Boards Feedback, and What We've Gathered

ModWuks·May 21, 2017·27 votes·2,972 views

We launched this sub-board a little under two weeks ago to open up a dialogue within the Boards community. Since then, we've received a tremendous amount of feedback covering various aspects of the Boards - over 700 messages worth. And even though we've mentioned our limitations with development, that didn't stop you from providing a lot of development ideas; but we got to see a lot of your passion and creativity come to life, and ultimately, we share a lot of your same sentiments. With all of this feedback, we've decided to aggregate the data to list out the various ideas we've received and to further those discussions without those points needing to be brought up repeatedly.

The following data does not represent the projects we're looking to move forward with, but rather just a list of the different points that we've received so far. We'll go through the list and have our own internal discussions, bring certain points up for discussion in the future, and look at feedback that's provided to us as it's posted in this sub-board. Thank you to everyone who has participated in our discussions.

Community

Let's Talk Boards on Boards Formatting, Syntax, Tips & Tricks, Etiquette
Identifying different types of harassment more proactively and dealing with cases more effectively
Disable ability to upvote posts on Boards Home
Boards Wishlist (Done!)
Identify other ways to streamline report communications
Workshop with moderators to ensure consistency across moderators
Develop a Riot feedback loop within Report a Bug
Clarify purpose of upvotes See this
Filter out Team Recruitment on Boards Home
More visibility on Boards changes and updates
Refine the different community creations sub-boards to clarify what should go where and to emphasize each of the crafts
Refine moderation policies behind or remove political threads in GD (In-Progress)
Separate sub-board for Streams/Videos
Discussion view vs Chronological View, and how they should be implemented on the Boards
New Player sub-board
Don't change GD culture
Separate Gameplay Balance with Advice

The Voting System (Mostly Development)

Hide upvotes/downvotes for first hour and replace with "?"
Show upvotes/downvotes on threads
No votes shown until you vote/post, not changeable once voted
Harsher stances on upvote manipulation
Disable voting
Visibility determined by thread activity, not upvotes
Disable voting outside of threads

Development

More stickers
Different Boards Themes other than default
Reporting content on mobile
Red Tracker Filter
Community Creations as Boards Header, rotating
Integrated lock icon for locked threads
More advanced reporting functionalities
Integrated player-to-player communication platform
Floating Riot Bar at top as scroll with auto-refresh notifications
BB code
Autoquote feature on reply
Spoiler/Hide functionality
Better way to make tables

51 Comments

DrCyanideMay 22, 201735 votes

No votes shown until you vote/post, not changeable

NO! No no no! No! Not being able to change your vote was one of the worst aspects of the old forums!

If you vote based on your first impression, but then read something that changes your mind you should be able to rescind your vote.
Misclicks (particularly on mobile) can't be corrected. Sorry, your great post just got a down vote and I can't undo that.

OceanicEyesMay 22, 20173 votes

100% agreed. Plus sometimes it's fun to downvote, then upvote so it's like a double upvote.

GigaPubeMay 23, 20173 votes

i can only hope everyone that votes based on 1st impression feels just as bad about their ignorant decisions

AMYS GRAVEMay 23, 20171 votes

jhin threads would be no more.

Deep Terror NamiMay 22, 201720 votes

More stickers should be top priority!

https://i.gyazo.com/40810b6b9479329987df48b1b7231afb.png

TyrekGoldenspearMay 22, 20172 votes

Seconded.

SecondChanceHeroMay 22, 20173 votes

[{quoted}](name=Deep Terror Nami,realm=NA,application-id=6heBIhQc,discussion-id=4HHR0ibm,comment-id=0000,timestamp=2017-05-22T00:24:05.327+0000)

More stickers should be top priority!

https://i.gyazo.com/40810b6b9479329987df48b1b7231afb.png

^ I vote to allocate 100% of riot resources to the issue. It's clearly a matter of life and death. Must have stickerZzzzz!!!

