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I'm quite excited for the day when I have other people to help me out on this, but right now I keep changing so much of the back end that it doesn't make sense yet to add on another person. Once things stabilize in a few months, then I might be ready to get some trusted people to help me out.
Right now, my biggest priorities are:
Visual redesign
User preferences
User generated match info
1) I've been talking with about a dozen different designers, and will be getting the first round of sample work from them on friday (those that I didn't scare off).
Sounds good. I think it would benefit the site to have some flashier titles then just text, but I think functionality is a big priority
2) For user preferences, I need to find some time where I don't have anything else going on so I can sit down and pound it out in one setting.
That will definitely help, but I believe there are already some tools in place that help alleviate the problem. It's not perfect, but I think it will do for now. I like the changes you made showing the last 20 games, that really helps.
I think I echo the sentiment that being able to quickly view the top matches of an entire tournament (IPL V1, TSL3, NASL, GSL 2011 May, etc). would be greatly appreciate. It is great to be able to see the ladder and the individual games with rankings, but another option to have a similar (for the sake or arguement) 20 game list that are the highest ranked. You could even implement it with the Top List page, just add an extra parameter to sort by which tournament.
Like divide mentioned, defaults do matter. The majority of your users to this site will probably be non-registered users who are just looking for the next best game. Even so, the default view is the same for registered users, because there isn't really user preferences :D (it's funny when you think about it, but it kind of works).
3) For the user generated match info (other parameters on which to rate matches), I'm a little stuck in the "what would work best" stage and really need some feedback, but it doesn't look like people want to give it 
I won't say that, people in this thread are giving you some great ideas. The ideas stuck out to me when reading this thread were:
1) user comments on individuals matches (with spoiler tags)
2) similar to Captial Ship watch on Liquidpedia, allow for users to select tags which make the games more exciting to watch. For one example, include Carriers/Broodlords/Battlecruiser/Mothership as possible reasons why to watch the match.
3) Include information such as Bo3, Bo5, Bo7 for matches
.....
102301) Linking TL profile with Sc2rantings profile (personal note: this depends on how much TL wants to use this site compared to their own write-ups)
People are giving you suggestions within the thread, I'd say follow those. You're on the right track here with a site that is very useful to the SC2 community as a whole. Divide has also been giving you so useful comments.
Since it sounds like more people are commenting on the thread rather then sending you direct emails, perhaps you could post another poll to see which features people would like implement first. Be sure to update the original post as well as show the poll in the lastest post in the thread.
Looking forward to see more developments.
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Maybe I misspoke. There are many good ideas, but they are pretty high level, and I need work on specifics.
1) Comments on matches: I go back and forth on this, because I don't want to spend a lot of time moderating, and I don't want bullshit flame wars that haunts most of the SC community pages. Maybe you can only post comments after X votes, and x time as a registered user, so if you get a temp ban or something, it's actually meaninful... but then I don't want people making extra accounts to get by the bans and then messing up the votes by having many accounts voting over the same thigns.
2) Tags for matches: This is something I'm working on, but I'm having trouble coming up with the correct tags, and was what I meant by, "I'm not getting enough feedback". Maybe I should have asked for it more directly. What sort of tags would be useful to have? It would be horrible to have a bunch of tags, then later find out they suck and replace them with different ones, because then all the work people put into the first set of tags is lost, and people will be disheartened and not want to keep tagging stuff.
3) Yes, this information is already in the database... I"m not sure why I didn't include it in the existing match details. I'll do that tonight when I get home from work. Fixed.
4) Linking with TL accounts: This would be a dream come true, but it's hard to get the TL admins to work with me. Chill has been great, but isn't involved on the tech front much. He recommended some people to PM about tech stuff, but they haven't gotten back to me, and I don't want to spam them with requests. I'm also wanting to do some sort of Open Auth login, but my coding skills aren't that great. I'll see if I can find a free service (something Janrain like) that might do this for me.
5) Best matches per season: Yeah, this is in the works. I'd say it'd be done tonight, but I just got a boxee and a new TV so... I'll probably be playing with that for the next few days =p.
