Forum Consolidation
While I'm looking into the technical issues that need to be resolved, I've also been looking over some general site organization. What do you guys think of doing some forum consolidation? Forum activity breeds forum activity. An easy way to juice a board into some more activity is to consolidate forums -- actually, usually a forum is only added when forum volume is so much that users can no longer easily see the new topics in a specific forum. Here's what I see in the general forum sections (let's ignore the Groups for now)General - Rebel Cafe - Arts & Entertainment - News & Announcements - Databank Discussion - Communications In Character - The Battlegrounds - IC News & Propaganda - Astral Astoria - Biographies and History - OOC Forum - Research & Development
I think we could combine some of these and end up with fewer, but more frequently used forums. Maybe something like this:
General - Rebel Cafe - News & Announcements In Character - The Battlegrounds - Astral Astoria - Technology, Propaganda, & History - OOC Forum
A&E, Databank Discussion, and Communications could go into the Cafe, resulting in one general forum that is frequently used. News and Announcements is contextually different and published to the home page, so that has to stay separate.
R&D, IC News, and Bio & History could all be grouped into one forum, with the different topics distinguished by the use of [posttype] tags in the subject line. They're all non-roleplaying yet In Character thread types that exist more for informational purposes than for active use (ah for the days of a good old propaganda flame war), eg: contextually similar.
Whaddya think? Something like this would result in fewer, yet more active forums. It's a subtle effect, but I think it'll result in a boost to post frequency as less-frequent members stop by and see.
Comments
#9 6:02am 28/12/10
I'm Smarts, and I joined TRF in '06.
That is all.
#8 6:01am 28/12/10
[QUOTE=Omnae]I agree, we shouldn't have to rely on you. The last thing you need when you're getting your freak on with your woman during netflix is a message from Omnae complaining that something is broken at TRF. :O[/QUOTE]
<_<
>_>
You do log into Live quite a lot.
#7 5:56am 28/12/10
Well, personally, I think a group should have only 1 forum. Members of that group have access to that forum. None of this 5 forums and 3 invisible secret forums for negotiations on the off-chance that some other group wants to talk.
Members of all ranks should talk in their group forum. Everything else can take place in the Battlegrounds, IC Propaganda or OOC forum (or even PM).
Smarts has been around a while now. Pretty respected rp'er and prolific writer. Everyone sort of took a hiatus after Cataclysm rp but he seems to be getting back into the BG's.
Point is, though, even while being somewhat competitive, I think we could get along with one forum per group. Threads and characters are becoming more intertwined and while we do retain some element of competition, we are becoming more and more cooperative in roleplaying execution...
I agree, we shouldn't have to rely on you. The last thing you need when you're getting your freak on with your woman during netflix is a message from Omnae complaining that something is broken at TRF. :O
#6 5:46am 28/12/10
[QUOTE=Omnae]I was under the impression that IC News & Propaganda was also linked to the Portal.[/QUOTE]I don't remember. It's possible.
[QUOTE=Omnae]Titus, you asked a question regarding whether or not competitive roleplaying is still around (in another thread). I still feel the presence of Smarts' tentacles worming their way around my throat so I would say: "Yes, in some form or manner"[/QUOTE]OK, next question on that train of thought: Is it alive and active enough to justify forums for the different groups? And who the hell is this Smarts fellow, new (as of 2 years ago) or a rebranded oldie? I'm so out of the loop.
I'm trying to wrap my head around the feature set for TRF v3.0. Groups is possibly the more complex set of features. Seth and I had a little chat last night, and one of the things we went over was paring things down, or simplifying things to the point where the site doesn't rely on me so much (eg: someone else should be able to fix things like broken profile pages).
#5 5:30am 28/12/10
I was under the impression that IC News & Propaganda was also linked to the Portal.
I like the idea of having two forums for General posts.
However, I would prefer to keep the IC aspects (at least) to:
- Battlegrounds (Astral Astoria a subforum within the Battlegrounds [kind of like Floor 300-ish is with the Astral Astoria)
- IC News & Propaganda
- TRF U-verse Information Center (combination of Biographies, R&D forum)
- OOC Forum
Titus, you asked a question regarding whether or not competitive roleplaying is still around (in another thread). I still feel the presence of Smarts' tentacles worming their way around my throat so I would say: "Yes, in some form or manner"
#4 5:21am 28/12/10
[QUOTE=Gro]I can understand folding Bios and R&D together, but Propaganda should be folded into Battlegrounds. Personally, I would prefer to keep Bios and R&D separate entities simply for simplicity's sake of being able to scroll through tech or scroll through characters. I imagine combining the two together would just look awkward and cluttered.[/QUOTE]
A Bio should really be part of the username's profile, and not a forum.
R&D should be static content with comments, a wiki page or some other structured page content, not a forum.
So ideally, they shouldn't be forums even.
[QUOTE=Gro]Also: What is the damn point of the Astoria? I know it was part of a big plan to give newbs somewhere to go. But, since the only person who actually has characters on the Astoria is Damalis, it largely just results into us taking any new players out of involvement with the rest of us.[/QUOTE]
The Astoria doesn't have much point unless we had a steady stream of new members. We intended on trying to funnel newbies through it before they hit the BG, a place they could post one-line posts without being called on it.
#3 4:50am 28/12/10
[quote] But, since the only person who actually has characters on the Astoria is Damalis...[/quote]Actually, I have quite a few, thanks. o_O
#2 4:27am 28/12/10
The problem with that is that Propaganda is fundamentally different from the R&D and Bios.
I can understand folding Bios and R&D together, but Propaganda should be folded into Battlegrounds. Personally, I would prefer to keep Bios and R&D seperate entities simply for simplicity's sake of being able to scroll through tech or scroll through characters. I imagine combining the two together would just look awkward and cluttered.
I agree with the folding of the OOG forums.
Also: What is the damn point of the Astoria? I know it was part of a big plan to give newbs somewhere to go. But, since the only person who actually has characters on the Astoria is Damalis, it largely just results into us taking any new players out of involvement with the rest of us.
#1 4:04am 28/12/10
I'm with the lay-out personally, though I think we need a better name for the said "Technology, Propaganda, & History Forum"
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