Dude, Wheres My Thread? - Simple Guide To Forum Topics

Where indeed.

Did your post have Class names and talk about class stuff in it?
Then it's probably here: Multiboxing Group Composition Discusssion

Did your post talk about questing or instances?
Then it's probably here: PvE - Instances and Advanced Tactics

Did your post talk about that massive Crit you nailed that other dude with?
Then it's probably here: PvP Discussion

Did your post specifically talk about 1 MMO?
Then it's probably here: MMORPG General Discussion

Did your post have to do with software support or questions?
Then it's probably here: Software Tools

Did your post have to do with hardware support or questions?
Then it's probably here: Hardware Tools

Did your post have to do with how awesome Jamba is and how everyone should go get it now?
Then it's probably here: Macros and Addons

If you still haven't found your post, the last place to look: Off-Topic


If you STILL can't find your post, and you can't find it via searching, I probably fed it to my cat. Sorry.

Um, where'd my post on cat porn go? :cursing:


edit: FIRST! :love:

And by "Feeding to my cat" you mean:

Admin X moves thread to Officer forum
Admins talk, then move thread back to where it was
Admin Y moves thread to Officer forum
Admins talk, then move thread back to where it was
Admin Z makes post talking about how thread is going to be locked.
Admin Z promptly moves thread to officer forum.

Lock post dissapears.

Everyone on the forum goes "WTF THREAD KEEPS DISAPPEARING ZOMG"
Admin makes post.

There should be stickies made of combined knowledge.

Instead of 200 different threads about "is this a good combo?" there should be one that has all the pros and cons listed, kept up to date in the first post. Then discussion about the classes within that individual thread. (Go see elitist jerks if you want to see a working example)

There is so much useful information on these boards, but it is very tough to find. Consolidating it would make that much easier. The wiki was supposed to do that, but posts lead to more discussion than a wiki.

Considering every poster around here is intelligent and obviously has great organizational skills, as do the mods, its odd that the place is as unorganized as it is.

The same questions are asked and answered 50 times in threads that don't appear to have anything in common.

Posts disappear every day and fruitless time is spent looking for posts that could be anywhere or could be no where.

One problem is that you have lots of wow talk (whats best classes etc.) but this isnt a wow forum per se.

One thing for sure when you click on "forums" you get ALL the forums and not yet more sub groups of forums:

http://www.fohguild.org/forums/

Its so easy to find stuff at foh but not here I don't know why exactly ...

On problem is that General has become vapid, any quality post is moved to somewhere else. Posters ususaly will post in General first and then if the thread has any merit a mod moves it to the right spot, thus General is full of less quality posts. People who come to the forum newly hit general first and find the lower quality posts and might not venture into the meat of the site.

Also there seems to be an aversion to contriversy... on the one hand its wise to keep the forums adult and professional, yet its a fine line to not stiffle disagreement and argument.

Back to general orgainzation there are only two choices, either subdivided everything down (Hardware, cpu, Intel, I7) or have everything in General (this has the edge that the most recent posts on everything are visible). Seems the same people who are interested in Jamba would also be interested in Keyclone and whats the best motherboards, its not like people only need one catagory.

We don't have to pay to post here - whatever you guys want to do is fine with me. :)

I had been thinking about what Sam said for a while.
It would indeed become much easier to find what was needed if the general forum was pretty much done away with.

Setup Section
? New People/I need help
---? Basic Setup Sticky
---? Controlling Methods Sticky (FTL, Hyrda, Focus based, Leader Based, etc)
---? Brief Software Description Sticky
---? Solutions to Common Errors
---? People post their questions about getting everything working.
? Hardware Forum
? Software Forum
---? Each piece of software gets its own sticky, for discussing its use.

WoW Section
? Group Setup Forum
---? 5 Box PvE Sticky
---? 5 Box PvP Sticky
---? 3 Box Sticky
---? 2 Box Sticky
? Macro Forum
? Leveling Forum
---? Questing Sticky (with guides linked in the first post)
---? Boosting Sticky (again, with how-tos in first post)
? PvE Forum
---? Heroics Sticky
---? Raids Sticky
? PvP Forum
---? Arena Sticky
---? Battlegrounds Sticky
---? World PvP Sticky
? Professions

Random Section
? Screenshots/Movies Forum
? Other MMORPG
? Off Topic

I feel it would be easier to streamline information if done that way. Of course the first post in each sticky would have to be kept up to date with the latest and most important information. Then let most of the discussion take place in just single threads. Starting a new thread requires something significant.

