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olympe

Suggestions regarding DR

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56 minutes ago, Quetzals said:

I was redirected here, so I guess I'll go ahead and ask here. What type of "alts" lowers the chance of release to a DR? The breeding-only alts? Biome alts? Or both?

I’ll add to what Fiona said; I think it depends on how well it ties into the concept at this point. A lot of old requests were told to nix their alts because they just had a different colour palette for literally no reason. Imo if there’s a good reason behind it that really ties into the concept, it’ll be better received than just randomly sticking one in. I think biome alts make more sense personally.

 

There’s also the issue of it being a variant or an alt, because variants (i.e. Fire Gem, Gemshard) seem to be a lot better received than alts (with the only up-to-date one I can think of being the Undine)

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I feel like keeping old threads would stifle creativity. “Oh I have this great idea, but there’s already this really old locked thread that’s really similar, guess I can’t use it.”

 

If an op returns, but the artist is gone, they’d have to start from scratch anyway. If the artist comes back but op is gone, they’d have to start from scratch, getting a chance for a new thread for a fresh start would be best, yeah?

 

When you declutter something, you toss out things you don’t need, or have no sentimental value. Why lock some threads when we can just toss ‘em all and repost what is sentimental to us. And if we wait long enough, anyone coming back will see the warning and understand.

 

With wiping, you don’t have to worry about when to cut-off, you don’t have to worry about a multitude of threads and suggestions scaring people off, or discouraging anyone from trying their own version of a dragon that got completed and then tossed back.

 

With an empty slate, you “clear the air” you can make new rules, create a new enviornment that’s more positive and accepting, and essentially start over. Especially with a concept dump thread, I feel like we can get more creativity, because then people can just suggest things for fun. If someone wants to roll with it, that’d be super exciting.

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TJ has already made it clear before that having similar concepts (as long as they aren't blatant copies) are fine. Reopening requests would breathe new creativity into the section, but just deleting vast amounts of threads--including more recent ones that just don't have activity-- would definitely deter some people.

 

Reposting is a hassle. I know. I've done it. And it just would create a flood of "well, this got deleted because I wasn't here" and we'd be back to the same amount of backlog regardless of whether someone has one or two threads or not. 

 

I'm already leaning towards calling it quits with further DRs after I finish up my two concepts, but this would just be the icing on the cake. I guess that's what we want though, right? Fewer requests anyway.

 

ETA: concept dump threads are okay with me, but going from limiting the section to suddenly just wiping everything seems like a rushed way to handle it. 

Edited by Jazeki

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17 minutes ago, Jazeki said:

TJ has already made it clear before that having similar concepts (as long as they aren't blatant copies) are fine. Reopening requests would breathe new creativity into the section, but just deleting vast amounts of threads--including more recent ones that just don't have activity-- would definitely deter some people.

Bolding because yes! In DR I've seen people come back to their old projects that were around before I'd ever seen them. And old threads brought back that I had seen before, but who are wanting to redo their sprites or reimagine their dragons. It's great, and quite a fair few concepts have done it, and their new versions are looking awesome. It'd be such a shame if the connector came back with an idea of how to revive their thread only to find it deleted.

 

Deleting old projects, I feel, would create a sense of elitism. Only the concepts with the most active artists, or a concept deemed "interesting" enough to have continuous posts, would remain. A concept where the artists are very busy and can't post frequently would end up deleted. It'd be totally unfair ¯\_(ヅ)_/¯

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2 hours ago, Quetzals said:

I was redirected here, so I guess I'll go ahead and ask here. What type of "alts" lowers the chance of release to a DR? The breeding-only alts? Biome alts? Or both?

Nobody really knows the answer to that, but there are rumors. Then again, there used to be a persistent rumor that TJ didn't like Eastern dragons, and the "evidence" cited was that, at the time, we only had one Eastern breed - Silvers. So, most people who wanted to suggest Eastern dragons were discouraged - until TJ stepped up and stated plainly that no, he didn't dislike Easterns and yes, he could only release concepts that people actually made. So, because everyone thought TJ didn't like Easterns, they weren't created in the first place, which meant there were none to release. (Well, almost none.)

