Smashboards Site Update #2 + Give Your Suggestions

[AlphaZealot]

Smashers,

The upcoming year will bring many changes to Smashboards. Some of these changes require quite a bit of prep work and may take months to unfold, while others can occur more quickly. One change that we can implement right away is a revamp of how our forums are structured. Currently, there is clutter, unnecessary forums, forums with little or no traffic that distract from others and split attention, and one sub-community of Smashers who deserve and have been clamoring patiently for more, and much deserved, space.

I am talking, of course, about the creative community of Smashers behind Project M - which on December 28th released demo v2.5. If you haven't explored or are unfamilier with Project M, more information can be found here and can be discussed on our forums by going here! As part of the many changes coming to Smashboards, Project M, and other projects like it, will be receiving more exposure and their own frontpage forum space instead of remaining nested within other areas of the site.

Other changes will be made by merging some (sub)forums together (for example: Atlantic North and Beast Coast Tea Room will be joined). During this process, no information or threads should be lost - just simply relocated. There is a chance of some awkwardness if you are browsing one of the forums as it is being moved.

As for other updates, the January 3rd test-migration appears to be holding. Additionally, assuming the test is successful, we are tentatively targeting a live-migration to the new servers on January 7th, 2013. This is obviously the week prior to Apex 2013, which can be discussed here. We will do whatever we can to make sure the migration is successful prior to Apex 2013, and if there are potential issues (likely revealed in testing) we may postpone the migration until after the Apex weekend. More information on this will be revealed after the test migration is completed.

Reminder: Registration for the largest Smash tournament of the year closes on December 30th, so make sure to go here and register if you are interested in attending. And as another gentle reminder, Premium Memberships that go to support the site can still be purchased here!

Finally, I'd love to hear feedback and suggestions from the community about changes they would like to see with Smashboards. Please use this discussion thread for this update as an opportunity to let us know what Smashboards can do better!

Happy Smashing!

AlphaZealot
Follow on Twitter

EDIT: TOTAL ACCIDENT BUT 12,000TH POST!!!

Smashboards Transition Log

• Smashboards Site Update #1 (Servers purchased, test migration, Premium update)
• Smashboards Under New Ownership (covers purchase of Smashboards from MLG)

 

[Alex Strife]

use xenforo plz

 

[WindMajor]

The world is now grateful that Smash mods can get front page exposure.

 

[Karnu]

I suggest for people to be to buy premium membership with PayPal.

 

[Strong Badam]

It's about time! Thank you, AZ.

 

[Shadic]

So excited about more P:M exposure on Smashboards. Thank you AZ.

 

[GuruKid]

Really grateful for the extra exposure. Much love.

 

[Kite91]

things I suggest.

A SWF app. If possible of course, I'd love to see an app made for the site. something I can keep on my phone home screen and just press.

maybe a better chat system. think aim... but on the site. The one we have is just bland and... blah maybe just me

a ranking system or something. idk


new forum layout/look

 

[MattDotZeb]

a ranking system or something. idk

I'd vote to bring back the rep system.

Maybe just showing a +0/-0 thing instead of how it used to be.

 

[Vigilante]

Project M with its own forums? That is amazing news! Thank you AlphaZealot.

 

[Claire Diviner]

A SWF app. If possible of course, I'd love to see an app made for the site. I something I can keep on my phone home screen and just press.

I am in full support of this idea. Seriously, this will make my browsing SWF much easier on my phone (not that it was difficult to begin with). I will even donate whatever I can every month to help this kind of cause.

As for any changes I would personally suggest, I would like to be able to quote multiple posts via mobile SWF. I figured if people can do so on a PC, it should stand to reason we should be able to do so on the mobile version.

While more of a nitpick than anything else, I figured - assuming you still keep the censor system in - the higher ups look into reworking which words are actually censored, since names like **** Tracy can look weird because of it. Just my two cents.

 

[Muhti]

Iirc, there is an app for Android.

But not for Apple sadly.

 

[John2k4]

I've heard mixed reviews about the app Tapatalk for forum usage.


As for chat, we have an IRC with built in webchat feature. Maybe just make it a lot easier to find.

