Board Thread:General Discussion/@comment-31256456-20181228061901/@comment-25615841-20181229204539

Off the bat, I have to preface this saying that I'm not the best person to go to for information on the Role Ideas boards. I suppose I've just lost interest in them after grinding them for so long after I joined and basically forcing myself to make long, tiring reviews that repeat themselves and really just don't need to be stretched out as much as they are. Last time I reviewed seriously, or not including the odd reply here and then was when I was trying for ToTM, but even with all this I can mostly tell from contributions alone which users are most active on there. With all that, I hope to be able to edit more there to help fix whatever problems we have on the Role Idea boards, even if that means spending less time on Fun and Games Board(s).

The actual problem of Role Creators has existed since the day people started submitting their ideas on the comments of the Roles page, and I've seen a good few ways people have dealt with it. One to mention is peolpe just being cold and/or aggressive with their reviews, and it should go without saying this isn't a good way to encourage people to contribute more.

What I've always tried doing was leave a message of encouragement at the end of my reviews for newer creators. Since developing and posting an idea can be quite challenging, it's nice to see people being supportive, and counteracting the negative behaviour by just being nice to OPs. Though I haven't seen too much of people being outright toxic, I understand how hard it can be for creators to stay motivated, which is why reviewers should always try just be positive about the work posted.

ToTM! :D - The debate that never ends. First off, your point about some users not being talkative, or choosing to make their edits in a different way is completely valid. The whole stat side of ToTM, including numbers (or their absence) required to participate, will hopefully be revamped soon, since for one, it's true that there are plenty of people who contribute in ways that don't require frequent posting. Additionally, this appears to have caused a majority of nominees being active mostly or only on the more frequently used boards. Not saying that's necessarily a bad thing, but it isn't representative of the wiki as a whole, that's true. This also appears to have caused a lot more self nominations, which I don't see as a good thing, but there really isn't a reliable way to prevent them short of just banning them. I still urge people to discourage self nominations, though.

Yes, the 400 edits to vote requirement was put into place to discourage bot accounts, and I feel like some kind of requirement was necessary, as bot accounts voting are, or at least were a genuine concern. You may not have seen their trend and how often people even joke about them since they weren't really as much of a hot topic before the Summer or even this generation of users, but I can say that I know of the existence of at least one 200+ edit second account that isn't a simple alt to replace the owner's first account for whatever reason.

Along with this, I would argue that in the past (again, before this year's Summer), one off votes made in favour of whoever by users who aren't seen often on any part of the wiki were drowned out by people with views of the wiki more in line with what we should see fit as the ideal state of this place - more actual contribution. This isn't to say that nowadays users can't tell which users have tried the hardest, but it's hard for people's ideals and values on here to remain the same after so much time passing since the creation of ToTM, but I have seen more often people mass voting for users because of their overwhelming presence rather than actual work. Hopefully, whatever guidelines put into place for the contest in the future will neither too heavily restrict nominees or voters, nor will they allow for laziness or encourage self nominations and a majority of uses voting for nominees for activity rather than merit. As I've said before, voters are what actually decides the state of ToTM.

There's no point in being embarassed over a low mainspace though. Mine is below ten, and even that is mostly grammar. And hey, any mainspace is good as long as it's not vandalism; small grammar fixes or changes probably make up a majority of the articles we have nowadays, and that's all thanks to people who don't scroll by after noticing something.

Besides, contributes somehow. A community which shuns its users for not taking time to do an exact thing is no family at all. You can basically say this wiki is run on donations of effort, and any little helps, DoTW, Role Ideas/Reviews, buffing up our wam score, and posting things on Fun and Games. Users being active and posting anything are always appreciated, as that's what allows us to actually call ourselves a community. All that, provided they follow the rules and aren't obnoxious while doing so, which is the problem I see with a part of the board as of now.

Anyway, I'm happy to see issues like these still be brought up. This wiki has really strayed from what it used to be, and I want to help new users see what direction we want this place to be going in. While I could go on another rant about new users and how their view of this place is completely different, I wish to save that, as well as the Fun and Games discussion and derailing for (an)other thread(s). Once again, thanks for bringing this up and helping us move forward.