Advertising the forum

[Catwalk]

Right now there's a bunch of homeless DS members who are either trying to find out what happened to the site or who gave up looking. I'm hoping I can get contact info for them from Flash, would save us a lot of trouble. I have him on Facebook, hope I can reach him there.

There's also a large group of dormant MoM fans who might very well be interested, this game has a large cult following. I want to spread the word about this forum in all locations where MoM is being discussed, and I'd like to coordinate that a bit so we don't step on each other's toes. I suggest using this thread to keep track of where we've posted about the forum, anyone is free to post about it anywhere but try not to post somewhere we've advertised already.

Standard message to use if you don't care to write a description yourself, feel free to adjust it as needed:

I'd like to invite you to join a newly established Master of Magic community at the Realms Beyond forums (http://www.realmsbeyond.net/forums/forum...y.php?f=56). It has been formed on basis of the now defunct site dragonsword.com which was taken down a few months ago. At Realms Beyond, we're offering the following features for die-hard MoM fans:
- MoM v1.40, by kyrub. An ambitious patch project which is already functional and still under active development. Includes bug fixes, interface improvements and AI strengthening. The game itself is kept as close to the original as possible, with very few and very small real changes.
- Catnip, by Catwalk. An almost as ambitious mod project under active development which aims to rebalance and revitalize MoM through a large number of balance and feature changes. Most of this is done through number tweaking, some hacking of features will also be employed. If you'd like a say in the project's development we're always happy to listen to feedback and help is most welcome.
- Plight, by Psyringe. An excellent patch for the help files which corrects a large amount of wrong and misleading information as well as putting up a lot of new information and enhancing the help interface. Highly recommended, and still under active development.
- Game editors, by Joel. A series of editors which allow you to change the game parameters for units, races, buildings and spells.
- Various other MoM resources and links
- Tournaments!
- Nostalgia, strategy talk and all-round nerding

Hope you'll pay us a visit!

[Catwalk]

Places where we've put out the word:
http://www.teamteabag.com/2008/04/14/gam...f-magic-pc
http://www.abandonia.com
Dan Simpson, current maintainer of the MoM FAQ
mobygames.com
Justin Gattuso, owner of http://www.machinations.org
http://www.gamespot.com
http://www.gog.com
http://www.suite101.com/content/master-o...ew-a104084 AND stalked the author on Facebook :P
Cislyn, owner of http://www.elushae.org/~cislyn/gaming.html
http://www.jonathanmoeller.com/screed/?p=599
http://videolamer.com/best-game-ever-master-of-magic
Joel Schlecht, creator of the game editors which let you mod game parameters (had him on e-mail)
PMed a bunch of people at http://www.rpgcodex.net, http://forum.rpg.net and http://forum.shrapnelgames.com. 5 positive responses so far

I'd like someone with:
- an account on Implode's forum to post a message there, as account registration has been disabled. - DONE by kyrub
- a HotUd account to post a message at http://www.hotud.org/component/content/a...tegy/20376
- time to spare to sign up and post at http://www.incgamers.com/News/22240/mast...c-hits-gog
- wiki skills to put a link for us on the wiki page at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Master_of_M...rnal_links DONE
- an account at http://www.forum.rpg.net to post a message there DONE
- creativity to put a plug for us at http://www.giantbomb.com/master-of-magic/61-21978/
- spare time or an account to post at http://n4g.com/news/510679/elemental-is-...uelandquot
- a yellow hamster to post at http://www.freegameempire.com/forums/Mas...ic-English
- Danish skills (which probably means me) to post at http://railgun.newz.dk/stardock-annoncer...r-of-magic
- a keyboard to write a MoM review plugging us shamelessly at http://www.amazon.com/Master-Magic-pc/dp/B00079V5WQ or maybe down below in the comments section
- a low level of alcohol in their blood to post at http://softwaregadgets.gridspace.net/200...-discovery
- a clean conscience and a sinfree life to post at http://tishtoshtesh.wordpress.com/2008/1...-of-magic/
- a lot of patience to try contacting IGN about us at http://pc.ign.com/email.html
- an account to post at http://www.rpgcodex.net/phpBB/viewtopic.php?t=31046 DONE
- more wiki skills to post at http://www.dosbox.com/wiki/GAMES:Master_of_Magic
- knowledge about Elemental to post at http://forums.elementalgame.com/388358
- a kind heart to look up MoM videos on YouTube and post about us, there are quite a few
- a sense of civic duty to tip off the nice people at http://forums.sinsofasolarempire.com/396427 and http://aow.heavengames.com/cgi-bin/forum...6,5447,,60
- working knowledge of CPR to help the MoM fans at http://www.octopusoverlords.com/forum/vi...=2&t=73411

[I like Serena]

- wiki skills to put a link for us on the wiki page at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Master_of_M...rnal_links

I've added the external link on wikipedia.

