The Source: "Quality Issues"

[klaus]

I hate bitching about this, but I feel somebody needs to step forward and do it.

The overall quality of the majority of The Source's posts (I'm talking content here) appears to be decreasing.
Obviously I don't claim to be a truely skilled analyst and/or "super smart stuff poster". I'm not an old-schooler either, I joined this site some time in 2007. Nevertheless, I'm confident to be able to judge quality when it comes to posts concerning Legacy. And I feel TheSource has seen better times.

So one of the things I really miss is members posting results, ideas and insights based on thorough testing. Most of the time all you get is shallow shaz unfortunately.

- Is the development I'm witnessing based on a generation shift, meaning the smart oldies retiring slowly but surely?
- Is there anything we as a community can do about it?
- What are your thoughts on this topic?

[diffy]

A great deal of the work done on Legacy decks is done in private. That is the nature of competition, and a sign that the format is getting more competitive.

[b4r0n]

GP: Chicago is coming up. I wouldn't expect any groundbreaking ideas until after then.

[ForceofWill]

I feel I could contribute a lot but 90% of the time I'm either too lazy or doing something else. I'm sure that's true for more than just me.

[Jaynel]

Don't read the N/D forum. You'll notice an immediate increase in the quality of posts on The Source.

[dahcmai]

Just do what I do, ignore the crap out of everyone and make your own decks. Then ask for advice and sometimes, just sometimes you'll get a decent response that's worth exploring.

You're better off listening to yourself half the time.



Though I do admit I liked hearing how someone played a deck with "certain card" and decided it was crap for "whatever reason". That made deckbuilding so much easier when a person explained how it interacted with others.

[Deep6er]

For example, I know that I refuse to post in certain threads (the Team America thread, and the It's the Fear thread are prime candidates here, while the Solidarity thread is another one I'm unlikely to post in), so I know what you're talking about. The reason I refuse to post in the threads are because of the increase in retarded posts. I made my point clear in my other posts, and I argued the points they made. If they refuse to listen, then I can do nothing.

I genuinely want to help people get better, but I can do nothing until some of them ask for help. I've come to the conclusion that to truly help people, they need to want help.

I've felt that some other quality posters on the site feel the same way. Therefore, it makes sense that if the quality posters are posting less, and the fucking retarded ones are posting more, it would be harder to see the good posts because of the haystack of shit posts in the way.

[TheInfamousBearAssassin]

For example, I know that I refuse to post in certain threads (the Team America thread, and the It's the Fear thread are prime candidates here, while the Solidarity thread is another one I'm unlikely to post in), so I know what you're talking about. The reason I refuse to post in the threads are because of the increase in retarded posts. I made my point clear in my other posts, and I argued the points they made. If they refuse to listen, then I can do nothing.

I genuinely want to help people get better, but I can do nothing until some of them ask for help. I've come to the conclusion that to truly help people, they need to want help.

I've felt that some other quality posters on the site feel the same way. Therefore, it makes sense that if the quality posters are posting less, and the fucking retarded ones are posting more, it would be harder to see the good posts because of the haystack of shit posts in the way.

Says the guy that loses to Extirpate.


ZING!

[Aggro_zombies]

Says the guy that loses to Extirpate.


ZING!
*rimshot* (http://www.instantrimshot.com/)

Stay out of N&D and make liberal use of the Ignore function. Works for me.

[Isamaru]

For example, I know that I refuse to post in certain threads (the Team America thread, and the It's the Fear thread are prime candidates here, while the Solidarity thread is another one I'm unlikely to post in), so I know what you're talking about. The reason I refuse to post in the threads are because of the increase in retarded posts. I made my point clear in my other posts, and I argued the points they made. If they refuse to listen, then I can do nothing.

I genuinely want to help people get better, but I can do nothing until some of them ask for help. I've come to the conclusion that to truly help people, they need to want help.

I've felt that some other quality posters on the site feel the same way. Therefore, it makes sense that if the quality posters are posting less, and the fucking retarded ones are posting more, it would be harder to see the good posts because of the haystack of shit posts in the way.

So, so true.

[subway-guy]

I find it kind of funny that all the veteran players posted in this forum (excluding me).