 

TJ did state once somewhere that he didn't really favor concepts where he had to release at least half a dozen alts at once (or something along those lines), but since then, we've seen both Zyumorphs and Xenowyrms being released, so I don't know how true that still is. There were also a couple of cases where an alt/sister breed got released way after the original release of the breed - black and vine alts, seasonals (which got released in accord with their seasons), nebula alts, dark luminas, black stripes, blue-winged solstices - so, going that route is always an option, too.

 

Anyway, there's only one person who can answer this question, so I quoted it in TJ's ask-a-mod thread (and added some more specific questions). Let's see how it turns out.

 

***

 

Now, regarding a clean slate in DR: As long as the threads that get cleaned out don't get deleted, but merely archived (maybe for another year or so?), it doesn't really matter where exactly the cut-off is. I agree that 3 months is probably too short, so maybe 6 months? After all, all it takes for a thread to be "spared" is one bump by either the OP ("This might seem dead, but [insert artist name] will further work on it once they're less busy.") or one of the artists involved. Plus, the threads won't be just gone, but somewhere they can be retrieved. So, even if your thread gets punted there, it's not quite gone.

Maybe, just maybe, it would even make sense to create a section for "inactive requests" where all topics are locked (=> no bumps) so the OPs/artists can see that they're still there? It could alleviate some anxiety.

Edited by olympe

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45 minutes ago, Jazeki said:

TJ has already made it clear before that having similar concepts (as long as they aren't blatant copies) are fine. Reopening requests would breathe new creativity into the section, but just deleting vast amounts of threads--including more recent ones that just don't have activity-- would definitely deter some people.

 

Reposting is a hassle. I know. I've done it. And it just would create a flood of "well, this got deleted because I wasn't here" and we'd be back to the same amount of backlog regardless of whether someone has one or two threads or not. 

 

I'm already leaning towards calling it quits with further DRs after I finish up my two concepts, but this would just be the icing on the cake. I guess that's what we want though, right? Fewer requests anyway.

 

ETA: concept dump threads are okay with me, but going from limiting the section to suddenly just wiping everything seems like a rushed way to handle it. 

 

(bolding for emphasis) Yes! Very very much this. I totally support and encourage completely dead/inactive threads being archived, and I really do think that will help DR as a whole. I do *not* support clearing out *everything* including still-active concepts, because that seems like it would do the exact opposite of what most people are wanting. I see a lot of talk about no motivation/reason for people to jump in to help DR threads, I see people talking about being discouraged by the current DR state.... I think those feelings would be *magnified* if the entire section was just totally wiped including totally active concepts. I mean, talk about discouragement! You've been working on a concept so hard for months, maybe years, you've recently posted some changes or talked with people in the thread about crits, you are very committed to this concept.... And then you get told the entire thing is just going to get deleted and if you want to keep working on it you have to re-post everything? How on earth is that going to encourage people or promote creativity? 

 

Also, it just seems completely unnecessary to me. Like, *really* unnecessary. It makes complete sense to archive/clean out concepts that haven't been touched in multiple years. It makes no sense at all to go around deleting concepts that are actively being worked on right now. It seems like a lot of unnecessary work all around, both for the mods that have to go through and do all of that, and the people who see their concepts trashed and have to start over in a new thread. It really doesn't make sense at all to me.

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5 minutes ago, HeatherMarie said:

 

(bolding for emphasis) Yes! Very very much this. I totally support and encourage completely dead/inactive threads being archived, and I really do think that will help DR as a whole. I do *not* support clearing out *everything* including still-active concepts, because that seems like it would do the exact opposite of what most people are wanting. I see a lot of talk about no motivation/reason for people to jump in to help DR threads, I see people talking about being discouraged by the current DR state.... I think those feelings would be *magnified* if the entire section was just totally wiped including totally active concepts. I mean, talk about discouragement! You've been working on a concept so hard for months, maybe years, you've recently posted some changes or talked with people in the thread about crits, you are very committed to this concept.... And then you get told the entire thing is just going to get deleted and if you want to keep working on it you have to re-post everything? How on earth is that going to encourage people or promote creativity? 

