User talk:HighGenGrue/Why The Suggestion System Sucks: A rant by HighGenGrue and Asema

Comments & ideas

Hi! Having seen how the suggestions system is [not] working, I agree with many of your complaints. It's quite obviously broken. Partly it's the people, as you point out. Responses to suggestions can be incredibly rude, dismissive, and antagonistic. This appears to be because many people have a vested interest in certain aspects of the status quo; especially things that make aspects of PK or griefing easier (eg. anonymous overbarricading or barrier removal). I'm a new user to the game, and this aspect of the community is almost enough to make me give up playing.

The next is the dupe system. A strong idea, that fails to gain an acceptance vote of 2/3rd majority, is henceforth forever doomed, because any similar idea can simply be marked "dupe".

So very simply, if an idea does not win overwhelming submission on its first go, it can never succeed. This completely ignores future changes to the game, changing playerbase, or minor tweaks to the idea that make it more workable. The people with the power in this system are those who want things to stay the way they are, no matter how good or bad they may be.

There's clearly a lot of interest in flashlights, rifles, and numerous other suggestions that have been made. Yet these ideas are simply killed because they have been suggested in the past. This doesn't allow for any improving of the idea to find something that works.

Game balance is too often used as an excuse to kill ideas. Game balance is very important; but part of developing and improving a game, is dealing with balance changes when implementing new features. It's simply work to do, not something that forever prevents changes from being made.

I notice from this page that many of your complaints have been echoed before: The_REAL_Suggestion_Guidelines.

How can it be reformed? Should a Suggestions System Reform project be started? Can we get people on board?

Supposedly, the purpose of the suggestion system is to present good ideas to Kevan on a regular basis. If good ideas are being killed off, users who make suggestions are being attacked and discouraged, and there's no process to improve minor problems with an idea, then obviously it's not fulfilling its purpose.

A voting system by random wiki users or game players who may have strong biases they are promoting doesn't serve the purpose of filtering suggestions so the best go to Kevan. A system where it's overwhelmingly easier to permanently and irrevocably kill an idea rather than tweak and improve them so they become before is broken.

I have a few thoughts:

• Get rid of unaccountable public voting. It's obviously too easy to just vote "kill" "dupe" "spam" on everything, and belittle the suggester in the process. This doesn't promote improving the game at all. It's a negative for the community, the wiki, and the game.
• Establish a Suggestions Team, who are charged with impartially evaluating ideas and assisting the suggester in tweaking the idea to make it workable.
• Go through a round of Public Input. Note this is not voting, this is simply comments reflecting how the idea is received: expressions of support, or specifically identified problems with the idea. Establish guidelines that require comments to be constructive and not insulting.
• Others who are interested in a particular idea can become involved in the process to help tweak it as well.
• If consensus among the Suggestions Team and public input is that an idea is unworkable or game-breaking, shelve it. That doesn't mean it's permanently dead. Ideas, like characters in UD, should be able to be revivified if there's renewed interest in it.
• If the public response is somewhat positive, keep working on it, and submit it to review again. If the submitter and (again, as impartial as possible Suggestions Team) feel an idea still has merit, this process can continue to repeat. If an idea is just not gaining traction, or there's still plenty of valid criticism, go back and fix the problem parts that remain.
• Any idea whose reception is strongly positive goes into the pile for Kevan. That doesn't mean it needs a certain percentage of votes; but rather that the community has expressed support for it and there's little remaining the way of valid criticism.

This would make the suggestion process iterative, and geared towards improvement. Ideas that obviously won't go anywhere can be gently killed off in consultation with the originator. Those that have some merit but obvious need a lot of work in order to make them feasible for the game have an ongoing process of improvement and community participation. Those that are great right from the start can quickly go through team evaluation, public input, and get put onto the recommended pile for Kevan.

--Zhani 20:35, 31 August 2008 (BST)

Additional thoughts:

The suggestions system should be collaborative and constructive. Currently, it is adversarial and destructive. Users submit ideas on their own, and even though others may provide comments in support, they are essentially left to defend their idea on their own. And overwhelmingly, comments and votes can be directed towards completely shooting the idea down, without hope of really fixing it. Instead, interested users should be able to work together on any suggestion: turning it into a community project, and user contributions should be directed towards improving ideas to address criticism, rather than denying the idea a future.

