How do you feel about post dislikes and like based "rating" system?

[Arnenna]

OKAY...

Let us take this thread as an example. By and large it has been very civil and has amassed at least half a dozen different solid viewpoints on this very subject. So,

Do we really need a system that means just because you disagree with someone else' view - you would therefore feel obliged to downgrade them?? And on the flip side of that, just because someone has the same opinion as you - you upgrade them?

That is where madness lies.

We can have decent conversations without the petty need to boost or demoralise someone's ego. If you don't like what they say, then write it in a post like we have done in this thread. No need to increase the pool of anonymous keyboard warriors.

Also, it would stifle the conversation massively. Some people would not post their feelings for fear of losing a rating. I can see why it would work for Cordovan because it means we are moderating the forums for him but at such a huge cost to our already limited freedom of speech when it comes to game matters.

I'm not sure responses in threads would matter, but the subject of a thread would. As we know from current forum activity, forum threads can often stray off course and lots of downgrading via responses that are not relevant to the thread topic would skew results.

I think it's just better all around to let people say what they want to say. If they want to big up something about the game, then they should go for it, without being hindered. Likewise for someone with a complaint.

[grallonsphere]

I find it difficult to believe people are really intimidated about posting on these forums. Just looking at the "Suggestions forum", the vast majority of suggestions have ZERO replies, positive, negative, anything at all. Would it really be intimidating to post in support of something that has had NO feedback at all? And is dissenting feed-back automatically a call for "Oh they are just trolling" or "Hating on me"? I can't imagine what people would feel if they visited the WoW or FF14 forums that have a "like" only system and the General Discussion forums for both of those game are completely overrun with actual trolls and little to no moderation of any kind. Those are quite clearly dumpster fires of forums.

But some disagreement over opinion or an idea is suddenly trolling?

I agree; and that is precisely the trap a Reddit-like upvote/downvote mechanism would spring. It's so much easier (an 'safer'...) to click a button rather than having to articulate one's opinion into a coherent post. I can already see how this would stifle the conversation and give way to the sort of mob rule we've seen on so many other social media platforms.

[Varmintkiller]

[You want to lecture me, OK. Then analyze the situation carefully before you do, because as said above, I went to check the OP's thread again (his suggested idea) and the comment in question under this thread. Nothing of what you said is true. The comment under this thread referred to that other thread and described the situation from this another thread, pretty much how it happened, and he did that as a response to the exact user who opened up this other thread (with the question whether they felt unwelcome there and why and describing the situation from the thread, which again, was perfectly ok, on point, and didn't have anything outright toxic).[/QUOTE]

You’re right, I should have looked up that old thread started by Aurehir. DoRonRon didn’t falsely ascribe an opinion to him. Instead, he took an actual opinion of Aurehir that was totally unrelated to this thread, and used it to deride Aurehir and claim that Aurehir would leave everyone else to suffer. And then, yes, said people who support SSG are just too inexperienced to know better.

I could do that too. Someone recently started a thread about animated people in boats, and how he/she would like those added in at some point. Nothing to do with this thread. But what if I ignored the fact that it was off-topic, and said something in this thread like “Oh, animated people in boats would make more lag, we’d all suffer for your silly animated people, only people who are inexperienced would ask for such a thing.” Can you honestly say you would be just fine with it? Can you honestly not see that it’s just a personal attack? (I don’t really have a problem with animated people, so don’t let this example send the thread shooting off in that direction.)

Again, though, convincing you is not really important. SSG just needs to understand why the forums are not that useful when it comes to feedback. I think they do.

[Arnenna]

What Aurehir posted was a thoughtful contribution about why many folks don’t post here often. Your reply was a perfect demonstration of the vituperative bile and bitterness that keeps many posters away. If SSG really wants these forums to be more useful, they need to curb behavior like yours.

It was an opinion, much like your post is your opinion, only, theirs isn't attacking another forum user. Having a go at someone because they have an opinion is what stifles posters here and why many people do not post. Bile and bitterness? Where? The poster used nothing of the sort.

The only bile and bitterness I see on the forum is when a poster comes in and shoots down another, calls them out, labels them, and chastises them for their honest opinion. If you don't like what a forum poster has to say, disagree with them and add your own viewpoint. What you think of their opinion, as another forum user is neither relevant or important.

Its why I don't frequent the forum as often as I used to. I come in here, add my thoughts on how something (something that I like already, but think could be better) in game can be improved, add some helpful hints for other players who are having problems with something, and then I'm labelled as a complainer for giving constructive feedback.

