A Genuine Curiosity

[Constance the Curious]

Hello all

Forgive this impudent question from a newcomer (have been a lurker for a while now but just registered), but I'm genuinely curious to know the reason why the users of this forum have a, for lack of a better word, an obsession with Proposals and the DNSL? Allow me to elaborate.

There are three English speaking servers in this game, Forge International, Forge US and Forge Beta. All three have their own ways and methods of dealing with ideas and suggestions, and all have their own Do Not Suggest Lists too. A quick glance will reveal that the US DNSL has a whopping 18,145 views, leaving International and Beta far behind with 646 and 372 views each. This in a way indicates that the DNSL here has been given an elevated, almost god-like status. Granted, the US DNSL thread is much, much older than the other two, and of course views by themselves don't have any significant weightage, which brings me to my next point.

I have carefully perused the way all the three forums deal with new ideas, and frankly speaking I must say I am baffled with the way this forum does it. Nowhere on neither International nor Beta is it mentioned that a proposal should have to be nominated, or go through a voting stage with a 70% majority, or get discounted if they don't achieve the required majority, and only then will it get submitted to the developers for their consideration. I am not complaining, on the contrary am merely curious why there is so much bureaucracy and red-tape here on these forums.

TL;DR: Why is there such a fascination with proposals here, which isn't quite present on either International or Beta?

 

[Freshmeboy]

Because we are the problem child of INNO and are being punished..or is that another FoE conspiracy...?

 

[barra370804]

Because Big Brother is always watching you...

 

[RazorbackPirate]

1. The DNSL list was written by Inno. It is a list of items they will not consider proposals on.
2. The process followed on the US forum for proposals is the process developed by Inno.
3. The US servers make up, by far, the largest percentage of FoE users worldwide.
4. As the largest installed base, the DNSL will have the largest number of views, the US forum generating the largest number of proposals.
5. There is no point in allowing a proposal to be debated, put into nomination, or put up for voting when Inno has explicitly stated, through the DNSL, that they will not entertain proposals in those areas.
6. It's Inno's game, therefore Inno gets to dictate the rules and process by which they will entertain proposals.
7. They don't care how we feel about the list, or the process, their game, their rules.
8. End of story.

 

[Constance the Curious]

1. The DNSL list was written by Inno. It is a list of items they will not consider proposals on.
2. The process followed on the US forum for proposals is the process developed by Inno.
3. The US servers make up, by far, the largest percentage of FoE users worldwide.
4. As the largest installed base, the DNSL will have the largest number of views, the US forum generating the largest number of proposals.
5. There is no point in allowing a proposal to be debated, put into nomination, or put up for voting when Inno has explicitly stated, through the DNSL, that they will not entertain proposals in those areas.
6. It's Inno's game, therefore Inno gets to dictate the rules and process by which they will entertain proposals.
7. They don't care how we feel about the list, or the process, their game, their rules.
8. End of story.

Thank you, I do not seek to debate or discuss the DNSL or what it comprises. My question was why there is a different protocol and procedure for ideas on this forum as compared to its other English counterparts, which you've answered sufficiently well

 

[DevaCat]

Hello and welcome! I too was a long time guest lurker before joining in on the fun.

I can speculate on the number of views. Aside from the numbers thing mentioned above there is the entertainment value! While waiting on timers or productions or troop builds I can always visit the spectacle that is the Proposals section and enjoy the train wreck carnage of poorly thought out ideas, the clash of sparring egos, and truly enjoy the occasional well expressed and well thought out idea that might actually make the game better. Surely I'm not the only one checking a particularly tasty thread a few times to see what has developed even if I don't post anything myself. Multiply that by many and the views count soars.

An interesting comparison would be number of proposals made. Are we here really more proposal inclined than people on other servers? Or do we just have a harder time using Search?

 

[Algona]

Why is there such a fascination with proposals here, which isn't quite present on either International or Beta?

