What do we want the future of Druchii.net to be?

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Re: What do we want the future of Druchii.net to be?

Post by Daeron »

Right. I'm not "active" at the moment, since a busy period on the job and at home had me take a break from the game. I also started playing some other game with my buddies, which is putting AoS/WH on a low at the moment. Unfortunately, this also killed my drive to paint and try some initiatives.

For the time being, I'm checking in regularly for technical reasons and to keep up with the news.

Asrai is available on Asrai.druchii.net. The Asrai.org domain was not correctly handed to me, unfortunately. They lost their sub to it in july, but there's still a cooldown period on the domain which is preventing me from registering it.
Aside from that, the three forums are in technically doing well, with a single (smaller) bill for all 3 combined than Dnet had on its own before.

If a new forum is to be made, that's fine. I can set it up.

MERGING the accounts and data, though... That can be done, but it's a more ambitious project. If we decide to go this way, I'll work on a plan to implement this. This may cost some time, so I'd like to see a final decision on this first, before I commit ;)
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Re: What do we want the future of Druchii.net to be?

Post by Shadowspite »

Daeron wrote:Asrai is available on Asrai.druchii.net.

Then the link on Druchii.net's 'Portal' page should be pointing there.

If a new forum is to be made, that's fine. I can set it up.
MERGING the accounts and data, though... That can be done, but it's a more ambitious project.

In that case, it's probably better to start with a clean slate, an entirely new forum with whatever arrangement of subforums we can finally agree on. The existing three forums can presumably be added in as archives later, right? Would making them read-only make it any easier to port them over? I'm clueless about this stuff.

Is there any way to port across people's existing logins so that we don't all have to register new membership accounts? I worry that some people will just not bother signing up at the 'new' site and we'll lose even more people in the move. Basic human psychology: we will keep more people onboard if the move requires no effort on their part.

Another question. If we have the new site's forums initially divided into three 'sets' of subforums, one 'set' for each faction (HE, DE, WE), is it possible to have some subforums in (or appearing in / accessible through) all three 'sets'?
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Re: What do we want the future of Druchii.net to be?

Post by Calisson »

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Re: What do we want the future of Druchii.net to be?

Post by Lord Drakon »

Daeron wrote:Right. I'm not "active" at the moment, since a busy period on the job and at home had me take a break from the game. I also started playing some other game with my buddies, which is putting AoS/WH on a low at the moment. Unfortunately, this also killed my drive to paint and try some initiatives.


I meant no offense! Please don't excuse yourself, we all have breaks from the game :) I see it as potential not as problem, now it seems there are so many lurkers out there. The team has always done an amazing job (I really love the new druchii.net logos).
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Re: What do we want the future of Druchii.net to be?

Post by Rork »

Shadowspite wrote:EDIT: Rork, would that mean taking over the domain name and responsibility for paying for server space? What exactly do you do? :P


Pretty much ;) .

These days I just pop up once in a while and make a quip. I like to think no one is ever expecting me to descend upon them with unconstrained wrath.

Like this:

:badh:
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Re: What do we want the future of Druchii.net to be?

Post by cultofkhaine »

Rork wrote:
Shadowspite wrote:
Like this: :badh:


I'm worried!
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Re: What do we want the future of Druchii.net to be?

Post by Shadowspite »

And how much does it cost per year at the moment? Not that I'm angling for the job... ;)
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Re: What do we want the future of Druchii.net to be?

Post by Rork »

Shadowspite wrote:And how much does it cost per year at the moment? Not that I'm angling for the job... ;)


It's about $15 a month.
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Re: What do we want the future of Druchii.net to be?

Post by Shadowspite »

Hm. That's more than I can comfortably afford, to be honest (especially at post-Brexit exchange rates). I could probably manage it if the cost was shared with at least one other person, though.
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Re: What do we want the future of Druchii.net to be?

Post by Amboadine »

I have been a little busy over the last couple of months and gaming in every respect has been a low priority. Think this is my first post in a couple of weeks, however @Shadowspite, more than happy to share costs if needed.

Right, back into lurk mode for another week or so whilst I get my work life balance back in shape.
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Re: What do we want the future of Druchii.net to be?

Post by Shadowspite »

Amboadine wrote:however @Shadowspite, more than happy to share costs if needed.

In that case, I can give a provisional 'yes'. Assuming nobody else wants the job. I don't want people to feel I'm trying to take over, though, so if someone else wants to do it and can shoulder the cost I will defer to them.