I guess I'm just rather biased because I really like the EJ forums, and find them extremely easy to use. Just trying to throw ideas out there that make a good thing even better.

I've personally never had a problem finding the things I'm looking for. I learned how to do keyword searches, read FAQs & forum descriptions and use things like google a long time ago. If that were a more common skill, the number of times people would have to post the same question over and over would plummet.

About the only thing I'd change on these forums would be sub-sectioning MMORPG General Discussion by game, or at least making common stickies by game {WoW, EQ, EQ2, ect etc etc}. Everything else is broken up in a logical format, that forum, however, is a pretty big mess. 90% of the gaming index seems centered around WoW {hard to lay blame on that, everyone plays WoW} but if there's a PvE section, PvP section and Group Composition section all mostly aimed toward WoW, anything else is going to get lost. At the very least, it doesn't feel like it belongs there. It's like muscling in on the WoW Multi-boxers forum. ;)

When I started coming here about 18 months ago I was able to find everything I needed to get started. EVERYTHING. This site may not be what everybody deems "easily accessible", but nothing here is hard to find if you just take the time. The more wading I did, the more I found out about classes and setup. Stuff that I wouldn't have found otherwise. Stuff that I would have never thought to ask or even consider.

I've only needed to ask one question on setup so far and it was to someone posting about how to use round robin in Keyclone, and that was about a month ago.

That's why I never speak up when someone is looking for advice on what classes to play, or macros, or setup. Everything needed is here. You just have to take the time to find it.

On classes, and no offense to anyone, but I didn't need someone to tell me which classes would have better synergy than others. I knew I was going to multibox, and most everybody played shamans so that's what I started out with. After the fun ran out of casting LB and CL x5, I moved on to something harder, multiclass, and once again everything I needed to start that group was here. It's my group so why should I be asking what toons to play?

All the old timers here, and a lot of the new guys too, have done an excellent job of posting ideas and how-to's all over the place for all to see. To not look at posts from 18 months ago is lazy and does everybody who has came before us an injustice.

I don't see this site as being messy. As long as I can find what I'm looking for, others can too. Just my two cents.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by 'Sam DeathWalker',index.php?page=Thread&postID=175772#p ost175772

Considering every poster around here is intelligent and obviously has great organizational skills, as do the mods, its odd that the place is as unorganized as it is.

The same questions are asked and answered 50 times in threads that don't appear to have anything in common.

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This is because people simply don't search for their answers, or they don't know the key phrases to search. There are two parts to this, the first, is typically "I'm going to post a new thread to ask my question instead of search" is generally born out of people being lazy, or people being unsure of current documentation. The second is not too much you can do about because it involves with learning the terminology, once someone is used to the terminology they can find things easier because they know what to search for.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by 'Sam DeathWalker',index.php?page=Thread&postID=175772#p ost175772

posts disappear every day and fruitless time is spent looking for posts that could be anywhere or could be no where.

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Posts that disappear 90% of the time you shouldn't have seen anyway. (Outsider Spam, Talking about things that are against ToS/EULA, etc) You can hardly gripe about us removing these posts. The other 10% are people who feel they need certain moderator attention. Again, you shouldn't have seen these threads either because they are of no real value to the community. So if you're wasting your time looking for these kinds of posts, you should go to WoW General forums, they last a lot longer there than they do here.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by 'Sam DeathWalker',index.php?page=Thread&postID=175772#p ost175772

One problem is that you have lots of wow talk (whats best classes etc.) but this isnt a wow forum per se.

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True, I let a LOT of stuff linger in general that should be moved, but I don't move it right away (or sometimes at all) because I'm not trying to be THAT GUY who is super thread moving guy. I move A LOT of threads, but that's mainly because if we're going to breakdown topics to different forum and people post them in the wrong forum, you've just defeated the entire purpose of having all the other forums subsections. You have so many WoW threads here because, (stand back, this is gonna be a shocker), most of us play WoW. If most of us played EQ/WAR/whatever, you'd see that game dominate the threads. I don't think this is a problem at all. I don't understand how anyone would see a problem with it.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by 'Sam DeathWalker',index.php?page=Thread&postID=175772#p ost175772

On problem is that General has become vapid, any quality post is moved to somewhere else. Posters ususaly will post in General first and then if the thread has any merit a mod moves it to the right spot, thus General is full of less quality posts. People who come to the forum newly hit general first and find the lower quality posts and might not venture into the meat of the site.

Also there seems to be an aversion to contriversy... on the one hand its wise to keep the forums adult and professional, yet its a fine line to not stiffle disagreement and argument.

