BriDynN: TWG's Community Initiative Project

[Vendetta21]

Originally Posted by dAnceguy117

the host signups are the only game-related thing listed up there. what's the concern?

making too many changes quickly may cause people to become unfamiliar with the forum but moreso having a huge project makes the task daunting and unmanageable whereas doing it bits and pieces makes it so one may actually accomplish

for many reasons you want to break a project up into components and handle them one at a time, each thing will probably generate quite a bit of discussion, take a good chunk of time, and change the feel of this place

i think changing the host sign-ups and rewriting the history thread are overall really positive changes and we shouldn't spread ourselves thin until those are done unless there are more volunteers to do the work of freshening this place up </manager>

[mellonxcollie]

Originally Posted by Vendetta21

we shouldn't spread ourselves thin

I agree with you 100%, however I do think we should have a general TWG discussion forum (or at least thread) and it would take very minimal effort to do this. Skype really doesn't cut it, it's an instant messenger, we can't have all of our forum discussion go on in there.

As for the other ideas, especially the new player's guide, I agree we may be getting in over our heads. I would be willing to help out if possible (though right now is not a good time, in a few weeks when my hands have healed I can help). If we all work together we can make these major projects seem easy peasy~

[dAnceguy117]

ok now I get it, just an order of operations. good deal.

[Tps222]

There is one change that I want more than anything: Scheduled routine signup threads.

We used to do this a while back. Once the host and game are voted on, we set a designated date and time for signups. We divide the signups into two phases, with each phase allowing half the player pool to signup.

You set those two signup phases on the same day, but hours apart, to accommodate for people who live in different time zones/work different hours.

Example: TWG XXL: 18 players. First 9 signup up at 5PM EST, Last 9 signup at 10PM EST. No one can signup before 5PM EST, and once the first 9 fill that up, you wait until 10PM EST to have another chance to signup.

This will prevent people from missing out on signups when they genuinely wanted to play. The established timeframes should be boldly advertised not only in the hosting thread, but also in the title of the signup thread (and edited to reflect when the first period begins, ends; while also noting when the 2nd period of signups opens and ends).

As long as we can carry this out in a 3 step phase (Host/Game/Signup times), it should simplify and improve the signup process altogether.

[FoJaR]

i think there should be 4 or 5 phases, with two panels, one for host signups and one for player sign ups

but then we will need a couple more phases to nominate the panels for each set for each game, and then the phases for nominating the panels that will nominate the panels

[DarkManticoreX2]

Originally Posted by Tps222

There is one change that I want more than anything: Scheduled routine signup threads.

We used to do this a while back. Once the host and game are voted on, we set a designated date and time for signups. We divide the signups into two phases, with each phase allowing half the player pool to signup.

You set those two signup phases on the same day, but hours apart, to accommodate for people who live in different time zones/work different hours.

Example: TWG XXL: 18 players. First 9 signup up at 5PM EST, Last 9 signup at 10PM EST. No one can signup before 5PM EST, and once the first 9 fill that up, you wait until 10PM EST to have another chance to signup.

This will prevent people from missing out on signups when they genuinely wanted to play. The established timeframes should be boldly advertised not only in the hosting thread, but also in the title of the signup thread (and edited to reflect when the first period begins, ends; while also noting when the 2nd period of signups opens and ends).

As long as we can carry this out in a 3 step phase (Host/Game/Signup times), it should simplify and improve the signup process altogether.

I don't know why we stopped doing this. Lets start again.

[Xiz]

Originally Posted by DarkManticoreX2

I don't know why we stopped doing this. Lets start again.

I agree. I approve of this.

[Svaz]

I'll concur with that.

[Brilliant Dynamite Neon]

Hey guys, sorry I haven't responded to anything, I've been catching up with schoolwork due to my visit to the doctor last week and closures this week. I'll update the OP and address everyone's responses as soon as I am able.

[Brilliant Dynamite Neon]

Definitely support splitting signup times again. Anythign pro-inclusivity is good

Sorry guys, I really wanna get into this tonight but right now I can't focus on anything and my eyes just wanna close. Good night everyone

But yeah, these things are basically in priority order to get done, and I will be definitely devoting my time to this thread tomorrow.