My purely personal viewpoint:

The Proposal process is way cool. An idea, hopefully some searching and a bit of read...(READ BEFORE POSTING) ...ing, some typing, some debate, arguing, yelling, screaming grandstandinhg, a vote, and boom!

Mu idea is being evaluated by the Devs for possible incorporation into the game.

This is a wonderful opportunity.

It's also a breeding ground for selfish and thoughtless people to offer up ideas that range from the self serving to game damaging.

All one step away from being on a Dev's desk.

Happily though the folk at INNO seem to be pretty immune to bad ideas. But INNO does make occasional mistakes.

More on that. I joined the forums a week after starting play over five years ago. The mod staff, especially jaelis, were on the ball working with the Guidelines and the Dnsl to keep a lid on the worst Proposals. Forum life was good.

We went through a period though where two separate factors came into play. INNO went through a period of ridiculous mistakes due to poor quality control and short sighted and bad design. The mod staff changed and became whimsical in their decisions.

The long time frequent posters on this forum share two traits. They like this game and because they are reading everything, they know a lot about this game. Sure, we spend a lot of time arguing, insulting, stomping on each other. But those two traits pervail long term.

So when we were seeing INNO making stupid mistake after stupid mistake for over a year, we stepped up our game here on the forum. No conscious decisions, no agreements, no conspiracy. just the natural reaction of folk who like and understand the game.

We swarmed all over bad Proposals because we weren't sure that some overworked pressured Dev wouldn't grab hold of anything no matter how bad and start processing it.

Our reactions seem kinda strange, maybe even wrong in retrospect, but INNO was doing some really stupid things.

Anyway, to bring this back to your questions on the reason folk are obsessed with the Dnsl and Proposals . a large part of that is hangover, err, residuals, from that period.

Times have changed, INNO has gotten a lot better at quality control and design and the mod staff settled down over the last 18 months.

I suspect that over time folk will back off even more. But as long as selfish and thoughtless folk make Proposals that are one step away from landing on a dev's desk that folk who like and understand the game will always react strongly to greedy and bad Proposals.

 

[Agent327]

Hello all

Forgive this impudent question from a newcomer (have been a lurker for a while now but just registered), but I'm genuinely curious to know the reason why the users of this forum have a, for lack of a better word, an obsession with Proposals and the DNSL? Allow me to elaborate.

There are three English speaking servers in this game, Forge International, Forge US and Forge Beta. All three have their own ways and methods of dealing with ideas and suggestions, and all have their own Do Not Suggest Lists too. A quick glance will reveal that the US DNSL has a whopping 18,145 views, leaving International and Beta far behind with 646 and 372 views each. This in a way indicates that the DNSL here has been given an elevated, almost god-like status. Granted, the US DNSL thread is much, much older than the other two, and of course views by themselves don't have any significant weightage, which brings me to my next point.

You should have done better research. Reason for the difference in views is easy to explain. Beta never had a DNSL until november 2019 and on the international server the forum and ideas section were revamped, so the DNSL there is also from a more recent date. They however also had one from the start, so would have about the same number of views as the US forum.

I have carefully perused the way all the three forums deal with new ideas, and frankly speaking I must say I am baffled with the way this forum does it. Nowhere on neither International nor Beta is it mentioned that a proposal should have to be nominated, or go through a voting stage with a 70% majority, or get discounted if they don't achieve the required majority, and only then will it get submitted to the developers for their consideration. I am not complaining, on the contrary am merely curious why there is so much bureaucracy and red-tape here on these forums.

Again your research is totally insufficient.

On the international forum proposals need to follow a required format that also demands you put in a poll. That poll is used for the popularity system. Based on popularity proposals are forwarded, so they also use a voting majority system.

Beta forum also requires you to add a poll. While the percentage needed for forwarding a proposal isn't mentioned, the poll is obvious enough.

TL;DR: Why is there such a fascination with proposals here, which isn't quite present on either International or Beta?

All three forums work basically the same. If there is any more fascination with proposals here it is coming from you. Based on bad research you are however totally WRONG!.