Can't be bothered with that. time is too precious to waste providing feedback just to be shot down in flames for it. SSG ask for it, players give it, some positive, some negative, and ALL should be welcome. I'm sure it is from SSG's standpoint, they just need to take care of the players trying to police what feedback they think they should get.

[Arnenna]

The majority of people on this platform isn't "trolls". An up/downvote system will prevent bad posts as it generally will get downvoted to oblivion. And if a post gets tons of upvotes its probably because a lot of people find it good.

Good initiative to modernize the forum, you shouldn't have to write a post to dislike/like something, an up/downvote system fixes this. I'm all in favor of this. And it might breath some life into the forums again and make it more interesting.

It sounds like the people who don't want it are afraid of getting downvoted.

Why would anyone here be afraid of being downvoted? Does anyone really think that a voting system is going to make any difference whatsoever to the outcome of suggestions and feedback on the forum?

All it may do - at best, is alert the forum moderators of hot topics - either way. A thread with a lot of thumbs up may be worth taking a closer look at and a thread with a lot of thumbs down will probably warrant an even closer look at. It's business at the end of the day, and if it were mine, I would be more worried about the unhappy customers than the happy ones. Happy ones usually don't leave, resulting in lost revenue.

A voting system wouldn't affect me. I'd post as I always post. What makes me avoid the forum is forum users trying to police the posts of others, and there is a massive amount of that happening here the last year or so. Its unhindered and unaddressed. Nothing else bothers me. I can wade through negativity like it's cool water on a hot day, same for positivity. What I can't manage, or won't to be more precise is forum users (note, not official moderators, just other players) trying to police other forum users.

[TesalionLortus]

I still stand by what I said though: its disgusting to bring up someone's position in a completely different thread, about a completely different subject, in this thread
when all someone posts is that she/ he finds these mbs intimidating.


Unless you think its fair game to bring up your completely unrelated posts about completely unrelated subjects, here to make my point?

It's not something that realistically happens very often. Say, if the poster in question actually does this with every single one of their posts as consistent argumentation tactic of sorts and is being utterly irrelevant in many such postings, true, seems like a bad behavior. But if that's just once in a moon, specifically to paint a relevant example (which it was here, regarding matters so heavily discussed here), I don't think it's "disgusting" If you're not going to do that in your every response to me, then sure, why not, feel free to bring up any of my other posts under any of the other threads, if it's relevant. I'm in a public space, consciously putting word out there in a public space - it's not my private space or private chat or private secret that's not allowed to reference, it's a huge difference

I think the issue is really unsolvable and ultimately boils down to people who expect long discussions and wanna say something, anything, positive or negative, but anything goes, no stifling of freedom of speech, and people who are very easily offended or don't want to put much into words or don't want to see long discussion between some parties and they're fine with harsh stifling of freedom of speech, even if based on mere conjecture and "fickle" so it's just as likely an innocent party will be harmed/banned in the process.

Maybe we should all have badges under our posts, choose either "I tend to write lengthier responses and view a forum as a place of (sorta) academic discourse. Feel free to engage me and challenge my view point, no tabu" and "I'm easily offended and don't like any heated discussions, I view my favorite game forum as a safe space for me to relax, please don't engage me" This may sound bizarre but I suspect it would solve the problem much better than any likes, dislikes, systems of shaming, harsh moderation, emotes etc. At least in general discourse, though there is still a question of how the heck am I supposed to add something and/or disagree with the other party who keeps posting peculiar suggestions or opinions but expects just a safe space... so in theory I shouldn't engage them? Maybe we should have a rule that says I can just post "Strongly disagree! I have reasonable arguments against it but can't post more" - the end - but in order for it to be fair the OP is forbidden from engaging any of those posters any further about this matter and trying to continue their original post or paint it like they're in the right despite disagreements, otherwise they'll be punished too. Someone gets their friendly safe space and can discuss their idea with people who think alike if they want, but otherwise you're stuck with a bunch of disagreements under your post and can't even ask why or try to convince them - something in exchange for something, no? And I can avoid triggering such people who don't feel "safe" here whatever that may entail. An original ruleset/community enviroment that I think probably doesn't exist anywhere online but hey, maybe LOTRO can be the first to implement it and revolutionize the internet

[Arnenna]

