The Complete "Subforum" Suggestion! (Totally Updated!)

Hey Tip.It.

I am Devoted12, and I truly think that the Help and Advice board is totally chaos! I have sent PM's to some Adminstrators asking if we should report all the misplaced Help and Advice topics that belong in one of the Help and Advice sub-forums. They all responded with the clear answer of YES, that will help greatly. So, I tend to go over to the Help and Advice everyone once and awhile to clear up the most recent topics. Although those get changed, which is a great thing because it makes our boards look so much nicer, later on, the same person will misplace their topic again.

Because of this, I would like to know if there is any way we can merge the subforums and make the Help and Advice forum how it was in the past. By doing this, the users are less intimidated by the many subforums they have to chose before they ask their question. Because the users are less intimidated, they can get an answer faster due to more people visiting the forums because the confusion or "maze" has been torn down and the old, easier Help and Advice was restored.

It has been said by a couple of mods and even an Administrator that by merging the subforums, it will put less work and pressure on their shoulders. They will have more time to devote to more important issues instead of attending to the misplaced threads in Help and Advice.

So, this seems like a win win situation. The users will like the idea, and the mods seem to love the idea. What do you have to lose?

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Here are quotes regarding the Help and Advice Merge topic.

Probably an easy way to make this work better would be to remove the main H&A board and make it a sub-forum in itself. By this, when you click on the Help and Advice board link, you'll be taken to a list of sub-forums rather than 2 sub-forums and a general help and advice. This way, people will see the multiple forums and will be more likely to post in the correct one since there won't necessarily be one that is viewed more than the others.

What you do is when you click on Help and Advice it takes you to a page in which you HAVE to click on either Skill, Quest & Mini-Game Help, Money-Making, Monster, Item, NPC Help, Help & Advice Archive, or General Help And Advice. By doing this, it makes it so the person wishing to post the topic has to pick which subject his topic is about instead of being able to post it without giving the correct sub-forum a glance! This is a good idea! Thanks for it. :)

What I would like to see be done with the forums overall is the actual removal of some of the subforums. This is crazy, you say! Not really. In my experiences, extremely active communities actually have less boards than we have here--and the quality of the threads seem to be a bit better than ours as well. Some of you probably know that I have posted this on previous suggestion threads but I feel it needs mentioning again once and awhile. The fewer the boards, the better in my opinion. Instead of having three boards serving one general topic, that board is left by itself with threads constantly moving and changing positions on the first (and second, third) pages. It is up to the user(s) to keep the threads alive; in the end, the most popular and the most interesting threads are on page one while the stupid/noob threads are on the later pages, constantly being pushed back.

 

 

 

Going back to the original point of this suggestion, I think the help board's current state is confusing. I think subforums are confusing and/or unnecessary. Combine the help board once more and make it more fast paced. Not only will the author's question be answered faster but it will allow for more "loose" moderation, as people don't post stupid responses saying that "this thread belongs in board X." That's another downfall of splitting up boards - the constant posts by wannabe-moderators stating that a thread is in the wrong place. Pet peeve of mine.

 

 

 

Very well thought out post, Devoted. Good read.

 

 

In the end, I'd like to see the mindset of the help board user change. RuneScape is changing frequently enough that people wishing to be helpful will never be bored. And people wishing to get an answer to their question will receive one promptly, almost like a chat room. If such a (re)merge were to take place, I (again) would like to see little moderation take place. If you want an answer, you'll have to post in the proper manner or else you'll be stuck without any information. Your post won't get locked - worse, it will go to page two and no one will ever see it again.

 

By seperating the forums, I believe that a lot of mods are having to do a lot of extra work that is not necessary. I know I have given these mods a lot of the work due to all my reports, but I thought the sub-forums were there to stay, therefore, that was the best action to take. By eliminating the subforums, the popular questions stay up, and the stupid, immature questions go away. Plus, a person who wishes to answer the question doesn't have to go through a maze if you will to just get to the right question. Since the subforums were created, I saw a decrease in people visiting those forums. I rarely see more than two people on that forum! Before, many people visited the forum because it was easy to pick and choose what question they wished to answer.

