Forums Consolidation and Streamlining

[Urwendil]

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I like it generally. The new structure was a good surprise when I came to the forum this morning. Good job Sapience, Council et al
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[Vellrad]

Are you (Turbine as a whole, not specific people) are going to destroy theese forums appereance like on DDO boards with theese changes?

[daneyul]

I spend 90% of my time in the class forums, so as long as those stay (which they are) I'm happy. Especially glad to see a Patch Notes section! I never had a problem finding them but maybe this will stop most of the "Where are the patch notes?!" threads.

Really? No problem finding them? With options like SUPPORT, and NEWS, and ANNOUNCEMENTS and DEV TRACKER at the top of the screen, your first instinct was to click something called: "Lorebook"???? Then the recent changes tab (last on the right), game releases (from a dropdown menu) then go to an update section?

All keeping in mind the klugey slowness for which the MyLotro site is famous making every wrong choice take forever? You never had a problem finding them? Never??

Guess all the posters of those annoying threads asking about them didn't have your, uh, esoteric sense of organization.

[Taravith]

Well we certainly don't want people posting their non-creative creations!

Hmm... Is all creation creative? Can one truly create something or only draw upon pre-existing knowledge of what others have created before? Is all creation only re-creation? In which case, can there even be a first true creator?

You have four hours. You are allowed one (1) copy of the Summa Theologica.

[Lethareth]

Wow, the forums are loading so much faster now! Great job, Sapience and the rest of the team! No longer having to go on a coffee break while waiting for the forums to load up.

[Sapience]

Wow, the forums are loading so much faster now! Great job, Sapience and the rest of the team! No longer having to go on a coffee break while waiting for the forums to load up.

Nothing backend has chaned. This is just a happy side effect from reducing the number of forums the system has to deal with. Unlike something like a kinship forum this one is run across multiple instances and servers for loadbalancing. So when there is less information (fewer forums) to keep track and replicate across the farm, things lighten up a bit.

[TinDragon]

Really? No problem finding them? With options like SUPPORT, and NEWS, and ANNOUNCEMENTS and DEV TRACKER at the top of the screen, your first instinct was to click something called: "Lorebook"???? Then the recent changes tab (last on the right), game releases (from a dropdown menu) then go to an update section?

All keeping in mind the klugey slowness for which the MyLotro site is famous making every wrong choice take forever? You never had a problem finding them? Never??

Guess all the posters of those annoying threads asking about them didn't have your, uh, esoteric sense of organization.

A) For the past 2 years or so, there's been a pattern to how they're named. It's really not hard to know where they'll be posted even a week or two in advance.
B) They always post the link to the notes on Twitter.
C) They always post the link on Facebook.
D) Sapience posts the links to the notes at least once per update in the forums, which can be found in the Dev Tracker.
E) Since I haven't been playing this game since the day it came out, there have obviously been patch notes released before whatever update I'm currently looking for the notes. Theory is usually sound that the notes for the newest update will probably be found in the same place as the notes for all of the other updates.

So yeah, no, I've never had a problem finding them.

By the way, you know your browser has a "Favorites" option for a reason, right? Protip: Go to the updates page once, and put it in your favorites.

[Artemis-The-Hunter]

Thank you Sapience for listening and communicating with all of us, it really means a lot to be able to talk and bounce around ideas with you and the rest of the developer team. This is one of the best threads i have read on the forums with back-and-forth communication between devs and players. Thanks for everything, can't wait to see the improvements.

[MessyR]

Did you remove the kinship section in all the server subforums? if so why?

I see what you did, and i dont understand why tbh, now every kin will BUMP there recruitment threads and we will constantly lose other threads that might need attention.

I also enjoy the fact a few get to decide for the rest :-D i see how things work now!

[TinDragon]

Did you remove the kinship section in all the server subforums? if so why?

I see what you did, and i dont understand why tbh, now every kin will BUMP there recruitment threads and we will constantly lose other threads that might need attention.

I also enjoy the fact a few get to decide for the rest :-D i see how things work now!

Looking at Brandywine, the largest server, a total of 14 threads have been posted in during the entire month of May so far, around half a page or less. That's 14 between the old Trade forum, the old Kinship forum, and whatever posts were already in the General Brandywine forum. You really think that's gonna be an issue?

Snowbourn's not even close to that. Between those three forums there are a total of three threads that have been posted in during the month of May.

People aren't gonna randomly start bumping their kin threads more now that it's in a slightly different section, that doesn't make any sense. And the numbers from what I'm seeing indicate that even with those three combined, there are barely enough threads to justify keeping Server PvP separate from Server General (though don't get me wrong, I prefer them to be separated).

[Kalderic]

Did you remove the kinship section in all the server subforums? if so why?

I see what you did, and i dont understand why tbh, now every kin will BUMP there recruitment threads and we will constantly lose other threads that might need attention.

on Withywindle not even a chance to bump your recruitment post. all kinship recruitment posts seem to have simply been deleted .
I hope that was a mistake. those threads were in pretty active use.

[CrookedTroll]

Sooo...

Since I have never dropped to Premium, much less F2P, have no idea where this is. However, when F2P was announced, or the forums were revamped, the forums had only certain areas were for Free 2 Play players to post, with the rest read only access, acknowledging Premium and above players were more valuable. Has that, Is that going away?

