Old forum members should be nice to new forum members.

I posted this in a locked thread, topic "How to be well spoken".

It applies to the new topic at hand.

Just to update everyone, it is still fairly wrong for a new person to come to the forums for the first time with a lot of questions, and post them, and get 4 replies immediately to "search forums".

There are better ways to do that. As listed in my quote, you could just not reply if you are going to reply that. If you are going to take the time to reply, go ahead and link the tread with their answer in it, and then type out the answer below it, and then welcome them to the forum and suggest them to use the search feature in the future.

If you can, save a template post you can copy-paste into the reply box. Or just do part of what I asked. I feel that it hurts the community when newcomers feel attacked. We do want the community to have as many members as we can, right?

If smaller games and communities did this, they would have nobody. If smaller games and communities saw someone attack a newcomer, they would probably instant ban because of how dire they need newcomers. Smaller communities are as friendly as possible so people stay with them, they need it to survive. Let's not be gluttonous with our members and not think we need newcomers, we in fact are not as large as CoD and we do need people to want to be longterm contributors of the game as players and idea sources and modders and advertisement.

Bottom line, every post should welcome new members. Any post that is not very friendly to newcomers should and ought to be deleted, the poster warned, and the poster disciplined over multiple infractions because it costs time for moderators or devs to apologize for this behavior.

Blah blah blah Trophy System, i know you're experienced with the forums but this topic has been talked about before with Garet and discussed heavily in the past, you should search those topics and necro them to the front page. blah blah blah blah blah

I have to agree,

When I first posted on these forums, getting told to search/ its been discussed heavily in the past do a search before posting/ feels more annoying to me more then anything. Not annoying in that yeah i should of searched before making my post, but that no one cared to comment on my thoughts .

#agree

Nice post, Trophy.

I support this. how about also petitioning to get a search feature that's at least like the one from the PHP forum we had before, if not better?

basically to attain this we'd have to remove all the limits we didn't have on the PHP forum search.
-the 3-letter word error
-the sort by age filter
-the 200 result limit

I don't get told to search because I already do, son.

It's a side issue.

People are mean to new members.

Still, at least it's not as bad as the TES forums... I remember in anticipation of Skyrim's release, any information that was more than 4 hours old was considered "old" by the basement dwellers, and they'd rip into anyone who posted it

Good post, TTS.

To be clear, and no, this is not optional, BE NICE to new users. If someone posts a new thread that has been discussed a hundred times before, the appropriate response is:
- Welcome them!
- Answer their question, even if briefly.
- If there's another thread actively going that might answer most of their questions, point them there!

Or:
- Don't respond.

Aggressive "learn to search, noob" types posts will result in warnings, suspension, or removal from the forums. It's not acceptable behavior. Everyone here was a new user at one point. Extend the same courtesy to them that you, presumably, would like to have had extended to you. If you are incapable of showing courtesy, simply don't respond. Problem solved.

Most people who tell people to search do answer their question. Or, if they tell people to search and don't explain, it's because someone earlier on in the thread already answered the question.

I don't even think most people are mean to new members. Some people can be abrasive from time to time. But not mean.

All in all, we have really nice members here on the PA forums. It's an awesome community.

What is mean about asking someone new to use the searchsystem ?
and even if i do i give a short answer to the question

My apologies for trying to keep copythreads to a minimum (because thats never annoying to anyone it seems ) .. i am concidered mean and annoying and thus shall stop post in the forum .... ... realy?

Dont take this as me feeling insulted in any way or anything .. i'm just sayin

It's the way people say it. Don't be condescending or disrespectful.

I think you and brian are nice enough.

That being said, don't use "use search" as your first words, and also try to answer them and welcome them first in your post. You already mostly do that guys.

It is just, sometimes it happens that 4 people without answering just say "use search" and that is starting to become arguments.

Again. You guys are absolutely *the best* when it comes to community communication. I've never seen anyone get this right before. You guys should be a case study in "how to have forums that don't suck" and "how to properly communicate with your supporters."

I <3 Uber.

Yeah. I used to be a complete jerk until I got called out on it.

That's why I always start out threads with welcoming them to the forums. Goes a long way.

I generally just answer threads even if it's something I quite possibly just answered yesterday. In some cases, consolidation is useful, especially for straight-up informational or technical posts like, "My screen is black. What does it mean!?" In many cases, though, I think a new thread is better, especially if it's been over a week since the old thread had any posts. A new thread can attract new participants, be a fresh start and a chance to reconsider old positions. For a game in flux, it may literally mean the game has changed since the old thread was started.

My rule of thumb as a thread starter has generally been "if it's not on page 1, time for a new thread!"

Also, I think threads that are 20+ pages long (especially if they are 20+ pages of pure debate) are more stifling to discussion than simply letting it drop and starting over.

This is from a personal message in my inbox with a newish forum user.

The search function is a piece of **** that is broken. It doesn't work. You can't assume that a new user did not search.


New users do not know the content of every livestream.

I think what has been really driving this is the influx of new players with "I just played your game and in needs XYZ." That we have seen appear sometimes multiple in a day.

It drives me up a wall(but, I'm a forum ghost so I stay hidden). I'm sure it does the same thing with everyone else.

Since we can obviously not change human nature or fix foolishness, I can only hope that we keep a level of civility going. We may be tired, annoyed and angry, but civility towards one's fellow Commander should be observed.

Also, if a question is answered, we don't need 20 people posting the answer as well and then starting a new discussion. Give them the answer to the question, maybe 3-5 more posts and then it should be done.

That's good feedback. They're willing to actually say "Yes, it needs this", and most of the time we respond with "Yes, that's confirmed", and the Devs look at it and they're like "F*** yeah, we're awesome" and everybody gets a cookie.

I'd like to highlight this. And I'll start by saying this : I admit haven't been the nicest cutest little gremlin, I'm aware of that.

this wasn't the case upon my arrival here if any of you remember me from my first posts

I strongly believe that the initial treatment I received and the response from the admins led me to my current forum attitude. Some might not see a problem, but I personally preferred my old reaction to all things.

It's a learned trade, the forum waltz. And those running the school are the ones setting the wrong example.

I shall not have this be ignored. It is something that everyone should know. And that must be taken into account.

Any of you would be very VERY wrong to assume it has become a big problem latetly. NO! it's been a problem always! and what it does is perpetuate the tradition!

.........that said, time for a little comic relief:

It's mostly tone, but also, simply saying "Use search" is a pretty unfriendly and rude way to welcome a brand new user to the forum.

When someone actually takes the effort and come to a game / company specific forum to communicate, and especially since not everyone's search-fu is similar, and quite simply the terms that people use differ so widely, it's mostly about "Help the newbie out, try and help them get their feet wet, and they'll start to learn that stuff on their own".

This community is awesome. But.. we can make it more awesome by making people feel welcome when they make the decision to join us! As I've said in the past, it doesn't need to be all rainbows and puppy dogs, just remember not everyone thinks/works the way you may. A little kindness goes a long way to making an amazing community even better.

*But - if there were more rainbows and puppies, I wouldn't object