I think by eliminating unneeded subforums is, in fact, the best way to go. Less work for the moderators, which leads to less moderators being needed. Like The Sith said, it will also weed out all the wannabe mods that report things (I am guilty of it, I did it ALL day). Doing all this will vanquish a lot of the stress that mods and administrative members have to deal with on a day to day basis.

 

I have to agree splitting Help/ Advice into subforums is complicating/intimidating for the users.

 

Getting a answer to a question should be easy and quick. Not having to stop to look through the

 

subforums to find the correct forum to post on.

 

I am not a big fan of subforums I actually feel that the old H/A forum worked out well. What I would like

 

to see is maybe 1 subforum for Moneymaking/Quest help.

 

This is one of the biggest issues in my opinion. The new Help and Advice is WAY to slow. Just yesterday a kid posted his topic in two different places on the Help and Advice forum just to be seen and get his answer. This is obviously not a good thing to have going in a forum. The question wasn't even complicated, you could find it in a Tip.It guide in 10 seconds. The old forums were fast and easy, that's how they need to be again!

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Now, the General P2P merge with the General forum!

The Sith brought the idea up so I will let him and Tripsis explain it!

I'll try to check in with this thread tomorrow. I personally am for the removal of subforums on a variety of our boards (along with the merging of boards, for example Gen and Gen P2P - its current state is very ambiguous) but not without proper discussion by users and staff.

I actually completely agree with that. While it's nice in concept, it just isn't working out. Everyone knows that General P2P gets more attention than General, so they post things in P2P that should go in General. At times it is a bit straining on us moderators when users want their thread in P2P for more attention when it doesn't belong there. I'd be all for merging those two.

 

 

 

I do believe that the original intent of subforums was to condense the size of the forum to make it less intimidating. While it's nice for organizational purposes (as I already said), I don't think that's what's best for the users (especially judging by the large number of angry threads we had once the subforums were implemented). I really do think that we should be here to accommodate their desires and comfort as the staff is here to serve the users, not ourselves. I think that eliminating many of the subforums will make the users' and our lives easier

So there you have it folks the complete view of what we believe should happen on the Subforum issue. I will add more as time progresses

Well, thats my two cents,

Thanks for reading this and hopefully taking it into consideration! :)

Devoted12

True that there are a lot of misplaced topics, but that isn't the Tip.it Staffs' fault, is it? I think users should be smart enough to understand where to put their own topic, and where not to.

I agree that this is a tad bit of a problem in the Help & Advice forum. I'd be more than happy to poke in now and than and sort through them :)

I agree with you. I never said it was Tip.It's fault. I actually said they were doing a great job! But, the fact of the matter is that spam or any other misplaced topic isn't Tip.It's fault either, yet they still take care of the problem. I think the poster should be able to decide which forum to put their topic in, but in reality, it doesn't work that way. If you look on almost any of the forums, there is a locked or moved topic. This is because people don't pay better attention by using the search button, or knowing where to put their topic. I believe we need to monitor that forum a little more until people get the picture. Then, it will reduce the problems on this board entirely.

I also noticed that most misplaced topics are supposed to go into Help and Advice. By clairfying which topics should go in which sub-forum and also enforcing this, people may be less inclined to misplace their topic due to all the support the forum is receiving.

I agree that this is a tad bit of a problem in the Help & Advice forum. I'd be more than happy to poke in now and than and sort through them :)

Thanks Tripsis, you are always a big help! If you don't mind every once and awhile I will poke my head in there too and report all the misplaced topics. :wink:

Thank you all for the input :)

Probably an easy way to make this work better would be to remove the main H&A board and make it a sub-forum in itself. By this, when you click on the Help and Advice board link, you'll be taken to a list of sub-forums rather than 2 sub-forums and a general help and advice. This way, people will see the multiple forums and will be more likely to post in the correct one since there won't necessarily be one that is viewed more than the others.

