Pre-Concept Stage of Version 2.0 - Just generating ideas

[Fate Flyer]

As much as I love this original design for FoG (granted, there have been some minor aesthetic tweaks since the board's creation), it has been on my mind (and the mind of Axiom Awaits/Tony/my boyfriend/the one behind the coding of the board) for a little while to renovate this place a bit and to bring it up to modern times. I'm not even sure what this would entail completely, but my boyfriend and I plan on eventually putting our heads together and generating some great ideas for this place. Granted, both our own lives have some order that is still in the process of being restored to them, and we're both in stressful and busy positions in our lives (he's finishing up with his Bachelor's degree, and we'll both be moving in a few months, while we're also currently job hunting), so there are a number of things that need to be sorted out first, but in the meantime and of course after some more things get smoothed over, we'd like to devote some more attention to the message board.

Tony is the web page developer, while I am the artist, so I know if we both work together, we can come up with some type of new design for the board that will be an improvement, but I'd like to get your opinions on anything that you guys would personally like to see changed. I'm sure you all have at least one thing you've noticed that you'd like to see different. Please understand that we do have some limitations though, since this board was created through Forumotion, and despite all of our creativity, we do not have absolute freedom. Of course, if you are completely happy with the look and feel of everything the way that it is now, then by all means, feel free to say so. We will be taking your suggestions into much consideration when time allows us to plan this further.

Something that I would like to personally see is the ability to have multiple forum skins. However, one major problem that I can already foresee with this is that if members change the color of their font to suit one theme, that font may not be visible on a different theme. It would make things challenging, unless our themes were of similar color schemes, which kind of defeats the purpose. Tony and I will have to talk more about it. He may have a way around this.

One question I do have is: if and when we do revamp FoG, would you prefer to keep with a darker layout like it is now, or would you like a more lighter-colored one?

[Loki]

I've always had a preference for darker layouts. I find them to be less of a strain on the eyes when reading (which is important given the purpose of the site).

[Gadreille]

I definitely prefer the darker layout. I can't think of anything that I would like changed that you can change, except for maybe these newfound "similar topics" that are at the bottom of every thread. The only reason why they bother me is because they are rarely actually similar in any way, sense or fashion

[Digital Muse]

I also agree with the darker layout for ease of reading ( important late at night or for the aged such as myself XD).

I also have checked a couple of the 'sumilar' topics and found only 1 thing out of dozens that was mildly of interest.

Lastly, the chatbox at the bottom of the page is a bit archaic. One cannot go idle for long without being logged off, you cannot open private rooms for specific RP discussions or PM anyone else in the room with questions or commentary. In fact...the only thing I do like is I can change colors on my font easily. Please bring back the old link.

[Kalon Ordona II]

I've never been in favor of multiple forum skins. I prefer unity to customization. I like the idea that everyone sees the same FOG.

Some suggestions, though? Hmm...
Perhaps the banner? I remember long ago when the fog of the FOG extended out of the image. Also, I think the "a community for advanced role-payers" could stand to be a little larger.

What you could add, though, is maybe some effects like having the buttons change or light up (or steam, but that would probably be difficult and hard on people's internets) when you move over them.

By and large, I think I like the boards how they are. If you just make little touches here and there to add polish, though, that's always welcome. No need to make radical changes, just keep improving what we already have. That's my two cents.

[Lara]

I agree with what Ryona said. I don't quite understand why they're there since I don't personally care about 'similar topics' when on an online forum. :p

My only suggestion would be to bring back the old/remodel the current chat room. Just because I liked how it used to be, hate the way it is now (the bottom-of-the-page business), and wouldn't mind seeing other versions since I already don't like it. XD

I like the darker skin. Bright ones kill my eyes...

[The Melancholy Spirit]

Personally, the way I look at this is: FoG is a roleplaying forum. I'm not a fan of the similiar topics or the chatbox at the bottom, but other than that I love how the current FoG looks and works. And, as I said, it is a roleplaying forum. As long as it works and looks decent, why bother messing it?

Just my personal opinion, I'd rather not see anything change on FoG.

[Gunneh]

I think I'm gonna have to agree with what everyone else has said, Fate. I may be biased since I set up the IRC, but I've also been hearing a lot of talk of people not exactly being too keen on the Chat Box because of those things like the Auto-Logout and other things. Also, as it's been previously stated, the "Similar Topics" at the bottom of the threads are, more than usually, barely similar in any way.

