Contemporary Fantasy Genre Lounge, Please

November, 2011 was my first NaNoWriMo. The only thing missing from my great experience here is a Contemporary Fantasy genre lounge.

I know about the Fantasy lounge, but Fantasy and Contemporary Fantasy are different genres. There are major differences between the genres. One difference, Contemporary Fantasy is always set in the present day, on this world. Contemporary Fantasy does have some aspects of Fantasy - elves, magic to name two examples, but Contemporary Fantasy also has some elements of Horror and Supernatural. However, as with Fantasy, there are so many differences between the genres of Horror and Supernatural, and Contemporary Fantasy. I think that Urban Fantasy would fit in with Contemporary Fantasy.

I found one Urban Fantasy thread in the Horror and Supernatural lounge, and a Contemporary Fantasy thread in the Fantasy lounge. I only found those threads by Googling "Contemporary (or Urban)" + "NaNoWriMo." At the end of October, to the beginning of November, I thought there were not many NaNos writing Contemporary/Urban Fantasy, and that's why there wasn't a specific genre lounge. As time passed, I was surprised to come across other NaNos who were writing Contemporary/Urban Fantasy. I only came across a limited number of Contemporary/Urban Fantasy writers, but I think there are enough out there to justify a distinct genre lounge.

Right now, Contemporary/Urban Fantasy writers are spread all around the forums, posting to whichever genre forum seems most related to our individual story aspects. Everyone is welcomed in every forum, true and right enough. However, it would be wonderful to have an easy to find location where Contemporary Fantasy NaNos can congregate.

I wish we could have separate genre lounges (or even subforums) for all possibile genres; however, it's just not possible. While there may be differences between different subgenres, they still fall under the fantasy umbrella; contemporary fantasy, like high fantasy or other subgenres, is a subgenre of the overall fantasy heading. We aren't looking to create separate genre lounges at this time... we just don't have the page real estate! If we were to ever go that route, it would actually likely be High Fantasy that gets the first subgenre lounge, since more people write that kind than just about any other. Steampunk would be close after.

As much as we'd like to have a separate forum for each possibility, we just can't... not enough room!

Actually the optimal arrangement would be having a subarea for speculative fiction, and divide that further. Steampunk is a good example: is it science fiction (tangenting alternate history) or fantasy?

One reason for dividing the fantasy forum would be that the currect fantasy forum is HUGE. It's by far the largest genre lounge at the moment (glanced hastily). Only other "fact" gropus that are larger are plot doctoring and reference desk (which seem too large to be useful, BTW, and some groups that are more chatting groups...

That would actually mean adding a hierarchy level genre - subgenre, which might be reasonable, making it possible to get more separate forums without getting a looooooooooooooooooong unwieldy list of forums.

Apropos hierarchy levels: Why does going to the top level actually show both top level and the following?

When it could be just
Official stuff
December and beyond
etc.
and clicking that header would bring you to the list for that forum category?

The top list would be much shorter.

Is there a technical reason, as practically all the forum systems I've been using work that way (although some of them have subforums that you can see only by clicking open the main one)?

There's a sticky at the top of the fantasy forum: Welcome to the Fantasy Forum.

There are links to threads on all the different sub-genres listed right there -- added as they were created or a demand came along.

The sub-genre threads and other popular threads have been linked to the top of the forum for your convenience.

Also, a lot of threads are for help with people's specific stories or discuss aspects that overlap all over the place. Romance, death, dragons, unicorns, food -- these can show up in any sub-genre.

People rarely even use the sub-genre threads. Why should there be entire lounges? It would create confusion. We've got a whole thread (and several duplicates locked) from people asking if their novel is even fantasy. Now is your story contemporary or high or steampunk or historical or none of the above.

In a forum I use at work (the engine is simple machines, FYI, it is clumsy, byt the system has 20 users instead of half a million) there is at least one subforum having "general area" and then subforums. So the "general" is not part of the subforums.

I think the problem with dedicated subgenre threads is that when there starts to be more traffic, you suddenly get an enormous thread with very varying actual subject matter, and searching information there gets difficult.

Giving an (invented) example: somebody asks about magic swords in thread "high fantasy". Now there is a lot of discussion going on about kings, dragons, mad magicians, princesses and griffins, and the poor blade gets buried under this all...