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Suggestions Discussion

Active Suggestions

These suggestions were at vote. Discussions were held about them here.

Developing Suggestions

This section is for suggestions which have not yet been submitted, and are still being worked on. Please add new suggestions to the top of the list.

New ways to utilize skillpoints

"Disposable" Skills for Maxed-Out Survivors

Further Discussion

This is for any further discussion concerning the suggestions page that doesn't fall into the previous categories.

Voting Rules Clarification

*X should be implemented first is not a valid reason for a vote. You are voting on the merit of THIS suggestion, not how it compares to others.

Does this extend to "Humans/Zombies need to be buffed first", "Survivors/Zombies do not need any more buffs", "Look at the stats, it is clear we need a Survivor/Zombie buff before any more Zombie/Survivor buffs are implemented" votes? Can non-mods enforce this? If the answer to both of these is yes, I am going on a fucking vote-removal spree in Previous Days --Gene Splicer 16:36, 14 October 2006 (BST)

I agree with the above sentiments, all of them are poor reason for a kill vote. Adding something like that to the description could be a good idea. I'm not sure about striking peoples votes out retroactively after a guidlines change, though. I would just make the change, then enforce it in the future. The Mad Axeman 11:51, 15 October 2006 (BST)

I believe the X should be implemented first reason IS valid, with regards to suggestions for Contacts. There are a lot of suggestions for doing stuff with contact lists, but the current system for contact listing in game is total anarchy. EVERYONE on your contact list is just a name. Would it be best if we could get some categories for those names first (at the very least Friends/Enemies)? A lot of the suggestions are prone to griefing (and/or PKing) since both types of contacts would appear at the same time. I think it might also apply to communication.--Pesatyel 00:12, 16 October 2006 (BST)

Well now, that's a tricky one. I have struck some votes (although not from my suggestions - only from other peoples) where the voters have clearly made an unfair X should be implemented first vote. I mean, sometimes you get a vote like "I don't like this idea for cakes because we need more ideas about helicopters". However, the vote that reads "[Survivors/Zombies] do not need any more buffs" is a valid vote, in my opinion. The voter is essentially saying that the suggestion will tip the game balance out of whack. It's a judgement call, like so many things - and if the person you strike feels strongly that their vote is valid, they're free to either call on a mod for a decision, or to re-vote with a different reason. Let's face it, just because a vote is struck, there's nothing to stop someone re-voting with a new reason. So, really, striking votes that are hard to call on the X should be implemented first rule would just be a waste of time. I also think that retroactive strikes on suggestions waiting for their two weeks to be up, on votes made on the first day, would be unfair - unless you notified the person you struck of what you were doing and why. A "fucking vote-removal spree" could well be seen as vandalism, especially as it sounds clearly like bad faith. If you know of a vote that you clearly think breaks the rule, why not contact a mod and ask them for their opinion, and if they might make a decision as to whether to strike it - that way, you could never be accused of bad faith in the matter. --Funt Solo 15:21, 16 October 2006 (BST)

The existance of this rule was only brought to my attention recently, and I posted this in the "heat of the moment". By "fucking vote removal spree" I meant "removal of many, many votes that, under one interpretation of that rule, are invalid but have not been removed". I wanted to know if I could do it myself because notifying a mod of every one of these would be... difficult, due to their common appearance. And I have no problem with people revoting with a different reason... but it forces them to think of a reason, and they may realise that they don't actually have one.

However, the vote that reads "[Survivors/Zombies] do not need any more buffs" is a valid vote, in my opinion. The voter is essentially saying that the suggestion will tip the game balance out of whack. Except ALL changes throw the balance out of whack. The majority of changes implemented are not put in to fix a balance issue and bring the sides "more in balance". The majority are put into introduce a new, more interesting facet to the game, usually alongside an equally powerful buff or buffs to the other side. The votes I am objecting to are not ones saying "This is overpowered and would imbalance the game", those are perfectly valid and I have voted that way myself a number of times. I am referring to the votes that say "This suggestion is bad because and only because it is a Zombie/Survivor buff, and Zombies/Survivors are currently winning." These votes are obviously less-than-relevant because a) Kevan is not going to implement a skill for side A and no skill for side B when side A is obviously dominating, b) suggestions are rarely implemented quickly enough for the current status quo to be in effect when they are, and c) (most imporantly) it has absolutely nothing to do with the merit (or lack of) of the suggestion itself. So what I am asking is, does this rule extend to cover this situation, and if not, should we implement one that does? --Gene Splicer 20:59, 16 October 2006 (BST)

Honestly, I don't think it's worth the bother. You're free to discuss someone's vote with them, and ask them to change their vote. The thing is, they're just as free not to listen to you. I'll tell you something I've noticed - sometimes a person will completely misunderstand a suggestion, and they'll put their reason down and it's just plain wrong. But if you stick in a Re, explaining quite clearly how they're wrong, they don't change their vote. It's just one of those things. Subjectivity, innit? Like you took "tip the game balance out of whack" and then translated it into "change the game balance". I think those two terms are vastly different in meaning. I've voted Kill/Spam on quite a few zombie buffs, recently - partly because I don't follow the argument that zombies are under-powered, and I think these buffs will over-power them and spoil the game. People will naturally vote on the effect a suggestion will have on the game they are playing NOW. I think the system works pretty well as it is - sometimes a suggestion gets into Peer Reviewed that I think is shockingly bad, but I trust in [He Who Cannot Be Named] to have some sense in deciding what and what not to implement. For interest, can you point out just a single example of the kind of vote you think should be struck, so I can see more clearly what you mean? --Funt Solo 22:09, 16 October 2006 (BST)

Spam Value Clarification

Under most sections, it seems clear that, when tallying votes to make a decision on Reviewed / Rejected / Undecided, a Spam is worth the same as a Kill or a Keep. However, in the Voting Complete pages (example here) it says that a Spam is only worth 0.5 of a vote. I assume that's an error? --Funt Solo 11:54, 30 September 2006 (BST)

Probably. Does it matter that much? Suggestion normally go to 3 places: Peer Reviewed, Peer Rejected and Previous Days. Undecided really isn't all that necessary.--Pesatyel 12:20, 1 October 2006 (BST)

I think you've missed my point - on the Voting Complete pages it says that Spam votes are only worth HALF of other votes. --Funt Solo 18:08, 1 October 2006 (BST)

I think it was a mistake, so it's changed now.--Toejam 12:21, 5 October 2006 (BST)

That was left over from the old rules, it changed quite a while ago.--The General ^{T Sys U! P! F!} 11:37, 23 October 2006 (BST)

I think the Spam vote shouldn't count for anything. I think that would cut down on it's usage. That way, people would only vote Spam on ideas that are truly broken. Well, actually people wouldn't (see Point Blank Combat), but it would help a little. But I can see how people want Spam to count as something, so I think the max it should count would be half a kill. --Pinpoint 19:56, 23 October 2006 (BST)

Take a look at this. This has already been discussed, significantly (check the last 4 archives). No, it wouldn't cut down on the usage because the spam vote's ACTUAL value is in the quick removal of shitty suggestions. When spam votes are used on a suggestion, the suggestion EITHER gets enough to be removed OR it will get 1 or 2. What your talking about, the "value" of the vote being 1 or 0 or .5, would ONLY affect those 1 or 2 voters who vote Spam but the suggestion isn't spamminated. Should THEIR votes count less? Why? If the spam vote "value" WERE 0, it wouldn't stop people from using it. In fact, it might make people use it MORE, just to make their vote "count."--Pesatyel 04:06, 24 October 2006 (BST)

There must be a lot more shitty suggestions these days, then. I don't think there are. I think people have just lost sight of what kinds of suggestions should be spammed, and what should be killed; but, since you don't actually need to validate your vote anymore, people just Spam everything. --Pinpoint 23:06, 24 October 2006 (BST)

Who says you don't need to valid your vote anymore? The only recent change is a...relaxation of what is valid, but you STILL have to have a reason. It is a mix of there being a lot more shitty suggestions, people "having their minds already made up" about the game (resistance to change) and the fact that "most of the good stuff has already been thought of." While that last is not ENTIRELY true, it simply means that suggestions tend to fall into certain categories (new weapons, for example) that crop up ALL the time, so instead of really thinking about how a new gun might affect the game, they just see it as "new gun? we don't need it. SPAM! The MOST IMPORTANT THING TO REMEMBER is that Kevan pulls stuff out of Peer Rejected (probably more so than Peer Reviewed). As long as your suggestion is clear and to the point, even if it gets spamminated, it still has a chance.--Pesatyel 04:38, 25 October 2006 (BST)

Discussion Page Suggestion Template

Since the discussion page is NOT for voting, we don't need the 3 seperate "voting" areas. They just clutter the page and, possibly, confuse people. Instead of this:

For Votes here

Against Votes here

Spam/Dupe Votes here

it should just be this:

Discuss here

-Pesatyel 13:05, 1 October 2006 (BST)

If people don't have any objections to it I could change the template so that it works like this. I'll check this in about 3 days time to see if anyone has any objections to it, if not I'll just go right ahead and update the template so that we can do this without it being forced to have the different sections show up. - Jedaz - 14:45/22/12/2024 12:43, 10 October 2006 (BST)

I've upgraded the tmplate so we can use it like this now

===Suggestion Name===
{{suggestionNew|
suggest_time=~~~~|
suggest_type=Skill, balance change, improvement, etc.|
suggest_scope=Who or what it applies to.|
suggest_description=Full description. Check spelling and be descriptive.|
<!-- PLEASE LEAVE ALL DISCUSSION **BELOW** THIS LINE - DO NOT DELETE THIS LINE -->
discussion=<font size = 4> '''Discussion'''</font>
<!-- PLEASE LEAVE ALL DISCUSSION **ABOVE** THIS LINE - DO NOT DELETE THIS LINE -->}}
----

As you can see it comes out like

Some suggestion

Timestamp:	Jedaz - 14:45/22/12/2024 11:31, 15 October 2006 (BST)
Type:	Of some type
Scope:	Just an example
Description:	The example

Discussion

This is just some example discussion.

So all we need to do is give this example somewhere on this page and then it should be all good to go for people to use. - Jedaz - 14:45/22/12/2024 11:31, 15 October 2006 (BST)

I stuck it here. --Funt Solo 15:09, 16 October 2006 (BST)

lol, well I just stuck it here just yesterday. Well we'll just leave both up because it'll give the new change more exposure =P - Jedaz - 14:45/22/12/2024 00:30, 18 October 2006 (BST)

Valid Votes

The Valid Votes rules no longer make sense. They should be changed. --Funt Solo 10:50, 10 October 2006 (BST)

How so? I think they are still a very good indicator on how people should vote. The only difference that I would do to them to make them valid is to add the word Vote infront of each of them, but everything else is fine. If you have any ideas on how you think they should be updated please say so. - Jedaz - 14:45/22/12/2024 12:47, 10 October 2006 (BST)

I meant in terms of the new layout - there's no need to say Kill, for example, if your vote's in the Kill section. I agree with you that the guidelines are still very useful. Also, the stuff about Kill/Change not being valid is no longer ... erm ... valid. It's the section the vote goes into that matters. --Funt Solo 13:09, 10 October 2006 (BST)

Yes, good point. I think we should make up a list then and present it to a moderator so it can be changed to reflect the current state of the rules and how people are using them. Of course we'll have this discussion over a period of days so that anyone interested can get involved. - Jedaz - 14:45/22/12/2024 00:48, 11 October 2006 (BST)

List of what? As I see it, based on the new template layout, not much changes. We still need to do a redifinition of the votes (as we've been trying to do below). To put it bare bones simply, a suggestion is either "perfect" as is, needs work or utterly irredeemable. I'm in favor of changing the "kill" section/vote to revise. The sections/votes would be defined as:

Keep section: Suggestion is good AS IS. No need to have add anything but a time stamp (well, maybe a positive comment).
Revise (formerly Kill) section: Suggestion needs work to be a "Keeper." Voters add what THEY think should be changed to make it a "Keeper."
Spam/Dupe section: Spam if the suggestion CANNOT be made into a keeper, no matter how much revision is done. Voters add why the suggestion should be spamminated. Dupe if the suggestion is exact or very similar to a suggestion in Peer Review or Peer Rejected. Voter adds a link to the duplicated suggestion.

How does THAT sound?--Pesatyel 05:59, 11 October 2006 (BST)

Well thats different then what we are trying to aim at here. This is just aiming at trying to define the wording of the examples and to remove the redundant rules so that they are in line with what the updated rules are and how the community uses them. For example under Invalid Votes we can remove the part about Change, Kill/Change ect as people are now allowed to vote anything that they want as long as it's under the appropiate header. Also valid votes need to be changed as people are voting things like "Newbie Friendly", "OMG" and other such phrases. As the rules are writen currently they are still all invalid votes, but we can easily see what they are by looking at the headings. Does that make sense what this discussion is trying to achieve? - Jedaz - 14:45/22/12/2024 08:18, 11 October 2006 (BST)

Yes, we're not discussing changing the meanings of Kill/Keep/Spam - that's the other discussion down below - just the wording of this bit. --Funt Solo 12:59, 12 October 2006 (BST)

I see the two as related. Anyway, if we are going to change the wording, then lets change the wording:

===Invalid Votes===
*Change If the suggestion's current form does not have merit, Kill is the *appropriate vote. Change votes will be deleted.

Kill/Change, Keep, but Change, Keep/Change - These votes will result in the only valid part of your vote being counted; the change part is completely ignored during the vote tallying. If you only want the suggestion to be kept if it's changed, vote Kill and ask them to re-suggest with your changes. No longer invalid.
Server Load and Programming Complexity are NOT very good Kill reasons. You are voting on the merit of the suggestion and whether or not you think it belongs in the game. Server load/complexity issues are up to Kevan to decide.
X should be implemented first is not a valid reason for a vote. You are voting on the merit of THIS suggestion, not how it compares to others.
Kill/Spam votes that do not have reasoning behind them are invalid. You MUST justify your vote.

Is THAT what you meant?--Pesatyel 04:41, 13 October 2006 (BST)

You make it look so easy. :) --Funt Solo 14:20, 13 October 2006 (BST)

I made the changes, because I am cool like that. Anything else need changing?--Gage 02:54, 16 October 2006 (BST)

Hmmph - I asked about this a while ago at M/DS, and was totally ignored. :::Sticks tongue out at Gage::: --Darth Sensitive

^W! 02:56, 16 October 2006 (BST)

When I saw M/DS my first thought was UDWiki:Moderation/Darth Sensitive. >_< –Xoid ^S•T•FU! 05:16, 16 October 2006 (BST)

I should so have my own moderation page! --Darth Sensitive

^W! 22:37, 16 October 2006 (BST)

Obscene Voting Practices

Is there a reason most of the people here hate zombies? Every suggestion I see that gives zombies even the slightest bit of help gets spammed quickly, and the piece of shit that is Point-Blank Combat (would ruin the game) is getting Keep votes like mad! Why does this obscene pro-survivor, anti-zombie bias exist here? --Pinpoint 19:53, 23 October 2006 (BST)

It exists in your head. Go take a look in Peer Reviewed. --Funt Solo 21:41, 1 November 2006 (UTC)

Policy Discussion

This area is for formal discussion of policy changes for the suggestions page, as per the Voting Guidelines.

Clarify Rule 12

Currently, Rule 12 reads:

12. Each author should not make more than one suggestion per day. This limit does not include suggestions which the author has removed for the purpose of revision. Suggestions may be revised once per day at most. Suggestions must be removed prior to revisions being posted. Frequent removal of suggestions to avoid having them spaminated is considered abuse of the system. Removal of suggestions in order to post non-revision suggestions the same day is also considered abuse of the system.

The updated version would read as follows:

12. Each author may submit one new Suggestion and one Revision to this page per day. A Revision may be a revised version of that day’s suggestion or of a previous day’s suggestion. A Revision may not be posted until the Suggestion is removed. Removing a Suggestion or Revision to prevent it from being Spaminated is considered abuse.

This version is better because:

It's clearer and more concise.

It draws a clear distinction between Suggestions and Revisions (revised versions of previous suggestions) whereas the old version uses the terms interchangeably causing confusion.

It clarifies that the revision need not be a revision of the suggestion provided that day, which was never my intent when I submitted Policy D, which became the updated version of Rule 12 (see discussion below).

