Decline in quality of the forums

Ban all forumites! Delete all threads! Die, trolls! Die, die, die!
/rant off

Like Inde said, use the report post button, and tell your friends to use the report post button. We still don't accept bad posts, but there's only so much we can do when we're zerged with them and have no reports to go by.

What very, apt points Xenrath, has made, and imo valid too! The use of certain words is offensive, with little being learnt, maybe your language filter can be updated to include such derogatory terms? Personally, one i see a lot on the boards is "retard", here in the U.K, it doesn't seem to get bandied about that much, but is no less offensive.
I think the art of using constructive criticism, seems to have been lost, and anonymous on the net.
Sure a lot of ppl will shout they feel hard done by, either by ANet or Guru, but its about doing so, politely, and respecting others views.

This may be due to the new forum titles. People get all giddy about them and now they want to pop out posts on every thread they see.

I have noticed many annoying things, but the worst ones I will post here. People post junk in threads and it doesn't contribute to the origional posters question. Posts like "Yah I think the capes suck right now," are useless if you don't say why they suck. People also post the same thing that ten posters before them have posted. Ten people post that the fix to error 7 is to step on your motherboard. Why does an eleventh person need to say the same thing?

I agree with Inde that this decline is large than GWGuru. This is happening on other fansites, in game, everywhere.

Alias X has imo posted the obvious answer..

<snip> People also post the same thing that ten posters before them have posted. Ten people post that the fix to error 7 is to step on your motherboard. Why does an eleventh person need to say the same thing? <snip>

this is mainly visable in such forums as riverside and sardelac..you only have to read through the first couple pages to realize most of the posts have not contributed anything new to the thread..mainly after the first 2 pages everything just goes to the pits...

I know this will put more workload on the strained mods as it is but there really should be some kind of limit to the number of pages one thread can have...a thread with 10 pages normally has 2-3 pages of usefull info/points of view ect the last 7-8 pages are full of spam/trolls/flames and reapeted posts from the page before

How about instantly permabanning anyone being rude as agreed by some majority of the mods or hell any mod. You wouldn't even have to enforce it much I imagine after the first week of example...

I know it's harsh and I myself would likely have gotten baned at some point due to this but I guarentee people would think more about what they post if each post they make could cost them their ability to speak at all. Free speech is a great American right but I'm sick to death with some of the immautrity I see quite often on these boards, not to mention the genearl unwillingness to take the time out to read, sometiems even a few lines above/below where they post.

I don't think titles have much to do with it. I've been here for awhile and I'm happy just using the Buy/Sell services and popping into the occasional community discussion to get the general feeling. Of course people will post the negative stuff, its something everyone can either agree or disagree on. Right now a large majority agree with the negative vibe and thus, they know if they post something with that feeling, they're going to get a positive response. To make matters worse, the entire Guild Wars franchise provides seemingly endless points that negativity can be used upon. This will probably get a little better when Nightfall is first released, but many people will focus on what is wrong and downplay what is good, simply because they are used to the negative outlook. Not much can be done except to wait out this "depression" until people either move on or cheer up. You cannot go around banning people because they are negative about something. Instead, we as posters can make efforts to make their post into something good. Do not force this, only post positive if you truely feel that way.

I don't say much here, but it is still nice to read the discussions, so I hope this rainy cloud passes over sooner rather than later.

Well, I know that some of the 10 people saying the same thing is just because they don't read the whole thread. Especially after like 3 pages you get people starting their post with; 'I didn't read the whole thread, but this is what I think of it.' after which they repeat the exact same thing mentioned in the post before them.

Another thing is that the same topics seem to come back every few weeks. How many 'monks don't get any love' and 'W/Mo need to get nerfed' threads have we not seen? They may be interesting to newer members (I used to enjoy reading them), but for the people that have been here a while, they know allmost in advance what is going to happen, so they won't spend as much time explaining their point...they have done it hundred times before...

Just a sidenote, this is a problem that is not just limited to Guru. This has been happening on other forums as well. Some people weren't happy with Factions or some of the updates or whatever, and this is reflected across most, if not all fansites. There's not that much we as mods can do if the person posting isn't breaking any rules. Let's hope this trend will improve as time goes on.

