Inactivity = Need for Change?

[Igiss]

Well, like all our readers noticed, there wasn't too much activity on this board lately.

It feels a bit sad that all you see on the eldescrolls.com main website are the news that Shivering Isles are sold for a discount price on Xbox Live. We get no more expansions, and no news on forthcoming TES projects. That's sad truth.

So, we need other subjects to focus on... other games. Fallout 3 from Bethesda is the first one that comes in mind (subject to release in the end of this month). Problem is, "Cyrodiil Forums" name means that any other games different from Elder Scrolls are secondary. So, we have three options now...

1) Leave everything as-is and wait for a new Elder Scrolls game announcement (which may, or may not come sometime after Fallout 3 release);
2) Leave the board as-is and add a few more forums on other games, like Fallout 3, other RPGs, maybe MMO games;
3) Change name (and domain) of this forum to become a more generic board, still having extensive coverage of TES along with other games.

I'm not starting a poll on this intentionally, to hear all opinions that you have.

[metamay]

I think our best bet is to be a general gaming forum (perhaps with heavy focus on the Elder Scrolls) because if we switch to another specific game, the same thing will happen after a year or two and we have to think of new ways to revive it.

As for the domain, I don't see a huge need to change it - yes it's TES themed but for people not into TES it can be as good as any other random name. What matters is that people know we are here, not what the domain name is.

Another way to get more traffic is actually to reduce the number of boards. It will look busier with more posts in one board vs more boards with one post. (Edit: I mean if the forum looks busy, more people will be encouraged to participate.) Just a suggestion, I know you have worked on this before.
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Since Oblivion is getting old, how about merging it with the Elder Scrolls board?
For example remove the entire Oblivion category and make 3 new boards:
   Elder Scrolls General
   Elder Scrolls Spoilers
   Elder Scrolls Mods

The Hardware board can be merged with the general hardware and tech board, and there is no need (in my opinion) to separate the platforms as long as we have so few active posters. We can specify in the posts which platform we use if it has any relevance.

[DM8954]

1.) Even if it might be misguided or overly optimistic of me, I think that we'll be hearing something about the next chapter of Elder Scrolls history shortly after Fallout 3 hits the market... So, anywhere from mid-November to early January we might have a press release to get us ready for our years-long wait for TES5.

2.) I don't think we need to leave everything "as is", though, since nothing in this world is completely constant. Death and taxes happen to everyone but tax rates change and so does life expectancy. It would be a good idea to open sections for other games. Other Bethesda games would be a logical starting point but we don't even have to stick with that. Personally, Oblivion is the only game I'm interested at the moment (and probably will remain so, since I'm getting further into modding) but there's no reason we couldn't branch out into any games our members might be interested in.

3.) I don't think a name change is in order. I think we've established a good name with those who are familiar with us. Changing now means we have to start over with building up our presence under a new name... and there's always the chance that someone will remember us and come looking for cyrodiil.net only to find that we've moved or disappeared. Cyrodiil is generic enough within the TES universe that any and all TES games will relate to it, even distantly. Even though it is a TES reference, it's not so familiar to anyone who doesn't play Oblivion that it would tie us only to TES. If you don't play TES games, it's just another random name, like metamay said.


I can kinda see what you mean about the categories on the main page, metamay, but I'm not sure I like the idea of a full merge as you suggest. I agree about Oblivion Hardware & Software moving into general Hardware & Software. Out of the 14 topics in the general version, at least half of them are already about TES games. With the console Vs. PC separation, it would save space on the main page to combine them. Oblivion console users are a bit of a minority on this site but even many of the ones we have as their questions in the regular section and (hopefully) just specify that they're not using the PC version. So, this change is also do-able but we might want to go to the extra trouble when moving them to specify in the thread title which system the question concerns. If this move is approved, I'll help move and rename them as appropriate. I'm sure some of them don't even matter, since the only major difference in the game between the systems is whether you can use mods and console commands to fix the problems that can crop up.

I do think that we should leave Oblivion separate from the rest of TES. It is unfortunate that it makes the list longer on the main page (especially if we'll be adding new game sections) but it is still a main focus of the site and there are still fans (and mods) of both Morrowind and Oblivion that are active. It would be difficult to find what you're looking for if Morrowind and Oblivion discussions are mixed together... especially if/when TES5 comes out and discussions and mods for that commence.

I don't know how everyone feels about sub-boards (or Child Boards). Until the Multi-Media Contest was formed, this site didn't use sub-boards at all. I find it really convenient that once I click a forum on the main page I see all posts immediately without needing to click again to go into a sub-board... but on the other hand, we could consolidate the TES games into one small section without losing the important groupings if we use sub-categories. For instance, you'd have the TES section with "Oblivion", "Morrowind", & "Other TES" (later TES5) on the main page. Below Oblivion you'd have "Oblivion Mods", "Hints & Spoilers", & "General Oblivion Discussion". The downside is that you'd have to click one extra time to see new posts in Oblivion and all new posts in that section would show up on the main page in only 1 place instead of the 5 we have now. I think it might be worth it, given the new direction we're getting ready to take... but I would miss how quick and simple the current 1-tier system is. Any thoughts?

