Combined Forum?

[David Watts]

Originally Posted by Charlie Hough

That's what the historical forum effectively was for many years, and it did perfectly fine. I'm not sure why this seems like a doomsday scenario for you, but if this change is implemented, we will all see how it goes.

As it is, online forums have been effectively dead for years, and they have rapidly aged out as a way to discuss games and products. Everything has long since moved on to other platforms, apps and social media channels, for better or for worse. Inevitably, this means forums are going to decline in activity and popularity, no matter what you do. It's largely only the long-term veteran user base that continues to use them heavily.

Double post. Sorry.

[luckymann]

Originally Posted by Charlie Hough

There seems to be much less of that since the dynasty reports have taken over, although that's a correlation and not necessarily causation.

Simply not true, sorry. Like I said, the online version of tumbleweeds were blowing through that forum when I decided to move my existing save there in the late v21 / early v22 cycle and subsequently started adding all my new ones. The fact of the matter is that the toxic nature of these boards and the dissipation of the old crew's interest in being exposed to it is why this had become the case, not the proliferation of sim recaps. They indeed are the effect, not the cause.

I'm not saying I disagree with your argument and have already provided both a mea culpa and a que sera sera. But at least, I beg of you, get your facts straight.

G

[Brad K]

The questions and comments about fictional play are in the General Discussions forum in great volume along with some about historical play. Why are people asking for a specific forum only for questions and discussions of historical play when there is nothing like that for fictional play despite the much greater volume?

[kq76]

I'm confused by what you want. thehef and Ktulu listed their preferences out for us very clearly. Can you do the same? Is it the following?

Historical (Simulations, aka Dynasties, & Discussions)
Fictional (Simulations, aka Dynasties, & Discussions)

I see we currently have a Simulations & a Dynasties forum (I didn't think we had the latter). I take it you want the Dynasties forum merged with Simulations?

[luckymann]

Originally Posted by kq76

I'm confused by what you want. thehef and Ktulu listed their preferences out for us very clearly. Can you do the same? Is it the following?

Historical (Simulations, aka Dynasties, & Discussions)
Fictional (Simulations, aka Dynasties, & Discussions)

I see we currently have a Simulations & a Dynasties forum (I didn't think we had the latter). I take it you want the Dynasties forum merged with Simulations?

KQ I suspect this question was directed to Brad, and I'll let him give his own answer rather than try to speak for him.

Here's mine.

If you actually take a second to look at the 23 "Historical Simulation" board, you'll quickly see the issues raised elsewhere - which, I feel compelled to add, were only made AFTER the new structure in this v24 Forum had been implemented - are fairly bogus. Yes, there are a number of historical sim threads (which you could perhaps rightly argue are "Dynasty" threads) there and all are currently bunched at the top. But just below them are a host of Q&A type posts regarding how-tos on historical settings and the like, and these occur with far more regularity than the allegations made elsewhere. You'll also notice they all get responded to by the guys who frequent the Historicals board.

IMHO, This is just - like so much else on this forum of late - another huge and pointless mountain being fashioned out of the smallest molehill. No idea of the motivation behind whoever decided to make the change, but this is what you get when you inflict this sort of unnecessary power-wielding on others: A mess where no mess need be.

I'm leaving my threads on v23 until further notice and no idea what I'll do after that, if anything on here TBH the way it is all going. In the meantime, I'll continue to help out with whatever queries raised that I feel I might have insights into - in whatever forum they might be posted, if I stumble across them - and mind my own business at all other times, as I usually do.

Sorry, this ended up being way more of a rant than I wanted. Take that as a sign of my frustration and remember how even-handed I almost invariably am - that should give you some idea how I feel about this nonsense.

G

PS You might also notice that already there is a new "Dynasty" thread in this forum - so I suggest you switch out "Simulations" in the Forum title for "Discussions" or something along those lines to remove the confusion.