So much for Free (sic) Speech huh.......

[FundinStrongarm]

Wow, the forums are loading so much faster now! Great job, Sapience and the rest of the team! No longer having to go on a coffee break while waiting for the forums to load up.

I have noticed this as well. Just imagine how smooth everything will be once all the backend stuff gets changed.

[Sapience]

Did you remove the kinship section in all the server subforums? if so why?

I see what you did, and i dont understand why tbh, now every kin will BUMP there recruitment threads and we will constantly lose other threads that might need attention.

The kinship forums were ALL removed and posts placed in the main server forums. The same with trade. Simply put, volume. For the most part there was little reason to have 3 forums for General, trade, and kinship when two of them received little traffic.

I sincerly hope no kinship will choose to Bump their threads. Given it's expressly prohibited under the Community Guidelines.

http://archive.lotro.com/community/7...nityguidelines
"8. Making short posts for the sole purpose of moving your thread up the Forums ("bumping") or adding to your post count is not allowed."

on Withywindle not even a chance to bump your recruitment post. all kinship recruitment posts seem to have simply been deleted .
I hope that was a mistake. those threads were in pretty active use.

Again, bumping = violation.

In taking a quick look it does look like the Withywindle kinship threads got lost in the shuffle. Instead of being copied it appears they were deleted. I apologize as this was not the intent. All were to have been moved to the Withywindle server forum.

[Fredelas]

In taking a quick look it does look like the Withywindle kinship threads got lost in the shuffle. Instead of being copied it appears they were deleted. I apologize as this was not the intent. All were to have been moved to the Withywindle server forum.

Perhaps a short personal note in the Withywindle forum would help alert kinships to this fact so they can create new recruitment threads. They might not think to look in the Forums, Lottery, & Community Site Discussion forum for this information.

[Crell_1]

Perhaps a short personal note in the Withywindle forum would help alert kinships to this fact so they can create new recruitment threads. They might not think to look in the Forums, Lottery, & Community Site Discussion forum for this information.

I dont suppose we could take to putting posts in a read-only archive state on perhaps a secondary board instead of permanently deleting them the next time forums get pruned? We lose so much community history this way.

[Sapience]

I dont suppose we could take to putting posts in a read-only archive state on perhaps a secondary board instead of permanently deleting them the next time forums get pruned? We lose so much community history this way.

Forums aren't pruned. Haven't been since I killed that policy a good while back. The issue at hand was simple human error.

[Hurin]

Forums aren't pruned. Haven't been since I killed that policy a good while back. The issue at hand was simple human error.

This is appreciated, by the way! Thank you for ending that policy!

[Crell_1]

Forums aren't pruned. Haven't been since I killed that policy a good while back. The issue at hand was simple human error.

Glad to hear the policy got changed. I so rarely look for an ancient post, but when I do, its nice to know that its there.

For example, a post that listed the oldest-kinships on my primary-game world when I only had a poster-name to search through..

Its data that we wont be able to get anymore, without data.lotro.com, and it was already difficult to parse without 3rd party sites which long ago ceased operation.

[Urwendil]

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Forums aren't pruned. Haven't been since I killed that policy a good while back.

Well killed! For gaming nerds who haunt the relevant fora archives are important. In the case of LOTRO they are practically useful as well
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[TheStormKing]

Forums aren't pruned. Haven't been since I killed that policy a good while back. The issue at hand was simple human error.

Ohhh.... Wish this was always the case. Many TSK posts were lost before that day.

[TheStormKing]

Finally, I want to thank the Players council for their feedback and suggestions on what to keep and what to let go. Also, a special thanks to Bondgirl51 who came up with the basic outline we all worked from.

This! Bondgirl51 had a great template we were able to work directly from.

It is clear to me that for every part of this game, is someone on the Council who is threaded deeply into hope for its success. Bondgirl's help in that respect is a small proof of that.

[Calta]

The music forum is rather specific to the music system in game.

However, I think the "Postcards from Middle-earth" forum could be adapted to this use. After all, words can paint a 'picture postcard' as well as images.

Ideas for a new name?

I like WHart's suggestion of "Creative Endeavors".

It means screen art, post cards, fan writing, videos/films, cartoons like Whiteberry's and Fred's infamous 'sixth bag' graphic story, and of course, cosmetics, could all be collected (under subforums if necessary). I feel the creativity of the community, engendered by the game and the Lore gets a bit swamped when scattered through the too many current locations

I'd also put a 'funnies' collection here, so people can see some of the best threads in game ('things a champion would like you to know' and 'Demotivation of the ring'-I'm looking at you.

Art and humour are the glue of any community. Too often the best of our community gets swamped by the issue de jour.

Thank you Sapience, forum workers, player council and community for this.


Just realised Nymphonic may actually get his wish and have to change his sig! LOL

[auximenes]

Sapience, is there any chance of getting a 1-click 'subscribe to thread' option? It's a 3-click process now, with multiple screen loads.

[Thodorin]

The new german subforum http://forums.lotro.com/forumdisplay...annte-Probleme need a Sub Text like the englisch version. The Players confuse it with the technical help forum http://forums.lotro.com/forumdisplay...e-(inoffiziell)