Forum Divisions

[weasel]

Hey everyone,

The forums starting to get real busy, and 3 pages of new posts every morning is a bit.. intimidating, to say the least. I'm going to be splitting them up.

I've already made a seperate forum (as you may have noticed) for Development-related stuff; I think it'll be nice to have all those posts in one spot, so people don't have to go trolling through millions of threads to find last week's updates. I've kept the latest posts on a "global announcement" so they will show up no matter what forum you're looking at.

That leaves the other 18 pages of posts.

I'd like to split this forum into two halves - as close to 50/50 as I can get it. My knee-jerk response is "easy! just divide it into registered/non-registered threads." But upon closer inspection, you'll see most threads here have paid their , and there are very few threads (in comparison) in the L1-20 crowd.

I'm not looking to split it into more than 3 parts.

Any suggestions on what type of forum split you'd like to see? We don't really have off-topic discussions; I can see putting in a bug-report or technical issues forum, but that still leaves the mast majority to be sorted.

[sk89q]

How about this?

1. Designs
2. Levels
3. Contests

EDIT: Maybe Designs and Levels would go into one forum.

[OfficiallyHaphazard]

Games and Challenges
Solutions, Levels and Techniques


That I think is the easiest way to split the board.

Hmmm. but then which section would the adventures of Joe go? I think Games and Challenges....

I also think designs and levels should go together, because every level has people designing for it...

[weasel]

Games and Challenges
Solutions, Levels and Techniques


That I think is the easiest way to split the board.

Hmmm. but then which section would the adventures of Joe go? I think Games and Challenges....

I also think designs and levels should go together, because every level has people designing for it...

Yeah that looks like a decent split. I mean there's some carryover (solutions to challenges, levels for games) but people should be able to figure it out.

And yes, designs/levels definitely go together.

[SockFolder]

I actually thought a more level oriented section would be nice. Some place where I could go "How do you like this level" or a "Here are my best levels" thread like OfficiallyHaphazard made without feeling I'm just spamming the forum with ads for my levels =).

On the otherhand, I don't know what % of the threads would go to such a section.

[blurg]

I like the idea of a Standing Challenges section. Sometimes those get lost in the mix and I have to scroll over four pages to find them.

[sccook]

I think you should reconsider splitting the forums into discussions of the free levels and the user levels. This site is getting more coverage...I just saw it mentioned on a site devoted to college sports. With more coverage, you will see a constant (and probably increasing) number of new addicts each day/week. In the last few days, I've seen a number of threads started by some noob who is impressed with his latest contraption for one of the first 20 levels.

Then at the top of the free level board, you could pin the discussion of challenges and pin each challenge to the top of this board as well.

[OfficiallyHaphazard]

I do think there should be a stickied list to where users can post their contraptions to levels 1-20. Probably a thread for each level, and a master thread giving the link of each sub thread. There are about 15 threads devoted to unpossible...

[penguinbarber]

Wouldnt it be cool with a read only "Hall of fame" for ipecac contraptions?
[Edit: Maybe board users should be able to post, thread starts exclusively for admins)

Perhaps a sticky in some other section where you can post suggestions?

[OfficiallyHaphazard]

I see you have started to make some of the divisions

I think it might be helpful to have global thread telling where users should post their questions. Like the "catapult in the tube thread" that was started in the challenges and games section would probably be better off in the levels/solutions area (which is this forum).

Anyhow, thanks for the work .. if I can help out in any way, I am more than willing

[Twilightzero]

For low divisions, then I'd do something like:

Levels 1-20
User Levels & Technical Discussion
Challenges & Contests

So Joe would go into challenges & contests, since it is a challenge/contest of sorts (IMHO), Levels 1-20 would comprise most of the freebie crowd and designs for the free levels, and User Levels/Tech would get the crowd and the in-depth discussions.

[sk89q]

How about putting suggestions into "Bugs, Technical, and Registration Issues" also?

[weasel]

Allright, I think this is going to be a layout that holds us for a time.

I could have done the lazy thing and just let things "start now", but I actually filed through all twenty pages of posts an started filing and organizing things where they should be. I may have missed a few, or sent a few to the wrong forum; feel free to tag them and I'll move em later

I'm thinking about putting suggestions in the "technical issues" forum too - I already filed a few there - but I'm not sure on that one yet. We'll see how things go.

Tomorrow I'll work on getting some stickies up in each forum with relevant information - including a Sticky showing links to solution threads for levels 1-20.

[NightStryke]

Now you've done it. Now you'll have to actually do moderator stuff, because people will start putting threads in the wrong forums and you'll have to move them. I hope you're happy.

[sk89q]

How about a General (Chat) forum?