It's not something that realistically happens very often. Say, if the poster in question actually does this with every single one of their posts as consistent argumentation tactic of sorts and is being utterly irrelevant in many such postings, true, seems like a bad behavior. But if that's just once in a moon, specifically to paint a relevant example (which it was here, regarding matters so heavily discussed here), I don't think it's "disgusting" If you're not going to do that in your every response to me, then sure, why not, feel free to bring up any of my other posts under any of the other threads, if it's relevant. I'm in a public space, consciously putting word out there in a public space - it's not my private space or private chat or private secret that's not allowed to reference, it's a huge difference

I think the issue is really unsolvable and ultimately boils down to people who expect long discussions and wanna say something, anything, positive or negative, but anything goes, no stifling of freedom of speech, and people who are very easily offended or don't want to put much into words or don't want to see long discussion between some parties and they're fine with harsh stifling of freedom of speech, even if based on mere conjecture and "fickle" so it's just as likely an innocent party will be harmed/banned in the process.

Maybe we should all have badges under our posts, choose either "I tend to write lengthier responses and view a forum as a place of (sorta) academic discourse. Feel free to engage me and challenge my view point, no tabu" and "I'm easily offended and don't like any heated discussions, I view my favorite game forum as a safe space for me to relax, please don't engage me" This may sound bizarre but I suspect it would solve the problem much better than any likes, dislikes, systems of shaming, harsh moderation, emotes etc. At least in general discourse, though there is still a question of how the heck am I supposed to add something and/or disagree with the other party who keeps posting peculiar suggestions or opinions but expects just a safe space... so in theory I shouldn't engage them? Maybe we should have a rule that says I can just post "Strongly disagree! I have reasonable arguments against it but can't post more" - the end - but in order for it to be fair the OP is forbidden from engaging any of those posters any further about this matter and trying to continue their original post or paint it like they're in the right despite disagreements, otherwise they'll be punished too. Someone gets their friendly safe space and can discuss their idea with people who think alike if they want, but otherwise you're stuck with a bunch of disagreements under your post and can't even ask why or try to convince them - something in exchange for something, no? And I can avoid triggering such people who don't feel "safe" here whatever that may entail. An original ruleset/community enviroment that I think probably doesn't exist anywhere online but hey, maybe LOTRO can be the first to implement it and revolutionize the internet

While in general, its not considered great to refer to other threads because it can become confusing to readers that aren't aware of them, people do do it here and for many different reasons. There are people in this thread that have done it. Some do it from a positive stand point, some to defend their own viewpoint and some from nothing but a neutral stance. I see no issue with it. It's nowhere near as toxic as name calling and there is far, far, far more of that going down.

Your idea of little badges made me laugh. They would have to be interchangeable though. I can see yours as "Welcomes Debate" in this thread, however, in the dwarf thread, it would have to be "Approach at your own peril." See what I did there? Referencing a different thread is about as far from toxic as it gets. Seriously though, if people can't handle a little negative feedback, they should maybe stay away from the internet. Its a cakewalk here, mild and cool compared to many other forum sites.

[TesalionLortus]

I could do that too. Someone recently started a thread about animated people in boats, and how he/she would like those added in at some point. Nothing to do with this thread. But what if I ignored the fact that it was off-topic, and said something in this thread like “Oh, animated people in boats would make more lag, we’d all suffer for your silly animated people, only people who are inexperienced would ask for such a thing.”

In this example it clearly sounds snarky though, with no room for doubt. If it was framed more like the post in question, so "Did you feel unsafe in that boat thread you made? Animated people may cause more lag but since you support that, you would be evidently fine with leaving us stranded with even more lag. SSG should also provide a comment about the subject rather than stay silent, so we have some idea of how feasible something like this would be. We should all stand in one row and try to benefit as a player base. Even the players who are yet to advance further in the game and avidly support such changes like animated boat NPCs, but they are in for a huge surprise when lag hits." (Which doesn't really make me feel like you're specifically referring to me in that last sentence) If that's the case, then OK, feel free to do that, you have every right to. Although note... to that, I can respond: Yes, I felt safe under that thread, in fact I kept posting, because there is nothing that stops me from posting. Also, here is why I don't think animated people on boats would influence lag, which is very likely. Etc. Whereas, it would more difficult to defend against the lag affecting other people argument in the discussed OG example. Bandwidth is bandwidth, after all, it doesn't sprinkle out of a thin air. If it's getting prioritized towards somewhere, then that means those who aren't prioritized would surely feel the results of the prioritization. So we have some underlying differences here, and in the end, yeah! Feel free to refer to my posts or threads.

Anyway, makes me wonder, would you support my crazy solution from the post above? :P Sounds revolutionary and such rules would be easy for me to follow!

