It would be great if Blizzard listed basic details of forum users (for users that opt-in) so that viewers of a post can evaluate how much weight they should give to a remark and or at least have some context. It also brings a little more integrity to the forum and makes it more helpful to viewers overall.
Hypothetical examples of player KPIs that could be listed:
1.) How many PVP losses / wins in the last month per character
2.) How many hours played in the last month per character
3.) How many max T100 NMDs completed solo
4.) Current character levels and their max tier
What scenarios would this help?
1.) If a person is says PVP is terrible, but they’ve never played PVP, we can ignore the post
2.) If person says diablo tier 4 is too tough, but their character level is 55, we understand the context
3.) If person is complaining about current seasonal content, but has not even played the season, we have this transparency
4.) If a person is claiming to be an expert on a particular topic, but their experience says otherwise. Or if person is an expert on a topic and their experience speaks to this, their words have higher weight than someone that just speaks their opinion
5.) If a particular player says another competing class is over powered, we understand any particular biases they may have.
6.) If a person says Eternal realm is terrible, but they’ve never played Eternal.
Right now the only way to evaluate someone’s experience and knowledge is based on the number of posts. Which is not a good assumption or metric. Basically itnis a vanity metric. Because some folks prefer to write more than they play.
So you want to segregate an open forum by adding metrics to each person who posts so that their opinion on a particular topic is immediately marked valid or invalid if it doesn’t reach a specific standard?
Yea, good luck with that.
Negative, no amount of posts should make you take them anymore or any less seriously. Actually read what they’re saying, come up with your own opinion, and debate or agree if necessary, like any sane human would do. My post count shouldn’t make people suddenly believe my opinion is correct or incorrect, or have more or less weight to it.
Johnny2_Shoes first post complaining about disconnects is a valid concern. Now if they don’t help us by explaining said problem it’s hard to take them seriously, and if they aren’t willing to at least troubleshoot, that’s an even bigger problem. However Mr. 5K posts making a post about how he doesn’t like a particular system doesn’t mean it should automatically be changed in the next patch either.
Sounds like you are aligned with my post that the current metric of # of posts from a user is not a good metric. It is a vanity metric. Really says nothing more than they like to write.
As for number of disconnects that are handled by support, it makes perfect sense for tech support to not look at # of pvp wins. I would hope that doesnt need training.
As for your point engaging in a debate with someone, i like a good debate but i want to be selective in who i engage with in a debate at a deeper level. There is a good % opinion posts that dont have any data to support them. So yes, you eventually figure out how much pudding there is in the pie… after your time is wasted. Im trying to avoid wasting time and / or false leads. So the metrics arent perfect but a basic litmus test. If i had to choose between opinions from 3 people on best way to do XYZ, one of them having drastically more experience than the others, i would choose the latter
Honestly if we didn’t even have that number being shown I’d be perfectly fine with it. I will say I do like to engage in conversations though, especially in a written form.
I feel in a video game, where people have at least played the content they are having an opinion about has more weight then some one just reciting a content creator based on their latest video/stream. I’ll agree with you there. That being said, I come to the forums for entertainment value and to engage with people.
We’re not a think tank whose sole purpose is to find every solution to every problem within the game. We’re just a bunch of guys sitting around the water cooler giving our opinions on any number of topics. Not all of us are going to be experts on every single topic.
So if you would like a more engaging experience with people who you believe have more weight to their words for being more knowledgeable on a particular topic, might I suggest creating a Discord? A public forum would definitely not be the best place for you though, nor would they change their rules based on metrics of what you’ve accomplished in the game.
I agree, it’s hogwash. The only purpose is to engage in ad hominem and authority fallacy arguments. Bliz will never waste resources on an idea such as this.
I didnt think about blizzard forums as a social circle and entertainment, but it sounds reasonable. I also lean towards being introverted (but i assume that is most people playing blizzard d4) so i place less importance on social matters. My use case for forums is different: insight collecting, helping others or trying too, making suggestions to improve the game.
There is a sub blizzard forum (class specific) i use that is really informative with great debates. Little to no trolling with great community. Good discussion. Not everyone is an expert, but everyone contributes insights. Nobody pretends to be an expert and for the most part, qualify their responses if qualification is appropriate (ie: i never used aspect xyz before, but if i did id…).
Going from there to here is night and day. So there are still good golden nuggets of info in the general forum but also a lot of solid rock of misleading posts (intentional and unintentional).
Many other Blizzard games display basic game stats on their forum accounts. Example Diablo 3, WoW, etc, etc, etc. It’s to reduce the troll power. If some rando dude is talkin all kinds of smack about something, just look at the profile, see if they are real or not, etc. Also, with trading coming to D4 on larger scale, profiles would help see legit buyers/sellers.
I have 9999 hours in all areas of the game, I am the number one rank on my main alt for all gauntlet brackets and I have a max level perfect stats character of every class. I was also world first hardcore on every character (at the same time while multiboxing).
Because of my vast accomplishments I have the authority to claim that your idea is almost as dumb as the real life ID blizzard tried to push back in the day.
Fairly certain I’ve been called every name in the book, from troll, to D4/Blizzard hater, white knight, shill, rear end hole, etc. Although I have become friends with a few that were willing to hear me out on any particular subject. I enjoyed those conversations.
To be fair though, I do troll certain posts, I won’t lie.
Just engage with people knowing full well in advance they are full of dung and everything works out, smoothly. Or, they ban themselves when they lose control of their emotions because they never learned to construct an argument or don’t have one (see Cringy).
