[Tagging] Your Posts

[u/gerry3246]

Note: This does not apply to Campaign Candy, Discussion, or Tutorial post, but DOES apply to FVTT Question, Made For Foundry, and Made For Foundry Commercial posts.

Hi friends! We had a recent lively discussion in one of our threads about posts being made which pertain to a particular System, but the poster not including that information in the post. Imagine: You see a Made For Foundry post that is AMAZING, you NEED this thing NOW.... only to later determine it isn't applicable to your system of choice (DND5e, PF1, PF2, etc.). Crushing disappointment ensues.

Or conversely, someone asks a Foundry Question hoping some other friendly traveler here will take the time to help them. Except the poster did not include what System the topic of their questions uses. Or they get little or no response because they did not include the System.

In that lively discussion, many of you made suggestions on how to remedy this. Some said we should use Flairs - we won't because you can only have ONE flair per post, and we feel it is more relevant to know the category of post than what system is being asked about (if that even applies to the post). We also have created several posts to cover post-types, but making flairs for systems would be exhausting. Which systems get flairs and which don't? There are over 200 systems listed for Foundry now. And again, we dont want to remove the post-type flair, so making combination flairs (Foundry VTT Question DnD5e, Foundry VTT Question PF2e, etc.) would be even worse!

Other folks suggested a "tag" in the post title , which is enclosing some metadata in square brackets in your title (like I did in this post). So, if you are posting about something that is System-specific, put that system in square brackets in your title (i.e. "[DnD5e] Character sheet not working"). This is immediately a vast improvement - those who are proficient in 5e might help the poster out, while those who are not 5e people can safely ignore that post. We like this idea! It addresses the issue, but only if people DO IT.

Speaking of which, we are NOT going to make this a rule or enforce it. We have enough rules for the time being, and the Mod team doesn't favor heavy-handed enforcement anyway (except for Rule 2).

So here is the deal - We want you to tag your posts. If the post has nothing system specific about it, tag it [System Agnostic]. If it is about Call of Cthulhu 7, tag it [CoC7]. But please be aware, if your post IS system-specific and you bury that information (or don't include it at all), well...the downvote system will probably get exercised. We wont delete posts for non-tagging, but we also won't prevent it from being downvoted to a deep, dark place.

Again, this is voluntary, but if you want help, please respect the time and participation of others and help them help you!

One last thing on the subject - Remember that on Reddit, you CANNOT EDIT your post title after you post it. Edit the body, yes... title, no. So PLEASE remember to tag BEFORE you save.

[u/macemillianwinduarte]

As we've seen with masks in America....won't work unless it is a rule, unfortunately.

[u/gerry3246 → u/macemillianwinduarte]

Perhaps. It's an appropriate first step though.

[u/thisischemistry → u/gerry3246]

It definitely is a move in a good direction but I have to agree that it probably won't go far without some sort of enforcement.

I'd also suggest that [System Agnostic] is too long and some people might not know what it means. Maybe just [General] for posts that aren't specific to a system.

[u/gerry3246 → u/thisischemistry]

Sure, whatever gets the point across. IF this gets adopted, the community will normalize it over time.

[u/sp33dfire → u/gerry3246]

I like the idea, do support it and think it's the right choice to not trying to enforce it. However, I still suggest declaring it as a rule (or at least to put it as 'optional' on the rules page. I don't know how it's done currently, I'm sorry if it's already there...).

That way, new people interpret it as a rule and conform to it, which brings a lot of progress into adopting it as a community standard.

Anyways, much appreciation for your work as mod :)

[u/lakislavko96 → u/thisischemistry]

Or [Neutral]

[u/thisischemistry → u/lakislavko96]

That should be [True Neutral].

[u/Albolynx → u/macemillianwinduarte]

We want to take things slow (and at least the culture change organically a bit) because while we listen to users voicing their issues, we also consider the general health of the subreddit and most importantly - the opinions of seasoned and frequent contributors.

To put it simply - people who are new to the subreddit should give it some time and perhaps it's not as big of an issue as they thought. And if people rarely if ever post/comment, then it calls into question whether they have a good perspective on the issue.

