Preferred forum style?

[studbucket]

Anyone have a preferred style for the new forums. I have been using the "default vb5 style" and I like it a bit more than the "default style". The spacing or icons is a bit different. See below for a screenshot.

Curious what others are using though. I'd like to see what works best or looks nicest.

image.png

[LowerWolf]

None of the styles have been really great or bad for me yet. One thing that annoys me are all the subforums. For example, if I go to the Madden board, I'm likely going to look at the most recent posts in the main Madden forum. But the whole top of the page is cluttered with sub forums. Then there are stickies. I have to scroll a good way down to get to what I'm looking for. I don't remember it being that way on the old board, although it's quite possible I've just forgotten.

I've looked at some of the other boards where I lurk, and none of them have sub forums. I don't think that's feasible here. The Madden board, for example again, needs sub forums for sliders, rosters, etc. But having drop-downs or some other way where you can avoid them if you don't want them would be nice. There are times too where the board just looks cluttered to me.

I may post some screenshots later on. I realize keeping the board's speed up (and it's been pretty good for me the last week or so now) and getting all the data back are the priorities.

Edit: When I initially posted, I thought I was posting in Steve's thread. Wasn't trying to hijack with my other thoughts.

[studbucket]

Yeah, there are ways to make the subforums take up less room probably. We had them before, but the spacing is probably more than needed now. Definitely something to look at.

[VDusen04]

This has been one of my biggest gripes with the new forums. It's honestly negatively affecting my experience to such a degree that I visit less than I used to.

The biggest problem is that I'm just not seeing enough of what I want to see. In the previous forums, I recall there being sub-forums near the top of the page but if I had to estimate, the page as a whole felt like it was:

-80 percent: The stuff I want to see (active threads in the forum I'm in)
-20 percent: The stuff I don't want to see (sub-forums, stickies, ads, etc)

With the new forum layout, it feels like it's closer to 50-50, or maybe worse. I find myself scrolling down a lot to see active posts and even then, it seems like I can only see a few per page. It's honestly annoying and certainly interferes with the overall forum experience to a degree that affects my willingness to read and post.

Edit: I actually just went ahead and used the Wayback Machine to compare to the old forums. https://web.archive.org/web/20230826...2k-basketball/

On the old NBA 2K forums in 2024, here's the breakdown:

1. Five sub-forums listed taking up about five inches of space
2. 10 stickied threads
3. 35 topic threads

On the new 2K forum:

1. Seven sub-forum tabs taking up 10 inches of space or more
2. Three stickied threads
3. 10 topic threads

Somehow, even with 10 stickied threads, the old forum felt freer to navigate and provided three-fold more information per page.

Basically, I'm just getting way less without having to endlessly scroll and click. It's not a great time.

[Rocky]

I wish there was something like the old "I'm at work" style. Just a pure black and white.

[Armor and Sword]

Anyway....anyway to disable all these ads....it's unbearable and I won't be coming back much at all if I can't get back to what we had before where ad's were blocked.

It's incredibly obnoxious and makes it impossible to read the forums comfortably.

[jkra0512]

Anyway....anyway to disable all these ads....it's unbearable and I won't be coming back much at all if I can't get back to what we had before where ad's were blocked.

It's incredibly obnoxious and makes it impossible to read the forums comfortably.

I feel the same way. I feel like I'm playing a point-n-click game trying to exit out of all these ads. I realize OS has to make some money to keep the lights on, but there has to be another way.

[studbucket]

I just tried Gradient.

I like how it makes individual forum threads look. I can better differentiate posts. There's enough contrast between posts, the thread area, and the sides.

image.png

[LionsSharks15]

I like Light Blue. Simple and readable

[Ghost Of The Year]

I'm using Grunge.

[SmashMan]

I've been on the OS theme since they added it. Couldn't find a generic vBulletin style that I liked as a whole. The ones with colors I liked? Hated the font choices. The ones with font most readable to me? Crappy colors. Ones with decent color and font? Didn't like the spacing. I felt like Goldilocks over here looking for one that was just right.