Manalink Forum Reorganization

[Yaki]

Could we have one sticky locked announcement post that always points to the latest game update and corresponding card artwork update? It's really hard to track things down.

It would be great to have such one locked thread (just one post) with:

1) Original Manalink 2.0 files needed for basic play (optional)
2) Duel Art (optional)

3) Latest game update (with corresponding needed version - if any)
4) Latest card artwork update (with corresponding needed version - if any)

Post would be modified only when new patch is released - no replies allowed.

There are just too many update links scattered over the forum, wiki and other places. Lots of them are outdated even if some are tagged as "this is the only thing you need to play the latest.. "

This simple solution would also eradicate the chance for users to patch something wrong. Less user mistakes and errors - more time to concentrate on deck building, card testing and.. enjoying the game

So basically we would have this locked sticky "one post" thread that ALWAYS has everything user needs to play the LATEST Manalink. Right now - if you go to "New users start here" subforum - first sticky thread is "Current manalink and Graphic packs". Manalink posted there is almost 2 months old.

WIKI with installation instructions could also point to this post for download stuff and there would be no need to modify both places.

Announcements and development threads could then continue to spread the usual way.. without confusion what to download.

Also, I agree with jatill when he says the wiki should be the first guide for new players (wiki link could also be put inside it). I say this because I'm new on the forum and successfully installed the game with the wiki (sad thing - Installation thread with a wiki link is on the 7th place of the "New users start here" subforum).

[Salbei]

Sorry for the "gravedigging", didn´t want to create a new topic for this.

I have been cleaning up the forum a bit (mostly moving topics).
Started this yesterday and there is still a lot of work left to do.(The board did not get "cleaned" for quite a while...)
Also asked Huggybaby to rename the subforums. (New Users Start Here and Decks and Strategy).

I´d really like to have 2 additional "sub-forums".

wall of text | Open

1) "Patches"
Currently almost 3 entire pages of this "Manalink 2.0" forum consist of "New" patch topics.Only the latest one is sticky, but this leads to some issues whenever somebody missed a patch.
Moving all of them into a forum would make it very easy to spot
a) NEW updates
b) missing updates
New topics should start with the date (20110216 - name). YYYYMMDD
Only "developers" may create topics.
I do not know if it is possible, but the topics should be displayed in reverse alphabetical order ( 2011,2010,2009 etc). This way the "latest" patch is always ontop.

2) "Bugreports"
We currently use a SINGLE topic to report bugs.That topic is already at page 72 and chances are very high that "old" bugs won´t get spotted (and thus NOT fixed). There are also single bugreport topics spread all over the place.

I would suggest to add another sub-forum called "Bugreports" with a different structure.
1)People create a topic per bug (named after the card name).
The post should include the version used and a savegame where the bug can be recreated.(or at least a screenshot when a replay won´t help).
2)After the bug is confirmed it gets tagged with [confirmed] after the topic name.Otherwise [unconfirmed].
Would be best if we could announce one or two people as "bughunters" to do this.
3)Now Developers can conveniently check the [confirmed] topics and then replace the [confirmed] with [solved] when the bug is fixed with the next patch.

Sounds a bit complicated, but should really help getting the job done right.

Let me know what you think about it.I know people got used to our "organized chaos", but it would really help new users and also the developers.

--------> edit:
-I am about 70% through with the cleaning up.
Moved 52(!) patch topics and countless (~80) troubleshoot/bug/development topics. Shrinked the Manalink 2.0 forum from 9 pages to 3 (!) without deleting anything.
Still a few topics left that do not belong in there, but i have done enough for now.
Also note the ratio of troubleshooting topics compared to everything else.

-HB implemented the 2 requested sub-forums.Thanks.
-HB sayss it is not possible to "sort" topics, so i guess we just have to keep the recent ones "sticky" and people will have to watch the creation date.

-I´ve created another "read-me" for the Bug Report Section ->
viewtopic.php?f=86&t=4012

-added the so called "SCV". A downloadable version at the Installation forum a couple days ago.Hopefully this will reduce any installation issues.(check signature). Don´t mean to replace the WIKI link, but it is supposed to be a very easy to install alternative for now.
Got around 70 downloads per file already and nobody has reported any trouble with it so far.
Would be great if anyone could mirror those files (~400MB) again. Already uploaded it to my Webspace (had to remove a TON of old patch mirrors and other stuff) and Rapidshare.
Any OCH (One Click Hoster) would do it.

To do:
-Slightly Re-organize the "Installation" forum.Especially the FAQ needs an update.
-try to organize a ToirtoiseSVN repository to fix the Patch/Artwork issues once and for all
-finish cleaning the "main" forum
-find "Bughunters"

->> edit
Tried to create a very "convenient" way to get Bugs fixed.
Just check the Bug Reports section.
Confirmed bugs (with savegames) should be sticky for 2 months or until they are fixed. Should be very easy to spot those.

The "main" forum should be almost clean now.

Still need a better way to organize the "Patches" forum. Currently i just "sticky" the latest patch for a month. Should guarantee that the latest ones will stay ontop. Won´t fix "bumping" though.
Did not want to re-name any topics until i have figured out a "basic" system.

To do:
-Slightly Re-organize the "Installation" forum.Especially the FAQ needs an update.
-try to organize a ToirtoiseSVN repository to fix the Patch/Artwork issues once and for all

[Salbei]

The majority of the Reorganization is done.
Nobody did "anything" to clean up the mess in here for a long time and it took me almost 2 entire days to do so.
I think it was worth the effort after all.

I really hope the "Bug Reports" and "Patches" sections will make everything more user friendly.
Especially new Users should have a easier time to find everything.

Any further suggestions are welcome !