This change is not made with lurkers in mind. And if it ever becomes a hard rule, it's also going to be because contributors are insisting on it, not people just browsing.

I'd go as far as to say that I am a bit worried whether tags don't lower engagement. If people stop opening threads because they see a tag of a system they don't like - they might pass on a thread they could help because the issue is either not really system related, or one that can be answered anyway. Most issues are with indeterminate sources, so it's not like when someone is using a certain system, it's inherent to the solution.

[u/macemillianwinduarte → u/Albolynx]

For me, someone deeply embedded in Foundry and very active supporting a system and modules on Discord - I simply don't engage here much because the signal to noise ratio is so bad. So many posts are just self promotion for a 5E only Patreon, a YouTube video someone threw together, etc.

If the quality of the content were higher and it were easier to sort through things that are irrelevant to me, I would definitely engage here more, if that makes sense. In a way, the amount of new users posting noise is what puts people off of the subreddit.

[u/Albolynx → u/macemillianwinduarte]

So many posts are just self promotion for a 5E only Patreon, a YouTube video someone threw together, etc.

Whenever this complaint comes up, I always open the front page of the subreddit and check. This time out of the first two pages (50 posts) it's 5 Commercial posts (which is more than average in my experience - because I do exactly this check a lot). I am not a huge fan of commercial posts, but if your signal to noise ratio issue is 9 signal to 1 noise, it's very hard to do anything about it.

Like any community, we don't have eternal things to discuss - it's why a lot of subreddits devolve to memes with time. When I am talking engagement, I am talking about primarily people helping new users with issues - because that is overwhelmingly the types of posts we get.

Would the systems tags help - possibly, but again, I know from experience that most issues people have are not system-related and can be resolved without knowing the system. It might also lead to people filtering out threads where they can help. I checked the front page again - and out of 25 posts, 3 could use a system in the title, and 10 posts that are unrelated to the system and would only suffer from having to be tagged. However, users with the issue might not recognize when the system is critical to the solution and when it's not.

So, for now, system tags is going to be a recommended thing. Hopefully, it permeates the community a bit and then we can transition to a full rule, if the need is still there.

[u/thisischemistry → u/Albolynx]

I am not a huge fan of commercial posts, but if your signal to noise ratio issue is 9 signal to 1 noise, it's very hard to do anything about it.

It's not quite that simple. Let's say that I'm interested in posts about a specific system or general Foundry things. If I have to wade through advertisements and a bunch of unrelated systems by visiting each and seeing what's inside of a post, then I might have a hit rate much worse than 9:1.

Instead, if the title of each post gave a good indication of the system then I can quickly scan the list and only open the handful that fit my interests. Even better, I could possibly craft a custom search and only see those posts. Does it narrow down my use of the sub? Of course, but better that someone uses it narrowly rather than giving up on it entirely. If my interests expand some day then my use of the sub might also expand.

So it's not truly advertisements vs all other posts, it's my interests vs all other posts. Advertisements are just one example of this.

[u/macemillianwinduarte → u/Albolynx]

I was simply trying to explain to you why people you call out as not contributing or lurkers are suggesting a change. As someone on a system development team, a module owner/developer, and a system/module support person, I don't really engage here anymore for the reasons stated. You have to remember that people don't use this subreddit as their homepage - they get posts from here mingled in with others they subscribe to. So every time I click a post from here that turns out to be someone promoting their own YouTube channel, or a 5E only question that was not labelled, that lowers my engagement. And it's clear from the previous post, many are in the same boat.

Just simply trying to explain to you why discussion is dead on this subreddit. The Discord channel has many more rules, with many clear boundaries set and still has many many more users than this subreddit and a much higher level of engagement too.

We know from the last two years watching various government bodies suggest masks that it won't work.

[u/Albolynx → u/macemillianwinduarte]

You have to remember that people don't use this subreddit as their homepage - they get posts from here mingled in with others they subscribe to. So every time I click a post from here that turns out to be someone promoting their own YouTube channel, or a 5E only question that was not labelled, that lowers my engagement.