Back to general orgainzation there are only two choices, either subdivided everything down (Hardware, cpu, Intel, I7) or have everything in General (this has the edge that the most recent posts on everything are visible). Seems the same people who are interested in Jamba would also be interested in Keyclone and whats the best motherboards, its not like people only need one catagory.

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General is vapid? Are you and I on the same forums? There are 5-20 NEW threads created everyday in general. Granted 40%-60% are in the wrong section and get moved to the appropriate section. This much activity in 1 section is hardly vapid. IMHO the General forum is not a free for all dumping ground. A lot of people think it is, hell Sam, most threads you have started about your team have been originally posted in General when its obvious that it belongs in Screenshots or PvE. There is no merit system that affects which posts get moved and which don't. My personal method for deciding if a thread needs to be moved is "what is the focus? What is the content aimed at?" If someone posts "my keyclone expired" Bam, welcome to Software. If someone posts "QQQQQQQ I got stomped in arena", Bam, welcome to PvP. This may not be how ALL the mods work, but this is my thought process on it. I think there are only 2 or 3 of us that are really active in moving threads to the proper location. We've never discussed protocol or any set of strict rules. Ellay trusts us to use our own judgements.

There are not "only two choices" for General organization. There are many options. Our current system is General is the place where as long as it has to do with multiboxing in general it is technically in the right area. But as soon a a thread shifts or is dominated by a certain topic, it should be moved to where that topic is covered. I feel this is the best method given our current posting trends. Dumping EVERYTHING into one single general forum is the worst idea I've ever heard of. Anyone who would even suggest such a thing has never had to be on the admin side of such a project and isn't taking the general user's experience into account. You said "fruitless time is spent looking for posts that could be anywhere or could be no where.", this is exactly what people will be doing if we had everything dumped into one section. The entire reason topics are divided out is so that people can come here and FIND information about specific topics.

"Seems the same people who are interested in Jamba would also be interested in Keyclone and whats the best motherboards, its not like people only need one catagory" This is true from a marketing standpoint, but not a reference / informational standpoint. Having hardware threads mixed with addon's and software would be confusing in the very least.

Bottom line, IMHO: We have a great organizational setup, we have great people posting here but sometimes content needs a nudge in the right direction. I don't move threads to stop discussion. I move threads to ensure discussion happens alongside other similar discussions.

Well by vapid I mean look at the current General the most recent 20 or so posts, there is virtually no valueuable information in those, as compared to the top 20 in macros, software, hardware etc. forums. And as you say 40-60 percent are moved elsewehre, I'v never encounted a forum where so much moving is done ... seems less work for the mods also.

FoH dumps most everything in General with no organizational effort:

http://www.fohguild.org/forums/mmorp...al-discussion/

But everything you say is also resonable. There are lots of ways to do this all resonably valid no doubt. And as you say many post without searching first ...

I'v found the EQ warrior forum very nice all around, resonably well organized with a bit more polished feel.

http://www.thesteelwarrior.org/forum...isplay.php?f=1

But the best of all forums, imo, has been MrFixIt, I think they make all their own software but their whole layout has all beat I thinks:

http://www.mrfixitonline.com/aoe3

Go hang out at FoH then. Kind of ironic that you're complaining about the quality of forums here (especially on something as silly as your personal preference for organization) when I've yet to see you actually contribute to anything outside of self-aggrandization.

The way these forums are set up works out just fine. General operates as a *gasp* general channel with a number of useful and useless threads. Big whoop. It doesn't exist for your personal benefit or to suit your personal tastes.

The sub-forums work just fine as well, as personally, I don't want to sift through a bunch of threads on software I don't use, PvP I don't participate in, or guild chatter that I'm not a part of. At the same time, I'm sure there are a number of people who don't want to sift through macros, PvE discussions, and group composition theories.

In summation: The forums are fine. Stop bitching.

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Originally Posted by 'Bigfish',index.php?page=Thread&postID=175852#post 175852

In summation: The forums are fine. Stop bitching.

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/Internet high five

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Originally Posted by 'Svpernova09',index.php?page=Thread&postID=175837# post175837

This is because people simply don't search for their answers, or they don't know the key phrases to search. There are two parts to this, the first, is typically "I'm going to post a new thread to ask my question instead of search" is generally born out of people being lazy, or people being unsure of current documentation.

