Do we need another forum?
 

It seems to me that half the most active threads in the Dom2 forum are all MP game coordination/play threads. Interesting reads, sometimes, but they are usually far too long to catch up if you havent been there from the get-go. I was thinking that it might be useful to have another forum like:

Dom2 Multiplayer

or something like that? What are people's opinions on the subject?

Re: Do we need another forum?
 

Sounds like a very good idea. After all, other games have more than one forum...

Re: Do we need another forum?
 

I'd love to see all the MP threads moved into their own forum, leaving this one for Q&A.

That said, Yvelina, you might note that none of the other game's forums split MP apart. What you typically see is multiple forums per game developer, one per each of their games. SE4, which has even more Posts than Dom 2, doesn't appear to break out their MP games. OTOH, I don't know if the SE4 forum(s) are running the high percentage of MP threads (vs. Q&A threads) that the Dom 2 forum is.

Re: Do we need another forum?
 

In many ways it sound like a logical idea. The only problem I see is that anyone who's possibly in the market for a new game will have to regularly scan the MP forum as well as the discussion forum. If that's most of us, will we have actually have saved ourselves any time or effort?

Mark

Re: Do we need another forum?
 

Mark,

The majority of players of any computer game, even strongly MP ones like the various FPS and RTS play in SP. The ratio of MP to SP players on forums is typically a bit higher than the overall figure for a given game, because the sort of players who socialize (MP) are also more active on the Net in general as well. That said, I doubt that MP players of Dom 2, even on this forum, outnumber those that play in SP. Especially if you add in the forum lurkers.

EDIT: someone should do a poll on:

* SP only
* MP only
* mostly SP
* mostly MP
* don't play, just lurk here http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/yawn.gif

Re: Do we need another forum?
 

I ask several time ago about splitting the dom2 forum at least in 3 forum:

- map and mod editing (or modding)
- mp game
- other

so, if you are looking for new map and mods or help in map desing you go 1, if you are looking ofr a MP game you go 2 otherwise you stay 3 ...

I think people usually are looking for this 3 things

good play
Liga

Re: Do we need another forum?
 

I know I don't exactly pull a lot of weight here, but for what it's worth, I really like liga's three forum idea. Yes, I'm interested in all three aspects, but I typically come to the forums here with specific thoughts in mind, and that would certainly make it easier to find things.

Re: Do we need another forum?
 

Yes most games released have multiple forums such as:

General Gameplay
Game Strategies
Technicial Help & Bugs
Editor and Mod Making
Play-By-Email games
Multiplayer


Dominions_2 has everything jammed into one forum which is a bad idea.

Re: Do we need another forum?
 

actually the " Multiplayer/PBEM Registry " forum was created in response to the request from Dom2 players. It was supposed to be a place to do the AAR's and such. And there are ones for general OT stuff and for questions to Shrapnel which dont get much use.

I could see one for MODs and one for MAPs and one for FAQ's/NewbieQuestions.

Re: Do we need another forum?
 

meh. for this one i'm of the "if it ain't broke, don't fix it" persuasion.

Re: Do we need another forum?
 

It's a tough call. On the one hand, you want to have the MP threads very easily available, so that newbies and interested players can get at them with a minimum of hassle. But on the other hand you dont want any brand of forum traffic to get washed out by any other. And that seems to be whats happening now, as MP threads take up more than half of the top 25 or so thread positions.

I mean, even tho I am the one who started this thread I am still torn on it.

One thing I can say tho, is that I am against breaking the current forum out into too many smaller ones. Like its nice logically to have a MOD forum and a Newbie/FAQ forum, etc, etc. But until there is enough traffic to suggest a push in that direction (as there is with MP threads) then I dont think it is worthwhile, given that any division in the forums will result in some division in the Online community (even if it is just as simple as older/veteran players paying way more attention to the MP forum or something).

Re: Do we need another forum?
 

There already is a forum for multiplayer games, so there's no need to split this forum.

Re: Do we need another forum?
 

I don�t know if this can be done without Moderator intervention with the current software, but what would be nice in my view is if MP game threads were moved into a separate forum once the game was filled. For this to work well the thread poster would need to be able to do that.