[rufus]

I hate bitching about this, but I feel somebody needs to step forward and do it.
...
- Is the development I'm witnessing based on a generation shift, meaning the smart oldies retiring slowly but surely?
- Is there anything we as a community can do about it?
- What are your thoughts on this topic?

Ultimately, the nature of the internet is that there is a small number of donors, and a large number of consumers. Basically, it's hard to come up with original, useful stuff, but easy to put up fluff. (Because my interest is primarily recreational, you'll find that my posts tend to be untested suggestions and speculation.) As a consequence discussion forums are subject to a less intense form of John Gabriel's 'Greater Internet Dickwad' phenomenon with a bit less anonymity, and a smaller audience. (http://www.penny-arcade.com/images/2004/20040319h.jpg)

Consider, for a moment what's inolved in putting up a, more or less, useless post: A few minutes on gatherer, or some other search site, and the ability to pay attention for a few moments. Compare this to the standard of posting that you're looking for:
"So one of the things I really miss is members posting results, ideas and insights based on thorough testing."
In practice, that works out to hours or more of offline work per post. And, realistically, a lot of testing requires a competent opponent, which makes things even harder.

[Bryant Cook]

For example, I know that I refuse to post in certain threads (the Team America thread, and the It's the Fear thread are prime candidates here, while the Solidarity thread is another one I'm unlikely to post in), so I know what you're talking about. The reason I refuse to post in the threads are because of the increase in retarded posts. I made my point clear in my other posts, and I argued the points they made. If they refuse to listen, then I can do nothing.

I genuinely want to help people get better, but I can do nothing until some of them ask for help. I've come to the conclusion that to truly help people, they need to want help.

I've felt that some other quality posters on the site feel the same way. Therefore, it makes sense that if the quality posters are posting less, and the fucking retarded ones are posting more, it would be harder to see the good posts because of the haystack of shit posts in the way.

I hate to agree with this but it's mostly true. Not to mention, when you're hard work and effort is ignored. I can't count how many times I get PM's or IM's asking dumb questions, then not have them listen to me. "I think I'm going to play manamorphose instead of Ponder. But Thankz!" or when people change cards in a list just to have their own touch on the list. This is a personal pet peeve. It's like removing the wheels from a car to put on a stop sign. Both are somewhat circular and will hold the object up, but one does a better job. Stuff like this is why I generally ignore the TES thread, that and people will ask questions without reading. Generally, everything has been covered.

[Phoenix Ignition]

at and people will ask questions without reading. Generally, everything has been covered.

No, I agree with most of your post, but you have to draw the line somewhere on how many of the 1139 posts in the TES thread you expect people to read. Out of all of the crap that has been posted in TES, I notice you have added mystical tutors to the deck after pages and pages of condemning the choice.

I'm not sure where I'd put myself on this subject, because what direction does everyone think these threads should be going in? I don't follow the DTB thread for the specific reason that, excluding new set releases, there is really not much to be done with the deck. Established decks is more fun, but they are also established, so the discussion there probably will be a bunch of shitty comments mixed with 1 or 2 good ones.

The way I see it, even if one decent addition/change to the deck happens out of all of the garbage that is posted, it will be worth it. Just like civilization, we progress so slowly as a species, with only 1 or 2 individuals actually contributing a large amount, while the rest of the species just slowly progress towards a better or more advanced place.

The key to all of this is to make sure that explanations are backed up with reasons, and that the general population that argues well are going to be the people who know what they are talking about. While there are 100s of people arguing poor choices, in almost every case tournament reports and playtesting will show who is right. And if playtesting and tournament reports show that the "correct" person or progenitor of the deck is wrong, then chances are that they are wrong.

[emidln]

No, I agree with most of your post, but you have to draw the line somewhere on how many of the 1139 posts in the TES thread you expect people to read.

There exists an amazing piece of technology that we broadly term "search." As I understand it, even fine respectable establishments such as our own implement this technology in order to allow us to find out information about posts containing certain words.

