Introducing: The Forum Reputation System

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Originally Posted by DeputyDonkey

Thats a fair point. I just assumed that most would down vote based on disagreeing with the content but if its really meant for toxicity or meaningless posts then I suppose it could be useful.

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I think your assumption will ultimately be correct. I expect anyone on either side of the engineering debate to have horrible rep by weeks end.

Interesting. Curious to see my reputation is actually as good as my ego tells it is. :smirk:

The Reputation System: What's Good, What's Bad, What Needs to be Done

As a brief overview, I'd like to touch on some of the flaws in this system. I'll also go over some of the good things that come with this system, and some of the possible fixes. Let's start with the good:

The Good

1. It rewards good and constructive discussion.
This one's a no brainer. With this new system, people can see rewards in making greater strides to the community, such as troop ideas, balance ideas, and other novel ideas for developing the mechanics of the game. Grand ideas such as Mastermind's Quests and detailed troop ideas are to be rewarded greatly. This is almost certainly the intention in making this.


2. It encourages the building of an actual reputation.
Quantifying the true reputation of a person in a way other than their post count in this way is more effective in that a. massively contributing posts are rewarded over short, blippy ones and b. reputation is based on other people, rather than a system-defined number.


The Bad
1. It discourages dissenting opinions.
Discussion is fine and dandy, but the fear of a downvote could prevent people from sharing constructive yet unpopular opinions, facing an unofficial punishment in the form of a ton of downvotes. Thus, people will be more encouraged to preach the postings of people in power or those with already high reputation, rather than formulate their own opinion. This also means the possibility of the formation of echo chambers in General - people just continuously agree with each other without really considering what is the best way. Many issues have been raised and addressed through complaints in the forums; with this fear of posting, issues cannot be addressed, because they aren't being raised in the first place.


2. There's no good way to monitor this.
Moderators are *ahem* unpaid volunteers, and they already have to deal with a ton of reports daily. The issue arises with a flurry of up and down votes coming in: how can the mods check for abuse and incorrect application of the vote? They have the ability to do so, but the enforcement of it is unclear.


3. People will be more concerned with votes on their posts rather than content.
Look to YouTube as an example for this. Many YouTubers are focused on their viewcounts because it is a sign of success and good revenue for the content creator. Phrases such as "If you liked this content, please give me a reputation point" could easily become commonplace.


The Fixes
1. Remove the downvote.
You don't need it. What the negative rep button tries to solve for, the report button can solve for already. Reddit's downvote system is constantly misapplied, despite the fact that it explicitly says that "downvotes are to be used for posts that add nothing to the discussion" which it is rarely used for. An upvote only system gets rid of problem 1 entirely and to an extent problem 2.


2. Ban phrases that are used to attract reputation point.
Basically, just make rule 20 a bit more broad to prevent this from happening, since it already covers manipulation.

3. Give Off-Topic the Reputation System.
Yes, I get it's a trial period, but there's no reason to withhold it from another testing ground! The justification for excluding OT from the test could be applied to any other subforum. Off-Topic is actually a decently constructive place, and the test results of the reputation system will not be as wholesome without giving OT a chance.

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Originally Posted by Radiating

The Reputation System: What's Good, What's Bad, What Needs to be Done

As a brief overview, I'd like to touch on some of the flaws in this system. I'll also go over some of the good things that come with this system, and some of the possible fixes. Let's start with the good:

The Good

1. It rewards good and constructive discussion.
This one's a no brainer. With this new system, people can see rewards in making greater strides to the community, such as troop ideas, balance ideas, and other novel ideas for developing the mechanics of the game. Grand ideas such as Mastermind's Quests and detailed troop ideas are to be rewarded greatly. This is almost certainly the intention in making this.


2. It encourages the building of an actual reputation.
Quantifying the true reputation of a person in a way other than their post count in this way is more effective in that a. massively contributing posts are rewarded over short, blippy ones and b. reputation is based on other people, rather than a system-defined number.


The Bad
1. It discourages dissenting opinions.
Discussion is fine and dandy, but the fear of a downvote could prevent people from sharing constructive yet unpopular opinions, facing an unofficial punishment in the form of a ton of downvotes. Thus, people will be more encouraged to preach the postings of people in power or those with already high reputation, rather than formulate their own opinion. This also means the possibility of the formation of echo chambers in General - people just continuously agree with each other without really considering what is the best way. Many issues have been raised and addressed through complaints in the forums; with this fear of posting, issues cannot be addressed, because they aren't being raised in the first place.