It seems like a hassle to go through this whole process again, but it's important. Please let me know your thoughts on this. Rheingold 03:59, 19 September 2006 (BST)

This was not the original intent of the policy, and allows users to potentially post 2 suggestions per day. The mods have made their decision, get over it. We have a precedent set now, so we don't need clarification of the rules, especially of your kind.--Gage 06:05, 19 September 2006 (BST)--Gage 05:57, 19 September 2006 (BST)

NO. Just no. Just because Aushvitz played your skin flute dosn't mean you have to be his lackey. Just no. Also, somewhat unclear, a revision of a ten month old suggestion reposted, or a suggestion "revised" and changed completely other than the name, would both follow this rule but be abuse currently. --CaptainM 06:04, 19 September 2006 (BST)

CaptainM, please take your projected fantasies elsewhere. Now, as to the new wording, I don't see anything wrong with it. It still requires the first suggestion to be removed, so no one could submit two suggestions a day. They have to be willing to take down the original first. Thus the spirit is still the same. Oh, and Gage, I think a clarification on a policy by the author of said policy is important. --Pinpoint 06:52, 19 September 2006 (BST)

I wrote the policy, not Rheingold. Dumbass.--Gage 07:20, 19 September 2006 (BST)

That's why Rheingold said he wrote it, right? --Pinpoint 12:12, 20 September 2006 (BST)

Go look who wrote it. Xoid and I wrote it. It was my idea originally. All Rheingold did was get me to change the number of revisions from 2 to 1. I think I would know what my policy is supposed to mean, thanks.--Gage 15:41, 20 September 2006 (BST)

Which means that when Rheingold suggested one, the above clarification is how he meant it. Which means it's an entirely valid clarification. --Pinpoint 22:49, 20 September 2006 (BST)

No, he misunderstood it. He wants to change it to what he thinks it should be.--Gage 02:24, 21 September 2006 (BST)

The unbanning of Mr. Aushvitz shows there is no clear understanding of what the rule means. Bob apparently agrees with your interpretation. Xoid apparently agrees with mine: Furthermore, the wording said "revision". The suggestion that Aushvitz placed was a revision under all common meanings of the word. Even if the mods were unanimous in agreeing with me, or with you, that still wouldn't stop this from being a needlessly ambiguous rule.

Whether you agree with my version or not I hope you agree (with Bob and I) that clarification is needed. If you don't like my version of the clarified rule, submit your own. I might even vote for it. I just want the rules to be as clear as possible so that people can't be witch-hunted. Rheingold 05:43, 21 September 2006 (BST)

how about this?

Each author should not make more than one unique suggestion per day. This limit does not include suggestions which the author has removed for the purpose of revision. Suggestions may be revised once per day at most. Suggestions must be removed prior to revisions being posted. Frequent removal of suggestions to avoid having them spaminated is considered abuse of the system. Removal of suggestions in order to post non-revision suggestions the same day is also considered abuse of the system.--Gage 06:10, 21 September 2006 (BST)

Looks okay. What about:

Each author is allowed 1 suggestion per day. That suggestion may be removed by the author for revision, if necessary, 1 time and the revision reposted the same day. Suggestions must be removed prior to revisions being posted. Frequent removal of suggestions to avoid having them spaminated is considered abuse of the system. Removal of suggestions in order to post non-revision suggestions the same day is also considered abuse of the system.

Gets more to the point (*I* think), instead of "should not make more than one" and "may be revised once per day at most".--Pesatyel 13:13, 1 October 2006 (BST)

I've got to admit, I'm confused. Could I post a suggestion, then remove it, then post a revision of a suggestion from two weeks ago, all in the space of 24 hours? Or does the revision have to be of the current, 24-hour, suggestion? I think it's supposed to be the latter, but frankly, that paragraph (by Gage) is confusing. I'm not saying it doesn't make sense - just that if it does, it's lost on my simple, human brain. Can it be worded another way? (Pesatyel's version suggests that posting a revision after the 24-hour period would somehow be wrong - although I know that's not what's meant). Hmmm. Anyone know any lawyers? --Funt Solo 10:13, 2 October 2006 (BST)

Really? Hmmm...I thought it was to the point. Basically, as I see it, if a suggestion is pulled then revised and reposted it is still considered (technically speaking) the SAME suggestion. Meaning the person is still only posting one suggestion for that day. The main thrust of the whole rule is a single 24 hour period of time. Once the time has elapsed, any suggestion made the following 24 hour period would probably be considered a "new suggestion," even if a revision of the previous days suggestion. But I see you had that idea as well, below. I edited your post below. Tell me what you think of the different wording.--Pesatyel 05:21, 5 October 2006 (BST)

How's this:

Each author may post ~~one~~ one unique suggestion per ~~day</s\>~~ 24 hour period. That suggestion may be removed, revised and re-posted (by the author) once within that ~~day</s\>~~ 24 hour period, and only in that order. If a revised suggestion is re-posted after that ~~day</s\>~~ 24 hour period, it counts as a new suggestion. (Frequent removal of suggestions to avoid having them spaminated is considered abuse of the system.) --Funt Solo 14:51, 2 October 2006 (BST); with later edits by Pesatyel

~~An idea on warnings~~
I know, I should just let mods do their buisiness, but I genuinely think that this will help. I've had this idea for some time, and I realized that it would seriously help in the case we just recently witnessed. I was thinking, that when people who are on VB for something that is not an obvious vandalisim act (I.e. page blanking, link spammage, stuff like that), that they are allowed a set amount of time to give a defense. The rules: You must give a defense within x amount of time and you cannot put any unrelated edits after the notification that you are on VB. What do you think about this? --Gold Blade 22:47, 25 September 2006 (BST)
Sounds useful. I'd like to add that if someone doesn't raise a defense, that shouldn't be seen as evidence that they vandalized (they could have gone on holiday or something). You could raise your idea at UDWiki:Moderation/Policy_Discussion.--Toejam 04:21, 30 September 2006 (BST)

Gold Blade, you know that this isn't the place for this. This goes under policy discussion. –Xoid ^S•T•FU! 04:23, 30 September 2006 (BST)

~~Summary Of Votes~~
Under the current rules (specifically 10 & 11), it's clear that no suggestion should be altered once voting has begun, and even in the case of "notes added for clarification", it's suggested the suggestion be removed and re-submitted. I agree with those rules.
If a suggestion passes into Peer Reviewed or Undecided, a small note of the concerns of voters is often added. In effect, this is a summary of the voting.
With particularly controversial suggestions, or those that attract discussion, it might be useful if the author of the suggestion could add a brief summary of votes / concerns, to the bottom of their suggestion, while voting is underway. This would allow new voters to get an idea of the key concerns, plus it would save the person who eventually archives these a bit of time. Additionally, it might prove beneficial to anyone who might later decide to implement a suggestion.
For example, with a suggestion I currently have under voting for a river running through Malton, I thought it would be useful to add in a summary of the key concerns:

Whether river squares be impassable/passable a key concern.
Infection for human swimmers a popular idea.
Ferries suggested.
Clarification requested on number of bridges.
A more twisting route taking in suburbs across Malton suggested.
This would not add new rules to the suggestion, and would have to be placed in a definitely separate area (a box, as part of the template?), where it was clear that it was not part of the suggestion, and only a summary of the votes.
--Funt Solo 09:52, 30 September 2006 (BST)
What exactly are you suggesting? That the author read all the votes, then summarize what they say in the suggestion's description? I think it would confuse people more (even if "seperated"). If the voters bring up serious enough or several concerns, the author has the option of pulling the suggestion down to address those concerns. Besides, voters already have the capability of reading what everyone else said in their votes. Either a voter makes up his mind by reading the suggestion alone or they make up their mind after reading the suggestion AND how others voted. Adding redundant information the voters can already obtain won't help anything.--Pesatyel 12:31, 1 October 2006 (BST)
~~You know, you're right. I don't know what I was thinking. --Funt Solo 12:34, 1 October 2006 (BST)~~
~~Change Voting Categories~~
I notice Spam is being used as a strong kill and since we can't actually stop people from voting Spam even when a kill is more appropriate I suggest changing the system to better suit the way people actually vote.
Right now we have Keep, Kill, and Spam. Keep is if you want the suggestion to be implemented. Kill is if you don't like the suggestion or want something significant to change before you'd vote keep. Spam is for suggestions that are vandalism, trying to be humorous, or grossly ignorant of the gameplay mechanics or zombie genre. However this is not the way they are used. People vote keep when they like a suggestion, kill if they want to change something, and spam anything they don't ever want to pass.
I suggest we change the voting options from Keep, Kill, Spam/Dupe and make them Keep, Change, Kill/Dupe. Change would work exactly the same as Kill does now and the new Kill would work as Spam currently does. This would clear up some confusion and make the voting options actually coresspond to the way people vote. Vote keep if you want it to be kept, vote change if you think it can be salvaged, and kill if you want to close debate on the issue. --Jon Pyre 07:43, 1 October 2006 (BST)

You're right, in part, that Spam is sometimes mis-used as a strong kill. However, if a suggestion has merit - then it won't get spaminated - there would be enough Kill/Keep votes to keep it afloat. I don't think there's a problem to fix.
I disagree that Spam is for vandalism. Vandalism will be removed as such by the mods. I also disagree that Spam is for humerous suggestions. Again, those will be moved to the humerous suggestions section. Spam is only for a suggestion that you think is unsalvageable.
You're also wrong that people who want something changed always vote Kill. That is just not the case. Check out (for example) my recent River suggestion - and take note of the amount of people who voted Keep, but also suggested significant changes. This kind of voting happens all the time.
Introducing a Change vote would actually cause more confusion, not reduce it.
I like the current system. Keep/Kill can both have change provisos in their text, and Spam is for unsalvageable suggestions. --Funt Solo 12:32, 1 October 2006 (BST)

This is the way *I* vote:
Keep: The suggestion is good AS IS.