The next time someone wants to know about Manamorphose (just taking this one because it's easy, replace it with any card you wish), instead they should search the thread for "Manamorphose" and read those posts. Perhaps an even better solution would be to suggest simply think about the cards in question and their interactions in the deck yourself, but we probably don't want to unleash that can of worms on our fine readers. Either of these might change the question

"What do you guys think about Manamorphose/Ponder in Matchup X?"

to (in the event that no discussion was found, or the discussion was incomplete (maybe something changed, looked suspicious, etc. otherwise, don't waste the space repeating shit)

"I haven't found any discussion regarding Manamorphose vs Ponder in the Thunderbluff and Chubstill matchups. After testing X games against Thunderbluff and Chubstill, I've found Manamorphose to be an undesirable card in my hand. Every time I drew Manamorphose, I considered if Ponder would be better than Manamorphose in this situation an I came to RANDOM_CONCLUSION_ABOUT_MANAMORPHOSE_VS_PONDER."

Even better would be statistics backed by game logs and an analysis of + decision tree involving the test games, but I'd expect that most players aren't nearly as fanatical about testing as I am. I'm probably way off base in suggesting that a model be designed to explain/test/discuss the functionality of certain cards, with analysis given on what the deck is trying to do and how it wants the game to work.

That said, most interesting and thought-provoking discussions on the format tend to happen in IM/PM/Voice Chat/IRL/my inner dialogue. This is largely because Message Boards are a fairly slow way of communicating ideas, especially fluid ideas pertaining to theoretical discussion of something as complex and interconnected as a deck of magic cards. After the ideas are generated, crafted, and have undergone some review, they trickle down to boards such as this one. At least in my mind, this board functions as more of a dropping off point for a mostly finished product or data from some testing rather than a place for serious discussion.

[Pinder]

I notice you have added mystical tutors to the deck after pages and pages of condemning the choice.


From what I understand, Bryant put Mystical Tutor in TES to act as Ad Nauseam 3-4. Actually running 4 AdN, as well as the maindeck IGG and Tendrils, probably causes too much lifeloss when you're revealing cards to Ad Nauseam. Mystical serves as a happy medium here because it allows you consistent access to the most powerful card draw in the deck, while only dinging you for 1 instead of 5 when revealed to it. Put simply, Bryant runs Mystical Tutor now because Ad Nauseam was printed, whereas before I agree wholeheartedly that it didn't belong in the deck. You can't fault him for changing the deck as a response to a change in the card pool. Mystical wasn't good TES, and now it is. That's why he runs it.

As for the quality of posting, I agree that the signal:noise ratio is incredibly unbalanced, but it's always been that way and always will be for the foreseeable future because the number of people posting noise is always going to be so much higher. Take it from someone who has roughly half his posts in Mish-Mash, it is much much easier to post one- or two-line fluff posts than it is to type something thoughtful up with actual merit. But really, what can you do? Ban all the people who we think are being stupid? But who makes that call? The Admins? Some independent "post quality enforcement committee"? The point is that people here are allowed to post just about anything they want (within reason), and it's always going to be on the reader to seperate the wheat from the chaff.

[Phoenix Ignition]

There exists an amazing piece of technology that we broadly term "search." As I understand it, even fine respectable establishments such as our own implement this technology in order to allow us to find out information about posts containing certain words.

The next time someone wants to know about Manamorphose (just taking this one because it's easy, replace it with any card you wish), instead they should search the thread for "Manamorphose" and read those posts. Perhaps an even better solution would be to suggest simply think about the cards in question and their interactions in the deck yourself, but we probably don't want to unleash that can of worms on our fine readers. Either of these might change the question
If only it were this easy. Obviously most people lack the extensive playing experience that only a few people per deck have to answer in depth questions that you could seemingly "think about cards in question and their interactions in the deck yourself." If I wanted to look up why duress was only used as a 2 of and orim's chant a 4 of when counterbalance is so incredibly prevalent in today's metagame, should I then search "Duress"?



That said, most interesting and thought-provoking discussions on the format tend to happen in IM/PM/Voice Chat/IRL/my inner dialogue. This is largely because Message Boards are a fairly slow way of communicating ideas, especially fluid ideas pertaining to theoretical discussion of something as complex and interconnected as a deck of magic cards. After the ideas are generated, crafted, and have undergone some review, they trickle down to boards such as this one. At least in my mind, this board functions as more of a dropping off point for a mostly finished product or data from some testing rather than a place for serious discussion.

Even though the discussions happen elsewhere, you really can't communicate them to such a large playerbase. The great thing about forums is the amount of people who can respond to something that you post, bringing a seemingly endless number of new ideas to a deck. The worst part is the exact same thing.