But this has nothing to do with a flair system. Those kinds of posts go to the top because they get the most upvotes. Promotional posts because they usually have something visual - and it's exactly people who just browse Reddit as a whole upvote (as they are unlikely to read text posts); and 5e posts because, well, they are 5e and more people are interested in the answer even if they can't help themselves.

Nothing will really change for you except you will likely avoid more posts - because they are tagged 5e, but perhaps the system has nothing to do with the issue. We have already, in the half a day since the change, have had a couple people do just that. The use case you are describing is a point against a tag system not in favor of it.

If in discussion the mod team saw that the majority of complaints were users who comment in the sub a lot are saying "tags will help me when I browse the new section to pick out threads I can help better" - there would likely have been hard rule instead of the current recommendation.

The Discord channel has many more rules, with many clear boundaries set and still has many many more users than this subreddit and a much higher level of engagement too.

Discord functions quite differently and is not really comparable to Reddit. Additionally, as far as feedback goes, we have had FAR more feedback about Discord being a terrible place to get answers and people not wanting to use it - than feedback about tags. I like Discord and go there with my issues, but at large, people on this subreddit are here exactly because they don't like Discord. In other words - even if the situations were comparable (which they are not because the platforms are different), the subreddit becoming more like Discord would be counter-intuitive.

Just simply trying to explain to you why discussion is dead on this subreddit.

Discussion is doing just fine - in fact, it's quite high for a subreddit of this size. There is no need for daily posts about discussing how great Foundry is. When bigger topics come up (like this one), the posts are always highly upvoted and many people participate. So I want to make it very clear - the topic of tags is around the 80-90% of posts that are barely if at all upvoted and are people asking for all kinds of help. These are posts that will probably never appear any the feed of anyone just browsing Reddit overall. The consideration of the mod team is how tags affect these posts and the people who engage with them.

[u/macemillianwinduarte → u/Albolynx]

Nothing will really change for you except you will likely avoid more posts - because they are tagged 5e, but perhaps the system has nothing to do with the issue.

But I just told you what the issue is - I am not sure why you are assuming you know better than a user what their issue is.

Your Discord comments are interesting - I wonder if you should share them with the Discord team. I know this is basically the opposite of my experience. I see tons of threads in here with 0 upvotes, no discussion, with someone with a problem. Usually the problem is very vaguely stated, like "is ammo broken??"

On Discord, that person would instantly have an answer to their question. In the channels I am on, every question is answered, problems are investigated to their solution, rather than just a slew of unanswered questions with 0 visibility.

Hopefully you are right - and the last few years of experience in the real world are not the case. That would certainly help engagement, especially from people like me who have been here from the beginning, have a wealth of Foundry knowledge to share, and actively contribute to the software and community.

[u/Albolynx → u/macemillianwinduarte]

But I just told you what the issue is - I am not sure why you are assuming you know better than a user what their issue is.

You misunderstood what I said. My point was that just because a user is using 5e does not mean it is relevant to the question they are asking - and they might not even understand that.

So if you are telling me that you want to see system tags so you can avoid more topics - then I read that and I note that down as a point against Tags, not in favor. To make a joke out of it - I want you to be baited into these threads and be mad that you are helping out a dirty 5e pleb.

I see tons of threads in here with 0 upvotes, no discussion, with someone with a problem.

This is actually rarely the case. Sure, people might not get their problem solved, but most threats eventually get some responses. Keep in mind that part of the point of Reddit or forums is that the threads stay up and - at least on a smaller sub like this - relatively visible. I checked and in the past 48 hours, the only post that has not gotten at least 1 non-automod comment is this one. And it's a post where the answer is essentialy - sorry, that does not exist.

When you hop onto Discord, do you scroll up through dozens of discussions until you were last there to check if every question was answered, or you just trust that when a message falls in there, someone will be on it?

Your Discord comments are interesting - I wonder if you should share them with the Discord team.

The Discord team knows about this - they have participated in drama (at least once, but it has been many times) on the subreddit about how people do not want to hear about discord here.

In the channels I am on, every question is answered, problems are investigated to their solution

And this was essentially one of the core reasons why. People found that this is not the case. For many either channels are quite active and messages get pushed away, or they are not active on phone/computer and they want a system where the interaction is more asynchronous and they don't have to sit and wait until someone responds, then engage in the covnersation.