User preferences would be more along the lines of:
* Bookmarking matches. That way you can create a saved list of the matches you want to see, and don't have to re-find them later.
* Turn off spoilers by default (or at least the group level spoilers)
* When listing matches, have the matches that you don't have subscription to called out visually (which means also a way to delineating which matches you do have a subscription to). This, of course, would be an optional service.
* Username instead of email for login
* Ability to change password
I think the big thing I missing is this: Having another dedicated SC2 fan (or 2) who I can have a long conversation with about the specifics of features, and how best to implement them. That's the sort of dialog I need, and can't really be achieved well through chat.
If you want to be that guy, I'm down. Let's get on a skype call tonight or tomorrow and just solve all these problems. Seriously.
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Update
Added HD World Tournament (no front page listing. Find it in the all tournament's section)
[edit]Added a "remove spoilers" tag.**
Better layout of recent matches on homepage
Minor visual changes
** This will remove the spoilers from the matches, but not from the winner column.
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On May 13 2011 13:12 Koibu0 wrote:
Update
Added HD World Tournament (no front page listing. Find it in the all tournament's section)
[edit]Added a "remove spoilers" tag.**
Better layout of recent matches on homepage
Minor visual changes
** This will remove the spoilers from the matches, but not from the winner column.
Looks great Koibu0!
You might want to add the 3rd place matches for the TSL between Empire.Kas & mouz.HasuObs.
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this is a great site, thanks for your hardwork
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I want to hear from you guys: What shows / tournaments should we include?!
We've got the big ones: GSL, IPL, NASL, TSL, but what else? I recently added HD World Championship, or whatever it was that HD put out, and the amount of work put into it way outweighed the return on it. Waste of time on my part, I think.
The only other big tournaments I can think of off the top of my head would be Dreamhack and MLG, but I'm sure there's at least a few other major ones I don't know of.
So let me know. 
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StarsWar, FXOpen, EG Masters Cup, and SAGA Invitational are next set of tournaments that I can think of in size and scale.
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On May 16 2011 14:24 Koibu0 wrote:I want to hear from you guys: What shows / tournaments should we include?! We've got the big ones: GSL, IPL, NASL, TSL, but what else? I recently added HD World Championship, or whatever it was that HD put out, and the amount of work put into it way outweighed the return on it. Waste of time on my part, I think. The only other big tournaments I can think of off the top of my head would be Dreamhack and MLG, but I'm sure there's at least a few other major ones I don't know of. So let me know.
I think one of the reasons that the HD:WC didn't get many reviews was that:
1) There wasn't a link on the home page, so nobody who wanted to rate knew about it.
2) Nobody really knew about in the first place
If we are going to add more tournaments, I think at the very least you need to put another big link to that tournament on the main site, or even a smaller like the podcast links.
Probably a good baseline for what tournaments to cover (given that this posted on teamliquid) is anything that is on the Teamliquid BIG Events Tracker (http://www.teamliquid.net/events/). These will also probably be the easiest to include on the website, as TL already has links for brackets and information done for you, as opposed to hunting around for them.
If you're really ambitious, we could try to do all the events in the Tournament Tracker (http://www.teamliquid.net/tournaments/), but seems like overkill. Given the amount of ratings you got from the HD:WT, I don't think the site is quite big enough that the smallest tournaments will get any ratings.
But hey, until you spread your wings, you'll have no idea how far you can fly :D
Any word from the graphic designer?
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See, this is why I ask you guys this stuff. I don't use TL enough to know about the big events tracker or tournament tracker pages. Even with all these events, I still want to know which ones you guys want to see the most, because I don't have time to put everything up right away, so having priorities would be nice. Also, are any of these worth adding previous season, or just the ones from here on out?
I can't have a big button on the page for every tournament, but as things get added, the list will probably morph to look morel like the shows list. I was hoping I'd get a really nice solution from the graphic designers on this, but I was pretty unimpressed with the submissions. I'll probably put out another request for a graphic designer in another week or two.
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I'd say as a baseline for what next big tournaments to definitely include would be MLG, Dreamhack, and IPL (you've already made it a link on your page, might as well continue coverage for it  ).