Like I said, no matter how many bad posts there are, there are likely to be some new suggestions. I know the best changes I've made to particular decks come from bad suggestions that make me think about similar but different cards.

[emidln]

If only it were this easy. Obviously most people lack the extensive playing experience that only a few people per deck have to answer in depth questions that you could seemingly "think about cards in question and their interactions in the deck yourself." If I wanted to look up why duress was only used as a 2 of and orim's chant a 4 of when counterbalance is so incredibly prevalent in today's metagame, should I then search "Duress"?

Perhaps you should search for both and determine why they are played. After that, you should evaluate what TES's gameplan is against Counterbalance decks. (Hint: it's not to win a war of attrition over a long period.) Next, you'll probably want to gather some statistics on just what percentage of top8s and total decks played in Bryant's area that CB decks account for. Now, the big part of playing magic comes where you have to draw conclusions from data. You might just obsolete your question. Failing that, you could search for "duress chant comparison/analysis" (pick one of comparison or analysis). If all that fails, then, as I implied, ask a question.


Even though the discussions happen elsewhere, you really can't communicate them to such a large playerbase.

I don't want to or need to do such a thing. Examining decks/strategies/card choices doesn't actually require a lot of mental capacity, just careful adherence to what essentially boils down to a scientific/engineering methodology of testing, examining what the needs of a deck are, searching for cards that fill the needs, and then doing more testing (strategies and card choices are just different ways to look at deck design but the approach is easily generalized). I can do this with a relatively small group of people, likely much faster than large discussion boards due to a lack of line noise and constant harras^W^W intelligent, skilled, and dedicated playtest partners/teammates/people unfortunate enough to be on my buddy list. This leaves us developing core strategies and then presenting them to a larger audience (which is what a message board is good for in my mind).


Like I said, no matter how many bad posts there are, there are likely to be some new suggestions. I know the best changes I've made to particular decks come from bad suggestions that make me think about similar but different cards.

I call this the fantasma blanca effect (j/k Will) and it can be simulated almost completely by surrounding yourself with people who can think differently than you do. Magic is a game with finite card choices after all, and while there are an infinite number of combinations to be made during the course of a game, it is relatively easy to limit your analysis to cards that can consistently perform required functions without the aid or benefit of other cards using statistical considerations. It does help if the people who are presenting your new suggestions have already gone through the same steps that you would have gone through yourself as far as research, theory, and testing.

[frogboy]

Ban all the people who we think are being stupid?

The reds voted me down on this one ;[

[georgjorge]

1. Questions that would be easy to answer by just playtesting the deck/reading the thread are obnoxious, yes. But what is even worse for me is pages of people posting their decklists which are no more than 3-5 cards off the standard decklists. This isn't limited to new or inexperienced players, even those who have a lot of knowledge about a deck often feel the need to inform others whenever they made some small changes by posting their list. A solution to that could be stricter moderation - if someone posts a decklist without any changes to previous decklists, or doesn't include any comment about why he made changes, report the post and get it deleted by a mod.

2. However, some comments here seem to imply that one person knows everything about a certain deck, and thus his opinion concerning it is always right. I think even "inventing" a deck and/or spending many hours on playing and improving it doesn't mean that one can't be wrong. If that were the case, we wouldn't need threads but just primers, regularly updated by the person who knows everything about the deck. Take threads like UGw Thresh or 4c Landstill, for example. There are some people in it who obviously know a lot about the deck, and have had success with it, yet there are enough issues where they don't agree on a common position.

3. You know what would be great ? If the primer of a thread would be updated to include links to relevant discussions in the thread when they appear. For example, if people argue for a page whether Chalice deserves a maindeck spot in Aggro Loam, using relevant arguments, that page could be linked to in the primer, making it easy to find. Searching for "Chalice" in that thread will turn up a lot of results, most of them just being decklists which include Chalice. Of course, that wouldn't solve the problem that people that are new to a thread don't seem to read the primer anyway.




Ban all the people who we think are being stupid?

Ignore lists work fine ; ). They're like a ban that still allows people to "express themselves" on the forums, they just don't know that no-one reads it anymore.