[Huggybaby]

Thanks Salbei! This forum really needed the herculean cleanup you did. Things look much better to me, and hopefully the freqeunt users will benefit as well.

[Salbei]

Thanks for updating the descriptions. We are almost done
Hope those changes don´t scare off the "old" members, but i am confident they will get used to a less chaotic environment

[Gargaroz]

Thanx from me too, Saibei, our code-fixing work is more easy now.

[Salbei]

We shall soon have 4(!) people that explicitly focus on that forum section.
I´m afraid we are going to run out of bugs soon

Also there haven´t been any questions about the installation lately so i guess everything is working fine.

I am starting to re-organize the "Decks, Strategy and Challenges" section.

wall of text | Open

To do:
-merge a ton of topics
-add a index topic (links to each challenge)

The current "form" is just messed up and VERY confusing. There are a ton of "random" topics in there, most of them with a misleading name.Overall it is just a mess.

The solution i have in mind should look like this:

Announcement
Index
Donate

Topics
Share your decks *sticky*
Challenge ideas *sticky*
topics

The "Index" will contain links to each challenge topic.
Added a similar thing to the current "Challenges Tutorial" (check signature), so check that for a preview.

This will require a lot of my time, but should be worth the effort.

I am really happy with the new Bug Report system and that we got enough people to "take care" of it.This way i can focus on things like this.

---
Had some major trouble to merge the topics. No topics got lost, but instead of merging the topics as i intended the forum had different plans.

I had to improvise a bit and created Archives for each Challenge set (merged all duplicate topics into those).
My initial idea was to create a topic ([Archive]Challenge Set 1) and link back to the Index topic at the first post.
Somehow whenever i merged, it ALWAYS put my initial post from that topic as the last one after merging (guess because of the date).
Did some trial and error with "test" topics/posts but could not accomplish the intended result.Had to go a slightly different route then and improvise.

Long story short - i figured out a system.
Only downside so far is that the current Challenge topics are empty.
Still have to figure out a way to move specific posts where i want them to be without messing up the post order.
Got to ask Bog Wraith and Huggybaby , there should be a way to do this - i just can´t figure it out right now.

I am going to do the same thing (index) for Patches after this. This will fix the current "no bump" problem in there.

My progress can be seen >here<

-> edit:
After 6 straight hours of numb work i finished the Index and created a topic for every single Challenge.

Wall of text nobody is going to read anyway | Open

To Do:
#1 Move posts from Archive to each Challenge topic
OR
#2 just Quote informative posts

THIS is gonna suck! Especially since i still do not know a way move single posts without breaking the topic.
I might only quote "good" posts from the Archive and post those in there instead. Would be easier for me to do and would also "filter" things like "whyyyyy is my card not unlocked ???!!!"

Guess #2 is the way to go. This Index "system" should prevent new challenge related topics (after i created roughly 50 topics rofl) and most importantly provide a very quick way to find what people are looking for.
I even added the Cards each challenge unlocks behind the topic name. Don´t even want to know how much time Jatill had to spend just for creating the individual challenges ... would blow my mind.

---
Going to index Patches now. Meanwhile i might figure out a better solution for this.

-> done
viewtopic.php?f=85&t=4026

---
Check the Announcement for the solution. I really need to enjoy "my" Sunday now

-> edit
I´m almost done with the Challenge section. Hope you will get used to the "index".Personally i used it a ton of times already just for finding the proper topics in no time (to post the archived quotes).
Just Set#1 missing now. Going to finish that soon.

---
I´m not 100% happy with the signature yet, but it should do what it is supposed to do for now.

It is actually 5 different pictures, that is why it might look weird.
Each picture should link you to a different section.

sig | Open

If anyone is interested here is the code.

Code: Select all

[url=http://www.slightlymagic.net/forum/viewforum.php?f=25][img]http://www.salbei.spacequadrat.de/magic/pic/mlsig.png[/img][/url][url=http://www.slightlymagic.net/forum/viewtopic.php?f=55&t=3991][img]http://www.salbei.spacequadrat.de/magic/pic/svcsig.png[/img][/url][url=http://www.slightlymagic.net/wiki/Installation_Guide_and_User_Manual][img]http://www.salbei.spacequadrat.de/magic/pic/wikisig.png[/img][/url][url=http://www.slightlymagic.net/forum/viewtopic.php?f=85&t=4026][img]http://www.salbei.spacequadrat.de/magic/pic/patchsig.png[/img][/url][url=http://www.slightlymagic.net/forum/viewtopic.php?f=57&t=4045#p54190][img]http://www.salbei.spacequadrat.de/magic/pic/cisig.png[/img][/url]


Pretty much "<url=source><img>source</img></url>" over and over again.
Was a bit tricky to create "readable" images when you just got 20 pixels available for height.
Might change the pics when i get bored

It is supposed to be all in one line.Let me know if it is too long.
Hope you like it.

[Huggybaby]

The sig is good. I'd like a more brightly lit avatar though, yours seems to get darker every day, until eventually it must fade out completely.

[Dave]

Great job on the reorganization. I think it's much better now. Don't get me wrong. It was great before, but now it's even better .

[Salbei]

I started to add the AI decks (seperate topic) for the Challenges. Might link to the "used" ones at the individual challenge topics when i got time spare.
Most likely won´t be used as frequently, but people have asked for those in the past and i thought it would be a nice thing to have.
Should also help Jatill if he decides to change some decks in the future (better overview, used your deck IDs, names and even the order of the cards are the same. Should be easy to use for you.Just please remember to let me know after you made any changes).

viewtopic.php?f=57&t=4127&p=54761#p54759

-> finished. Lots and lots of data entry. Took roughly 5 hours.
In hindsight i should have written a .bat to figure out the cardnames instead of manually searching.
Didn´t thought it would take that long.