As for more aesthetic things, the darker motif for everything is an oldie but a goodie. Plus, I don't think we mentioned it to you, but in the time that you were gone and Weiss was Admin, we were actually working with Agenda to get a theme changer made to change everything to a much lighter (and brighter) theme. It got made and tossed into all of the coding...and nobody really seemed to like it. Plus, the one we were using was buggy and it messed with several things. That's not to say that Axiom wouldn't do a better job, of course, but it needs to be mentioned.

Aside from that...maybe what Kalon said with the icons would be neat, but it might lag on some people's connections or cause bigger problems for those users with slower internet connections.

[Fate Flyer]

Thank you very much for all the quick replies and feedback on this, everyone. We appreciate any advice, and please do note that you can post in here as time goes on if more things occur to you.

It sounds pretty unanimous that the dark theme is working for everyone, so that's definitely something that's good to know. (It's interesting that a lighter theme was tried out previously.)

As for the Similar Topics at the bottom, I'm not sure where that came from, but that appears to be something new Forumotion just installed. As far as I know, I can't get rid of that, but I'll try researching. I completely agree though that it just seems to be taking up space and doesn't seem to be of any help whatsoever.

If you guys all prefer the IRC chatroom, I may have to relocate that button I used and then find where the link might have moved to, as it seemed to have been completely misplaced from FoG. The chatroom at the bottom is just something that's already preinstalled into the Forumotion system and is a standard chat for this message board. The reason that I don't really want to encourage a nice, fancy, big chatroom for us is primarily because I'd prefer people to use FoG to talk and discuss things as opposed to only talking in the chatroom. While it's certainly fine to sometimes meet up and chat live with your fellow members, we do have OoC forums here as well, and that's actually something that I'm trying to work on and hoping to improve as well, is the level of activity within the forums.

Like I said, thanks so much for getting back to me on this right away, and I'll pass this along to Axiom Awaits as well. As I mentioned though, these future improvements may come along in the semi-distant future, as in a few months from now, toward the end of the year or possibly the beginning of next. I know that Axiom is currently working on designing a professional website for a restaurant at the moment, so when school isn't taking up his time, he also has that to occupy it. But I'm sure you guys more than understand.

[The Ghost Writer]

The Similar Topics feature was implemented by Forumotion several months ago in one of their rarely useful updates. When it was implemented, admins had the option of turning them on or off and by default they were set to off. However, a recent update with a failed advanced BBC editor (where the results had eToxic clients in an absolute uproar!) set them to on by default and board owners can no longer find a way to turn them off.

eToxic representatives claimed that the Similar Topics feature was implemented as a way for board owners to connect and interact more with different audiences, but the real scheme lies with the company simply generating more hits to their domains and increasing their ranks on search indexes. Millions of users, five links per thread, and all leading to random eToxic-owned URLs. Maniacally genius if you ask me. Here's a tip: try removing the links via CSS, or JavaScript.

[Gadreille]

The reason that I don't really want to encourage a nice, fancy, big chatroom for us is primarily because I'd prefer people to use FoG to talk and discuss things as opposed to only talking in the chatroom. While it's certainly fine to sometimes meet up and chat live with your fellow members, we do have OoC forums here as well, and that's actually something that I'm trying to work on and hoping to improve as well, is the level of activity within the forums.

I quite agree. That chat room is the bane of Emoria's existence, in my opinion. Not that it's very active anyway. But it sucks sitting on FOG for an hour with absolutely no one to talk to because I don't get on the chat program, and no one bothers to write on the actual website. It gives the illusion of inactivity that is very unimpressive.

[Fate Flyer]

The Similar Topics feature was implemented by Forumotion several months ago in one of their rarely useful updates. When it was implemented, admins had the option of turning them on or off and by default they were set to off. However, a recent update with a failed advanced BBC editor (where the results had eToxic clients in an absolute uproar!) set them to on by default and board owners can no longer find a way to turn them off.

eToxic representatives claimed that the Similar Topics feature was implemented as a way for board owners to connect and interact more with different audiences, but the real scheme lies with the company simply generating more hits to their domains and increasing their ranks on search indexes. Millions of users, five links per thread, and all leading to random eToxic-owned URLs. Maniacally genius if you ask me. Here's a tip: try removing the links via CSS, or JavaScript.

