RTW or Colloseum subforum suggestion

[Tamur]

hi all,

Though I realise that gameplaying and game researching are inextricably linked for some folks (like myself), there is a definite distinction between posts examining the game for patterns, and those making an observation about gameplay. One can lead into the other very freely, but there's a distinct difference between the "researching" threads and the general comments threads.

I am hoping that we can have a subforum for RTW research. Of all the boards I've been to, this one has by far the most consistently intelligent comments about the game -- everything from Red Harvest's excellent analyses of the gameplay of different factions, to Quietus' work on the economic engine, to therother's excellent series of posts on the many campaign game factors.

Thoughts?

I fully understand this may not be the best way to go, and am perfectly content to keep writing down thread numbers. But for a researcher this would be a very, very helpful way to be sure to connect with other researchers and keep it all in one spot.

BTW, I'm not suggesting that the Colloseum be completely void of research-like threads, or that the subforum be forced on people.

Thank you,

Tamur

[Mithrandir]

Check out the monastery...

[Tamur]

Mmm... it isn't historical research I'm speaking of. It seems like it would be out of place in the Monastery to talk about distance-to-capital penalties, yes?

[Mithrandir]

ah ,never mind my post then.

[TosaInu]

Hello Tamur,

I guess I've to sit down for a while and think about this. There's a subscribe system right?

It's technically possible to add subforums to the Colosseum. It's a pretty busy forum, or so it seems for my ignorant being. Adding subforums for a more focussed specialism (?) may be a good idea. Comments from other users there please?

[Tamur]

I'm not familiar with the subscribe system, though I have seen the keyword around somewhere. Is this a way to organise threads into groups? I'll look around the boards and see what I can learn about that.

[frogbeastegg]

There are some good threads that are worth keeping easy to find until the next patch, ones which don't fit in RTW guides. It is getting hard to find some of the research topics; I can't even find a couple of mine now our old search is gone.

At the same time the new forum is likely to end up with less traffic, and that means less people posting their ideas and questions. Anything in the colusseum is guaranteed to get more views and therefore potentially more replies. There is also potential for repetition with similar topics in both forums.

[Mithrandir]

I'm not familiar with the subscribe system, though I have seen the keyword around somewhere. Is this a way to organise threads into groups? I'll look around the boards and see what I can learn about that.

You can subscribe to threads, receiving a PM,email or both if someone replies to it.

[Tamur]

At the same time the new forum is likely to end up with less traffic, and that means less people posting their ideas and questions. Anything in the colusseum is guaranteed to get more views and therefore potentially more replies.

Very good point, and I agree entirely.

Since Tosa posted re: subscriptions, I've been able to check out and start up some subscription folders. I assume this hits the DB a bit, but is exactly the feature I was looking for.

Now to go through my list and subscribe, whee. Thanks for the help, everyone. Unless there are those who Really, really want this to happen, you can consider my request to be withdrawn.

[Blodrast]

i guess i don't feel very strongly either way, but here are my two cents:
it might be a good idea to have a more game-technical subforum, i.e. stuff about the details of how the game works.

I see several reasons for this:

- stuff like that is not interesting to everybody; people who don't wanna read it can simply ignore the forum, rather than having to go through all posts in the colosseum

- moreover (and this is not repeating the previous post), I'm sure all of you (including you, froggy, as you confessed a while ago after finishing the MTW guide) dissected a few games in your life to the point that a lot of the charm of the game was lost; you may not all share this feeling, and maybe you haven't come across such a situation, but if you have, you'll know what I'm talking about. Since such a subforum would potentially do that, it's better if it were separated.

- for people who _are_ interested in that stuff, and _do_ want to have access to them, it would help them have easy access to that info. Let's face it, searching for something in the Colosseum has a decent chance to come up with too many results, considering the incredible high level of activity it's been seeing lately (and which is likely to keep for a while, esp. considering the upcoming patch, which will be more significant than 1.1 most likely). Moreover, there have been quite a few problems with the database lately, and it seems like a search function won't help that; it's quite possible that search will be disabled for more and more forums, possibly for all. While I do agree that one can subscribe to threads, at the current rate of new threads it is very easy to lose stuff, especially if you're away for a few days...

