Big changes a'coming! Merging the D&D forums

arbados · Oct 11, 2012

It's going to be impossible to please everyone and in fairness there is value to both opinions. However, I'm in favor of the change.

I have absolutely no interest in 4th edition rules, but am very interested to hear the opinions of persons who play that edition on things such as race, treasure, random encounters, etc. I play Pathfinder and sometimes feel the forum gets lonely. I am happy to try and reinvigorate the forums with the change.

Dragonhelm · Oct 12, 2012

I like the idea of merging the forums. I like more than one edition, and I find it a bit tedious going in and out of forums to find the topics that interest me. Having them all in one forum with the sortable functionality that Morrus is talking about sounds like a winner to me.

I also like the idea of cross-pollination. I could see this being very useful, for example, for doing conversions from one system to another. So want to convert from Pathfinder to 4e, or 1e to 3e? Then this new D&D forum will be for you. I bet the response will be better too.

Anyway, that's my two steel.

aboyd · Oct 12, 2012

Meh. I haven't posted a lot in the last 2 months (lost my job, been distracted). I came in tonight to start up posting again, saw this.

While I would be a fan of combining basic/1st/2nd/3rd/Pathfinder into one big group, mixing in 4th and 5th seems really bad. At the very least, 4th is mechanically and conceptually quite different. And if we can go beyond "very least" and state more, I simply don't want to bother mixing it up with 4th edition fans.

I've read in this thread that Dragonsfoot is held up as a failure because they keep things split out. That actually sounds good to me, so I'll go take a look.

EDIT: Dragonsfoot sucks. OK, I'll keep looking.

Janaxstrus · Oct 12, 2012

I don't like this even a little.

If numbers and visits are down, I'd put the blame on the fact that these forums are dreadfully, PAINFULLY, excruciatingly slow at times, not split forums. I'm on an 80mb internet connection and have issues opening threads, going to the next page, etc, yet have absolutely no problem streaming a movie.

I don't forsee me renewing just to deal with slow forums and having to run through multiple searches to find the topics I want to read. A good filter allows me to see only what I want, not only what I want...as long as I only want 1 thing. I don't want to see 4e stuff, don't care about most general threads, etc. I would, however, like to be able to read all PF, 3.x and Next stuff without having to have 3 different windows each with it's own filter.

Oh well, not my site, do what you want.

Umbran · Oct 12, 2012

aboyd said:
While I would be a fan of combining basic/1st/2nd/3rd/Pathfinder into one big group, mixing in 4th and 5th seems really bad. At the very least, 4th is mechanically and conceptually quite different.

Well, conceptually different or not, only seven threads in the 4e forum have gotten posts in the past day or so. The 4e forum is, at this point, pretty low traffic.

Halivar · Oct 12, 2012

"I don't even want to be around fans of [X] edition" seems a very silly reason for opposition to me.

Myself, I want the old General forum back, where people could talk about OSR and newer editions in one place. This gives it back to me, and therefore I approve.

Mark CMG · Oct 12, 2012

Umbran said:
Well, conceptually different or not, only seven threads in the 4e forum have gotten posts in the past day or so. The 4e forum is, at this point, pretty low traffic.

What's the traffic like in the 5E forum currently and what's it like when there is major news like just after a playtest round release?

saskganesh · Oct 12, 2012

Don't like.

In my opinion, we already have a general forum, so we don't need a second general (D&D) forum.

Rather than cross-pollination, I think you're just going to see more weeds and the hardworking mods are going to be extra busier as gardeners.

eh. I'm sure I'll survive. But if traffic is trending down, I advise you to create a forum space and environment which stimulates community and creativity. Make people want to come here.

Radiating Gnome · Oct 13, 2012

I'm fine with it. I got quite used to using the "All threads" menu option when it was available, and this seems to be an improvement on that idea.

It's worth trying -- after all, it's the web, if it doesn't work, it can always be changed back.

-rg

Nikosandros · Oct 13, 2012

I'm very much in favor. If you look at the example page that Morrus linked, you can see topics going back to yesterday, despite the fear that Next threads will push everything else away from the from page in a short time.

I've never been a fan of too many sub-forums (that's why I dislike both WotC and Paizo forums). It seems very easy not to click on threads that one doesn't find interesting. I don't get the fear of "contamination". Yes, 4e might be very different, but it's not like a 4e thread will somehow "pollute" nearby threads...

The only caveat is that proper tagging must be enforced, otherwise it can get confusing.