Can't help you with your Galaxy problem, as I've never used it.

Regarding tracking forum topics: just tick the checkbox that says 'This is my favourite topic' which appears near the right side of the comment thread at the top and bottom of each page. The forum software used here is homemade, and is as tangled and bug-ridden as a sackful of plague rats. So, yeah, any post will vanish from your 'My posts' page something like a week after your first post in that thread, and won't reappear there no matter how recently or frequently you subsequently post there, unless you've had a reply in that thread since you last visited it. Basically, if you think you may want to follow a given topic for more than a few days...fave it.

If you're interested, there are a [url=https://www.gog.com/forum/general/adalia_fundamentals_fixing_gog_so_you_dont_have_to]userscripts that add extra functionality and options to the site (including the forums). I don't use either of them, but tons of people here swear by them (though if you only occasionally visit the site, or don't care about the non-forum-related features, these might not appeal to you much).

There used to be an options menu on the bottom left (because that makes so much sense) that allowed you to make some deeper changes. I think install path was one of them, but I don't use Galaxy and am of only second-hand help, at best. See if it's still there, perhaps?

EDIT: typo

The gear icon at the bottom of the installed games list on the left. The bottom three settings on the pop-up are "Install games to:" (with Manage all folders manually tick box), "Download games to:" (basically, the temporary holding folder for game files as they're downloaded) and "Download extras to:". These only apply to games installed through Galaxy.

For games installed from downloaded installers, the "+" icon at the top allows you to scan your computer for installed games. If they don't appear, you can go to the game's library page, click More > Manage > Import Folder. This allows you to manually locate the game's folder.

I am aware of how to configure the default installation location. When you install a game via GOG Galaxy it will ask you where you want the game to be installed to and gives you an opportunity to choose a location other than the default location. For a list of issues with this process:

- the default installation path is currently configured to "E:\GOG Games\" and if I install The Witcher 3 to the default location "E:\GOG Games\" it will actually install it to "E:\GOG Games\The Witcher 3\" (If I choose to install it to "E:\" it will install to "E:\The Witcher 3\", if I choose to install it to "E:\banana\" it will install to "E:\banana\The Witcher 3\")

- I can't change that "The Witcher 3" portion of the installation path

- I can't tell it to directly install in to the specified folder, instead of a mystery subfolder. For example I can't intuitively specify "E:\GOG Games\The Witcher 3\" as the installation path in order to get the game to install to "E:\GOG Games\The Witcher 3\", instead I have to unintuitively tell it to install to "E:\GOG Games\".

- I can't tell in advance that it will create a folder within the specified destination. The interface doesn't mention it will create a "The Witcher 3" folder at the specified destination.

Because of these issues I don't know what GOG Galaxy names the install folder for Age of Wonders III, so I don't know what to rename my pre-existing folder to in order to appease GOG Galaxy. It also means that I have to specify a location one level up from where the game is actually installed to. For example if the game is installed to "E:\Age of Wonders III\" and I tell GOG Galaxy to install to "E:\Age of Wonders III" it will actually check "E:\Age of Wonders III\Age of Wonders III\" for pre-existing files and not "E:\Age of Wonders III\" (Assuming the install folder GOG Galaxy uses is named "Age of Wonders III") It will then begin downloading an entirely new copy of the game to install to "E:\Age of Wonders III\Age of Wonders III\"

It's all just a big mess of unintuitiveness and dumbness.

It also doesn't warn you when cancelling downloads, instead it just instantly cancels the download and deletes everything pertaining to the download. Good luck if you accidentally click the Cancel button by accident on your multi-gigabyte size game! The Cancel button doesn't have a tooltip or anything, it's just an extremely small button with an even smaller X on it that is a similar colour to the buttons background.

Directing the manual scan to the games main folder is enough, the game doesn't need to be installed in a folder with the same name as the respective Galaxy folder. If Galaxy does download the game again, it is because your installation is too old and needs to be updated in order to work work with Galaxy.

This is indeed not very user friendly and it differs from virtually all other software out there however I'm sure it is just a temporary limitation of the heavily beta state of the software. They will most likely greatly improve the user interface to this in a manner similar to how all other software works in the future I imagine, or I can't think of any good reason why they wouldn't anyway. Yes, I've done that before a few times and killed an 8GB or so download as it was nearing completion too. The UI needs some work but I'm sure they're well aware of it. Hopefully 1.1.6 or 1.2 or whatever is the next release will resolve some of these issues though. If not, hopefully they hire Joel Spolsky. :)