Probably an easy way to make this work better would be to remove the main H&A board and make it a sub-forum in itself. By this, when you click on the Help and Advice board link, you'll be taken to a list of sub-forums rather than 2 sub-forums and a general help and advice. This way, people will see the multiple forums and will be more likely to post in the correct one since there won't necessarily be one that is viewed more than the others.

That is a great idea! I will be sure to add that to my post while giving you credit of course! Thanks for the help.

Thanks everyone :)

Devoted12

I agree with dark regarding the best way to organize things - I've seen that done before and think it may help.

I think the main problem I have with the Help forum is its use of subforums. My views on forum organization have changed a lot over the past four years due to my participation in other community forums. I have to say that the ones I liked the most (and the ones that seemed to be the most popular) were the forums that had fewer subcategories/subforums. I'm all for organization but I think people get way too involved in it at times--especially in their desire to weed out the posts they don't like and only leave what they do like to read (if that makes sense). Many people suggest making a subforum for this, a new board for that.. when the goal isn't really to make things more organized but to put the threads that particular user finds interesting in a separate place.

What I would like to see be done with the forums overall is the actual removal of some of the subforums. This is crazy, you say! Not really. In my experiences, extremely active communities actually have less boards than we have here--and the quality of the threads seem to be a bit better than ours as well. Some of you probably know that I have posted this on previous suggestion threads but I feel it needs mentioning again once and awhile. The fewer the boards, the better in my opinion. Instead of having three boards serving one general topic, that board is left by itself with threads constantly moving and changing positions on the first (and second, third) pages. It is up to the user(s) to keep the threads alive; in the end, the most popular and the most interesting threads are on page one while the stupid/noob threads are on the later pages, constantly being pushed back.

Going back to the original point of this suggestion, I think the help board's current state is confusing. I think subforums are confusing and/or unnecessary. Combine the help board once more and make it more fast paced. Not only will the author's question be answered faster but it will allow for more "loose" moderation, as people don't post stupid responses saying that "this thread belongs in board X." That's another downfall of splitting up boards - the constant posts by wannabe-moderators stating that a thread is in the wrong place. Pet peeve of mine. :)

Very well thought out post, Devoted. Good read.

If we're going to back-track the H&A board, a suggestion I'd have to help keep it organized would be for people to make sure that they give a brief summary of their question in the title, rather than a flat out title of "HELP PL0X!" So long as people clearly summarize their problem in their title, organization shouldn't be too much of a problem.

Also, for the questions that are asked very commonly, such as how do I make money, these questions should probably have a sticky where (using "How to Make Money" as an example) people can post their stats and economic status and people can reply back with their suggestions.

Also, for the questions that are asked very commonly, such as how do I make money, these questions should probably have a sticky where (using "How to Make Money" as an example) people can post their stats and economic status and people can reply back with their suggestions.

What i was thinking of. I have seen some repeating questions appearing in H&A again and again. Tip.it should have some sticky threads (like those in rants) about commonly asked questions. I can spot quite a lot of "from xxx money to xxx million types" questions appearing again and again in subforum about money issues, I feel that there should be a sticky thread for such topics.

There should be a sticky thread about FAQs seen in those subforums involving simple questions usually with one word replies where forum users can find their respective answers through ctrl + F.

I agree about encouraging people to use more descriptive titles. I also think that since the board would be moving faster, people won't bother to respond to threads that are completely devoid of any information about the question, leading thread authors to create more descriptive threads/titles.

As far as stickies go, some would be alright.. unless there is an alternative. I just want to avoid things like, "Post all your questions about X here!" "Post all your questions about Y here!" etc. until the board is inundated with stickies. For this reason, I think stickies where people ask for help or post repeated questions eventually get ignored and become somewhat useless. When people post their own thread, they're getting their own personalized answers and are not trying to communicate with someone through a swarm of other people's posts. Instead, I think a sticky regarding proper posting procedure would be fine (if you want help regarding making money, post your stats (for example)).