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I seem to have an opposing viewpoint to many on this forum. I would rather have many similar posts than an inactive forum. I really don't understand those who bash members for posting a thread instead of searching for the answer on their own. Even with the most basic question you'll still get varied answers depending on who is online at the time and who the user base is (it does change over time). Also, even if a subject was covered multiple times it could be the first time some members are seeing the thread. These members will benefit from having someone ask the question, or bump the thread. For instance, I'm sure the Pally vs DK tank debate has at least 10 threads with valuable information. However, I likely wouldn't have known as much as I currently do about DKs if some random thread hadn't been started again. Whoever started that thread could have just used the search function, found their answer, and continued on their merry way. However, I personally wouldn't have gained anything and I'm glad they made a new post regarding a subject that could have been covered with a search. I may never have searched for that information on my own, or even thought to ask questions regarding the subject, but because someone started a redundant thread that may have been covered 2 weeks ago, I was able to learn.

Forums are supposed to be active dialog... they're not supposed to be encyclopedias for reference.

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Originally Posted by 'Owltoid',index.php?page=Thread&postID=175857#post 175857

I seem to have an opposing viewpoint to many on this forum. I would rather have many similar posts than an inactive forum.

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I think that forums that have a lot of similar posts eventually turn into inactive forums. I do feel that moderating should be left to the moderators, so if a person is posting a topic that they should have searched for, it should be left to the moderators to deal with it, and not have members hassling the person who made the post. But I prefer forums that are run by an active and strict moderating team. You know where you stand, and you learn how things will be handled after a while. And most important, troublemakers don't last long. That to me is more important than layout and how many sub-forums we have.

I would say that repetitive topics are a fair issue for what needs to be addressed. I also find them helpful in so much that as independant players, we often find ourselves needing to bounce ideas off each other to figure out what works best for us. The solution one player reaches may not be the best answer for another player, even if they have a similar issue. Is it worth partaking in thread necromancy or hijacking to try and get elaboration on a point, or is it better to make a fresh topic that discussion can continue in? So long as we're not stuck at either extreme, I don't see much of a problem.

We've had the same problems pretty much since the start. People don't know where to post and cant be arsed to search. I believe keyclone and I both made suggestions for re-structuring in the staff forum a while ago, I'd advise the admins re-check that thread, because the suggestions made were pretty fucking awesome tbh ;)

I've always been in favour of an Elitist-Jerks style of moderation here. It works, plain and simple.

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Originally Posted by 'Bigfish',index.php?page=Thread&postID=175852#post 175852

Go hang out at FoH then. Kind of ironic that you're complaining about the quality of forums here (especially on something as silly as your personal preference for organization) when I've yet to see you actually contribute to anything outside of self-aggrandization.

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Thats cause yur to lazy to use "search":

http://www.dual-boxing.com/forums/in...412&highlight=

Quote:

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Originally Posted by 'Sam DeathWalker',index.php?page=Thread&postID=175945#p ost175945

Quote:

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Originally Posted by 'Bigfish',index.php?page=Thread&postID=175852#post 175852

Go hang out at FoH then. Kind of ironic that you're complaining about the quality of forums here (especially on something as silly as your personal preference for organization) when I've yet to see you actually contribute to anything outside of self-aggrandization.

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Thats cause yur to lazy to use "search":

http://www.dual-boxing.com/forums/in...412&highlight=

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"The link you are trying to reach is no longer available or is invalid. "

So I was right?

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Originally Posted by 'Owltoid',index.php?page=Thread&postID=175857#post 175857

Forums are supposed to be active dialog... they're not supposed to be encyclopedias for reference.

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ding ding! we have a winner

active dialog... i call this chatter. my thinking is that we want a good amount of chatter to keep things interesting for people. if stuff is in the wrong group, and has been idle for a couple of days... then move it to the appropriate thread. what you don't want is to move a thread in the middle of an active conversation. that would kill chatter and confuse people as they cannot find the thread they were chatting on.

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Originally Posted by 'Wilbur',index.php?page=Thread&postID=175903#post1 75903

We've had the same problems pretty much since the start. People don't know where to post and cant be arsed to search. I believe keyclone and I both made suggestions for re-structuring in the staff forum a while ago, I'd advise the admins re-check that thread, because the suggestions made were pretty fucking awesome tbh ;)

I've always been in favour of an Elitist-Jerks style of moderation here. It works, plain and simple.

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Certain mods are in favor of reorganization, certain mods enjoy the additional jabber. I think the concern here is a balance between conversation and reference material -- while it would be great to be organized like the wiki, we DO actually have a wiki already and we don't want to nip budding conversations.

Neither are really more wrong or right -- but we did try reorganizing the Software/Hardware forums and it was accepted about 50/50 as voted by the forum community. In the end, we removed it.

