Posting this here since people are still getting their forum accounts/permissions squared away. We're having a discussion right now among the game leaders about how the game forums should be set up in our new forum structure, and who can see what/post where. There have been complaints in the past about XoO members not being able to see the "good stuff" that was hidden away on our game forums. Like GW had a relatively quiet "public" section and this huge member section with 90 million forums that no one outside of that game ever saw. The game member forums were hopping, the public forum was dead, and the rest of XoO had no idea what was going on in GW. That made a lot of people unhappy. I don't mean GW specifically but that kind of set-up. And I agree, it seems silly to have to hide most things from our members However, as we go to set up new forums, several of us, myself included, are uncomfortable with doing away with game-specific forums altogether. I do think that 99.9% of all that old stuff should be open to all XoO members, but I also want a small space where people in that specific game can talk about tasks that need to be done in-game without people from outside that game basically spamming those posts. So I am proposing a system where we have everything open to XoO members to see and post except for a small section devoted to in-game organization where all XoO members can still see it, but not post. For instance, raid sign ups for WoW might be in there. You will all be able to read the sign up list, but unless you are in the division (meaning, you can actually go to the raid) then you couldn't post on that thread. You could, however, start a new thread on the forums that are open to all members and ask questions about raiding or whatever, or respond to something funny that someone said. I can't imagine that most of you would want to post on that raid sign-up thread unless you wanted to be jerks but, um, you know we do have a few. Because everyone could see those forums, people would know if they were being abused by putting things that are not specific organizational things in there. Posts that are about like "hey guise did you see the latest on the new xpac?" would be moved out of those see-but-not-post forums and into the forums where everyone who is a XoO member can post. What are your thoughts on this? I am not promising that anything is going to come of this thread, but since I got accused of going against what the members were asking for, I thought I'd double-check your pulse on this subject.
There needs to be as few freaking forums as humanly possible. We dont need a seperate forum for every up and coming game until we have a division for it with a leadership set up and something to actually put our hands on with the game. It takes up room, looks trashy, and serves no purpose other than housing increasingly stale threads.
The more forums there are, the more people will be using the "new posts" link at the top of the page which defeats some of the purpose of having separate forums in the first place.
I think we already have too many forums here. Just because we "used to have" this and that doesnt make it a good idea. Over half our forums had less than a hundred posts in them.
Lots of people talk about builds for thier toons or ships and ya, if it's that super secrete you don't want anyone outside the guild to know about it then PM it or put it in the Officers forum and give it to people upon request if they are trustworthy. Make everything viewable by all members (save officer forums and up) and the community will benefit. I want people to see my forums, and see our activity. Check out our screenshots and achievements. Maybe they might want to play... who knows.
Yes and im a firm believer that secrets should be something as limited as possible. It will encourage people playing not just one or two games with Xen, but many if not all. If you have something like ship fittings or skill sets then perhaps they can get a forum specifically and only for those skills/fittings. Achievements, inter member discussion should always be something for Xen as a whole. We need to be a community not a conglomeration of guilds.
hard question to really ask people, i believe most people wouldnt really care to have other XoO members c there "secret" stuff. (lets be also honest, someone else in the world will find it out sooner or later). Then some other people will care, and i dont think the leaders should have to option to make their section of the forums secret/not secret. I do think there were way to many forums in old site, ridiculously to many.. I think right now is perfect if anything. Its a rly hard idea... i encourage people to keep saying things though, maybe have a vote at the end of it all?
If other XoO could see my XoO-only guides then I wouldn't care because they're XoO-only. If you have stuff that is only for a select group of XoO then it defeats the purpose of having a XoO in the first place X.X Stop defeating our purposes!!! I'd say something like this: 1. public for all 2. Internal for all xoo but split by division, only game-specific stuff allowed 3. command, split by division for all xoo_leadertypes (no officer forum because those are kind of meh. If you can't trust your officers in the command forum then they shouldn't be officers anyway) Maybe even merge the recruiting forums and have the recruits tag their posts with GW or AoC. Just because they want to join the GW division doesn't mean an AoC-officer can't have a quick chat with them to see if they fit XoO. I remember from the old forum that we had to send screenshots to recruits to show where they could write their application. X.X
I think we should have game specific forums for the eyes of those gamers only. There should also continue to be the public section of the game specific forums. I think what needs to be adjusted is the use of them. Game leaders should feel free to move non-sensitive topics to the public forum, like news, updates, game discussion, member interaction (i.e. the WTS/WTB forums that GW had). Those forums should be the primary grounds for the game, hopefully. More sensitive information like builds, tactics, organization, guild issues, etc. should be confined strictly to the players of that game (i.e. team build for upcoming match). The reason for this is not to keep it from other XoO members, but rather to keep it from the public, prying eyes. That is kind of like a two-tiered system for the game forums, public and private. I don't think a third tier should be introduced that makes posts public to all XoO members, but keeps it from the unregistered general public. There is no use for that, IMO. As for non-game specific forums, I think we can cut back on that, too. Back on the old forums we had a forum for everything under the sun. We should start out with a couple basic forums and expand the number we have if it proves necessary in the future (i.e. the XoO Fitness forum).