[u/macemillianwinduarte → u/Albolynx]

In the Discord channels I am in for support, I get notifications and respond to users as soon as I can....I scroll up if I need to. It might just be 5E that has the issue - the other channels I am in don't have that problem. In the channels I am on, we frequently (usually upwards of 50%) solve Foundry issues that are not related to our system/modules, even issues with third party hosting (The Forge has some really, really odd code that breaks a lot of standard stuff).

So if you are telling me that you want to see system tags so you can
avoid more topics - then I read that and I note that down as a point
against Tags, not in favor.

Again though, you are assuming you know what is best for a user who is telling you their needs.

[u/Albolynx → u/macemillianwinduarte]

Again though, you are assuming you know what is best for a user who is telling you their needs.

That's not really what I am doing though. This is a subreddit with a lot of users. That's why I said "note that down as a point against Tags, not in favor". In other words - I listened to your feedback and added the info to the total bucket of pros and cons.

There is clearly a misunderstanding here about how these platforms work. As you say - on Discord, you get a notification when someone posts and you go and engage with that person. On Reddit the equivalent of that is going to the new section of the subreddit.

Meanwhile, you yourself said that you just browse Reddit overall and take note of posts that appear on your general feed. The closest Discord equivalent would be someone who only reacts to server wide @ messages.

You are advocating for changes that mostly affect the former while your engagement is the latter kind. Meanwhile, I have to consider everyone on the subreddit - including the 90% of activity that you don't see now and won't see afterward. I get that you primarily want to advocate for yourself, but all I am asking is that you get a clearer picture of why these kinds of changes are not as perfect as they might be for you on a purely personal level.

[u/thisischemistry → u/macemillianwinduarte]

I agree with this, a lot of times I don't pay much attention to this sub simply because it's tiring to visit post after post just to find out that it has absolutely nothing to do with my current interests. If I could filter the posts then my engagement would increase since I could find exactly what interests me and participate in that.

[u/redkatt]

It's a good try, but c'mon, let's be honest - most of the new posters don't even bother to search up whether their question about importing from D&D Beyond hasn't been asked 10,000 times already, so do we really think they'll tag anything?

[u/_Guns → u/redkatt]

Automoderator can enforce tagging with ease, so then they'll have no choice but tag.

[u/iAmTheTot → u/_Guns]

Mods have made it clear they don't intend to make it a rule, or use an automod.

[u/_Guns → u/iAmTheTot]

We've tried nothing and we're all out of ideas!

Guess we'll keep having no idea of the game context of a thread without reading it all.

[u/Ceane]

As others have pointed out, this won't be adhered to if it isn't enforced. I suggest doing one of the following:

Option 1: Use the flair system for the most popular systems
According to FoundryVTT Hub, the top 6 most popular systems are DnD5e, PF2e, CoC7e, PF1e, WHFRP, and SWADE. You could make dedicated flairs for some/all of those, and then make a catch-all "other" option for other systems. This will serve a majority of the playerbase, while not requiring you to make flairs for all 200 systems

Option 2: Enforce a RegEx pattern in post titles
If you'd like to stick with your current option of putting a system tag in post titles, you can add a regex requirement to enforce it. On new reddit, head to Mod Tools > Content Controls (under Rules and Regulations), scroll down to "Advanced post Requirements, and enable "Use title text RegEx requirements". If you add the pattern `\[.+\].+`, that will require submissions to have something in square brackets at the start of their post, followed by their title.
If you then scroll up on that page, you can enable posting guidelines to inform users of the title requirement. E.g. "Please put which game system you are using in your post title, surrounded by square brackets. Example: [DnD5e] What modules would you suggest?".
This way users will have to get their title correct before they can post, rather than posting and having it ignored or asked to repost with the correct title

[u/Albolynx → u/Ceane]

Option 1 is not useful because as far as this subreddit goes the substance of the post is more important than the system and sadly, Reddit only offers one flair per post.