Mira Arya EntheMay 22, 20179 votes

Visibility determined by thread activity, not upvotes Hide upvotes/downvotes for first hour and replace with "?" No votes shown until you vote/post

My life is complete. Thank you. Finally the boards will be about discussion, not farming upvotes or shutting dowm viewpoints by a select mob deciding nobody deserves to have a certain PoV.

SnakDatSmilesBakMay 22, 20176 votes

Hi, I'd like to suggest a dm (direct message) system so I can slide into more dm's. Seriously though a dm system would be nice so boards members can communicate better without 3rd party apps.

OceanicEyesMay 22, 20171 votes

This is a good idea.

Pater GascoigneMay 22, 20176 votes

Voting systems are not a healthy system for a discussion forum. You will get the people that spam threads just to farm upvotes. But even worse, it discourages discussing with others. It's easier to downvote someone rather than telling that person what you disagree with. Some people might also not want to express an unpopular opinion since they will get downvoted into invisibility.

CowseedMay 22, 20171 votes

Downvoted for no reason whatsoever [slayer-jinx-catface]

Skins ProjectMay 22, 20176 votes

Visibility determined by thread activity, not upvotes

I feel M&G should be excluded from this...

Because the point of M&G isn't about activity.. I.E. LF replying to comments doesn't make the meme better.

Other then that it seems like great improvements are headed towards my beloved boards <3

(Wuuuuuuuuuuks what was the wuks insidenttttt tellllllll me alreadyyyyyyy!)

CowseedMay 22, 20172 votes

I think the states of memes and games is near perfect. This crappy system is actual benificial to that sub-board given the nature of the content.

Skins ProjectMay 22, 20171 votes

More or less what I was saying.

As a super-active boards member this all seems great to me.

I just feel M&G is fine as it is :p

AeszarckMay 22, 20173 votes

I would also like to request a Search User Profile in the Development section. It can sometimes be really hard to find a user through Search.

Other than that, good list! I'm glad you're dedicated toward improving the Boards!

ModWuksMay 22, 20171 votes

{quoted}

I would also like to request a Search User Profile in the Development section. It can sometimes be really hard to find a user through Search.

How would the search user profile work?

AeszarckMay 22, 20174 votes

{quoted}

How would the search user profile work?

I'd just like to type in a user's Summoner Name and find his or her Profile in a separate Search from the normal Search. I sometimes want to find threads from someone and if I don't remember the title or if the title is just really difficult to find, then I want to be able to find the person's profile instead. Right now I don't have a reliable way of finding user profiles.

Fondling GemsMay 22, 20173 votes

Definitely this. I have had people mention a thread someone else wrote a long time ago and I have to google their summoner name hoping I find a thread they made/commented on to be able to search their post history.

DrCyanideMay 22, 20175 votes

Pro tip: if you know the capitalization on their summoner name (easily done by searching for their match history on just about any website) you can find their profile from your own

Example: Lets say you wanted to find a post by DTN, but couldn't find any posts by them. (For some reason you forgot to look in Player Behavior)

You look them up on na.op.gg, which tells you the correct spelling is "Deep Terror Nami"
You go to your own Boards Profile (in this case, https://boards.na.leagueoflegends.com/en/player/NA/Fondling%20Gems )
You delete your name from the end, resulting in https://boards.na.leagueoflegends.com/en/player/NA/
You paste on the name you found, resulting in https://boards.na.leagueoflegends.com/en/player/NA/Deep Terror Nami

Your browser will fix any encoding you need to do.

NOTE: If you're looking for someone from another server who posts on the NA boards, you'll swap the "NA" out for their server (such as "EUW" for Malicious Metal)

Fondling GemsMay 22, 20173 votes

What is your address so I can bake and send you a cookie? Thanks a ton lol.

DrCyanideMay 22, 20171 votes

Actually just started making some chocolate chip cookies. I'll pretend ones from you.

If you feel that's not good enough for you, I also accept mystery skins/champions :)

AeszarckMay 22, 20171 votes

[zombie-nunu-hearts]

Sraeg2013May 22, 20172 votes

How about a STRICT set of rules?