The idea of having a fast paced board is also to have less moderation in the end. The last thing I would want to see happen would be a bunch of locks just because a question was answered some time ago. Communities I've participated in have it quite the opposite - some questions get answered over and over again (and some people do link them to other threads about the same subject). It may be a bit annoying at first but using the money making question as an example, the answer varies per person. We could compile a sticky with answers to common questions, sure, but that would require quite a bit of effort. Keeping it up to date would also be a problem, which is why a precise money making guide has never been published: money making methods in RuneScape are constantly changing.

In the end, I'd like to see the mindset of the help board user change. RuneScape is changing frequently enough that people wishing to be helpful will never be bored. And people wishing to get an answer to their question will receive one promptly, almost like a chat room. If such a (re)merge were to take place, I (again) would like to see little moderation take place. If you want an answer, you'll have to post in the proper manner or else you'll be stuck without any information. Your post won't get locked - worse, it will go to page two and no one will ever see it again. :)

I am happy where this thread is going with some great input! Thanks everyone. :)

I guess I am classified in the wannabe mod thing then. I have been trying to sort a lot of the posts out in Help and Advice, and that means I fit your description perfectly. I feel pretty stupid now lol. I guess I need to tone down on that then. :wink:

I also like the idea of eliminating the subforums, especially on Help and Advice. Surprisingly, I am not much of a "organization freak". I am actually the total opposite. To tell you the truth, I liked the old board of Help and Advice. I thought that anyone with a question would be answered in a manner by a person with the right answer. By seperating the forums, I believe that a lot of mods are having to do a lot of extra work that is not necessary. I know I have given these mods a lot of the work due to all my reports, but I thought the sub-forums were there to stay, therefore, that was the best action to take. By eliminating the subforums, the popular questions stay up, and the stupid, immature questions go away. Plus, a person who wishes to answer the question doesn't have to go through a maze if you will to just get to the right question. Since the subforums were created, I saw a decrease in people visiting those forums. I rarely see more than two people on that forum! Before, many people visited the forum because it was easy to pick and choose what question they wished to answer.

I think by eliminating unneeded subforums is, in fact, the best way to go. Less work for the moderators, which leads to less moderators being needed. Like The Sith said, it will also weed out all the wannabe mods that report things (I am guilty of it, I did it ALL day). Doing all this will vanquish a lot of the stress that mods and administrative members have to deal with on a day to day basis.

Thanks for all the input everybody and feel free to add more anytime! :)

Devoted12

While it is a pet peeve, I didn't intend my comments about "wannabe mods" to be entirely negative. The staff appreciates people's enthusiasm for keeping the boards clean but at the same time, like you mentioned, Devoted, people who spend their time JUST making such comments aren't helping matters at all.

I'll try to check in with this thread tomorrow. I personally am for the removal of subforums on a variety of our boards (along with the merging of boards, for example Gen and Gen P2P - its current state is very ambiguous) but not without proper discussion by users and staff.

Yeah I was never really pro-subforums :oops: I always thought they made the forum look more cluttered. While they do help with organizational purposes, that's not always best for forums, as it greatly complicates things for regular users and moderators. While some people are just too lazy to bother with them, others are just intimidated because there are like three forums to choose from just to ask one question!

People who report misplaced threads and such are actually very helpful. I encourage you to keep doing so :) It's the people who just post, "Wrong forum, this'll get locked soon," who aren't really helping anybody. Because we moderators won't even know about the thread unless they report it, so we won't be able to move/lock the thread :wall: But please, keep sending in reports! :thumbsup:

While it is a pet peeve, I didn't intend my comments about "wannabe mods" to be entirely negative. The staff appreciates people's enthusiasm for keeping the boards clean but at the same time, like you mentioned, Devoted, people who spend their time JUST making such comments aren't helping matters at all.

Yeah, I try to answer the question almost all of the time. Plus, I do other things than reporting, like posting in Tripsis's blog and QueenValerie's! lol :lol:

 

I'll try to check in with this thread tomorrow. I personally am for the removal of subforums on a variety of our boards (along with the merging of boards, for example Gen and Gen P2P - its current state is very ambiguous) but not without proper discussion by users and staff.