I disagree with this entirely. While I do think there should be a standard set of provisions a new recruit must meet for ALL games, I do not think a leader from another game has any business sniffing out players that they may not ever have to "deal with." The reason for this is we already have a somewhat tense disparity in the community between PvE and PvP. I'd hate to have an officer of a PvP game start sniffin' out a prospective recruit for a GW PvE division - the idea of a "quality player for XoO" might be entirely different. On top of that, each game will have its own vibe - even if all the games in XoO were strictly PvP. Each game of PvP is different and requires different types of people. What I WOULD encourage is for people from games other than the applicant is seeking to join to extend them a warm welcome into the community. People should feel free to read all the applications and say, "hey - welcome to the forums, bud. Good luck on your application!" or someone else might say, "oooh saw that you also play XXXX game. I play it too, my IGN is Bob - hit me up some time." If people start having petty concerns about post counts and +1's, turn off post counts for the recruitment forums. But I really do think that it would be nice to get prospective recruits involved in discussion right from their application. http://forum.sof-guild.com/showthread.php?t=11058 That is a link to a GW guild who has a cool application process. I'm not saying we should be that rigorous with our welcoming, but look how many people just drop in and say "hey" to the prospective recruit. Part of joining XoO is becomming a part of the whole community, and having people from other games show their faces is a positive step to having them get more into us.
Yes, this is a problem. I'd suggest the following forums: - XoO news section so people can be informed about posts on the main site if they only check the forum. - Public chat. Merge the entire public section into this unless one specific category has enough topics to require its own forum. - Private members chat for XoO members. Any topic started here that can go in the public section should be moved. - Each supported game can have its own public and private chat areas. They can have other forums areas if they require them. - Discussions on unsupported games can go in the private or public section where they are likely to get more views, thus helping that game get enough people to become supported. - Recruitment section. One forum for each game. I don't think there is enough traffic to require the processing/accepted/denied subforums for most games.
Please stick to the subject lev or dont post. It's touchy enough as is without people posting stuff like that. ______________________________- I've read several posts about people being concerned with the "public" seeing our members section. This is currently not the case. Only XoO Members can see it and you must apply to the XoO User Group to gain access. Game leaders and Admins have the ability to accept people into the XoO Members User group. I do not accept anyone I don't know into the user group. Nor should the admins or other game leaders. The only thing I see is people not wanting player "X" in their forum cuase they don't like him and others who think their raid times and builds are so super secrete they can't use in game ui's or the forums that members can all view.
I kind of have to agree, if these forums are only viewable by people already in XoO, then why should it matter if they have private forums or not... As of right now, only the admins and GL can accept people into the members section, so if you have something so secret you can not share, then don't be sharing it at all. Unless you have something to hide....
Oversimplification. But if your point was the necessity of direct points, then point noted. Shoji flames me for assuming that mindset though.
Your still not contributing to the topic Lev. ---------------------------------- We need to just poll this with several options and then once we get the overall feel for what the community wants finalize it with a meeting or Poll for the Xenate. It's easier for people to just hit the vote button instead of debate their opinion with others.
When you ask an actual question with content, I will answer. You haven't stated either a problem with what I said or an inquiry to know how x would work with y. Therefore I am taking your statement as either ill thought out or in support of what I am saying. I'm betting it's not the latter so please retype your statement with a bit more content and try again. As for the merged recruitment forums. We are all adults, if someone was trying to jack players from another game that's obviously not a very mature officer and they need to be talked with. I actually like the idea of merged forums. I have met more than one person that just wants to apply for Xen as a whole and not a specific game but simply posts in a game they play as more of a token. Other officers from other games would be free to review the posts and ask questions, but not attempt to recruit someone for guild wars into age of conan or vice versa. Seems simple enough to me.
Originally I thought about just doing a public and private section for each game where you keep the private stuff to a minimum, but do we really need private sections in the forums if it is already in the members only section. Who cares if someone from GW sees when your raid in WoW is happening?
Me? Well rather, I care if I can see posts from other games. I'll be honest, I'm not very interested in seeing every post from every game on my "New Posts" button. I have absolutely zero interest in WoW and several other games here. At the same time, I don't feel like my preference should keep others from seeing multiple game forums. This has probably been asked before, but is there a way to put entire sections of forums on Ignore? I've only been able to do it with individual threads (like the Word Association thread).