roleplay world The Re-imagining of PonyRoleplay

[Troblems 5,617]

Back in April of this year, the Poniverse announced a new website. A website of distraction free role-play, that would allow for better organization of both Mlpforums, and role-play threads. An ambitious project, one that we knew would take a lot of hard work and time to get it up and running. Unfortunately, the original release date was a bit pre-mature.

 

We were hoping to get PonyRoleplay up by BronyCon, in early August. As of now, that date is being pushed back. We don’t want to give an exact date, as often pushing to release by a certain date leads to important parts of the project being sloppy, or not as well-constructed as it would have been if given the proper attention. 

 

When first announced, a lot of features were promised. Features that at this point in time will not all be included, particularly an IRC channel. After a lot of discussion amongst the leadership of the project, it was decided that an IRC channel would be counter-productive to what a forums strives to do: create a medium with which people can share well thought out ideas which are published via an open ended readily accessible internet page. 

 

So where does the reimagining bit come in? We’ve decided rather than going with the same forum software that Mlpforums has (Invision Power Board, or IPB for short), we’re looking at going with XenForo (xF for short). xF is a much newer platform than IPB, and caters well to role-play needs. It allows for the creation of sub-accounts which will allow users to easily identify which role-play character is being used, among other things.

 

It will be a shift from what we’re currently used to, however the PonyRoleplay moderation team has given a lot of thought, and had a lot of discussion about what will best suit the needs of both the users and the team working on the back end.

 

With all that said, we’re hoping to launch by the end of this year. This is in no way a firm date, because if PonyRoleplay isn’t ready by then, it won’t be launched. While a forum needs to change over time to suit its users, and is never finished, the PonyRoleplay team hopes to have all of the features currently envisioned to be fully capable of being used at the time of release. 

 

We still have a lot of work to do. A very lot, but we hope to bring the best possible site for role-players in the pony world that we can. That being said, we could use some more help. We’ve been working on this project a long time, the latest incarnation starting in early January. We lost a lot of our team in May and June due to finals, graduation and summer. We hope to recover some of those lost people in the form of our lore team.

 

The lore team will be in charge of writing and maintaining what we know of Equestria, as well as enhancing and creating what we don’t know. The moderation team will be doing their best to keep the site organized, as much as possible, given how many people there will be, drama free. We need organized, stable, intelligent upstanding members of Mlpforums to help us with both jobs.

 

The current PonyRoleplay team is really excited for this release. As much as it pained us to do it, pushing back the opening date really was our best option for bringing to the role-players the best site we can. We ask that you have patience, because we really are working our butts off to produce this labor of love, and we really can’t wait for the role-playing pony community to see it.

[ghostfacekiller39 23,860]

Lucky roleplayers, getting to use Xenforo...it makes IPB look like that free forum software anyone can get   

[~The Snowy Wolf~ 1,579]

I still like and support this project 100%, but I feel like it would kinda alienate some roleplayers, like myself, from the rest of the forum since I mainly RP, but occasionally go to the home screen to see what's going on or something.

[Courageous Thunder Dash 7,824]

Well...looks like I've gotta get used to something new...

[M'aiq the Liar 5,804]

Well, as long as it works lol.

I look forward to trying out the mlpf roleplays as soon as they get up and running in their new shiny home.

[Kay Dreamer 884]

I still like and support this project 100%, but I feel like it would kinda alienate some roleplayers, like myself, from the rest of the forum since I mainly RP, but occasionally go to the home screen to see what's going on or something.

 

This issue is one which has been given a great deal of thought. However, remaining here as a subsection of MLPF limits how far we can expand the roleplay forums. MLPF was never designed as a roleplay site. It's rule and warning systems are tailored for a discussion forum, and have never really 'fit' the needs of the roleplay section. By creating Pony Roleplay, not only can we implement rules which are tailored to the needs of a roleplay site, in addition to hiring more dedicated roleplay staff, we can expand our scope to create a roleplay environment which will truly shine.

 

Your login for Pony Roleplay will be the same Poniverse login you use here on MLPF. Furthermore, we're hoping to retain close ties with MLPF, giving users every reason to remain active on both sites.

