Guide How To: Make A Good Thread

Most of us already know what makes a bad thread, but something that's less talked about is how to make a good thread. Regardless if you get warned for posting useless content, or if you just want to improve your already well-known threads, here are four of my basic tips on how to make a good thread:

1. Useful and Usable

Good content is content that is both useful and usable. Your information should be something that's either new, important, or significant to the reader. If you want to post your opinion on how you don't like the stats on this one dagger, go find a new one, because odds are no one cares. If you want to post about your experience on finding a typo in a quest, you might find it funny, but still, odds are no one cares. That's the reality of things. So before you even start making your post, ask yourself this: Does the forum community need this post?

2. Keep it short

Try to keep your information as short as possible but without losing any detail. Why? Because, odds are again that no one cares enough to read through all of your text, and even if they do care, walls of text are usually intimidating. Don't scare away your readers. Say what needs to be said, no more, no less, no exceptions.

3. Create a Hierarchy of Information

If your post is going to be long, you need to create a visual hierarchy of information. Make sure your most important information is visible at first glance. Use headers to organize your points; bold or italicize unique or important terms. Making a list, like with what I've done on this thread, is also extremely effective—you can literally get a good idea of what this thread is about just by reading my headers.

4. Make sure it's easy on the eyes

Please stop writing in gigantic font. Stop bolding everything. Stop using an absurd amount of colours. If anything, it only makes your post look childish, unprofessional, hard-to-read, and quite frankly, unworthy of being read. My advice is to keep it simple and standard. Never should you use more than two fonts: one for your regular text, one for the headers. If you want to use colours, stick to using 1 or 2 colours only.​

Though there are an abundant amount of other, smaller tips I could give everyone, I feel like these four techniques were the most important ones that I needed to get out. But if you want the fundamental, guiding principle on how to make a good thread, remember this: Write for the reader.

Thank you for your time.

___________________

Also, don't be afraid to post your own suggestions on what you think makes a good thread!​

 

Finally, maybe this can help stop *some* shitposting... Ahri thank you for clarifying this matter.

 

You should include to use the "None" text color, as many people will use the opposite color of whatever theme they're using (ex. black text for light theme uses, white text for dark theme users), the "none" color will set it so it's automatically colored depending on your theme

 

Shitposting is part of the internet cycle

 

We will put an end to shitposting!

Well, unless those scrubs read this thread. .-.

 

COLOURS!

I heard times new roman's the easiest font to read, is that true? Do you know any 2 important colours to use in threads? You should state in 4. to never use black font and white font EVER, it's not going to show white text for dark theme users and black text for light theme users. Don't use light and dark colours, use colours that contrast from the light theme and dark theme equally. Ex. Red-3, and Blue-3.

 

Certain fonts have little "strokes" at the ends of their letters, like with Georgia, Book Antiqua, or Times New Roman. These "strokes" help your eyes flow from letter to letter, word to word, that's why they're the best for large texts. (These fonts are called Serif fonts)

But while those fonts are the easiest to read, they're not the nicest "looking" fonts. Fonts like Arial or Trebuchet MS are the nicest to look at because there's less stuff going on. Therefore, these fonts are better for headers. (These fonts are called Sans-Serif fonts)

 

So much info

 

all in good fun m8s no h8s pl8s​

ill try to analyze this and speak my opinion because this is the internet and, although frowned upon, is not illegal
tldr i had my right to remain silent and i ignored it

1. Useful and Usable

well i did try to make that one anime tutorial way back at the end of december but i bet people were there for the fresh titties and saltshakers anyway
and even if they did either theyre sneaky as fuck or thinking of a n even bigger burn
which i felt at the imp chat and val community skype

seriously, some of you guys are spicy
fuck you


2. Keep it short

​

3. Hierarchy of Information

then shouldnt have this been the first fact in the list?


4. Make sure it's easy on the eyes

​

maybe i should meme it up, and then at the end of the month just drop the memes altogether
then maybe ill have an even bigger follower base
muahahaha

 

Why is my ELA teacher in the forums.
Edit: On a more serious note, maybe you should do this on all of the threads, (suggestion section _pls).

 

This deserves to be stickied

 

I agree with a lot of the stuff you provide here. However, I wouldn't say that Bolding, increasing font size, and using some colors here and there are
what make a forum post go bad. I increase my font size, use color, and bold to make it readable. Some people can't even read the tiny font that is already provided. I bold and font size to make it easier to read and the colors I use are not mixed all over the place. I agree though that some people can use color all over their forum posts. If I use color it is to let the reader know that I am changing over to a whole new subject. For example, I will do an intro with the standard GREEN Wynncraft font and then follow up with some questions in a DIFFERENT font because it is separate from the intro. Bolding is also very useful because if you do not bold and you have a color, it doesn't show the full color. Here is an example of GREEN bolded and GREEN not bolded. But seriously this is forums, not your usual 5 page essay.

 

Finally I know how to write a good thread. Thanks friend :)

 

The more you know

 

This is what breaks threads.

 

Same for selfish users who think that the only theme people use is the dark theme, and who therefore spam white text all over the freaking forums.

 

Ikr some people though...like this thread here! https://forums.wynncraft.com/threads/and-then-theres-me.103861/

 

Thanks a lot! I'm planning on making a general suggestions post for guilds. However, I still think that color on a page looks good if you use it to highlight important items and headers. Is this the case, or should you never do this?

 

Use BOLD to bring a readers attention to a word. It stands out a lot more. Example: "I think you should not vote for Donald Trump"

Use Underline for titles and subtitles. Combining this with Bold makes it look a lot better. Example: "How to get the best weapon:"

Don't use Italics for sarcasm. Example: "You should definitely flyhack"

Strikethrough is usually used for attempting to remove mistakes comedic purposes, such as "hiding" text you didn't mean to put there. Example: "I hope you die and lose all your stuff beat the boss flawlessly!". I wouldn't advise using Strikethrough in General Suggestions or serious threads.

Colour is like a spice. Use a little of it, and it makes things better. Use tons, and you're left with a bad taste in your mouth (eyes?). Example: "Negative Identifications are in Red.". An important side note here: Be careful what colours you choose. Some colours are easy to read on one theme, but near impossible to read on another. Also, make sure to change your colour to "None" when you're finished writing in colour. This defaults the colour to Black on Light Themes, and White on Dark Themes (so it's easier for everyone to read).

Keep Font Size consistent. If you want to bring attention to words, don't use LARGE LETTERS, use Bold instead. Larger Letters should be used for titles, and Smaller Letters can be used for notes or external conversation. Examples: "How to make a good thread: Pt. 1" "Who's this "Grian" anyway? He sounds dumb...What's that? He's an admin? ...shoot."

Use Spoilers to split up text into easier to read sections. Examples:

Spoiler: My Suggestion

You should add housing into Wynncraft because it would be cool!

Spoiler: TL:DR

Add housing.

 

Was meant to signify for both themes, as I was pointing out the distinct blending of the color with the background, not just that it was black.