Long term health of mafiascum

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Post Post #6 (isolation #0) » Fri Dec 05, 2014 1:11 am

Post by Bicephalous Bob »

In post 4, Quilford wrote:It could also be that mafiascum screams Web 1.0 in a way which communicates neither trustworthiness nor intimacy.

I really think a new design would go a long way.
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Post Post #8 (isolation #1) » Fri Dec 05, 2014 1:48 am

Post by Bicephalous Bob »

http://forum.mafiascum.net/viewtopic.php?f=7&t=23303

It's not a complete redesign, but the header is by far the most Web 1.0-ish.
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Post Post #20 (isolation #2) » Fri Dec 05, 2014 4:05 am

Post by Bicephalous Bob »

White-on-black designs are pretty annoying.

I'd change the entire header to match the spring-quil design, not just the logo. To match the rest of the site, you'd just have to get rid of:

-The tacky white (in MafSilver) dividers in individual posts
-The thick borders around the sections such as "Mafia Games" and "Discussion" on the forum's index page
-All gradients
-All rounded corners
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Post Post #23 (isolation #3) » Fri Dec 05, 2014 4:22 am

Post by Bicephalous Bob »

In post 21, Quilford wrote:
In post 20, Bicephalous Bob wrote:White-on-black designs are pretty annoying.

I'd change the entire header to match the spring-quil design, not just the logo. To match the rest of the site, you'd just have to get rid of:

-The tacky white (in MafSilver) dividers in individual posts
-The thick borders around the sections such as "Mafia Games" and "Discussion" on the forum's index page
-All gradients
-All rounded corners

That's exactly the approach I took in the design I linked in #19. If there was support for it, I'd try working towards it again.

hmm, it's way better than the current MafBlack, but I don't think I'm the only one who dislikes reading loads of white text on a black background. I think you have a bigger chance to get your design to be the standard if you start with a black-on-white design.
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Post Post #30 (isolation #4) » Fri Dec 05, 2014 5:18 am

Post by Bicephalous Bob »

In post 27, Quilford wrote:I literally just inverted the design in #19 to obtain this; is that something you'd prefer?

I'd prefer it, but I'm not a big fan of the light grey/red palette.
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Post Post #31 (isolation #5) » Fri Dec 05, 2014 5:21 am

Post by Bicephalous Bob »

It might work better with a broken white background and #222-ish body text.
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Post Post #50 (isolation #6) » Fri Dec 05, 2014 10:49 am

Post by Bicephalous Bob »

In post 42, Riddleton wrote:Maybe I'm just old skool, but I can't be the only person who hates the web 2.0 bling crap, right?

I agree that the templates reck linked to are not even close to the right look for this site, but Web 2.0 doesn't mean bling crap.
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Post Post #74 (isolation #7) » Sat Dec 06, 2014 12:30 am

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If sitechat is really going to be used for mafia, it'd make sense to have a fixed-link fullscreen version of the chat so votecount lines don't break and it's easier to look back in history, for example. It should really look like a place to play mafia, having all information (rooms, players online, xylbot docs) in one place, not just like a superimposed add-on.
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Post Post #78 (isolation #8) » Sat Dec 06, 2014 1:24 am

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In post 76, Empking wrote:I think that redesigning the site based on fads is probably a bad idea, it might work for Youtube but they can hire better designers.

You really don't need to be a good designer to improve on this design. For example, the full-width design is long outdated. Lines of body text should be 75 characters long at most, with 50-60 characters optimizing readability. This isn't a fad, this is a well-researched fact.
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Post Post #86 (isolation #9) » Sat Dec 06, 2014 2:39 am

Post by Bicephalous Bob »

In post 79, chamber wrote:
In post 74, Bicephalous Bob wrote:If sitechat is really going to be used for mafia, it'd make sense to have a fixed-link fullscreen version of the chat so votecount lines don't break and it's easier to look back in history, for example. It should really look like a place to play mafia, having all information (rooms, players online, xylbot docs) in one place, not just like a superimposed add-on.


It might not be immediately obvious but the windows can be resized. There is also a list of whos online and the rooms already?

I didn't know the former, but having one game type superimposed over the other doesn't make sense structurally. Having a separate chat for chat games at mafiascum.net/chatmafia also means you don't have to make the chat for chatting opt-out instead of opt-in.

In post 81, chamber wrote:
In post 78, Bicephalous Bob wrote:ines of body text should be 75 characters long at most, with 50-60 characters optimizing readability.


This is extremely narrow. I'm not saying you are wrong but we'd need more than white space on either side if you are right.

This principle probably doesn't hold for forums, but a design with a centered wrapper and a max-width of 800 to 960 pixels would be nice.
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Post Post #87 (isolation #10) » Sat Dec 06, 2014 2:50 am

Post by Bicephalous Bob »

It'll also help get the site indexed as a chat mafia site on google and give people the option to directly link to it. Since chat mafia is currently found within the forum, people still come here for the forum mafia and perhaps stay for the chat mafia. If you want to attract people who want to play live mafia, you have to present it as a distinct feature.
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Post Post #88 (isolation #11) » Sat Dec 06, 2014 3:07 am

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In post 79, chamber wrote:There is also a list of whos online and the rooms already?

