Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

Seriously, why, people?

When I click on a battle report, I'm expecting to see pictures, which means that any battle report worth reading is going to have a little bit of load time to it. Meanwhile, it's more than a little off-putting to have to click once on the battle report, and then have to go through and click 15 more times just to reveal all the pictures, so that I can then scroll back to the top and start actually reading the report.

It's enough of a barrier, that I find that after the first hunt-and-peck for the next tiny spoiler button, I just give up and read the words, and battle reports that are just words tend to get me to stop reading them pretty quickly.

Other than hoping to lay the same kind of a psychological trap as a candy advent calendar, or vainly attempting to bring in audience participation into the fold, what are people really hoping to achieve by doing this?

It's really annoying...

Is it not trying to help those with low bandwidth? Or do spoiler pictures load regardless of whether they're visible or not?

I find the one that have each turn spoiler are just better organized and easier to keep track off.

This is one of those things where 50% like spoilers and 50% dont, you cant please everyone so its up to the people who spend their time making these reports to format it how they like. Jy2 uses spoilers but I would say he makes the best reports here on dakka, although I do like yours as well Ailaros. Just becasue its not your way, does not mean its the wrong way.

He seems to be asking a question more than criticizing... I tried it out on my last BatRep, and as above, I just did it to make load time quicker and make it feel more organized.
Both ways definitely work.

 jifel wrote:
He seems to be asking a question more than criticizing... I tried it out on my last BatRep, and as above, I just did it to make load time quicker and make it feel more organized.
Both ways definitely work.

Have edited my previous post, was a bit OTT.

My stance is more in the "spoiler camp" though, but as you say. Both ways work.

1. It's courteous to people with slower connections. IEven for folks with reasonably quick connections, it makes the thread load quicker, especially if you're coming back later after reading the report just for the post-game discussion.
2. Some folks find it makes the report better organized and more enjoyable, revealing info stage by stage.

I think it's a really nice way to do things, and I appreciate the extra effort on the report of the writer.

But you don't have to use spoilers in order to organize things. You can use headings or quote boxes, or whatever.

It just seems that the obnoxiousness of having to click on stuff and then waiting for it to load (rather than a single click, and having everything load while you're reading the stuff above it) outweighs whatever organizational benefits you get, especially since you can organize things other ways.

As Mitch Hedburg once said, I don't like Peppridge Farm bread - it's just one more step between me and toast.

Misuse of the tag?

I personally don't like the look of a BatRep that has big pictures between small lines of text. This is more of a problem when you have multiple pictures per turn, but I just find that the text can get lost when there's lots of pictures.

 Ailaros wrote:
But you don't have to use spoilers in order to organize things. You can use headings or quote boxes, or whatever.

It just seems that the obnoxiousness of having to click on stuff and then waiting for it to load (rather than a single click, and having everything load while you're reading the stuff above it) outweighs whatever organizational benefits you get, especially since you can organize things other ways.

As Mitch Hedburg once said, I don't like Peppridge Farm bread - it's just one more step between me and toast.

So your complaining about clicking to view things because it's bothersome to you rather then more useful to the makers themselves?

 Ailaros wrote:
But you don't have to use spoilers in order to organize things. You can use headings or quote boxes, or whatever.

It just seems that the obnoxiousness of having to click on stuff and then waiting for it to load (rather than a single click, and having everything load while you're reading the stuff above it) outweighs whatever organizational benefits you get, especially since you can organize things other ways.

As Mitch Hedburg once said, I don't like Peppridge Farm bread - it's just one more step between me and toast.

Some post more photos than others. I've done reports with like 200-300 pictures, that can be really annoying in terms of load time, like mannahnin said if you're coming back after having already read the initial report to see what others have posted, it can be really annoying, you end up on a conveyor belt of scrolling since the page keeps getting larger as pictures load.

@Crablezworth

I thought that was just me, I so hate that never ending conveyor belt of doom

I much prefer the use of spoiler tags. It's an ingenious use of the Internet. I find it a lot easier to follow.

There really is no comparison. Spoiler tag batreps are far superior to the normal kind. Hands down. End of discussion.

Personally I hate using spoiler tags to cover up images. I tried it in one report because I got a couple requests to do it, but I just think it looks far worse aesthetically. That said, I generally have around 30+ images per battle report. I've been working on ways to be both courteous, avoid massive load times and get my preferred format all at once. Formerly I'd have huge images which would stretch the page while it loaded and large image files which make loading even slower (PNGs are bad for this). Now I convert all my images before I upload them to a smaller width and into JPEGs. This not only means the page no longer gets stretched (well, not quite so badly anyway), but it also reduces the total load time considerably. Shameless plug: if you wanna see how I do it, click me.

btw, I'm under the impression that spoiler tags do not decrease the load time, since the images are loading regardless.

I like them. They make it nice and easy to view how the battle report is organized. Also, as mentioned, it helps people with bandwith issues so they can load in chunks. If a few extra clicks is really a worry for you then you're leading a good life.

You know whats more annoying? Threads about spoiler tags in the battle report section rather then actual battle reports.

I dunno, it's not like you would expect to read a battle report under a thread called " Why do people hide their pictures in spoiler tags?", even if it is in the Battle Reports section.

Still a bit ridiculous IMO. Save this crap for general discussion.

It's discussion directly pertaining to and about Battle Reports. It's about whether a particular way of formatting and handling the images in a battle report is a good idea and whether people like it.

