Changes to the Privy Council

[Buxton]

Currently, many new members post many threads regarding already discussed suggestions; my idea is to add an extra notice when starting a new topic:

NOTICE:

Before you start a new thread, be sure you do the following:

1) Read and understand the forum rules (link).

2) Read the Welcome or informational Stickied thread(s) at the top of this forum you intend to post to.  These threads will contain guidelines and information about when and what to post in this forum.

3) Use the search function to research the idea/comment/suggestion you want to post about.  These forums have been around for quite some time.  There is a wealth of information that has already been discussed.  If you find one or more threads that contain information about your topic - read them thoroughly to see if your idea/suggestion/comment has already been posted.  If it has not, pick an appropriate thread and post your message there.  In the event that none of them are a good fit, or you do not find existing threads about your subject - then it is acceptable to start a new thread.

Suggestion specific rules:

Please note that the developer of the game has prepared a suggestion guide located here (link).

A frequently suggested topic with links is located here (link). Please read this thoroughly and if you find you're idea then add you're support/improvement to the relevant forum.

Multilayer on line play has been discussed much and denied in this thread here (link).

These rules are here in order to make it easier for others to find information.  When there are too many threads on the same topic, usually only one or two of them have valuable information.  When someone is trying to find an answer to a question, and the search function returns 10 threads - it can be very hard for them to locate the one bit of good information within all the useless stuff.

Failure to follow these guidelines, will typically result in your thread being locked by a moderator.  In the worst case, continued spamming of the forums with useless threads will result in a ban.

Thank you for thinking before posting

It may clear a few threads.

 

[calandale]

I just doubt that it's worth the effort. These people just don't seem to
read the red notice at all. Maybe if the new stuff was in blue?

 

[Janus]

Having that text be different only in that one specific board isn't really feasible (would take either a nasty hack which could break if we change the board structure, or a hell of a lot of work), so it would show up for every new topic created. Not sure that would be good, even less people would actually read that message if it were longer and containing stuff irrelevant to the the area they're in.

 

[Sturmspawn]

...This might be a bit heavy handed, and a lot of work for the moderators, but what if duplicate topics were just deleted? possibly with a 24-notice that the topic is a dupe, is locked and will be deleted... Oh, and perhaps the dupee's post count should be decremented [like by 5]. A little aversion therapy perhaps. This would help to resolve the clogging of search with meaningless hits on dupes. This would be a global thing -not just on privy council.

Oh - by the way, it might help if the owner-creator of a dupe had the power to delete it themselves. I see a lot of these kinds of threads - where the inquiring mind is given one response with a pointer to the main thread. It would be nice to have the option to clean up after ones' self.

 

[bryce777]

You can't stop people from posting stupid suggestions, or duplicate ones, or from being bad with english/incoherent.

I just wish the moderators would follow their own rules as far as what is moved to kings court.

All the time, I see people make threads with 5-6 suggestions in them or with very vague titles and sometimes they get moved to the king's court.

It should not be about what the moderators like, but about suggestions that are 1) stated clearly as to what they are. Otherwise they are a useless waste of time to us, let alone to armagan and 2) have not been suggested before or are substantially different than other seemingly similar ones and 3) just talk about one subject per thread

I have long since run out of suggestions, but I remember having quite a few of them that were completely ignored even though they were original and well stated, even though there are quite a few that have made it to king's court in spite of breaking the stated rules.

 

[Cymro]

I would like to see clear titles enforced: "PLEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEZ READ!!!!!!!!!!!!!!1111111one" and others should be a temp-bannable offence. So many times I have gone into one of these topics only to get a duplicate, thus wasting at least 5 seconds of my time

 

[Archonsod]

Oh - by the way, it might help if the owner-creator of a dupe had the power to delete it themselves. I see a lot of these kinds of threads - where the inquiring mind is given one response with a pointer to the main thread. It would be nice to have the option to clean up after ones' self.

They can lock the thread. If people would stop posting to such threads they'd drop off the main page fairly soon.

All the time, I see people make threads with 5-6 suggestions in them or with very vague titles and sometimes they get moved to the king's court.

It should not be about what the moderators like, but about suggestions that are 1) stated clearly as to what they are. Otherwise they are a useless waste of time to us, let alone to armagan and 2) have not been suggested before or are substantially different than other seemingly similar ones and 3) just talk about one subject per thread

Moving to the Kings Court is also dependent on activity within the thread. If a thread breaks some of the rules but is generating a few hundred replies then it's possible we'll move it. If someone posts a well thought out idea which generates little or no discussion then there's little point in moving it to the court (it'd fall off the page within an hour or two). The main purpose of seperating the board was to cut down on the number of duplicates floating around the original suggestion board (there were times when the entire first thread of that board consisted of nothing but duplicate suggestions, with replies directing the starter to the original thread).
You're right though, titles should be edited to make it clear what the thread is about. As for multiple suggestions, quite often the initial thread will encompass six or seven suggestions, and discussion will focus almost exclusively on one. In that case then technically the thread is a single issue, even if the post starter had intended it to be more.

