Here we go again

It is time for the annual website redesign.

On a more serious note I think this one should stick around for a while.

For a brief history, the guide was originally a Google Doc that I started during the Night Hold raid in Legion. If you want a trip down memory lane or never originally seen the guide, you can view it here.

3 Months later the Google Doc turned into the RetPaladin.xyz website. Originally, I called it the Ret Wiki and was using the MediaWiki platform. The intention was to have knowledgeable people help contribute and create their own pages and resources on the site. This never came to fruition, and the site was also awfully slow. I would link a screenshot if I could find one, but you can just imagine what Wikipedia looks like and make it look worse and have a dark theme.

At the end of 2017 I migrated the guide to WordPress. I am not a web dev of any sort and wanted something that would be easier to maintain. The site had several issues and was only marginally faster than MediaWiki. This could have been optimized in some way, but I choose to just abandon it and move on.

During December of 2018, the site was redesigned and running on a HTML + Bootstrap theme with no sort of CMS. This did prove to be much faster. The site also looked much better on mobile aside from the charts. However, maintenance and adding new pages was very work intensive. Every time I added a new page or changed a page name, I had to do updates for every single page on my site. Every time I made a new page, it was all HTML. There was no editor or page creator of any sort. It was a very laborious process.

Fast-forward to today, we are now on Ghost. It is much lighter than WordPress. In some cases, it loads faster than the HTML + Bootstrap version. When I create a new page, it will be updated across all pages. It has a built-in editor which makes creating new pages easier. I can also make "posts" as well. These are blog style articles. This will let me easily make short posts, or long posts, on assorted topics related to Ret.

I hope you all enjoy the new layout or at least find it usable. If you do see something that seems off or you feel is a detriment, please let me know.

I also want to thank all the people who support me on Patreon. When I first started the guide, I was unemployed as I quit my job due to elevated levels of stress and workplace dissatisfaction. My Patrons quite literally made it possible to keep the website running. The guide has served as a passion project and something I could devote my time and energy to create a resource I believe to be beneficial. It also helped me not think about real life circumstances. If you find my content helpful and you are in a secure financial position any support on my Patreon is greatly appreciated.