Kill: The suggestion could get a keep, but needs revision.

Spam: No amount of revision could get a keep for this suggestion.
We COULD change "Kill" to "Revise" (I like that better than "Change"). However, you say the new Kill would work as Spam currently does. Isn't that just semantics? What, really, would change other than the name (Spam to Kill)? Instead of suggestions getting "Spamminated," they will just get "Killinated" and everything will go on as usual. Changing the NAME of the vote won't do anything. You have to change the MEANING of the vote. And, as I said, I see nothing wrong with the definitions I (and most of us) use.--Pesatyel 12:42, 1 October 2006 (BST)

My only problem with dilineating a suggestion as spam is that, so far as I can tell, people simply use it as "kill it a lot, just cause". I don't have a problem with my ideas being shot down, but if they're hated that much, I'd like to think that people should bother to go into detail why. This is especially true if people simply repeat a claim that the original author's tried to argue. It seems needlessly hostile that a considered, if wrong-headed, suggestion can be spaminated by seven people who don't really care enough to put their thoughts down in any level of detail. --Kestrel, 07:14, October 1, 2006 (CDT)
Case in point - two of the spam votes for my latest suggestion have accused it of being pickle flavored. A few others are clearly just strong kills, without any comment about the core concepts of the idea, just the parts I myself said I was flexible on, things expressly not grounds for a down vote (specifically, difficulty of coding), or the claim that since it was RP-thematic, there was no need to use it. What's the point of posting the guidelines for the spam vote if there's no reason for people to follow them? --Kestrel 23:54, 3 October 2006 (BST)

On further review, I've decided it's not worth bothering to make suggestions in the first place. People spaminate for no reason, spaminate without getting their facts straight, spaminate in defiance of the wiki rules, and spaminate whether they believe that the core concept of an idea is salvageable or not. I have no problem with my ideas being shot down, but people apparently love shooting ideas down for its own sake. --Kestrel 02:16, 4 October 2006 (BST)

~~The way I see them?~~
Keep

for suggestions that are fine as is, or close enough that it really doesn't matter.

Kill

for suggestions that are not bad, but need work.

Spam

for suggestions that are not salvagable without a complete or near complete rewrite.
–Xoid ^S•T•FU! 13:24, 1 October 2006 (BST)
I vote
Keep

Suggestions that I like as submitted, or like as submitted but think an addition would make it even better. I also sometimes include "I think this is what you mean but please clarify" comments.

Kill

for suggestions that have a good idea at their heart, but I would dislike being submitted as-is.