I agree with you, I am for the removal of subforums. They seem to complicate things a lot more than needed and also tend to drive people away because it looks intimidating. I totally agree with you!

 

People who report misplaced threads and such are actually very helpful. I encourage you to keep doing so It's the people who just post, "Wrong forum, this'll get locked soon," who aren't really helping anybody. Because we moderators won't even know about the thread unless they report it, so we won't be able to move/lock the thread But please, keep sending in reports!

 

Yeah, I try to not do that. I try to answer their question while also telling them what forum they should use next time incase another question should arise. I also try to put that in the reports but I am not entirely sure if you guys actually read those and use them. If so, then that's good, a lot of extra work on my part was put to use. :)

Thanks everyone for your input! :)

Devoted12

I totally agree with this. After Help and Advice was split up into subforums, I stopped posting there for about two months. I've started posting again some, but not on the scale that I used to. The other thing on H&A that drives me crazy is when people post for help with merchanting, when there are some amazing guides on the topic in the AOW.

Questions regarding money and skills are ok, because they are usually different for each person, so I try to answer those. And please,do not make a sticky for people to post questions on for H&A, as the questions and people answering would become crazy. I imagine we would get things like "I posted before him, why didn't my question get answered?" and the sort.

Thats all I have to say for now.

I have to agree splitting Help/ Advice into subforums is complicating/intimidating for the users.

Getting a answer to a question should be easy and quick. Not having to stop to look through the

subforums to find the correct forum to post on.

I am not a big fan of subforums I actually feel that the old H/A forum worked out well. What I would like

to see is maybe 1 subforum for Moneymaking/Quest help.

We do appreciate everyone helping us Mods out so don't ever feel you are over helping. I would love to

see more users do what Devoted does if you see that is has been posted before report it/show a link to

the other topic it helps us Mods from having to search we just need to check out your link make sure it's the same topic.

Just wanted to add I myself appreciate all the extra help some users put into there reports. Thanks for that. :thumbsup:

 

We do appreciate everyone helping us Mods out so don't ever feel you are over helping. I would love to

 

see more users do what Devoted does if you see that is has been posted before report it/show a link to

 

the other topic it helps us Mods from having to search we just need to check out your link make sure it's the same topic.

 

Just wanted to add I myself appreciate all the extra help some users put into there reports. Thanks for that. :thumbsup:

Thanks for the nice comment. That is a very nice compliment to recieve!

 

I'll try to check in with this thread tomorrow. I personally am for the removal of subforums on a variety of our boards (along with the merging of boards, for example Gen and Gen P2P - its current state is very ambiguous) but not without proper discussion by users and staff.

It seems so far some of the mods would agree with the removal, so it seems like this is heading in the right direction. The subforums are causing more harm than good!

Thanks for the compliments and input everybody! :)

Devoted12

I'll try to check in with this thread tomorrow. I personally am for the removal of subforums on a variety of our boards (along with the merging of boards, for example Gen and Gen P2P - its current state is very ambiguous) but not without proper discussion by users and staff.

I actually completely agree with that. While it's nice in concept, it just isn't working out. Everyone knows that General P2P gets more attention than General, so they post things in P2P that should go in General. At times it is a bit straining on us moderators when users want their thread in P2P for more attention when it doesn't belong there. I'd be all for merging those two.

I do believe that the original intent of subforums was to condense the size of the forum to make it less intimidating. While it's nice for organizational purposes (as I already said), I don't think that's what's best for the users (especially judging by the large number of angry threads we had once the subforums were implemented). I really do think that we should be here to accommodate their desires and comfort as the staff is here to serve the users, not ourselves. I think that eliminating many of the subforums will make the users' and our lives easier.

Another problem with the Help & Advice subforums is that many, many people are actually getting it mixed up with the AOW subforums :shock: (I've probably even mixed them up a few times myself). Right now, I just think they're creating more problems than necessary.

