BGG and me

Template tweak on my blog

I was informed by an IE user (Thanks, Simon) that my blog didn't work properly on IE due to a few errant pixel widths. I fixed this. Hopefully this didn't wreck anything on anyone else's browser.

BGG and me

My most often used Board Game Geek features are, in order:

Notification on content I have posted or tagged - If I have posted a thread or comment, or I just really like the thread, I want to know when people add comments. BGG sends me notification via email.

Active threads, sorted by game - This was much better than "recent additions", because I don't want to know about new games, new images, geeklist comments, and so on, and I want to see only one line for a thread change, not one line for each comment.

Unfortunately, this feature seems to have disappeared.

RSS notification on new forum postings - BGG allows me to receive RSS on new posts to a forum category or a specific game, new articles, new geeklists, and so on.

Game specific information - When I get a new game, I check out any rules troubles or variants that people have posted. After playing a few times, I will check out strategies or gameplay issues.

My BGG - I review my contact information, game ratings, and comments here. If I've played anything new, I add it to the ratings. I also like to see if anyone has added me to their Geekbuddy list.

Latest/Popular Geeklists - I check occasionally.

Top rated game list - Checked when I am in the market for new games.

BoardGameSpeak - I've heard most.

Auctions/Marketplace/Trades - I check rarely, but not never. The marketplace is always too highly priced for me. The auctions can be nice, since I usually only have to pay GeekGold. And trading is hard.

Other - I played T&E on the Geek a few times. I've also answered some "Why did the Geek?" and Geekquestions, when I'm really bored.

The new BGG

Of course, I owe a large part of my gaming and a lot of my online game presence to BGG, so I don't feel any immediate need to criticize when things are changed. So long as they work and are not too annoying.

So the first thing I did after the latest change to the site was to configure my home page: Recently viewed (left col, a nice new feature), News + Recent Geeklists(30) + Recent Marketplace(20) (center col), Recent Forums(20) + Recent Game Forums(20) (right col).

I'm not happy with the increase in ads on the front page (4 places on the page is a bit much) followed by asking readers for a donation to remove them. That strikes me as a questionable business model. But I can hardly complain. I've contributed content to them, and they've given me useful access to content from others, so the relationship is still good. Not to mention that they throw a great con, and they're both super nice people.

Yehuda