Suggestion for Site/Forums

[Coatleque]

I just wanted to make a quick update about my request. I figured out an HTML / Wiki code hack to accomplish what I wanted with tool-tips. Here is how, for anyone interested:

 

[[Wiki Link Here|Display Text Here]]

 

This will create a wiki link that has a mouse-over "on hover" text box which shows anything you place in the title attribute of the span tag. In this way, I was able to condense my entire Relationship section by putting descriptions in the hover text and only displaying the names themselves. You can also change the displayed name of the link to whatever you place inside the span element itself.

 

Hope this gives others some ideas.

[FreelanceWizard]

Stickied per user request. Feel free to use this as a suggestion box.

[Unnamed Mercenary]

"Heated topic" icebox section. If a topic because too heated too fast, can it be moved (temporarily) to a forum with posting limits, if possible? Maybe a person could only respond once an hour. Or if there were a number of individuals causing issues, they could have access revoked while allowing the thread to cool back down to a more peaceful simmer.

[Maril]

*runs into thread* 

 

I would like to suggest a box-thing where you can put in your timezone, so that it appears under your avatar like this: 

 

 

Pardon the shabby paint-edit. 

 

It'd make it a lot easier to figure out which people you are time-compatible with. It's not a given that people include their timezones in their making-connections posts for example, and at least for me I know there are some timezones like EST that I can work better with - The difference between 6 and 9 hours is pretty big for me. 

 

I know that you can click on people's profiles to see their local time, but that's only something I realized recently and it's a little tedious having to click peoples profiles to see it.

[DeletedUser]

I would like to suggest a box-thing where you can put in your timezone, so that it appears under your avatar like this:

 

I wholeheartedly support this idea.

[Oscare]

Right now, we have 110x110 avatars available, and people like to use character art for their avatar, and most of the time they emd squished because of limited pixel space...

 

Would it be at all possible to extend avatar dimensions? Something like 450 by 190, so that it doesn't hyper extend or hyper width threads.

[Unnamed Mercenary]

...Would it be possible to add a "Forum Games" subsection to the RP board?

 

There's been a large influx of recent "Describe your character doing ______" and "How does your character react to ______ " threads that I think are detracting away from more in-depth development threads.

[FreelanceWizard]

Let me hit a bunch of these at once.

• Icebox section: We can actually "semi-lock" a thread so that every post has to be approved by a mod. We might start employing that more in threads that get particularly hot; I'll look into whether there's a mod that lets us apply per-thread posting delays.
  
• Timezone in the infobox: That's a great idea and yeah, I can totally do that. Give me a few days to put it together.
  
• Avatar size limits: This one is a little tricky, actually. My main PC is 2560x1440, and so the forums could be a lot bigger side to side. However, on phones, the avatars are actually pretty large. From a vertical standpoint, we can get into some weird display issues if the infobox next to a post gets large. So, I'll take a look at the CSS, but I don't think we can really change the avatar sizes.
  
• Forum games: When I think of forum games, I think of things like the compliments thread or the "reply with just a GIF" thread. I don't class the "how does your character react to X" type of thread as a forum game, but rather as an RP prompt that can help people think through and develop their characters. Sure, some of them can be a bit silly, but sometimes a silly prompt helps you think outside the box about a character. One creative writing exercise I remember fondly involved picking a character, a situation, and a tone out of a hat and writing a story about it; it forced people to improvise and think fast even when the result seemed nonsensical (such as a serious story about a hit man going to the dentist). At any rate, I'm not sure I want to get into the business of deciding what kind of prompt is an in-depth one and which is a forum game, so right now, I don't think a new forum section is necessary. If we get a lot of forum games popping up in Off Topic, though, I'll revisit this.
  

[FreelanceWizard]

We now have a timezone option! Set it in your User CP->Profile section to your timezone offset from UTC, and it'll show up in your profile and next to your posts.

[Blue]

An option to turn off the picture gallery from being displayed on the home page would be nice.... You know how I am towards a certain type of art content ....

[Merai the Vixen]

What about having a live chat room attached to the site!!  Or like a live shout box?  I'd love the chat room idea, for when people can't access the game.

[Ilwe'ran]

I suggest to add a "Guide / Lore" section under the RP discussion forum so we can separate people who discuss about RP in general or ask some questions from those who are working on some guides or gather some lore to make some big informative posts. It would be really easier to find what you're looking for and to valorise the people work that way rather than in the middle of those thousands topic all together :dazed:

[Desu Nee]

I really really wish we had a #IRC or Chat Channel.

[Aya]

I really really wish we had a #IRC or Chat Channel.

Chat is coming!

[FreelanceWizard]

I'm working on live chat functionality as one our Patreon tiers. As Yoshi-P would say, "please look forward to it."

 

Turning off the gallery feed is something I can probably arrange. Let me look at what my template field options are and I'll see if I can't set that up.

 

As for lore, my recommendation is for lore posts to go on the wiki; we have an entire Lore category for them, in fact! I'd love to see more lore articles written there for people to reference. Feel free to be bold and write things up.