[Brilliant Dynamite Neon]

Okay, so looking at all the suggestions, here's how I think the new Host Signups are going to go down.

OPENING OF THREAD
This is where the host of the previous game will start the thread, and post a specific time when they're going to kick off the signups. At this stage, people declare Intent to Vote in the thread.

PROPOSAL STAGE: Proposal of Games
This is where people put their games up for the vote as usual, nothing much changed here.

VOTING STAGE: Voting for Games
In the voting stage, everyone who declared ITV during the opening stage votes on whichever game they would like to play in. Host counts votes as normal, but only people who declared ITV will be included, so in this way it's like counting votes during a game. We can even have "insta-host" at a majority of all votes as well; at your discretion of course.

Alternatively, we can skip the registration in Opening Stage and just have a deadline for voting, counting anybody who votes (this also means that the previous host can skip the Opening stuff and post the Signups Thread whenever he feels postgame discussion is flagging). Of course, this would make it unfair to have an instant win condition, as there's no way of telling what an actual majority will be.

DISCUSSION STAGE: Learning About the Setup
In this stage, all players can now look at the selected game critically and ask any questions, raise any concerns about balance, etc. and the host can perform minor tweaks as he or she sees fit. However, there should not be huge changes or things that break the spirit of the game that's trying to be hosted. People shouldn't vote one thing

Xiz has a great idea; if there does arise such a situation where legitimate concerns in the winning game cannot be acceptably addressed and there is a failure to launch, we can take the runner-up game and go from there.

------

The thing about this approach is that it doesn't support general review of game setups. While I'll give you the fact that it's not necessarily what people want, and it is more efficient to focus on the games that is actually going to be played, if we go with something like this, I think resurrecting the Game Workshop would indeed be necessary, so people aren't stuck never getting feedback for their games and can make them as presentable as possible for proposal.

I think this is the soundest "workflow" for the process though. Still debating how long these stages should be. This is definitely as refined as it needs to be.

---------------------------------

OTHER THINGS:

@Manti: I have a rough outline of a good Beginner's Guide and the topics it will cover, and I will get in contact with you ASAP to discuss it.

History thread stuff is underway and doesn't really affect things too much.

Everything else I think would best be considered later. I will still write something for them though.

[dAnceguy117]

hey all! we should renovate the host signups process soon.

[Xiz]

Yup. We just reverted back to our old method, no thanks to me

[cedolad]

Originally Posted by dAnceguy117

hey all! we should renovate the host signups process soon.

Can we get a queue system going?

[Guest15937]

Well the thing with queue systems is, there was one on another site I used to play on, and it was queued up with a wait time of like 3 years, and most of the time, once someone's game finally got up, the person had long since left the site...

We'd need a sort of activity check.

[thesunfan]

I dislike the idea of a queue because people's tastes will waver between games. Mine do at least; I'm the kid that wants to try all the different flavors of ice-cream, I can't be happy with just strawberry or whatever. Also, its a pretty big bonerkill to have to wait possibly weeks or months to host a game.

[HansSky]

I'd be willing to take on the project of putting together a detailed history of FFR(and ffya) TWGs IF I can get one or two to volunteers to help me(100+ games is a lot). Right now the history thread is incomplete but I would like to go all the way back to include a number of statistics: (inspired by devonin's annoying post in the chit chat thread)

-Total number of wolf/human wins
-Total number of wins for individual players
-Total number of games played for individuals
-Total number of votes for individuals as human and wolf
-Average day game ends on with wolf/human victory

I would also include other interesting history(the council...) and take note of when it happened. This is a lot of information which is why I would like some help. I'll still probably do it anyway even if nobody wants to take this on with me. If there is anything else(statistics) people are interested in looking for let me know.

[DarkManticoreX2]

Just an FYI, BDN and sunfan have been doing this for a while now, I think they're pretty close to done on the whole history part.

I know only 30 games are currently posted, but I'm pretty sure they have a lot more done "behind the scenes"

Also V started doing FFya's, but I don't know how far he got.

[HansSky]

Just saw that. Usually don't read before opening my mouth. Depending on where they are I'd still like to help.

[DarkManticoreX2]

Shoot BDN and Sunfan PMs. I'm sure they'd be more then happy for the help.