[x5_Doombie]

Hi everyone. I wanted to make this post to talk about our small community and the next step in its growth.
The Breaking Bronze community is something that formed after I began a stream on Twitch.tv about 2 years ago. Since then the stream has grown purely because the viewer base of the stream is an incredible group of people. The Stream itself is about improving and enjoying the game of starcraft. The stream grew, I believe, because of how active and entertaining the chat is. Every day that I stream I get to hang out with a great bunch of people that share a passion. Familiar faces that are active and supportive.
To do my part for the community I have developed a website. This website is www.BreakingBronze.com
This website has a heap of features that I hope people can use and take advantage of. It has the ability to be a very practical, helpful and interactive website.
Some features of the site are
– A build library
– A build ranking system
– User chat
– User private messaging
– User account gallery
– Forums
– Submit a build feature
This website has been designed and created as a home for lower level players. Somewhere that we can learn and grow together. Higher level players can share their knowledge and skill. This is a place where being bad at StarCraft is ok. Not knowing things, is ok. I want this site to work, I really do. I have put a lot of work into it. A lot of time and effort. For this site to work though It is important that the community takes over now. If you can coach, put yourself forward as a coach, if you want to know things, use the forums to learn. If you know of cool builds, submit them to the library. Help this site grown, help the community grow.
I hope you enjoy the website and will join the breaking bronze community.

[Philosopher]

Looks nice man. Will definitely take a more indepth look at it

[ToR.Jombie]

Website looks awesome.... im technically doing work, but will join up and give it a good squiz tonight!

[SLCN.Wally]

If you/ the people submitting builds w/e can keep the builds up to date then this will make a good site, it's hard for new people to search for builds because they don't even know what to search for so it's nice having tons of builds in one place. Hopefully stays up to date

[sR.BoardingPear]

Finally a place where noobs like me can learn to be noobs of a higher standard. Nice work guys

[|Erasmus|]

Originally Posted by fray`Wally

If you/ the people submitting builds w/e can keep the builds up to date then this will make a good site, it's hard for new people to search for builds because they don't even know what to search for so it's nice having tons of builds in one place. Hopefully stays up to date

The only thing I dislike is the build rating system, which appears to be anonymous and without reason... i.e. people can just poorly rate other builds anonymously and give no explanation as to why.

Nice looking website though, kudos.

[Drinksarlot]

Nice looking site

[rezyn8]

Great stuff Doombie - registered!

If you need help on the website side of things, let me know.

[x5_Doombie]

yeah the rating system isn't ideal i agree |Erasmus| . i will try to implement it a little better in the future but i have limited technical skills. i would like to have the rating system rank builds depending on various factors but i just don't know how. Thanks though, and please keep the feedback coming because i want this site to grow and change, i want it to be useful.

[|Erasmus|]

Even if you just force people to leave a comment so you don't just get 1 star ratings or at least can ignore the ones that don't rationalise why they think the build isn't good. As is, someone will just macro terribly, lose and blame the build.

[x5_Bard]

Nice to see you finally get this up and running Doombie! Looks good mate.

[uJeanZ]

Great initiative. Will definitely spread the word.

[eCKoa`ProzeR]

Should definitely have a link to sc2sea.com ;D hehe
Great website though

[VorteX]

Nice Site Doombie

Hope the succeed!

Some improvement to the Site:

• When you click on "Register" under the login form on the homepage, it take you to a place to login. Problem is: If you haven't register an account, therefore you don't have an account to login with. It should take to you to the create account page instead, upon clicking the "Register". The "register" in the "My Profile" Works fine.
• The Site takes quite a bit of time to load each page. For a site that looks light, its quite heavy.
• Add a section, where users can upload/submit a replay of their own, so it can be analyzed and give advice from experience players.
• When Submitting a Build, make it possible for people, who already have them written down on a word document or on a text file, to upload it, instead of copy or pasting (losing its format) and allows photos/pictures (if any).
• Protoss Builds: http://www.breakingbronze.com/builds/protoss-builds/. Pointless Page where all the Sub-Menu of PvT, PvZ, and PvP Builds can be shown right there instead of the Sub-Menu (which save the extra clicking for the user).
• Terran Builds: http://www.breakingbronze.com/builds/terran-builds/. Pointless Page where all the Sub-Menu of TvT, TvZ, and TvP Builds can be shown right there instead of the Sub-Menu (which save the extra clicking for the user).
• Zerg Builds: http://www.breakingbronze.com/builds/zerg-builds/. Pointless Page where all the Sub-Menu of ZvT, ZvZ, and ZvP Builds can be shown right there instead of the Sub-Menu (which save the extra clicking for the user). Whenever it gets implemented, at this point in time there no Builds shown for Zerg yet.
• Replace the "User is Online : )" with a solid green, to me personally it looks like they are offline.
• This maybe minor: In the Member Directory, have an option of display X amount of profile per page.
• Any kind of Friend's list?
• Any kind of "Read it later" option?
• In the builds section, have some print friendly format, good for people to print it out and have the build in front of them (rather than painstakingly write it all out).
• Integrate twitch into the website, so people can watch your stream from breakingbronze.com. It boost number to your site, rather than re-directing your views to twitch.
• Have a Clan War Page
• Have a link to: http://www.sc2sea.com/ (spread the SEA scene).
• Have a Screenshot Area, where players can submit a screen shot of a epic fight, epic win, got promoted, and so on. Alternatively, if you have limited server space, you can have host the image at imgur/flikr or something and display it in a gallery form.
• Have a video Area, where players can submit a video of a epic fight, epic win, got promoted, epic kiting and so on. Alternatively, if you have limited server space, you can have host the image at youtube or something and display it in a gallery form.
• Event Section, where (if any) events can be posted up or help organize events there.
• In the "About Us" and contact information to be shown there (skype or/and email address?). make it easier for people to contact breakingbronze.com admin.
• Some kind of secure messaging system (if there already isnt there), that doesn't rely on Skype or email (especially those who don't have either of them or due to privacy may not release them or for whatever reason they have).
• No chance, of having "https"?
• Overhaul the anonymous rating (or any rating for the matter) is not an good idea. People who is frustrated with any build, will probable rate it down low. It needs to be looked at clearly and see what can be done so that the rating can be accurately represent the build (and unbiased). Otherwise good build will be shoved down the drain with low ratings.

