MadMonkey: OK, hold on - let me clarify what I'm thinking.\

BrainKing.com board - this would be for pawns & everyone to ask questions about brainking, learn about brainking, and brainking issues.

General Chat - this is NOT for brainking related stuff, but rather a place just for what it says - general chat. It's not to teach pawns or anyone more about the site, but gives them a place to chat with others - which in turn keeps pawns on the site longer, hopefully allowing them to form friendship with others and in the end - hopefully being a positive thing for newer users.

Some people don't like general chat, and in that case do not have to go there. I don't go there much myself. But some do like to chat, say "Hi", "hows the weather", etc... for those people, having the board on their favourites list will possible give them a positive to the site.

And if you want to give away memberships so badly, and a post on some board isn't working, why not choose a few of the most active ones and send them a message asking if they're interested? ;)

(by the way, I'm not interested at the moment so don't waste your time with me)

MadMonkey: That's not what I said. I know of some pawns that DO follow up on GC. Again, it has nothing to with with one's level of membership...

Fortunately I am a pawn who is interested in free membership so You can stop asking others ; )

Hrqls: I can remove server news and bk.info entries from my mainpage.

I think the membership level has nothing to do with what boards one chooses to read or not. Or to the commitement one has to the site or not (I know of many paying members that don't spend as much time or do as much stuff around here as some pawns do).
Not all members read the "Members only" board, do they? (I know I hardly didn't)
Why would you think that most pawns would read a "pawns only" board?

I never had problems with GC in the past. It just didn't interest me, that was all. And there will always be player that come here to the site to play and not to chat. If they want to become more involved in the site, then I'm sure they'll find whatever it has to offer, it's not some red numbers on the right column that will make them change their way in this site (just maybe speed it up, I agree there).

BIG BAD WOLF: I think i read somewhere today on one of the boards.to have prize tournaments.If those with an interest of giving away these free memebership,are able to create tounaments for them,which has worked good in the past.Which would be less work for all that are involed in promoting this.

BIG BAD WOLF: I do agree with most of what you say, but i fail to agree with the General Board aspect, it is too General. Pawns wont find anything out about Brainking by not going to boards, but has just been pointed out by a PAWN, they dont go there, and the reason is quite obvious.

Hrqls: I know they cant, and agree the English is a problem for some.
Being able to read something is different to having an opinion though, Pawns do have them and should be allowed to put theres across.
A lot of people do not read or post on DB's as you know for numerous reasons, even less Pawns.
When a Pawn does mention something it is just pushed to one side, like below, how about listening to what they say.

MadMonkey: Well it sounds like pauloaguia does not read the GC board because of past problems.... and those types of members most likely already know about the discussion boards, and are not the ones I'm thinking about targeting. I'm more thinking of the ones who never visited a board before, or maybe once but does not go through the trouble of trying to find the boards - possible coming here, playing a few games, and leaving. Giving them quick access to the BK.com board allows them a place to ask questions about the site, and see other site related information & questions that users post. Having a link to GC board allows them a place to "chat" so they don't come on bk.com board and start a friendly conversation - which most likely will get them a warning to take it to GC, which in turn puts some people off as the boards not being friends, and in the end turning them away from the site.

Why can't the GC board be used with pawns to post also? What would the purpose be for a pawn only board? That is for the current example where some paid users want to find pawns interested in trying out the bishop membership, if the paid member can't post on the pawn only board - then the pawn only board would be pointless. And if you say that paid members can post on a pawn board, then it goes back to why can't everyone just use the general chat board?

MadMonkey: they cant turn off fencers news messages cant they ?
they can count that as a board with messages for them .. the only problem might be that its only available in english

BIG BAD WOLF: lol,
I agree with pauloaguia who is a Pawn so whose opinion we should take note of. He doesnt read the GC board, and i am sure there a alot that dont (members as well). I think if Pawns had a board where everything there was relevant to them, they would have a place to look for stuff and be kept up to date with things,that would be a good default board.
IMO, If the feeling of Pawns on the site is not taken into account, the chance of getting new members must surely be harmed.

