Dear Magic Community.

I feel it is a real shame that these official forums, for the game we all love so much, is dwindling both in user number and in content quality. It feels as though post counts are way down and the fun appears to have been taken away from meaningful discussion and interaction. So much so that many people simply refuse to participate in threads, opting instead to use third party forums and hence fragmenting the discussion on Magic Online topics.

I have expressed my concerns of overmoderation and I have also expressed my concerns of the minortity of users who in my opinion belittle threads and users so much so that any meaningful discussion is stifled. The official forums have been through several iterations in the past but it is my opinion that the current setup and heavy moderation is not working to deliver a fun and interactive community.

I dont pretend I speak on behalf of the community and it is not my intention to start a troll war, but I am personally tired of the state of these forums and hope together we can make some changes to improve them for the benefit of the Magic Online Community. Do you share theses views. What would you like to see changed / improved to increase the visibility and fucntionality of this resource.  

Regards,
- Hammer

 

Feb 20, 2012 -- 4:59AM, Under_The_hammer wrote:

Dear Magic Community.

I feel it is a real shame that these official forums, for the game we all love so much, is dwindling both in user number and in content quality. It feels as though post counts are way down and the fun appears to have been taken away from meaningful discussion and interaction. So much so that many people simply refuse to participate in threads, opting instead to use third party forums and hence fragmenting the discussion on Magic Online topics.

I have expressed my concerns of overmoderation and I have also expressed my concerns of the minortity of users who in my opinion belittle threads and users so much so that any meaningful discussion is stifled. The official forums have been through several iterations in the past but it is my opinion that the current setup and heavy moderation is not working to deliver a fun and interactive community.

I dont pretend I speak on behalf of the community and it is not my intention to start a troll war, but I am personally tired of the state of these forums and hope together we can make some changes to improve them for the benefit of the Magic Online Community. Do you share theses views. What would you like to see changed / improved to increase the visibility and fucntionality of this resource.  

Regards,
- Hammer

 

I don't know of a great solution other than WOTC doing something about it but I agree 100%.  Everytime a new player comes in here and asks a question they are basically made fun of and put down and we don't see them again.  WAY TO GO you won the argument and lost the battle.  WOTC could also better integrate the forums into the MTGO client and show the top threads in MTGO general which would probably provide a huge boost to them. 

History is doomed to repeat lest it is learned from. WoTC cares nothing for reembracing the forums because they cant erase the 8+ years of mismanagement of the game and the forums. I honestly dont know why they keep the boards live. I mean, move the FAQs to a static page that will be ignored like it is now and keep a bug/tech forum live. Everything else is censored unless it is in lockstep with Marketing/Sales goals.

I love the game, but hate the company that makes it.  
 

Feb 20, 2012 -- 7:00AM, bubba0077 wrote:

I've also been annoyed lately by some of the posters around here being overly snide, and not just with new posters. Unfortunately, there isn't much I can do from a moderation standpoint to modify this behavior, and the ORCs have become too removed from the community and tied to strict CoC interpretation to be effective in this matter. Confronting them is also ineffective, as it often just results in a flame war and a bunch of off-topic posts that derail the thread. The best option would seem to be to report the offending posts as baiting and hope the ORCs deal with it in a sensible manner.

As for moderation, I obviously disagree as it pertains to the moderation for which I'm responsible (thread moves and duplicate closures). But I am generally open to discussion on these (in the proper place: Boards Business) and have reopened or reversed moves in the past in response to a convincing argument. As for ORC moderation, I don't always agree with ORC moderation either, though in general I think most do a good job. Unfortunately, the poor examples stick out in our minds (and a couple are really egregious).

Moving to Boards Business.

P.S. Incidentally, the thread moderation which I believe precipitated this thread was made because of these concerns.

I'm not going to comment on being mean or rude to new players.  I don't know if it happens or not, but it's not good.



I will comment on Bubba moving moving threads.  That is killing these boards.  The boards do not have enough traffic to warrant multiple subforums, yet Bubba is constantly moving many of the very few threads posted to the subforums that no one even looks at.  If site traffic picks back up, I'm all for moving threads to reduce board clutter, but as of the last couple of years it's been completely unnecessary, and just kills some potentially good conversations, and probably further reduces site traffic.

One of the big reasons I used to come here a lot was the WOTC staff as they were very active here.  They would post very often and we had some great discussions here.  Over time people got more and more negative towards them and everytime they would post here they would just be attacked.  So what do  you think happened?  They quit posting.  Can you blame them?  Not really.

There is a difference in constructive feedback and attacking.  What I saw was attacking.