Oh, wow. Thanks for this information, Ghost Writer. You saved me some time with this. However...ugh. Although Forumotion is the biggest "free" message board builder, it does present a lot of little headaches, such as this one. I'm sure it wouldn't be a problem for Axiom Awaits (who needs to rejoin FoG) to simply get rid of it in the CSS code.

The reason that I don't really want to encourage a nice, fancy, big chatroom for us is primarily because I'd prefer people to use FoG to talk and discuss things as opposed to only talking in the chatroom. While it's certainly fine to sometimes meet up and chat live with your fellow members, we do have OoC forums here as well, and that's actually something that I'm trying to work on and hoping to improve as well, is the level of activity within the forums.

I quite agree. That chat room is the bane of Emoria's existence, in my opinion. Not that it's very active anyway. But it sucks sitting on FOG for an hour with absolutely no one to talk to because I don't get on the chat program, and no one bothers to write on the actual website. It gives the illusion of inactivity that is very unimpressive.

I'm glad you agree as well, Ryona. I have noticed a decline in posting activity around the boards, and it'd be nice to get people involved in conversations more often once again. It seems people haven't been creating as many new threads either, which also gives the impression that FoG has been going through a bit of some down time. Once I find some more free time, I also would like to start promoting again, and of course after Axiom and I have a chance to update some things around here, I will feel very motivated to show off the boards to any potential new members in order to help increase the activity and expand our FoG family. ^_^

[Bird of Hermes]

For the same reasons that Loki and others have stated, I like darker themes because of the ease on the eyes, especially when reading longer posts.

I would not be opposed to new forum skins, but it would be very difficult to implement if people use font colors other than the default.

I don't really like the IRC, so my opinion on it is biased.

I don't know much about Forumotion, so I can't comment on the technically details. XD

One thing I have noticed is that, at least for me, it is difficult to find topics that interest me if I am just looking through the forum. This is primarily in the role-play section where the title is the only reliable indicator of the type of role-play it is. I wish there was a way to, say, find all of the active fantasy role-plays or find just role-plays with steam-punk elements. The search engine is pretty useless to me. I do not know if there is any feasible way to improve this without unneeded clutter. However, if I don't check the new topics or replies daily, I find that I miss threads that I may like to join and the only way to find them is to go to each individual topic and read the posts to see if I am interested just to find out that the role-play is one that is not in the genre or topic I was looking for.

Also, a listing of active role-plays would help, but I think that has been deemed unfeasible in the past.

[Fate Flyer]

One thing I have noticed is that, at least for me, it is difficult to find topics that interest me if I am just looking through the forum. This is primarily in the role-play section where the title is the only reliable indicator of the type of role-play it is. I wish there was a way to, say, find all of the active fantasy role-plays or find just role-plays with steam-punk elements. The search engine is pretty useless to me. I do not know if there is any feasible way to improve this without unneeded clutter. However, if I don't check the new topics or replies daily, I find that I miss threads that I may like to join and the only way to find them is to go to each individual topic and read the posts to see if I am interested just to find out that the role-play is one that is not in the genre or topic I was looking for.

Also, a listing of active role-plays would help, but I think that has been deemed unfeasible in the past.

Yes, agreed. This is something I feel could probably be improved upon as well, and within the very foreseeable future. The search option here is not really all that helpful either, I find. I wish they [as in Forumotion] could improve that function, as it doesn't always work properly or doesn't always find everything related to what you're searching for.

However, it would be easy to split the role play forums up into different categories so that members could find the right genre or theme they are looking for. Of course, this would not only mean creating a lot more forums, but also looking at all the RP topics we already have and then determining which category they fit into in order to move them to their rightful spot. Still, there is another option where we could eliminate that problem by simply putting all old, abandoned or forgotten role plays into their own "ghost town" or "lost souls" type of forum for them to rest. What does everyone think of this? It also raised the question though: Would we completely do away with the Advanced, Casual, and One-On-One sections? Or would we keep them and simply put ALL the new categories (ie. Sci-Fi, Fantasy, Steampunk, etc.) into subforums of each?


