LegendBegins

Myriad Reality

<Snipped quote by Host>

Whatevs.
He will find that out soon enough. Also, wanna know what new character will be showing up via IC, associated with Dane?

@souleaterfan320

Make it a surprise.

<Snipped quote by Host>

Well someone never worked a serious job before. :/
>speaking from experience of friends who have, fuck that noise personally.

@DarkwolfX37

Because I'm working intently on my studies?

>Why is green text a thing here surely that should be an option and not automatic david fix this lol<

@DarkwolfX37

I'll talk to him about it.

Mahz's Dev Journal

I've been in a forum where apart from the usual post ranking system, we also has an equipment system. Granted, the forum was not just about RPs, but the equipment system had quite good uptake.

For each post you would get a point. And you could use those points to buy things that appear under your profile as text. For example, I just used 50pts to buy a Newspaper Hat. And last week I bought a Bulletproof Vest. My profile would look like this next to my post.

SilverRain
Headgear: Newspaper Hat
Armour: Bulletproof Vest
Accessory: Red rose

My profile would have a list of things I had already bought and I can switch between them. Certain sections such as Spam, did not award points for posts. The equipment system did occupy a bit too much space though - especially for those who bought something for every slot.

@SilverRain

Two glaring flaws with that system:
1) Multiple accounts
2) Speed posting RPs

Myriad Reality

<Snipped quote by Host>

It's a machine that makes the final part before its shipped off.
I technically didn't break it, but the date code piece stopped working and half of my finished parts didn't have a date code.

Still kinda iffy on the fired part, my boss didn't seem too worried.

@souleaterfan320

Was it even your fault?

Mahz's Dev Journal

<Snipped quote> I like that we do writing-levels rather than genres for subforums. The RPs I tended to like always got buried since they had half-a-novel posts and progressed slower. Besides, genres are a vague mess. My fantasy not being your fantasy and space opera being nothing like a 20-years-into-future scenario despite both being scifi and so forth...

I also like that I don't need to "subscribe to see content".

@Shienvien

I agree. The thing is that I often see wonderful features that the Guild has that make people want to stay when they see it, but I don't as often see things that make people want to talk about it to all their friends, or to make it something that will get the (less choosy) people here in the first place. Something that makes people say "Woah, RPG? That's the place that has _____!" I truly believe that we have the greatest community and forum of the roleplaying world, but I don't feel like there's that "bait" to make people who know nothing about us interested in the first place.

Mahz's Dev Journal

<Snipped quote by LegendBegins>
~30% growth since Jan of this year (since the second rewrite launched). Things like server issues aside, the guild likes to grow at about 7% each month which was true even back in 2007 when it originally launched. And, interestingly enough, the guild generally has its biggest months when I'm away. Just coincidence, I tell myself.

@Mahz

There may be more growth, but internally, there's generally mass panic when you're gone.

Mahz's Dev Journal

@NuttsnBolts
Exactly. We not only need something to keep people here, we need something to get them here in the first place.

Mahz's Dev Journal

<Snipped quote by LegendBegins>

Yeah, when implementing features, I've been trying to navigate a middleground between "basic features that everyone expects from a forum" and "custom/unique guild features".

Of course, the lack of some core forum features is also what makes other forums more pleasing to use than the guild. But the guild and its userbase are always growing and improving despite what probably seem like my best efforts to stop it.

@Mahz

Do we have an estimated growth rate/userbase size?

Mahz's Dev Journal

@NuttsnBolts
I was considering something closer to "bait" and less like the "hook" you're describing. For example, I just finished writing program today that you can play chess on, but it requires another person to play against. However, I wish to implement a Genetic Algorithm/Artificial Neural Network that learns how to play chess and win as time progressed. Because I don't want to play chess against a (literally) dumb AI a thousand times, I plan to crowdsource it and allow thousands of other people to do that job for me. If the Guild had something like that, it could begin to draw people in, since they would be talking about it. "Hey, did you hear about this site called 'RoleplayerGuild?' They have this really cool AI Chess thing that gets smarter the more it plays against people; it even beat me once!" That begins to direct traffic to RPG so people can see this feature (and possibly many others), while a percentage of that "sticks," and stays for the hooks you mentioned.

Mahz's Dev Journal

@Mahz
I see one of those says "More people." What if the Guild had some sort of draw, something that made it unique above all other RP forums, other than the fact that it's 100% custom, since that will be come more apparent as time goes on.

Mahz's Dev Journal

Got another crazy idea, @Mahz... Two levels of invisibility: Everyone and non-friends. Might work best once the friend system is more complete, as it would need some way to not simply be for someone to add X as friend to see if they're online or not.

Perhaps "Visible to all", "Visible to my friends" & "Visible to none"?

@Ellri

You could just as easily link it on the left side bar.

Perhaps make the IC, OOC, and Char here linkable?

@TheMaster99

Ah, beat me to it. Ninja'd.