The perennial problem of a forum is, how do you organize information, so that it becomes and remains accessible for us. Occasionally people complain about how difficult it is to find anything, but the longer we stay here we apparently accept that this is just how it works.
Amazingly enough there is a feature in place, which enables us to link related threads, without someone having to manage and update a central thread all the time: Tags. In order for this to work we only need to agree on which tags we want to use. For starters I created a Link catalog for character builds, masteries and skills. As you can see this can become as granular as we want - as opposed to the Tag Cloud, which only displays the most recent and popular tags.
In the beginning many of the links do not yield any results, as these tags have not been used yet. But if you find this useful and start to tag your threads accordingly, we should be able to create a nice cross-reference with a minimum of effort. And with your support I’d be happy to set up additional link catalogs for other subjects.
As thread owner you can add 5 tags and others can add 2 tags - up to a total of 10 tags. You should not try to exhaust this limit though. If you post a guide for a Commando build, then you do not need to add a tag for e.g. Cadence just because this is your default attack. Ideally you discuss any skills (or a mastery as a whole) in dedicated threads and use those tags for these. However I feel that the list of tags for Character builds also needs theme tags: lightning build, pet build, etc.
For the tags I used the written-out names. Abbreviations are convenient for the writer, but not very telling for new users and often ambiguous. Some tags have an affix - e.g. Soldier (build) should be used for a single class build, whereas Soldier is for mastery discussions. Similarly for the four Celestial powers, which share the name with their constallation.
Please note that tags work globally on the forums. I am on the fence if bug reports should be tagged. I see the benefit for any current issues, but in the long run it would clutter the result list with obsolete threads.
A few tasks for and questions to you:
- What do you think of it? Is there anything that should be changed?
- Should bug reports be tagged?
- Assuming you agree with the above, please tag your threads - including any past ones, if still relevant.
- If you wish to help out, tag other people’s threads. And report incorrectly tagged ones.
- Suggest build themes.
- Should the mastery skills be sorted in alphabetical order like everything else? Currently they are sorted by tier and any passive skills from the bottom row are at the end.
- Which other subjects should also receive their link catalog?
Last but not least a request regarding the forum etiquette. It is probably easier for you forum regulars to tag threads of new users, instead of educating them to do this. The latter might not be perceived well. And if someone else does, please refrain from telling him not to do so. That would be a moderator’s task - use the report button to inform us.