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Added: Social sharing buttons (by request.)
Also, we now have a twitter account. Follow us @sc2ratings for updates, ideas, etc.
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Hey Koibu0, when looking at the most recent GSL: TL, all I see are question marks for the player names and what tournament it is....
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That's because the players hadn't be announced (since the matches hadn't been played) so the question marks are fillers. I'm adding the players right now, but it'll take a while since I'm adding them as I'm watching =p
[Edit] Matches added (and rated). Didn't get a chance to see all the matches though.
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Don't worry about having to see all the TL matches, I think as long as the matches are up people can rate themselves.
Personally, I would say the greatest focus right now should be adding some of the most current new matches. I don't know what you're working on right, but definitely anything for the current we were talking about earlier in the thread.
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Added new polls (please vote).
Added gsltl3 matches for days 1 and 2
On May 18 2011 11:43 LotsofLuck wrote:
Don't worry about having to see all the TL matches, I think as long as the matches are up people can rate themselves.
I'm getting them up, but it sucks having all the matches spoiled for me when I add things. On the other hand, I add so many matches, I don't always remember who won/lost each one.
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On May 19 2011 03:31 Koibu0 wrote:
Added new polls (please vote).
Added gsltl3 matches for days 1 and 2
Great, I think this is a step in the right direction.
Capital Ships: Good, in whatever form they appear
Nukes: Yes, definitely. Don't see them that much
Base Trade: Definitely good idea
Match Length: Good idea to have estimate for time commitment to watch series, especially if it is a Bo7
Crazy Micro: Definitely something to look for
Dance: Funny, but I don't think I have ever seen this happen in any game. If it has, I need to see some more games then O.o
Both Armies Maxed: I think I missed voted on this option, but atleast for the Zerg player it's pretty easy to get maxed out.
One Sided: Good, like applying to GSL May.
Some of the other ideas I had were: Nydus Worm, Ultralisk, Archons, Dark Templar, Plantary Fortress Rushing, Stalemate....I'll come back and think of others.
Show nested quote +On May 18 2011 11:43 LotsofLuck wrote:
Don't worry about having to see all the TL matches, I think as long as the matches are up people can rate themselves. I'm getting them up, but it sucks having all the matches spoiled for me when I add things. On the other hand, I add so many matches, I don't always remember who won/lost each one.
Like I said before, I'm happy to help adding matches and tournaments, it sounds like a lot of work to do by yourself. I know you said before that you want the site to be more stable, but if there are much more tournaments happening I would be glad to be step in to have the site get more coverage.
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@LotsofLuck
What you say and what you vote seem to be opposite...
And I'm not ready to have somebody else poking around on the input side. When that time comes, I'll post it here, but don't expect it for a long while.
PF rushing doesn't really ever happen at the pro level. I can't think of a match, but stalemate (or near stalemate) is a good idea. As for dancing, it happens a lot in the GSL TL. In every season I think. I know I've seen it this season twice, and I think it was the finals of the first season it was in 3 or 4 games back to back.
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On May 19 2011 14:19 Koibu0 wrote:
@LotsofLuck
What you say and what you vote seem to be opposite...
Eh, I may have burned through those pretty fast. Oh well.
And I'm not ready to have somebody else poking around on the input side. When that time comes, I'll post it here, but don't expect it for a long while.
Aight, I'll stop asking then
As for dancing, it happens a lot in the GSL TL. In every season I think. I know I've seen it this season twice, and I think it was the finals of the first season it was in 3 or 4 games back to back.
Well that would be my problem, I haven't been watching much of any of the GSL TLs.
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GSL Team League 3 has finished, and all the matches are up online. Go rate them!
Also, tonight I'll start adding in all the match info for the GSL Super Tournament.
Lastly, I've been getting some good questions and recommendations from people emailing me directly (the contact form on the site), but in the famous words of Johny 5, "Need more input". Don't be shy now. Post it in this thread, PM me, email me directly, but don't be too timid to share your ideas.
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Added GSL Super Tournament
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EPT