 

[Kite91]

I was kinda thinking more like the Facebook chat. I after you log into your account the chat pops up in the corner where you can minimize it, join chats, or message one person

 

[Life]

PM released on the 29th

 

[GunBlaze]

Thank you based AZ

 

[infiniteV115]

[COLLAPSE="Suggestions for changes we'd like to see in SWF, yes?"]I wish there was a way to ignore threads (similar to how we can ignore other users)
ie if there was 1 specific thread of which the user is not fond, but said thread is active simply because it's new, there should be a way for the user to ignore it so that when they visit the subforum in which said thread is located, not only would the thread not be visible to the user, but the subforum would not be updated when there is a new post in the ignored thread.

So, for example, if someone made a thread called 'tires don exits' in the subforum Smash World Forums > Super Smash Bros. Brawl > Competitive Brawl Discussion > Metagame Data & Ruleset Analysis, and I were to ignore the thread 'tires don exits' and I read all posts in every other thread in the MD&RA subforum, when a new post occurs in the 'tires don exits' thread and I view the Competitive Brawl Discussion subforum, there should still be the large white check mark symbol (rather than the large orange exclamation point) next to the MD&RA forum (indicating that there are no unread posts in this subforum) because every post has either been viewed by the user already or is in an ignored thread.

Or maybe make it an option with regards to whether or not the user should be notified of unread posts in an ignored forum. The main idea is that we have the ability to ignore forums.[/COLLAPSE]

 

[GHNeko]

Bring back the RPG system.

~ Sincerely yours,

A JRPG fanboy.

 

[Claire Diviner]

Regarding premium purchasing, if it's ever made so people can use PayPal, would Google Checkout remain as an option as well? I find it really simple to use Google Checkout.

 

[AlphaZealot]

Looking into options for using Paypal, preferably both systems can be used. vBulletin may be limiting options here.

Also, as threads get moved around, you may see your post count go up!

 

[WindMajor]

Fix Friend Finder plz.

 

[Isatis]

Looking into options for using Paypal, preferably both systems can be used. vBulletin may be limiting options here.

Also, as threads get moved around, you may see your post count go up!

Just to expand on this: Paypal plugin is currently broken. I'm not sure if Paypal changed anything or if something on the server is just ignoring whatever Paypal sends it. It may function normally again as migration happens.

 

[Jolteon]

Thank you for the PM support! This is wonderful news.

 

[Muhti]

Make everything about Luigi on this site.

He needs more attention

Alright fine....

Why not add Forum Games and Decseive Games together and make them into sub-forums under its parents: Games

 

[AlphaZealot]

Muhti: good idea, will probably do that!

 

[Muhti]

Muhti: good idea, will probably do that!

The Luigi idea?

I knew it was amazing XD

Anyways, that idea came to me in two minutes. Then I realized that both of them on the front page wasnt really necessary.

 

[Lore]

I can understand them being under a larger board as subs, but forum games and decisive games are completely different entities in nearly every way. Merging them would be catastrophic, to say the least.

 

[UltiMario]

AZ let every forum have social threads again

Please ;-;

 

[Internalyzed]

Looking into options for using Paypal, preferably both systems can be used. vBulletin may be limiting options here.

Also, as threads get moved around, you may see your post count go up!

Why would moving threads result in inflated post counts?

 

[WindMajor]

Some sub-forums have post count turned off. Merging them into a forum with post count turned on would mean that all those posts that didn't count would now count towards the post count.

 

[Marshmellowman]

Why not add Forum Games and Decseive Games together and make them into sub-forums under its parents: Games

I can understand them being under a larger board as subs, but forum games and decisive games are completely different entities in nearly every way. Merging them would be catastrophic, to say the least.

the rooms actually used to be combined under just "forum games" but were separated due to people realizing how different they were. so if forum games and decisive games are to be part of the condensing of rooms for the sake of cutting down clutter on the index similar to the regional zones then its best they remain completely separate. they could be subforums with the main forum (games) having nothing but links to each one similar to how online tournament listings is there solely to lead users to brawl online tournaments or smash 64 online events

(sorry if this comes off as a bit of regurgitation sjust i wanna make it clear that the rooms really oughta be separate regardless of the outcome)

 

[Bones0]

- Hiding threads, like Infinite said, would be sick. There are a lot of threads in Melee Discussion that I simply never read, but they are either stickied or get bumped a lot. It makes it feel very cluttered when looking for certain threads.