EDIT: Oh, and something else that I personally thought of that I would like to have fixed is that when you click on the name of a topic from the main front page of FoG, it doesn't take you to the latest post; it just takes you to the first post of that topic. It's really irksome, and I've never seen a message board do that before. It wasn't always like that, so I'm not sure why they would have changed it to be that way, but I do not like that at all. I'm hoping we can change that.

[Bird of Hermes]

However, it would be easy to split the role play forums up into different categories so that members could find the right genre or theme they are looking for. Of course, this would not only mean creating a lot more forums, but also looking at all the RP topics we already have and then determining which category they fit into in order to move them to their rightful spot. Still, there is another option where we could eliminate that problem by simply putting all old, abandoned or forgotten role plays into their own "ghost town" or "lost souls" type of forum for them to rest. What does everyone think of this? It also raised the question though: Would we completely do away with the Advanced, Casual, and One-On-One sections? Or would we keep them and simply put ALL the new categories (ie. Sci-Fi, Fantasy, Steampunk, etc.) into subforums of each?

I suppose either would work. Simply placing the old role-plays in their own category would likely be the simplest. If we did only categories, we would have to decide where previous things go which may prove too much work.

[Lara]

For the idea of genres, it might be easier to just have a subheading under the title where the creator of the roleplay would write what they think the genres would be. I know that quest-type RP site I work with has employed this in the past for informing people of "newbie" threads versus character-specific or more difficult tasks, and I feel that has worked well for us in the past. It could be just as easily brought in to work with genres, providing the creator is willing to decide what genres their roleplay might fit into. And that way, they can also write down multiple genres if applicable, so you don't have people confused over where to but roleplays that cross genres.

[Guest]

I don't know. I personally like things how they are and wouldn't suggest any big changes. It's really easy to navigate and it's aesthetically pleasing in design, as it is right now.

Making different sections unnecessarily complicates things, in my opinion. When new people come here, for some it might be a bit overwhelming to see a bunch of different sections. And decisions for what sections to put them in might get sketchy, especially with overlapping potential, like horror, romance, action, etc.(not sure what genres you would separate things into) and it gets restrictive too. What if I make a role-play with multiple different genre qualities? If I put it in only one section, then it's not in others that might fit and people who aren't interested in the selected category will pass it by even though the topic itself might have other qualities that fit their interests.

And Lara suggested the idea I had, so I'm gonna second the subheading/labels idea.

EDIT: Oh, and I also like the non-fancy chat idea to encourage forum activity. It looks really dead here most of the time and will probably discourage new users. And whenever I go into chat, half the time people just sit around not saying anything anyways(at least not the main channel).

[Digital Muse]

[quote= Oh, and something else that I personally thought of that I would like to have fixed is that when you click on the name of a topic from the main front page of FoG, it doesn't take you to the latest post; it just takes you to the first post of that topic. It's really irksome, and I've never seen a message board do that before. It wasn't always like that, so I'm not sure why they would have changed it to be that way, but I do not like that at all. I'm hoping we can change that.

Actually, if you click on the tiny dark arrow after the last poster's name from the main FoG page it takes you to the last post of a thread.

As far as moving defunct RPs to a 'Ghost Town (a name I really like, BTW), I think this would be a great idea. It would also keep things clean, but allow access to old RPs fro reading, resurrecting or resource materials

[Lara]

I definitely like the idea of "archiving" old RPs. I know that I love going back and rereading things that I've been in, and it's incredibly troublesome to have to save them all in a Word document (which I used to be stuck doing for Gaia XD ).

[Gadreille]

We would need a definition for what is "old" or "dead". But it does sound like a good idea, as long as there is the possiblity for it to be moved out again, should some miracle befall the players.

I agree with everyone that I like FOG the way it is, except for a few bugs that I already know are the fault of forumotion and not FOG, but I wouldn't mind seeing something new. I have seen some sites that pull off skins very well, and even some that change with the seasons and holidays. It can work, but I'm sure it takes a lot of work.

[Digital Muse]

I might recommend contacting the person running the RP for a final ruling (if possible) before moving anything.

[Kalon Ordona II]

Genre subforums? Eek, that's what I think of it.
I've seen that done in Gaia and some other role-playing forums, and I don't like it because almost all role-plays are multi-genre. Compartmentalization can all too easily be overdone.

