Where did the IRC Channel sticky go?
 

I am working off a different computer w/o my bookmark to the Dom IRC page and i could have sworn there used to be a stickied thread that talked about the Dom channel but either I am blind or it vanished.
http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/image...s/confused.gif

Re: Where did the IRC Channel sticky go?
 

It's probably been unstickied to reduce the cltter at the top of the forum. Search for it on the forum, then mark it as a favorite thread and it will create a bookmark in your profile when you go to see My Home.

Re: Where did the IRC Channel sticky go?
 

I haven't noticed that it went down, but I honestly think that we should have an IRC sticky. The IRC channel is the second most, if not THE most important source of information and on games on Dom3, and frankly it needs all the traffic/users that it can get. If people think that the old thread was getting old, I could make a new one which has all the info in it.

Re: Where did the IRC Channel sticky go?
 

There's two stickies which are not necessary:

Reviews and Post-Relase Press
The gamers on the Illwinter forums don't need reminders on why DOM_3 is great. Ideally this should be moved to the General Shrapnel Games Forums to lure new gamers.


New Dominions Patch Is Given Unto Thee
New Dominions Patch threads really don't need a sticky as they will remain at the top of the forum with postings of appreciation and fade away appropiately with time. This is another rotting corpse sticky just cluttering the forum.

Re: Where did the IRC Channel sticky go?
 

That's my notion as well. It's nice to see the Dom3 reviews and post-release press, but the stuff is getting kinda old. Maybe the Dom3 game page on Shrapnel would be a better place for those awards instead. I assume that people coming here have already visited that page and/or bought the game.

Re: Where did the IRC Channel sticky go?
 

Sticky restored.

Re: Where did the IRC Channel sticky go?
 

Thanks!

Re: Where did the IRC Channel sticky go?
 

Instead of more stickies, why not just include the information in the FAQ? I am not against the IRC thread being stickied, but it would be cleaner to consolidate where possible.

Re: Where did the IRC Channel sticky go?
 

I can add the IRC stuff to the FAQ in the next few days. That will also serve the purpose of putting the FAQ at the very top of the forum for a while.

As far as the Reviews & Press thread and the patch thread, I just asked Annette and and orders are that both threads are staying because they are good for new people. For us old hands they are unnecessary clutter, but the rationale behind the decision is sound.

Re: Where did the IRC Channel sticky go?
 

IRC section added to FAQ, old thread unstickied.

Re: Where did the IRC Channel sticky go?
 

Thanks Edi

Re: Where did the IRC Channel sticky go?
 

Thats probably better. I dont really see it with its own sticky anymore than the wiki, or the strategy newsgroup, or skype talk channel should.

Re: Where did the IRC Channel sticky go?
 

I'm here since over a year now, and I never heard about an official Wiki or a strategy newsgroup. And Skype talk channel? Does Skype even offer something like this?

The IRC channel, believe it or not, is IMHO the most useful resource for people who have a question about the game, want to participate in a blitz/duel game, or just like to hang out with fellow Dom3 people. It's especially an invaluable resource for Newbies. You'll find members of the MP playing and of the modding community there and can directly talk to them, way easier than the forums could ever be. So in my opinion it would really warrant its own sticky, although I am fine with it being in the FAQ, too. Just make the thing stand out, so that people that know IRC and that ARE interested can find it instantly and don't have to dig.

Re: Where did the IRC Channel sticky go?
 

If necessary, I can reorganize the FAQ thread so that the IRC channel post is closer to the top, perhaps as the second or even the first post and everything else moved one post down. Otherwise it's best to keep as the last post in the FAQ so it's easiest to find.

More stickies are a bad thing because we can't desticky the admin ones and the bug shortlist and strategy index are absolutely essential for the functioning of the forum. That would leave only the introductions thread as a candidate for unstickying, but I'd rather have that than a separate "Hi, I'm new!" thread for every new person.

Re: Where did the IRC Channel sticky go?
 

If we think having a sticky IRC thread is a bad idea (it never bothered me, but these things are subjective of course), I think it would be an excellent idea to have it as the first entry in the FAQ.

Re: Where did the IRC Channel sticky go?
 

I'll do that tomorrow.

Re: Where did the IRC Channel sticky go?
 

Well its all subjective. If you go to the welcome thread you will see many people who came here from the strategy newsgroup, and many more still only use that as their source of answers. I dont know of any who came here from IRC.