Spam

for suggestions that are just plain stupid in every possible way.
Gene Splicer 13:02, 5 October 2006 (BST)
Personally, I think the entire spam vote concept needs to disappear. No one uses it as they are supposed to. The spam vote is only supposed to be used when something is so ridiculously overpowering or against the core game concepts that it would break the game. In my time here I have never seen a suggestion that fits that bill (except Eat Self, of course...), and yet I see spam votes all the time.
As an example of how everyone uses spam as a strong kill, I'll use one of my own suggestions that was spaminated. Anyone remember that machine gun suggestion I had for the forts? Now, I'm not claiming that this should have made it into peer reviewed (I've since realized it really wouldn't have fit well into the game), but some of the reasons people gave for spamming it were infinitely more ridiculous than the suggestion itself. Many argued that it was out of flavor for the genre. However, machine gun turrets have appeared in just about every zombie movie that ever had a fort, so it's not completely out of the genre or particularly ridiculous like flying purple hippos or something. But what really got me about the spamination of that suggestion is that people claimed it was overpowered. If one did the math (1 death for every 20 AP spent, unless they had body building or a flak jacket), the attacking zombies would only have been 5% less effective. Malls, by comparison, can be practically twice as strong in terms of barricades, making zombies 50% less effective. That also doesn't take into account the superior search percentages of malls.
This story happens all the time. People spam a suggestion because they don't like it and give a reason that is either BS or not even mathematically consistent. And it's not just people like me or Mr A, either. I'm sure all of you have had people spam your suggestions and justify it with the word "overpowered", without even so much as explaining how it is overpowered or showing any mathematical/statistical evidence.
Now, the suggestions page clearly states:
Spam votes are not a "strong kill", they are simply here to prevent the utterly ridiculous from clogging up the system. If you do not like the idea, and it's not some crazy uber power or something else ridiculous, VOTE KILL, NOT SPAM. Spam votes will be counted as Kill when votes are tallied.
Right there it says that if a suggestion is not UTTERLY ridiculous people should not vote spam. In order for a suggestion to be utterly ridiculous in terms of flavor, it has to be unheard of in a zombie movie or game. Machine guns, Assault rifles, intelligent zombies that plan and coordinate attacks, etc have all made numerous appearances in zombie movies and games. Should they get into peer reviewed? No. Most of these types of suggestions would unbalance the game or otherwise not fit in. Should they get spaminated? No, they aren't utterly ridiculous. They should get killed, but not spammed.
Really, the best way to fix everything would be to eliminate the spam votes, leave dupes alone, and give mods the power to remove any suggestion they believe to be vandalism or such as long as 2/3 of the votes are kill or dupe. In this way the spam votes would no longer even be necessary, because it's purpose is to get rid of truly ridiculous suggestions. --Reaper with no name 15:56, 16 October 2006 (BST)
Or "Spam, for the most ridiculous suggestions."
That's "ridiculous" from the point of view of the voter. It's their opinion. If they think, to follow your example, that machine gun turrets are ridiculous as they see the game, then it is their right to vote Spam. The system does work well as is. If a suggestion is not completely awful, the weight of Keep or Kill votes will counter the Spam votes - and the suggestion will last the full two weeks of voting to end up wherever it deserves to end up. Only the worst suggestions get spaminated, which clears the field for those suggestions that have some merit.
What might a voter take "ridiculous" to mean? That it doesn't belong in the genre as they see it? That the rules would unbalance the game? That no change apart from a complete re-write could salvage the suggestion? That it would ruin the game experience for them? That they hate the flavour? Any of those things could lead to a valid spam vote - but you need two thirds spam votes to kill off a suggestion before it gets to the full two weeks.
If that doesn't happen, then Spam is Kill, in terms of the final tally. I just don't see a problem, except that some people are getting upset that their suggestions aren't well-received. --Funt Solo 17:02, 16 October 2006 (BST)
I don't mind that many of my suggestions are spaminated. A lot of my suggestions are terrible. Some of them I only suggest to see how people will react to them for future reference (Severed Hand for example). What I do mind is that I believe people are abusing the spam vote.
Just because someone doesn't like something doesn't mean that they should be able to just vote spam on it. Under that line of logic people can auto-spam every single suggestion because they don't like the idea of zombies being able to do anything except die or are opposed to any changes in the game whatsoever. Heck, something as simple as "Nerfs my safehouse" could be grounds for a spam vote if you base the criteria on how much someone likes a suggestion or whether it fits into the game as they see it.
Votes are supposed to have reasoning to justify them or else they are considered invalid. But people rarely give any when they vote spam (or if they do, they use reasoning that is ultimately flawed, which is a whole 'nother problem...). They just say "overpowered", or "out of flavor". But that carries no weight on it's own. They have to demonstrate why it is that way, or else it shouldn't count. But it doesn't work that way.
Also, while one part of the rules may only say "ridiculous", another part says "utterly ridiculous". Now, it's possible I'm looking too much into the wording, but it indicates to me that spam voting should be very rare because "Utterly" and "ridiculous" together describe something for which there is no logic to it being in the game whatsoever. There is no room for opinion there. It either can make sense in the game or it can't. If one can come up with a logical reason for why it would be there, then it doesn't fall under "utterly ridiculous".
And while we're on the subject of spamination, the spamination process itself is a problem. How are we to know how the suggestion would have fared had it lasted the full two weeks? Because people spam suggestions so readily (even those that get into peer reviewed suffer at least a few spam votes most of the time), it is very possible that a suggestion which would have made it into peer review had it been around long enough for everyone to vote on it would be spaminated. All it would take is the first 7 people voting spam. Even if the suggestion was the best in the world, and 1,000,000,000 after that 7th spam would have voted keep, it doesn't matter as long as those 7 spams get there first.
And it's not as unlikely a scenario as one would think. There are several issues that drive a deep divide between members of the community. Take for example skills that make zombies more powerful in combat. There are many who are deeply opposed to making zombies any stronger, believing they are strong enough already. But then there are others who would immediately start shouting about how weak zombies are and how barricades make it almost impossible for zombies to attack survivors without a huge horde (I think I'm part of this group). If someone made a suggestion that, say, increased the accuracy of a zombie's claw attacks by 5%, and the anti-zombie-strengthening people happened to all vote on it before the other side did, it would be spaminated before it would even have a chance to spread it's wings. For all we know, this type of scenario has been played out several times.
And a final problem with spamination is that if it happens fast enough the author will have no clue what it was that people hated about it. I still have no clue what people's reasons were for spamming Recognition. --Reaper with no name 18:22, 16 October 2006 (BST)
Find me one example of a spaminated suggestion that deserves a re-vote. --Funt Solo 18:34, 16 October 2006 (BST)
You don't understand why people spammed Recognition? Read the votes. It's fairly clear that they didn't want Zombie anonymity to be nerfed. What could you have changed about your suggestion to alleviate their concerns? Nothing. Therefore, they correctly used the Spam vote. QED. --Funt Solo 18:42, 16 October 2006 (BST)
I meant for future reference. Now that I know people love zombie anonymity, I won't make that same mistake again. I didn't know the votes were saved when suggestions are spaminated. Thanks for setting me straight on that part.
As for a suggestion that deserves a re-vote, the problem is that there's no way to tell whether or not it deserves a re-vote, because there are no votes after spamination. And even if it had never happened, the fact remains that it can happen. That's reason enough for some sort of change. --Reaper with no name 18:59, 16 October 2006 (BST)
I made a suggestion some time ago that, when a suggestion is done voting (be it spammed, duped or the full 2 weeks), it should be moved in its entirety, including all votes, to the appropriate page. Maybe that should be brought up again?--Pesatyel 03:43, 17 October 2006 (BST)
The main problem with the Spam vote is that the voting process is supposed to be an exchange of ideas and a place for feedback. The spam vote curtails debate entirely. Perhaps a suggestion is overpowered. But someone spamming it out of hand might prevent some future voter from seeing something there they could improve on, or from voting kill but suggesting a fix in their vote. Spam ends the debate. Even for suggestions that you never want to have passed in any form whatsoever you should vote kill so other people see why that suggestion is a bad idea and DON'T SUGGEST IT AGAIN. Spam should be for vandalism and things that are so dumb they don't need to stick around as a lesson of what not to do. --Jon Pyre 01:25, 17 October 2006 (BST)
Well, part of the problem is that people don't make use of the discussion pages as intended (where your "exchange of ideas" SHOULD be). Take a look at the page above. We had 37 developing suggestions and 8 active ones. But look how many people ACTUALLY participated in most of those discussions. Sure, some were retarded, but some had potential (hence some discussion), but most people just wait until it is up for voting.--Pesatyel 03:43, 17 October 2006 (BST)
Personally, I believe people should be allowed to vote how they want. I think the key may lie in someone (a moderator?) reading the votes and removing the ones that don't have "valid" reasons (whether, keep, kill OR spam). But the inherent problem, of course, is who decides WHAT is a "valid" vote. How about this, maybe we could set up a page to review a suggestion to see if the voting was "fair" or not?--Pesatyel 03:43, 17 October 2006 (BST)
Well, bear in mind that Kevan doesn't ONLY implement ideas from Peer Review. In fact, off the top of my head, I think there are MORE from Peer Rejected! But I could be wrong. The point is, I think, simplicity and something Kevan can use. WE may like or dislike a particular suggestion, but if it is worded and the mechanics are something Kevan can use, well, it doesn't matter so much whether we like or dislike it, now does it?--Pesatyel 05:35, 17 October 2006 (BST)
"the voting process is supposed to be an exchange of ideas and a place for feedback". No, that's just how you treat it. The discussion page is for feedback and exchange. What a lot of people are failing to realise is that voters are doing you a favour, by taking the time to vote on the suggestions at all. That the voting doesn't go your way is not the fault of the voters, and they shouldn't be shouted down for providing their honest opinion. If you are brave enough to ask for the opinion of your peers, you should not be petulant about that opinion not matching your own. --Funt Solo 09:53, 17 October 2006 (BST)
But see, that is the very argument people are using against the spam vote. It isn't that the vote "isn't going the author's way" it is that people don't really READ the suggestion and/or consider how it could improve the game (which should be the primary goal of EVERY suggestion). They just spamminate it because it is easier. Of course I'm not saying that's how *I* see it, but I believe that's how a lot of people who don't like the spam vote see it.--Pesatyel 07:04, 18 October 2006 (BST)
The basic point is, if you don't want to see a suggestion come back vote kill. Then people will read the kill votes and know why it is bad. And the author will read the kill votes and see what they did wrong. Spam is meant to get rid of things that have absolutely no merit, that people should instinctively know are bad like "flying zombies". --Jon Pyre 19:30, 21 October 2006 (BST)
I'm calling bullshit on that - "flying zombies" would get put into "Humorous Suggestions". Spam is for unfixable suggestions, just like it says on the tin - and most Spam votes do provide feedback as to why the voter thinks that suggestion is unfixable. If they didn't, it wouldn't be a valid vote. The simple fact is this: authors don't like to see spam votes on their suggestions, and I count myself in that. --Funt Solo 02:21, 22 October 2006 (BST)
Once a suggestion is spamminated, the votes disappear (and having to use history is a pain in the ass). So once it gets to Peer Rejected, people CAN'T see voter feedback and why voters think the suggestion is unfixable. HOWEVER, if a suggestion is NOT spamminated, it goes to Previous Days IN TACT (ie. WITH all votes still attached). It isn't about authors not liking to see spam votes on their suggestions (what author does?). It is about seeing the same stupid crap over and over because people don't know why it was rejected...just that it was.--Pesatyel 05:12, 22 October 2006 (BST)
Once a suggestion is spamminated, the votes disappear (and having to use history is a pain in the ass). So once it gets to Peer Rejected, people CAN'T see voter feedback and why voters think the suggestion is unfixable. HOWEVER, if a suggestion is NOT spamminated, it goes to Previous Days IN TACT (ie. WITH all votes still attached). It isn't about authors not liking to see spam votes on their suggestions (what author does?). It is about seeing the same stupid crap over and over because people don't know why it was rejected...just that it was. --Jon Pyre 09:10, 22 October 2006 (BST)
Okay, now I see your point. One possible solution is to have a summary line (as for Peer Reviewed), which indicates (in brief) why any suggestion ended up in Peer Rejected. Of course, the onus is then on the contributers who do the sorting to put in the effort. That's probably the same person who sorts all of the suggestions. That's quite a time-consuming task, and some might argue that time spent on Reviewed and Undecided suggestions is more worthwhile than time spent on Rejected. Here's an idea to share the workload - why doesn't the person who wrote the suggestion get off their fat arse and check the history to see why their ill-thought out pile of shite was spaminated? No, that just wouldn't do, would it. Sorry. What was I thinking? Of course, it's up to someone else to mollycoddle the author de merde and perhaps, whilst they're not busy kindly explaining why things have gone awry with their precious suggestion, they could also pop around to the author's house and wipe their arse for them? Yes, that's far more reasonable. --Funt Solo 09:32, 22 October 2006 (BST)
Well, like I said, using the history is a pain in the ass. It isn't easy to find what you are looking for. The easiest thing to do, I think, would be to just move the suggestion to Previous Days or Peer Rejected as is. Everything else gets done that way, so why not spamminated suggestions. ESPECIALLY if you consider those are the biggest problems on the suggestion page. Fact of the matter is, there are four things that happen to a suggestion put up for voting: It is spamminated and moved to Peer Rejected, it is removed by the author either for revision or to just remove it, it is accepted and moved to Peer Reviewed or nothing happens to it and it ends up in the limbo of Undecided. And the last rarely ever happens any more. And, again it has nothing to do with the author "getting of their fat arse" to check the history. In fact this has nothing to do with the original author at all. It is about a rejected suggestion appearing over and over because new authors don't know why it was rejected.--Pesatyel 22:17, 22 October 2006 (BST)
You know, I've done some thinking. And what I've realized is that the whole "I'm voting spam because the suggestion is unfixable" argument makes about as much sense as 2+2=3. Most people who frequently vote spam claim that they do so because the suggestion is unfixable or just exceedingly bad. But the only real difference between kill and spam votes is that spam votes have the added possibility of getting the suggestion removed, preventing further voting on it. But this begs the question: if a given suggestion is really so bad that it has no chance of getting into peer reviewed, then why bother voting spam at all? Either way, it's going to end up in the same place, right? If it really had no merit whatsoever, then voting spam would mean the same as voting kill.
So then, why would one vote spam if the suggestion is certain to go into peer rejected either way? The only answer to this question is that the suggestion's fate is not certain. The voter is afraid that if they just vote kill, others will come along, vote keep, and propel the suggestion into either undecided or peer reviewed despite their objections. So, they "nip it in the bud", so to speak, using the spam vote. But if voting kill rather than spam could mean that the suggestion would go into peer reviewed or undecided, then it DOES have merit, and thus should not be spaminated.
You can try to argue with this simple fact, but there is no reason to vote spam on suggestions other than to get a suggestion you don't like removed because you are afraid of it passing. How do we know: because that's all that the spam vote does: it removes suggestions before everyone has had a chance to vote on them. There is no way to know whether or not a suggestion would have passed had it been up for the full two weeks unless it is allowed to happen. Hence, spam voting is (to put it in rather extreme terms) an attempt to subvert the democracy of the suggestions page by not allowing everyone the chance to vote on suggestions. --Reaper with no name 18:05, 25 October 2006 (BST)
Hrmn...bollocks. I'll tell you, honestly, and I've no reason to lie: I vote Spam on unfixable (in my opinion) suggestions. I vote Kill on a suggestion I think is fixable enough that I might vote Keep on a re-write. I'm not just claiming that's why I vote that way - that is why I vote that way. And your conspiracy theory fails to realise the actual benefit to spaminating suggestions - it stops them cluttering the place up. Prove me wrong - go and find a spaminated suggestion that you didn't write that you really believe deserves to become part of the game. Let's place it on this page and let everyone vote on it from now until the end of time - and we'll see. I think you'll find the democratic process is doing just fine. --Funt Solo 18:16, 25 October 2006 (BST)
It's not meant to be a conspiracy theory. And I suppose I should have specified the difference between what one intends when they vote spam and what they are actually saying. It is clear that many people appear to use spam for suggestions that are unfixable, but that doesn't change the fact that if the suggestion was truly unfixable and therefore destined for peer rejected that there's no harm in voting kill instead of spam. And if it wasn't necessarily destined for peer rejected...well, then there would be a lot of harm in voting spam. Whether it's happened or not in the past is irrelevant; it can happen. We can easily do something about it. The alternative has no disadvantages other than the "cluttering". But really, what's more important: keeping the place neat and tidy or making sure that every suggestion present and future is treated fairly?
And while we're on the subject of cluttering up the suggestions page, tell me: how many suggestions are made on average per day? Is the removal of suggestions "cluttering up" the space of a page that only contains a single day's worth of suggestions really necessary? I don't think so. It doesn't save that much space. --Reaper with no name 19:52, 25 October 2006 (BST)
Reaper, you hit the nail squarely on the head about the spam vote. THE reason for the spam vote is to get shitty suggestions removed as quickly as possible, so as to not clutter the suggestion page. Whether or not a suggestion IS shitty enough to get spamminated, that is up to the individual voters and as I've said multiple times in these discussions don't tell people how to vote. SOME people may abuse the vote, but I fully believe most do not. Your basically telling ME that I don't know how to vote on a suggestions. What makes YOUR vote any "better" than mine? And "unfixable" is but ONE of the many reasonings behind a spam vote. Others include breaking the game, not fitting within genre, and requiring the game be reset. The only REAL problem with spamminating a suggestion is that, when it is moved, the votes are removed. You know, I think you do have something of a point about, now that there are fewer suggestions per day, the spam vote isn't needed quite so much.
Question is, what are you suggesting we do to correct the "problem?"--Pesatyel 04:47, 26 October 2006 (BST)
This is just a circular argument. Now you're focussing down on the suggestions page itself, but ignoring the suggestion system as a whole. Pretend that you only vote on suggestions once a week - you'd go to the previous suggestions page - where (under your system) all the really crappy deserving-of-spamination suggestions would still be cluttering up the system. Now back to my challenge, which everyone politely ignores: Prove me wrong - go and find a spaminated suggestion that you didn't write that you really believe deserves to become part of the game. Let's place it on this page and let everyone vote on it from now until the end of time - and we'll see. I think you'll find the democratic process is doing just fine. Really. Have you even looked? If there is such a big problem with spamination, then you should find loads of really great suggestions littering Peer Rejected, right? Uh-huh. Hrmn... --Funt Solo 12:34, 26 October 2006 (BST)
Voting again on a previously spaminated suggestion doesn't tell us how it would have fared had it been allowed to be voted on for the full two weeks. People change. Some people leave. New people join. As an example, when I first started playing UD, if someone submitted a suggestion for heashot being removed from the game, I would have voted keep, because back then I felt that headshot griefed zombies. Today, I would vote kill on that same suggestion, simply because I have come to understand that attacking a zombie's AP is the only way for death to have any real effect on them if they have ankle grab.
I also think it's interesting how I'm being accused of telling people how to vote, because the only thing I'm talking about is the removal of the ability to prevent other people from voting. Spam voting not only tells people how to vote but forces people to vote in a certain way (that is, not at all). It forces them to abstain. When a person spaminates a suggestion, they are basically saying (whether they mean to or not) that their vote is more important than the votes of all the people who would have come afterward, be those votes keep, kill, dupe, or spam. Why? Because that's what the spam vote does; it prevents other people from casting their votes. And you can say whatever you want about how a spam vote from you only means a suggestion is unfixable, game-breaking, etc, but that doesn't change the fact that you are also giving out the message that your vote is more important than any other votes which would have come later. If I start stabbing someone and say "Don't worry! I'm not hurting you!", does that mean I'm not hurting them? Of course not. Spam votes are kill votes with the added effect of being able to remove a suggestion before it's time and preventing other people from voting. Because kill does the same thing without that secondary effect, there is no way to rationalize spam voting as not being an attempt to prevent others from voting on it.
The saddest part of all this is, the spam voters' votes are more important than everyone else's under the current system. Even a million keeps means nothing as long as enough spam votes get there first. How can anyone even call that a democratic process? Democracy is based on the concept of everyone having a say. But if things that are being voted on can be removed before everyone has a chance to vote on them, then those late people don't really have a say in the issue to begin with. --Reaper with no name 19:54, 27 October 2006 (BST)
~~You still haven't shown a single spaminated suggestion that deserves to live. Money your put mouth your where is. --Funt Solo 21:04, 27 October 2006 (BST)~~
"Deserves to live" is highly subjective. There are plenty of spammed suggestions with some keeps. Those people at least felt it deserved to live. That's the problem with spam. It is for the unfixable. But it should only be applied to suggestions that nobody half-way sane would support. For instance if I suggested something "Increase Infectious Bite to 2 Damage" it'd get several spams from people saying infectious bite is strong enough, this would be unfair, etc. They'd be right that it's a bad idea. But there's a world of difference between a suggestion I merely think is bad and something like "Dynamite Bombs: Time Bomb Auto-kills Up To 20 Zombies" which is outright ridiculous. Kill isn't for suggestions you think can be salvaged. It's isn't a "Close but change this please" category. It's for suggestions you don't want to pass. Spam is for suggestions that are spam, utterly unworthy of consideration by anyone. A bad suggestion still deserves to be considered and rejected. Spam is to get rid of suggestions, not votes. If even a small number of voters could theoretically vote keep they deserve the right to, even if you disagree with their logic or notions of game balance. Moderators were given their special spam vote in order to prevent people from jokingly supporting a suggestion. If there are serious keep votes moderators should let the voting process play out. --Jon Pyre 01:14, 29 October 2006 (UTC)
I'd agree with you if not for the simple fact that voting is subjective. I've stated how I vote on multiple occasions (Keep - as is, Kill - needs revision, spam - will never be a "keeper"). Thus, if I vote on something, I honestly believe the WHY of how I vote. But as I said, the voting is subjective. My reasonings might not be your reasonings, but because you may like a suggestion and I think it is utter crap does NOT mitigate or invalidate EITHER of our votes. It sounds to me like you are suggesting that, if a suggestions gets keep votes, it should stay on the page no matter how many spam votes it gets, but I'm sure you see the flaw in THAT. What makes a "serious" keep vote (author excluded) or even a "serious" spam vote?--Pesatyel 05:14, 29 October 2006 (UTC)
It seems to me we have three choices: 1) We can put up suggestions from Peer Rejected on a seperate page for "review" to see whether or not it was voted on "fairly" (is there a chance it might have done better if not for the Mod Spam?). 2) If an author or voter believes a suggestion was removed via spam unfairly, they could call for arbitration or some kind of review. 3) Institute a MINIMUM length of time (say a few hours) a suggestion has to stay on the page, regardless of how many spam votes it receives, before it can be removed (I believe this should include author removal as well).--Pesatyel 05:14, 29 October 2006 (UTC)
I think it's pretty much put up or shut up time. Put forward a proposal for whatever change you think is needed and see how it floats. I'm all set to vote Spam on it. (Joke - of course I would give any proposal fair consideration.) --Funt Solo 09:54, 29 October 2006 (UTC)