BIG BAD WOLF: *nod* i agree, or we point them there
(btw i dont have chat on my favourites either, but i have this one there of course ;))

pauloaguia: I'm not sure what you mean about it changing - basicly I would say both so if let say a new pawn wants to say "hi" and only sees the bk.com board on his list, they may be tempted to start a general conversation there. If they see both bk.com & general chat, hopefully there will be more of a chance to go to the chat board to have a nice chat.

BIG BAD WOLF: I'm not sure if GC would be a good 'default' board. Unless it has changed quite a while in these past few months I haven't read it ;P

Fencer: dont forget to add the english as well though as the language specific board might not contain the same information

BIG BAD WOLF: It would be better to add the language specific version of BrainKing.com board (not everyone speaks English).

Fencer: Someone mentioned this on General Chat, and I think it is a good idea - a way to get pawns more involved in the site.

By default, I think all pawns should have Brainking.com & General Chat board added to their favourites list. That way when the see the red (X new), they will start to read it - which in turn may get them more interested in the site - which in turn may help the site membership grow also.

First, all current pawns, I would put those 2 boards on their favorites list. Then make it so whenever someone new signs up on the site, those 2 boards are there by default.

Of course pawns can at any time take the boards back off their favourites list if they don't like it. You might get a little negative reaction from current pawns if you put those boards on their favourites automaticly, but I think the benifit would be worth it.

pauloaguia: c) is correct and when I finish coding of the agent, b) will take place.

Fencer: So, if a knight buys a Bishop membership for himself what will happen?
* His knight membership will automatically be given an extra month
* At the end of his current knight membership it will automatically turn into a Bishop
* The membership extension will have to be manually made, because the automatic script doesn't contemplate this situation
* Something else

And what if a Rook buys a Bishop memberhsip to himself?

MadMonkey: I think the Pawns think the News is only for paying members and remove it.

Foxy Lady: They dont know, i havent found one yet that found it without being told. Admitted this sort of situation does not arise often that Members are willing to pay for a Pawn to try out a membership.
I would imagine alot of Pawns dont read the General board(like alot of Members), because thats exactly what it is General. How often do you go the to find someone has just put a smiley or link to another site.
I guess this board would be better in future as at least things here normally relate to Brainking.
I just thought a Pawn board would be good as it would be a place where things relate to them only.

MadMonkey: I doubt it. It cannot be better visible than in Server News on the Main Page. If they don't read even that, you can hardly expect they would read a new discussion board.

MadMonkey: My first Bishop finally read GC and not confused anymore.He had no idea what was going on.

Fencer: Could Pawns have a discussion board, moderated appropriately by who ever. I have spoken to 6 Pawns since last night and not one of them knew about the kind offers of several members to try out the Brain Bishop membership.
I know it is on the General board, but i guess they feel there is nothing of interest there for them so dont look at it (know the feeling lol).
Maybe if there was a Pawn Board they would

Fencer: PayPal always gives me a hard time submitting.I have to clear my cookies no not mine WEBTV after 3 tries.

Jason: Place two orders. Or change the quantity at the shopping cart.

fencer how can i buy someone a 2 month membership (brain bishop) as i only have the option to pay for one month .

joshi tm: Thats cool for the pawns, get 15 vacation days for €2

joshi tm: Per year.

imsoaddicted: PER MONTH? That's 240 non-playing games a year!

joshi tm: as its the same as a brain knight you get 20 vacation days

Fencer: How many vacation days do you get when you purchase a B Bishop membership?

BIG BAD WOLF: 1) There is always something easy to understand just when I wake up. Yes, you can do it.
2) Yes, according to the Brains page.

1) If I buy 12 months worth of a Bishop membership, and extend my membership an extra 12 months. Do I have to find 12 different pawns to give those to, or can I say "group" them together in 4 month group and make 3 different prize tournament for the prize of the 4 months of bishop memberships?

2) Can you still get brains for writing articles on brainrook.com? http://www.brainrook.com I have not had a lot of time to write much, but would still be interested - more interested if I can earn brains while doing so.