[klaus]

3. You know what would be great ? If the primer of a thread would be updated to include links to relevant discussions in the thread when they appear. For example, if people argue for a page whether Chalice deserves a maindeck spot in Aggro Loam, using relevant arguments, that page could be linked to in the primer, making it easy to find. Searching for "Chalice" in that thread will turn up a lot of results, most of them just being decklists which include Chalice. Of course, that wouldn't solve the problem that people that are new to a thread don't seem to read the primer anyway.

I digg that.

[Phoenix Ignition]

3. You know what would be great ? If the primer of a thread would be updated to include links to relevant discussions in the thread when they appear. For example, if people argue for a page whether Chalice deserves a maindeck spot in Aggro Loam, using relevant arguments, that page could be linked to in the primer, making it easy to find. Searching for "Chalice" in that thread will turn up a lot of results, most of them just being decklists which include Chalice. Of course, that wouldn't solve the problem that people that are new to a thread don't seem to read the primer anyway.

Yeah, this would be great. Can we somehow get the mods to get people who own the threads on the specific decklists to just put in a link like he said of which page or post to start looking at of why they should/shouldn't play a specific card? Granted noobs won't read it right away, but then we could just say "read the primer" instead of going into another endless detailed list of reasons.

[dahcmai]

I hate using the ignore. Sometimes in a blue moon a person comes in a posts something groundbreaking on total accident. It's not common, but occasionally, a card that was forgotten is brought up again and fits perfectly.

TES is a good example of a deck that is tricky to play. It's not intuitive at all from a person's point of view who's never touched something similar before. Hell, I figured it was easier to ask than to run through that mess looking for the Doomsday stack that was mentioned in it. I can understand how people would have questions on it. It takes a certain amount of finesse to play properly. A lot of "try to go for this" if you're "playing against this" type things.

It reminds me of Chess. That thread is going to get a lot of stupid crap no matter what. Until you have played the utter crap out of it, you're not going to get most of it.

[Jaiminho]

I just wanna thank everyone for making me reconsider using the Ignore list. The UGw Thresh thread is so much cleaner now and I only needed to ignore one user.

[Parcher]

Ignore lists work fine ; ). They're like a ban that still allows people to "express themselves" on the forums, they just don't know that no-one reads it anymore.

If this were true, you would be able to place Mods and Admins on the ignore list as well.

[TheInfamousBearAssassin]

Sub-threads for each thread, such as a "Don't play Dark Confidant in Sui", etc., would be immensely useful. If you had a way of clicking directly to them from the first post.

[herbig]

The overall quality of the majority of The Source's posts (I'm talking content here) appears to be decreasing . . . I'm not an old-schooler either, I joined this site some time in 2007. Nevertheless, I'm confident to be able to judge quality when it comes to posts concerning Legacy. And I feel TheSource has seen better times.

The quality is remaining the same. What's happening is your judgment of quality is improving. Those better times were when you were ignorant of the state of things.

[Dark_Cynic87]

From what I understand [...] Bryant runs Mystical Tutor now because Ad Nauseam was printed, whereas before I agree wholeheartedly that it didn't belong in the deck. You can't fault him for changing the deck as a response to a change in the card pool. Mystical wasn't good TES, and now it is. That's why he runs it.

It wasn't as a response. GreenOne and I had to convince it into the build after AdN was printed.



As for the quality of posting, I agree that the signal:noise ratio is incredibly unbalanced, but it's always been that way and always will be for the foreseeable future because the number of people posting noise is always going to be so much higher. Take it from someone who has roughly half his posts in Mish-Mash, it is much much easier to post one- or two-line fluff posts than it is to type something thoughtful up with actual merit. But really, what can you do? Ban all the people who we think are being stupid? But who makes that call? The Admins? Some independent "post quality enforcement committee"? The point is that people here are allowed to post just about anything they want (within reason), and it's always going to be on the reader to seperate the wheat from the chaff.

I like the chaff. It really adds flavor. I can seperate on my own what/who I listen to as far as quality goes, but I like the little tidbits and all the mindless nonsensical tidbits left by people. I'm not condoning stupidity, but off-topic (and even some on-topic) random or funny quotes are important to us. A whole thread has been made for quotes from people, and I'd say 99% of those quotes posted have little magical seriousness involved. Use your ignore user thingy if you don't like the chaff, or enjoy the comedy of the people. I suppose it's just what you want to take away from here that determines how happy with the site you are.