There is a Dom3 wiki which has as many supporters as the irc channel.

As for skype, there was a discussion to create a voice-channel which is as easy as creating an irc channel. There was disagreement on which program to use but I had thought that skype had won out. Maybe not. I dont really keep up on any of these. The only official channel is this forum. But I see no problem with having the IRC in the FAQ post. Its also in the MP forum in the MP Servers post.

Re: Where did the IRC Channel sticky go?
 

I have to say the IRC channel is a huge deal. I've probably found out more on there than on the forums.

I've never run into the wiki or the strategy newsgroup. Do you have links?

Re: Where did the IRC Channel sticky go?
 

Well, I wouldn't know, because "Introduce yourself" topics are not my thing. I'm not sure if I ever looked in there, but I certainly didn't introduce myself there. If you have something to say, then do it. But just saying Hi is talk for talking's sake, without meaning and thus of no interest to me.

Obviously, because they'd have to find the IRC channel first. Which they'd do here. That's why it needs advertising space. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

Again, what's that Dom3 wiki site address? I'm not sure if I know what you speak of. I know of a Wiki for Dom3 maps, one for a ladder of MP players and duel reports initiated by Folket, a Dominions section over at the StrategyWiki, and some very extensive chinese Wiki on Dom3 as well. Save for the last one, those Wikis are more or less dead and don't seem to find much use/updates. I don't want to underestimate the laudable effort and work that the people have put into these things, but let's face it, that's how it is - the StrategyWiki for example consists of more hollowed out skeleton pages than anything else. I really think that we could use a good Wiki on Dom3, by the way, I just don't think that we have anything in that regard yet. That's all besides the point - a Wiki is still for static information. The IRC channel is for direct communication.

I have tried Google for Skype channels, but while I'm usually pretty good at these things I don't think that I've found something which matches well enough, besides a proposal/plea which comes close on some forum, two years ago. The only thing that I know are conferences in Skype. Which require that somebody who wants to join it has to be explicitly invited by the creator of the conference, at the very least. There are more gripes that I have with Skype:

- you need to register with Skype if you want to use it
- if you do voice chat, everybody who wants to join needs a microphone
- if you do voice chat, the performance becomes horrible the more people join in, the usual prerogative is "everybody not talking kills the mike" and this will still make people on slow connections drop out uncontrollably
- it's a proprietary protocol, and I know of no software besides the official Skype builds that can utilize it, unlike e.g. Jabber
- it's P2P software which uses your client to stream voice chat of other users over your line while it's running, which is bad for people with quota-limited Internet, like me

Given that IRC is pretty widespread already, I don't think that there's an alternative that comes close, besides maybe Jabber - but I don't know enough about that yet and while I heard lots of good about it, I think that thing still hasn't taken off as much as it should.

Re: Where did the IRC Channel sticky go?
 

Bah! Of course the IRC channel thread should be stickied. 'Tis a priori truth. All suggestions to the contrary are cynical twaddle. Come chat with us. You'll love it! Free balloons at the door! http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

Re: Where did the IRC Channel sticky go?
 

Please sticky the IRC channel thread to the top. Plz plz.

Re: Where did the IRC Channel sticky go?
 

The old IRC channel sticky is not coming back, but the FAQ thread has been reorganized and renamed and the IRC channel info is now in the first post. Thanks to Pasha for pointing out the Colloquy client for Mac, which I'd forgotten to list when I put the IRC post together.

Re: Where did the IRC Channel sticky go?
 

@Edi:
Did you see the irc post in the MP Servers sticky?
Some people are more willing to check something out if they dont have to download/install something new to get there. It might be best to start with a standard URL link so that people can see if it works for them. Then move on to the info on downloading other softwares if they need it.
<a href="irc://irc.gamesurge.net/dominions" target="_blank">irc://irc.gamesurge.net/dominions</a>

Re: Where did the IRC Channel sticky go?
 

Yeah, I took a look. Not substantially different than the list of browser based options in the FAQ IRC post, but I changed it a bit so the browser based options are more prominent and the first two links are into options that require no installation or configuration of any new stuff.

Is there something that the FAQ entry does not cover after these changes or something that needs further improvement? In my own opinion the information there should be sufficient, but I'm not opposed to someone taking the time to do a more detailed writeup of things.