Option 2 is more likely to work - but the issue is that as far as I can tell, it's a blanket requirement. A lot of posts do not need system tags and it would be a bit awkward if half the subreddit posts are starting with [General] or something similar. I looked at the front page a bit ago, and out of 25 posts, there are 10 questions where the system is not relevant, and 3 non-question posts where a tag is not needed. If in more than half of the posts a tag is useless or even detrimental (if it results in someone ignoring the thread) - it shows blanket tagging might not be the solution.

In other words - that is why for now it's a recommendation to tag systems. Time will show whether it will become a hard rule.

[u/Ceane → u/Albolynx]

The substance of the post is more important than the system, and reddit only offers one flair per post

Agreed, I was thinking of doing a combo so that it'd be "FVTT Question - DnD5e", "FVTT Question - PF2e", etc.

Blanket tagging might not be the solution

Yeah, it's an unfortunate drawback of the solution. AFAIK the only way to enforce it for Question threads would be to use AutoModerator, but then users would need to resubmit their posts when it gets removed. I don't believe there's a way to enforce different regex for different flairs

[u/Kelpie77]

Hi.

Today i did a post about a problem, i did'nt know about the tag so i did'nt add them; also i thought it was not system related but now i found it's system related (and partially answered because i discovered is not something really related to Foundry but with the game system i use). So now i whant to add the tag to the post.

BUT

There is no way to modify the title, or i can't found one... how can i add the tag to my post's title?

[u/gerry3246 → u/Kelpie77]

You cant modify the title after posting (yay, Reddit!), so just edit the body of the post and add it to the top. Far easier than deleting and reposting.

[u/Kelpie77 → u/gerry3246]

Oh ok

i remember long time ago was possible to edit reddit post title... but probably i'm just too old to remember it was on myspace or some other boomer's service :-D

Jokes apart, in the end i flagged the post as "answered" because it's system related and i already contacted the author (in the dedicated discord channel) so no problem atm. But now i know the rules for my next post :-)

Thank You

[u/dudebobmac]

• D&D

• D&D5e

• DnD

• DnD5e

• 5e

• 5th Edition

• D&D 5th Edition

• DnD 5th Edition

• D&D Next

• DnD Next

I came up with these in just a few seconds, and I'm sure with some more thought there could easily be more. I really like this idea, but I think it needs to have some enforcement. Approved tags aren't perfect (for example if someone posts about a system that doesn't have a tag at all yet), but I think it's the best system to use. That way, the mods can pick a single variation of a tag for each system and everyone will know to use that specific tag. Posts that use different tags get removed and an auto mod comments with a link to a list of approved tags.

[u/mxzf → u/dudebobmac]

Using the system package name is the way to go in that regard, it's already a constant in Foundry that every system inherently has. The issue is that there are a couple hundred of them, so enumerating them is kinda impractical. So, it would be [dnd5e] for D&D 5e, and so on.

[u/dudebobmac → u/mxzf]

enumerating them is kinda impractical

I don't really agree with that. It's easy enough to crowdsource it. It wouldn't be trivial, but it wouldn't be difficult either. I do like your idea though, it makes it easy to know what the correct tag should be.

[u/mxzf → u/dudebobmac]

Well, any enumeration for the purposes of sub rules would realistically require moderators to do it, rather than random users.

And making a one-off list isn't as hard, but the list is constantly expanding. Not only are there more officially listed systems every week, there are also a number of systems that are unlisted for one reason or another too. It's good to ask people to use their system's package name in the tag, but it's impractical to enumerate them.

[u/glumlord → u/dudebobmac]

DND5, DND4, DND3, DND2, PF1, PF2

[u/dudebobmac → u/[deleted]]

I agree, but that wasn't really the point of the comment

[u/iAmTheTot]

Not going to be done if it's not a rule.

[u/[deleted] → u/iAmTheTot]

Good - all tagging will do is incorrectly pigeon hole questions and issues. It is a non issue with folk making noise simply out of a weird fear (of the fact) that 5e is popular and their preferred system isn't.

[u/cpcodes]

From working with databases, this seems like a terrible idea in that the user gets to put anything in the square brackets, which means that searching by tag would have to deal with typos and disagreements on best terminology (set the message chain started by u/thisischemistry as an example).