Do we have a consensus on starting the new forums organisation as a separate site for now? And what is the current feeling among the Asrai and Ulthuan admins? Are they just waiting for us to get our collective finger out?
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Re: What do we want the future of Druchii.net to be?

Post by Calisson »

An idea becomes a project when the following is gathered:
- a mission
- a leader
- a team
- a plan
- some resources.
Could you elaborate on these?
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Re: What do we want the future of Druchii.net to be?

Post by Shadowspite »

We seem to still be haggling over details of what the 'mission' is. And I'm still waiting for the answers to several questions.
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Re: What do we want the future of Druchii.net to be?

Post by Calisson »

Up to you to define the terms, and see if you attract a team.
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Re: What do we want the future of Druchii.net to be?

Post by Shadowspite »

So, what you're saying is, if I want anything to actually happen, I need to take the entire burden of goal-setting, organising and planning on my own shoulders and hope other people are willing to pitch in and help? This despite my making clear I have no relevant technical expertise?

Well, I don't have all the necessary information to formulate any sort of meaningful plan, hence my questions. Once those are answered, maybe I can make a start.
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Re: What do we want the future of Druchii.net to be?

Post by cultofkhaine »

The conversation on this just goes round in circles. :badh:

I think collectively the mods/those interested just need to make a decision on it.
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Re: What do we want the future of Druchii.net to be?

Post by Shadowspite »

OK, I can at least put some preliminary thoughts down, see if this is what Calisson is getting at...

Mission: To create a forum-based website for all players of elves (and aelves) in AoS, WHFB (all editions), KoW, 9th Age, plus whatever other tabletop battle games people are interested in. Secondary priority is to keep alive and hopefully grow the existing Druchii.net, Asrai.org and Ulthuan.net communities. Eventually, these three websites will be retired and archived at the new site. We also need to think of other functions we can add to make the new website a place that is worth visiting.

Leader: I'll be honest. I'd rather this not be me, as I have no relevant technical knowledge or practical experience of building or running a website (I was a global mod for like a week way back in D.net's distant past, but that never involved me actually doing anything that I can recall). However, I'm willing to give it a go if the alternative is the slow bleeding death of Druchii.net. I've been a Druchii.netter for longer than anyone else currently here (even if I left for a while), and I'll be damned if I'll let it die without a fight. But it is obviously not ideal to have this project led by someone for whom HTML might as well be sorcery.

Team: This will be hard. A lot of you are busy with real-life stuff right now. We absolutely need Daeron on board, as he's the only guy we have who can actually do the technical stuff. I can handle contacts with Ulthuan and Asrai admins if Calisson is too busy. I need to discuss with Daeron, to find out what specifically needs doing and how big a team is actually required.

Plan: This is the bit I can't really start on until I know a bit more.

Resources: Amboadine and I can share the financial cost, provided the new site doesn't end up being substantially more expensive than the current three sites combined (which it shouldn't, right?).
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Re: What do we want the future of Druchii.net to be?

Post by Calisson »

Alright! :D

Thanks for this good start.
About Daeron and myself, don't worry, we remain involved.
Leadership, I can keep it, it just will be not as fast as I would like, due to T9A soaking more than 100% of my free time (do not play, do not paint...).

Missing plan:
reviewing the discussions earlier in this thread, we did not settle on what the future forum should look like.
What is the considered main division in the future forum?
Blue/Green/Purple/Panelves?
AoS/WHFB/KoW/T9A?
P&M/Games/Fluff?
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Re: What do we want the future of Druchii.net to be?

Post by Shadowspite »

This post is just a rehash, and I'm only putting it here at all because nobody else has replied for two days now. I think Calisson wanted everyone's thoughts on this issue, not just mine...

Anyway, you already know my preferences. The current system of three websites divides us up primarily by elf faction, and that clearly doesn't work (otherwise we'd not be having this conversation because the three sites wouldn't be slowly bleeding out).

And the three factions don't have any relevance to AoS, which is likely to remain one of the top 3 systems for popularity (I'd bet on it being the most popular system long-term). Sure, the Wanderers are pretty much the old Wood Elves, but both Dark and High Elves have been divided into mini-factions, most of whom are not viable armies on their own. The new aelf factions such as the Shadowkin might have some similarities to the old WHFB kindreds, but Shadowkin are not Druchii. Even the Wanderers have an old High Elf unit in their faction alongside the Wood Elf legacy units.

So I don't think it makes sense to have the forums divided up into HE, DE, WE. I would prefer the forums to be split by game system, with the less popular systems grouped together. P&M should probably be a single subforum since that's obviously not system-specific. And, as I said before, we should use thread tags for any further specialisation.