[Kage]

I think you might have misunderstood Ilwe's suggestion.

 

There's a lot of posts in the RP section that are "general" to RP. Character building and how to roleplay out of your comfort zone etc.

 

However, there's also a lot of posts that are more geared towards the RP that is specific to FFXIV where it deals with questions of lore and what may be more acceptable etc. A section mainly for the lore enthusiasts to help those would help separate the two.

[Nebbs]

I really really wish we had a #IRC or Chat Channel.

Chat is coming!

 

There is skype being used by many, if you want something in the interim

[Kage]

I really really wish we had a #IRC or Chat Channel.

Chat is coming!

 

There is skype being used by many

Many people also visit the RPC during times... they shouldn't. So a web browser based chat is much easier to deal with. Plus, not everyone has skype accounts while everyone wanting to chat here... have accounts to RPC.

[FreelanceWizard]

I think you might have misunderstood Ilwe's suggestion.

 

There's a lot of posts in the RP section that are "general" to RP. Character building and how to roleplay out of your comfort zone etc.

 

However, there's also a lot of posts that are more geared towards the RP that is specific to FFXIV where it deals with questions of lore and what may be more acceptable etc. A section mainly for the lore enthusiasts to help those would help separate the two.

 

Ah, that makes more sense.

 

This is one I'll have to give a bit of thought to. I'm generally very conservative on creating more forums, preferring a "less is more" philosophy; however, if there's enough regular lore hunting activity, and there's an easy way for mods and users to be able to distinguish which posts go where, I think it might be a viable option. This may be an opportunity for a poll.

[Desu Nee]

I think you might have misunderstood Ilwe's suggestion.

 

There's a lot of posts in the RP section that are "general" to RP. Character building and how to roleplay out of your comfort zone etc.

 

However, there's also a lot of posts that are more geared towards the RP that is specific to FFXIV where it deals with questions of lore and what may be more acceptable etc. A section mainly for the lore enthusiasts to help those would help separate the two.

 

Ah, that makes more sense.

 

This is one I'll have to give a bit of thought to. I'm generally very conservative on creating more forums, preferring a "less is more" philosophy; however, if there's enough regular lore hunting activity, and there's an easy way for mods and users to be able to distinguish which posts go where, I think it might be a viable option. This may be an opportunity for a poll.

I second that. We've had a lot of Lore discussions lately, after all, and with Heavensward coming it will just multiply.

[Kage]

I think you might have misunderstood Ilwe's suggestion.

 

There's a lot of posts in the RP section that are "general" to RP. Character building and how to roleplay out of your comfort zone etc.

 

However, there's also a lot of posts that are more geared towards the RP that is specific to FFXIV where it deals with questions of lore and what may be more acceptable etc. A section mainly for the lore enthusiasts to help those would help separate the two.

 

Ah, that makes more sense.

 

This is one I'll have to give a bit of thought to. I'm generally very conservative on creating more forums, preferring a "less is more" philosophy; however, if there's enough regular lore hunting activity, and there's an easy way for mods and users to be able to distinguish which posts go where, I think it might be a viable option. This may be an opportunity for a poll.

 

... You would hate to see what my old university anime club's forums were like when I was trying to get forums used again. Sub-forums. Sub-forums everywhere.

 

For me, it makes it easier to find specific things I'm looking for.

[Max]

I second that idea. Recently I've been trying to read up on some FFXIV lore for a new character, but it feels like it's scattered and I'm hopping around the web for tidbits. It would be convenient to have a dedicated section for lore and the like.

[Unnamed Mercenary]

I second that idea. Recently I've been trying to read up on some FFXIV lore for a new character, but it feels like it's scattered and I'm hopping around the web for tidbits. It would be convenient to have a dedicated section for lore and the like.

 

Poke Sounsyy and I. We'll try to help out!

 

(Seconding a lore subsection. It's kinda like the other subsection idea I propsed, but splitting lore from general sounds like a much better idea)

[Ilwe'ran]

As for lore, my recommendation is for lore posts to go on the wiki; we have an entire Lore category for them, in fact! I'd love to see more lore articles written there for people to reference. Feel free to be bold and write things up.

 

Writing on a forum is somehow more convenient and "natural" and you cannot write guides either on wiki. I think that people who write some lore informations are interested by people comments, discussions etc. which is not really possible on the wiki. I believe that most of us are using the wiki as a tool to know about each others characters and the forum to dig for the lore / guides ^^ .

(And what the other people said too ♥)

[Nebbs]

I really really wish we had a #IRC or Chat Channel.

Chat is coming!

 

There is skype being used by many

Many people also visit the RPC during times... they shouldn't. So a web browser based chat is much easier to deal with. Plus, not everyone has skype accounts while everyone wanting to chat here... have accounts to RPC.

 

Horses for courses but if you want something while this arrives there is a bunch on skype. And if we do do one something that plays well with chat apps would be good.