Again, I'm certain that we can live without it just fine, but I think it may be worthwhile, overall...
That, of course, is merely my own personal opinion ;)


Edit: as for the "less views, hence less activity in it" argument, I'm really not sure it stands (sorry, froggy). After all, it is _exactly_ the same kind of thing as a "Guides" forum !
And yet, we have a Guides forum for each of the TW series !
And if it wasn't an issue for those, why would it be for this one ?
I mean, you can see that the Guides section get very few hits in comparison with the Colosseum, let's say. And as the game becomes more and more familiar to people, the Guides section as well as the potential one we're discussing here will both get few hits, mostly from the really hardcore players, or the newest newbies...
I pretty much see this potential subforum in the same position as any of the other Guides forums, and all pro and con arguments apply to it exactly the same as they would apply to any of those...
Again, I'm not a fanatical supporter of a new subforum, I'm just arguing some logic here...(or at leasy _my_ logic, which probably isn't universal ;)) ).

[Tamur]

Good post Blodrast. After trying to sort through the Colloseum and realising that there are ten pages of threads just to get back to the beginning of last week, let alone things that were active over two weeks ago, I've reconsidered and express a renewed interest in seeing this happen.

After today, I take the view that the Colloseum will remain the end-all of RTW discussion, but that the dissection that Blodrast mentioned simply needs its own space. I know if I were simply interested in a game, the last thing I'd want to see was a detailed formula about its mechanics. There seems to be a specific group of those who consistently post in the mechanics threads, and those who post on other discussions.

So I guess we need some more opinions on this.. I'm once again for it.

[TosaInu]

Hello,

Not the only reason, but a good reason to think about adding a new forum is an extremely high rate of forum usage. 10 pages in one week is quite a lot. The Sword Dojo is about good for anything STW related as topics stay on page 1 for weeks.

The other arguments sound good too and I guess there are others as well. I think it's pretty clear that another SP forum is required. I think we should change focus to how it should work and implement it as quickly as possible. Ideas please?

[frogbeastegg]

I pretty much see this potential subforum in the same position as any of the other Guides forums, and all pro and con arguments apply to it exactly the same as they would apply to any of those...

Exactly. I was thinking from the POV of someone who has watched the guide forums quite closely for months now. The simple fact is if you move a thread over to guide is very often all but dies; the viewcount plummets and replies are few and far between. Now, you could say that when the thread is moved its purpose has already been met, but that's usually not really true.

The question is how many forums like this do we want, and how many can we add before things are stretched too thin?

Just for the record I didn't exactly find MTW lost its charm, more that it never had any in the first place.

Anyway, good points.

For the record I also don't feel strongly either way.

[therother]

I think it's pretty clear that another SP forum is required. I think we should change focus to how it should work and implement it as quickly as possible. Ideas please?

Ok, I'll throw a few out there. I think the first question to ask is what do we want it for? Game research or to siphon off more of the current Colosseum to reduced the level of thread turnover?

Perhaps it'll only be for the posting and discussion of game research, e.g. questions such as "what's the best way to use archers?" or "how do you maximise trade income?" Or a more general forum for asking questions about the game - for example will threads asking questions such as "How do I reduce squalor?" be welcomed after that issue has been researched?

The first, more limited, idea will do little to reduce the post rate on the Colosseum. The second has a chance, but then runs the risk of defeating the purpose for which the forum was proposed if the number of non-research threads is too high.

Another way to go would be to have an archive forum, where good research threads would be moved to after they have run their course in the forum proper. There they would stay as reference.

The level of Moderating, I suppose, is also a question. If it is to be a purely research thread, that might require a fair degree of management of threads, moving/deleting threads as appropriate to prevent clutter.

Anyway, hopefully that should help get the ball rolling...

[Louis de la Ferte Ste Colombe]

Those are the early time... It will cool down a bit.

The main hall was good enough for MTW, and when some specific need arised (PBM, Guides...), specific forum were created.

Eventually, some non faction topics were included in the guides forum. The same will happen to RTW, and that will be moderator choice to move a topic or not.