The suggestion system could be broken up into distinct "areas":

• A Suggestions Inbox, much like the existing Talk:Suggestions. Anyone and everyone is invited to submit new ideas. New ideas are a good thing. They are the seed of potential game improvements. At this point, the focus should be on evaluating them for potential, not killing them before they're fully formed. The process should be simple and friendly. For example, and using the flashlight idea because I like it and I think it has merit: JoeUser comes along and says "Hay u guyz, I think we shud get a flashlite, cuz then u cud search in the dark without a genrator!!!" Sure, it lacks detail, sure it's a dupe, and sure response has been lukewarm in the past. But it's a start.
• A Suggestions in Progress space. Much like existing suggestion, each independent idea would get its own working page, possibly with subpages to discuss particular aspects of the idea. If the originator of an idea wants to maintain a sense of "ownership", and create & maintain this page, it's up to them; but anyone in the community could take an existing submitted idea, and start working on it. This working page would be devoid of voting, non-constructive criticism, etc. Where an idea is an obvious dupe, then the submitter would be directed to the existing idea in progress, where they can contribute to it, instead of starting a new one. Substantively similar ideas in progress could be combined.
  It's here that an idea can be continually refined & improved over weeks or months. "Well, the general idea of a flashlight is certainly in-genre and seems valid, but I'm concerned about game balance and the effect on search rates." "You have a point, but there exists a wide space between the inability to effectively search in a dark building, and having to spend the AP to acquire a generator, fuel can, and set them up. A flashlight would represent a middle ground in terms of AP investment, and search rate reward." So as discussions by interested parties continue, the idea can be refined into something that looks very workable for the game.
• A Public Review Space. Periodically, the primary authors working on an idea can submit it for review. This would take a "snapshot" of the suggestion in its current state, and similar to the existing Peer Review, submit it to evaluation by the general wiki or game community. However, and importantly, this is not a vote. There are no "dupe", "spam", or "kill" comments. Abusiveness should be moderated, and as I said, there should be guidelines in place. Instead, this is where those with opinions for or against can present them, as arguments why this is good for the game, or why it may be detrimental. Following this, the authors can go back and address identified problems with the idea. "Zombies can't use flashlights, it's biased to survivors!"
  Submissions might be limited to once every three months or so per idea, so they cannot be "spammed", and there's ample time for genuine improvement. But likewise, no idea that actually has community interest can ever be "killed". If enough people want it, and criticisms can be addressed, then it stands a chance of getting through.
• Reviewed Suggestions This of course is essentially the same as Category:Peer_Reviewed_Suggestions. Once an idea has essentially passed muster, it goes on the books for Kevan to look at. The criteria for determining this may be a little tricky: I don't want to see a simple vote system, as it's too easy to game and abuse. But likewise, putting it all in the hands of a limited group, the "Suggestions Team" opens the door to favoritism. What I'd want to see is that ideas that have been refined to address the majority of concerns, and show strong community appeal, should go into the reviewed suggestion even if there's still opposition. PKers or Survivors or Zombies or Griefers not liking an idea shouldn't be sufficient in itself to keep it from being considered for addition to the game. So long as it's a good idea and most concerns have been addressed, it should be eligible.

--Zhani 21:35, 31 August 2008 (BST)

Nice

So. Whats the next step? Leading by example, how to fix some of the asshattery? --Rosslessness^{Want a Location Image?} 21:19, 31 August 2008 (BST)

I think it would be appropriate to have a page/space to discuss either changes to the existing system, or proposals for a new replacement system. This could be in a public area, or under a user page so it's kept "semi-private", for those particularly interested in it. When something resembling a consensus emerges, we could test the system by operating it in parallel; inviting idea submitters to also submit their suggestions to the new system, then see how it works for evaluating & improving ideas, and moving them towards finalization. --Zhani 21:44, 31 August 2008 (BST)

In a non official sense a list or a collective of people who try to treat new suggestors with patience and well, non contempt is a good idea.--Rosslessness^{Want a Location Image?} 23:14, 31 August 2008 (BST)

I propose a list of rules on how to act courteous (Wait, there ARE? What is that? Nobody GIVES A SHIT?). These would be strictly moderated.

No more "WTFCENTAURS", no more "Your idea sucks. SPAM.". That's my biggest gripe. Even some mods act hostile when against a suggestion. Maybe even make flaming by mods a misconductable thing.

Anyone who make a non-constructive vote or response to as suggestion Goes from warning to bye bye. I should make a policy discussion about this. --High Gen. Grue Talk 04:48, 4 September 2008 (BST)

Mods? What made you think we have mods here? The sysops are not moderators, they can act just as foul as the other wiki users. --Aeon17x 05:57, 4 September 2008 (BST)

"Establish a Suggestions Team, who are charged with impartially evaluating ideas and assisting the suggester in tweaking the idea to make it workable." -- Good idea. But, you realise don't you that if this team was at all conversant in the game, it's mechanics, probabilities and balance issues, and had half a brain -- the end result would be pretty much the same as what we have now. The same good ideas go through, the same-old bad ones get tossed in the trash heap, where they belong.

See, when people make suggestions that are not utter CRAP, they are typically dealt with respectfully and constructively. Maybe it's not a giant Oprah hippie hugfest, maybe the idea is rejected, criticised, well... Grow up and deal... But people actually have respect for suggestors who have respect for the game and people who play it, as well for those who take the time to deal with the Suggestions page; i.e. respect enough to do their homework before coming to class...

It's the people who suggest crap and/or who act like spoilt brats if someone has the horrible temerity ZOMG to criticise their idea -- they are the ones who get flamed. And rightly so. This page, though there are some good ideas buried in here, on the whole is just whinging over the fact that you didn't come prepared, and your idea was just plain bad, and now people are calling you on it.

Now I actually have some ideas to fix the Suggestions system. But they're not about whining like this is... I might put them together at some point... In the meantime though, sorry, but this is not the solution to the problems... --WanYao 06:25, 4 September 2008 (BST)

I had trouble reading your post. From what I gather, you're saying that hostility is merited if a suggestion isn't utter crap - now, the problem here is that everything is utter crap to most suggestions regulars. I can provide numerous examples, if you'd care, of unwarranted hostility like that discussed here.

Also, you seem to gather that it's about whining. It's not. It's about a way to fix the suggestions system and make it collabrative moreso than it is now. Tell me, what other problems are there with the suggestions system than pure unworkability, rule-mongering, and vaguely defined terms used in impeccable law?

It would seem, even further, that it's impossible just to bring an idea to the table (which the Suggestions page should be about); doing homework, going through paperwork (I do enough of that IRL), building an exacting, balanced in the eyes of everyone who would ever think to look at the suggestion in the ever mechanical form of your suggestion - all this should NOT be required (and it is, even on pages like Talk:Suggestions that have mere ideas on them). --Asema 17:54, 4 September 2008 (BST)

The post ends here. The remaining text is noise.

Grow up and deal... Please don't. It makes you seem arrogant and as if there's any sort of maturity needed to work with the suggestions system at current. You're one of the more hostile users, I've seen.

This page, though there are some good ideas buried in here, on the whole is just whinging over the fact that you didn't come prepared, and your idea was just plain bad, and now people are calling you on it. Uh, yeah. My suggestions were terrible. I know that much. But I did, in fact, come prepared; I read your few dozen pages of policies, guidelines, suggestions, opinions, and faux rules, and so on. You seem to think (and rightly so) that the suggestions page is a battlefield.

Let me ask, how bloody old are you? --Asema 17:54, 4 September 2008 (BST)

Finally, on a note that isn't me criticizing WanYao, I love all of your ideas. --Asema 17:54, 4 September 2008 (BST)

WanYao, given your behavior on the suggestions discussion, you're providing a perfect example of the kind of problem described here. Your antagonism helps no one, and definitely detracts from the process. If you don't like seeing new ideas that may have been suggested before, then don't read new suggestions. Let others discuss whether they like them or not; if it's a bad idea, then the community won't accept it. And I agree with Asema: relying on the anonymity of a wiki as an excuse to be abusive towards people without consequence isn't a sign of maturity. No one "deserves" to be "flamed"; they deserve to have an explanation of why their idea doesn't work. Anything else is simply a rationalization to excuse using others to take out your frustrations. --Zhani 20:42, 4 September 2008 (BST)