[kq76]

Okay, so I'm trying to understand this. There's a group of people who want a line divided between Historical and Fictional, some who want lines between Historical, Fictional, Simulations, and Discussions (4 forums), and maybe even some who want just one board for everything. And what we currently have (ignoring the current forum names) is a line dividing Simulations and Discussions, which I'll be honest is probably what I would have done too without reading these comments.

And to be clear, I had nothing to do with creating OOTP24's board structure and I can't myself change it. I only entered this thread to try to help people get what they want.

Do we want a poll? Or is this too nuanced for a poll?

Is there a divide between historical-first and fictional-first players of the game or is it simply that some people liked how the boards were divided the last few years while some didn't?

[David Watts]

Originally Posted by luckymann

KQ I suspect this question was directed to Brad, and I'll let him give his own answer rather than try to speak for him.

Here's mine.

If you actually take a second to look at the 23 "Historical Simulation" board, you'll quickly see the issues raised elsewhere - which, I feel compelled to add, were only made AFTER the new structure in this v24 Forum had been implemented - are fairly bogus. Yes, there are a number of historical sim threads (which you could perhaps rightly argue are "Dynasty" threads) there and all are currently bunched at the top. But just below them are a host of Q&A type posts regarding how-tos on historical settings and the like, and these occur with far more regularity than the allegations made elsewhere. You'll also notice they all get responded to by the guys who frequent the Historicals board.

IMHO, This is just - like so much else on this forum of late - another huge and pointless mountain being fashioned out of the smallest molehill. No idea of the motivation behind whoever decided to make the change, but this is what you get when you inflict this sort of unnecessary power-wielding on others: A mess where no mess need be.

I'm leaving my threads on v23 until further notice and no idea what I'll do after that, if anything on here TBH the way it is all going. In the meantime, I'll continue to help out with whatever queries raised that I feel I might have insights into - in whatever forum they might be posted, if I stumble across them - and mind my own business at all other times, as I usually do.

Sorry, this ended up being way more of a rant than I wanted. Take that as a sign of my frustration and remember how even-handed I almost invariably am - that should give you some idea how I feel about this nonsense.

G

PS You might also notice that already there is a new "Dynasty" thread in this forum - so I suggest you switch out "Simulations" in the Forum title for "Discussions" or something along those lines to remove the confusion.

This is why I love your sim reports. You say things perfectly Thank you.

[Brad K]

I think it should be two forums, historical (sim reports and Q&A), and fictional (sim reports and Q&A). I think four forums would result in not much traffic in the Q&A forums, especially fictional, because so many questions (especially on fictional) are in the general discussion forum. Its possible to divide too much.

Luckymann is right that there were no complaints about the ability to get A's to Q's in the historical forum until this thread and in fact there is no reason to complain. As he says Q's get asked and A's get posted. The way most board users function a thread isn't buried until it goes to page two. And that plain doesn't happen in the Historical forum.

Still on page 1 is a Q post with no responses that is from Jan 17. It's easy to explain why that one has no responses. The question is about an on line league for which there is likely no expertise in the historical forum.

Additionally the forum description says its for sim discussions with no mention of historical Q&A. Those of us who post about our sims are perfectly happy to answer Qs and have proven that. I wonder what standing the Q posters think they have to take over. LOL.

[Brad K]

Originally Posted by Charlie Hough

Yes, we need a dedicated forum where non-dynasty-relayed historical play can be discussed on its own. Some users may be discouraged from asking questions about historical settings, customization and other topics because they might get confused and think the historical forum is for dynasties only. Similarly, a lot of good questions, tips and advice get shuffled down the forum rather quickly because there are so many dynasty threads.

Yet that's exactly what the forum description says its for. People often don't read the descriptions. And those who post Qs get As.

There was no question in my mind where to put my Pirates Moneyball thread. The historical forum name and description said that's where it belonged, and the dynasty forum and description said it didn't belong there because I wasn't trying to win all the time. I was trying to win occasionally without spending money.