Which raises the question of whether our current forum software is right for a tag-based system. This is something Daeron needs to weigh in on. Also, I'd like to know just what can be done with forum layout. Is it possible to have the same subforum accessible through multiple 'paths'? I really can't put any sort of detailed plan together without getting answers to these questions.

Honestly, I'd be fine with just giving Daeron carte blanche to design the forum layout in whatever way he thinks would be best for what we're trying to achieve.
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Re: What do we want the future of Druchii.net to be?

Post by Calisson »

So here is the plan I propose:

New forum, associated with a Facebook account, same name.

Name: elfwargames.net, acronym EWG.net
Note: other names have been proposed, I like them less.
elfbattles.net, elvenstrategy.com, wargameselves.com
elvesforum.com, elves-online.com, elvescompendium.com
ElfMiniatures.net, fantasyelves.com, elveskingdom.com, pointyears.net


Main forums:
1. P&M.
- all combined (1).
2. Aelves in AoS.
- subdivided in fluff and gaming (2).
3. Elves in T9A.
- subdivided in fluff and 3 factions gaming (4).
4. Elves in WFB (all editions)
- Asrai, Druchii, Ulthuan (3).
5. Elves KoW
- no subdivision (1).
6. Elves in other games (BB, WM, 40k...)
- subdivided by game (4).
7. Website miscellaneous (everything not model, fluff or gaming).

Total 7 main forums, 15 main sub-forums.
We will see when more sub-forums become necessary.

Identity:
Some sub-forums are dedicated to some factions.
Additionally, if technically feasible, we should leave the user the option to select among 4 atmospheres (blue/green/purple/gray) which would influence how the screen looks.
We should also let the user select which forum are visible and which ones are not seen on his screen.
@ Daeron, feasible?

Milestones:
1. (week-me) Tell our intention to Asrai and Ulthuan. Ask them if they have objections. Take reply into account, except if it causes delays.
2. (month-Daeron) Build the new site.
3. (month-Daeron) Migrate D.net and A.org into that site.
4. (week or month-who?) Create FB account.
5. (month-them) When ready, U.net joins.

Team:
Admin = me + ?
Webmaster = Daeron.
Moderators = Shadowspite, Cultofkhaine, Amboadine, + ?
FB animator = ?
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Re: What do we want the future of Druchii.net to be?

Post by cultofkhaine »

Looks good to me.
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Re: What do we want the future of Druchii.net to be?

Post by Shadowspite »

Looks OK, except...

What does it gain by being Facebook-ized? I'm not on FB and don't especially want to be. Will it be necessary to have a FB account in order to use the new site? Or is it just that the new site itself will also have its own FB page?
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Re: What do we want the future of Druchii.net to be?

Post by T.D. »

Cultofkhaine wrote:Looks good to me.


+1

I quite like elves-online, but of course it doesnt have the wargame aspect we are focusing on. Maybe we should do a voting survey across all three forums and discuss with the other admins first?

The site won't fly without a good name, and ideally we want to be hoovering up search engine searches for Elves, High Elves, Dark Elves, Wood Elves and Aelves (as well as associated wargame titles)...

Looks OK, except...

What does it gain by being Facebook-ized? I'm not on FB and don't especially want to be. Will it be necessary to have a FB account in order to use the new site? Or is it just that the new site itself will also have its own FB page?


Forum traffic everywhere has been usurped by social media; so by catering to social media we are connecting back in to where the online action is.

It shouldn't be necessary to have FB to access the forum, but for management purposes you might want to start a FB page so you can access the Elves FB site (but not actively use your FB account as a personal FB page if that's not your thing). Having both a forum and a FB gives us both depth (forum) and spread (FB).
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Re: What do we want the future of Druchii.net to be?

Post by cultofkhaine »

I like the idea of a forum for the name - to me everything starts with the brand/identity first.
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Re: What do we want the future of Druchii.net to be?

Post by Shadowspite »

T.D. wrote:It shouldn't be necessary to have FB to access the forum, but for management purposes you might want to start a FB page so you can access the Elves FB site (but not actively use your FB account as a personal FB page if that's not your thing). Having both a forum and a FB gives us both depth (forum) and spread (FB).

OK, that's fine then. I don't think FB is Satan Incarnate or anything, it's just that I've never felt any urge to have a FB page/account.

Anyway, I rather like 'Aelfheim' as a website name. Might be too AoS, though.
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