- Option to turn off auto-censors, even if just for people who are registered as 18 or older or something along those lines. At the very least, uncensoring some of the more tame words would be nice. You can turn on hit TV shows and here the words [DONKEY] and [FEMALE DOG] being thrown around, so censoring them on the Internet seems a bit ridiculous.

- Add more content for site customization, along the lines of additional skins, and my personal dream, the ability to change the site's home page image. I'm currently forced to look at Metaknight with every click... Being able to select a MELEE Falco to appear in the background of the Smash Blue skin's image would be really awesome.

- Tio integration into SmashBoards. As a TO, I'm sure you can appreciate anything that makes it easier on TOs. If Tio could simply prompt for certain types of information after a tournament and automatically publish it to the appropriate Tournament Results forum, that'd mean results being posted asap. You already have most of the info entered into Tio, such as the tournament name, date, number of entrants, etc. Having Tio automatically generate threads would also mean greater standardization for the Tournament Results forum. Some threads have doubles above singles results, bracket images above results lists, or vice versa. It can get very frustrating looking for a specific piece of information.

- If you wanted to take the above concept a step further, you could introduce live-updating brackets or allow people viewing the forums to select a tournament thread and mark it as "Avoid Spoilers". All results could then be tagged with different values as to how far in the tournament they are. You would display R1 pools without results with the corresponding videos hyperlinked onto the player names. When the person is satisfied with having watched all of the pools matches or all of the bracket matches at a certain level, they can click "Next Round" and the next round of pools or bracket will display, again with the corresponding videos hyperlinked. Having this level of integration with threads, Tio, live Stream archives, and YouTube videos would be downright spectacular.

- If you wanted to go even DEEPER, connect players' profiles to their tournament results. Being able to click my profile name and immediately see all of my tournament results and videos tagged with my name, all organized by date, would be SICK. This would also make it a lot easier for people who are currently still working on getting an Elo system in place. If all tournaments are published to the forums in uniform and those results are then automatically linked to players, it's quite easy to simply plug all the results into the formula and generate Elo ratings for players (which could then display right below my avatar, join date, location, and post count. And of course, you should give players a decent level of control over who they want viewing their Elo rating, tournament results/history, or videos. Just make sure it isn't possible to hide certain tournament results but not others (for obvious reasons). If some sort of rating system ever gets off the ground, it could lead to simply amazing systems for almost any use. For instance, teammate finders. People want to team with someone their skill at Apex, but have no idea how good anyone is. If this sort of system in place, people could click a "Teammate Finder" link, search for a player and filter all the results based on how close their ratings are to each other, how close geographically they are, what characters they play in teams, what they would consider their style (aggro, defensive, etc.), their goal from entering (play to win, play for fun, etc).

- This same sort of system could be applied to videos in general. Being able to search a massive video archive based on what characters you want to see and what level of players you want to watch would make it a million times easier for veterans and newbies alike to find what they want. It's sort of hard for new players to find top level player videos because they don't know who the top players for each character are. Sure, I know that if I wanted to watch high level Falco that I should search Dr. Peepee, Mango, Zhu, Westballz, etc., but how could new players possibly know to search for those players? Even knowing those names, I have to search each player manually if I want to find a good set for a specific matchup. If I want to find a good Falco vs. Luigi match, I wouldn't know where to start. I'd have to go figure out the top Luigi players, and cross reference them to see if they've played any of the top Falcos. A complete hassle and waste of time, and I'm bound to miss some video gems in the process. Outside of tournament videos, you have combo videos and just miscellaneous videos that are awesome but get little to no viewership because only a fraction of the forum goers actually check Video Discussion. There's a lot of content to be enjoyed, but a lot of people who would enjoy it don't know to look for it. Stop making them look for it, and bring it to the front page in a feature section. Feature new combo videos, upcoming tournaments, and current live streams. Also don't settle for hyperlinking things at that level. Reducing clicks can make a huge difference in viewership. No one wants to click a million times through mediocre content to find the good stuff. Embed combo vids and live streams with chats directly into threads so they can catch peoples' eyes who are browsing instead of simply getting views from people who are looking for that content specifically.