Oh, you missed option 4) There's nothing to fix. Leave it as is. --Funt Solo 09:55, 29 October 2006 (UTC)
-All right, I'll put this addition to the spam removal rules up for discussion then and we'll see how the vote goes:
When removing a spammed vote you must leave behind the suggestion title and the tally of votes at removal. The suggestion's author may leave a one line rebuttal defending/summarizing/linking to their suggestion. Longer comments will be truncated. Future voters that view the suggestion in peer rejected or the history and decide to support it may leave their name, without comment and with many names per line to save space, for the rest of the two-week voting period. If these votes of support would have prevented spamination if added to the keep tally the suggestion may be resubmitted without being labeled a Dupe.
I believe this would solve our problem. No one would be denied a chance to vote because of spamination, and any suggestion that truly deserves spamination shouldn't be able to get enough support for resubmittal. --Jon Pyre 10:49, 29 October 2006 (UTC)
There are several problems with that. You cannot define "one line" as a limit. The length of a line of text on a web page is dependant on monitor resolution. If you were to define it as one sentence, that wouldn't work either - as people can write some pretty long sentences if they want to. What this then does is essentially nerf the Spamination by allowing voting to continue even though the suggestion has been moved. It's worse than either moving it or not moving it, as the suggestion text, and the votes up to spamination are now in two different locations. This would also dramatically increase the workload for whoever edits the suggestions pages - as they would have to track each of these occurences, and keep count of your "[multiple votes] per line". I remain convinced that there is no problem to fix - as nobody who is writing on this topic wanting a change can come up with even a single example of where the process has gone wrong. It's just policy change for the sake of it, or on an obscure point of arguable principle. There's a maxim used in software engineering: "what's the problem?" If it turns out there isn't one, then the project shouldn't go ahead. --Funt Solo 14:13, 29 October 2006 (UTC)
A line should be interpreted as a single sentence of default font size that doesn't cause the screen to scroll to the right on an average monitor. That can easily be clarified by just giving it a character limit instead. This would not cause extra work for anyone maintaining the page because they would not need to do anything with the suggestion. All this does is let voting restart on a suggestion if a large number of voters thought it was unfairly spammed. It isn't moved from the old location, just submitted again by the author if they so choose. Spam only exists to prevent clutter on the page. If enough voters support it then it shouldn't be doomed to spam just because it was taken off-page in the first hour. I'm not saying this revival system would be used often, most Spammed suggestions do deserve it after all. But this would be a valuable safeguard against abuse. Giving voters the right to vote is only democracy. This shouln't take up a lot of space it'd just look like

