At any rate, it looks like you all believe forums to be important (so do I): is there any plan to reshape the forums somehow, to make them more appealing/easier to access? I know they work as they are, they are just not the most appealing/user friendly I've seen in games of this kind.
That is an understatement, like saying the Earth is a little bit large. Improving the forums may well merit consideration as the
top priority. ... I think they [forums]are good enough. I'm not exactly sure what could be really better.
As a new manager a few seasons ago, I considered the forums so difficult to navigate and follow that they were essentially useless. I suspected there might be useful info there, but finding it the first time, and then even finding the thread again a few days later, proved almost impossible. With all due respect, that is
not good enough for a new user. Forums that are useful to a new user should be a
top priority.The best threads grow rather long, and it becomes impossible to know where you are in the thread. …near the beginning? …near the end? …in the middle? Where was that really good post, I can’t find it. All you can do is go forward a few posts … a few more … a few more … a few more … oops, the end, it must have been the other way … go the other way a few posts … a few more … a few more … a few more … a few more … ah, I give up. It needs page numbers, maybe even post numbers. It needs a way to bookmark an especially good post to find it again.
The “Sneak Peek” is also inadequately organized. If a thread is not one of the few shown there with “Recent Activity,”, it is almost impossible to find, and much easier to ignore. That is not “good enough,” either. We need a way to place priority on a thread so it stays on top – that way we can follow the threads that are meaningful to us at our stage of development. For that matter, we need a way to place LOW priority on a thread, so we can push the silly wastes of time to the bottom.