Christer
Joined: Aug 02, 2003
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Although an intro email / PM is a reasonable idea, it's not something I would go into. I've been thinking over various things that would improve the newcomer experience, and I simply don't think it's a good idea to push more long-form stuff to read onto people.
Instead, what I've been considering is setting up a bunch of mini tutorials, much like what pretty much all modern games have.
It could go something like this:
1. The coach registers on the site
2. Coach logs in, skims/skips the rules (I'm not under the illusion that people actually read them right away)
So far so good. It's not rocket science to get here, but currently, there's no easing in to the site, so coaches don't really know what they're supposed to do.. So, my idea is something like:
3. The coach has no teams created, so the overview shows a big sign saying "It's now time to make a team!", with a link to the team creation system
4. Here, a few improvements to the explanations for divisions and a friendly notification for races that are hard to play for newcomers..
5. Team creation time. A nice big link to an appropriate help page for how it works, and links to starting lineup pages for the selected race.
6. Team done! Now the site notices a team, but no matches, so a box appears explaining how to go about getting a match, pointing to the game finder.
7. If a match has been created and not reported, there will be a help text on the overview for the coach, telling them how to deal with problems should they appear during the match.
8. Ok, match is reported. First time in post match sequence, so a quick intro on what that is, and how it works. A quick explanation on how to pick skills, and possibly some suggestions on skills that are reasonable (such as block / dodge / guard) and won't absolutely destroy a team if they're picked for a random player on their team.
Basic tutorial completed! From here on, a "Tip of the day" type thing could be shown for a few weeks (or until turned off I guess) somewhere in the interface, giving helpful tips on various topics such as chat rooms, PMs, tournaments, leagues.. All sort of stuff would be possible here.
This, together with a set of links to help pages in all the different subsystems of the site would make it a lot friendlier for newcomers. |
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Macavity
Joined: Nov 23, 2004
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 Posted:
Jul 31, 2012 - 23:29 |
 
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Someday, somehow, somewhere, Christer will say something that isn't monumentally more intelligent than what I've thought of......
Not today.
Edit:: Holy smoke monkeys on crack! I left out the negative in my first post. I'm very ashamed. I'm terribly sorry. |
_________________
When I became a man I put away childish things, including the fear of childishness and the desire to be very grown up. -C.S. Lewis
Last edited by Macavity on %b %01, %2012 - %16:%Aug; edited 1 time in total |
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garyt1
Joined: Mar 12, 2011
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Aug 01, 2012 - 08:14 |
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Yes Christer! If you do not want a special pm then having some clear signs prompting you how to start would work very well. Good ideas with the tutorial. |
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