[TesalionLortus]

Your idea of little badges made me laugh. They would have to be interchangeable though. I can see yours as "Welcomes Debate" in this thread, however, in the dwarf thread, it would have to be "Approach at your own peril." See what I did there? Referencing a different thread is about as far from toxic as it gets. Seriously though, if people can't handle a little negative feedback, they should maybe stay away from the internet. Its a cakewalk here, mild and cool compared to many other forum sites.

I can proudly wear many different badges! Why not! Make this a collectible game. Like crypto kitties. You can have your forum "stance" displayed to inform others but also a cool collectible images proudly displayed, gather them through in-game deeds :P

[TesalionLortus]

Why would anyone here be afraid of being downvoted? Does anyone really think that a voting system is going to make any difference whatsoever to the outcome of suggestions and feedback on the forum?

All it may do - at best, is alert the forum moderators of hot topics - either way. A thread with a lot of thumbs up may be worth taking a closer look at and a thread with a lot of thumbs down will probably warrant an even closer look at. It's business at the end of the day, and if it were mine, I would be more worried about the unhappy customers than the happy ones. Happy ones usually don't leave, resulting in lost revenue.

Earlier in the thread I referred to the latest fiasco with blue water - this is one of the factors that make me feel a bit concerned our devs aren't ready for it :P Like, something like this happened, based on such "numbers" feedback, but shouldn't have happened, it was silly and wasted dev effort. Numbers feedback and "hot" feedback are not always good feedbacks that you should blindly follow, as others have already mentioned in this thread, and seems like the devs already cave in to such "hot" bug reports, so adding "hot" like/dislike factor would be even greater risk of such fails due to apparent demand (which I say apparent, because again, I'm not convinced the total number of forum users is any way indicative of the larger player base - and people not entirely satisfied don't always choose to complain about it, some get burnt out and just silently quit, for example - they don't offer feedback nor ideas). So unless you're a Forever-In-Open-Beta steam game, it's not something smart to focus on "hot" forum feedback, from a business standpoint - because as a business you're also looking at the big picture - fixing major graphical bugs seems like a better business decision and good image for the game, for example, than trying to satisfy some complainers who will most likely not quit over something superficial like "water not being blue enough"

So, in theory, downvote me to oblivion and I wouldn't care. But in practice it's far worse to keep the balance (as a dev) when you're constantly exposed to these "hot hot" reactions that make you feel like "ah, we gotta do it, or ah, we can't do it because look at that, 1k dislikes" - but maybe for 1k dislikes there are 10k silent players who would actually find something appealing?

[Arnenna]

I can proudly wear many different badges! Why not! Make this a collectible game. Like crypto kitties. You can have your forum "stance" displayed to inform others but also a cool collectible images proudly displayed, gather them through in-game deeds :P

Ohh I know it for sure. I've been on the pointy end of quite a few of your badges for sure, as you have on mine. Holding grudges though, and carrying baggage for weeks, months or even a year or more, not my bag. Don't think it's yours either. Seems we both understand the nature of debate, how to get past it and still hold the ability to sit and enjoy a cool drink in each other's company later on.


I'm wearing my "Cheeky Monkey" badge today

[Varmintkiller]

Anyway, makes me wonder, would you support my crazy solution from the post above? :P Sounds revolutionary and such rules would be easy for me to follow!

I would have no problem with you and others here having badges, or trading badges, or collecting badges, for whatever reasons you like. I likewise have no concern about which of you stays, or goes, or posts more, or posts less.

My sole concern with the forums is that SSG not come to the mistaken conclusion that what gets posted here by the thousands-of-posts forum royalty somehow represents how most players feel. Sure, it would be nice if others found the forums useful, but I don’t really see why SSG should prioritize it, particularly if they can get more useful feedback elsewhere. To that end, as I posted earlier, I think surveys could work.

Anyway, as long as SSG seems to understand the limitations of the forum’s input, I’m more than happy to go back to just playing the game and only coming here to check the announcements threads. And you folks can go back to doing whatever floats your boat. Get it?

[Vilan]

I can proudly wear many different badges! Why not! Make this a collectible game. Like crypto kitties. You can have your forum "stance" displayed to inform others but also a cool collectible images proudly displayed, gather them through in-game deeds :P

OK, the idea of "forum stances" made me LOL. "Another long-winded post about lag, time to switch to Endurance stance..."

As you were.

[Arnenna]

I would have no problem with you and others here having badges, or trading badges, or collecting badges, for whatever reasons you like. I likewise have no concern about which of you stays, or goes, or posts more, or posts less.