Pce,

--DC

[Van Phanel]

I like the chaff. It really adds flavor. I can seperate on my own what/who I listen to as far as quality goes, but I like the little tidbits and all the mindless nonsensical tidbits left by people.

You misunderstood the OP. Nobody complains about The Source being ... well ... The Source. What you call chaff are all the little nuances that make this site so great. What Klaus called chaff were all the stupid posts that are meant to be on-topic but just dwell with stupidity.

And he's right, there are a lot of them. This is the price of a public forum though and the more I think about it, the more do I like herbig's interpretation of the issue.

[Mayk0l]

I for one would like to see more posts by the adepts in the adept threads. Those are always good reads, and I feel like the number of posts in those threads have gone down.

On the "st00pit peeoplez" thing: I believe all ideas are ideas, not all of them are as good as others, but all of them are still worth considering regardless of who came up with the idea. All people are eager to contribute. The thing that bothers me is that people keep repeating the ideas that have been discarded. I consider the Mystical Tutor issue in the TES thread an exception to this, but you should try and read the Dragon Stompy thread. After 20 pages, you're done, but there'll be like 80 more. I stopped reading there too.

I feel like quality could go up if people just read the threads before posting, but sometimes I get the feeling people are posting in threads for the sake of posting and "to keep the discussion alive". The Ichorid thread has been "dead" for some time (the LED thread), which is perfectly fine to me; nothing new has come up for the deck.

[KillemallCFH]

I feel like quality could go up if people just read the threads before postingTo be fair, telling someone to read 100 pages about a deck is pretty unrealistic. Still, you should at least read the last 10 pages or so.

Also, I really like Jack's suggestion of somehow having sub-threads to separate different ideas within a thread. However, the logistics of doing so seem like a nightmare, and it is probably unrealistic that such a thing would ever be implemented.

[herbig]

sometimes I get the feeling people are posting in threads for the sake of posting and "to keep the discussion alive".

Prime example.

[Zach Tartell]

I for one would like to see more posts by the adepts in the adept threads. Those are always good reads, and I feel like the number of posts in those threads have gone down.


I love responding to good adept questions, but I feel like it's unfair to ask us to answer questions that haven't been posed yet (no slight to you, Mayk, just saying that I wish we had more decent questions).


The thread's right here (http://www.mtgthesource.com/forums/showthread.php?t=5869), folks. Make some noise.

[Afro]

I for one would like to see more posts by the adepts in the adept threads. Those are always good reads, and I feel like the number of posts in those threads have gone down.

I don't know if I am the only one who this happens to but when I go to post I read over what other Adepts have said and anything I am preparing to write has pretty much been said. Leaving me with either a post full of quotes or me just wasting my time.

[Pinder]

I don't know if I am the only one who this happens to but when I go to post I read over what other Adepts have said and anything I am preparing to write has pretty much been said. Leaving me with either a post full of quotes or me just wasting my time.

Yeah, if you don't get in on the ground level with the Adept Q&A, there's not a whole lot you can say without repeating what others have said. Take the current question for example. I don't know if we need deeper questions ("What's your perfect Sunday?") or whatever, but this man speaks truth.

[Mayk0l]

Prime example.

What do you mean? My post is a prime example of what I'm talking about? I disagree


Zach, Afro, Pinder;
you guys make very valid points. I'll sit down and think of some questions more sensitive to different views and opinions.

[dahcmai]

I wouldn't mind if the mods went through threads that have gotten long and deleted the posts along the lines of "have you tried this <random card>". Those are so annoying. The ones that have something like "omg, that's amzing" and they post nothing else, I think I'd smile seeing deleted also.

Would help when trying to find something in search if anything.

[Bryant Cook]

I wouldn't mind if the mods went through threads that have gotten long and deleted the posts along the lines of "have you tried this <random card>". Those are so annoying. The ones that have something like "omg, that's amzing" and they post nothing else, I think I'd smile seeing deleted also.

Would help when trying to find something in search if anything.

Moderators don't have the time for this. They're real people too! With problems, jobs and lives. What people need to do is search threads, it's not that hard.