System Abbreviations and Edition Tags

[Matthew]

Is there any chance that the forum staff might encourage the use of system abbreviations and/or edition tags preceding thread titles in the gaming section? In the past it wasn't necessary because the majority of topics were D20 and threads that weren't generally had the system in the title. I think it would make the current 3e/4e conflation a lot easier to negotiate. My suggested categories would be something like:

[Gen] Generic/General
Basic Dungeons & Dragons
[1e] First Edition Advanced Dungeons & Dragons
[2e] Second Edition Advanced Dungeons & Dragons
[AD&D] Advanced Dungeons & Dragons
[3e] Dungeons & Dragons 3.0 or 3.5
[4e] Dungeons & Dragons 4.0
[D20] 3.0, 3.5, 4.0 and other direct D20 systems
[D6] Star Wars D6 and other D6 games
[WoD] World of Darkness
[C&C] Castles & Crusades
[RM] Role Master
[RQ] Rune Quest
[SWS] Star Wars Saga
[T20] True20
[Tra] Traveller
[Ex] Exalted
[SR] Shadow Run
[SW] Savage Worlds
[AM] Ars Magica
[GURPS] Generic Universal Role-playing System
[M&M] Mutants & Masterminds
[ED] Earth Dawn
[SS] Seventh Sea
[FS] Fading Suns
[LA] Lejendary Adventures
[BRPG] Basic Role-playing Game
[SF] Star Frontiers
[MF] Mutant Future
[GW] Gamma World
[WHFRP] Warhammer Fantasy Role-play

[B]Simulacrum Games

[OSRIC] Old School Reference & Index Compilation (OGL approximation of AD&D)
[LL] Labyrinth Lord (OGL approximation of BD&D)


...I dunno, just something I think would be useful. Maybe it boxes things off too much, creates extra unnecessary work, or would be too intimidating to new posters. I cannot really tell, but if it's not mandatory and only encouraged, perhaps it would police itself [and I don't mean via vigilantee moderating :smallwink:].

[Zherog]

I believe it's possible to have the forum give the user a choice when they create a thread, and then insert a tag based on that choice. If I'm remembering correctly, EN World does that on one of their forums.

Of course, doing so would require altering the forum code, and could have an impact on performance, so...

[Matthew]

Aye they do (actually a tag is mandatory on EnWorld), but as you say, we don't want to alter the forum code. Preferably, these tags would be encouraged to be put into the titles of the threads themselves, for instance:

[4e] What's Wrong?
[4e] Monsters
[3e] Two Weapon Fighting?
[AD&D] Questions
[D20] Pulp Fiction Genre?

etc...

[Emperor Tippy]

Whether or not we need them for every thread, I would require them for 3e and 4e threads.

[Illiterate Scribe]

We could finally put the post icon section to good use - currently, it doesn't serve much extra purpose, but it could be put to work as a tag.

Also, what would Inquisitor be? [][]?

[Matthew]

Also, what would Inquisitor be? [][]?

Maybe...

[I]Inquisitor

You probably wouldn't need to bother.

[Charity]

I think it is only going to get more confused as time goes by if we don't.
Lets put those board code monkeys to work eh Raw.

[Lord Lorac Silvanos]

I believe it's possible to have the forum give the user a choice when they create a thread, and then insert a tag based on that choice. If I'm remembering correctly, EN World does that on one of their forums.

Of course, doing so would require altering the forum code, and could have an impact on performance, so...

I think the latest version of vBulletin has such a feature, but a change is probably not around the corner.