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Originally Posted by 'Gadzooks',index.php?page=Thread&postID=175776#pos t175776

We don't have to pay to post here - whatever you guys want to do is fine with me. :)

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This.

If anyone is dissatisfied with how the forums are being run, go start your own damn forum.

For my part, I appreciate effort and work that goes into making this place both interesting to visit for chat, and a storehouse of great info.

Knobley

Quote:

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Originally Posted by 'Svpernova09',index.php?page=Thread&postID=175853# post175853

Quote:

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Originally Posted by 'Bigfish',index.php?page=Thread&postID=175852#post 175852

In summation: The forums are fine. Stop bitching.

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/Internet high five

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hit the nail on the head. i could not agree more.

these forums are the picture of perfection (well, mostly anyway) and i wouldn't do anything to change them! like another had said, we don't "pay to post" here so why should you keep bitching about what this forum is or isn't? its great and there is nothing more to be said. just about everything you need can be found with a quick search and scan of posts. if by some miracle you CAN'T fine what you are looking for, then you just have to post what you are thinking and you will be lifted up or shot down. either way the community will eventually, or atleast hopefully, reply to your post and answer your question. thus putting an end to your wandering mind, at least for a little while ;) heh

~YYF

So.. where does the CP end up then?

Hey you should have a hardware marketplace sub forum (like that person selling the X-keys), people have stuffs and things change so they might like to sell others their stuffs, and others might like to buy second hand items cheaper.

I'm an admin on a sports site and have dealt with this sort of thing a couple times over the years.

People are lazy in general, on my other forum I also see a lot of people who have a fetish for starting threads, something about seeing their name in lights.

I personally feel that the chatter is more a sign of a lively forum, even though many of the same questions and topics come up on a regular basis. To some extent it's unavoidable, but a couple suggestions might help.

1- A relatively up-to-date FAQ, with a label of "updated through" right up front. People will often check the FAQ, hit one or two links, get a dead link, think to themselves "screw that, I'm special" and pop up a new thread.

2- The Wiki and stickies in general don't get updated often enough, or it's hard to pick out the "ohmigod this is brilliant!" portions from the dross that's just a placeholder. Add in a function like a lot of sites like amazon use that say "was this article/post helpful to you?" The Rate this thread functionality already does that, I'd recommend rewording the label, moving it to the top of the thread and upsizing it to make it stand out.

Think about it, when you go to curse or amazon or a lot of places, you often sort by how other people have rated things. Since this isn't WoW General we shouldn't see too much of the punitive juvenile crap. Then you set a threshold of after X ratings with an average of blah or higher a flag is attached to notify that it needs to be moved to the wiki or does it automatically.

This rating tendency will take some effort for the community to train themselves to use and support it, and the forum software likely allows searching or ordering search results on rating basis.

3- While I have been a little guilty of "write my own thread" syndrome on occasion, I think one more productive approach to handling those repeat threads is to post a reply comment linking to the past thread. This is especially useful for stuff like the Hydra and FTL variants, or Falkor's quest acceptance work, because if the person gets off their butt and follows the link, they can work their way through a web of information and pick up a LOT of other links and information in the process. Constant cross referencing is the key, so someone can always find their way through the maze.

Yep. Happens alla time. I always considered those folks good entertainment targets for mockery, or you threaten to bounce them entirely. Eventually they realize they're not a beautiful snowflake and you wouldn't not enjoy bouncing them.

Moderator goal is to be Deputy Dawg with his feet on his desk, "moderating" by benign neglect. Pity it doesn't work that way unless you occasionally smack some toolbag's face in, and the regulars help set the tone that that ain't cool.

Remember, a temper tantrum can be a lot of fun if you have absolutely no reason to put up with it.

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Originally Posted by 'Knobley',index.php?page=Thread&postID=175973#post 175973

Quote:

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Originally Posted by 'Gadzooks',index.php?page=Thread&postID=175776#pos t175776

We don't have to pay to post here - whatever you guys want to do is fine with me. :)

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This.

If anyone is dissatisfied with how the forums are being run, go start your own damn forum.

For my part, I appreciate effort and work that goes into making this place both interesting to visit for chat, and a storehouse of great info.

Knobley

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Feedback is crucial for this forum. To have people shut up would result in never improving.

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Originally Posted by 'Oswyn',index.php?page=Thread&postID=177209#post17 7209

Feedback is crucial for this forum. To have people shut up would result in never improving

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Oh sure it's crucial... this place simply couldn't function with out a bunch of QQing about how things are being handled.