I've had enough of dealing with those bullshit guidelines everybody, especially moderators interpret their own way. I've had countless of my comments removed, warnings and suspension received solely, because "guidelines" are a mess.

Truth be told in all my years dealing with the internet and writing on various forums in the past decade, I haven't received even 3 warnings total. Not until I started writing on LoL Boards where I get at least 1 removed post a month.

What was the difference? On those other forums all rules were rules. Plain and simple with transparent punishment systems, not based on fee-fees of some random snowflakes.

DokkaebiMay 23, 20172 votes

Just get rid of downvoting. All it causes is harm. Most other websites have moved on and taken the 'upvote or don't upvote' system and it works a lot better.

DokkaebiMay 23, 20172 votes

See? Here we can see it in action. Targeted trolling is so easy when you can just go and downvote every single post/comment by someone and make their replies worthless.

ModEvangeleJun 6, 20172 votes

Nami Praise be unto Wuks.

ModWuksJun 6, 20171 votes

{quoted}

Praise be unto Wuks.

And to you.

ModAttysu The PoroJun 6, 20172 votes

Stickers and customizable board themes are the ones I am most excited for tbh, good work!

BreakuMay 22, 20171 votes

Hide upvotes/downvotes for first hour and replace with "?" No votes shown until you vote/post, not changeable once voted

But I pick which threads to read based on the votes it has?

Mira Arya EntheMay 22, 20179 votes

Exactly why this is being discussed. Conversations should be about conversation not upvote farming nor shutting a person up because a couple top boards members disagree with their viewpoint.

ModWuksMay 22, 20172 votes

[{quoted}](name=Mira Arya Enthe,realm=NA,application-id=6heBIhQc,discussion-id=4HHR0ibm,comment-id=00050000,timestamp=2017-05-22T12:26:37.295+0000)

Exactly why this is being ~~fixed~~ discussed.

Fixed that for ya. Just wanted to clarify again that this is the list of ideas that people brought forward and that we still need to look into each of these points to move forward with and how.

Additionally, with just the first point, "Hot" view will still be a thing. Putting "?"s for the first two hours will allow the post to be voted upon without biases that will make or break the post.

Mira Arya EntheMay 22, 20173 votes

Changed the wording for you. I personally will be retiring from the boards mostly once I feel it is an open and friendly discussion community for everyone regardless of what they main, what classes they like or what memelords like or dislike them. So I look forward to these changes.

JorenciceMay 22, 20174 votes

Kek?

I assume you don't exist in the work world.

Ever heard of the saying "you can please half the people all of the time or all the people half of the time but not both"

You will NEVER find ANYWHERE that's a open and friendly place for EVERYONE.

There is simply to many differing opinions for that.

Mira Arya EntheMay 22, 20175 votes

My definition of open and friendly is all those differing opinions being allowed to exist. And whether that is impossible or not doesn't mean it shouldn't be the goal.

JorenciceMay 22, 20173 votes

How can an opinion not exist?

Just because it has a negative vote count doesn't mean it doesn't exist

It just means more people disagreed than agrees.

Mira Arya EntheMay 22, 20175 votes

Votes are not meant to be agree or disagree. A boards mod clearly stated before upvotes are for if you feel it is an on topic or valid discussion and downvotes are for if it is off topic or presented in a bad manner.

A negative vote count around here often just means the first couple board prowlers or headline readers who saw it did not want it visible because they either want to surpress the opinion or person, so they downvoted it. Which not only lowers visibility of a potentially perfectly valid topic, but creates a negative disposition for anybody new coming along. People see a negative or positive vote and decide before potentially even reading that it deserved downvotes/upvotes.

Especially if the viewpoint or person is attached at all to existing boards drama. I have several people who upvote or downvote me just based on knowing me. Which is why votes should take second place to discussion, if have any relevancy at all.

NsaneMay 22, 20174 votes

[{quoted}](name=Mira Arya Enthe,realm=NA,application-id=6heBIhQc,discussion-id=4HHR0ibm,comment-id=00050000000000000000000000000000,timestamp=2017-05-22T21:24:22.477+0000)

Votes are not meant to be agree or disagree.