ZebioLizard2 wrote:So your complaining about clicking to view things because it's bothersome to you rather then more useful to the makers themselves?

Firstly, battle reports are written for the reader, not the writer. Secondly, you can get the same organizational benefits from other ways that aren't a pain to readers.

Crablezworth wrote:Some post more photos than others. I've done reports with like 200-300 pictures, that can be really annoying in terms of load time, like mannahnin said if you're coming back after having already read the initial report to see what others have posted, it can be really annoying, you end up on a conveyor belt of scrolling since the page keeps getting larger as pictures load.

Sure, but in this case, you could put the entire report in a single spoiler. Breaking it up into over a dozen spoilers is unecessary.

andtheyshallknownofear wrote:If a few extra clicks is really a worry for you then you're leading a good life.

Ailaros, that's a terrible argument.

There's a qualitative difference between spoilering natural and substantive chunks of content like the turns of a battle report, vs. sentences of a paragraph like you've just done. If you can't perceive the difference, then you're probably best off just skipping those reports.

Ok first of all... Fuzzy Pickles.

Second:
In my recent Battle Report I had 2 games reporting in 1 threat. Now (lack of pictures due to time constraints whilst playing) due to writing up 2 reports; I dumped them each into their own spoiler so that the post itself wasnt 500 pages long (hyperbole but you get the point).

I like spoilers, even if it is turn by turn, for a few reasons. Some have already been mentioned and they are legitimate reasons whether or not you personally agree with them.

Other reasons include:
The natural habit of the eye to be attracted to nice shiny things (pictures) further down, spoiling what happened as some people actually like to read and view the battle report as the battle happened.
Not having the post be a decent ream of paper long. I'm serious about this - I read battle reports as entertainment whilst I eat lunch, or wait for an update to finish downloading, etc. If I wanted to read a novel I would pick up Path of the Renegade (current novel of choice). I find it easier to read a battle report if the turns are dumped into spoiler tags. People who do what you did to try and illustrate your point are being obnoxious. Dropping 1 sentence, or a short statement into a spoiler is not the same as dropping an entire persons turn with corresponding pictures into a spoiler.

But at the end of the day; it is clear that you are borderline trolling on this thread simply because you don't like people using spoilers; and you think therefore everyone should never be allowed to; regardless of any logical or reasoned response to the contrary. The little stunt in your spoiler spam post illustrates this perfectly.

Ailaros, my bat rep I posted had 10 spoilers, one for each player turn. I like it, and enjoy reading it, you can read up to a certain turn, go away and know were to go when you come back. Also were you trolling with that last post, sorry but battle reports with spoilers dont break up single phrases, but whole game turns.

Are you one of those people that buys the games workshop bundle deals with built in 0% discount, becasue it saved you a few clicks.

I dont upload Bat Reps but when I'm posting +10 images on the news with some of them 900 pixels or more in height, I'm gonna save the bother of people having to scroll for years!

My whole point is that it doesn't make sense for ANY amount of content to be broken down in a way that requires input to view it. It doesn't matter if it's a piece of a sentence, or two sentences and a picture. It's the chunking that's the problem, not the resolution of the chunks.

Plus, seriously, how long does it take to read a battle report? Especially one wherein the report is a picture and a couple of sentences per turn? It would be like getting halfway through a post card and then complaining because you can't remember where you left off. In any case, you could always just leave your screen up on the report, and that's where you left off.

tuiman wrote:Are you one of those people that buys the games workshop bundle deals with built in 0% discount, becasue it saved you a few clicks.

Are you one of those people who would rather watch a movie in 10-minute chunks on youtube rather than watching it as a contiguous piece on netflix?

Of course it makes sense. It reduces load times and reduces scrolling. Scrolling down the thread is also input by the user. Either way we're interacting with the text to view the whole thing.

Your exact same argument applied to novels would be "Chapters are a stupid idea; the whole book should just be one uninterrupted stream of text." Or "Pages are dumb; we should go back to scrolls."

Of course, a novel is much longer than a battle report, but really it's just a question of how much text and how many images become easier to handle and more wieldy when brorken up in chunks like this. Which is subjective. And for some reason, you seem to enjoy a longer uninterrupted stread of pictures and text than 9/10 of the people who've responded so far.

Yes, you're actually getting right on to my point.

Is organizing things in a rational way a good idea? Yes.

Is putting each of those segments into something where you have to click on stuff to get access to the next chunk a good idea? No.

Can you organize things in a rational way without using spoilers? Yes.

Are spoiler tags the best way to organize things? No.

Are you one of those people who would rather watch a movie in 10-minute chunks on youtube rather than watching it as a contiguous piece on netflix?

Actually, back when my net was quite terrible. I'd prefer the 10 minute chunks on youtube because then I could actually watch them by setting them up proper beforehand, if I had netflix back then, it'd be interrupted every few bits. So full loading over streaming would've been better.

Firstly, battle reports are written for the reader, not the writer. Secondly, you can get the same organizational benefits from other ways that aren't a pain to readers.

Except I prefer the way it's done to full image posts as well as others, so it's not a clear cut issue because it's very individualized, so it's more of a personal opinion on whether or not someone dislikes it. Rather then "This is obviously better for everyone, why aren't you using X"

If you dont like them dont read them, simple.

Its not good saying that its dumb and pointless, yes you are entitled to your opinion, but at least come up with a decent argument rather than, i prefer it this way, every other way is dumb. It does not help your point.