There so far what i got, when having no account there (so not sure of pages that requires to login to access). Don't know if they helped or not.

[breadfan]

I haven't had much chance to get a good look but I've had a very quick play, nicely done. I'll do some more later. Vortex has some interesting points but I've picked out a few that I question

Originally Posted by VorteX

...
Some improvement to the Site:

• Add a section, where users can upload/submit a replay of their own, so it can be analyzed and give advice from experience players.
  I don't think there's any reason you need to do this - just point people at drop.sc or similar and link to those locations. It opens up a whole other area of security risk that you need to take care of and probably isn't worth it.
• When Submitting a Build, make it possible for people, who already have them written down on a word document or on a text file, to upload it, instead of copy or pasting (losing its format) and allows photos/pictures (if any).
  Same as above. A wysiwig editor is just fine, asking people to do some formatting tweaks to upload builds is a small ask, I don't think you want to get bogged down in allowing uploads, doing any kind of conversion, etc.
• No chance, of having "https"?
  Not necessary?

Otherwise, as Erasmus said the whole rating thing is definitely a concern, but in a community like this there are going to be people leaving feedback about things that they just plain don't understand. It's inevitable.

So to leverage that, you could split it up into different types of ratings. By default (subscriber-level access) people can rate say, the perceived difficulty of the build, but only higher level players who you provide a different level of access, can rate the build's effectiveness, etc. I agree it'd be nice to tie forced comments into it too, but there's still going to be someone rating a build 1/10 and their comment being "Kappa" or something. Sure you can read the comments, but at the end of the day most people are probably looking for a list where they can sort by rating, and then pick the best rated builds, and they probably aren't going to scrutinize the comments on the protoss all-in that is around a 50% rating because it's too far down the list.

[VorteX]

Originally Posted by breadfan

but I've had a very quick play, nicely done. I'll do some more later.

Go for it and see, what i missed and/or you can improve on anything i suggested. More eyes the better, to improve the website

Another Suggestion/s:

• Any kind of separate Wiki Page (but linking to breakingbronze.com, for easy user to edit articles relating to SC2. Of course this is Optional.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Originally Posted by breadfan

I don't think there's any reason you need to do this - just point people at drop.sc or similar and link to those locations. It opens up a whole other area of security risk that you need to take care of and probably isn't worth it.

That will Work, provide a section where it compiles and displays all the user's drop.sc links (or any other replay upload site). Where it is optional for the user to add a description about the replay in the link.

Originally Posted by breadfan

Same as above. A wysiwig editor is just fine, asking people to do some formatting tweaks to upload builds is a small ask, I don't think you want to get bogged down in allowing uploads, doing any kind of conversion, etc.

Having an editor same or similar to sc2sea would be ideal method. With all the in browser formatting of text.

Originally Posted by breadfan

Not necessary?

This is only optional, that's all and like you said not necessary.

Originally Posted by breadfan

Otherwise, as Erasmus said the whole rating thing is definitely a concern, but in a community like this there are going to be people leaving feedback about things that they just plain don't understand. It's inevitable.

I agree...it have to be looked accurately and unbiased at each building being accurately rated. Naturally people, will see a low rating and dismiss the build, even if it is a good Build (similar to people, might not want to watch a low-rated movie). So it's important to look at this rating system.

Most people will just post pointless stuff (such as "10 Char", "Kappa", "Protoss Op", etc...), just to be able to rate. Beside that most people, just want to find a highest rated build and no care or bother to read all the comments (do you read all or majority of the comments on each App on iTunes, that you download? or do you just look at the App Rating?)

At this point...I suggested to scrap/disable the rating all together, until a accurate unbiased rating system is found.

[x5_Doombie]

Hey guys thanks very much EVERYONE for your feedback so far. The first step in improving the build library happened today.

The flawed rating system is still in place, but now as well as that there is the ability for members to comment on Builds. This will allow more feedback on builds that allows a little more judgement and depth. This also allows for modifications to the build and direct written opinions.

The rating system still needs work but this should help a little.

[x5_Doombie]

The Zerg build section is now also fixed!