That way everyone can easily keep an eye for games starting without being buried in threads for long running games. That being said, I don�t play MP with the forum people much (at all, currently) so its not a big deal to me either way, although I would like to decrease the clutter on the main board.

Re: Do we need another forum?
 

Perhaps if the forum were split, and a dedicated Dom 2-only MP game forum created, those who are creating MP threads might actually be encouraged to post in that forum rather than in this one. The existence of a general-use MP forum, as it stands now, does not seem to have registered on the consciousness of the Dom 2 MP players, or they don't like Dom 2 threads mixing with those of other games.

Re: Do we need another forum?
 

The forum should definitely be split into at least three others. Why we're stuck with one forum is just sick when compared with other game forums.

Suggested New Forums:
General Gameplay
Game Strategies
Technicial Help & Bugs
Editor and Mod Making
Play-By-Email games
Multiplayer

Re: Do we need another forum?
 

well, that's far too many. there do seem like an extraordinary number of game threads lately, so you could easily argue for a subforum. I'd just be a bit worried that a lot of people wouldn't notice new games as readily.

Re: Do we need another forum?
 

As long as each forum is properly titled that shouldn't be a problem. Other official game forums typically have at least 4 other sub-forums.

Re: Do we need another forum?
 

I wouldn't split the forum into a lot of forums but just a "Main" and "MP Games" forum might be ok.

- Kel

Re: Do we need another forum?
 

We ought to split off the maps/mod-making as well, just to make Gandalf happy. Gandalf is the one who would be going through all the work of splitting the forum and moving threads around, and he's expressed his own preference for having a separate maps/mod-making forum. Hence there should be a separate maps/mod-making to "reward" Gandalf for all the work that's going to be dumped on him.

Re: Do we need another forum?
 

There is a general forum for multiplayer games, but by the argument that this thread is based on that is not a good solution. If you were looking for an MP game/player/etc, instead of sifting through general Dom2 Posts you'd just be sifting through SE4 MP Posts or some other game.

Re: Do we need another forum?
 

There are few MP threads on the SEIV board, and they are mostly there to draw players to some games/seek replacements. So if Dominions does go to this generic forum, I would say most threads there would be Dominions related.

However, doing so might not be such a good idea for the other games. If less popular games have only one thread once in a while there, their players may not want to browse through fifty Dominions 2 threads before seeking the one thread they want to read.

Re: Do we need another forum?
 

There is also the point that if there is one forum for PbEm games then people going there might get interested in one of the other games being discussed, and it. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

Re: Do we need another forum?
 

True enough, if said players are patient enough/do not mind being invaded by Nagas, Vampire Queens and their ilk. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

Re: Do we need another forum?
 

Yah, yah, let's spread our dominion there !

- Kel

Re: Do we need another forum?
 

Double edged sword. Positive side is cross-pollenation b/w games. Negative side is what we've already discussed in this thread: one group or another is forced to sift in order to find the threads they are interested in.

My personal opinion is that if this was our only recourse I think I'd actually opt to just keep everything in the dom2 general thread. I'd rather have to sift here then go to another forum and then sift anyway :}

Re: Do we need another forum?
 

I'd rather have nntp gateway, so I can choose to view what I want and let computer do the sifting http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

Re: Do we need another forum?
 

I think having a seperate forum for MP games is a good idea.

Re: Do we need another forum?
 

There's several reasons to have multiple sub-forums for any game:

1) Makes searching a forum more effective and less time consuming.

2) When developers wish to review/examine technical game issues they will have a specific forum for this. Currently they only have a topic sticky which doesn't always get used. Plus how many times have we seen new topics where some gamer can't get the game to work where they haven't tried updating drivers or clean-booting the system... we would rarely see these if there was a technical/bug sub-forum.

3) A multiplayer forum would allow those gamers to easily find new/current games and other related topics.

4) I'm sure I've missed other reasons as well since several sub-forums exist for virtually any PC_Game. Since there isn't one popular game I can think of which doesn't have several sub-forums on the official website... Dominions_2 deserves the same respect.

Re: Do we need another forum?
 

As a rank noob (still awaiting my copy of the game), I'm all in favor of splitting the forums. I would especially welcome a "game play" section with plenty of stickies for such as I.