And since I was busy anyway, I've added a short new page in my own language on
http://nl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Master_of_Magic
with a link to our new forum!

[KingOfPain]

I think the link on wiki is removed (Forums/fansites not allowed per WP:EL)

[I like Serena]

I think the link on wiki is removed (Forums/fansites not allowed per WP:EL)

Yep. Apparently the user Jappalang has rewritten the entire page about Master of Magic to conform to a long list of wikipedia guidelines. His goal is to get this article to a "Good Article" status. And he is still monitoring the page.
I guess it's good that he works for quality - a pity though that we cannot get our link there.

Howevere, the article in my own language is still there (on nl.wikipedia.org)!
Perhaps there are Polish, Finnish, Danish, or whatnot members that can make a page in their own language?
The page I published may not be a Good Article, but at least it may be of some use to people who want to find us!

[Psyringe]

I think mention of an unofficial patch (with a link to the respective thread here, but the thread might need to look a bit more polished) might go through. Perhaps check how it's done for other games with popular unofficial patches (Civ4, Planescape, MoO3, etc.).

Also, the fact that the game has an active community even 16 years after its release may fulfill Wikipedia's notability requirements. The problem with that is that we currently don't really have much of a community to show, since DragonSword has gone down.

But in general, Wikipedia is an encyclopedia, not an advertisement board. So I can see why they wouldn't appreciate a link to us at this stage. Although it's always tempting to use Wikipedia to become more popular, the usual process for such projects is the other way round; first you become popular, and then you might have a chance to appear in Wikipedia.

[kyrub]

I think I had problem posting a link to unofficial patch in the Wiki in the past (even in the Talk section ).

Other games have it normally. So, for MoO un. patch, there's a link in the talk section, but for MoM, never, although it was posted by several people.


I really question the Wiki standards here. Look at how much place goes to the Brad Wardell đĐ#&@ stuff on the MoM page - a commercial promotion at its best. But once you make a fan-made project or page like this, they ignore it (it is not commercial and avoids media attention, so it is probably under wiki radar). It is stupefying.

[Catwalk]

I think wiki is crap :P And I had a pretty good feeling this would happen, but figured it was worth a shot. And while Psyringe is right that we need to get established first, I'm confident we'll have an active and reputable community here in no time. Our projects are of great interest to MoM players, and there isn't really a good collection of MoM resources anywhere anymore. Not to mention the fact that we're the only dedicated MoM community anywhere, and a kickass one at that

[Psyringe]

Wikipedia's structure is generally that of a (badly monitored) bureaucracy. There are a lot of rules and regulations, but on many places nobody actually enforces them. However, when you are at a place where someone does try to enforce these rules, one needs to (as in every bureaucracy) think yourself into his mindset, read the rules, and argue based on the rules, if one wants to have a chance of success.

I've read a discussion on the MoM talk page (not sure if it's the one you meant), and there, the pro-side was arguing from a perspective of common sense. That's not a wrong perspective by any means, but common sense is simply irrelevant for a bureaucracy with its fixed set of rules and policies. As long as you can't base your argument on the written regulations, they'll always say "What you say might make sense, but it's still against our rules."

The odd thing is that there are lots of pages in Wikipedia where these policies aren't enforced by anyone, so it's kind of a lottery. It would have been just as likely that just nobody cared enough about the MoM page to even notice a link to the patch. Another oddity is that sites with extremely low professional credibility (IGN, for example) count as "reliable source", whereas perfectly well laid out arguments may be shunned as "original research". As a result, the only reliable way for an independent project to get into Wikipedia is to write to these "reliable sources" or their editors until they mention you, then use this as an evidence for notability, and be prepared with a number of rules to link if the notability or the source is questioned.

However, with the same investment in time and effort, you can probably make your project known throughout the internet at dozens of places.

(Btw, to clarify: I don't want to "diss" Wikipedia. Actually I love it. But its organizational structure, as every structure, has certain disadvantages, and unfortunately these rear their ugly head in this case.)

[Catwalk]

...
However, with the same investment in time and effort, you can probably make your project known throughout the internet at dozens of places.

My thoughts too Thought it was worth a shot, I thought it'd be easier to have a link under External Links than an actual mention in the article. I'll stick by my belief that they're rules nazis