Hrqls: Yep, i agree with that totally. Fencer (and Liquid of course) would be the only ones able to move players in/out of Teams for what they deem a valid reason at ant other times.

MadMonkey: i love the idea for the active/non-active box

it would require far less work for a captain to make sure all his team members want to play

fencer, when/if you read this, should we post it on the feature request board as well ? or pm you ? or would it require a lot of work for you ? ;)

MadMonkey: great idea!

#3 a team participating in a team stairs have to be on the team for more than 1 month

Fencer: LOL, then I have the perfect solution, come to my own conclusions and spam you with PMs. I like this system !
More seriously, OK, when there is any doubt I will post in the specific forum first in order to have other people's opinions.

nabla: I read no boards, not even this one. So it's always the best to discuss a new feature anywhere and when some conclusion is made, send me a notification.

Hello Fencer, I have a little question for you !
In the feature requests board, it is stated that feature requests that are specific to a game should be posted in the game's discussion board, when it exists. But do you really read all games discussion boards ? For instance, the backgammon board ? :-)
I would have some feature requests - don't worry, not only about backgammon - but I want to post them in a place where you will see them.

BIG BAD WOLF: Sounds good.
I prefer #2 idea better like you do.
I also thing there should be an option for players where they can add whether they are available to play a match or not, an active/non-active box they can change on the team sheet. Some players may be going on holiday or not want any more games as you say. This way the Captain would know who to pick from, it would save players leaving and re-joining Teams.

Time is the only issue i was thinking of. At present there are some players who do keep Tournaments running as they do not move till just before there time is up for a move. I can see this irritating some other players who would like to get on with Matches. I think either 3-4 days per move or have 2 sets of Stairs, one Fast & one Slow or use the Fischer's clock to set how long a match should last.

MadMonkey: Working from your idea, this is what I see:

Each fellowship has 1 team of 6 players in the stairs. Or beter yet, maybe 7 players, that way there will be less ties. But getting 7 might be hard for some fellowships. Maybe 5, but allow fellowship to enter 2 teams for those who have a lot. But now I'm getting into more work for Fencer.

Since it's backgammon, I would say just do a 1 game per 2 players.

Each team captain can challenge 1 team, and can also be challenged by another team. So no more then 2 team stair matchs can go on at the same time. (like current stairs)

The players on the team when the challenge started stays until that match is done.

I'm not sure what I like beter:
1) Limit a team to changing 1 player once a month (or)
2) A player has to stay with a team at least a month before they can be removed or leave. (which means every month, a fellowship could technicly change their team completly.

I kind of like #2 beter since sometimes you will get a few people who will all of a sudden not want any more games and may need to be replaced.

Of course the extra rule would be that if a person drops their membership to a pawn level, they can be removed and replaced right away without the limits above getting in the way. (*** When I say right away - they can complete current games, but no new challenges can be made or accepted until the pawn is replaced by a knight/rook fellowship member ***)

Other then that, most of the regular stairs rules would work. The time limit of 4-5 days I found work for the majority of players (a few find it too slow, a few find it too fast - but most find 4-5 days pretty good).

So this is my more complete thoughts about MadMonkey's team stairs.

MadMonkey: I like that idea !

fakarten: thanks! no secret points :)
i can sleep peacefully again ;)

MadMonkey: I like that idea !

Do we know what our prizes were for October yet

MadMonkey: Mhm. Not a bad idea.

Fencer: This is not really a Feature Request, more of an idea for Brainking Teams playing a bigger part. My first thought was about having a Team Backgammon League, but after talking to a couple of players it could take alot of sorting out. So to a new idea which should be alot easier as i think nearly all the code is already written, it just needs modifying.
How about we have TEAM Backgammon stairs. Backgammon is the obvious choice as most Fellowships have a Team for it, if it works then other Stairs could be introduced. All that we need is Rules set, as in number of players(6 seems good), changing Team players, amount of challenges at one time etc....
There would have to be a good way to check players are not chopping & changing Teams every few days though.
What do you think ?

Vikings:I haven't received more than two requests yet.