2. There's no good way to monitor this.
Moderators are *ahem* unpaid volunteers, and they already have to deal with a ton of reports daily. The issue arises with a flurry of up and down votes coming in: how can the mods check for abuse and incorrect application of the vote? They have the ability to do so, but the enforcement of it is unclear.


3. People will be more concerned with votes on their posts rather than content.
Look to YouTube as an example for this. Many YouTubers are focused on their viewcounts because it is a sign of success and good revenue for the content creator. Phrases such as "If you liked this content, please give me a reputation point" could easily become commonplace.


The Fixes
1. Remove the downvote.
You don't need it. What the negative rep button tries to solve for, the report button can solve for already. Reddit's downvote system is constantly misapplied, despite the fact that it explicitly says that "downvotes are to be used for posts that add nothing to the discussion" which it is rarely used for. An upvote only system gets rid of problem 1 entirely and to an extent problem 2.


2. Ban phrases that are used to attract reputation point.
Basically, just make rule 20 a bit more broad to prevent this from happening, since it already covers manipulation.

3. Give Off-Topic the Reputation System.
Yes, I get it's a trial period, but there's no reason to withhold it from another testing ground! The justification for excluding OT from the test could be applied to any other subforum. Off-Topic is actually a decently constructive place, and the test results of the reputation system will not be as wholesome without giving OT a chance.

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One thing i hope you add to your review is that the rep system is virtually non existent in the mobile site, a negative imo. If you were not aware of the system when visiting on the mobile site you would never know its there. On reddit their post voting system is available on the mobile and full site and has a more even reach to forum members.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Radiating

The Fixes
1. Remove the downvote.
You don't need it. What the negative rep button tries to solve for, the report button can solve for already. Reddit's downvote system is constantly misapplied, despite the fact that it explicitly says that "downvotes are to be used for posts that add nothing to the discussion" which it is rarely used for. An upvote only system gets rid of problem 1 entirely and to an extent problem 2.

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I would disagree with this.
Taken from my also massive post in cr there can be very many benefits that the down vote can offer.

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Originally Posted by thecoolkyle

The next section that I'll talk about is the ideas and feature requests section.

To me this section will have the new system used the most and will be quite rough with how a person's rep points are effected.
I find that while the system is used for posts and not threads this section will be equal with the need for rep points.
According to the thread perspective, I do feel that the system will be very beneficial, as it will discourage threads that contain like 3 sentances without any stats if it's for a troop/card. Not only that but by takeing out terrible idea threads, threads which are good shall remain on the first pages and will not be pushed down by bad idea threads. This can make it easier to read around the section, attract more people to look at the section, those who make good threads will get more recognition, and those who make bad threads will have a desire to change.

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Athough the down vote can bring problems, I gave many ideas on how these problems can stop in my post. I find that keeping the down vote, but changing the way it works would be most beneficial.
https://forum.supercell.com/showthre...=1#post9571687
The report button as you mentioned, doesn't help stop pointless 2 sentence spam threads that clutter up the first page of sections. The down vote system can.

Not sure if this has been said -- but this system very much resembles the one on the misc section of bodybuilding.com

Some things that will happen -- people will quote people often and say -- repped or negged or rep me.

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Originally Posted by Holbomb

I think your assumption will ultimately be correct. I expect anyone on either side of the engineering debate to have horrible rep by weeks end.

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Hahaha.... I was thinking the same thing. Anyone brave enough to fill in the blanks?
"Engineering is _________"
"Please nurf _________"
"Bring back __________"

Still like the trial, though.

Forum reputation: Any downside to becoming notorious?

Title says it all. Might be fun to become notorious. Some people might make it a goal. lol

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Originally Posted by DeputyDonkey

One thing i hope you add to your review is that the rep system is virtually non existent in the mobile site, a negative imo. If you were not aware of the system when visiting on the mobile site you would never know its there. On reddit their post voting system is available on the mobile and full site and has a more even reach to forum members.

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Not to derail this thread too much, but since you brought up the point; the mobile version of the forums is already lacking in several other features. An odd situation for a forum discussing a mobile game. There have been multiple times where I could only see something by switching to the full version (last instance I recall was a thread referenced someone's sig; not visible on mobile). A very small feat on my phone.

Don't give them any ideas :smirk: