what do I do?" thread.
It seems like similar mechanisms could be used to better organize Bug Reports, Suggestions, and Gameplay Questions. Take some community nominations for commonly reported non-bugs like when people fiddle with their raws and get indexing errors that turn all their elves into elephants or give them "cancels make steel: need some crazy nonsense material unrelated to steel" messages, commonly suggested ideas, and FAQs like "how do I stop migrants?", and make some sticky threads.
Incidentally this also highlights my issues with the subforums idea. Does anyone think it would really be better organization to set up a system of "to ask questions about construction, use the construction questions subforum; to ask questions about migrants, use the migration questions subforum; to ask questions about fluids, use the oh shit I flooded my fort subforum" and so on?

[Granite26]

Kanddak:

That's a great idea in theory, but the problem is, who would maintain it?  The options are either a single OP, or Toady himself, neither of which are a viable solution.  The trick is to have a 'common suggestion' thread that is stickied but doesn't rely on a single person to maintain.  There's already perfect media for user generated content....

[Sinergistic]

Has a 'Common Suggestion' page been setup on the wiki? I've just tried to log in, but it isn't taking the password I thought I used, and I can't find the recovery option.

So: Wiki page that anyone can edit that notes all the really common suggestions, with a stickied thread in this forum linking there. Or maybe in the forum header? How about a page that pops up the first time someone tries to make a new topic in this forum? "Hello! I see you're trying to make a new topic! Might wanna just hold off on that for a minute and check this out. If what you want to suggest is already listed, or you see something similar, you might try searching the forum first and using one of the pre-existing threads! You may continue in xx seconds!".

[Granite26]

Here's the link the the mock-up I wrote.

Please feel free to move stuff around or use the comment page to make suggestions.  I'm going to create a side-bar 'yeah we know' section for 'problems' with DF stemming from the fact that it's still being developed.  Basically a list of content that still uses stems rather than full featured functionality (Mounts would be a good example)

[praguepride]

I like it! Although that means its up to the players to actually read it.

It does take hte burden off of Toady to shift through things. Kudos for the good idea! Kudos all around.

[SirHoneyBadger]

I'm for maybe having a general Bay12Games Forum thread for companywide concerns/suggestions, and things like donation inquiries, interviews, important news, and what have you, stickied at the very top of the Forum, and which could include an extensive set of FAQs for the Forum, for DF, for other Bay12 games, etc.

I think it would be a nice professional touch, and might make for a good starting point for new people, and even guests, to familiarize themselves with the Forum.

[Craftling]

Just so people know what ideas are being accepted by toady, thought about or definitely out, could we get someone to go through and put a tick, question mark or cross beside each topic to see if it is alright or just silly.
Sorry Toady/Threetoe.
Am I in the right place?