I am not sure I like a game mechanic forum. Not many people would look at it, and we would miss potential input. I support that worthy research topic be moved to Guide forum to avoid their disappearance, but so far, I have seen none (there are some worthy topic, but too often the case get polluted by too many divergent input.. and it's not often conclusive... And it does not always look right anyway...). I am rather demanding

Louis,

[Morat]

The main hall was good enough for MTW, and when some specific need arised (PBM, Guides...), specific forum were created.

Would this not qualify as a specific need?

I am not sure I like a game mechanic forum. Not many people would look at it, and we would miss potential input.

We agree on this point. Perhaps there should be permenant links thread between the two forums, similar to the one therotter has produced?

I support that worthy research topic be moved to Guide forum to avoid their disappearance, but so far, I have seen none (there are some worthy topic, but too often the case get polluted by too many divergent input.. and it's not often conclusive... And it does not always look right anyway...).

Well, YMMV, it seems. I've seen a number of them that have helped my improve my gameplay immensely. Try looking in therotter's thread here:

https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showthread.php?t=38742

I think that it is the threads linked to there that Tamur is talking about moving to a new forum, although I may be wrong. If you've not seen them, does that not mean that Tamur has a point about these threads getting lost?

[Tamur]

Hmm, I like the idea of a forum which threads are moved into as reference. However, having modded at boards for NWN where we did this sort of thing, I do worry about the fact that the mods would suddenly have a significant increase in their workload.

A conundrum if there ever was one...

[Blodrast]

Louis, I have to disagree with you on the issue that there are hardly any threads discussing "technical" aspects of the game...there are quite a few, written by Tamur, Soulflame, Quietus, therother, and others that I may not remember right now. The fact that they are so hard to find and are very few in comparison to the rest of the threads only proves that something needs to be done about them.

Anyway, I agree with the idea that those threads could go into the Guides forum. They don't necessarily need a forum of their own.
The idea was to make them more accessible (or accessible at all, to be more precise. Currently most of them are as good as lost).

As for the amount of activity in the Guides forum, as far as MTW is concerned, at least, I've seen a serious amount of activity in it this very summer (i.e., a looong time after its release). I've only been here a short time, I know, but when I came in June the MTW Guides were few and far between. A _lot_ of stuff appeared during the summer. And I can give you specific examples if you like.
My point is that I don't believe the RTW guides forum will simply wither and die, just as the MTW one did not. On the contrary, it will probably take a while until people are experienced enough to produce guides for all the factions (do keep in mind that RTW is way more complex than MTW).
For the same complexity reason, I believe there are far more game mechanics issues than in previous TW games - I mean, if you only consider the 500k or so of text files, which do shed quite a bit of light on the game mechanics, there's a lof of issues that can be covered...
Since the game is more compex, the mechanics is more complex, and there will be more to discuss about it.

I agree with Tamur though, that if this is the solution that's gonna be adopted (i.e., have a specific place for that kind of threads, be it in an already existing forum (e.g. Guides) or their own forum), it looks like more work for mods.
A (partial) solution to this may be having people PM mods when a new thread that qualifies as "game mechanics" (or whatever you may choose to call it) appears, and all the mod has to do is move it him/her-self (without having to browse all posts all the time and keep track to see if this thread evolved into a technical one or not...).

Finally, I might well be wrong and you right, and there be a very low activity level or interest (or both) in such things (although things do not seem to indicate that right now). In that case, we'll only have the already existing great threads by the people I've mentioned above put in their own separate place, and they will server as great guides/info/whatever. Where's the harm in that ? If it ends there, it ends there. No sweat. But at least that very useful info is there for someone who _is_ interested in it, and is very unlikely to find it otherwise (please keep in mind the fact that search is not likely to be a feature...at least in the immediate future).


blodrast

[Blodrast]

someone mentioned an Archive forum: those already exist...
I'm not sure exactly what their purpose is, though, i.e. what kind of threads are supposed to go in there ?
The RTW Archive forum only has one thread in it...

[Sjakihata]

I am for such a sub-forum.

