0002841: Crawl Forum? - Dungeon Crawl Stone Soup Tracker

(0009301)
KiloByte (manager)
2010-11-17 00:59

Yeah, especially since that Something Awful forum puts all non-recent posts behind a paywall, making it a no-go from the start. Not to mention the general level of denizens there being a mere notch above /b/.

(0009302)
psyshvl (reporter)
2010-11-17 02:40

I also support the idea of a forum. When I first found out about Crawl, I looked for a forum to discuss it, and was disappointed to find none. For alot of people, including myself, having a forum for discussing Crawl would make asking, 'what is a good starting combo?' and other questions/bug reports/discussion easier to do. Sure there is IRC, Something Awful, and rougelike.misc, but they're hard to access/use for the anyone wanting to talk about Crawl with other people.

(0009303)
pixnaps (reporter)
2010-11-17 02:44

+1

(0009304)
user308
2010-11-17 04:30

Great, sounds like there's some support!

I have some ideas already - one subboard could be for good race/class combinations, one for Stupid Deaths, one for best morgue files, one for general strategy, one for WTF? questions, and one for betatesting discussion. There could be more or less, the actual level of participation in different topics would dictate the final scope.

I think with a bit of promotion on the Something Awful forum and links from the appropriate sites, it wouldn't be too hard to get it going.

Obviously it would be best if it could be hosted on one of the existing sites, but if there's no appetite for that I could start it on my personal site.

(0009305)
TGW (reporter)
2010-11-17 05:13
edited on: 2010-11-17 05:14

Development discussion should stay on the wiki. A forum would fragment it for no gain. And obviously the tracker is better suited for bug reports.

Could be nice for game discussion, though, since we wouldn't need to share it with POWDER and spambots.

(0009308)
user308
2010-11-17 20:32

Yeah, good point. That could go in a sticky, and we would just not have forums for those issues.

However, I think it will be inevitable that people will make comments like "I wish mummies were easier to play" or whatever. That will just have to be dealt with appropriately when it happens - refer people to the wiki etc.

What is POWDER?

(0009311)
Happylisk (reporter)
2010-11-18 17:12

POWDER is an interesting roguelike made by Mr. Lait: http://www.zincland.com/powder/ [^]

(0009329)
evktalo (administrator)
2010-11-22 18:29

We would definitely link to a Crawl-dedicated forum from the official site. What I would consider useful would be forums "to player, from players", I don't think the devteam should "own" it (or have any responsibility, hehe).

--Eino

(0009331)
user308
2010-11-23 01:52

Even if not owned by the dev team, would it be possible to host this somewhere "official"?

Also - any recommendations re software? I used phpBB years ago, but I have no clue as to the current state of the art.

(0009337)
galehar (administrator)
2010-11-23 17:33

Maybe we can ask to create a crawl section in an already existing open source game forum, like this one for example: http://forum.freegamedev.net/ [^]

(0009339)
dpeg (administrator)
2010-11-23 17:55

I agree with all the points: Yes, a dedicated, sane and free forum would be good (so SA does not really fit the last two points). The devteam would not take responsibility but we would link the forum in all the relevant places (including in-game and documentation).

As to what kind of forum to set up, I couldn't say -- I don't use them. And there will be many opinions from among those who do. So I suggest to resolve this issue.

If someone comes around with a new forum, just announce this in all the places you can think of: ##crawl, ##crawl-dev, SA, rec.games.roguelike.misc, Mantis (this here).

(0009345)
user308
2010-11-24 04:47
edited on: 2010-11-24 18:05

Okay, have a look-see: http://dungeoncrawlstonesoup.freeforums.org/ [^]

Pixnaps reports that the sign-up process for members is spammy - I didn't go through that because I was the creator of the board. I'd like to know what others think of that before this is promoted anywhere.

(0009360)
dpeg (administrator)
2010-11-24 19:24

djnrempel: Looks very good! Did you announce this in the relevant places? I have no idea how long it takes for a forum to become properly established but with Crawl's player base it shouldn't be too long.

(0009361)
dpeg (administrator)
2010-11-24 19:25

ah, sorry, I missed that last comment

(0009363)
user308
2010-11-24 20:37
edited on: 2010-11-24 22:20

I'm toying with hosting it myself, which offers several advantages, but also creates new issues - I have to take care of security updates, I have to pay to host it, etc., and just generally more work to set it up.

How is the hosting for crawl.develz.org and chaosforge funded? Who would I have to ask about getting it hosted here?

(0009365)
user308
2010-11-24 22:34

I think for now I'll keep it where it is.

Looking through the admin options, I see that I can disable ads for 5 forum staff members - I'm content to make that the first 5 people from here who sign up.