I think sometimes (well ok, may be a lot), people just expect too much from Anet/Guru.
It would be nice if Guru, had a program, am excluding the search button as this feature is often forgotten about where, if a post said, error ?? it was directed to a relavant page with error fixes, on it especially, for the more usual connection error's. Without it being put on screen. It would save a lot of space on the forums. Am excluding the search button

Quote:

I speak from the Off Topic section. The new titles are causing some very negative attitudes. Many members of the OT section strongly dislike the new titles and it has lead to some negative attitudes to this sight. I do not think this is the full problem, just part of it. With all the problems in factions and people complaining about how Factoins "suxs" it does not give out the helpful information that it did when Prophecies came out.

Quote:

Thats a good question. I wish i could tell you, i dont have a problem with them but apparently some of the other guys do.

In reply to ChildofMalkav, " Is this even a fan site."
Yep its a top notch fan site, why, because ppl try and help each other, in general respect anothers point of view, even if they do not agree, they disect the game, and forums, but offer avenues to improve, investigate. And give ppl the opportunity to to vent, congratulate, at will. And yes, i'd also like to see an end to the countless reposts of error .??? Or for the poster to check either Guild Wars site for the error, which aint gonna happen, which is why they posted here. So yeah, for me its a fan site, and a damn good one, for all its faults fella

Actually i think that the decline in the quality of the forums is a testament to the success of Guild Wars Guru. The site has become one of the premier fansites and as a result all of the neanderthal gw players have migrated here. Unfortunately, with success you have to pay a price. I have been impressed with the actions of the mods lately, useless threads have been closed with a quickness. If only we could get rid of the morons posting in the useful threads.
Just my 2 cents.

do you know what i am getting really tired of seeing this thread pop-up, ok there is a decline in the quality of posts. I am so sorry that every single person can't post a nugget or pearl of wisdom each time they post but hopefully you will learn something from this post.

GW is a massive community there are obviously going to be moron posters as well as newbie posters, wake up, wise up, smell the coffee and open your eyes almost every online game has suffered from this it's the drawback to big success. The crowd puller of these types of games is immense you are going to get to meet as well as converse with people from all walks of life, age,gender,race and nationality. Unfortunately not every poster and person will be to everyone's liking.

It was the same when i used to play CSS, NWN and halo 1 & 2 there is nothing that can be done, just try and sift through the posts and look at the things which interest you and disregard the rest, just try to cope with it thats what everyone has to do.

I am not trying to give you grief but stop going on about it, we are all fully aware of the situation, the main thing is to stop being so naive about it as to just think it's a GWG or even a GW problem as this occurs through loads of Online Games i am sure you could find some Wow forums that are quite similar.

Honestly there isn't that much the moderators can seriously do about it except what they are doing now, as you are irrevocably complaining about the community itself and it's the community that keep this place alive.

Just my opinion: I started playing one week after GW was released, have been reading/writing on GWguru ever since - and quality is not declining. Actually it's a lot higher now than it was a month or so after release, when every thread was a rant bitching and moaning about the horrible, horrible, grind in GW. Imagine the present ranting about nerfs, but three times worse.

I don't read the OT section, though. I have other sites to go to for general discussions.

I feel the moderators are doing a good job. Most of my inflammatory posts (when I get annoyed by the whininess of some posters) disappear almost instantly.

The last two posts kind of describe what I mean just perfectly. One who is "really tired" of this ONE thread, in an out of the way part of the forum most people don't go to (and is only one page) and then goes on to try to justify the crap and the usual "just deal with it" response. The other one virtually admitting the "must flame the whiners!" type of posts.

One person's "whine" or "rant" is another person's valid complaint. It's a pity people can't keep that in mind and respect someone's post, and instead decide to make dismissive useless comments which

- provide no real counterargument
- in some way demean the reference post
- provide no alternatives/help ("stfu!" or "stop whining" type of response does not count)


Now let me give an example (warning this next part is strictly for example and is in no way meant to offend)

Noobs. STFU. If you don't like this thread go somewhere else. If you're tired about it, stop whining. Go play Oblivion with all the fanbois there.


Now, you can just say "oh well that's what happens when you get more people on here" or whatever else justification and "nothing can be done" about it, but I quite disagree. At this point all it would take is for a mod to step in and say "Enough! stick to the topic and discuss counter/pro debate!" and reprimand me for that comment, that should help reduce what I'm talking about.

If someone feels the need to try to excuse it, one can't help wondering what their motive is for doing that. There shouldn't be any excuses, and no justifications. There is no need to post along those lines and I'm positive there is actually more of it now. Actually one suggestion would be to look at posts and see if they fit the 3 points mentioned above, you'll find more than a few do.

Heck make me a moderator I'd be quite happy to prune a lot of the empty non-contributory responses (j/k I have another forum to admin as it is hehe)