 

Also, it just seems completely unnecessary to me. Like, *really* unnecessary. It makes complete sense to archive/clean out concepts that haven't been touched in multiple years. It makes no sense at all to go around deleting concepts that are actively being worked on right now. It seems like a lot of unnecessary work all around, both for the mods that have to go through and do all of that, and the people who see their concepts trashed and have to start over in a new thread. It really doesn't make sense at all to me.

Amen! This is exactly what I was trying to say, but you said it much better.

 

I just think it would be counterproductive to make everyone repost their concept if they want to continue it and would discourage more people than it would "inspire". It could easily be the last straw that would make someone give up entirely and we could lose a potential new artist (to say nothing of the dragon.)

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Maybe have a forum for "inactive" requests"; put threads in there that haven't seen action in a year, say, and move them back if action starts up again ?

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21 minutes ago, Fuzzbucket said:

Maybe have a forum for "inactive" requests"; put threads in there that haven't seen action in a year, say, and move them back if action starts up again ?

Yeah, I like this idea. Archiving a load of topics and then having them floating around in a place where they can get mixed up with all the active ones seems counterproductive to the “clean up”. Having two sections - one active and one inactive - is very organised and would surely help keep everything clean.

 

(And I mean, Completed is no more so we have space for it now :P)

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Completed was hidden, we can’t see it but mods can. Plus wasn’t another subforum nixed?

 

Honestly, I don’t see a point in keeping older threads, and some of the more active threads in DR are super long from restarts. It’s been a year since cl was purged, it’s been long enough to save things, drum up interest in concepts, and generally try to get things back to completed. Why keep something on the basis of “they might come back”? What if they don’t come back?

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I'd prefer a section for inactive topics, and for two reasons: First, it nips all the "but I might want to come back years later" arguments straight in the butt. Because the concepts don't get lost, just relocated.

And second, it might give some people inspiration to look through them. And maybe, just maybe, someone will look through the section and find an old concept of theirs.

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1 hour ago, Sextonator said:

 

Why keep something on the basis of “they might come back”? What if they don’t come back?

There are artists who have taken over threads of users who have long-since gone inactive. This was mentioned previously by Fiona. There is a currently active topic that was just recently revived by someone who left DC for years and just now came back. Luckily, they didn't have to start over from scratch. 

 

 Ostensibly, it's not a problem if these are in a different section than the active concepts. Plus, maybe people can be inspired to make a similar concept. "Hey. These are inactive, but I really like the idea."

Edited by Jazeki

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If someone takes over a thread, then an option where they can recreate and be in charge of the thread would be desirable, yeah? They’d have to collect all the information, being able to update the first post without having to pm a mod to do it would be nice.

 

And I can really only see people getting discouraged, seeing a request similar to what they’ve thought of sitting inactive.

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6 minutes ago, Sextonator said:

If someone takes over a thread, then an option where they can recreate and be in charge of the thread would be desirable, yeah? They’d have to collect all the information, being able to update the first post without having to pm a mod to do it would be nice.

 

And I can really only see people getting discouraged, seeing a request similar to what they’ve thought of sitting inactive.

They'd still have to wait for mod approval for a new thread to be made active. And I openly admitted that I would be very discouraged if this happened. Why would I want to create anything if there's a possibility of it being wiped if not active or if  any of my previous concepts were wiped anyway without my input. I can't speak for anyone else, but I won't be creating anything if TJ just decides that deleting is the way to go.

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I’m pretty sure DR used to have old threads deleted on the regular. They were ones that hadn’t been updated in awhile, yeah, but it was done to keep it a reasonable size. And no, no one was notified.

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Just now, Sextonator said:

I’m pretty sure DR used to have old threads deleted on the regular. They were ones that hadn’t been updated in awhile, yeah, but it was done to keep it a reasonable size. And no, no one was notified.

I mean, can't the mods hide a Dragon Request thread and then bring it back upon request?

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Yeah, I have noticed the disappearence of some concepts, which weren't anywhere near completion, such as Cotton Dragons and Apple Mint Dragons. I would be up for "Inactive Section"  or perhaps everyone should be provided by PM with a copy of the OP, and then have thr whole DR deleted. If anyone is interested in continuing on their pre-clean posted concepts, they'd repost. If there are artists that took over an inactive concept, they could PM a mod and inform them.

