What would you like to see for 2006 on ENWorld?

[Aus_Snow]

I second the link to 'bbcode list' suggestion - a lot of people don't seem to know that stuff. I guess larger avatars would be nice, too (just physically larger perhaps, without filesize increase?)

Also, how about a non-d20 RPG section? As in, have a D&D General, a d20/OGL, and a non-d20 RPG General (as well as all the other current ones)? Unless this really goes against the spirit of the site somehow, I think it would be a useful addition, personally.

 

[trancejeremy]

The review section could use some work:


The old way of allowing anyone to add a product to a database and just having it approved by a moderator was a lot better.

Now, you basically have to post in meta asking for a product to be added, which often goes overlooked, and wears out Crothian, since he is basically the only one that does it.

Also making linking it up better with the Gamestore would be nice. For instance, if it goes on sale at the gamestore, an entry is automatically create for it in the review section.


A minimum length for reviews would be nice. As of now, there seems to be none, resulting in very short reviews which tell you nothing. For instance, the latest review seems to be just 1 line. Not to mention the flood of 2-3 sentence reviews for a certain software product.

Maybe there could be a thread added to every product page that would allow comments? (As opposed to reviews)


The average review score doesn't always show up. For instance, on Goodman's page

http://www.enworld.org/reviews.php?do=publisher&publisherid=2005155

The Redwood Scar doesn't have an average listed, even though it has 2 5 star reviews.



Also, the menus at the top of the page here no longer seem to work for me. "Site Menu", "Gamestore", etc. They used to expand when I clicked on them, now they just don't do anything

 

[IronWolf]

Also, the menus at the top of the page here no longer seem to work for me. "Site Menu", "Gamestore", etc. They used to expand when I clicked on them, now they just don't do anything

I think that's going to be a browser issue, not a site issue. The menus are working fine for me using FireFox on a Linux box and they also work on my FireFox installs on Windows boxen.

I *think* when I have seen this issue reported before that clearing the browser cache fixed it?

 

[IronWolf]

2) useful stealth mode (as stealth is now, but include some form of [little] icon/text/symbol/something to show "new threads", etc)

Aren't the new threads bolded now? Or am I missing something? I would vote to keep stealth as stealthy as possible...

 

[fusangite]

I'm not a highly product-focused guy. I purchase RPG supplements very rarely. As a result, the non-forums part of ENWorld don't do much for me. If I had a wish it would be weekly opinion columns about gaming. Currently, we have a news section and a reviews section but the news section isn't really like news articles; it's more akin to wire service feeds.

I'd like to see some weekly or monthly gaming roundup and opinion columns in the news or reviews area. That way I'd visit other parts of the site a whole lot more and I think some of the columns could be great jumping-off points for thread discussion and vice versa (ie. some threads could form the basis of columns).

 

[fusangite]

A crack down on passive aggressive posts.

Hear hear! Whenever I really want to burn someone on this site, I use passive-aggressive tactics. I usually manage to refrain from doing so but when I get out of control I always resort to those tactics -- because they are rewarded.

I actually am trying to get a similar directive on the e-mail list I'm on for a non-profit society board on which I sit. We haven't really thought through how to design such a policy but I'll be comparing notes between the two organizations if this gets taken on here.

 

[francisca]

This is not a thread about moderation policies nor is it to become one. It is a thread on technical issues only please. I'm sorry I did not make that clear.

Fair enough.

 

[Dark Psion]

A few things I have seen on other boards;

Quick Edit: Allows you to edit your post (esspecialy for speeling) right in the message, in the thread.

Topic Floater : When you scroll below the title of a post, a dynamic link will appear in the upper right corner to go back to the top.

Signature Reduction: Allows a large signature to be reduced to a button that can be activated or ignored as you wish.

 

[Haltherrion]

I'd like to see three things:

• The User Galleries working again
• More work on the product ratings page. (just checked now and not sure the averate rating feature is working.) It would be really nice to see what fellow Enworlders thought of various products, the WOTC stuff but especially the other publishers.
• larger user avatars. 64x64 is too tiny. People already have much larger banners in their footers and the standard avatars are often larger.

To extend the second point, I think Amazon creates a lot of sales by making it easy to gather and display ratings from lots of users for various products. Helps people go from "maybe I should buy this" to "yep, looks good, I'll buy." Enworld users should be able to get lots of value from it and it should generate traffic for the Enworld store and help support the site.

To be useful, you'd like something that quickly and gracefully allowed folks to enter ratings (maybe a sheet with many products on it at once and something like amazon's very quick rating update that you see on their "your store" page.) Would be even cooler to have break-out categories like "utility for a ref", "utility for a player", "illustration quality", etc in addition to overall rating. When reporting ratings it is important for readers to be able to determine how many users the ratings is based on.

I've purchased very few non-WOTC items but it is more out of difficulty of browsing the material than a dislike of those venues. Would really like an easier way to find the gems. The reviews are useful but ratings would be much better as a first step to cull things down a bit.

You could encourage people to rate items by tallying ratings in addition to postings (people are surprisingly responsive to such things )

 

[trancejeremy]

I think that's going to be a browser issue, not a site issue. The menus are working fine for me using FireFox on a Linux box and they also work on my FireFox installs on Windows boxen.

I *think* when I have seen this issue reported before that clearing the browser cache fixed it?

Oooh, that fixed it. Thanks!