As I imagine it will work as a addition (constantly updated) to the manual but also as a valve/filter to the colloseum

[Louis de la Ferte Ste Colombe]

There are threads discussing the mechanics of the game...

I think mods got to move them to Guides if they see fit... Mods also ought to trim them a bit, as they are a lot of useless comments in there. That's a lot of work for mods.
If a new forum is created where those topics would be discussed, we will just divide everyone attention, without creating a place where the real good stuff would be safeguarded... This new forum would be either ignored or swamped with useless questions, and we are back to square one.

The main difference between the Guide forum and a 'game mechs' forum is; who can create a new topic; if it is mod only, then use the Guide the forum. If anyone can, we will lose the real valuable stuff anyway, lost in the middle of all the other discussion and topics already seen a 1000th time (as in; how do I unlock faction? etc, etc...).

Let the discussion happen in general forum, and move it to Guides when convenient. Leave it to mod discretion. Either mod or main topic contributor can trim it and get rid of the noise once the topic would be explored; before that would be a good way to kill it. Guides forum is a kind of graveyard

PM ing mods; that's more work for the mods too... And I can see some interesting self promotion happening.

Louis,

[Blodrast]

well, the mods don't necessarily have to do the trimming, at least.
The people I've mentioned above did that themselves, by continuously updating and changing the first post in the thread.
This could work as some sort of responsibility: if you've created that thread, well, you also have the responsibility to update it (or someone else can volunteer for that).
But I'm fairly sure that this won't even be an issue; people who do research of their own will, will do that without anybody having to tell them about it.

You're right about self promotion, and at that I believe it will be at the mod's discretion (as usual). But a lot of them won't, and will simply be good threads.

Who can create the topics: I have no perfect solution, but as I've said before, a thread is either obviously a "technical/game mechanics" thread from the beginning, or evolves into one.
The first case is easy, will be obvious to spot for what it is, and will hardly need any checking from the mod. The second one is admittedly trickier, though. In that case we would probably need the "PM the mod" solution (or some other way).

As for the graveyard aspect of the Guides forum, I dunno. Right now it's the third most popular forum in the Guild, after Colosseum and RTW mods. It will probably decline, but not too fast. I expect new things will keep being discovered about RTW for a while now - and if an expansion pack comes along, well...
Don't get me wrong, Louis, please - you raise some good points that I have no solution for.
And yes, there are threads discussing the mechanics of the game, but the main reason we're having all this discussion is because most people tend to agree that they're relatively hard to find (no search function, very very high rate of new posts, etc). Besides, people new to the board may not even know they exist, so they wouldn't look for them (not that reading thousands of posts is something they are likely to do anyway...). The idea is to put some few (?) select threads in a place where the info (useful to many, not necessarily to all, of course) is easily accessible.

[Duke John]

We are planning to make the Entrace Hall mostly for new members to introduce themselves. This means that the rate of new topics in the EH will be added to the one in the Colosseum. IMO once a forum has an entire page of updated threads in a single day it is getting too much traffic.

The colosseum has general comments, posts about strategy and research. The latter are far more valuable in the long run, but they are also constantly being threatened by being pushed off the first page by general comments that only provide a "quick fix".

So besides a possible research subforum I propose a strategic subforum.

[therother]

There have been a number of good points raised here; I can't say that I've wholly disagreed with any yet.

But, FWIW, here's my summary, loosely based on what's been suggested in the thread thus far.

I'll quickly sketch out a number of possible scenarios:

1. Leave things as they are, and use searches and unofficial threads to index research in the forums.
2. Have an official index thread pinned in the Colosseum, probably maintained by a Senior Member or above. This could have sections for game research, strategy, official patches, mods, and so on.
3. Create a 'normal' research forum. By this I mean that it would have much the same rules/moderating any other forum.
4. Create a more restricted forum, similar to the current guide forums, in that only moderators can create threads. They would do so by request from members (e.g. via PM or a request thread). Co-opting an idea voiced here, it would be incumbent on the starting member to eventually produce a concise summary of the contents of the thread to eventually replace the moderator's initial post once the topic has run its course. The thread would be locked once the summary is done. This would require only limit moderator involvement, as the thread would develop naturally until the end, when the user would send the post, complete with markups, to the moderator. As we expect the volume of the fourm to be quite low, I don't think it should be too much of a chore for a moderator who has an incliation towards research in any case.
5. Create a more draconian (obligatory historical reference) forum, where either: the moderator deletes/modifies any post not directly relevant to the topic at hand; or the Admin creates a user group specifically for the research forum (if this is even possible), and membership policed much more strictly than in the Guild proper, or even both. Obviously this would require a great deal of moderator involvement, not to mention it would be harder to setup up and administrate, especially the 2nd part.

