Posting Restriction for Balance Discussion

[Actual serious post, please consider for at least 2 seconds before explaining why my continued existence is a detriment to society]

So I've been browsing the balance discussions on discord for a few months now, and reading the latest few pages it actually struck me how much discussions had degraded. Sure, it's not like discord balance threads were ever a pinnacle of rational discourse, but the early to mid threads used to have a fair bit of engagement from higher rated players, developers, and otherwise relevant parties. I mean sure, you could say that most of it were people coming in to shit on whatever position FTX happened to be taking, but the important thing was that it generated useful discussion to work off of.

I was reading the latest thread and this is what it looked like.

[Image removed to prevent witch hunting]

You might think that this is a biased sample, but that post has 200+ posts and the entire thread, without exaggeration, is that cycle of comments the whole way through. And it's not like this is an isolated incident. Every thread in the last few pages looks like this or has 0 comments.

[Though to be fair to LoliNekoTrap, he is the OP]

The point I'm trying to raise is that despite the certainty that many of the lower rated players in these discussions are trying their best to contribute, they are simply incapable of doing so. The threshold of having an original, nuanced, and relevant opinion on any given subject is a phenomenally high one that I don't think most people are capable of properly appreciating, and I think that the prevalence of these useless, derailing, "helpful" commentary from 1ks are driving away actual potential contributors who don't want to scroll through 300 comments to see if Tagada or Farms said anything that requires them to add onto.

At the same time, I think a lot of minor, niche or otherwise creative ideas come from lower rated players who are viewing a problem from a fresh angle, so here's the proposal:

Anyone should be able to create a balance suggestion or discussion post, provided they pass whatever minimal criteria already established.

From there, only people above a certain threshold (whatever may be established idk) can actually comment on the discussion post.

As to the logistics, allow a simple automated system allowing people to declare their credentials to comment and filter out anyone who breaks the rules, rather than try to individually admit players into the discussion, to minimize moderator workload.

This measure is less about stopping lower rated players from participating in these discussions, and more about allowing higher rated players to once again feel that these discussions have any meaning whatsoever that won't be drowned by the absolute cesspool of idiocy that drowns out any insightful posts and responds not to reason nor argument. I truly believe that this is the largest reason of balance discussions being perceived as a useless meme channel, and the major deterrent to improvement.

This is for discord because I don't know how this forum works with regards to restricting posting access, but could work here too.

Thanks for coming to my TED talk (aka what not having aeolus does to a mf)

@snowy801 said in Posting Restriction for Balance Discussion:

The point I'm trying to raise is that despite the certainty that many of the lower rated players in these discussions are trying their best to contribute, they are simply incapable of doing so

I don't think that is the problem.
I have yet to see someone wanting to actually contribute but unable to do so because of their lack of game knowledge.
Even if you have no idea what you are talking about as a 500 rated player, making a post with your opinion is contributing to the discussion since it allows people to see how the situation looks to a 500 rated player. Not accepting that a 2k rated player is probably correct and insisting on your stance being the correct one for 100+ messages is the problem. And this is completely unrelated to rating.
The only difference is that most 2k rated players know each other so they are more comfortable in the discussion (since they know the other one has weird takes) and are more engaged (since they know the person), compared to some random guy they don't know, where they have no idea how stupid he is and aren't interested in the person itself, since they don't know him and don't play with him. (you are more interested in your friends opinions that the opinion of some random stranger)

In the post you screenshoted I think me, sylph and lolinekotrap had a fine discussion about the pros and cons about this suggestion (though we were spinning in circles sometimes). Meanwhile two others tried to derail the discussion with "are you retarded. just makes tmd bro".
Also if you check the other threads you'll see that the first guy from your screenshot has opened a few of them while stating his intention of not trying to actually contribute, but to simply derail the balance forum. Banning such behavior would be the correct strategy instead of something that loosely correlates with it like ingame rating.

Nobody should be seriousposting on discord threads anyway. Forums are for that.

This. As evidenced, Discord is an abhorrent environment for any kind of discussion and everyone would be better off with it gone.

