Posted today in News:
WIZARDS OF THE COAST COMMUNITY FORUMS TO BE SHUT DOWN
Choosing to retire a former foundation of our community was not an easy decision, but we feel that we must adjust our communications structure to reflect where conversations about Wizards of the Coast games are taking place.
Social media has changed significantly over the last ten years, and discussions about games aren't exclusive to company-hosted forums. The majority of community conversation takes place on third-party websites (such as Reddit, Twitter, Facebook, Tumblr, and many other fantastic community-run websites), and it is up to us to evolve alongside our players.
We encourage past and current users to retrieve any information you want to retain from the Community Forums for bothDungeons & Dragons and Magic: The Gathering. The shutdown will occur on October 29, 2015, at 10:00 a.m. PT. We want to provide enough time for our forum members to move their content, and we recognize that given our forum's vibrant user base and extensive history, this may take time. Any information still on the forums on the cut-off date will be deleted.
Thank you to all of our past and current forum users. You helped build our community into what it is now, and we look forward to continuing to interact with you on our many active social platforms.
I encourage those seeking answers to migrate to our AL Facebook page. It is as active, if not more, than these forums.
Greg Marks
DnDAL Associate Resource Manager
Thanks Skerrit (Greg Marks, Associate Resource Manager) for patrolling these boards and helping everyone! And thanks to all of you who posted here with questions or advice to others as well.
Please keep in contact with the League on our social media channels:
Our Site: http://www.dndadventurersleague.org
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/groups/adventurersleague/
G+: https://plus.google.com/communities/112559314186117492998
Twitter: https://twitter.com/dnd_advleague
Raddu76 wrote:
It figures. I spent years being locked out of the forums because of a misunderstanding with my email address. I just regained access THIS WEEK.
And, just to put in my 2 bits, I don't believe social media can replace an online forum that is precisely targetted to a single subject with a range of topics such as this. I think Hasbro is shutting down services to save money, but this is a service that is critical to the D&D community. What will they cut next?
Just sayin'...
Goodbye, and thanks for all the Fish
Well this royally sucks. Is there any chance of a forum being added to dndadventurersleague.org, or is that site also under the purview of Cobra Command?
Relying on multiple third-party social networks is going to fracture the community and muddle communications between the AL staff and those of us in the trenches. Also, I expect table variation to skyrocket to absurd levels, as there will no longer be a reliable, centralized location for rulings topics to be discussed.
The rest of the D&D subforums won't be as affected, as the users in those forums will migrate to ENWorld and GitP, if they aren't already part of those communities. However, AL needs to have a home where users can easily find discussions in a timely manner. Facebook, G+, and Twitter all fail in that regard. Reddit doesn't work as a fair place to have such discussions, as trolls can pretty much make a topic disappear by lambasting it with enough downvotes. AL needs a singular place where every voice will be heard, not a litany of social networks where voices can be easily drowned out.
SteveMND wrote:
So does the AL have any sort of official presence, or at least follow, any forums on any other sites, like Enworld or anything? You do not lose things in a forum the way you do on Facebook and other social media.
Come on guys...WOTC could even set up this seasons correctly by having SCG to be available this season when it's suppose to be player content for RoD?! The on top of that for a lot of people Gen Con was a bummer because WOTC backed out. WOTC keeps dropping the ball and now they are doing it yet again by shutting down the Forums, which were a easy access to players in need of questions or DMs that were throwing around ideas ant wanted to know if something would work..idiots. My personal beliefs is because of some of the negative feedback WOTC got here because they don't get that a lot on Facebook eveybody is o so up beat..pathetic! Pluse all the spoilers about the expedition mods allows people who haven't played them to know what items certs are In them and they' re whole outline. My LC always got anoiyed that I new what was going to happen in every mod we played and what the item was as well. I've been on Facebook AL and none of these things ever get discussed and I've not seen spoilers like they have on here so I will assume these are some of the reasons for the shutdown. So in the emortal words of Malcom X " fight the power " because the man is shutting use down.
I'll try Reddit for a while, but I've found the Facebook presence to be lacking. Partially because of the format, but a lot of us gamers like to keep work and personal lives separate.
No...mostly because of the format. Forums are a lot more condusive to "community", which is what I consider this.
Enevhar_Aldarion wrote:
Pauper wrote:
SteveMND wrote:
I'm very disappointed by the decision to shut down the forums. Although I'm on Twitter, items related to D&D are only a tiny, tiny fraction of my feed, and they're completely transitory. If I don't happen to be online when something is posted I just won't see it. I dislike Facebook (a lot), and dislike G+ only slightly less. I've never used Reddit.
More to the point, though, as this is the only site actually owned by WotC, it is the only one that I consider official. I'd never consider some comment on Twitter or Facebook to be "official" or binding on my AL play in any way.
So from my perspective, WotC is sundering the AL community into smaller, independent islands. As SteveMND said, they've removed the "Organized" from "Organized Play."
Who will bring back the RPGA?
Honestly, the biggest problem with facebook forums is that google doesn't search them as it does for standard forums. Thus it will be impossible to rely on google results to potentially answer questions about adventurer's league play.
The wiki (http://dndadventurersleague.org/sage/index.php?title=Main_Page) is also a good place to check out the FAQ.
Skerrit wrote:
Err.. there IS a presence at Enworld. In fact want a review of an AL scenario? You will find it there? There are very few reviews of any scenario in WOTC's own forums. Whilst we only have one stickied thread at enworld, there is always room for more.
Mommy_was_an_Orc wrote:
I guess there's always the forums at Enworld.
Haha...I guess I bailed out just before the death knell of AL.
Looks like Gencon did more damage to their brand than they wanted to admit to.
I don't have access to any of the social media 'personal data collection vacuums'. I'm not about to give facebook access to and ownership of all my private information and any ideas I come up with into perpetuity. Anybody ever actually read their User Agreement? Makes poker websites EULA seem totally legit and fair by comparison.
It's too bad really, I wanted AL to succeed.
Then again, maybe AL will be more fun now that nobody will be around to make bad sweeping rules decrees all the time. And even if they did, it only takes about 2 weeks for any trace of anytihng to disappear completely from public sight into FBs all encompassing for-sale databases. As soon as my bookmarks go poof, I'll be able to actually cast summoning spells again and shapechange into T-rex just like the NPCs can.
Byakugan01 wrote:
Pauper wrote:
OK there is a complete AL Forum now at ENWorld which anyone here can use:
http://www.enworld.org/forum/forumdisplay.php?539-D-amp-D-Adventurer-s-League
Pretty much agree with everythiing to this point:
SteveMND wrote:
Skerrit wrote:
Pauper wrote:
Closing down the WoTC forums for favor of a relying on a non-centralized 3rd party source is a big mistake IMO. WoTC gives up all control over the content and the content is dispirsed to the winds. Today's big social sites like Facebook are yesterday's dust.
...and that's not going into the lack of privacy on the big social sites plus how they sell your personal information for profit. I'll keep Google Caching this site as long as I can rather than go elsewhere.
Pauper wrote:
RDRUNR wrote: