[Micky C]

I was under the impression that the rep system was intended to be used when a poster has either contributed to or detrimented the forum/community. So if people go around and downvoting/upvoting posts from several months ago when the effect of the original post has long since disappeared, it becomes useless IMO. It's like necroposting, but with rep points.

[Mikko]

Micky C, on 15 August 2011 - 03:16 AM, said:

I was under the impression that the rep system was intended to be used when a poster has either contributed to or detrimented the forum/community. So if people go around and downvoting/upvoting posts from several months ago when the effect of the original post has long since disappeared, it becomes useless IMO. It's like necroposting, but with rep points.

A bad troll post remains a bad troll post; it doesn't decay over time. However, some posts may actually gain over time if the poster turns out to be correct with respect to something that wasn't really known at the time. For both these reasons, there should be no time limit to voting. (The system should rather be removed entirely but that's another matter.)

[Kathy]

Upvoting would be especially true about the first post since I saw many times first post being updated with various useful info found in the thread.

Also, necroposting is nothing bad when poster give interesting information or opinion.

[Micky C]

Yeah but 95% of the time when people necropost is to say something like "yeah I agree with Mr X" or "I like that picture" when the thread has essentially been abandoned for several months at least. Recently Hendricks266 resurrected an old thread to update some information, and that's more than fine, but unfortunately it's one of only a few cases of beneficial necroposting on this forum.

[Martin]

In my opinion, the whole system should be removed. Sane people who don't give a fuck about the rep system wouldn't care if it's removed, and stupid cunts who live for their up votes and cry when they get down voted wouldn't have anything to cry about. It's literally the most unimportant thing ever. I remember when I started using fora, there would be people who would post all the time to up their post-count (the equivalent of rep back in the day). It was gay then, and it's gay now. If I had my way, there'd be no rep system, and also no post count. Just an avatar and a join date. You don't need anything else. Spamming isn't tolerated anywhere (good) these days, so post-count boosting doesn't really happen any more. Rep systems always bring this kind of trouble. Why is it even needed? If you make good posts, you know everyone thinks your posts are good by the way they reply. Rep systems can fuck off.

[The Commander]

Martin, on 16 August 2011 - 08:11 AM, said:

In my opinion, the whole system should be removed. Sane people who don't give a fuck about the rep system wouldn't care if it's removed, and stupid cunts who live for their up votes and cry when they get down voted wouldn't have anything to cry about. It's literally the most unimportant thing ever. I remember when I started using fora, there would be people who would post all the time to up their post-count (the equivalent of rep back in the day). It was gay then, and it's gay now. If I had my way, there'd be no rep system, and also no post count. Just an avatar and a join date. You don't need anything else. Spamming isn't tolerated anywhere (good) these days, so post-count boosting doesn't really happen any more. Rep systems always bring this kind of trouble. Why is it even needed? If you make good posts, you know everyone thinks your posts are good by the way they reply. Rep systems can fuck off.

Now what if you were a new person to join the forums and asked for some advice and the first person to give you the advice was Jhect for example?
Followed by someone such as DeeperThought?

Now with the reputation system we can tell which person would most likely be giving the best advice, without the system the person maybe misled into the wrong advice by following what a troll said.

[Mike Norvak]

Martin, on 16 August 2011 - 08:11 AM, said:

In my opinion, the whole system should be removed. Sane people who don't give a fuck about the rep system wouldn't care if it's removed, and stupid cunts who live for their up votes and cry when they get down voted wouldn't have anything to cry about. It's literally the most unimportant thing ever. I remember when I started using fora, there would be people who would post all the time to up their post-count (the equivalent of rep back in the day). It was gay then, and it's gay now. If I had my way, there'd be no rep system, and also no post count. Just an avatar and a join date. You don't need anything else. Spamming isn't tolerated anywhere (good) these days, so post-count boosting doesn't really happen any more. Rep systems always bring this kind of trouble. Why is it even needed? If you make good posts, you know everyone thinks your posts are good by the way they reply. Rep systems can fuck off.

Also when I see someone's rep status I only pay attention to the color for example, giving less importance to the number. Since practically there isn't any active users with red status, I think this is becoming kinda pointless. Also the system is not unified, I mean someone post a map which he spent 6 months of work for example and gets let's say 2 points for posting it, and someone elso makes a good and witty comment about one zone in the same map and gets 3 points, or some one gives a hard (but not harsh) criticism about Duke Nukem Forever (for example) and it gets -4 points, some one makes a promise about make something and wins 1 point, another more express what he thinks 3 points, etc.