If possibly, I'd actually love to get some of the users' opinions on some of these ideas (like through making a poll), especially before making a big move like merging General P2P and General.

I knew someone would pounce on that General comment. ;)

I've posted a thread up for other staff discussion - mods know where to find it.

Thanks for your input Tripsis! :D

I also noticed that people would post their topics in General P2P so that they could get more attention. I have even seen topics that say in the title KEEP IN P2P! When that is in the title, you know that they know it is in the wrong place. They want more attention for their topic.

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Soon when I finish like 2k more nats, I will re-do this entire thread. I will make it so we are not only concentrating on the Help and Advice forums, we are concentrating on a lot of sub-forums being merged. If anyone would like to suggest more forums other than the Help and Advice forum plus the General P2P and General forums being merged, feel free to share. I will re-do it with people's quotes, that way, they all get credit for what was their idea. If for any reason you don't want your name up in lights, contact me, and I will take your idea off.

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I knew someone would pounce on that General comment. ;)

 

 

 

I've posted a thread up for other staff discussion - mods know where to find it.

Aww man I'm left out. lol It's ok, as long as you guys keep me updated through here if you can. I don't know if that is against the rules or not though. :)

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Thanks for all the input guys and look for a total makeover so it makes it easier for everyone to understand if they are just joining the discussion!

Devoted12

If General and General P2P are ever going to be merged together, both f2pers and p2pers visiting that single forum, maybe there could be a feature where thread author may choose to indicate his/her as p2p content or not. This should prevent some f2pers from reading p2p content when the f2per may not want to.

First off, I went to say thanks for the input. It is very much appreciated! :)

I believe your plan has good intentions, but once again, it will complicate things. By putting in that button, it leaves the author in control of whether or not their post should be considered P2P or not. If you check the P2P box, less people would be able to see your topic. That is one of the problems we have now that is also discussed in this earlier on. People are intentinally misplacing their threads so their thread can get more publicity. Because of this, many mods have to work a lot harder than they should to restore the forums to their correct state. I believe by putting in a button, many users will not click it. Therefore, mods will once again have to work to hard for such a small issue. This means that we are once again at square one.

I also believe that if we can't get users to post in the correct foums, this would be too complicated. I know many users will quickly digest clicking the button, but some users will be left in the dark. Then, once again, people will report the thread because it doesn't have the P2P content button checked. It sounds to messy for me, therefore, I am sure it is too messy for Mods.

Thanks for the input! :)

Devoted12

To be honest, I've never understood the qualms people have with F2P threads versus P2P threads. So you accidentally click on a thread that's P2P - it's easy enough to go back to the board index and click on another thread. Even aside from that, why don't people want to read threads about P2P if they're F2P or vice versa? This argument gets a bit exaggerated, I think - I don't see any elitist F2P or P2P users who refuse to read threads just because of membership status.

What would be an example of a F2P thread anyways? The reason the General board is so ambiguous is because most of the content can be discussed by both members and non-members. Where does discussion about RuneScape overall/in general go? What about welcoming yourself to Tip.it - General F2P or P2P (the latter having more popularity these days)? If I post a thread discussing RuneScape's increase in members over the past month, why would I choose General 1 over General 2?

[/random post]

Merging the General with the P2P General is the exact same as having the Help and Advice forums unseperated in my opinion. There really is not a difference. The Help and Advice forum is a mix of P2P and F2P questions. Just because it is a mix, it sure doesn't discourage F2P or P2P users from using the board. The user reads the title of the topic, and from their decides whether or not to venture into that thread and into the discussion. Like The Sith said if you don't have any interest or input in the topic, there's no harm in hitting the back button and selecting another topic that will suit you better. Since the Help and Advice forums work merged, the General and General P2P forums will work merged. The Help and Advice forum could be seen as a ginny pig experiment, and since it worked, it will open us up to greater and better things on this forum!

Ah okay guess I didn't thought about that. Thanks for the comments though, seems like my idea is redundant now. :P