Account Reputation

I didn't see this on the index so let me throw it out and see if there's been discussion on this:

With all the complaints I see from grievers, afkers, rage-quitters, leeches and the like, would a reputation system such as eBay uses for vendors and buyers be useful? Let's say that every account has the right to make a thumbs-up/thumbs-down vote on every every account. So, say you do a trade with someone and they trick you. You give them a thumbs down. Next time someone else trades with them, they check the rep on the player, and it show 5 up and 20 down. No deal, or at least better scrutiny.

Or say someone is attempting to join your group for a faction run. You check their rep to see if they are respected.

Maybe one could have two reps: one for "integrity" (rage quits, scams, etc.) and another for "skill" (self explanatory). Then, maybe a Mesmer could actually get in to a group if he had the props.

Since it's a one account to one account relationship, starting a new character doesn't clear the record. Add a "Change Rating" option so that people can redeem themselves over time.

The only objection I can think of, other than dev effort, is the possibility of miss-use. Grievers voting everyone down, for instance. If you add a "View the raters" option, maybe you can see that bad votes come from someone with an even worse rep. Maybe it doesn't even matter - grievers are a very notifiable but very small part of the community. Maybe their votes won't even be statistically significant.

So. Has this one already been beaten to death?

LOL, U HAB STOOPID NAEM, THUMBS DWON!11

I think that this will be abused, a lot. Sadly.

This works for sites, but not for games. I've played Maplestory for a very short time, which had a similar system. There was a whole thread devoted to the most stupid defames people had gotten. A lot of people got defamed (thumbs down) because they were a girl, for example.

maybe run it on something similar to the chess rating system? if you're rated good by a higher person then it causes more of an effect on your score while if you're rated bad by someone with a low score it won't affect it as much.

Perhaps if it is a title-track that you can ONLY get thumbs up for... that way the worst anyone can do is not vote for you at all...

Admittedly it could become like a popularity contest... and that isn't a good thing.

You want more kids donig this?

"O0mg5!! j00 SAIda that j0 0awdisagree!! withM!!?e!?!? n00 wao!I!I! i d0w!¬n ratye j00!h biat5ch c98nunt!!!"

No I thought not

Well, I know that would happen, but would there really be a lot of it? Aren't the majority of GW players relatively mature? Wouldn't the "sane" votes outweigh the silly ones?

That said, I love the idea of votes weighted by voter rep.

Ha. Hahaha. Hahahahaaaa.

Anyway. It's a nice idea in theory, but as others have said, I can just picture the amount of abuse this system would take. I suppose it could be tweaked to avoid it being abused so much, but uh, I doubt it.

Pardon the self-bump. I'm just sooooooo enamored with the idea. Wish it could be imlemented IRL, too.

What's wrong with this being a popularity contest? I mean, this ain't like high-school - you don't get points for being rich or pretty. You have to earn your popularity, which is pretty much the point.

Properly implemented, this could be the solution to a lot of unhappiness in this game. Imagine if you couldn't even enter a random arena with a reputation below x%?

/not signed . . . Like others said, sadly this will be abused by a lot of players. It won't be an accurate way to judge. I say make the ignore list larger instead.

I prefer no rating, cartographers in FA might for example be rated bots or afkers. Not to mention the already stated grieve rates.

I prefer to gamble a bit then. With trading its not even a problem if u watch well

Again, a little abuse is par for the course. Is it your contention (and, apparently, just about everyone else's) that there are more jerks than cool people in this game? If 5 rage kiddies give me a bad score (weighted down because they too have bad scores) and 50 upright citizens give me a good score, then I'm solid, right? Are you guys saying that the abusers will outweigh the good guys? Cause if that's so, then our community is fataly flawed and we all should just turtle up and play only with henchies.
Well, that would be nice, too, but that is by toon name, not account, and you can't learn from the communities opinions. You just don't get burned by the same guy twice, which you probably wouldn't have, anyway. I'm talking about not getting burned by the same guy once.

I'm a little surprised at the universally negative opinions on this. There's no way community reputation can be implemented that will address these concerns?

"NUB Y DIDNT U HEAL MEH THUMBSD OWN"
"LOL, U HAB STOOPID NAEM, THUMBS DWON!11"
"THUMBS UPPING PPL FOR 5K"

Self-explanatory.

Who ever said rating system on e-Bay works? It's just as broken as any other system.

As long as you're dealing with honest people, the ratings are mostly accurate. When dealing with dishonest people, the ratings are the same, since they manipulate their rating.

The only one who truly profits from such system are griefers who play the system. Honest people on the other hand have a lot to worry, since they can lose their rating in a matter of minutes, due to organized griefing group.

Ok, I think I have a variation that addresses most of your concerns. How about a system that combines the best of random surveys and Slashdot-style karma?

At the end of every interaction, such as a mission, a PvP battle, or a trade, there is a chance that participants will be given a use-it-or-lose-it opportunity to affect one of the other participant's "karma" level. Shortly after you enter the next town\outpost, you get this pop-up:

"Do you wish to dispense judgment on a recent trade\adventure\battle partner?
Yes No"

Make it modal (disable chat) so no one can negotiate the score. No organized reputation bombing, no drive by reputation hits.

If you click "No", that's that and you'll never know who was the target. It might also decrease the odds of you being "bothered" again in the future, as some might consider this an intrusion.

If you click "Yes", you get something like:

"Groo the Barbarian just traded you 1 Celestial Bag of Garbage for 8 Ectos.

Groo Rocks Groo Stinks"

You make your choice and now Groo's karma balance has been adjusted. Chat is enabled and your life goes on.

Only people with a positive karma balance are given a chance to grade others. The more positive, the more likely you are to get such a message. Over time, jerks will be rendered mute, and the best and brightest will have a virtual megaphone.

Conversely, the more negative your karma, the greater chance you have to be the target of such a judgement. The idea here is two-fold. If you're a real PITA, your karma will fall like a rock and you won't be able to give greens to charity. If you got a few unfair grades, though, it should quickly be balanced out. Add in a greater weight to new karma to encourage those with genuine personality issues to mend their ways.

Maybe one's karma can be displayed like a title of sorts. Enter an outpost, and anyone who clicks on your toon sees "Groo, Grand Master Cartographer of Narnia, Righteous Dude" or "Groo, Friend of The Charr, Royal Jerk-Wad". Give everyone a single rank of positive karma at account creation (innocent until proven guilty) to get the reputation process started while they're still in the cradle. By the time they hit Droks, everyone will be wearing their true colors around their necks.

I believe that minimizes the impact of the grievers, while maximizing the quality of the reputations created. What did I miss?