[The Khajiits of the nine]

Maybe we could change it to a Bethesda Forum-kinda like metamay was saying-but keep it focused around TES/Oblivion and maybe put a caption under CYRODIIL FORUMS saying devoted to TES games and Bethesda games.
I've never played Morrowwind or any other TES game for that matter and I imagine many other members (but mostly inactive ones) would of never played it either-so you may find a bit of inactivity on a board devoted to tthat.
I think a FALLOUT3 section would be alright-just as long as you Know others will purchase it.
No reason to change domain or any thing because as DM said we could be hearing a TES5 announcement in the next3-4 months.
There are still a few guests that jump on so theyre either looking to join or they are inactive members who forgot their password.
I think its SWEET AS! how it is right now but it's up to the admins to decide on this forums future.

[Igiss]

Ok, I'll review the forum structure next week. Maybe a forum for Fallout 3 should be created, true... but only after the game release.

And yes, I prefer the 1-tier system, even if it makes forum listing longer. 2nd-tier forums are not necessary for a board like ours (unless there's some need for miscellaneous forum for certain group of users).

Do we need a specail forum for Morrowind in particular, not just generic TES-games forum?

[metamay]

I don't think a specific Morrowind board is necessary, there are so few posts about the older TES games that General TES needs the Morrowind related posts, almost just to exist. I might be wrong.

[DM8954]

I agree that Morrowind is the backbone of the "other TES" section. As long as Oblivion and Morrowind aren't in the same space, it'll be ok.

[rockerdunmer]

I think a name change wouldn't be so bad if it was something that people googled often. I've also noticed that there are usually 4 or five guests having a look when i log in. We sort of need to encourage them that if they're really interested in this game, and enjoy talking about they should sign up and give us something to talk about...

(think about it, if your friends and family won't listen to your ravings about oblivion, isn't this 1 of the best places to be???)

[Igiss]

I think that we may start moving threads toward potential forum removal (Oblivion Hardware & Software > Hardware & Software, Oblivion Console > Oblivion General). I didn't find a way to do this via forum control panel.

Additionally, I suppose that admin rights should be granted to DM8954 (unless you are not against), cause I'm mostly busy with Discovery Freelancer mod and don't have much time to maintain Cyrodiil board these days.

[DM8954]

I'll start moving threads in those categories, as appropriate, as soon as I can.

I have no objections to taking on more responsibility around here to help you out, Igiss. I'm on here all the time quite a bit anyways, so it's not a problem. I'll PM you to ask about the specifics of how to handle certain things and how the control panel works.

[The Khajiits of the nine]

Additionally, I suppose that admin rights should be granted to DM8954 (unless you are not against), cause I'm mostly busy with Discovery Freelancer mod and don't have much time to maintain Cyrodiil board these days.

congrats DM... For 2 things hehe.
I've noticed the removal of all topics for the PS3 and XBOX360 boards-is this going thru deltion?
I think Igiss is right with those boards he mentioned.
But since we are related to oblivion keep the OSC's and every thing.

 I'm on here all the time quite a bit anyways,

a bit like what i'm turning into

[DM8954]

Thanks, Khajiits.

They're not being deleted, they're all just moving to new categories mostly from XBox/PS3 to Oblivion General, but a few needed to be in General Hardware & Software. I've started the transition from Oblivion Hardware & Software to General Hardware & Software. Some of those might end up elsewhere but not many.

Once the moves have been made, the empty forums can be deleted.

[Igiss]

DM8954 will receive admin rights tomorrow, confirmed.

Also, the "inactivity" is not a correct term for this particular month... if the forum will be as active as it was lately, by the end of October we'll have maximum monthly post count for the last 15 months

[Young Dragon]

Well after looking at our many different forums and what-not, i was thinking it may be easyer(if thats a word) to mabey seperate into thing like Oblivion, Morrowind, TES, ect ect sepratly and having sub sections inside each one for example you have oblivion mods but you could just have a section for mods in side each main forum, unless that seems like to much of a hassle.

[Igiss]

Ok, forums removed, admin privileges added.

[The Khajiits of the nine]

You've done a great job Igiss-I think some of your work maintaining this forum goes unnoticed
Again congrats DM
*clapclapclapclapclapclapclapclapclapclapclapclapclapclapclapclap*

[Paragon]

i "lurk" on these boards all the time but i don't usually have anything substantive to add.....but it seems to me that perhaps others feel as i do.....i'm finished with all the exp packs, and i don't mod, and i'm not interested in any other RPGs......so there doesn't seem much for me to add....thus my inactivity.  Except for entering competitions when i can, i have to resort to lurking. 

I guess what comes to my mind is.....are we doing everything we can to encourage new interest in Oblivion until when/if TES5 comes to be?  The competitions are great, the new ideas for new comps are great.  The more people we get to come here the more new ideas we'll have.  So, what's everybody doing to encourage new interest in the game and thus our beloved forums? 

I'll go back to lurking now.

[Young Dragon]

lurking..... im more of a sneaker.

[Igiss]

Well, how can we encourage interest in the game, if there's not a single piece of information about it right now? Speculations on what this new game may be... what else can I think of?

We don't know much of Bethesda's future plans, unfortunately. But it is very likely that the game is already in development. When official site will have any updates on it, I will update the site as well.

Before that: well, more content for the site could be useful... for example, new maps that I mentioned - maybe someone could browse for TES and Oblivion maps on other sites (preferably not-so-popular), and I'll ask owners if I could put their maps on my site.

[Paragon]

noooooo that's not what i meant!.......we should be generating interest in oblivion, not the next game!  I encourage anyone who talks to me about gaming to check it out.  we need to entice people to play and thus come here.