That's how they've been used since Season 2 when I first joined the forums. . .

Mira Arya EntheMay 22, 20174 votes

Back on the old boards visibility was not determined by votes.

NsaneMay 22, 20173 votes

[{quoted}](name=Mira Arya Enthe,realm=NA,application-id=6heBIhQc,discussion-id=4HHR0ibm,comment-id=0005000000000000000000000000000000000000,timestamp=2017-05-22T22:11:17.571+0000)

Back on the old boards visibility was not determined by votes.

Exactly, which is why it should have never changed in the first place. Having votes determine visibility is a stupid idea.

Mira Arya EntheMay 22, 20174 votes

Well yeh. That is exactly what I want lol.

BreakuMay 24, 20171 votes

Will there be an option to hide new threads, then?

I don't have time to read every single thread to try to find the important ones.

BreakuMay 24, 20171 votes

A couple of people can't "shut someone up"

And I really don't care to see the unpopular opinions.

Lord DesertMay 22, 20171 votes

We might see a drop in activity regarding views if we take away focal points (aka. the total vote count). We do want people to be interested and encuraged to look at threads without biasing the reader to much. Disabling the voting outside of threads is fantastic to get a reader to actually read the thread and then vote if they want to without losing the focal point.

But votes, even if up and downvotes are shown, bias the reader alot. Its not possible to not bias the reader and have focal points at the same time. (showing up and downvotes helps to identify controversal topics) Icons on the other hand (like the "lock" newly intorduced here) bias alot less, but are extremely good focal points! For new threads (1/2 - 1 hour) a "new" icon could replace the vote number (The total amount of votes should still be shown if you read the thread). After this time the icon switches to ether a red "↓" for -5 and lower, a white " - " for -4 to +4, or a green "↑" for +5 and above. This indication should last ~1day and then switch back to total votes + up and downvotes. ("new" and arrows could exist at the same time too)

All in all: We preserve the focal points but dont show the votes and dont bias the reader at first, later the important range from -4 to +4 is still unbiased and lastly the votes are shown. This should maximize the number of views without biasing the reader as much.

Extras: We could toy with some more icons like a "technical" icon, a "fun" icon or a "discussion" icon which the poster can put onto his thread (or, to protect from abuse, mods could grant them, if asked for).

Wuks, my dear friend, my best buddy, how, and is it possible for me, to do what you have done in this post!? This is exactly what I have been dreaming about! Please tell me its possible!

Glory ln DeathMay 23, 20171 votes

I like the idea of using a "New" icon in place of vote score for new threads (as opposed the the "?" Suggested in the OP), but I don't think we need to get super complicated with up and down arrows. Just leaving the "New" icon up for the first hour or so should be enough.

OceanicEyesMay 22, 20171 votes

Thoughts on hiding the name of the OP until you click the thread? Can't recall where I first saw the idea, but thought that was an interesting idea to discuss. On one hand it potentially limits bias based on the OP, on the other hand it sounds like it might just make it less convenient to find threads.

Of course this assumes that there is an author bias with threads, which is debatable.

Lord DesertMay 30, 20171 votes

Wuks, oh glorious, oh almighty, oh powerfull Wuks, would you, the master of the masters, the forger of worlds, the annhilator of Doom, grant this unimportant little shrimp the knowledge of creating what you have done in this thread? It may not be much but you shall be recieve my everlasting gratefullness!

ModBoggyBuntuJun 6, 20171 votes

Seems like some fine points to discuss. Hopefully we'll get to see results soon!

Jesus our ExodusSep 26, 20171 votes

Yo, I was wondering if you could add "Bump button" to the idea list. It will only affect the recent tab, and it will contribute to the OP of a thread getting visibility on their thread when they are online to discuss it. Also, if they feel like their topic isn't finished or needs to stay alive for some reason, they should be allowed to do so, in the spirit of open debate.

Some threads, no matter how good or still relevant they are, will just fall down on the list and never get read, because they didn't make it to the hot tab when they were being discussed.