Server and Website refresh

Discussion in 'Server/Website Chat' started by Jolly Long Arm, 8 Aug 2018.

  1. Jolly Long Arm The Moon... It's far away!

    So Gaming Masters [GM] is over 10 years old and is becoming pretty dated. Because of this and the recent server move I would like to propose a complete refresh of the website, servers, members, everything. Meaning getting a new look for the website, new logos and a change for the servers. However, this will need the support and acceptance of all managers and admins and majority of the members and community.

    Website
    Discord has become quite popular among many members but mumble is still used by generally the irish and their friends and should remain as is. Many may agree the website/forums are becoming disused and almost a ghost town. I think the refresh will bring more use to the website. The refresh for the website should remain using the Xenforo software as there is many recources that have been made/bought and wouldnt like to lose peoples work, but a rehaul of the style/theme (payment for this can be supported by members). Also a homepage where clear links to the discord, mumble, forums, events, and other services we provide.

    Servers
    Over the years many people have come and gone from servers we have or find servers for games we don't support. Originally TF2 was where it all started and where many of us met and would be a shame to cut it off completely, so it should remain as part of the community. However a large portion of the staple members (people who are here very often) have moved on to other games and this is where I think we can grow the most as a community adding such things like a rust or csgo server. All the server changes will need to be decided by the community and whose who will use it. No point it being there if its not used! Therefore a part of the refresh is that I propose for all servers to be shut down and have a discussion and vote for what we should have taking into account any plugins, maintenece and managing needed for each server wheather permament or tempoary.

    Rules
    All rules need to updated and to be rewritten, established and consistant accross all platforms. (website, discord, ect.) Most importantly they need to be enforced on ALL platforms and those who fail to follow these need to be acted upon regardless of role/status in the community.


    Final notes
    In the past I used to enjoy being a part of the community and although you may say if you don't like it leave. Recently I've thought about leaving and become saddend by things that happen and bored of the sameness, but i stay for a few members and the good times playing games with the people I've met here and even had the opportunity to meet and spend time with those who grew into friends, who I care about and dont want to lose.
    This idea came about because I miss the old days, but I want to look ahead to what we can do and can become which is much more than a tight knit friend group, we should be inclusive and open to all.

    Apologioes for spelling/punctuation/grammar errors im dyslexic so I hope it all makes sense and portrays what I want to say.
     
  2. Cactus The key is to never give up

    I like your ideas but I'm gonna be that guy and disagree.

    The website:
    I don't see the forums ever being popular again, even with a rehaul. I don't seem to use anything anymore except for reddit, discord & twitch. Perhaps others browse differently to me but this is what appears to be the norm nowadays, not community forums.
    I personally think it would be a waste of money and time.

    The servers:
    I don't play TF2 so my input here is not well researched. I think the only popular servers left are PH, Orange, MGE & UltiDuo. These should be the only ones we keep (unless you can merge MGE/UltiDuo, but I presume that is not possible). Potentially have a server we can use for stock if we want, however I presume most people just play casual for stock.

    Rules:
    Discord has had a evermore stagnating member base. I believe everyone knows the rules/nothing needs to be enforced as no one breaks any rules.
    I can't comment upon the servers because I don't go on them nor do I know what the TF2 community we now have is like - I just presume they are young & immature.


    I personally wouldn't mind seeing Discord being cleaned up:

    Channels:
    I liked the split of general & introduction.

    I think the game channels could be changed - retiring some of the channels (making them not visible to non managers) and creating more general channels (e.g. Blizzard Games) or attempting to keep up with the current games various members of the community are playing - I think this can really help getting people playing the same games together more.
    If we find we have a lot of game channels, we can implement a bot in a bot channel in which you can react to it's message to hide/show games channels you are interested/not interested in.

    Events needs to be changed - new users have to be manually added to the events role to see it, which is hard to ensure we don't miss people.

    Roles:
    I think roles need an overhaul & to be looked at.
    Managers kept same.
    Server Admins look at their permissions & most likely keep the same.
    All other roles looked at.

    I'm not sure the best way of doing things in roles, but for us who use voice channels, it is actually useful being able to move people so I have given a lot of people the ability to do this. Preferably a pseudo role in which you can give people so they can move others without having to "upgrade" their role - this would have to be looked at though so you are not able to give yourself extra permissions, but at the same time allow this to be given easily if requested.

    Events:
    Events are pretty dead unless @Mister Spuds organises things. Which is a massive flaw and essentially means we don't have events ever.


    My main point of my reply to the original post is that I don't think it's easy for us to actually be an "actively playing-together" community anymore as we all play different games & are a lot busier nowadays.

    Aside from SCP, I don't think I have played with many people in 3+ months (in some cases more) and even then I rarely see people in voice channels or contribute in text channels these days. There is not an easy or clear way to fix this I don't think, unless we start playing similar games again, rather than 2-3 people playing a game. I don't know when this next will be.

    It's a bit ironic but I did not see any issues until you misspelt Apologies lol
     
    Last edited: 8 Aug 2018
  3. I don't think there is anything we could do to the website to restore activity. It'll remain used for long posts like this and not much else. It's a shame really but not one we didn't see coming with the move to discord, without which GM would have died rather than moved.

    It's kinda stuck as XenForo 1.x due to lots of custom integration and addons, though I suspect it would thrive better with a Vanilla/Discourse style system. A homepage is a good idea, will have to investigate that. New theme is a maybe, I'd like to investigate taking the current look and applying that to a more modern/minimalist base rather than the bastardised stock XenForo 1.x base we have currently. I'm concerned it's a lot of work for me with potentially no gain - it's not like the old days where I had infinite free time to devote to GM, and people's browsing habits have changed

    There is minimal cost of empty tf2 servers, no good reason to remove existing servers. I've already removed a couple of super dead servers (#6 and TF2 lobby)

    Other games would be great, but it's a significant investment to set up and maintain. We've been burned before by setting up lots of games in good faith and having no one actually use them. The unfortunate fact is that none of the flavour of the month games have strong/any dedicated server support. Probably the best thing we could do is a public/mass-appeal Minecraft server, we certainly have the hardware for a large MC server

    I guess our rules are a little disjointed but I'm not sure it's ever been a huge issue
     
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  4. Dan Chief Detective at GM Police HQ - Jagex #1 Fan!

    We need to reach new markets

    I propose we unban the chinese and appoint @[ACG] Bob The Builder (who I can't tag for some reason, pls fix) to lead the team coordinating with our new members

    I also would promote @Cactus to head of our Russian branch as he clearly has lots of experience with translations and I really think he can do a lot of good work reaching out to them

    gm - это дерьмо, и вы все трахаете гей
     
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  5. Think this needs a little more clarification, orange should stay, prophunt should stay. I don't see the need for the other servers really and haven't really seen a reason for a number of years.
     
  6. Jolly Long Arm The Moon... It's far away!

    Apologies, the sentance goes on to say vote what will stay and what never gets used.
    but i agree with you
     

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