Another thing I've seen on Gaia is genre tags in role-play topic titles. I don't like these either, because it clutters up an otherwise neat-looking title. However, it could work very well with the Search function, since it searches topic titles. If you searched [F] for Fantasy, for example, you'd see a list of all the topics with [F] in the title.

*IDEA*
I have just thought of the solution! We can use tags like [F], [R], [M] and so on, but in the Interest Check only. That way the titles can stay nice for both the IC and OOC, and everything will be that much more manageable. You'll be able to tell instantly whether it's in Advanced, Casual or One-on-One, and the date should tell you whether it's active or not. We could even have a tag for Closed, Private, Accepting, or similar notes on whether more players are wanted.

All we'd have to do is have something in FOG information near creating topics, to list the genre tags and their definitions and encourage new topic creators to add these to interest checks (only) so that people can find them with one easy search.

[Fate Flyer]

Alright, so genre subforums are probably not the answer, is what I'm gathering, and I'm perfectly okay with that. I like the idea of putting a tag in front of the title though, but there may actually be a way of doing that (like choosing an option from a drop-down menu before you post in the RPing section that'll display before your title) in the coding, but I'm not sure. It's something I'll have to bring up to Axiom.

As for PMing each and every role play starter to inquire about their RP and its current status, that would be near impossible. Not only would it take quite a long time to do that, but I also wouldn't be holding my breath to hear back from most of them to begin with. I propose (if we do decide to move dead RPs to their own forum) that role plays that have not been posted in for a month automatically get moved there. They can always be brought back to life if their thread starter wants to PM me or a mod about it. I think it's pretty safe to assume that if no one has posted within a full month, its more than likely not going to be posted in again.

[Gadreille]

For most threads, that is true. However, I know for a fact that in the larger, slow moving role plays such as Sephiris and Emoria, a month can go by with no posting and then suddenly spring back to life again. Not that I don't think this should happen. Perhaps with the knowledge of an impending move it would drive players to post a bit more frequently. There are a lot of people here on FOG that just don't work well under pressure, so it will be a bit of an adjustment I still think it's a good rule though.

[Digital Muse]

I agree, a month is not long enough to wait. I'd say wait more like 6 months to be absolutely sure.

[Fate Flyer]

Oh, that's true about RPs like Emoria. I also wouldn't want to make people feel as if they are being pressured to post and therefore encouraging probably poorer quality posts.

Six months definitely sounds fair.

[Gadreille]

Oh yes, definitely six months. Also, you may end up getting "volunteer" threads. I'd be happy to let you know all of the threads I ran that are now extinct, and any in the future. So it won't completely depend on you looking at every single thread to determine on your own.

[Digital Muse]

Me too, Ryona.

[Bird of Hermes]

Kalon does have a point. Genre types may get too confusing or too cluttered. It may be more trouble than it's worth.

I like the idea of placing old role-plays in their own section as long as they can be taken out. I think it will really help. Of course, we would need a threshold. I would suggest three months.

The only other thing I would improve upon would be to have some way of knowing which role-plays were accepting members and which are not. Some people already do this very clearly on their own. However, sometimes I have had to read through many responses just to find that a role-play is closed to more players.

[The Ghost Writer]

Alright, so genre subforums are probably not the answer, is what I'm gathering, and I'm perfectly okay with that. I like the idea of putting a tag in front of the title though, but there may actually be a way of doing that (like choosing an option from a drop-down menu before you post in the RPing section that'll display before your title) in the coding, but I'm not sure. It's something I'll have to bring up to Axiom.

Definitely possible... but with JavaScript. Forumotion doesn't provide an option for that right out of their box of broken toys.

As for PMing each and every role play starter to inquire about their RP and its current status, that would be near impossible. Not only would it take quite a long time to do that, but I also wouldn't be holding my breath to hear back from most of them to begin with. I propose (if we do decide to move dead RPs to their own forum) that role plays that have not been posted in for a month automatically get moved there. They can always be brought back to life if their thread starter wants to PM me or a mod about it. I think it's pretty safe to assume that if no one has posted within a full month, its more than likely not going to be posted in again.

You can enable specific forums to prune posts after x amount of days. Note that pruning doesn't mean deletion; it means moving (for those that don't speak the forum lingo).

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