On the other hand since the system was implemented the number of trolling and useless or offensive posts were decreased imo, so that was the real purpose of the reps.

EDIT:

The Commander, on 16 August 2011 - 08:58 AM, said:

Now what if you were a new person to join the forums and asked for some advice and the first person to give you the advice was Jhect for example?
Followed by someone such as DeeperThought?

Now with the reputation system we can tell which person would most likely be giving the best advice, without the system the person maybe misled into the wrong advice by following what a troll said.

Yeah that's the other point where the rep is fully helpfulness, good bless Jhect isn't here anymore, (as Jhect) LOL

[Danukem]

The Commander, on 16 August 2011 - 08:58 AM, said:

Now what if you were a new person to join the forums and asked for some advice and the first person to give you the advice was Jhect for example?
Followed by someone such as DeeperThought?

Now with the reputation system we can tell which person would most likely be giving the best advice, without the system the person maybe misled into the wrong advice by following what a troll said.

I don't recall that ever being a problem for me when I have asked questions on forums that didn't have rep systems (e.g. back at 3DR). A smart person can usually tell how helpful a post is from the content of the post and the way it is written, regardless of who wrote it or what their rep is. Also, in your example, I would hope that an answer from a moderator would have more credibility, other things being equal.

My problem with the rep system now is that it's so easy to have a positive reputation that the rep number provides little or no useful information. Most reps steadily climb upward higher and higher. Even people who are involved in a lot of heated disputes and get other posters angry at them on a regular basis often have positive reps (I'm not saying people like that are necessarily trolls, but they are definitely not people you would expect to have good reps). The reason for this is pretty obvious. Imagine if a person got a point for getting to work on time every day, and was deducted a point each time they were late to work. Now suppose this person works five days a week, and they are late two days every week. That's pretty bad. In the real world, that person would have a reputation for being frequently late and would get fired if they worked in the private sector. But on my system they would actually earn a point each week (+3, -2). After a year, they would have about 50 points or so. On paper, their reputation would look better than a new employee who was on time every day but just hadn't accumulated as many points yet. Well, it's the same problem with our rep system. There are guys who act like douchebags a lot but have good reputations, simply because they post so much and they act civil somewhat more than 50% of the time. And then other posters who are model citizens but they don't have high reps because they don't post very often (maybe they post once a month to show some awesome new thing they are working on).

[Kathy]

Would it be possible to show number of upvotes and downvotes? Or have an upvote/downvote % for example. Because reputation is rising with the number of posts anyway. It's not the whole system that is broken, but perhaps there should be a better way to show the info. At least in the profile. Because the only option now is to count ups and downs in the profile.

[Danukem]

Helel, on 16 August 2011 - 10:16 AM, said:

Would it be possible to show number of upvotes and downvotes? Or have an upvote/downvote % for example. Because reputation is rising with the number of posts anyway. It's not the whole system that is broken, but perhaps there should be a better way to show the info.

I agree that it would be better to show something that represented the upvote/downvote ratio. That would completely fix the problem I was talking about.

[Master Fibbles]

Could it be made into a ratio? People with a 80% favorability rating as opposed to a person with just 50 rep points and a person with a 60% favorability as opposed to 200 rep points. That would show a more clear distinction.
Of course, people who have no votes at all would seem odd unless you count "no rep" posts as something. The math will get complicated...

[Hank]

just a reminder
http://forums.duke4....dpost__p__85869

changing anything in the code is a fucking pain in the neck. So let's wait for the next upgrade.
Meanwhile, sorry to be that blunt, but this community is small. I have three members I pay close attention to and could care less what their rating is.

[Master Fibbles]

Hank, on 16 August 2011 - 11:19 AM, said:

Meanwhile, sorry to be that blunt, but this community is small. I have three members I pay close attention to and could care less what their rating is.

Creeper.
That was a while ago though, so maybe TX has had the update...or a "couple of months" has become a "few months" and will soon be "almost a year." I guess it is kind of like DNF's development cycle.

[Kathy]

It's always like that when it's on pure enthusiasm. DNF was a job, though...

[TerminX]

The update actually just came out a couple of weeks ago and I haven't had time to remake the skin (again) yet. It's going to be a hassle.

