Brethren of the Brick Seas (BoBS) Introduction and Starting Thread

[Mike S]

Thanks! Will add when I find out the Sea Rat island names.

[Capt Wolf]

19 minutes ago, Mike S said:

Thanks! Will add when I find out the Sea Rat island names.

Mike S, could you create a single hi-res map that spans the islands from Nelissa in the west to the new islands in the east? I don't think we have a single map that shows this whole section in good detail. Thanks in advance (and thanks for all these beautiful maps in the first place!).

[Mike S]

31 minutes ago, Capt Wolf said:

Mike S, could you create a single hi-res map that spans the islands from Nelissa in the west to the new islands in the east? I don't think we have a single map that shows this whole section in good detail. Thanks in advance (and thanks for all these beautiful maps in the first place!).

Sure thing.

[Bregir]

10 minutes ago, Mike S said:

Sure thing.

Wuuhuu! Mike for the presidency of the Royal Cartographers Guild!

[Bregir]

Ok, in filling in our escorts, can I for escort vessels on the same convoy, just fill in one form with all the vessel names divided by semicolons? (At least the ones of the same class in the same convoy?

Otherwise, it takes next to forever...

[SkaForHire]

Yeah, this will be streamlined soon.... but I also have access to the Corrington Spreadsheet (I assume there is still one?)  Which tells me who is where anyway.  The Sea Rats always send me something like that as well, so they can streamline if they want too. (The others can follow suit as well, as long as I have something that tells me what escort goes where and protects whom[right word?])

[dr_spock]

On 10/10/2016 at 11:11 AM, Mike S said:

Thanks! I thought so but I had never seen the names confirmed in the Eslandola thread. So now just waiting on the Sea Rats now. I'm curious how they decide on names when they use darts to decide on which islands to pick....

 

[Legostone]

16 minutes ago, dr_spock said:

 

 

 

Not signed in

Why are your torches an the wall going in 4 different directions? :D

[Bregir]

26 minutes ago, SkaForHire said:

Yeah, this will be streamlined soon.... but I also have access to the Corrington Spreadsheet (I assume there is still one?)  Which tells me who is where anyway.  The Sea Rats always send me something like that as well, so they can streamline if they want too. (The others can follow suit as well, as long as I have something that tells me what escort goes where and protects whom[right word?])

It should be linked in the convoy sheets. Let me know if that doesn't work.

And I interpret this as if I don't need to fill in forms for all the escorts, as long as they are in the convoy spreadsheet? Please confirm.

[Legostone]

44 minutes ago, SkaForHire said:

Yeah, this will be streamlined soon.... but I also have access to the Corrington Spreadsheet (I assume there is still one?)  Which tells me who is where anyway.  The Sea Rats always send me something like that as well, so they can streamline if they want too. (The others can follow suit as well, as long as I have something that tells me what escort goes where and protects whom[right word?])

 

Well, the Eslandolan Trade Run Thread would be better than nothing, wouldn't it? 

[MKJoshA]

Can someone please confirm that MCRA forms are due by the 15th?

[Legostone]

3 minutes ago, MKJoshA said:

Can someone please confirm that MCRA forms are due by the 15th?

---->

On 10/2/2016 at 7:27 PM, Bregir said:

Dear all,

The MRCA has been postponed until the 15th, to allow those who still do not know if their vessels survived the last MRCA to participate. Most likely, this will be the last MRCA to be run this way. We are sorry for the delay in giving you this message.

/Bregir

On behalf of the leadership team.

1

 

 

 

[dr_spock]

1 hour ago, Legostone said:

Why are your torches an the wall going in 4 different directions? :D

Oh, that would be the air conditioning ceiling vents blowing down on them. 

Actually, I pointed them way so that there is more free space around the fishes and map and dart board.. Also to have balance and harmony like a BoBS piratey version of Chinese Feng Shui.

 

 

[MKJoshA]

3 hours ago, Legostone said:

---->

 

 

 

Sorry, I should have been clearer, if they are submitted any time on the 15th, will they be accepted, or do they need to be in before the 15th so any time on the 14th?

[Jacob Nion]

I am sure this has been asked several times in the months I was lost on the sea, but will the ship index be updated some time in the future? I know it'shard to keep track not only of all the newly built vessels but also of the permanently changing ownership. A solution could be that each faction keeps track of it's members fleets and send an updated list to maxim (or whoever is responsible at the moment).

[Bregir]

7 hours ago, MKJoshA said:

Sorry, I should have been clearer, if they are submitted any time on the 15th, will they be accepted, or do they need to be in before the 15th so any time on the 14th?

I am going to go out on a limp and take a leadership decision here: Normally a deadline means that it has to be submitted any time on the 15th, anywhere in the world, so that is what we will be going with here too.

59 minutes ago, Jacob Nion said:

I am sure this has been asked several times in the months I was lost on the sea, but will the ship index be updated some time in the future? I know it'shard to keep track not only of all the newly built vessels but also of the permanently changing ownership. A solution could be that each faction keeps track of it's members fleets and send an updated list to maxim (or whoever is responsible at the moment).

I think the best solution would be to have some sort of open list of ship licenses owned by whom. It would also make general administration much easier. Of course, such an index wouldn't have pictures like @Maxim I 's great index, but it would make his work easier too.

