Bulletin board changes

[Cz]

It's been 5 days since we closed down about half the forums on the bulletin board, and I think it's time for a thread about it, to get some questions answered, and some suggestions aired.

Naturally, I'll start with my side of it.

Why close half the forums?
I already covered this mostly in the article about it, but I'll cover it more thoroughly here; basically, we don't have time for it all.

Community work consists of
- gathering feedback
- answering questions
- providing official information
- working with volunteers
- administrating the official bulletin board
- dealing with special issues (e.g. banned exploiters going ballistic)
- gathering player/game statistics
- staying in-the-know on everything happening in the company
- probably some more stuff I don't remember right now

All this takes time, and something finally had to go. Looking at what took the most time, and could be covered by others, the first alternative was removing the bulletin board entirely.

However, due to us needing several of the forums ourselves, we couldn't do that. An evaluation on which forums were needed was done, and we ended up with the current setup. In this setup, the market forums have an insecure future, and are likely to be removed soon.

Considering the time the bulletin board takes, the alternative is simply cutting several of the other tasks, and that is not really an option. The list above might still be too big, so I wouldn't be surprised if something else has to go, or at least be reduced, too.

Why not get more people then?
While more people would mean more time, it would also mean more costs. Community work does not in itself produce income, and is thus not the first team to staff up. I am sure you too would like more designers and coders to improve the game, rather than having one more person telling you we're working on it.

What about those who won't go to other forums?
I'm sorry - I really am, but if you're going to be absolutely adamant about not going elsewhere, you're simply out of alternatives if you want to post on other topics than what we cover now.

Some are suggesting 'invading' other forums, spamming and posting off-topic. That's simply gonna give me more work for a while, cutting harder into the work I try to do, so I'm not entirely sure what logic is behind it. I guess it's just frustration, and hope people will refrain from doing such.

Why are those exact forums staying?
- Beginners' Corner and Technical Help forums because they're very valuable for newcomers, and we need to know what their questions are.
- Test Server forum because we need a place we control to deal with that.
- Community Corner as we need a place to post official information and possibly run discussions.
- Role-Playing as we want new players to see some of the basis for an MMORPG, and we need a place for in-character news, now that it's no longer on the web site. (Working on the setup for that right now.)
- Profession forums because they're needed for the Professionals program.

Market forums are likely to be closed soon.

Can we do anything to change the decision?
While I'm not inclined towards doing any changes creating more work right now, it's not impossible to get something changed.

If you want it changed, post a suggestion on how to do it here, and I'll consider it. But remember that adding more volunteers is actually more work, not less, unless the volunteers can cover large portions of my job.

What can I post in this thread?
Constructive input, like suggestions as mentioned above, and questions. Any unconstructive posts, jabs at people or sites, profanity or spam will be removed, and the poster risk being denied access to this forum. Sorry if that sounds harsh, but the moderation line giving least work is the strict one, and I have a lot to do this week.

[JORN]

I'm sad to see the market forums go

[Askeladden]

All i want to see is a few forums where players can post to other players. A forum like The world of RK and a PvP forum. Forums that FC dont have to read or post in. You can just put a rooted thread in them, stating that these forums are for players and you guys wont read em.

I think many miss the chance to commuicate with other players on your forums right now.

[iguanoid]

IMO its a seriously bad idea to close the market forums. Purely on a "hits" basis, this forum is way ahead of every other forum, and is very much a lifeline for tradeskillers and anyone buying and selling high end items.

Kind of like closing down the Wall Street of Rubika

[Animoy]

Come on! Dont close the market forum....Do you have any idea how much anger this will cause?

Community work does not in itself produce income

Neither does frustrated customers that quit

[didymus]

Hi ..

I think you should take the social forum back. It was strictly off topic, it didn't really need people from FunCom to watch over it much and the people who posted there really loved it.

I also think it's weird you've taken away the "Future Anarchy" section. Now, there's no section devoted to player feedback and what *we* think will improve the game. Seems like it should be an obligatory part of every MMORPG forum.

