Home Depot Now Selling Forum Themes - Love It? Hate It? Read and Discuss.

[DangerGirl]

Well, I guess this is as central a forum as any, so I'll post here and direct any other threads to it.

Obviously, we've announced that the default forum theme has been changed and most of you can see it, unless you've changed your theme to non-default, in which you'll need to manually change it to see the new one. As there is some confusion and other.. stuff.. going on about it, I wanted to put together this post for a central discussion regarding it.

First off, I'll admit I didn't have regular announcements up about the forum change, and that is my fault entirely. I did, however, release at least three global announcements before, during, and after the forum upgrade that stated we were working on and would have a brand new forum theme very soon. Staff has known since August, if they pay attention to the respective dev board that I've been coordinating the theme work on.

This, however, does not excuse the fact that I didn't remind the community, for which I apologize for. I was stuck in the technological mindset and thought the previous announcements would suffice.

We did have quite a few on-forum and private requests for a new theme. If you do a quick forum search you'll find a few of them.

http://www.trenchwars.org/forums/showthread.php?t=28101
http://www.trenchwars.org/forums/showthread.php?t=27322
http://www.trenchwars.org/forums/showthread.php?t=24988

With the introduction of the new TW.org website we felt obligated to find a decent match to keep us connected to the zone. We are the Trench Wars forum, it'd be nice if we tried to somewhat stay related. We're restricted in what exactly we can do with the theme, as no one has full access, so it is going to remain simple and not all technofied like the main TW.org site, which, btw, kicks ass.

We had a ton of people already using the new theme, and I didn't receive very many complaints, so the theme is as it is, except for a couple buttons and icons being worked on. I guess you can compare it to the Wii recall. They claim none of the testers complained about the handset going flying, but when it was released, the complaints came in hordes.

I'm not beyond making a few changes. But I need a large show of support for something before I go and modify the files. If you wish to make a comment, please do so here, but be constructive. If you simply say "it sucks," I might find the humor to perma change your personal theme to something even I wouldn't touch. :P

Now, aside from the forum theme, the subforum name changes were in the works, although it is more of an experiment at the moment, because it is something that needs to be done on the spot - since it's not a theme, everyone sees it the moment you do it. Obviously, some are working out and some aren't. It was meant to break up the monotony and bring the forum closer to the game itself while still keeping the little nuances of the community in it. If anyone wishes to comment on them, please do so here too, constructively of course.

As a reminder, any large news will be in the Global Announcements that you see above each forum. Please keep up with those. I watch the numbers on them and know not too many read em, which is a shame, because that's what they're there for, letting people know what's going on.

My New Year's resolutions to the forum are for myself to be more active in the community and hire a couple more moderators to help keep the peace and keep Forum Staff within the community. I was asked what it was that I wanted out of the forum. In short, I'd love to have a forum of subspace players, especially from the Trench Wars zone, to come to the TW forums to talk about the game, talk about the zone, talk about anything in general, make friends, make enemies, debate with people, bring up interesting and intelligent subjects, and all in all, just have some fun.

[Dameon Angell]

They told me on staff chat that the "F1" forum meant the "F1" key for help in-game. I'd change it back to "Help and Technical Support" or something. And the "Death Threats" forum just sounds mean.

[Mr. Peanuts]

Just change the names back to how they were.

[Ewan]

About the new names:

It might be a little weird for newer people, we've been improving the site and getting word about Continuum out to try and attract new players. The old names for the forums were to the point, anyone with no knowledge of the game would understand what each forum was for. Now they're either a reference to something in-game, or just a weird name. I'd suggest maybe a re-think on the name changes, either something so that anyone can instantly understand what that forum is for, or just back to the old ones.

[Liquid Blue]

People would be alot more open to title changes if they had a say in what they were being changed too. Your best bet would be to throw out a few suggestions and have majority rule over what the titles should be, if you truly think the old ones are getting stale.

This and mods that actually post and communicate with the community. Everyone has their own personal lives, but I think with 3 or 4 more mods the load won't be as big to bear and people won't have these mystery admins popping in to throw down their decisions and leave.

[Galleleo]

First off.. wtf are you doing using my joke? And if it was so awesome that you feel the need to use, how did I not win the caption contest? This is just wrong.

I might find the humor to perma change your personal theme to something even I wouldn't touch. :P

Abuse, axe yourself for it.

And change all the names back to how it was, it was just fine. And pub chat instead of general discussion, or Ear Candy instead of musical differences doesn't bring anyone any close to the game. In fact that whole part of the forum has nothing to do with the game.

