Relevance of the Forums

Hi all - this has been bothering me for quite some time and I wanted to get this off my chest before I go off-line.

As I've been hearing, the Marble Blast Discord Server is a main hub for elite players of this community (and even casual ones) to chat about Marble Blast or anything related to ball-rolling games in general, along with off-topic discussions and even posting memes.

Before Discord, there was this forum, and way before then, there were the Proboards, which we've all been using for years if we're not considering GarageGames' Forums. Once Discord rolled around and the server was created, activity of the forum still remained but eventually became less and less relevant.

But why do we need to let it become "irrelevant" to us? What makes us think that the forums are not cared about much more than the Discord server? Especially for those who don't want to join the Discord, nor even create an account on Discord to begin with, this may not be your interpretation, and I don't want to speak for others, but in my case, I have had bad experiences with the community in the Discord (and also in the past on the forums but not as serious as in the Discord), and when the forums are less active or if I'm being told "they're not cared about as much as the Discord", it makes me feel alienated and disconnected with the community.

Especially with my STOP II posts. (Which it's also weird, but I'm going off topic for a little bit - why is it that random posts made by that Puppydog person get much more responses and attention [which the Marble Blast Therefore topic is the most activity I've seen on the forums since the stupid TIME CAPSULE, which is honestly really disappointing], versus the STOP II posts, which are serious, informative, and are actually keeping a fantastic user modification on the site alive? It doesn't make sense to me... I'm likely wrong, but it just feels like the STOP II mod we've created for years is intentionally being ignored or is intentionally being made irrelevant.) Again, I can't speak for other users who are not on the Marble Blast Discord, but if I were to have a feeling about it, I wouldn't be surprised if others are feeling this way as well.

I genuinely want to see as much talk and response to this as possible, and maybe for staff members to find a way for the forums to be cared about as much as the Discord Server, because this is a great place to share what I've created for the community (even though there's no talk on it here and that feeling it's getting ignored which is probably incorrect, but I'm not sure), and this is a great place to share other content and thoughts as a whole as well.

tl;dr - We don't need to let the forums die or become irrelevant, but it feels like members are choosing to let this happen without balance, which is possibly alienating new or casual members, even though I can't speak for them. But it certainly makes me feel that way especially since 95% of my STOP II posts are getting no reception now.

I imagine the efficiency of Discord is the main reason why the forums are not used anywhere near as often as they used to be. Discord can pretty much do everything that the forums can - maybe reading back through conversations (on a long-term scale) is the thing that the forums do better, but that's all I can think of.

The same exact thing has happened to Webchat too. You can tag and talk to people on Discord while they're offline - not the case with Webchat.

I'd love for the forums to be used a bunch again, but it's definitely not as much of a necessary part of the community now as the Discord server is. I think that feeling for me mostly exists for nostalgic reasons.

The truth is that most of us, even on Discord, don't like Puppydog at all. And yet despite his constant "spamming" of posts, we have yet to find a reason to justly ban him from the website.

I desperately agree. His mods are not that good. He steals assets from other people's mods without even asking! And trust me! I used to do the same thing until I stopped stealing stuff without asking. I'm basically clean now. Back to the point here, Someone should get Puppydog off the site immediately. Who's with me?

Most of the Puppydog stuff was mostly just for shits and giggles.
In reality, mostly none of us like him at all. He stole and keeps stealing assets despite being told not to.

Nature Freak made a thread about this last year and we talked about it . . . yes. I left the Discord server, because the last few times I checked someone was peeing everywhere.
It is a shame STOP II isn't getting much attention on the forums, but then again, you probably didn't want attention like "will it have joj". There's only so much to say about all the update announcements.

And yet despite his constant "spamming" of posts, we have yet to find a reason to justly ban him from the website.

Just say the reason is "considerable differences of opinion about how the community should be run." :​p

Just say the reason is "considerable differences of opinion about how the community should be run." :​p

Just say it's because he's stealing assets. Or, better yet, that doxxing incident...whatever that was all about.

These are some awesome responses here! I know the Discord is more favorable but that still does not change my point on why the forums are still relevant, and why we need to stop pretending that they aren't, especially for the users who choose to not join the server, let alone make a Discord account at all. One other thing the forums offer that Discord doesn't is the formatting and organized areas and more customization options you can do here, where Discord is usually cluttered and messy. The forums have always been a great home and we should not stop using them.

On the whole Puppydog thing, let me be real here: The asset stealing, the "All Caps Are Being Used Talking" (which makes it hard to believe the user is older than 13) and especially the 'doxxing' incidents should already say so much on what needs to be done, yet moderation has either chosen not to do anything about the situation or they're not even fully aware on what is happening (is this really the case?). Though it sounds like there really is awareness on this from the comments I've gotten here. It makes me concerned that today's new moderators are not really handling the situation well, at least from my point of view, because the posting of personal information especially without permission in this context should already be a serious violation that would permanently result in termination of any account.

Current staff should probably add a couple new moderators/staff members that can act quickly on this and update stuff around the site (hey, look at me, I can be one of them if you'd like, I'd be doing a lot around here for you all!), especially because nobody has updated the Community Highlight nor the STOP II Download page with the new version of Marble Blast STOP II, something which I was told would happen eventually at some point.

The mods have taken some action on Puppydog already, they removed any and all download links to his mods and removed any images that he may have put showing his teachers' faces in a forum post. DK gave him a warning and he ignored it, though not much has been done outside of that.

Puppydog seems to have calmed down in the amount of spam he's been putting recently so that's a relief at least.