Edited by Quetzals

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31 minutes ago, Sextonator said:

If someone takes over a thread, then an option where they can recreate and be in charge of the thread would be desirable, yeah? They’d have to collect all the information, being able to update the first post without having to pm a mod to do it would be nice.

 

And I can really only see people getting discouraged, seeing a request similar to what they’ve thought of sitting inactive.

 

TJ has specifically said that similar DR concepts are completely fine, so if people get discouraged by seeing similar concepts that's really on them. Anyways, you seem to be talking about two very different things: Inactive threads getting wiped/archived/deleted/whatever, and *all* threads getting wiped. It seems to me that most people here are completely on board with years-inactive threads getting, at the very least, archived or moved to an 'inactive' section. I don't see much support at all for *active* threads getting cleared. 

 

You seem to be assuming a lot of things: Assuming that people get discouraged by seeing similar concepts sitting there, assuming that people would *want* to recreate a thread in order to be 'in charge' of it, etc. Multiple people here, myself included, have specifically said we would be more discouraged by active threads getting tossed out, and would *not* want to have to recreate a thread. 

 

To me, it seems the best way to go would be to have an 'inactive' section, where threads that haven't seen activity in over a year are moved and are *not* counted among the active-DR population. If someone comes back and sees their concept has been moved to inactive, they can PM a mod to move it back if they wish to pick it up again. (I personally think archiving or even outright deleting concepts that have had no updates since 2012-2013 would be completely understandable, but I can see that not everyone would want that.)

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You don’t have to figure out where to draw the line on when something is old and can be cleared if you clear everything.

 

I clearly don’t have a problem reposting my concepts, and I’d be willing to save information on concepts that don’t belong to me, but I’m working on, or even those that I’m interested in/am a fan of to make sure they can be reposted. It’s not that hard, and I don’t see it as a big deal. Heck, mods could set it as open submission for the first week or so, before setting it to needing approval.

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32 minutes ago, Sextonator said:

I’m pretty sure DR used to have old threads deleted on the regular. They were ones that hadn’t been updated in awhile, yeah, but it was done to keep it a reasonable size. And no, no one was notified.

Pretty sure is not completely sure. And I had a mod tell me before that if I wanted to check on or revive a thread that was removed, my best bet was to PM a global mod or to PM TJ in the case of one that wasn't on the completed list. Sure, people weren't notified, but they can go directly to the source rather than starting from scratch. I was given that option with one of the active concepts I have now. 

 

Also, we're moving forward to the present. People have already indicated that they want notification and that communication is a problem with DR. Mass deletion without notification would just make things worse as far as working on communication goes. 

Edited by Jazeki
Typo

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II’m not suggesting they just up and delete without warning, or without saying why they’re deleting(clean slate). They annouce that’s being cleared on x date months in the future, let them know they need to save info, they’ll be able to repost for x days/weeks without mod approval, after that they’ll need it.

 

Communication issues about what’s cave acceptable, which if You think about it, is probably most definitely a case by case issue.

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I know a few people who have come back after a few years and want to continue their concepts, but would hate to lose the descriptions etc.

That's why I would fully support an "inactive" section, maybe where the threads are visible to the OP only, but not deleted permanently.

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What would help most concepts is for people who has the time to learn how to draw, draw the dragons and sprite them with the help of artists who are experienced, both in-cave and those who are getting close to getting in cave. Anyone can make concepts and hope they come to life, but we have so many concepts and not enough people to help art. I know this was suggested by Infinis a while back, but I'm highly encouraging it as well

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I don't really see "they might come back" as a valid reason to keep old threads around. If we don't know for sure that the op/artist is going to come back, then why keep the thread? Why should anyone expect something they started 2-5 years ago to still be around? Any other forum, after that amount of time they'd just start a new thread. Bringing back something so old when all the art would need to be updated, and then the descriptions rewritten... you're basically starting over, a fresh thread isn't going to hurt.

 

And I'm going to try to make some tutorial videos. I want to do a voice over for them but I don't think my first video will... but it'll have annotations, at least.

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