In terms of promotion: I can do SA and the newsgroup, and the chaosforge wiki. I have no access to crawl.develz.org main page. I have never done IRC.

(0009366)
user308
2010-11-24 23:09
edited on: 2010-11-24 23:10

Never mind, I can't do SA - you have to pay $10 to register?

Does anyone here have a membership?

I posted on the Bay 12 forum.

On the chaosforge wiki I put it on the "Other Web Sites" page but that seems kind of buried. I didn't want to spam the front page either though.

(0009374)
KiloByte (manager)
2010-11-25 16:12

Er, wait... ads?????

What's the problem in just installing phpBB or whatever forum software is the hot stuff this millenium and configuring it? It's not like it would be a significant CPU or bandwidth drain to any server.

(0009379)
user308
2010-11-25 17:16

I've asked a few times about having it hosted here, but with no response.

I'm not a fan of ads either but it beats paying out of my own pocket.

(0009384)
SWATJester (reporter)
2010-11-25 19:46
edited on: 2010-11-25 19:47

If someone gets in touch with me offline, I will buy a domain name, host it on my servers (I work for a startup that hosts gaming communities, though I could do it on my personal servers if you'd like) and help set it up/configure however needed. Contact me offline, drosenthal@thegamenet.com

-e- I'm also an SA member so I can see about getting the OP in the Crawl thread updated with a link.

(0009389)
user308
2010-11-25 23:58
edited on: 2010-11-25 23:59

I sent you an e-mail but these kinds of messages sometimes end up spamfiltered. You can write me at djnrempel at gmail.

In terms of software, I think phpBB is like Windows - the most popular platform and thus the biggest target of security attacks. Something lighter like MyBB would be a good option I think.

(0009522)
user308
2010-12-01 23:09

The forum is off to a good start. Nobody seems to object to the ads, and I'm too busy right now to set it up somewhere else again.

Now however there have been some requests to have game dev discussion there. Please head over to http://dungeoncrawlstonesoup.freeforums.org/game-development-forum-t52.html [^] if you want to comment on this issue there.

(0009526)
due (developer)
2010-12-02 01:16
edited on: 2010-12-02 01:20

As I noted in my post on that thread, I think all of us totally encourage the idea of people talking about the game and its development. From the thread I can already see that some of the other developers are taking part in this conversation.

However, I totally object to the idea of moving all development discussion there. It seems extremely obvious to me as to why this is a bad idea, but I've clarified my reasons in my reply.

EDIT: To clarify, and to remove any confusion, it might be a good idea to note somewhere that this is not a forum officially run by the development team for Crawl, and that all bug reports should come here, etc. I'm not sure if it already says this or not.

(0009735)
user308
2010-12-14 22:57

Based on the feedback and my growing awareness of the limitations of freeforums.org, I've decided to work on moving the forum elsewhere and taking SWATJester up on his offer.

I could use some input on a domain name though. I want something that clearly communicates what the site would be about, but would also leave room for future expansion, eg. I don't want "forum" in the domain, but rather, to have something like domain.com/forum/ for the forum. Obviously something very general to the game would make sense but on the other hand I don't want to hijack the main identity, eg. dungeoncrawlstonesoup.com

To keep discussion in one place, please provide your comments on possible domain names at http://dungeoncrawlstonesoup.freeforums.org/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=130 [^]

(0009829)
jpeg (manager)
2010-12-20 20:59

With the Tavern established (https://crawl.develz.org/tavern/), [^] I'll simply close _this_ monolithic thread. Thanks to everyone involved! :)

Notes
(0009301) KiloByte (manager) 2010-11-17 00:59	Yeah, especially since that Something Awful forum puts all non-recent posts behind a paywall, making it a no-go from the start. Not to mention the general level of denizens there being a mere notch above /b/.

(0009302) psyshvl (reporter) 2010-11-17 02:40	I also support the idea of a forum. When I first found out about Crawl, I looked for a forum to discuss it, and was disappointed to find none. For alot of people, including myself, having a forum for discussing Crawl would make asking, 'what is a good starting combo?' and other questions/bug reports/discussion easier to do. Sure there is IRC, Something Awful, and rougelike.misc, but they're hard to access/use for the anyone wanting to talk about Crawl with other people.

(0009303) pixnaps (reporter) 2010-11-17 02:44	+1

(0009304) user308 2010-11-17 04:30	Great, sounds like there's some support! I have some ideas already - one subboard could be for good race/class combinations, one for Stupid Deaths, one for best morgue files, one for general strategy, one for WTF? questions, and one for betatesting discussion. There could be more or less, the actual level of participation in different topics would dictate the final scope. I think with a bit of promotion on the Something Awful forum and links from the appropriate sites, it wouldn't be too hard to get it going. Obviously it would be best if it could be hosted on one of the existing sites, but if there's no appetite for that I could start it on my personal site.

