Accio Nox {3 Rates}

[:~:Sarapha:~:]

Hello there I haven't posted my own board for rating in a while, let's give it a go

Information:
+The board is 7 years 9 months and 8 days old. We've been around a while, and I take great pride in that, considering most boards that age either have changed hands of admins or have died out. Anywhooooo. That also means I'm kind of particular about things on it.
+There are a lot of rules currently, but my weekend project is to knock those out. I had an issue with a group of people a while back who questioned anything that wasn't on the rules list, violating anything they could think that I didn't absolutely spell out for them. As they are gone now, I don't see the bother in cluttering up the space.

What I'm looking for:
+Spelling errors anywhere on the board
+Any qualms with the main skin (there are several more once an account is established, but those don't routinely get displayed)
+Etc, etc. Anything that someone can see as a guest that may deter them from joining.

harrypotterrp91.proboards.com


What I'm working on:
-group colors to make less blinding
-skin color for main skin to make it less bland
-banner image (all new)
-board descriptions (to make less of a stretched board)
-making the out of Hogwarts category visible to guests

[fleckphantasma]

Hello!

Firstly, congratulations on running such a successful site! You're clearly doing something right if you guys have been around that long and still have a solid member base. These are just a few things that I was thinking about when I was looking around. Hopefully at least one of these things might be helpful to you, or be what you're looking for in terms of feedback.

-- Member Group Colours
I would maybe consider changing the colours of your member groups a little. While it's great to see that you offer so many for people to choose from, a few of the colours are a little tough to read on your skin and could possibly deter some people from joining. It's a bit of a nit picky thing, but using colours outside of the red, yellow, green, blue and purple that one typically finds on Hogwarts sites can actually help distinguish characters a little more. (Shop Keeper, Ministry and perhaps Deatheater are the three I'd look at the most.)

-- Categories Without Boards
You have a category called Out of Hogwarts that currently doesn't have any boards beneath it. If you are planning on putting boards in there shortly then you can completely ignore this comment. Otherwise, I'd highly recommend that you make it a hidden category until you decide which/how many boards are going under there. It just helps to keep the forum looking cleaner and free of clutter.

-- Board Descriptions
Another tiny detail that could help you to tidy up a bit is to shorten the descriptions you have for your boards. While they are all very well detailed and tell you exactly what to expect, they extend your forum greatly and can sometimes make it look a little daunting to potential members. You can still have all of the boards that you have created, but if you can make your forum look just a little smaller then it doesn't look so overwhelming and scary to someone who is looking into your forum for the very first time.

-- Forum Archives
On a site like yours, you are bound to have threads that are no longer active, started by characters that no longer exist etc. Having an archive might help you to clean it up a little more so that you don't have 60 threads under a single board. Chances are that not all 60 of those threads are being used anymore, and it again just helps the forum look a little cleaner if you don't leave the inactive things hanging around.

[:~:Sarapha:~:]

Hello fleckphantasma! Thank you for the amazing review, and compliments

---Member Group colors;
I will most definitely work toward modifying those colors to be less blinding

---Categories without boards;
That one was actually more of a trick to the eye. I have a looooot of boards in that area, I accidentally placed them to only the adult characters can view, but guests cannot. I have it set up, after the character is Sorted, that during the term, Hogwarts is the only place that students can post and the Out of Character boards are only seen by Adult characters. This is to keep the realism of the terms. I will go to update the viewability of those right now, thank you for pointing that out

---Board descriptions;
I'll definitely do that. I've been working on the descriptions of the sub-boards (the place for the actual posting), so I can definitely shorten up the space taken up by the outer containers.

---Forum Archive;
We have one I have it set to memberview only, since I have threads from 2006 in there when we all really were just getting started, and is rather embarrassing. However, I have to have them there to reference from time to time as to when certain stuff happened. With the boards, though, we do a tri-monthly sweep to remove all of the threads that are inactive, which the last one was at the beginning of September. So all the ones you see are rather current That is set up because some people have circumstances that keep them from being online, and if a thread is moved without them knowing, people tend to be angry rather than understanding. If a character is deleted by staff or the member, we go through again and move all the threads they were involved in so that people don't post without knowing they won't get a reply.

Thank you so very much ^.^

[Alanna 🥀🖤]

What I noticed first when it loaded was that the banner graphic wasn't centered and the side tables were very very thin and actually cut off the site events graphic.

Other than that and the fact that the forum lacks color overall and where there is color (mainly the member groups) they are too bright and hurt my eyes; it is set up well and functional which is obvious in the forum's activity.

Of course my personal opinion to to re-design the forum to move away from Proboards default and look original, clearly your members do not care.

[:~:Sarapha:~:]

Thank you I took a vacation today, but tomorrow, I'll be back on there to spruce up the colorings.

[rohan]

These member color groups really need a lighter shade because I can barely see them.

Ministry: 27
Shop Keepers: 28
Vampires: 1
Werewolves: 2

Also, I think it would be good if you remove the "Users Online in the Last 24 Hours". Makes the online list look less vibrant.

Also, your forum is way too vast . All the dungeons and floors perhaps should be put as Sub-Sub Forums ?

A perfect Harry Potter RP Forum.

[:~:Sarapha:~:]

I'm working on the colors as we speak Thank you for alerting me.

The online in the past 24 hours, I have to keep, that's how a lot of members can quickly see if someone they were plotting with has been on, and I use it as a guide on my activity levels.

The vastness diminishes greatly after a character has been Accepted. Adult characters can only see the "Out of Hogwarts" boards (and OOC areas) and the Hogwarts students (with exception to those interning) can only see Hogwarts. On a Hogsmeade weekend, the Hogsmeade boards are opened to the students who are permitted entrance, and closed after. In the summer months, Hogwarts is entirely hidden from view.

[:~:Sarapha:~:]

Bump