~~SUGGESTION TITLE~~

Tally: 1 Keep 2 Kill 9 Spam

This idea for helicopters is really great and gives forts a cool use. Please check it out. -author

Mr Q, Diamond, HBomb, Goalie, Beryllium

~~—The preceding unsigned comment was added by Jon Pyre (talk • contribs) .~~

most Spammed suggestions do deserve it after all - Oh, so you've found an example of one that didn't deserve it, then? Excellent. Which one was that? --Funt Solo 18:14, 29 October 2006 (UTC)
Well, something I mentioned several times, is part of the problem is that, when a suggestion is sent to Peer Rejected, most of the time (I found a few WITH votes) the votes are removed. If spam voters (or ANY voters) gave legitimate reasons in their votes, those reasons are no longer there. And, since you seem so...incensed by the possibility of a suggestion or 2 being treated unfairly over the last year, I'm actually looking (more for the fact this is an interesting discussion than anything).--Pesatyel 20:10, 29 October 2006 (UTC)

I'm getting tired of Funt continually asking people for a spaminated suggestion that deserves to be kept. It doesn't matter if the suggestion deserved it or not. The fact is that it might have gotten into peer reviewed had it not been spaminated. But there is no way to tell today if it might have made it into peer-reviewed because the voters and their attitudes have changed. Re-voting would have no effect whatsoever on whether or not a suggestion would have gotten into peer-reviewed. And the most important part (that Funt keeps ignoring) is that regardless of whether it has happened before or not, it can happen. A system where that sort of thing is possible is clearly broken, no matter how unlikely it is to occur. --Reaper with no name 03:24, 30 October 2006 (UTC) That's my point exactly Reaper. It's not about defending bad suggestions, it's about defending the voting process. Spam votes should only be used on votes you think are unlikely to have any keep votes at all. "Get Rid of Newbie Zed 2 AP Penalty" while unlikely to pass might get some keep votes. "Psychic Zombie Attack" will not. Spam exists to help save future readers time they'd spend reading a crap suggestion. If you think even a few people will disagree with your judgement the suggestion should be killed. --Jon Pyre 04:01, 30 October 2006 (UTC)

It doesn't matter if the suggestion deserved it or not. - And there, I think that's the whole point. We're obviously never going to agree on this. I remain convinced that a lot of suggestion authors can't accept that their idea was badly constructed, and probably think that Peer Reviewed should be filled with their suggestions. All this "struggle for democracy" bullshit makes my teeth hurt. You say that the system is flawed, and yet you can provide no evidence whatsoever to back up your claim. That's why I think you're wrong. --Funt Solo 09:21, 30 October 2006 (UTC)

I don't mind that you think I'm wrong. What I mind is that you keep asking me for evidence of something that is untestable. I'm not trying to fill peer reviewed with people's bad suggestions. But the fact is that under the current system, it's possible that one day a good suggestion deserving of peer reviewed will fail because a lot of people who didn't like it happened to vote on it first. As long as that's possible, then there is a problem, because the spam vote doesn't serve any other purpose save for removing vandalism (which is a power that should be reserved for mods anyway, and doesn't necessarily have to be based on number of spam votes). --Reaper with no name 14:31, 30 October 2006 (UTC)

~~How about the following new rules:~~
Any suggestion may only be spaminated after it has been moved to Previous Days, and the suggestion in it's entirety (including votes) must be copied to the Discussion page for that Previous Day. (The suggestion text alone is moved to Peer Rejected, as normal).
[Justification: the suggestion gets at least a day of core, main page voting before it can be removed. Also, the votes remain intact, either so that people can see how the voting went, or so that an author who feels that they've been voted on unfairly can at least point to some evidence.]

Any suggestion may only be removed as a Dupe by a moderator.
[Justification: the Dupe vote is the most powerful way of removing a suggestion, and it should only be available to mods, who have proved their ability to make sound, impartial judgements on behalf of the community.]
~~--Funt Solo 16:31, 30 October 2006 (UTC)~~

~~I think that's a great compromise. Every suggestion would then at least get one day, which would cut down greatly on my worries. --Reaper with no name 17:10, 30 October 2006 (UTC)~~

I'd also add that the power to mod-spaminate should be limited to suggestions in Previous Days, thereby allowing the votes to be kept intact without them cluttering up this discussion page, which is full enough as is. This idea of keeping votes for future reference is, I have to admit, a powerful one. (In the case of a mod-dupe, I can understand why the suggestion and the votes are just deleted - a link to the duped suggestion is enough for people to see why it failed in the first place.) --Funt Solo 18:07, 30 October 2006 (UTC)

The problem is once a suggestion is in previous days spaminating it has little purpose. What if someone puts something on the main page called "Magic Zombies" and the text just has the line "Zombie Shoots Fireball! Kapew!" copied 800 times. Under these new rules it would have to stay on the main page for at least a day. --Jon Pyre 10:49, 1 November 2006 (UTC)

Catch yourself on. You know very well that could be removed either as vandalism (by a mod) or to humorous suggestions (by anyone) within minutes of it's appearance. We've already covered that ground half way up this section with your "flying hippos" example. Once it's in Previous Days then spaminating it has the purpose of removing clutter. The positive side effect (which you're not addressing) is that the votes will get kept. It's a compromise between removing the Spam vote altogether (good luck with that policy) and leaving the system as it is now. Given that one of the key issues raised is the removal of votes, and there's now a simple solution on the table which provides a way of keeping all the votes intact, I don't understand your negative attitude. What is it, your way or the highway? --Funt Solo 21:23, 1 November 2006 (UTC)

~~I guess that works. As long as there are enough mods around to clear away stuff from the current day when necessary. --Jon Pyre 09:46, 2 November 2006 (UTC)~~

~~Old Suggestions, New Opinions~~
It's occured to me (having edited through a lot of old suggestions) that quite a number of them might be voted on differently if they were resubmitted. Currently, however, the Dupe vote can knock down a suggestion most easily with only three votes (apart from a moderator spamination on three spams).
I propose that a Dupe vote can be placed in either the Kill, Keep or Spam section:
Dupe-Keep would mean that you know it's a Dupe, but you'd like the suggestion kept.