[Brad K]

Originally Posted by kq76

Do we want a poll? Or is this too nuanced for a poll?

Back in Usenet days I was in some situations where decisions weren't based just on a count of hands but also how well people presented their position. For example here, we have people saying Q threads get buried in historical and others saying they don't and its plenty easy to look at the historical forum and see the first page has Q threads dating back to Jan and they've all gotten answers.* So on that basis the facts support the position of those who say the threads don't get buried and their position should get the weight.

*The one Q thread without an A is a question about on line leagues which is not part of the expertise of the historical boardies.

[David Watts]

Originally Posted by kq76

Okay, so I'm trying to understand this. There's a group of people who want a line divided between Historical and Fictional, some who want lines between Historical, Fictional, Simulations, and Discussions (4 forums), and maybe even some who want just one board for everything. And what we currently have (ignoring the current forum names) is a line dividing Simulations and Discussions, which I'll be honest is probably what I would have done too without reading these comments.

And to be clear, I had nothing to do with creating OOTP24's board structure and I can't myself change it. I only entered this thread to try to help people get what they want.

Do we want a poll? Or is this too nuanced for a poll?

Is there a divide between historical-first and fictional-first players of the game or is it simply that some people liked how the boards were divided the last few years while some didn't?

KQ, I vote we keep things as they were for 23. A forum for historical simulations and forum for fictional simulations. Look back through the Forums still shown on this board. There has been a historical simulations forum going back to at least OOTP16. I've had questions answered in those forums year after year with zero problem. Just yesterday I had a question about the historical games new modifier features/setup. I had nowhere to ask it that I knew mainly historical players would see it. Lucky for me, Matt Arnold saw may question and answered my question. When I asked it in the general forum, I had to fear a long winded response by one of the know every things that pretty much answered nothing, but used a lot of words. Based on the title of the forum "Historical Simulations," it's probably Brad, Luckyman , The Whirled Ball guy, etc. that should be telling us question and game play discussion folks to take a walk, instead those folks are usually the ones that are first to answer my questions.

[Brad K]

Originally Posted by David Watts

KQ, I vote we keep things as they were for 23. A forum for historical simulations and forum for fictional simulations.

Need to rename dynasties fictional sims.

Anyone notice the forum for new users questions got cut in 24? Good move.

[kq76]

Originally Posted by Brad K

Back in Usenet days I was in some situations where decisions weren't based just on a count of hands but also how well people presented their position. For example here, we have people saying Q threads get buried in historical and others saying they don't and its plenty easy to look at the historical forum and see the first page has Q threads dating back to Jan and they've all gotten answers.* So on that basis the facts support the position of those who say the threads don't get buried and their position should get the weight.

*The one Q thread without an A is a question about on line leagues which is not part of the expertise of the historical boardies.

I think you're overplaying this point that threads are being "buried". I ctrl+f'd "bur" and the only person using that word is you. I re-read some posts and Charlie Hough said posts were getting shuffled down. So the count is 1.

Ktulu, however, made the interesting point that when one tries to search something in that forum that you get a bunch of simulation threads.

You also say,

Originally Posted by Brad K

The way most board users function a thread isn't buried until it goes to page two. And that plain doesn't happen in the Historical forum.

Here I think you're over-estimating how most users use the boards as well. If you have an answer to a question, I think most people are either going to do a search (using google or doing a site-wide search here or going to a specific board first) or they're going to go straight to some board here (general or not) and just post. I don't think many people at all are going to a board and then skimming down the titles to see if they see a thread that may answer their question. I just don't see that. So it doesn't matter if they're "buried". EDIT for clarification: Buried down a page, no. Buried among search results, yes.

Me personally, I actually very rarely use the board structure. I usually just use the New Posts link above or Google search.
...