If we are to get a research forum, I'd personally like to see something like 4, but that's just me.

I think Duke John has a point about a strategy forum. It might be useful to have a similar forum for strategy and tactics.

Assuming the plans that Duke John mentions about reducing the scope of the Entrance Hall go forward, are we going to get the RTW and MTW guide forums moved to under their respective game sections? If so, bearing in mind that the research is primarily intended for compilation into guides, could not the research forum become a sub-forum of the RTW guide forum?

[RedKnight]

Thanks for the invite, therother - I'm honored.

Many good ideas have been proposed - they all have their plusses and minusses. The biggest underlying problem with any "focussed" or "tuned" threads (or forums) is, who is going to be spending the time tuning or focussing it. Cheetah, Frogbeastegg, and many others made valiant efforts with the MTW Guides forum. But there, even I contributed "unfocussed" ideas in the sense that I commented on Russia's strategies a lot, earnestly at the time, then later realized I had been missing a lot, when I played a lot more. Now that we look back on that Guide forum, we see that it has a lot of focussed material - but also, a fair amount of thread drift. It gets back to the question of, is someone willing to spend the time to "tune" the threads? Who has the time? Do we really trust someone to do that? You've all voiced variations on these ideas in what you've posted.

Every idea has it's plusses and minusses. I for my part am curious about an idea that's new (to me) of the Wikipedia entry discussed here (Wiki here). To me it seems clear that a quantum leap in this complex issue could sure use a new approach, which the Wiki concept might (might) be. The existing wiki has barely been touched, but if folks really started unloading on it, it could conceivably become primo.

In the future, there might even be money in this sort of thing, as discussed here. But that's the distant future, when downloads that cost a nickel don't need a second thought, or making a new account, etc.

So I haven't really said much that's new. Or maybe I've concretized things, laugh.

When all is said and done at the end of the day, "90% of the work is just showing up" - be there and do something.

Enjoy the game! I recommend slavery over extermination, frankly - since I'm pulling off the best slaves for myself.

[Morat]

Could I ask what the current status of this idea is? There doesn't seem to have been much activity lately. Has it been dropped?

BTW, I think therother's 4th idea sounds about the best. But I'm not sure about locking the thread afterwards.

[Tamur]

I don't know about others, but I know therother is focusing on thesis work with a deadline approaching, as am I. I still think therother's #4 sounds like the best way to handle it, and I'd very much like to see it happen. Currently I'm in quarter-time RTW mode, but will be back at the research here in another three weeks or so.

[RedKnight]

I'll vote for #4 - here, here!

[TosaInu]

Hello,

Option 4 sounds good: I think such a specialized forum would do well with a dedicated member for day to day moderation such as starting the new topics. Is/are there (a) volunteer(s) for this? There will be a public voting if there are more.

Option 5 is possible, but adding usergroups makes administration harder as virtually everything has to be set and maintained for extra groups. A combination of 4 and 5 is a possibility: if the forum runs well and users understand what it is and what's expected, other usergroups can be allowed to start topics there.

Number 2 can be done too, an up to date TOC is always handy.

The listing of the forum. You could position it in Guides, but Guides is also the quick start for new people, the new forum is more in depth and may as well be a subforum in RTW SP?

[Tamur]

Re: the listing of the forum, I'd like it to be a subforum of the RTW forum for exactly the reason you pointed out Tosa. The Guides forum is a place for finished, helpful info while this new one will be constantly changing and probably too detailed to be considered a guide in any standard sense.

I'd be happy to volunteer to moderate this subforum, but certainly will not feel put out if someone else would rather.