My sole concern with the forums is that SSG not come to the mistaken conclusion that what gets posted here by the thousands-of-posts forum royalty somehow represents how most players feel. Sure, it would be nice if others found the forums useful, but I don’t really see why SSG should prioritize it, particularly if they can get more useful feedback elsewhere. To that end, as I posted earlier, I think surveys could work.

Anyway, as long as SSG seems to understand the limitations of the forum’s input, I’m more than happy to go back to just playing the game and only coming here to check the announcements threads. And you folks can go back to doing whatever floats your boat. Get it?

The thousands-of-posts forum royalty? That's a prime example of exactly what I was talking about earlier. That's a bit rich coming from someone who accused someone else that their wording made someone else look like a "noob", yet your ok with using wording that makes someone with a high post count look like they are favoured in some way or see themselves as a majority.

Trust me, if post count had anything to do with either of those things, the game we play would be much different and a few people who use these boards, along with the friends they randomly pull in to back them up wouldn't be permitted here.

Post count holds zero sway with SSG. Ask them.

You've just undone all the good things you actually had to say with one pretty toxic phrase. Well done you!

Time to stick on my "Not Interested" badge and bow out, which to be honest, i should have done a page ago. This was always heading to this exact spot. It's why I don't stay here long anymore or bother to try to give SSG feedback when they ask for it.

[Fadil]

It's not something that realistically happens very often. Say, if the poster in question actually does this with every single one of their posts as consistent argumentation tactic of sorts and is being utterly irrelevant in many such postings, true, seems like a bad behavior. But if that's just once in a moon, specifically to paint a relevant example (which it was here, regarding matters so heavily discussed here), I don't think it's "disgusting" If you're not going to do that in your every response to me, then sure, why not, feel free to bring up any of my other posts under any of the other threads, if it's relevant. I'm in a public space, consciously putting word out there in a public space - it's not my private space or private chat or private secret that's not allowed to reference, it's a huge difference

I think the issue is really unsolvable and ultimately boils down to people who expect long discussions and wanna say something, anything, positive or negative, but anything goes, no stifling of freedom of speech, and people who are very easily offended or don't want to put much into words or don't want to see long discussion between some parties and they're fine with harsh stifling of freedom of speech, even if based on mere conjecture and "fickle" so it's just as likely an innocent party will be harmed/banned in the process.

Nah, sorry but that's not what is at stake.
Prime example: you are in this post completely misrepresenting what other people, who you disagree with, think/ want.
Ofc it's that they are easily offended...ofc it's that they want to harshly stifle freedom of speech..
How about you actually try to listen to what they want, instead of misrepresenting their opinions?

A lot of people (myself included) who post here dont mind long discussions, or replies, and usually arent easily hurt/ upset about attacks.
That doesnt mean those attacks or the excessive negativity here are okay though.
Some continue to ignore that there are quite a lot of people who do feel these forums are too toxic, up to a point where
they either completely stop posting here, or maybe only lurk and find other ways to express themselves (as in contacting devs in other ways).

If those people could upvote posts they agree with, its simply giving them some freedom of speech too and a way to express what they like/ dont like about the game.
Or was that freedom of speech only meant for some and not for others.:P

[Phantion]

I humbly apologize to any readers of the LOTRO forums who ever felt offended or intimidated by my posts. I want to get that out there. I'm not sure if I'm one of the voices Cord has in mind, but I want to mention that, before I started posting, I was pretty under-confident and scared to post. I often got into some lore debates with others that made me honestly write out a post when I had some down-time and then delete it just out of concern that, "I don't want to get embroiled" in this or that lore debate. Sometimes, someone will post a big response to something I wrote, and I'll just decide, "not worth my time today," and I can see it going both ways.

I have to thank SSG- because, really, just overcoming that hurdle of under-confidence was a much needed boost to me. But I think I often overcompensate and go in the opposite direction and . . . end up with these super-long posts. I think I get very . . . well, excited about Tolkien and the game, and I can see how just the idea of getting a big block of text in response to something can seem very overwhelming to folks.

So, if I'm one of "them," I'm very sorry- and hope whatever forums changes they make, they'll make players less afraid and able to share their own enthusiasm for the game, Tolkien, etc.

Cheers!