In any case, I can understand you've got a lot of work, but this is doing a lot of damage to the player community, and I think saving the social forum f.ex would do a lot of good ..

[DaveDread]

I don't really care about the market forums. Any site can pick up and hold equally good ones, perhaps better. It's convenient to have them here, but they are not necessary.

Same goes for world of Rubi-ka, I search it for coords to that NPC or where you can find a beautiful scenery, it is pretty static info with updates every patch and can be handled as good (or better) outside the official forums. I'll miss the good vibe about that forums for sure, but we'll manage without.

A forum that I think is necessary thou, is a game mechanics forum. A place to ask and answer general game mechanics questions. The daddy of beginners corner kinda, during the weekend we've seen loads of game mechanics questions going into all various remaining forums. I would really enjoy having a common place to go rather then to read through all profession forums for the piece of info regarding whatever concept. Inits, dualwield, how interrupts work, melee vs. ranged etc. And, I think it is important to get all professions input on these issues, what is a problem for one profession might turn out to be a common problem or simply intended as a weakness.

I can't really see a fansite take this function since it's, well, it's AO. It's the numbers version of the RP forums.

[Waffen]

The market forums are the lifeblood of Rubi-ka. It allows everyone to reach the broadest possible audience to sell or buy whatever it is they're selling or buying, regardless of affiliation (clan, omni, neutral).

As AO is a worldwide game, this is extremely beneficial for those who would never have an opportunity to see much in-game trade spamming (and only from your own faction btw) due to timezone constraints.

Also, the market forums are pretty well self-policed. A few flame wars happen from time to time, but they are few and far between.

Finally, the market forums are one of the few things that keep mid and upper-level players around as we are ever-striving to obtain rare and unique items for our characters. Take that away, and you will leave us with hardly anything enjoyable for us to do.

[Revelator]

Just give us one social, OOC, let-anarchy-rule (no pun intended) forum, and I bet most of us would shut up! Put a big fat disclaimer on top of it that FC reserves the right to ignore absolutely everything there, just moderate it for foul language and other unpleasantness.

And if not for me and the others, think about poor Tehdeacon, who is probably going through some serious withdrawal at the moment!

[____________Ejeckted]

if you close the Market forums,
you're just going to send all the WTB/WTS spam to other forums.
(eg. Enforcer forum will have half a page of "wtb: support beam")
People are not going to stop trying to advertise their junk.

really bad idea.
please let the other forums remain ad-free and informative.

[Waffen]

Originally posted by Cz
What about those who won't go to other forums?
I'm sorry - I really am, but if you're going to be absolutely adamant about not going elsewhere, you're simply out of alternatives if you want to post on other topics than what we cover now.

Some are suggesting 'invading' other forums, spamming and posting off-topic. That's simply gonna give me more work for a while, cutting harder into the work I try to do, so I'm not entirely sure what logic is behind it. I guess it's just frustration, and hope people will refrain from doing such.

Here is one of your big problems with that Cz. Many of us check the forums from work on a limited basis as our companies allow. The official AO site has been very accessible to nearly everyone around the world. The same cannot be said of third-party sites. Some people are just not able to view them.

For those of us that can access these third-party sites, there is the problem of pop-up ads. At least here in the US, you can pretty much forget about the idea of installing some little program to kill the ads as that's a surefire way to have the IT department down our throats and can actually jeopardize our jobs.

And you know what? I have enough work at work. The idea of having to spend more time trolling through bulletin boards for the same information is just creating more work for me in what is supposed to be a game.

Quite frankly, the more impediments you impose upon people to have an enjoyable experience with AO outside the game, much less in-game, the fewer of us will actually stay around to play at all.

[Cz]

Saying one extra forum - any forum - is not extra work is simply not correct. Just check the old forums to observe that. No matter how much you posting here say you will stay on-topic and be nice, others won't. And due to that we must read all forums. I can't defend having a personal flame against some designer on a forum with "but, we don't read (or moderate) that forum".

The Market forums are very popular, but if that was the argument for staying, all forums would be here, I would have no time for anything else, and I think the lack of the other things on my list would be worse than the lack of these forums on this specific bulletin board. Other sites are very well equipped to cover buying and selling items.

