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On the Painting and Modelling section, I think it might be worth putting in a specific area for modelling terrain and Boards. There is alot of stuff out there but you need to trawl for it. Your thoughts?

The general feeling when we've discussed splitting off focused modelling boards in the past has been that once you start dividing it up, you weaken it as a whole.

Various forums have tried subdividing their modelling boards, and all that it really seems to do is kill off traffic, since most people don't go in there looking for specific stuff... they just want to browse and find stuff that's cool, and having everything split over multiple boards makes it harder to just browse.

I was thinking not so much as dividing Modelling, just for a P&M Showcase for Terrain and Boards. This covers everything from 'Flames of War' and '40k' right the way to 'WHFB' and 'Malifaux'. Nevermind, thought I would just throw this out there.

Terrain should definitely be it's own section.

I think having the two sections (terrain and models) makes sense and would in no way dillute things.

I could care less about half the models being posted, but would spend a lot of time in a terrain section.

mwnciboo wrote:I was thinking not so much as dividing Modelling, just for a P&M Showcase for Terrain and Boards.

But that's exactly the point. The end result is a separate section containing threads that instead of getting causal views from people browsing the general showcase, would now only really be seen by those people specifically looking to check out terrain... which, to be honest, I would suspect would be a distinct minority of forum viewers.

While it would certainly make it easier for those just wanting to see terrain, the end result would be fewer thread views. And people asking 'Hey, we have a separate showcase for terrain! Why don't we also have one for [insert area of specific interest here]?'

insaniak wrote:
While it would certainly make it easier for those just wanting to see terrain, the end result would be fewer thread views. And people asking 'Hey, we have a separate showcase for terrain! Why don't we also have one for [insert area of specific interest here]?'

I would argue that it doesn't weaken anything, and I doubt that "most" people would suggest splitting up the P&M boards beyond models (of any type) and terrain (of any type)... I was actually going to create another thread in Nuts and Bolts for just this thing (but a quick search stopped that)...


I personally would MUCH rather go to a subforum of Dakka Dakka to see terrain WIP/Showcase/tutorial threads than to go to another website altogether (which I currently do have to, essentially)

Ensis Ferrae wrote:I personally would MUCH rather go to a subforum of Dakka Dakka to see terrain WIP/Showcase/tutorial threads than to go to another website altogether (which I currently do have to, essentially)

That's the thing, though... if you're finding so few terrain threads in the regular modelling boards, that's hardly an argument for them having their own sub-forum.

Splitting a subject off into its own section doesn't automatically start people posting in it. We need to see that enough interest is there to warrant having a separate section... and currently, there just aren't enough posts about terrain to make it worthwhile.

I know I would love a terrain only section...

If Ye Lords of Dakka are afraid of less traffic, why not give the subforum a trial for about, say a month or so?

I agree that a specific thread would be useful and interesting, and I personally think that it wouldn't divert casual traffic too much.

However, if the thread was found to decrease traffic, it could easily be absorbed back into the P&M Section as it is now.

I agree with splitting the topic. It's not dilution you should be worried about, it's disorganization. The current state of that part of the forum really does make it difficult for anyone to find specific threads that are terrain based. In reality, threads showcasing terrain or giving tips on how to create it are very useful and serve a purpose other than popularity. Also, consider the blog article: http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/259854.page. It has 66 pages and hundreds of followers including myself.. and I had to spend the past 20 minutes just to find it.

20 minutes to find a thread? I have all the good terrain blogs subbed and exalted, it takes seconds to locate them and jump to the most recent unread post.

Using the logic of, 'this needs it's own sub-forum because there are a few good blogs:' We should have a seperate sub forum for blogs on all available W40k and WHFB armies and small game systems. That's insanely stupid, isn't it? There are far more Space Marine blogs than terrain ones and far more people are interested in them.
If the blog's good it'll float to the top often and you will soon see it and can subscribe.

Also, if you are really passionate about terrain building then why don't you do something about it?
When some of Dakka requested an Infinity sub-forum and it was rejected on very reasonable terms we didn't moan about it like it was our right to have it. We asked what the requirements were and got together to grow the community surrounding the game.
Lots of people have worked hard at that and one day Infinity will surely earn it's own sub-forum due to massively increased activity.
So if you are passionate about terrain and really think it needs a sub-forum then do something about it.

As for splitting threads into a sub-forum for a trial period? That's pretty damned ridiculous to suggest, just try and imagine the amount of work Lego and Yak put into this site and how outrageously heavy a workload it would be to do that.



