It's time for new Forums!

[Antheal]

So will the DDO team actually start using them as an official discussion platform now, or are we still going to be expected to get most of our information from Facebook/Twitter/Livestreams/Other instead of the official forums?

Shiny new forums are going to be worthless if the team carries on with its typical lack of communication.

[apocaladle]

Cordo, as the moderator of the forums, are you stoked for the update?

[Caarb]

Please make a mobile-compatible layout while you're at it.

Its not really within the skill or scope of SSG members to do this*. The current forums are on an old version of vBulletin the new forums will be on a version of Xenforo. Xenforo has both a native app and a mobile friendly CSS layout.

*Exception is the custom branding at the top and bottom of the page. This is likely to not be mobile friendly as I doubt much thought has gone into it.

[Cordovan]

Cordo, as the moderator of the forums, are you stoked for the update?

Very much so. The first few weeks are going to be a lot of work, but once things settle down it will be a night and day difference based on my experience so far. I've perhaps been more impacted than most by the brokenness of the existing forums for quite a few years now due to just how much time I spend using the forums in addition to dealing with its brains behind the scenes. This has been a long needed update.

[axel15810]

Nice, looking forward to it.

What did you all decide on when it comes to sub forums - will there still be class forums, new player advice forums, etc. etc. ?

Also, will links to specific threads on the old forums continue to function, or will the read only state break them?

[Targal]

fun fact: There's a mobile version of the forum, and it's quite unfunctional.

I haven't used it for years, and I wonder if it's usable at this point.

[Cordovan]

Nice, looking forward to it.

What did you all decide on when it comes to sub forums - will there still be class forums, new player advice forums, etc. etc. ?

Also, will links to specific threads on the old forums continue to function, or will the read only state break them?

All the sub forums will continue, I don't think I've removed anything, and we can add/remove as people want in the future. The only big changes are to open Fansite news up to a broader content creation place, creating the Bug Discussion forums, and turning Suggestions at least initially into a weighed forum where people can upvote good suggestions. We'll see on Suggestions, but I want to at least try it.

Old links will work if you swap the text from forums.ddo.com/whatever to forums-old.ddo.com/whatever.

[axel15810]

All the sub forums will continue, I don't think I've removed anything, and we can add/remove as people want in the future. The only big changes are to open Fansite news up to a broader content creation place, creating the Bug Discussion forums, and turning Suggestions at least initially into a weighed forum where people can upvote good suggestions. We'll see on Suggestions, but I want to at least try it.

Old links will work if you swap the text from forums.ddo.com/whatever to forums-old.ddo.com/whatever.

OK, thanks for the response.

[PurpleTimb]

Will users' join dates carry over? or will everyone have an join date of April 2023?

I like the idea of upvoting for the Suggestions sub-forum. There are a lot of really good ideas that get proposed here and any way that we can get more visibility on them is a good thing.

[AlcoArgo]

Hmmmmm...

The last time this happened I lost my account and had to start a new one. That is why I don't have a join date of 2006 on my forum account.

[thegreatcthulhu]

So a few things I wanted to say and ask; as always Cordovan, you are free to answer if you are able:

Questions:

A) I snuck a peak at the new ones (the URL is pretty easy to find I am sure you are aware). Based on what I am seeing, I have this question - did you opt for a solution that Daybreak found (it looks like you are getting help from the people at MTGO) or did you ultimately sift through various options until you elected to use XenForo? If you could tell the story behind this to some degree, I'd appreciate it.. I personally get interested in why people make these sorts of decisions (technology choices). If this is too nosey, no worries.

B) Will you be keeping the Drupal front end for DDO.com as well or is the main site going to be getting a face lift as well?

C) Will there be new people joining from Daybreak/Wizards/elsewhere to help administer the new boards or are you going to retain all those responsibilities in house at SSG? Either one doesn't bother me, I am just trying to figure out what we can expect.

D) Are you dreading the possibility of some regulars on here you've become familiar with picking new names and confusing you on the new boards?

Other Comments:

I am looking forward to the new boards myself (they are much cleaner looking, and I love the dread background). I for one will be happy to be done with the separate forum and user accounts.

I'll be especially happy to use a Dragonborn or Bahamut themed avatar... Gravatar integration is also a cool feature

Finally, I am glad to see you are keeping the subforums in the new board. I am not sure what to think of that, based on how I am seeing people use GD on this place now days... but either way, I hope they get used as much as they have been on this site. There were a lot of useful builds and other discussion in those subforums and I really hope to see it continue in the future.

[Calinthus]

Why try to "fix" something that isn't broken? Your time would be better spent on the game, fixing, idk... The ladder bug, the lag. Oh, and stop the free transfers. The servers already have enough difficulty filling parties and raids. What you are doing with those are ultimately going to hurt the game. Maybe, instead, advertise, on FB, Twitter, Any and all social media. Also, on TV, Streaming sites, like Disney+, Netflix, Hulu, ect. This game needs more population, on each server, if it is going to survive. You guys just need to advertise more. FB, Instagram, Ticktock... Those are all free advertisement platforms. Use them.

[Uska]

Guess I’m done with the forums losing my title join date and post count and larger green bar. loses my interest good luck

[dunklezhan]

Guess I’m done with the forums losing my title join date and post count and larger green bar. loses my interest good luck

For the record I don't mind* losing my bar or title.