Ow and put Links for the young at heart back where it was and not under "pub chat".

[Pummel]

First off.. wtf are you doing using my joke? And if it was so awesome that you feel the need to use, how did I not win the caption contest? This is just wrong.



Abuse, axe yourself for it.

And change all the names back to how it was, it was just fine. And pub chat instead of general discussion, or Ear Candy instead of musical differences doesn't bring anyone any close to the game. In fact that whole part of the forum has nothing to do with the game.

Ow and put Links for the young at heart back where it was and not under "pub chat".

Mr. Serious!

[gran guerrero]

useless crap is better with the description of all GHB threads can be found here.
general discussion is better
musical discussion, with subsubforum of instrument talk (guitars, drums, etc)
sports stays the same
trash talk

[Darkmoor]

The new theme might or might not be good, I will not comment more on it as it is incomplete, except that it looks like you will have to sacrifice some readability if you are going to use it.

Forum names and descriptions have gone from good to bad though. Why does the forum need the "look and feel" of the game, as you call it? New members will only find themselves confused, "what forum is for what and what the... are these names?". Not to mention that some of the names/descriptions might be considered discriminatory, offensive or simply racist, which would go against the almighty 'no racism in TW' rule. One more example that Staff are above the rules they enforce, but they stomp on us with a BanG if we try to be.

[Squeezer]

Just change the names back to how they were.

seconded. What was wrong with the forum names in the first place?

I believe, if anything, the new ones have made the forum more ambiguous for new members.

[DoTheFandango]

This topic name is as lame as the Forum names.

I believe there is currently a thread about the state of the forums, and that is titled, aptly, "What the Fuck".

Dupe thread, lock plz.

[Nethila]

We had a ton of people already using the new theme, and I didn't receive very many complaints,

i guess someone didnt read all those complain/whine threads about the new theme..

[Ephemeral]

New theme colors make it harder to read, I tried it for a while but switched it back to boring old theme.
New names do not matter to me, but I still don't understand how we can use the stupid "Talk about men and balls" as the Sports forum description. Makes it feel like a 12 y.o. forum, "hehe, pussy, balls, hehe see me say bad things, aren't I cool?".

[Mr. Peanuts]

I believe, if anything, the new ones have made the forum more ambiguous for new members.

abso-bloody-exactly.

I even find myself doing a double-take of the forum names.

[Subjugation]

My New Year's resolutions to the forum are for myself to be more active in the community and hire a couple more moderators to help keep the peace and keep Forum Staff within the community. I was asked what it was that I wanted out of the forum. In short, I'd love to have a forum of subspace players, especially from the Trench Wars zone, to come to the TW forums to talk about the game, talk about the zone, talk about anything in general, make friends, make enemies, debate with people, bring up interesting and intelligent subjects, and all in all, just have some fun.

First off, DG---thanks for the Mission Statement, the olive branch, and the official release that you're going to be expanding the moderator staff. Considering it's New Year's season, perhaps we can focus on the future; Hopefully 2007 will produce some peace and good tidings around these parts.

As I've already said, I actually like the new skin/theme, so that's not a point of contention for me. Additionally, for those that don't like the new one, there are other themes that are available---and they couldn't be any easier to use. You can change them without even going into your User Control Panel---hell, you don't even need to be logged into the forum to change the skin.

I think others have already mentioned my own concerns with the subforum titles. I think it's cool that it cross-promotes the game, so to speak. However, when creating the forum titles I think it's important to view them from the eyes of a newb. If we are serious about marketing the game and bringing in new users, we want them to spend as little time assimilating as possible. What I mean by that is someone who is not familiar with the F1 feature of the zone will not know that the F1 subforum is supposed to be the FAQ forum. On the other hand, both new visitors as well as seasoned veterans will know what to find in the ?help forum, because the title is self explanatory. Also, I don't see the harm in involving the community by asking for their input with the titles.

Lastly, I wanted to end my thoughts on the most important concern I have. I think it's pretty obvious that this place isn't a democracy, but neither should the community be made to feel marginalized, like it has been recently. Like LB, Face, Nickname, Zeus, myself and others have already mentioned (here, and in other threads), one of the foremost "constructive criticisms" we felt needed to be addressed is that the admins have greater communication and participation with the forum community. Hopefully, the new moderators will be more than just "thread lockers and movers". I think it's vital that the new mods will be public relations/community oriented individuals who will share the responsibility of keeping the community informed of upcoming changes, prevent small issues from snowballing into major problems (by moving or locking threads), and by keeping the line of communication open during the unavoidable periods of discontent.