 

[AlphaZealot]

As for chat, we have an IRC with built in webchat feature. Maybe just make it a lot easier to find.

Gave live chat on main-page space. Test it out!

I was kinda thinking more like the Facebook chat. I after you log into your account the chat pops up in the corner where you can minimize it, join chats, or message one person

For now I think the live chat is the best we can do.

A SWF app. If possible of course, I'd love to see an app made for the site. I something I can keep on my phone home screen and just press.

Will look into this in the future. Getting things cleaned up, on new servers, and a re-fresh look to the site is first priority before mobile and apps. However, I think any comprehensive site these days requires mobile/responsive themes + a dedicated app.

Regarding ignoring threads: like the idea...not sure if we have the capability at current with vBulletin. Forum upgrade will be occurring in the future which may bring new/changed/different features. This upgrade is the top priority after the server move.

Bones0: most of the stuff you mentioned has been on a wish-list of mine for years. We are currently very limited with vBulletin but many of those things I would love to see get developed over time. I would note that Premium Membership does give about...20 different skins to choose from.

I can understand them being under a larger board as subs, but forum games and decisive games are completely different entities in nearly every way. Merging them would be catastrophic, to say the least.

Will not merge and will go with the former idea (larger board > subs).

Changes that occurred so far:

• Regional zones condensed
• Brawl videos and media condensed
• Melee video and media condensed
• Live chat added to main page
• Information center renamed to Welcome Center
• Social groups no longer linked from main page
• Competitive Brawl condensed
• MLG Brawl archived

Project M boards will hopefully get put to the main page today. There may also be some re-ordering of sections.

 

[Kite91]

another thing. Maybe on the side of the page have a Video of the Month/Week. for melee and brawl.

 

[John2k4]

If that was implemented it could be put at the top of the page for each section, under a collapsable area. Eg: Click on the Brawl subsection, and you will see an embedded video there. If you don't want to see the videos, you just collapse the section and don't see anything.

 

[AlphaZealot]

Project M board is live. Still getting things moved around and changed, Bionic (with a side of Hylian) will be arranging things and moving things for a bit still. We will have character specific sub-forums for Project M.

 

[shanus]

you guys are amazing

 

[GHNeko]

based AZ.

i love you

 

[KnitePhox]

can 64 boards get their own section apart from "...Melee and 64"? i know we're a small board in swf perspective, but sticking it together with melee, although not as bad as i may make it seem, may and (im confident) has caused ppl interested in 64 to miss the board entirely. for example, if you click on ssbm and 64 on main page you have to scroll ALL THE WAY down, under each of the character boards of melee just to get to the 64 boards, each individual melee character before an entire game? what. small form of more exposure i suppose...


i second the swf app. though i use my phone's browser to view smashboards quite a bit, an app would probably be more efficient than constantly pinching to zoom in and out for clicking links.


lessen the time it takes to perform another search on site? i can remember quite a few times where i tried to search something and a 1 letter typo trolls for 1minute(i can imagine this has happened to many more people as well)...lessen penalty to 20-30sec?


also, what about in the "add brawl/melee stream" P:M and 64 get added, or just in general change to "add smash stream" then the streamer chooses their flavor/s..?


if any or none of these things happen, at the least we're going to get updated boards. awesome

thanks for agreeing to hear suggestions, AZ/swf team

 

[WindMajor]

another thing. Maybe on the side of the page have a Video of the Month/Week. for melee and brawl.

If that was implemented it could be put at the top of the page for each section, under a collapsable area. Eg: Click on the Brawl subsection, and you will see an embedded video there. If you don't want to see the videos, you just collapse the section and don't see anything.

I would actually prefer to see this get its own thread, and have the leader of that thread have a video featured monthly as a segment of Smash News.