[TesalionLortus]

If those people could upvote posts they agree with, its simply giving them some freedom of speech too and a way to express what they like/ dont like about the game.
Or was that freedom of speech only meant for some and not for others.:P

I wasn't against a like alone (but no to dislikes ), though I do have some concerns related to the likes making things seem "hot" (but forum, even the one with increased activity through likes, is far from majority anyway). You said I misrepresented something but I don't think I did. You weren't really who we discussed, after all, and if you say you're fine with discussions, ok, that was never in question. But we were discussing specific statements you and others made regarding a supposedly "disgusting" behavior of the other poster (or even calls for "weeding out" of such people) and now you quickly try to shift the subject once I challenged you on the toxicity arguments you made. Anyway, to each their own, arguments were made.

I think it's safe to assume the devs aren't exactly much influenced by this forum, as of right now. Seems rather fair. They do read some posts and threads, and they see things, but they're more likely to go "oh that's something interesting" or "those arguments and screenshot examples sound reasonable" when they read something that actually evokes such thoughts as opposed to "oh, that's a huge demand numbered in thousands, gotta do it!". It may appear there are some numerous entitled people here screaming this is how the game should play/how it did play in its "golden" age but it doesn't mean the devs listen to those people, can't think of any recent example that they do.




Yesss, I want useful surveys... I think this is how a potential dwarven survey should go. And send it by associated account email to every -confirmed active- player of the game!

Female dwarfs. Which one do you like better? You can choose more than one! Let's settle this matter once and for all!

Current models:
- Classic, just male models used.
- Dis - very soft femininized body, small beard, older female dwarf who evokes a grandma feeling.
- Fastrith, Hersegg (have links to wiki images of them too) - very soft femininized bodies with strong curved shapes, not of strong posture, humanly feminized hairstyles.
- Ragna the Fierce, Ausma etc - custom female designs, but similar to classic.


I think you didn't strike a good balance yet:
- Make dwarven woman recognizable as women through customs, attire, and beards/hairstyle, not as much body shapes
- Dwarven women shouldn't use hairstyles and attire associated with women of other races
- etc

And other specific questions, like, women dwarfs should have visible boobs, yes or no. Women dwarfs should have more stony expressions, yes or no. Etc.


Then, players who choose too many answers, only make their stance that they're fine with "whatever" apparent (and contributing their number to most options) but SSG can viably choose between the actually most popular specific ones

[Arnenna]

I humbly apologize to any readers of the LOTRO forums who ever felt offended or intimidated by my posts. I want to get that out there. I'm not sure if I'm one of the voices Cord has in mind, but I want to mention that, before I started posting, I was pretty under-confident and scared to post. I often got into some lore debates with others that made me honestly write out a post when I had some down-time and then delete it just out of concern that, "I don't want to get embroiled" in this or that lore debate. Sometimes, someone will post a big response to something I wrote, and I'll just decide, "not worth my time today," and I can see it going both ways.

I have to thank SSG- because, really, just overcoming that hurdle of under-confidence was a much needed boost to me. But I think I often overcompensate and go in the opposite direction and . . . end up with these super-long posts. I think I get very . . . well, excited about Tolkien and the game, and I can see how just the idea of getting a big block of text in response to something can seem very overwhelming to folks.

So, if I'm one of "them," I'm very sorry- and hope whatever forums changes they make, they'll make players less afraid and able to share their own enthusiasm for the game, Tolkien, etc.

Cheers!

Lovely post. As long as your not sticking labels on people, calling them names, ridiculing them (ie, calling them stupid, unwise, ridiculous etc), or a personal bugbear of mine - misquoting them or changing their actual words into something completely different - then nobody should be feeling intimidated or offended by what you post. Doesn't matter if its a one liner or half a book, or whether it's your 5th of 20,000th post. I've never seen you post anything remotely offensive or intimidating. Just want to put that out there before I go.

[DoRonRon]

@Arnenna

It's your journey that many are still to make. A pity we can't pull together so that they need not make it.
+1

@TesalionLortus
/bow
+2

How did the act of "quoting" turn into defcon 5 for some?

Sorry Arnenna you would have got the same number in the proposed system.

I'm a very chilled guy. I have slept the day away.

Because if I play in the wee small hours I can experience the game as many others can. No one else for miles around and immediate missions hand in. Some elite sport on another screen or a host of great podcasts to explore to widen my knowledge.

I do watch those streams that talk of "toxic" forums to grateful followers to believe when it's only because their nonsense was found out here. Trouble is their nonsense is not monitored even on the official and skews opinions as well as poorer game choices. But if the followers are so taken in, what CAN they offer to discussions? A few thumbs down on command? Trawling those very "toxic" forums for some nuggets of wisdom to convey not beneath them though.

It's the same on their live streams, start asking questions that might reveal the pretence and watch the body language, how dare we challenge them. I stick to videos now.

