[Rolken]

One question that's coming to a head with the F-Zero shenanigans and will be of wider significance with the influx of subsites in TSC4 is the degree of integration between them. Here are some possibilities.

- Complete dissociation. Basically nothing but some friendly links.
- Unified membership. One login for the various sites, but otherwise distinct.
- Partial community merge. The site forums are internally identical but in presentation each site has a subsection of the complete forums, with unnecessary ones masked. This could range from very slight (a general and staff forum in addition to site-specific ones) to extreme (everything shared except the equivalent of General Sonic and Competition Central).
- Complete community merge. You look at the forum and see everything, and everyone goes to the same chatroom (except perhaps the F-Zero folk, as they already have one)

Any further sharing beyond that is probably impractical. I think the primary considerations are activity levels and the degree to which the TSC atmosphere will be irrevocably changed by any such mergers made. Myself, I'm leaning towards something between shared membership and general forum mergers. And since the F-Zero guys have their own group of folks in place already, they may end up less integrated than the other sites if they desire (assuming the transfer comes to pass).

[Bilan]

Personally, I think there should be a unified membership across the subsites as a whole, but that could be just me.

As for forums, separate forums for each subsite with links to the others?

</two cents>

[CosmicFalcon]

I would have one TSC4 forum, like I detailed in the chatty. I shall write out how I foresee it (names are lol, they could be whatever):

The TSC4 Forum

|- Welcome Center
|-- Global News and Updates The new stuff on the site. Fear it.

|- Competition Central

|-- Sonic the Hedgehog Series - onos teh time attack!!!!1.
|---- Local News and Updates - The new stuff in Sonic. Fear it.
|---- Leaderboard Disputes - Think somebody's cheating? Post it here.
|---- Emerald Challenges - Custom challenges for the MegaDrive Sonic games.
|---- General Sonic Anything! Even chao training.

|-- F-Zero Series - onos teh hovercarz!!!!1.
|---- Local News and Updates - The new stuff in F-Zero. Fear it.
|---- Leaderboard Disputes
|---- General F-Zero

|-- Mario Series
|---- Local News and Updates
|---- Leaderboard Disputes
Yadda yadda. You get the picture. Each series' main forum equates to what the Competition Central forum is right now, with the other forums from Sonic general becoming child boards.

|- The Lounge
|-- Gaming and Grazing
|---- Are you asking for a CHALLENGE??? - Custom gamer challenges and time attacks and group playthroughs and other such stuff that wouldn't fit in somewhere else.
|-- Swigglez!

|- Site Management
|-- Elitist
|---- Sonic Elitists
|---- F-Zero Elitists
|---- Mario Elitists
|-- Really Super Elitist
|-- Moron Archives


I threw a really super elitist thing in there, because Elitist kind of becomes a place for all series-level mods and coolguys to bitch, so I figured maybe there should be ones who are more on the TSC4 inner circle rather than merely the Sonic inner circle. Savvy?

[Bilan]

CF's forum idea >> Mine

[Thorn]

Agreed, with the mine referring to whatever I was thinking of, not RPG's ideas.

[magnum12]

I like CF's idea the best. It seems like the most logical way to enact the mergers. Don't forget to add in the Mega Man sub section though. All I need to do is incoporate the completed results of my Mega Man Powered Up research and write up the charts for the Battle Network series. I'll post the final versions on this thread when I'm done (built to be exactly like TSC). It seems like TSC4 is nearly complete from all of the discussions lately.

[F-Man]

So you guys want our forum to become this large, and keep enlarging as new franchises are added to TSC4? And have members from all of them mixed up together?

Eventually this will generate people with completely different tastes, and silly arguments will start popping up. If that's what you guys want, then fine, I won't object, but I demand a new title for the site. How about MergerScore?

[Thorn]

^Yes, eventually it will get confusing.  Plus, it'll be hard to depict who can do what: say *pulls anme out of hat* RPG becomes a Spaceship User here, an Admin of TUSC, and a member of TMC and the F-Zero Forum.

But until we know how big TSC4 will actually be, maybe we should jsut get something working.

[Rolken]

I'm inclined to agree with F-Man. And getting something working is irrelevant, none of the ways are much more difficult than any other.

[Marth]

I'm not sure, but I'm thinking unified membership might be good.
It should work out well about any way, but I just don't want the Sonic stuff getting cluttered
and everything. If it was to be done like CF suggested, I'm thinking of this:
___________________________________________
The TSC4 Forum

-The Sonic Center

-The F-Zero Center

-The whatever Center
___________________________________________

...and TSC's boards would be exactly like they are now. The other sites would be a little smaller.
Like CF said:
___________________________________________
|---- Local News and Updates - The new stuff in F-Zero. Fear it.
|---- Leaderboard Disputes
|---- General F-Zero
___________________________________________

^And this would be on a separate screen from the main list of boards (Sonic, F-Zero, whatever),
and, of course, from all the Sonic boards.

My second choice is (copying CF, but changing it a little):
___________________________________________
The TSC4 Forum

-The F-Zero Center (click on this to bring up the F-Zero boards I mentioned earlier)

- The Sonic Center (this is where the regular TSC boards start)

|- Welcome Center
|-- Global News and Updates The new stuff on the site. Fear it.

|- Competition Central

...
___________________________________________

I hope the post isn't too messy. I can make a quick picture if it's needed.

[magnum12]

With some minor modifications to CF's tree based idea, here's what my structure would be.
TSC4
-Sonic section
l--TSC forums
l
l--TFC section
l   l-TFC forums
l
l--TMC (Mario) section
l   l-TMC forums
l
l--TMMC (Mega Man) section
l   l-TMMC forums
l
l---others
     l-other forums

-To summarize this drawing, think of TSC (The Sonic section) as the trunk of a tree. It would have portals that take the user to the sub sites linked to it like the branches of a tree. While the sites are fully integrated, the forums (with the exact same source code) of the "cadet branches" are seperate to prevent confusion.

[Spinballwizard]

Gogo Unified membership. >_>

I can't really see the TSC forum being mixed with any other competition. I see them as separate communities combined onto one basic framework (TSC4). One login shared for each is fine, but otherwise I think they should remain separate. This way, even though you're logged into the whole TSC4 framework, you only have to see the stuff you want to see. (For example, someone who only does Sonic can go to the TSC portion and not have to worry about, say, the F-Zero portion or the Mega Man portion.) I just think the communities need some space, y'know?

And God forbid we have everyone in #soniccenter (/the same channel) chatwise though -- I think that's just stupid.

[CosmicFalcon]

The more you seperate the forums for different series, and hence the communities, the easier it is for those who want to be 'purists' on one game or another. As far as someone who solely plays Sonic is concerned, the forums they visit would just be for Sonic, and likewise for the others when irrelevant forums are hidden.

The more you integrate the forums and communities, the easier it is for those who just have a casual interest in a bit of everything to waver from one place to the next. This is probably why I voted for greater integration, because otherwise I will probably stay solely on the Sonic or central type forums, if doing otherwise would mean going through a whole other site.

At the very least I am pro some shared Welcome Center and Lounge and perhaps staff action, if not shared then a 'central' one that is not series affiliated. You could then have series-affiliated general forums (oxymoronic?), but if you have only that then I feel it is somewhat encouraging segregation. I'm not saying you have to get on with people who compete in other things, I'm just saying the option should be more open.

[Rolken]

OK. While F-Zero's on TSC3 code I'll keep the forums entirely dissociated, as having partial integration on TSC3 is just not worth the effort. On TSC4 I'll go for the forum masking as it facilitates sharing PMs and such, and there's still the option of keeping the forums otherwise separate.