And this is exactly why I wanted to post my intentions and open this up to discussion in advance of making any changes at all, so that I could answer some questions and make sure that there was nothing that I had missed....
madd0ct0r wrote:
so you'll be maintaining three boards? the old SG ones (now busy with BFG), these ones (cut back to EA dev work) and a new one for 'army scale games', minitures and what have you.
so it's similar to the one we have now, just with the major sections at a further degree of removal from each other?
Technically, yes. The site will have three boards, which is a strange situation to be in. However, they will be far better defined with what their focus is. Right now, both the current forums can be used to discuss Epic, BFG and other games such as Necromunda. The new setup will mean that any SG games at 28mm (and Inqusitor) will be located over on the SG boards. It also means that events such as the GothiComp BFG painting competition will happen over there and hopefully concentrate the community.
As for the degree of seperation, yes and no. The easiest way to think about it is that the average players will use the new boards. If you just want to play Epic (and other games) then discussion on miniatures, rules questions, scenarios, etc will happen over on the new boards. Any development on lists, suppliments and so on will happen here. Let me put it this way, if Epic was still a part of GW, these boards would be the equivalent to the GW forums, while the new boards will be the 'players discussion' forums. Of course, there will always be a little crossover - although I would want to keep this to the absolute minimum - in the same way that a thread over on Warseer may be linked to here, and so on.
Jaggedtoothgrin wrote:
so does that mean army development will be in one forum, and army diaries and pretty pictures will be in another?
where do battle reports with pretty pictures, and spruiking for tournaments go?
Yes, to the first part. Army diaries, pretty pictures and so will happen on the new boards. In fact, with the potential of blogs, image storage and other features on the new site, this should be made easier to do generally. Tournament discussion will also happen on the new boards, along with tournament announcements for other games, to reach a wider audience. There is also potential to link tournament announcements to both front page news items and a calender.
Spectrar Ghost wrote:
What about EA rules queries? They would seem to bridge the gap; I'm not sure whether I'd like them in the TacComs and allow the EpiComms to just link them, or have them all in one place but make it almost required to sign up for both for Epic stuff.
I think that you are correct and that this is the area that will cause the most potential confusion. However, my initial thought is that rules questions would also move to the new boards (except where those questions relate to work in development). A certain amount of settling down and cross linking is - I think - inevitable initially. I agree that I am hesitant to require everyone to create a second account, but on the other hand I would rather deal with all of the upheaval at the same time and get it done with, than attempt to make concessions and potentially leave the situation cloudy and unresolved.
frogbear wrote:
Hi CS
Did you have an approximate timeframe before d-day to re-register/register?
This will not be an overnight change. Phase one is to sort out, archive and remove the various sections that we currently have. Another reason that I am talking about this now - well in advance of doing anything - is to allow people to make backups and to ensure that we dont lose anything. I would rather have 20 backup copies of something, than find that no-one had it. Certainly, nothing will be happening before Thursday 21st July. From that time, the Wiki and main site resources are first to be organised. Over here, the boards will need to be turned off when the actual installation happens (for maybe a day or three) but will return entirely unchanged after this is done, and while I configure the main site and set up at least the forum over there. At that point I will leave the current structure as it is, but turn off the ability to create new posts (or to reply to posts). That way, the current threads will stay as reference for a while.
Legion 4 wrote:
So we won't be discussing Other companies models, rules, etc. ?
Not here. But, the new boards will be exactly for this - open discussion of 6mm and 10mm games and miniatures.
Essentially, these boards will be reduced down to EpiComms News, NetEA Rules Ammendments, NetEA Battle Reports and the boards for each of the forces under development. We can also have boards for each of the suppliments, if required, and I am happy to discuss adding boards as they are needed.
I hope that this helps clarify a few issues. I know that this all seems quite large scale, but I do think that it is worth going through some disturbance in order to better focus where we are and what we are trying to achieve.
Thanks for your feedback.