I don't know. I see a lot of frustration and, frankly, I don't understand much of it. If the main complaint was "the forum titles/descriptions are confusing, please clarify them", okay, I totally get that. If the complaint was, "how the forums are divided aren't as effective to getting help as they should be", I'd understand that too. But what I seem to be hearing from some instead is, "I want to post where I want to post, regardless of the intent of the current board structure or what may be best." Or maybe even, "I'm a historical-only player, keep those filthy fictionals away from me". And that makes me just want to walk away, dust off my hands, and say, "okay, good luck with that".

[David Watts]

Originally Posted by kq76

I think you're overplaying this point that threads are being "buried". I ctrl+f'd "bur" and the only person using that word is you. I re-read some posts and Charlie Hough said posts were getting shuffled down. So the count is 1.

Ktulu, however, made the interesting point that when one tries to search something in that forum that you get a bunch of simulation threads.

You also say,



Here I think you're over-estimating how most users use the boards as well. If you have an answer to a question, I think most people are either going to do a search (using google or doing a site-wide search here or going to a specific board first) or they're going to go straight to some board here (general or not) and just post. I don't think many people at all are going to a board and then skimming down the titles to see if they see a thread that may answer their question. I just don't see that. So it doesn't matter if they're "buried". EDIT for clarification: Buried down a page, no. Buried among search results, yes.

Me personally, I actually very rarely use the board structure. I usually just use the New Posts link above or Google search.
...

I don't know. I see a lot of frustration and, frankly, I don't understand much of it. If the main complaint was "the forum titles/descriptions are confusing, please clarify them", okay, I totally get that. If the complaint was, "how the forums are divided aren't as effective to getting help as they should be", I'd understand that too. But what I seem to be hearing from some instead is, "I want to post where I want to post, regardless of the intent of the current board structure or what may be best." Or maybe even, "I'm a historical-only player, keep those filthy fictionals away from me". And that makes me just want to walk away, dust off my hands, and say, "okay, good luck with that".

LOL, once again as usual you hear what you want to hear. You are so wrong. I knew once I saw you were involved in the discussion we were probably doomed. As said earlier life goes on.

Never once seen you in the historical simulations forums. But, hey you know wjhat's best. Going to wear my baseball hat backwards all day in your honor. Peace out.

[David Watts]

I apologize if I sounded like a snob in my comments. I was not calling fictional players filthy in any way. I love reading about the fictional game. I love reading about the MLB qucikstart games people have going. I play random debut, so I'm playing fictional for the most part. Sorry if I offended anyone.

[Brad K]

Originally Posted by kq76

I don't know. I see a lot of frustration and, frankly, I don't understand much of it. If the main complaint was "the forum titles/descriptions are confusing, please clarify them", okay, I totally get that. If the complaint was, "how the forums are divided aren't as effective to getting help as they should be", I'd understand that too. But what I seem to be hearing from some instead is, "I want to post where I want to post, regardless of the intent of the current board structure or what may be best." Or maybe even, "I'm a historical-only player, keep those filthy fictionals away from me". And that makes me just want to walk away, dust off my hands, and say, "okay, good luck with that".

Its not hard.

There's a forum named dynasties. Its used by people doing fictional sims. So name it so it matches the usage.

There is a forum named fictional and historical sims. But the fictional people in are posting in the to be renamed dynasty forum and they have no reason to move.

Historical players post Q's in the current historical forum and they get A's. No problem for anyone.

[Tiger Fan]

As someone who for the most part just searches 'New Posts' when I visit and doesn't really worry about the categories it seems like maybe we are just making this much more complicated than it needs to be. I don't want to put words into anyone's mouth but I am getting the impression the concern is that those who want a historical discussion only forum want it primarily so they can discuss tips and approaches for doing things and are concerned it is getting cluttered with 'dynasty type storytelling posts' and will further do so now that fictional is lumped in with it. And I think that probably makes good sense as I know from a couple of searches in the historical section for 'how-to's' I can get bogged down wading through a lot of dynasty-thread like posts.