 

[Feerspoir]

Shouldn't Armagan and the rest of the devs be the only ones to be able to change topics to the King's Court? (I know, they've got more important things to do than seep through all the rubbish)

 

[Merentha]

Why?  That would only tell us what they plan on working on, or what they need more input on.

 

[Apollon-04]

To clear up clutter, you could add a delete button to the topics. Only the creator or an admin could delete a topic. This would help, because instead of just locking the thread, and having mroe stuff in the forums, you would have less, and it would be easier to navigate through.

 

[Merentha]

There is a delete button, unless I'm way off base.

 

[Apollon-04]

you can delete your posts, not your topics, as far as i know.

 

[Merentha]

Indeed, I checked and you're right.  Well I'll be damned.

 

[Feerspoir]

Why?  That would only tell us what they plan on working on, or what they need more input on.

Exactly. Concentrate forces on what is truly needed (from the devs' point of view).
For "they fought this way not that, x is realistic, look at this" we can go to an actual military history forum.

 

[Merentha]

We have one.

 

[Ingolifs]

[quote author=archonchod] If someone posts a well thought out idea which generates little or no discussion then there's little point in moving it to the court (it'd fall off the page within an hour or two). [/quote]

That's wrong. In my experience of lurking the suggestion forums, topic stay visible for much longer on the King's court than in the privy council.

Apart from the occasional move from the privy council, no threads are added to King's court. In order for a newly moved topic to fall off the page, all the topics on the current page and a few from the next page would have to be posted in. And that happens rarely. An idea will survive much longer on the first page in king's court than it will in Privy council.

I say this, partly because my ideas tend to fall in that category. I'll post a good idea, i'll get three people replying, saying something to the effect of 'Yeah I pretty much agree', and then the topic disappears. Unless Eogan comes along to post a well thought out addition or criticism to my idea, the thread is toast.

Furthermore, don't we want the better suggestions to be posted in King's court, regardless of the number of replies? After all, the King's court represents the cream of the crop, each post is an example of an original idea, or a common idea that's been explored and thought over to a much greater depth. It gives newbies an idea of what a good suggestion looks like. Also, it enables Armagan to see the good ideas without having to wade through the **** ones.

 

[calandale]

[quote author=archonchod]
[/quote]

Who?

 

[Archonsod]

Apart from the occasional move from the privy council, no threads are added to King's court. In order for a newly moved topic to fall off the page, all the topics on the current page and a few from the next page would have to be posted in. And that happens rarely. An idea will survive much longer on the first page in king's court than it will in Privy council.

The topic is automatically sorted by last reply when moved though. It may not necessarily start at the top of the Kings Court page.

Furthermore, don't we want the better suggestions to be posted in King's court, regardless of the number of replies?

Not really. Who judges whether the suggestion is good or not? The idea was simply to cut down on the duplicate topics or otherwise pointless suggestion threads we were getting.

 

[bryce777]

Oh - by the way, it might help if the owner-creator of a dupe had the power to delete it themselves. I see a lot of these kinds of threads - where the inquiring mind is given one response with a pointer to the main thread. It would be nice to have the option to clean up after ones' self.

They can lock the thread. If people would stop posting to such threads they'd drop off the main page fairly soon.

All the time, I see people make threads with 5-6 suggestions in them or with very vague titles and sometimes they get moved to the king's court.

It should not be about what the moderators like, but about suggestions that are 1) stated clearly as to what they are. Otherwise they are a useless waste of time to us, let alone to armagan and 2) have not been suggested before or are substantially different than other seemingly similar ones and 3) just talk about one subject per thread

Moving to the Kings Court is also dependent on activity within the thread. If a thread breaks some of the rules but is generating a few hundred replies then it's possible we'll move it. If someone posts a well thought out idea which generates little or no discussion then there's little point in moving it to the court (it'd fall off the page within an hour or two). The main purpose of seperating the board was to cut down on the number of duplicates floating around the original suggestion board (there were times when the entire first thread of that board consisted of nothing but duplicate suggestions, with replies directing the starter to the original thread).
You're right though, titles should be edited to make it clear what the thread is about. As for multiple suggestions, quite often the initial thread will encompass six or seven suggestions, and discussion will focus almost exclusively on one. In that case then technically the thread is a single issue, even if the post starter had intended it to be more.

Well, that makes sense.  thanks for the reply.