(0009305) TGW (reporter) 2010-11-17 05:13 edited on: 2010-11-17 05:14	Development discussion should stay on the wiki. A forum would fragment it for no gain. And obviously the tracker is better suited for bug reports. Could be nice for game discussion, though, since we wouldn't need to share it with POWDER and spambots.

(0009308) user308 2010-11-17 20:32	Yeah, good point. That could go in a sticky, and we would just not have forums for those issues. However, I think it will be inevitable that people will make comments like "I wish mummies were easier to play" or whatever. That will just have to be dealt with appropriately when it happens - refer people to the wiki etc. What is POWDER?

(0009311) Happylisk (reporter) 2010-11-18 17:12	POWDER is an interesting roguelike made by Mr. Lait: http://www.zincland.com/powder/ [^]

(0009329) evktalo (administrator) 2010-11-22 18:29	We would definitely link to a Crawl-dedicated forum from the official site. What I would consider useful would be forums "to player, from players", I don't think the devteam should "own" it (or have any responsibility, hehe). --Eino

(0009331) user308 2010-11-23 01:52	Even if not owned by the dev team, would it be possible to host this somewhere "official"? Also - any recommendations re software? I used phpBB years ago, but I have no clue as to the current state of the art.

(0009337) galehar (administrator) 2010-11-23 17:33	Maybe we can ask to create a crawl section in an already existing open source game forum, like this one for example: http://forum.freegamedev.net/ [^]

(0009339) dpeg (administrator) 2010-11-23 17:55	I agree with all the points: Yes, a dedicated, sane and free forum would be good (so SA does not really fit the last two points). The devteam would not take responsibility but we would link the forum in all the relevant places (including in-game and documentation). As to what kind of forum to set up, I couldn't say -- I don't use them. And there will be many opinions from among those who do. So I suggest to resolve this issue. If someone comes around with a new forum, just announce this in all the places you can think of: ##crawl, ##crawl-dev, SA, rec.games.roguelike.misc, Mantis (this here).

(0009345) user308 2010-11-24 04:47 edited on: 2010-11-24 18:05	Okay, have a look-see: http://dungeoncrawlstonesoup.freeforums.org/ [^] Pixnaps reports that the sign-up process for members is spammy - I didn't go through that because I was the creator of the board. I'd like to know what others think of that before this is promoted anywhere.

(0009360) dpeg (administrator) 2010-11-24 19:24	djnrempel: Looks very good! Did you announce this in the relevant places? I have no idea how long it takes for a forum to become properly established but with Crawl's player base it shouldn't be too long.

(0009361) dpeg (administrator) 2010-11-24 19:25	ah, sorry, I missed that last comment

(0009363) user308 2010-11-24 20:37 edited on: 2010-11-24 22:20	I'm toying with hosting it myself, which offers several advantages, but also creates new issues - I have to take care of security updates, I have to pay to host it, etc., and just generally more work to set it up. How is the hosting for crawl.develz.org and chaosforge funded? Who would I have to ask about getting it hosted here?

(0009365) user308 2010-11-24 22:34	I think for now I'll keep it where it is. Looking through the admin options, I see that I can disable ads for 5 forum staff members - I'm content to make that the first 5 people from here who sign up. In terms of promotion: I can do SA and the newsgroup, and the chaosforge wiki. I have no access to crawl.develz.org main page. I have never done IRC.

(0009366) user308 2010-11-24 23:09 edited on: 2010-11-24 23:10	Never mind, I can't do SA - you have to pay $10 to register? Does anyone here have a membership? I posted on the Bay 12 forum. On the chaosforge wiki I put it on the "Other Web Sites" page but that seems kind of buried. I didn't want to spam the front page either though.

(0009374) KiloByte (manager) 2010-11-25 16:12	Er, wait... ads????? What's the problem in just installing phpBB or whatever forum software is the hot stuff this millenium and configuring it? It's not like it would be a significant CPU or bandwidth drain to any server.

(0009379) user308 2010-11-25 17:16	I've asked a few times about having it hosted here, but with no response. I'm not a fan of ads either but it beats paying out of my own pocket.

(0009384) SWATJester (reporter) 2010-11-25 19:46 edited on: 2010-11-25 19:47	If someone gets in touch with me offline, I will buy a domain name, host it on my servers (I work for a startup that hosts gaming communities, though I could do it on my personal servers if you'd like) and help set it up/configure however needed. Contact me offline, drosenthal@thegamenet.com -e- I'm also an SA member so I can see about getting the OP in the Crawl thread updated with a link.