Yeah, but who ever checks if there are multiple rooms without someone telling them to do it? What I mean with having everything in one place is a layout like the fullscreen Facebook chat, where all rooms are on the left and everyone online is on the right.
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Post Post #91 (isolation #12) » Sat Dec 06, 2014 3:22 am

Post by Bicephalous Bob »

How about the site chat tab popping open on rooms if a new room is created?
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Post Post #93 (isolation #13) » Sat Dec 06, 2014 3:41 am

Post by Bicephalous Bob »

yeah that's unnecessary

a new standard chat that's always open like lobby for chat mafia will do if you aren't moving from the forum chat
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Post Post #203 (isolation #14) » Mon Dec 08, 2014 9:36 am

Post by Bicephalous Bob »

Is Xylbot a good bot? If so, why bother creating a new one?

In post 86, Bicephalous Bob wrote:I didn't know the former, but having one game type superimposed over the other doesn't make sense structurally. Having a separate chat for chat games at mafiascum.net/chatmafia also means you don't have to make the chat for chatting opt-out instead of opt-in.

In post 89, chamber wrote:
In post 87, Bicephalous Bob wrote:It'll also help get the site indexed as a chat mafia site on google and give people the option to directly link to it. Since chat mafia is currently found within the forum, people still come here for the forum mafia and perhaps stay for the chat mafia. If you want to attract people who want to play live mafia, you have to present it as a distinct feature.


Given infinite resources, sure. It's about prioritizing things given limited resources though. A lot of these things are already functionally accomplished, so I think they are likely to land a lower priority in my book.

What do you mean by "functionally accomplished"? Creating a fullscreen chat on a separate page doesn't seem that difficult considering you already have the backbone and the rewards are great.

As for getting more newbies in, add a link to the sign-up thread in the description of the Newbie forum. I imagine progressive deadlines would also help.
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Post Post #250 (isolation #15) » Tue Dec 09, 2014 3:44 am

Post by Bicephalous Bob »

In post 205, chamber wrote:
In post 203, Bicephalous Bob wrote:What do you mean by "functionally accomplished"? Creating a fullscreen chat on a separate page doesn't seem that difficult considering you already have the backbone and the rewards are great.


I think it would be more work than you realize? The rewards aren't great, they are very marginal when you can already expand a chat window to be nearly full screen.

Just don't print the phpBB wrapper? I did this in Firebug in 15 minutes: http://i.imgur.com/sX8yJtb.png
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Post Post #255 (isolation #16) » Tue Dec 09, 2014 5:22 am

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I made it look slightly less like ass: http://i.imgur.com/VYlGAST.png

In post 251, chamber wrote:If all you are going to do is remove features, why do it at all?

Presumably to make a full screen client one should be reworking the way the tabing works for instance.

Removing unnecessary features is a good thing. As for reworking the back-end, the only change I can think of is that selecting a room should replace the OutputBuffer instead of creating a new tab.
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Post Post #256 (isolation #17) » Tue Dec 09, 2014 5:25 am

Post by Bicephalous Bob »

And that the text input should go into the new room, of course.
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Post Post #270 (isolation #18) » Tue Dec 09, 2014 9:41 am

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In post 204, zoraster wrote:i found xylbot to be incredibly non-intuitive.

Is this mostly because of the text commands or are there other major reasons?

Creating a sidebar with dropdowns that send the commands for you (like the BBcode editor, except that it immediately sends the commands) would be relatively easy.
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Post Post #273 (isolation #19) » Tue Dec 09, 2014 10:01 am

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The interface would probably be a slightly modified webIRC client, which should be easier than reinventing Mafia.

I'm looking through the source code. It already seems to support open setups and I think usepresetup allows human mods to run closed setups? Throwing out the crazy stuff should be doable.
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Post Post #336 (isolation #20) » Thu Dec 11, 2014 7:10 am

Post by Bicephalous Bob »

In post 315, zoraster wrote:do you have a replacement in mind? If so, you certainly have my permission for what little that's worth

In post 8, Bicephalous Bob wrote:http://forum.mafiascum.net/viewtopic.php?f=7&t=23303

It's not a complete redesign, but the header is by far the most Web 1.0-ish.

please
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Post Post #442 (isolation #21) » Wed Dec 17, 2014 11:58 pm

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In post 438, zoraster wrote:I think it's worth pointing out that PLAYERS are in control of the timing too. If players want to end a day every 36 hours they can.

You have to think poorly of your own ability to scumhunt if you stop trying to convince people and compromise after 2 days if you still have 12 days left
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Post Post #475 (isolation #22) » Mon Dec 22, 2014 5:38 am

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the micro queue emphasizing flexible deadlines by adding an optional "deadline rules" field to the sign-up form for mods would be nice
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Post Post #499 (isolation #23) » Sat Dec 27, 2014 12:52 pm

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spinning jenny would've worked better
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Post Post #715 (isolation #24) » Mon Jun 08, 2015 11:27 pm

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SoftSpoken introduced me to epicmafia. Even though I was skeptic at first, I now think his plan has a better chance of succeeding than chatmafia. The user interface is very easy to use. The role list is limited, but I think most people won't mind the simplicity in a live mafia setting. Some good setups I have seen/was able to recreate are SCIENCE, C-14, Masons and Mafia, and Mountainous Nightless, with and without a mafia vengekill.
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