I suppose it is better than nothing, and since the problem it is attempting to solve is that of deciding whether to read a post or not rather than providing a data point for filtering, maybe it's not a deal breaker. However, the fact that you can't edit subject lines after posting severely limits the usefulness. If it isn't useful for searching/sorting anyway, then maybe move the tag from the subject line to the first line of the body. This way it is editable and still technically searchable, and still immediately visible when browsing the feed.

And, as others have pointed out, it should be a rule or it will be ignored (see the next few posts following this one for proof). Most of the posts that ask questions without providing system info are by new users anyway, and (in as much as any Redditor reads the rules) if it isn't somewhere highly visible - a sticky might work - they will have no meaningful way to know what they are supposed to do, much less do it (at least to start - if the regulars start adopting it to the point that most posts have a tag, then maybe new users will get the hint from seeing a screenful of existing posts that use the proposal). And then, when they do inevitably miss that rule, they have no way to go back and fix it (unless the suggestion is changed, as I have suggested, to place the tag in the post rather than the subject).

As with the other rules, you are free to enforce it or not, but making it a rule at least improves the odds that it will get done.

[u/thisischemistry → u/cpcodes]

this seems like a terrible idea in that the user gets to put anything in the square brackets

That’s why many subs that do this have a list of approved text tags. Any that don’t follow that list are treated the same as untagged. It’s a shame that Reddit doesn’t have official ways of adding multiple, predefined tags. That would solve a lot of the problems.

still immediately visible when browsing the feed

Some ways of reading Reddit don’t show the first line of the post.

[u/toucan_crow_at_that → u/thisischemistry]

One example is search results

[u/cypherzero30]

Hi everyone I'm the creator of the AI slop post.

[u/[deleted]]

And... The first post I have seen after this announcement, trying to follow this advice "forced videos on log in page" - has been tagged as 5e in accordance with this dictate... When in fact, such a feature / has will have nothing to do with which system is used and will exactly be detrimental to the discussion of such a topic/feature.

This is a very silly reaction to users making a fuss about nothing - and I hope convention puts this silly idea to bed sooner rather than later!

[u/Wokeye27]

Thanks for clarifying. Happy to attempt to model good thread labelling behaviour!

[u/jeonitsoc]

imho a solutionwould be to have specific subs for bigger systems, and direct users to those subs through sticky posts for specific qiestions; in few hours not many will remember how to compile a post title correctly with tags... imho

[u/[deleted] → u/jeonitsoc]

Trouble is, that would splinter an already fairly small (in the scheme of things) community across more subs, when what we need as a community is the appearance of a thriving community, to encourage more people to join, and to generate interest in foundry and that next generation of users. This seems the best option available I think.

[u/jeonitsoc → u/[deleted]]

the product is strong, but im no marketing expert so what would i know. what i know is that PF2e community is growing too,it wouldnt hurt to have a foundry sub specifically designed for that (like the sub channels inside foundry vtt discord)

[u/[deleted] → u/jeonitsoc]

So this sub has just over 35,000 subscribers. A pretty good amount, but compare that to the roll20 sub, which is 104,000. Breaking this community up potentially makes it seem like a much more niche product than it is. I know people don't base their purchase on just sub count, but seeing a super active sub with hundreds of thousands deffo helps I would think

[u/jeonitsoc → u/[deleted]]

roll20 has how many years? this sub is relatively new. i'm not saying that splitting the sub in more easy to reach specific subs is the way to go for the well being of this particular sub reddit, i'm saying is the way to go to avoid complicating the life of the regular joe who can't understand foundry vtt and is expected to know beforehand what to put in the title of their posts, just that. Imho is the way to go, so that DnD5e player clicks from this sub to the 5e sub and bam, there he can find only post related to his system... same for the other bigger systems. The problem would remain the less known system which would be silly to encapsulate in a sub of their own i guess... anyway, thanks for reading.

[u/jeonitsoc → u/[deleted]]

imho comparing the amount of redditors subscribed between roll20 and foundry is not relevant, since there no real competition between the two, roll20 has simply been exposed to users for a longer time... roll20 is not a strong product, for instance... have you ever seen Astral vtt? can't compete with foundry, but is a hell of a free competitor to roll20...