Voting & Organization (phpbb voting system)

[LoSboccacc]

it would be nice to have a voting system for crowdsourcing feedback in the suggestion forum.

no need to invent anything, there are plenty of upvoting mods,
like this one: https://www.phpbb.com/customise/db/mod/ ... valuation/

disclaimer: I am not affiliated with the devs or anyting

[Dysoch]

i like it. It would be simple and efficient!
you have my vote

[slpwnd]

This looks interesting and actually originally we pictured that the Ideas and Suggestions forum could work this way. However my concern is that the mod looks quite old (last update in 2010). Does anyone maybe have an experience with it?

[Darthlawsuit]

This looks interesting and actually originally we pictured that the Ideas and Suggestions forum could work this way. However my concern is that the mod looks quite old (last update in 2010). Does anyone maybe have an experience with it?

Might be best to ask this in the PHPBB forums. You may get a lot more replies than on the factorio forums.

[LoSboccacc]

last post hint at this mod working:

https://www.phpbb.com/community/viewtop ... start=1170

*I know nothing of phpbb

[TGS]

The main issue I see with this is that while the 'public' should have the ability to interface with the development team on ideas and how things can play out, you don't want to end up in a situation where you give the public the impression that if they 'upvote' something enough that it is guaranteed as a future feature.

What I mean by that is that I think the devs probably already have the next 6 months or so of 'work' planned/mapped out. Thus far we've been given the impression that the game is not currently sustainable in its current form. Obviously pending Steam Greenlight/Early Access etc. Once it becomes sustainable then this could be a good consideration. But really at this point having that sort of system would serve only one function, to gauge what the most popular suggestions are. Which doesn't necessarily make them good suggestions or easy to implement suggestions. Keeping in mind that such systems can also be very fickle, as the people themselves are fickle. People don't always know what they want, and when they get it they don't always like it.

[slpwnd]

@TGS good points. Actually the way I pictured this is that we would make a new subforum where only the devs could post topics and people could vote on them. For instance we have like 10 small features in our backlog at the moment. And they have been there for couple of months (other things always got priority). So for example you could give preference to pre-signals over having a logistic robot network in the smart inserters.

The other option is to make it open completely, but it would have to be clear that this whole process works as a recommendation system. Not a winner-must-be-implemented process.

I think the current Ideas & Suggestions works quite well. For instance before implementing certain feature I usually go through the forum and search for it to see what suggestions people had regarding this particular thing and take those suggestions into account. On the other hand there is tons of stuff already and it will only increase:)

What I mean by that is that I think the devs probably already have the next 6 months or so of 'work' planned/mapped out.

We have usually a very specific plan for the current release (~1.5 month ahead). Afterwards it becomes rather vague and the 6 months horizon is very very broad (like we want to have a stable version with the multiplayer on steam 6months from now).

eople don't always know what they want, and when they get it they don't always like it.

True.

[LoSboccacc]

Good points. Probably should have the totals hidden for all but mod/devs

There is still value in getting the community interest a a whole (but beware of voter bias)

[JoeSchmoe]

I think we need some organization and voting method. (possibly here, possibly in the wiki)

Request Categories (new feature, recipe tweak, audio/visual enhancements)
A list of requests, (short titles, with link to full discussion).
Users vote yea or nay,
Devs brief comment (yes, no, maybe)
User priorities. (For items that the devs said yes to, a way for users to indicate which they would like to see sooner rather than later)

Mods\Users could do some of the lifting adding\organizing the posts.
If this is done well, it would eliminate many duplicate posts, and lets the users see more interaction with the devs. With the devs only needing to scan down a list, and give a yes, no, maybe)

[ssilk]

Moved to this thread. Somehow schizophrenic?

My current opinion: Not really needed; the devs promised a bug-tracker-solution, which is in most cases also usable for suggestions. And it doesn't make the thinking about it easier: I think we have somehow a consensus what are good ideas and what not...

(and yes, also for that bug-tracker exists a thread! )