The problem of defining the General Discussion forum

Pogo

I understand that every user gets something different out of the forums. Very little of my time is spent in GD, since what I need can invariably be found in other subforums. Most of my reading is done in Character Discussion and nearly always begins with me opening the Compendium & jumping to a character. Most of my posting is done in Suggestions & Feedback.

This is not to say that I think there's no value in GD at all (or that I never find any of the threads there interesting), but that I can understand how some users might exclusively browse GD. GD in any forum tends to have more of a social element than other subforums, and this might be part of the reason why users gravitate toward it. I'm sure there are plenty of users who have GD as their browser bookmark for "the forums".

As far as encouraging people to keep feedback in Feedback and events in Events, forcibly moving threads will probably help people get adjusted to that idea (though it will be a pain for the moderators for some time), but it might also help slightly to move GD further down the list of subforums.

• News/Announcements
• Events
• Tips/Guides
• User Help & Advice (including Roster/Level Help)
• Alliances
• Character Information & Discussion
• Character Concepts & Speculation
• Theories & Statistics
• Feedback & Suggestions
• →Community Discussion (General Discussion)
• Bugs & Technical Issues

Reordering the list also emphasizes the content that newer/unestablished users are more likely to need (Announcements and Help, which are likely what brought them to the forums in the first place). Even if you don't define GD based on what it isn't, you can demonstrate what it isn't by listing those things ahead of GD. Users see the specialized subforums that match their proposed content before they even get to GD.

I also support the previously mentioned suggestion of a subforum for discussing the actual forum, though I'm not sure whether it would make more sense to have that subforum exist outside the individual games (or even to have each game's directory link in to the same subforum).

OneLastGambit

As a frequenter and poster of all the sub forums I think I know why people don't use the others so often. Its not because of a lack of red names posting there...Its because of a lack of members posting there. 

Mostly people aren't looking for dev comments on things (I'd say about 75-85% of the time anyway) they're posting things for other members to read and comment on, hence the general sub forum where it is most likely to be read by other members. 

It seems a simpler task to simply allow general to exist as it does and simply move annoucements and other direct game info into other sub forums and do not repost it in general (as you currently do). The mods (or whomever organises the forum) has set the example by posting official threads in general when they don't need to be. So do the following....

Info about new characters or rebalance? Goes in announcements and/or character discussion

Info about new events? Announcements and events sub forum.

Info about bugs? Announcements and bugs sub forum...

You see where I'm going. Wherever you post the info is likely where people will comment on it just out of sheer laziness.

I know people will say that information won't reach all members if you switch this way and it won't...at first. Once people start using the forum correctly they'll know where the info is and how to read it.

killerkoala

I guess we don't get to see any may previews updates in general discussion unless we are in missions post area, since it was moved there.