(0009389) user308 2010-11-25 23:58 edited on: 2010-11-25 23:59	I sent you an e-mail but these kinds of messages sometimes end up spamfiltered. You can write me at djnrempel at gmail. In terms of software, I think phpBB is like Windows - the most popular platform and thus the biggest target of security attacks. Something lighter like MyBB would be a good option I think.

(0009522) user308 2010-12-01 23:09	The forum is off to a good start. Nobody seems to object to the ads, and I'm too busy right now to set it up somewhere else again. Now however there have been some requests to have game dev discussion there. Please head over to http://dungeoncrawlstonesoup.freeforums.org/game-development-forum-t52.html [^] if you want to comment on this issue there.

(0009526) due (developer) 2010-12-02 01:16 edited on: 2010-12-02 01:20	As I noted in my post on that thread, I think all of us totally encourage the idea of people talking about the game and its development. From the thread I can already see that some of the other developers are taking part in this conversation. However, I totally object to the idea of moving all development discussion there. It seems extremely obvious to me as to why this is a bad idea, but I've clarified my reasons in my reply. EDIT: To clarify, and to remove any confusion, it might be a good idea to note somewhere that this is not a forum officially run by the development team for Crawl, and that all bug reports should come here, etc. I'm not sure if it already says this or not.

(0009735) user308 2010-12-14 22:57	Based on the feedback and my growing awareness of the limitations of freeforums.org, I've decided to work on moving the forum elsewhere and taking SWATJester up on his offer. I could use some input on a domain name though. I want something that clearly communicates what the site would be about, but would also leave room for future expansion, eg. I don't want "forum" in the domain, but rather, to have something like domain.com/forum/ for the forum. Obviously something very general to the game would make sense but on the other hand I don't want to hijack the main identity, eg. dungeoncrawlstonesoup.com To keep discussion in one place, please provide your comments on possible domain names at http://dungeoncrawlstonesoup.freeforums.org/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=130 [^]

(0009829) jpeg (manager) 2010-12-20 20:59	With the Tavern established (https://crawl.develz.org/tavern/), [^] I'll simply close _this_ monolithic thread. Thanks to everyone involved! :)

Issue History
Date Modified	Username	Field	Change
2010-11-16 18:25	user308	New Issue
2010-11-16 18:43	rafa	Issue Monitored: rafa
2010-11-17 00:59	KiloByte	Note Added: 0009301
2010-11-17 02:40	psyshvl	Note Added: 0009302
2010-11-17 02:44	pixnaps	Note Added: 0009303
2010-11-17 03:09	psyshvl	Issue Monitored: psyshvl
2010-11-17 04:30	user308	Note Added: 0009304
2010-11-17 05:13	TGW	Note Added: 0009305
2010-11-17 05:14	TGW	Note Edited: 0009305
2010-11-17 20:32	user308	Note Added: 0009308
2010-11-17 20:53	ledtim	Issue Monitored: ledtim
2010-11-18 17:12	Happylisk	Note Added: 0009311
2010-11-22 18:29	evktalo	Note Added: 0009329
2010-11-23 01:52	user308	Note Added: 0009331
2010-11-23 17:33	galehar	Note Added: 0009337
2010-11-23 17:55	dpeg	Note Added: 0009339
2010-11-24 04:47	user308	Note Added: 0009345
2010-11-24 18:05	user308	Note Edited: 0009345
2010-11-24 19:24	dpeg	Note Added: 0009360
2010-11-24 19:25	dpeg	Note Added: 0009361
2010-11-24 20:37	user308	Note Added: 0009363
2010-11-24 22:20	user308	Note Edited: 0009363
2010-11-24 22:34	user308	Note Added: 0009365
2010-11-24 23:09	user308	Note Added: 0009366
2010-11-24 23:10	user308	Note Edited: 0009366
2010-11-25 16:12	KiloByte	Note Added: 0009374
2010-11-25 17:16	user308	Note Added: 0009379
2010-11-25 19:46	SWATJester	Note Added: 0009384
2010-11-25 19:47	SWATJester	Note Edited: 0009384
2010-11-25 23:58	user308	Note Added: 0009389
2010-11-25 23:59	user308	Note Edited: 0009389
2010-12-01 23:09	user308	Note Added: 0009522
2010-12-02 01:16	due	Note Added: 0009526
2010-12-02 01:20	due	Note Edited: 0009526
2010-12-14 22:57	user308	Note Added: 0009735
2010-12-20 20:59	jpeg	Note Added: 0009829
2010-12-20 20:59	jpeg	Status	new => resolved
2010-12-20 20:59	jpeg	Fixed in Branch	=> 0.8 development branch
2010-12-20 20:59	jpeg	Resolution	open => done
2010-12-20 20:59	jpeg	Assigned To	=> jpeg
2010-12-20 20:59	jpeg	Status	resolved => closed

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