All a bit precarious to have so many platforms you have no control over in order to create some following and the pot of gold, that only a few attain. Other motivators have to be in play.


We will be accused of putting up a stalking horse next...

@Phantion

You raised a good point. I rarely touch any Lore discussions. Have read Lotr perhaps 3 or 4 times; first time it came to me, as the youngest, loose in a manila envelope much tattered. More pristine tomes came later. Being more techy it was never going to be with a scholarly mind set.

I'm not exactly intimidated to venture into those discussions, it's just that I can recognize there are others with a vast wealth of knowledge to inform their postings.
If I was to venture there I'm sure someone would put me straight on misconceptions I might have. I'm intelligent enough to not fight futile battles I'm never going to win.
I would not presume to up or down vote in ignorance either.


It would be like a "metric" that reports a value to SSG and not the multiple reasons that contribute to it. "Smart" devices and tech just handling over a choice of what to look at into the hands of mob generated AI or who knows what clod. An Idiocracy?

[DoRonRon]

I missed that post and I now see it. I thought this was about another thread and checked the wrong thread.

I still stand by what I said though: its disgusting to bring up someone's position in a completely different thread, about a completely different subject, in this thread
when all someone posts is that she/ he finds these mbs intimidating.

OP posted she/ he finds the mbs intimidating and that a few very loud voices intimidate others.
OP is 100% correct, as this thread shows.

Unless you think its fair game to bring up your completely unrelated posts about completely unrelated subjects, here to make my point?

Quite often I start off a reply with questions to clarify the circumstances. It might be very relevant to what they are seeing. My intention was to engage with the poster who felt marginalised and only raised the prior thread as a test case to gauge if that had been such an occasion and if I might take the opportunity for some self reflection in the future. I would however value their contribution still. Another seems to have assumed that duty. I can forgive not finding the specific thread, no point in locking yourself into an opinion on bad intel.

I do put the effort into reading whole threads before my contributions, in order, too often I see the work around offered up and excepted by the OP with thanks and yet followed by posters just replying to the OP with just the same advice or something else entirely and not at all relevant having missed out on the building picture.

It is very frustrating when OPs come with such little context and hope for some help. Might explain why CS all left or moved up if snowed under with such vague reports. I'm selfish, free them from the largely irrelevant and get to the nuanced bugs for a change. I don't hold up the devs and engineers in such regard as other's might because I had a few years doing code reviews and fixing bugs. No blame culture but not a no responsibility culture. Sort it and move on. I got to work with some very clever people and took their brilliance and turned it into innovative software for our clients. Systems analysis is a process. For me, seeing someone admit to not getting "math"(s) is just another piece of intel, we all reach our limit, mine was in University and rather stalled things.

I'm not immune to errors, you can find me coming back to a thread when it happens to hold my hands up. It might be more onerous for others to do that.

We can't just assume peoples thought process so we should take steps to find them out. Perhaps endeavouring to find out is seen as an attack when it's about reaching some commonality with which to proceed. Comes from dealing with the client's staff who are to use the software up to figuring how to implement what my boss came up with. Am I to deliver a button to press or software to bring the talents of their designers into it? The latter was so much easier, for me. I can appreciate the less user interaction with the software the better, just not in an MMO.

[Feoh]

Would a different system be able to help counter the belief that six people who post a hundred times over the course of a month about an issue represent the majority? Maybe, maybe not, but it's at least worth thinking about, since nothing is actually being proposed at the moment.

No it wouldn't. Putting a cap on the amount of posts by those six people would be more effective.

[LabadalofDorlomin]

Sorry but this thread solves nothing and is a prime example of what's wrong with this forum.

And you think that having a upgrade or downgrade button will solve all these problems? It will actually cause more problems?

Did you not hear/ read that a large group of players signal (as they have done so often on this very mb) that they dont dare to post here, that they feel intimidated
or just simply dislike the extreme toxicity of these mbs?

So, what you propose is to create another added system on top that will still prevent folks who don't like forums for whatever reason and also on top of that, stifle the few folks that do actively post on threads?

If people who feel too intimidated to post here, might add to a discussion by upvoting (still dont support downvoting for reasons I described) it might
give a hint how people think about certain issues. A LOT better than having to wade through the endless posts of the same tiny group
of toxic posters...day in day out.

What you are actually doing is creating the scenario that you state that you're trying to avoid. By having a system whereby the audience votes by popularity makes the reader almost instantly discount anyone on a low rating. I know you say that you don't like downvoting but think about it... even having a neutral rating is the same as being down rated.