Edited July 23, 2014 by Kay Dreamer

[3005 332]

Lucky roleplayers, getting to use Xenforo...it makes IPB look like that free forum software anyone can get   

 

Hugely disagree, I think it's the other way around. IPB (especially the new IPB 4, MLP Forums runs on IPB 3) is incredibly functional and looks amazing. xF is new, yes, but last I checked, it's caught up in a lawsuit, which prevents it from any major updates, leaving it in design purgatory indefinitely (if this has changed, apologies). 

 

I think xF is a fun idea in theory, but in terms of actually working, it will prove incredibly inconsistent in terms of continuing the aesthetic across Poniverse. Just meh opinion tho 

[Kay Dreamer 884]

@@3005,

 

To the best of my knowledge, that lawsuit has been over since early 2013. xF looks to have a thriving community of developers, and is very conducive to adding fascinating extensions such as the sub-accounts mentioned in the OP by Troblems.

 

As far as working within the Poniverse aesthetic, I'm no coder but I've been informed that xF is substantially more skinnable in terms of it's CSS options than IPB. We have talented people working on creating a layout for us which will blend flawlessly with the rest of Poniverse, and this consideration was in fact one of the things which appealed to us when deciding whether or not we should switch.

[Jeric 46,851]

@@3005,

 

To the best of my knowledge, that lawsuit has been over since early 2013. xF looks to have a thriving community of developers, and is very conducive to adding fascinating extensions such as the sub-accounts mentioned in the OP by Troblems.

 

As far as working within the Poniverse aesthetic, I'm no coder but I've been informed that xF is substantially more skinnable in terms of it's CSS options than IPB. We have talented people working on creating a layout for us which will blend flawlessly with the rest of Poniverse, and this consideration was in fact one of the things which appealed to us when deciding whether or not we should switch.

 

Correct. More secured, more customizable, better for SEO, and much easier to develop for. I actually didn't realize that you were going to use xF for RP ... good choice guys. 

[XxConfusedUnicornxX 834]

Whoo! So excited! This is a great idea for Poniverse <3

[Batbrony 16,055]

These sound like a number of wise actions on the PonyRoleplay team's part.   Very good guys, very good indeed.  Once you get closer to launching PonyRoleplay, feel free to contact the PR team; we'd be happy to reach out to a number of pony roleplaying communities, if you can think of any you'd like to contact, to get the word out about PonyRoleplay.   Good luck!!! 

[Troblems 5,617]

I still like and support this project 100%, but I feel like it would kinda alienate some roleplayers, like myself, from the rest of the forum since I mainly RP, but occasionally go to the home screen to see what's going on or something.

As a team we've discussed at length what is the best way to keep PRP integrated with Mlpforums, and combating the isolation from making it its own site. We believe we've got the answer to this, and there will be forthcoming details as the release date approaches. 

 

 

Hugely disagree, I think it's the other way around. IPB (especially the new IPB 4, MLP Forums runs on IPB 3) is incredibly functional and looks amazing. xF is new, yes, but last I checked, it's caught up in a lawsuit, which prevents it from any major updates, leaving it in design purgatory indefinitely (if this has changed, apologies). 

 

I think xF is a fun idea in theory, but in terms of actually working, it will prove incredibly inconsistent in terms of continuing the aesthetic across Poniverse. Just meh opinion tho 

Simply put: Can't please everybody. 

[3005 332]

Simply put: Can't please everybody. 

 

Of course not! That's life; just expressing my opinion haha

[yeet 2,027]

I think this will be awesome once it is done. I hope the background is good too.

[()()()()()()? 72]

OMG. Best. Idea. Ever. Please finish it up soon! It is going to be way more than 20% cooler than the setup right now. It would be cool to get the accounts here also copied into that new site as well.

[seoservices 1]

great project, so excited.

[Sketchy Sculpture 4]

I can't wait to see what it would look like! Or has it already been updated?

[Ashen Pathfinder 16,161]

I can't wait to see what it would look like! Or has it already been updated?

 

It's still yet to come out. This has been a labor of love, time, and patience from the staff of MLPF and is taking some times. I can say that I'm fairly excited being an pony RP'er myself.

 

I have no idea what it'll look like & all, but I have faith this will turn out to be grand.

[yayayayayala 1,668]

Sweet, I can't wait! I've been in the mood for a roleplay for a while but have never wanted to bother creating a thread before Anyways I'm excited to try out this new feature whenever it goes up, this sounds awesome!

Edited October 2, 2014 by yayayayayala