DISCUSSION: Forum Consolidation

[SOLDIER #819]

But I would be interested to know why it was switched. I've only been here under a year. So the format we have now is the only format I've seen.

There were a few reasons if I remember right. One of the major ones is that it hid activity. It was very hard to tell what forums had been posted in from the index since multiple forums were lumped together under one super-forum. It was also harder to check each forum. You had to click the forum, then click to get to another forum... I think one or two of those forums had a subforum...so that sucked too. It'd be even worse now, where you'd have to click about three times to get to that one new post.

It sounded nice in theory, but in practice a whole bunch of issues came up.

[Michael Swayne]

as a member that doesn't use half the forums on here anymore it would be nice not having to scroll down so far on the main page to get to things....I mean my poor finger and all that exercise you forum execs make it do.

That's why there is this...

SPOILER!!:

It allows you to hide sections that you don't want to see and saves your poor finger from exercising so much. It makes this...

SPOILER!!:

look like this...

SPOILER!!:

If you don't look at a specific section of the forum, hide it. And don't frown, because the next time you log back in, those sections you hid will still be hidden.

There were a few reasons if I remember right. One of the major ones is that it hid activity. It was very hard to tell what forums had been posted in from the index since multiple forums were lumped together under one super-forum. It was also harder to check each forum. You had to click the forum, then click to get to another forum... I think one or two of those forums had a subforum...so that sucked too. It'd be even worse now, where you'd have to click about three times to get to that one new post.

This is why there's "New Posts" in the bar at the top of the screen. So you don't have to spend time with useless clicking and scrolling. And there's also the "Today's Posts" in the Quick Links Drop Bar (also located at the top of the screen). AND there's also a search-function (titled "Display Options") at the bottom of each forum (for example, General Chat) that allows you set the threads you want to see in that forum from a specific time frame. Not only that, you can set what threads get displayed in the "Thread Display Options" section of the "Edit Options" in your User CP. This allows you to see only threads that had been made within the last day up to the last year (Default setting is all threads ever) permanently, or until you decide to change it again.

So basically, you can set things to be hidden yourself, and you can make it so older threads are not shown to you. The way things are right now make things easier for newer members to join in on everything at TFF. Having forums grouped together would make things look cleaner on the outside, but if a person is wondering about whether Final Fantasy IV is a good game for example, they could be misled into thinking that there are characters called Bartz or Terra because FF4 threads are mixed in with FF5 and/or FF6 threads. Do we then ask people making threads to specify in the titles what game is to be talked about in that thread? To me, that would get really annoying really fast. And what of the threads already made? Do the admins have to do extra work and change the titles of every thread to say what game is mentioned. I can't speak for the other members, but I don't want to read a post to find out what game it is referring to. That's why things have titles.