We already have the Dynasty thread which to me is a catch-all for all storytelling whether it be historical, fictional, modern or a combination of all of the above. When the Historical Simulations category was first added I thought it was pretty redundant to be honest- just based on the way it is described with

Historical Simulations Discuss historical simulations and their results in this forum.

Maybe the wording is the issue as to me that sounds like an invitation to talk about your personal career saves just like the Dynasty report has always been. If the goal is to share tips and ideas on to accomplish different goals and a place to answer user questions to improve their historical sim experience would it not be better to alter the title description of that to remove the 'dynasty type' posts? I can see it making perfect sense then to keep the historical and fictional aspects together but for ease of searching divide it into two sub-forums (Historical and Fictional)

So the Dynasty forum could stay unchanged - unless perhaps a slight description change to maybe change the word 'Dynasty' to something else if there are truly a large number of people (and I am not sure there are) who think of it only as building a powerhouse team and not a catch-all for sharing stories about your OOTP world leagues.

The new combined historical and fictional section should perhaps remove it's reference to discussing 'their results' as that to me sounds more like a dynasty forum topic.



So in summary maybe it is as simple as leaving the Dynasty forum as it is and making just a slight wording change and the addition of 2 sub-forums similar to the many sub-forums in the mods section.

OOTP24- HISTORICAL & FICTIONAL DISCUSION - Discuss how to get desired results out of historical and fictional OOTP leagues

with sub-forums

HISTORICAL - share ideas for optimizing your historical play experience

FICTIONAL - share ideas for optimizing your experience in creating and maintaining customized fictional OOTP worlds.

With this setup I would think at that point the main Historical & Fictional Discussion thread would be a catch-all for asking questions and sharing general ideas that apply to both fictional and historical games. For example, if a user wants to duplicate the real historical league structure and statistical output progression but with fictional players it would be discussed here.

The sub-forums are more for dedicated historical-only questions (like why use recalculate over the development engine) or Fictional-only questions (like how do I set my league up with teams in multiple nations but only allow players from certain nations on each team).


In my opinion the dynasty topic should not be split up. I think most who visit it read multiple types of dynasty reports and having them all together makes it less clicking to find ones with new posts added to it. To me all historical and fictional dynasty type writeups should go there along with the modern-day dynasty reports as well. I enjoy reading the random-debut and other recaps done in the historical section from OOTP23 but often miss them if I go straight to the Dynasty report section instead of checking new posts.

I also think (but maybe I am of the wrong opinion) the historical and fictional discussion threads should be for sharing ideas and asking for help and not another spot to write about your personal historical dynasty, (which belong in the dynasty report section in my opinion) and I can see a lot of "here is what happened in my last sim" type posts clutters it up and makes searching for a particular topic a little more difficult. Just my .02

[Brad K]

Originally Posted by Tiger Fan

As someone who for the most part just searches 'New Posts' when I visit and doesn't really worry about the categories it seems like maybe we are just making this much more complicated than it needs to be.

Correct. Here's super simple.

Take "fictional" out of the name for this forum because the fictional sim people decided many versions ago to post to the dynasties forum.

[luckymann]

Seems like the push is for this new structure to be the one kept. In that case, the two things I'd do here:

1. Change out the word "simulation" as it does give the impression that this is where you post reports about your save(s). I think we're agreed "Discussions" is the word to replace it with. It is in keeping with other forum nomenclature on here.

2. Police it regularly and consistently. Move the 1871 thread now in this forum to the Dynasty board and do the same for any that are added here in the future. That way it retains the purpose that all of this nonsense has seemingly been done in the name of.

Then let's just move on.

G

[Charlie Hough]

Originally Posted by David Watts

One thing I do like to do is discuss things that happen in my leagues. Where do I do that to not offend a patrol boy?

I suppose you would do it in the dedicated sub-forum for simulation reports. But it ultimately depends on whatever guidelines are established for the respective sub-forums and whether any of this actually happens.