And by the way, what do you care? Don't you just attack anything that floats?

[Jacob Nion]

Arrr me lad I want to show everyone what he's dealing with when my black sails glance at the horizon. 

But the thing is, I am a builder; I have the natural desire to have my builds indexed. I want them to be recognized and I also want to browse other users builds. Indexes are also an important feature for newbies who search for inspiration/information. Since this is the pirates forum, the aspect with the most prestige in this game should be our ships, no houses or plantations.

what about something similar to the settlement index? We call it the fleet index. Everyone willing makes a post where he lists and updates his personal fleet. Companies could have a post of its own. Everyone would be responsible to write down his losses, prizes and new built ships on his own. 

 

[Maxim I]

@Jacob Nion, @Bregir

 

Hahahaha :p Fun fact is, I started updating the ship index again this morning

But it is a lot of work (seriously, I updated 10 ships maybe in 3 hours...) and I am months behind (I have now finished all ships posted before June 1). So I am a big fan of an easier system.

One of the most time consumings things for me are people who don't have Flickr... Seriously... Especially when their pictures are on a spam site like photobucket, I lose a lot of time downloading the picture, adjusting it and then reuploading it...

[Legostone]

14 minutes ago, Maxim I said:

@Jacob Nion, @Bregir

 

Hahahaha :p Fun fact is, I started updating the ship index again this morning

But it is a lot of work (seriously, I updated 10 ships maybe in 3 hours...) and I am months behind (I have now finished all ships posted before June 1). So I am a big fan of an easier system.

One of the most time consumings things for me are people who don't have Flickr... Seriously... Especially when their pictures are on a spam site like photobucket, I lose a lot of time downloading the picture, adjusting it and then reuploading it...

 

Could we just have one shared Flickr Account where we collect all the pictures of ships, including information? Have 2 or 3 people who get access to it, so we can keep it up to date easier. 

[Maxim I]

3 minutes ago, Legostone said:

Could we just have one shared Flickr Account where we collect all the pictures of ships, including information? Have 2 or 3 people who get access to it, so we can keep it up to date easier. 

That's not a bad idea tbh!

Now I am uploading those pics to my Brickshelf so they don't appear in my Flickr.

Could you look for that?

[Elostirion]

I am convinced that the solution to such issues is always collaboration: Everyone needs to be involved (and also a chance to involve himself):

 

My suggestion:

List of ships

Ordered by nation

Ordered by class

Any other ordering easily possible. Design not yet great, but hey. Data is outdated, but can be upated.

For adding ships: Simple version or with some more optional data

Everyone could upload pictures.

 

It would need some more finetuning (e.g. what is the status of the ship, like sunk, captured, ...), but I could basically add everything you guys want. Everyone could submit their ships. Maxim could get some kind of admin-rights to edit the entries, maybe also one person from each faction, whatever. We could link pictures to flickr or any other site (just using URLs), no problem at all. We could define any types of view-filters (e.g. all MCTC ships, all Corrington warships, ...). Actually we could also make it so that it is not only displayed on the external site but that it also provides a BB-code export so that the latest shiplist can always be copy-pasted in here.

The effort only lies in me coding it properly once (most of which is already done, would just need some more input from people like Maxim on what is really needed) and then keeping the data up-to-date. Which is the effort there already is now, the difference though would be that everyone could easily assist in keeping data up-to-date.

 

Just an offer.

Edited October 14, 2016 by Elostirion

[dr_spock]

Before we go into too many directions and systems for keeping track of things.  We should decide on what information we want to see and collect.

Currently all ship license submission goes into a Google Form that feeds into a backend spreadsheet.  I don't think you can attached files directly into Google Forms.  Maybe some Google App Script Kung Fu can have a popup to allow submitters to put a ship photo onto a Google Drive. Submitters wouldn't need a Google account.

Additional columns could be added to the spreadsheet to track status and new owners, etc.  Those columns could be manually maintained by our BoBS Accountant when he updates people's account after the MRCA results or a transaction form submission.

The spreadsheet could then be used as the accurate data source to autogenerate Maxim's topic content or Elostirion website.

 

[Bregir]

22 minutes ago, dr_spock said:

Before we go into too many directions and systems for keeping track of things.  We should decide on what information we want to see and collect.

Currently all ship license submission goes into a Google Form that feeds into a backend spreadsheet.  I don't think you can attached files directly into Google Forms.  Maybe some Google App Script Kung Fu can have a popup to allow submitters to put a ship photo onto a Google Drive. Submitters wouldn't need a Google account.

Additional columns could be added to the spreadsheet to track status and new owners, etc.  Those columns could be manually maintained by our BoBS Accountant when he updates people's account after the MRCA results or a transaction form submission.

The spreadsheet could then be used as the accurate data source to autogenerate Maxim's topic content or Elostirion website.

 

I am with dr_spock on this. The more manual entries, the more will be missed, the more people will be frightened away by the workload, and the more errors will be in there :)

[gedren_y]

Additionally, not all ships get licensed, or at least not right away.

[Maxim I]

1 hour ago, gedren_y said:

Additionally, not all ships get licensed, or at least not right away.

Indeed, and in the past, I remembered people who forgot their licencing as I keep track of every ship