But Cordo did say above that he will do what he can to hunt these down and apply them manually. I think he'll probably end up drawing a line somewhere at some point, there must be hundreds to do, but I think founders should be on the 'definitely move over' list, if not '1st priority' during/after the migration. Founders deserve a special marker and special attention in my view, I mean talk about endurance! o7

I do think the idea of creating our own titles renders them meaningless mind you, regardless of how one got theirs. There should be some that are restricted that only moderators can apply, and others can't choose. I won a photo competition one valentine's day for instance - would have been a bit of a rubbish bonus prize if anyone could just create it for themselves. Mind you, I didn't enter the competition for the forum title I remember that as being a surprise so it's not like it's a motivator particularly, but its nice ?that it's fairly exclusive.

*this is not the same as not caring. The world won't end if I lose green bar & it's title, or the "Hopeless Romantic" forum title. ...but they are nice to have ended up with, y'know?

[Cordovan]

So a few things I wanted to say and ask; as always Cordovan, you are free to answer if you are able:

Questions:

A) I snuck a peak at the new ones (the URL is pretty easy to find I am sure you are aware). Based on what I am seeing, I have this question - did you opt for a solution that Daybreak found (it looks like you are getting help from the people at MTGO) or did you ultimately sift through various options until you elected to use XenForo? If you could tell the story behind this to some degree, I'd appreciate it.. I personally get interested in why people make these sorts of decisions (technology choices). If this is too nosey, no worries.

B) Will you be keeping the Drupal front end for DDO.com as well or is the main site going to be getting a face lift as well?

C) Will there be new people joining from Daybreak/Wizards/elsewhere to help administer the new boards or are you going to retain all those responsibilities in house at SSG? Either one doesn't bother me, I am just trying to figure out what we can expect.

D) Are you dreading the possibility of some regulars on here you've become familiar with picking new names and confusing you on the new boards?

Other Comments:

I am looking forward to the new boards myself (they are much cleaner looking, and I love the dread background). I for one will be happy to be done with the separate forum and user accounts.

I'll be especially happy to use a Dragonborn or Bahamut themed avatar... Gravatar integration is also a cool feature

Finally, I am glad to see you are keeping the subforums in the new board. I am not sure what to think of that, based on how I am seeing people use GD on this place now days... but either way, I hope they get used as much as they have been on this site. There were a lot of useful builds and other discussion in those subforums and I really hope to see it continue in the future.

A) This is part of a wider Daybreak effort to get all of the forums updated and sync'd to the same platform. We did look at about a half dozen different options and this is the one we picked, in part because this is what is already supported on the Daybreak platform side. But, ultimately it was a good choice regardless. In practice most of the modern day solutions were all about the same with minor cosmetic and feature variances.

B) Drupal has already been replaced for DDO.com, but it sticks around for a few things like the launcher news feed. Once we get a new launcher we expect it to be deprecated as well. DDO.com got a big facelift last year.

C) It'll still be SSG staffing the forums.

D) Not at all!

[Mindos]

A) This is part of a wider Daybreak effort

So SSG is owned by Daybreak? You can't say no is what I'm asking.

[thegreatcthulhu]

A) This is part of a wider Daybreak effort to get all of the forums updated and sync'd to the same platform. We did look at about a half dozen different options and this is the one we picked, in part because this is what is already supported on the Daybreak platform side. But, ultimately it was a good choice regardless. In practice most of the modern day solutions were all about the same with minor cosmetic and feature variances.

B) Drupal has already been replaced for DDO.com, but it sticks around for a few things like the launcher news feed. Once we get a new launcher we expect it to be deprecated as well. DDO.com got a big facelift last year.

C) It'll still be SSG staffing the forums.

D) Not at all!

Thanks for taking the time to answer; I am seeing now where I missed what you had done with ddo.com as a whole.

[cdbd3rd]

Why try to "fix" something that isn't broken? Your time would be better spent on the game, fixing, idk... The ladder bug, .....<snip>

LOL! The LAST place we want Jerry is dancing willy-nilly through the sketti!

[apocaladle]

So SSG is owned by Daybreak? You can't say no is what I'm asking.

Yeah, Tubine sold off DDO and LOTRO to Daybreak a while ago, I think they tried to sell Asherons Call 2 aswell but that didnt work so it was shut down when the team was changed to be under the newly formed SSG.

Related if curious, Daybreak is owned by EG7 which is a publicly traded company (market cap of 2.55 billion) so its owned by a ton of stock holders.

SSG is run by Sev, and it seems like for the most part they let him and the ssg team run the games how they like as long as they are fiscally responsible. Only a few things outside of that like Daybreak wanting to get all their games forums on a common system. I think Daybreak is also helps with SSG's support ticket system and their monetary transactions like the back end of the ingame stores and the back end of the ddo market. They also probably told Sev to try and capitalize on the D&D movie by doing extra marketing which resulted in things like the free questing code, ottos boxes and a bunch of exp bonus weekends back to back.

[Josielynn]

LOL! The LAST place we want Jerry is dancing willy-nilly through the sketti!

I don't know, that creates a pretty funny visual!!