Right now you can either read or discount what the serial posters say if you don't aqree with them which makes a rating system moot. The IMPORTANT thing should be the subject and not the individual posters. We do have a Thread rating system already in place but it is rarely used. In fact the only times I tend to see it used is within Sub-threads for individual issues such as a class forum or MP etc...

So, maybe this is what Cordovan could work on making more usable and easier to define the output instead of designing a system that beats down on individual posters.

[Fadil]

And you think that having a upgrade or downgrade button will solve all these problems? It will actually cause more problems?



So, what you propose is to create another added system on top that will still prevent folks who don't like forums for whatever reason and also on top of that, stifle the few folks that do actively post on threads?

How does allowing people to upvote certain posts, stifle others?
I can post something and then see that no one upvotes it, that only signals to me that not many players agree with a particular idea I posted, and you move on, period.

Unlike you I am not talking about a scenario with ratings (which would actually be an incredible bad idea), and I posted multiple times I think downvoting is a bad idea.

Right now you can either read or discount what the serial posters say if you don't aqree with them which makes a rating system moot. The IMPORTANT thing should be the subject and not the individual posters.

The IMPORTANT thing should be that many signal they dont post here at all because of the negativity/ toxicity of the forums.
Do those players matter at all?
I dont see anything in your post that would change that or that would make the forums more welcoming to all players.

[Rylnconn]

Now, I'm not sure what exactly Cordovan meant by it and whether he means to apply this globally or not. But he mentioned something like this on the stream and that he wants to try it.

He mentioned that a dislike/like system may have benefits - like, make it more visible what people really want/don't want as "quality" feedback loop. While likes alone, as a way to express some sort of silent agreement, don't strike me in a bad way, the dislike system does - forum (or any sort of online engagement for that matter, so that would include something like the official reddit or discord too) would be really just a minority of total player base, no? So there is no logical argument that the thing mostly disliked here on the forum would be necessarily a totally bad idea for the game. This appears as a logical conclusion to me, unless all their money SSG gets really lies with all those vocal players from the forum... but I highly doubt it - most likely than not, there is a huge portion of unvocal players who contribute to the game's earnings. Even some of the frequent posters wouldn't bother to just follow up on every single thread and click their like/dislike to make sure SSG gets a "proper feedback loop." Thus, I feel like SSG should judge all ideas on merit and their own grey cells, because any idea or feedback given may be insightful in some way - and restrain from any sort of bias based on what's liked or disliked the most here on the forum. It's worth to mention it's easy to hit a like or dislike button. It's harder to actually explain yourself in more detail and true, not everyone has the time or patience to do that, but if someone does, isn't that worth of any consideration and fair treatment, even if some happen to dislike it and clicked a button en masse?

Furthermore, he said that a "rating" based on those likes (I think?) may prompt some threads more than others (on main page?). Personally, I don't think it's a good idea either. The only threads ever prompted would be lag ones and screaming game is dead ones, without any coherence, even worse than before - any sort of constructive discussion and interesting story/world design/housing/and whatnot threads falling even more behind and buried, due to "low engagement" (likes) numbers. It's the truth of the matter people massively like/dislike such "trending rage" threads, easily written, and very general so "whatever goes there" - if they're a simple controversial title - rather than something very specific with a larger text. Something like this may work with reddit - which is usually a short format anyway, to talk about the game but as far as feedback goes the reddit rule is to blindly downvote anyone who says a single bad word about any aspect of the game into oblivion. Doesn't really sound like a format good for a forum though. Plus, I like the chronological aspect of the forum, and thread rating/prompt system based on some kind of factors really sounds like it would do away with that chronology, to some degree

That's my two cents, what do you think?

A forum based rating system would never work ..
theres not enough players active on the forum to give an accurate cross section of player population ( truly there are less than a hundred regular posters on the forums )
If ssg is serious about getting a yardstick measurement on the players likes or dislikes then the only way is to have a small questionnaire added to your accounts email :
Every account weather f2p or vip can be involved .
Ssg could send out the questionnaires monthly , quarterly or annually : personally I think quarterly would work especially in the beginning as to address the most important issues sooner than later .
Then perhaps after a year of the quarterlies ssg could reduce the frequency .
This is the best way for ssg to get concrete answers to what are the games main issues are .
Also its the best way to keep a finger on the pulse of the game .
One thing ssg could do to make sure of a high player involvement in the questionnaire would be to offer random awards ( say Lp gifts to 10 players that answered the questionnaire ).
If the rewards were high enough it would help curtail any players apathy and ensure a decent player involvement .