Personally, I think snob has made a few interesting observations.
agreed with snob till it got to this point
im a member of several forums under various guises but one large (with 6400+ users) I help moderate has not degenerated into a shit flinger craphola. Its been running over 6 years now and started off all revolving around a single cs 1.5 server.
Difference between that community and this one is that flaming is kept under wraps, trolls are banned, elitists are not tolerated nor are their ego’s inflated with e-peen stroking posts from other fags and there lots of interesting topics posted regularly to keep people coming back and posting reasoned comments.
I know that all forums are different, im not an idiot, and thats why im a member of 5 (at last count) plus a lurker of another 2 or 3. but I feel the BMS forums could be better. When you look at blackmesasource.com you think - damn this is a mod?! no freaking way looks awesome. Then you get to the forums and its just constant, “READ FAQ”, “Discussed this thousand times”, “TL;DR - SHIT IDEA” from the suggestions area, 3 very off topic ‘news’ threads and an area which seems dedicated to just constant bitching at each other. Maybe thats why Catz, when you mentions BMS to those guys, you got “unprofessional” as a response.
Forgive me folks, but uk basically said what they said.
What who said?
edit nvm, found the post
Karma 
I will be honest… I only half heard. One of the guys kinda off on the side asked what other projects I have been involved with, so maybe I heard their grumbling wrong? 
naw. they are just jelus.
One thing I noticed is the increase in post deletion. Now I understand if the subject matter is inappropriate or really extremely rude, such as what happened in the Chile thread. But if something is mildly rude or off-base, to the point where it can be argued upon and rectified, then I think it should be kept in, especially if posts have already been made responding to it.
Just my two cents.
I agree with snob quite a lot. The mod is pretty close to completion (or so I’m lead to believe). The devs wanna surprise us to a certain degree, so there’s little they can release without revealing surprises. At the same time we have a fairly nice community here, and there is a lot of fun had and in a lot of sections some very useful advice handed out.
Once the mod is released, however, I can’t help but feel there will be an explosion of relevant posts, about the mod. Knowing you lot they’ll all be complaints, be at least it’ll be relevant, on topic posting. This is just the calm before the storm, or something.
Winged… what should we do with posts that go off topic and continue to go off topic even after there was a warning? What if the off topic-ness is an escalating argument?
It is possible to continue both trains of though at the same time. For example, read my post. I responded both to his post and the topic of the thread. We remained on track.
If it gets to a point where there is no attempt to get back on topic, a small warning should be made instead of automatically deleting the post.
I had more planned to say, but Lost is on and I seem to have forgotten my last point. 
I’ll be back.
https://forums.blackmesasource.com/showthread.php?t=4037
Why is this thread not locked yet? There are many other threads just like this and they all end up the same shitty way.
Anyway, yeah, if you let a bout of off-topicness run its course, it’ll fizzle out pretty quickly. Usually the tangent is a small matter branching from the topic which is quickly resolved (ie: question answered, poster convinced he is wrong/idiotic, etc.) Or, conversely, the posters themselves get back on topic on their own.
Not to say topics don’t get severely off topic (ie: if the topic jumped from storm in France to how they drive). In these cases, a stern warning should be made. If it continues, a bulk delete is in order.
Meh, I realize I’m not a mod. But if I were, it’s how I’d handle it. Just a suggestion. Take it or leave it, I will not press the matter further.
I see you’re very consistent.
Well written, is more like it.
I just don’t see myself typing the same thing over and over to get my point across.
A warning PM to the involved parties would go a long way, rather than just letting it go on and then suddenly insta-banning without warning. Clearly a little off-topic and arguing is tolerated, but not everyone is aware of the invisible and varied personal limits of each mod. It’s not like there’s a rule that 4 off topic / argument posts are fine but 5 gets you permabanned.
A simple PM from a mod saying it’s time to knock it off in ______ thread would be a fantastic idea, followed by a quick post by the mod in the thread letting everyone else know to knock it off and that warnings have been given. Then everyone knows what’s going on. Easy really.
If you think that a warning will completely change someone’s behavior, you have too much faith in people. I do agree with that method though, if the warning is ignored, that makes the permaban perfectly justified.
I didn’t say “a warning will completely change someone’s behaviour” or anything remotely like that. Nor did I suggest that it would. I just mentioned that it would be a better system, and at least then people would know they’re getting too close to the edge.
It works for the Republicans.
“Dey want 2 pool da plug on grandma!!! :herp: :derp:”
Allow both trains of thought? One train being on topic, the other train being an argument? Why would we want to do that? Why would we want to allow an argument to break out in a thread over something other than the topic? What is this, a hockey game? (lame attempt at humour )
In a recent particular thread, I had already warned the thread was going off topic and tried to guide it back to where it needed to be. Yet the two parties picked up where they left off as if I hadn’t said anything. Why do I need to warn a second time? I am sorry, but I have not heard a convincing argument against deleting posts yet.
Wait wait… there IS the infraction system set up with points for ‘derailing threads’. Perhaps I can make better use of this. However does that mean I should still leave the argumentative posts alone so that others can be baited into the argument?
Posts dont get deleted cuz we dont like what you said. They get deleted to stop the bickering and to minimize the potential of others firing up the bickering a second or third time.
That thread is in the Massdebating Hall. This is an area that I personally do not go to very often. As a matter of fact, unless someone reports something, I suspect many moderators stay out of that area. This area was specifically set up by popular request and as you can see the mood and tone is set by those contributing to it.
If there is something going on in the thread you find trolling or derailing, please use the report button.
Well, Catz, where do you draw the line exactly for “off-topic”? Why can’t the rules be more lenient in an area of the forum where your post count does not increase? Why has this method of getting something back on topic only just been implemented?
And why not make use of the warning/infraction system?
Then again, I don’t know how strict you actually are with off-topic posts, so I hesitate to fully endorse this method.
All I’ll say is that during my brief stint as mod (and from what I’ve seen until recently) I saw it best to let a tangent run its course, especially if it was linked to the original topic, and especially if it was only one post. If it was severely off-topic, we’d step in, but otherwise we just let it fizzle out.
If there was a topic about PS3s and their new bug, would my post get deleted if I were to say that PS3s generally suck and that I don’t care because my 360 is running fine?
EDIT: And why do you spell “humour” that way?