[Master Fibbles]

How much change is there between versions at the base code? It seems odd that they wouldn't make it modular or at least compatible in both directions. Isn't the skin just a stylesheet or is it more complicated than, say, WordPress?

[Micky C]

Ok, so my rep suddenly took a huge dive. I took a look and I lost 5 rep points from 3 different topics within a minute or two of eachother. The posts seemed completely random and I can't understand why they would be individually repped down. Some of the posts were almost a year old. Does somebody have something against me? Edit: I think the max amount of minus rep points per day is 5? So they probably would have done more damage if they could have. In fact, it seems that the person specifically targeted old posts so that people don't come across them and cancel them out.

I'd appreciate it if one of the mods could quickly look into this to make sure it isn't a single person with a grudge. The loss of rep isn't as big a deal as the principal or someone intentionally abusing the system.

[rasmus thorup]

So if it is a person with a grudge. Why would he have it against you? And why do you care about it? You say that you don't care about the loss of rep. But is that really true? Can i see what kind of posts got rep down?

[Hendricks266]

rasmus thorup, on 01 September 2011 - 02:58 PM, said:

Can i see what kind of posts got rep down?

You can.

[TerminX]

It's taken care of now. The person in question has had their reputation point usage revoked (for good, this time) and I gave you some free rep points on the affected posts to offset the loss.

[Micky C]

Thanks TX!

rasmus thorup, on 01 September 2011 - 02:58 PM, said:

So if it is a person with a grudge. Why would he have it against you? And why do you care about it? You say that you don't care about the loss of rep. But is that really true? Can i see what kind of posts got rep down?

I've had minus rep points here and there. Sometimes I can see their reasoning, sometimes I can't, it doesn't usually bother me. But when someone goes on a minus repping rampage just for kicks or whatever, it gets a bit more touchy.

[rasmus thorup]

Yea i agreee that's annoying. I haven't had a minus repping rampage against me yet. But i haven't been here for such a long time yet. Maybe i will soon understand how annoying it is to be the victim I have 2 posts which got a total of about 14 rep downs. But that was expected since i kind of went against the flow. I just said how i didn't feel the 4 weapon system patch wasn't really that neccessary. Then bam! I guess people liked that patch.

[Kathy]

TX, on 01 September 2011 - 08:30 PM, said:

It's taken care of now. The person in question has had their reputation point usage revoked (for good, this time) and I gave you some free rep points on the affected posts to offset the loss.

Is there a way to piss off so much that you would give a -1000 reputation, but not to the point of being banned?

[TerminX]

Yes. I gave someone -100 once but then I decided to be nice and reset it to 0 instead. Coincidentally, it was the same guy who spammed downvotes against Micky C.

[Micky C]

Yeah the guy started a PM conversation with me where he said he believed I was using ghost accounts to vote myself up. I like a high rep, but I don't like it that much.

[Kathy]

TX, on 02 September 2011 - 12:38 PM, said:

Yes. I gave someone -100 once but then I decided to be nice and reset it to 0 instead. Coincidentally, it was the same guy who spammed downvotes against Micky C.

Should I spam everyone or would you be nice to give me -100 for free?

[Tetsuo]

Is having a rep system really worth it if it just causes drama? Nobody likes having their post negatived even if they deserve it. And I see people have high reps who probably shouldn't and they would get really upset if someone negatived a post of theirs.
I guess Ego is a good name for the rep system because to me it seems that's what it's mostly for... to boost a forum members ego.

Wow, Ego sure fluctuates fast around here I was 16 just a few minutes ago and now I'm 14!

[Micky C]

The rep system is far more useful to noobs to the forum than the actual members. For example, DeeperThought has the highest rep currently, so if he posted in the help section, people would know it's really good advice. Or maybe a mapper might have a good rep, or release a map, and in the download post got 20 rep points, then people would know it's a good map/he's a good mapper.

[Tetsuo]

OK so what about those people who usually post inflammatory posts filled with profanity who have high reps? I'm not naming any names.

[Danukem]

Tetsuo, on 03 September 2011 - 12:59 AM, said:

OK so what about those people who usually post inflammatory posts filled with profanity who have high reps? I'm not naming any names.

Yeah the system is pretty much useless as a gauge of actual reputation. It's more a measure of how often someone posts (I discussed this in a long post above). Which is ironic, because a simple post count based ranking is what the rep was replacing.