Dupe-Kill would mean that you know it's a Dupe, but you'd like the suggestion killed.

Dupe-Spam would mean that you know it's a Dupe, but you'd like the suggestion spammed.
I further propose that a suggestion is not removed when three Dupes are received, but that voting carry on normally.
This would allow suggestions to be re-voted on, essentially. Something in Peer Rejected might get moved to Peer Reviewed, for example - with notes added detailing the differences between itself and the new version (ie there would still only be one version of a suggestion - the original), plus the time of the move. Similarly, something in Peer Reviewed might be moved to Peer Rejected, with similar notes.
This would also allow any user to place an old suggestion up for re-voting. Now, I realise that probably sounds like a complete nightmare - but with only 1 suggestion allowed per user per day, it wouldn't be too bad, I think. Still, it wouldn't make sense to re-post a suggestion that only got rejected / reviewed that same day - so I suggest that re-posting of old suggestions be exactly that - suggestions over 2 months old (by the date of their 'left queue').
If re-posting an old suggestion (rather than unintentionally posting a dupe), or if a new suggestion is regarded as a Dupe (with 3 Dupe votes), it should be edited to include a link to the original suggestion, which remains in Reviewed / Rejected / Undecided until the end of the new voting. --Funt Solo 12:58, 10 October 2006 (BST)
Keep - Hey, hey, very interesting.. i agree with you. Dupe should have some degree of what you intend with it.. Dupe is the only vote higher than Spam.. power wise... And some dupes are still improvements over the suggestions in Peer rejected or Undecided for example. Why should a very good idea be tainted just because some prior user whom suggested it did a shitty job of it? --MrAushvitz 01:07, 11 October 2006 (BST)
Well, I only consider something a "dupe" if it comes from Peer Review or Peer Rejected. And this discussion realy centers on Peer Rejected, of course. But the key thing to remember is that it really isn't a "Peer Rejected" section anymore. It is a "Spamminated" section. I believe a suggestion would be VERY hard pressed to be accepted into Peer Review, even if you completely ignored the Dupe vote. Most of them are in there legitimately and for a reason. I also think this goes back to the definition of "Spam." Most people use the definition of "nothing will fix this" (ie. it will NEVER get Peer Reviewed).--Pesatyel 05:47, 11 October 2006 (BST)
This actually isn't a bad idea. You see, the problem with writing off a suggestion as a dupe and considering it dead (at least when that suggestion was in peer rejected) is that the suggestion may have merit that it didn't have before. What's rejected or spaminated today may be a great idea after the next update. Let's consider any one of a thousand failed zombie boosting suggestions. Let's say that these suggestions would get rejected now. After the next update, maybe survivors become very powerful. Too powerful, and the zombies need a boost badly. A particular suggestion sitting in peer rejected could be exactly what the doctor ordered. But under the current system, it would only take 3 people who think zombies should be pathetic weaklings to kill a perfect fix that was submitted before its time, simply by voting "dupe". Old suggestions should be able to be re-submitted when the game is updated or enough time passes that opinions have changed a lot. --Reaper with no name 19:12, 16 October 2006 (BST)

~~Dupe In The Wrong Place?~~
Currently, Dupe votes are placed in the Spam/Dupe section. This is misleading. According to the vote counting rules, a duplicate vote is not to be counted when tallying up the votes. However, by placing a vote in the Spam section, (as with Keep and Kill), is the voter indicating their vote should be spam if the suggestion is not found to be a dupe? If they don't provide a link to the dupe, is their vote invalid, or is it a spam vote (and does it include the requisite reasoning for a valid vote)?
To get rid of this ambiguity, I suggest there be a fourth voting section, purely for Dupe votes - and that people be allowed to place both a Dupe vote AND either a Kill, Keep or Spam vote. Further, it should be made clear that Dupe votes do not count towards the final tally, that they must contain a link, or a reference to a previous Dupe vote that does contain a link. (It doesn't make sense that three voters all have to provide the link, if one voter has already done so.)
This would involve altering the template, and the voting rules. --Funt Solo 08:15, 16 October 2006 (BST)
Simple. When voting Spam, put Spam. When voting Dupe, put Dupe. Besides, a legitmate dupe vote requires a link the duplicated suggestion.--Pesatyel 03:45, 17 October 2006 (BST)

~~Non-author Re~~
It's been bugging me for a little while now that I can't reply to a vote where the voter is using flawed calculations or has misread the suggestion. I understand that the suggestion page is not a discussion board and needs to be regulated as such, but I would like to see the restrictions eased a little bit to facilitate informed voting.
Valid reasons to reply to a vote when you are not the author are only to point out a mathematical error or misinterpreted detail of the suggestion. When replying to someone's vote, the reply should be preceded by "Non-author", "Non-author re:", "N-a Re:", or somewhere in the response it should be noted that you are not the author, either explicitly, or implicitly by use of language such as "I think the author meant…".
Trolling or personal comments will not be allowed. Any comments that are offensive or attack the voter in any way can be struck/deleted by any editor at their discretion. Calling someone a fucktard and and saying they can't read is an example of what not to do. The reply should be concise and direct, as there is no need for extended discussion, just a need to point out an error. In the event of mathematical error, a corrected example should be supplied.
If a voter needs to refute a non-author response to their vote, then they should do so as per usual with one reply of their own, and if more dialog is needed they shall have to re-locate to the talk page. It can be assumed that more voters may want to respond to a non-author re with their own, and in that case, I would propose that the party who is trying to reply to the non-author reply leave a note that the point is under discussion on the talk page.
In the interest of good form, the author should reply when they see the comment, confirming or denying it. The only reason this is necessary is that authors aren't always there, and if a days worth of voting follows the lead of one bad vote, then our system is compromised.
I originally intended to include logical fallacies as a criteria to respond to leave a non-author reply, but that sort of thing has too much possibility to devolve into an argument over how logic works, which is not the intent here. I merely want the capability to say to someone "No, you've misread the suggestion, and you're not correctly applying that statistical concept" when I see a bad vote, so that other voters won't make the same mistakes.
Any thoughts? --Burgan 21:15, 25 October 2006 (BST)
I sometimes add a Note, which is allowed, if you're striking someone elses text for a valid reason. I've used a Note once for another purpose - to indicate that the person saying Dupe was mistaken - because they were pointing to the author's own discussion of his own suggestion.
However, I was wary of even doing that. If you allow non-author Re comments, then you're opening a big can of ugly, malformed worms. It's bad enough as it is, with some people (who shall remain nameless) writing about 300 words for their vote, sometimes more than the suggestion itself has, and then the author replies with a 3 word Re, and then the voter comes back with another 300 words of verbiage. I mean, fuuuuucckkk.
Any discussion (beyond a single author Re and a single voter Re) should be carried out on the discussion page. I think that's sensible. If you think someone is wrong, then contact them on their talk page and tell them there.
Non-author re's will just make this place a nightmare. --Funt Solo 12:45, 26 October 2006 (BST)
It is true that there is a big can of worms that could be opened up by changes to the current policy. On the other hand though, many people don't check the discussion pages, so they would not be aware of the correction if it is only put there, and could continue voting based on the ideas of another voter whose calculations/interpretation was ultimately incorrect. I think what would be best is if non-authors are allowed to put a small reply (one that would have to specify that they are not the author) that only states that a possible error in calculation/interpretation is being discussed on the discussion page. This message would have to be something short and specific, though. Anything other than the agreed statement for it would be able to be struck by any user. This would minimize the amount of space taken up, not have any much more room for abuse than there already is, and get people to look at the discussion pages.
A possible example: Non-author note: Possible Math error or Misinformation. Check discussion page.
But then again, that's just how I think the problem would be best dealt with. --Reaper with no name 19:45, 26 October 2006 (BST)
There have been occassions were I would like to RE someone else for clarification. What I usually do is just do it within my own vote.--Pesatyel 05:05, 27 October 2006 (BST)
I agree. You should use your own vote to comment on mistakes made by others. What if the person saying there's a math error is wrong with their own math? --Jon Pyre 01:59, 29 October 2006 (BST)
As we all know, my math is infallible. I guess we've got to think of those 'lesser-people' as well, so I guess it's time to abort this idea.
In instances were I have already voted I suppose I'll just have to bite my tongue and stop visiting the page so often. --Burgan 06:22, 31 October 2006 (UTC)
~~Policy Votes~~
This area is for formal policy votes concerning the suggestions page. All policies, along with their associated votes and discussions, are governed by the Voting Guidelines established for this section.
~~Clarification Of Rule 12~~
~~Withdrawn by author according to Rule 3.5. --Funt Solo 18:01, 20 October 2006 (BST)~~

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