User:Dismounted Feudal Knight/Assorted thoughts

When I first wrote this, I was a moderator with a long standing chip on my shoulder. The administration read it and decided to offer me the job of Wiki Director, and then a spot as an administrator. That changes things. So this has gone from a post of frustration to a reply of sorts to my old attitudes on TWC, and a newer administrator's point of view on the state of the site.

The situation

TWC is in maintenance mode. Nothing new here.

There are 8 hex as of this draft. 4 sign in with regularity, myself included. One does turn up but has been somewhat spotty as of late. Three have not been seen much and one is simply retired but 'protected', so cannot be updated. The 'missing hex' (not 100% gone but far too irregular) are a very senior tech/general admin, the lead tech admin, and the owner. Needless to say that does not look good. As far as branch health, tech is basically gone. Content is struggling, with too few people across too many departments. Moderation is relatively healthy but not unscathed. It gets on because there isn't a whole lot of activity to moderate. Gaming is defunct in the public eye. Not a whole lot can happen at the administrative level because they are few, strapped for time and the ones with the real 'juice' are the ones who are absent. This is not to mention the dire need of technical updates to underlaying software, if we ever hope to catch up even to other forums, in a time that is unkind to even the most updated forums, for a franchise that's struggled a lot and even when it's not controversial, leaves little room for TWC's old niches to thrive.

Basically even at full strength TWC is way past its prime. The site can only keep the lights on with little room to grow.

Setting doom and gloom aside here is what TWC has going for it:

• There is just enough staff/hex to keep the lights on, and slowly adjust things to fit
• The discord server is usable
• The wiki is speedy and useful, particularly for medieval 2 modding
• The sheer legacy of TWC still attracts visitors, old and new

TWC survives by playing up these strengths. It will no longer thrive, I don't think even GED at full strength could change that, but I think it still has a degree of use in the classic total war community. This is a use that can be cultivated.

Options going forward

Best case

The best option is a technical reform where GED is more active or empowers someone who is to creatively operate the site day to day, and for himself or someone empowered to make key updates such as upgrading the wiki and performing deep tasks on the forum like hard deletions when needed to clean things up and feature updates. A full forum software upgrade is a dream but that would require these first steps to think about.

Ideally we're in a position where we clearly know what gets the best traffic and what exactly is needed to support the site, including if it's solvent or losing money. I assume articles and the wiki are the best things for the site but a clear confirmation is needed. Likewise, clarity on what's still draining the site would be appreciated so Hex can clean up more proactively. Either way, A few days of contact could oil the wheels for a few more years.

If nothing else

If there is no contact and no further direction then Hex itself must chart a course and carry on. Personally my angle is to do three things: reinforce the wiki, clean up where able on the forum, and encourage any aspect of the site that's alive while shelving things that bury what's left. As a Moderator I did quite a lot of thread level cleanup. As an administrator I do not have full power, but I do have better reach for this cleanup. Hopefully when a true Tech logs on I will have the power to do this sort of cleanup at the forum level. This may slightly improve speeds, but realistically I hope to just make things more navigable for users. This is of course in collaboration with Hex who are still on board and able. I intend to do this until, well, my interest lapses, or the plug is finally pulled (we simply have no idea if or when this could happen right now).

Section by section

What follows is thoughts by department/site section. What was previously here is already seen by the right people so these are just extra food for thought, especially where being an administrator changes anything.

Content

Content is still in need of streamlining, mainly on its lengthy staff page entry populated by very few people. This is a work in progress. I am not a content administrator, although I'm sort of the wiki administrator by proxy. Anything done on this would be in collaboration with Content Hex, and the staff who remain. This is basically RafSwi: it's fair to say the rest of Content Staff are either vacant or don't have much time day to day.

As I have become the Wiki Director I've assumed responsibility for doing whatever is possible here. And I'm optimistic - yes, the software is end of life, but it's still functional and easily picked up even if people don't have wiki experience. More on this as we go along. I can't promise huge waves but I would like to spread the wiki wherever it may be useful, bring in editors where possible, and improve content steadily over time. It's all we could ask for.

Modding and Total War

As a newly endowed modding hex this is squarely in my domain. As originally written the intention is to audit the game forums and try to clear dead stuff so living projects, or at least usable ones (working download) can be highlighted. This is not a quick or easy process and will need to be done in waves, and with any support I can get. Between Gigantus, Flinn and the not-retired standing hex Lolisuck, there's backup here so I think it will go well, though slowly. Any assistance be it to report unusable forums or to make defunct sections useful again would be appreciated.

It can't really begin until I get the ability to personally play with forums however. Anything before that is prep or wheel spinning.

Gaming & Site Awards

I hope to see progress on this matter eventually given my background in hotseating. But it's another 'come what may' situation. I don't want to see gaming or the site awards nixed but sooner or later we'll come to a point where these things will survive another year or we'll have to put them to bed in favor of what is still usable. If there are any developments you'll see them in forum side announcements.

Moderation

Any volunteer helps. I was a good chunk of moderation activity and I did not take up an overseer position as that would have pushed things too far. If you think you're cut for it send Abdul a message. It really doesn't matter if you can only show up from time to time, that's where we are at. If you can chip in you're probably good. Now if you have a recent history or whatnot, things probably haven't changed, I don't promise whatever was the issue before has gone away (now if it was years ago, ignore this and give it a shot). But you can still ask.

The Curia

distraction, still.

Okay, I'm guilty of playing around here a bit, primarily for history purposes.

Other thoughts

Instead of getting spanked for putting out a rant on the wiki I got a job. Hope never dies...

This will probably be updated as situations change or progress is made.