[Cz]

Scumbug; if people start posting a lot off-topic, we'll simply have to moderate it. Strictly if needed.

Waffen; as far as I know, none of the main sites' forums have pop-up ads.

[______________Laufer]

Removing the market forums is a bad idea. Sure it can be done on other sites, but the selection will always be broader and more plentyfull on the official site.

As Waffen puts it:"Also, the market forums are pretty well self-policed. A few flame wars happen from time to time, but they are few and far between."

This forum cant demand alot of work from AO's side and as this is ur primary reason for closing down forums, you can not really defend a close-down of the markets. Unless this is a gradually close-down of all exsisting forums.

I really cant see what u can achieve by closing down this kind of customer services .

/Laufer

{Moderator: No need for that type of comments.}

[locomdenom]

I had hoped that FC would relent and see that there does need to be some sort of avenue for player feedback.

I had hoped that FC would relent and see that a forum for general game-related info is beneficial to newcomers and old, though from reading Beginner's Corner, it seems like a lot of the old WoRK type threads are winding up there now, and maybe some of the old game mechanics threads.

But to see them not realize that shutting down the market forums is a bad idea... come on, Cz.

Your reason for closing down boards is that this list:

- gathering feedback
- answering questions
- providing official information
- working with volunteers
- administrating the official bulletin board
- dealing with special issues (e.g. banned exploiters going ballistic)
- gathering player/game statistics
- staying in-the-know on everything happening in the company
- probably some more stuff I don't remember right now

takes up too much of your time.

The market forums require a minimal amount of administrative work, all of which can be handled by ARK volunteers (closing spam threads, pretty much, and maybe occasionally closing down a flame war - the market forums are very calm). If the real reason is your above list, why close the markets? I can only conclude that there must be some other reason. And I can't think of what it is, and that scares me a little.

{Moderator: Please stay on topic.}

[____________Julekake]

bring the forums back and ill administer them (why not?) im unemployed anyways and funcom would only have to agree on it beeing "work experiense" wouldnt cost fc anything. i really miss all the forums. *sniff*

[Destractor]

The only reason to get rid of the market forum, would be that they have created a viable trading system ingame (like shopbot was).

{Moderator: No need for such comments about others.}

[Cz]

See my previous reply regarding one or two forums not taking any time at all. It does, every one. Remember that the ideal situation with work load would be having no forums. Go from there, and hopefully you'll see my side of it.

Basically, if you work till you drop, then try add just 5 more minutes. I doubt you can.

One thing that might make it easier - in fact - is if I can turn a few more things over to ARKs on the forum, but that require changes in the software. I might look into that, when I get time.

[Waffen]

Originally posted by Cz

Waffen; as far as I know, none of the main sites' forums have pop-up ads.

I believe that isn't the case from what has been posted here in the recently closed forums.

As for the market forums, the various sites could not do it as well. You would be taking an existing centralized market and splitting it across several varying sites, in effect creating many more chaotic markets attempting to work within a single game world economy, per dimension.

As an example, how well do you think it would work for the NYSE to be split, with trading taking place in Miami, San Francisco and Vienna, Austria in place of central trading in New York?

[______________Gartan]

Originally posted by Cz
See my previous reply regarding one or two forums not taking any time at all. It does, every one. Remember that the ideal situation with work load would be having no forums. Go from there, and hopefully you'll see my side of it.

lol so basically this isn't a discussion on the changes, its the community being told whats going to happen.

Removing the market forms would be an extremly bad idea, from both a community view and a buisness view. It would anger a lot of people and probably be a last straw for a lot of them. With new games coming out soon, ie SWG it would probably loose you a lot customers. From personal conversations with other players i think a lot of people are just waiting for SWG etc.

Having the many fan sites host the market is a bad idea it will just spread it out over those sites and make it difficult for anyone wanting to buy and sell. If you want to close the market forums the only viable option is to build an ingame system. ie a new shop where you can place your item and set a min max bid etc. People can then go to that shop and view the items on sale.