Edit: Sorry /rant.

I am passionate, but I'm asking to split the modeling forum into only two categories because I don't know how to make my own website. I'm asking for help as to how to build terrain, and I'm finding that the modeling section has loads of stuff on models.. not crafting the terrain they are played or put on display. Thank's for the tip though, I will subscribe to those blogs that are of interest to me, that's a start.

You don't have to start your own website. Just PM around (I know Casey is a great source for this) for links to DakkaDakka terrain blogs.

Subsections of forums are made when a specific area has been filled with so many of one topic that the new board has to be created to alleviate pressure and to allow for more discussion.

The closest to getting a new board is FOW, followed by Infinity. Or it could be the other way around. Whatever.

I'm glad you are passionate about it, that's really good to see, and wanting to gather like minded people is good too.

Your in the best place to find those people already, Dakka has some amazing terrain threads and modeling threads that include terrain. The fact remains that there aren't enough of them to warrant there own sub forum though.

If that's something you want to see, you cant expect Yak and Lego to do just do it on a whim. Someone has to put in the effort to gather everyone up and grow the community or it has to happen naturally. If that sounds too difficult then it's because there isn't enough interest in the subject. There is a small group called 'The League of Extraordinary Riveters,' or something of the sort, on Dakka if my memory serves me correctly. I believe they are rather more interested in terrain than your average hobbyist.

As far as i am aware there are no large or impressive terrain specific forums which suggest that the topic is one people are extremely interested in. You'll find that most people love terrain but are more interested in the games and the models.

Sub-forum requests crop up often here but only a few have any legs whatsoever and even those aren't worth it. Currently FoW is the next in line and i believe it still has some way to go. I believe Malifaux was getting a look in until the Infinity community showed that Corvus Belli had much more support in that section.

On the topic of an Infinity sub-forum, if you are really passionate then this was posted on 18/Feb/2012 18:04:24.

warboss wrote:Just peeked in there and there are 12 threads that have any posts entered in the last 10 days.. if you split off Infinity, you'll end up with a forum that has less than one thread active thread a day, lol.

On 27/Mar/2012 23:49:03 a request was made for an Infinity sub-forum and it was declined for good reason despite two pages of support. (You should read the thread here)

It is now the 20/Apr/2012, just two month later and there are just under eighty threads active in the last month alone. The point being that Infinity still hasn't earned the right to it's own sub-forum but the community pushes on regardless. There is also an Infinity Painting Competition supported by Corvus Belli and Rank Tracks and Glossary Entries in the works not to mention a host of other improvements.

With that in mind, do you still think terrain needs a sub-forum?

P.S. As Chowder said i'd be happy to send you links to a few of my favourite terrain related threads if you drop me a pm.

DemetriDominov wrote:...and I'm finding that the modeling section has loads of stuff on models.. not crafting the terrain they are played or put on display.

Which is exactly why it doesn't have a separate section.

In order for lego to consider splitting terrarin off from the general P&M section, we would have to be seeing enough terrain-related threads to sustain a separate section, and sufficient modelling traffic in general to offset the people who aren't happy about having too many sub-sections.

I do agree that the painting and modeling forum is rather cluttered at the moment, and am investigating some filtering options, but spinoff forums are not the way to go in most cases. Terrain is almost deserving of its own forum as it is different enough from models to not fall foul of the usual desire to force people to see a range of models/games/news, etc. but the volume is not quite significant enough to justify it at this point, and in most cases it is shown alongside models by users anyway.

legoburner wrote:I do agree that the painting and modeling forum is rather cluttered at the moment, and am investigating some filtering options, but spinoff forums are not the way to go in most cases. Terrain is almost deserving of its own forum as it is different enough from models to not fall foul of the usual desire to force people to see a range of models/games/news, etc. but the volume is not quite significant enough to justify it at this point, and in most cases it is shown alongside models by users anyway.

I completely understand where you are coming from, but do you think that in this case, it may be a case of "If you build it, they will come" ? I am not a programmer by any stretch of the imagination, so I'll as honestly, would it be very difficult to build a "terrain subforum" and run it in a sort of probationary period, where if during a certain time period it doesn't generate enough views/threads/responses, it could be rolled back into P&M and Showcase forums?

To much hassle for something like that to happen, TBH.

I think the plan is to wait to see if there needs to be a terrain specific board.