[The Rafalution]

One suggestion in that thread (made by someone else, so i'm not taking the credit here) was to have a learner forum which is open to users in the first week or so. Only allow mods/selective users to post in it. That way, new users get help from experienced people who are known to be helpful. Snarking is avoided.

if they werent allowed on otf for an entire week what would all the alias-account peeps do?

[Insanemadman]

I'm sure GQ used to have a much better ratio of good posters to morons than it does now.

[ToonToon_BarmyArmy]

I can't understand all the complaining about the game anyway. It has got some errors in there for sure, but it's nowhere near as unplayable as what CM4 was when it came out of the box. FM08 as it is, is in my opinion not bad at all and the producers certianly dont deserve the level of abuse that they have taken over it.

[Kill Rock Stars]

Originally posted by ToonToon_BarmyArmy:
it's nowhere near as unplayable as what CM4 was when it came out of the box.

damned by very, very faint praise

[Tim Madisun]

Originally posted by The Rafalution:
<BLOCKQUOTE>One suggestion in that thread (made by someone else, so i'm not taking the credit here) was to have a learner forum which is open to users in the first week or so. Only allow mods/selective users to post in it. That way, new users get help from experienced people who are known to be helpful. Snarking is avoided.

if they werent allowed on otf for an entire week what would all the alias-account peeps do? </BLOCKQUOTE>

The idea was to have read only access, so they could watch but not contribute for a week or so.

They'd have to suck it up, I guess?

[Sean M]

One suggestion in that thread (made by someone else, so i'm not taking the credit here) was to have a learner forum which is open to users in the first week or so. Only allow mods/selective users to post in it. That way, new users get help from experienced people who are known to be helpful. Snarking is avoided.

The best part of this idea is that you restrict new user posting rights in the first week or so to this learner forum only. Read only for the rest of the forum. It allows new users to get a feel for the place, get questions answered but not wreck the place. Would also help combat lacing, to a certain degree.

I think part of the problem is that you have several types of users all sharing the one forum.

Eg
* New players who want to ask a question.
* People who want to share their experiences in the game. Eg "Wow just had an unbelievable match"
* Long thread on an idea for the future
* Concise constructive criticism
* People who want to complain
etc


I don't think they will restrict new users from posting in other forums. Just in case someone wants to ask a about a computer problem. Or joined up to ask a specific question about skins or editing.

I agree that the best way is to split the forum and hope it improves things.

Worse case scenario is if the newbie forum becomes an exact replica of the GQ forum. Eg if newbies start lots of threads slagging off the game and then get into fights with other newbies.


=----=
Realistically I don't think things are going to change. I think they view GQ as the "learner forum" and starting point for new users. And they feel the solution is for existing users to be friendlier and nicer.

When I read that thread by Miles. I got the sense it was more about ways to change user behaviour than restructuring the forums.

[Mr Wallin]

Originally posted by ajw2255:
it's always been pretty grim

Headache inducingly bad most of the time...

[Kain]

The main problem with GQ is the lack of dedicated mods to that forum. Kris and Glyn are the only ones I've seen in there in months, and not only are neither on the forums as much as they used to (not a criticism there), but they cover a lot of other forums as well.

Miles' thread also hasn't helped at all, due to it being started almost 2 months ago and absolutely nothing being done since. It got better for about a week or so, now its as bad as ever.

[Ackter]

Originally posted by Herman Bloom:
It's awful, not particularly helped out by SI in some cases. Will repeat for the billionth time that the thread in OTF is the best bit of feedback I've seen on the boards.

The OTF thread has the same mong-to-quality ratio as GQ tbh. Difference is that it's far more pronounced in GQ.

There used to be far more constructive threads in GQ than there are in the OTF thread, unfortunately they, and most of their posters, have been pushed out by the sheer force of mong.

[Ackter]

Oh, and a suggestions forum is clearly the way to go, along with dedicated moderation.

The suggestion forum should be undereath GQ though, as the top forum is usually where the more crap posters congregate (you just have to look at the amount of closed threads in the FML forum to realise half of the new users don't even bother to look at what forum they're in before posting - they just click on the top-most forum and shoot).