I do agree with the post to some degree. As you can see in my status here (which I changed literally 2 days ago) you can kind of figure that I wouldn't mind some requirements, however I do enjoy reading post from e.g. ComradeStryker since they provide detailed PoVs and not only a personal opinion.
About the other ppl I'm neutral and don't want to get personal here since the forum is the wrong place for it.

To come back to the problem, I do agree that the Discord became quite a joke. Sadly it's quite a lot of shitposting or just straight up ridiculous ideas like ACU having Oxygen or food as an extra ressource and that shorta shit, things which won't get implemented due to - well - obvious reasons. Personally I do ignore most of the posts there even though they have 200+ messages and might have a few good inputs, each time someone wants to explain me something though I'll redirect them to the forum instead. Don't think many balance members are following the thread there.
From my personal PoV: I've applied to the balance team because I play / talk a lot with lower ranked people and can see some problems they have which are just invisible or not a big deal for high ranks, effectively meaning that I was aiming to be the voice for those ~1200-2000 ranked people (Ignoring my toxicity to some certain people). So for me lower ranked takes are indeed important, but I'd say only if they either are 1200+ ranked or if they provide a very detailed view on specific topics.
For the ones wondering why I don't consider the <1200 ranked players when talking about balance: Cuz most things seem either trash or OP for them. The old gun ACU before the recent nerf? Was still too weak because it was hard to micro in order to stay in range! The sniperbots? Trash because 2 bombers can just snipe them due to their hp!

So far nearly all topics on the Discord were not interesting for me (or I just skipped through them) but I wouldn't go so far to just say "people <1200 rating are not allowed to talk about balance". I'd prefer removing the balance-thread on the Discord entirely and moderate balance-takes more strictly so thinks like the oxygen / food threads are not considered a balance due to obvious reasons (which at one point should be written down).

Or in short:
Move balance-thread to forum, moderate more strictly and close threads which rather aim for the "mod-suggest"-direction.

(Yes I do know I only gave my subjective opinion so feel free to just ignore it if it's not helpful)

They do this here as well. It's a mocking competition

@snowy801 I don't think checking people's global rating/games played stat is really indicative, since it doesn't include any of the games they've played with matchmaking/ladder!

Still, the point that lower-skilled players have less of a thorough understanding of balance is certainly valid.
I generally try throwing my own ideas out in the 'general' discussion areas, asking for opinions from others;
while trying to re-iterate what I've learned from skilled players in the actual balance suggestions.

The main reason I like to throw out ideas in general areas and ask for opinions is because I enjoy talking about the game when I'm not able to play it, assume that people on the supreme commander discord also like discussing 'what ifs' and such, and find it a great way to learn more about the ins and outs of the game.

Still, point taken, I'll stop contributing until I'm meeting 2000-rating players in 1v1s. (Although I'd still probably have 12 custom games and 1170 global rating, since I play ladder.
Also note that the account snowy screenshotted above is not mine.)

@sladow-noob said in Posting Restriction for Balance Discussion:

Move balance-thread to forum, moderate more strictly and close threads which rather aim for the "mod-suggest"-direction.

Or moving those threads into more fitting subforums, which is also not possible on discord I think.
But apart from the "balance suggestions" that are in fact just ideas for mods, recently it has been actively tried to kill any meaningful discussion on discord. If that is the intended use-case for that category it might be a good idea to just remove it.
Moving to the forums will loose some people (discord is more accessible for most), but you can then directly see their ingame name (so you can put context on their opinion) and I guess reputation though I don't know how meaningfull that is.

@sylph_ said in Posting Restriction for Balance Discussion:

@snowy801 I don't think checking people's global rating/games played alone is really indicative, since it doesn't include any of the games they've played on the ladder.

This is actually not entirely true because the ladder and MM will impact your global rating til a point like 1.4k iirc

Also please don't take any point personally. Everyone has good and bad takes, me included. If a person happens to read like 5 bad ones in a row and no good one (which isn't uncommon if you're active or just sharing own opinions without data) you just happen to have a bad image for them. It's the same for me since I did some major clown arguments in the past and still have like 1-2 which certainly are not perfect. Ask FTX about my take on Janus a month ago 4head

@nex I do like the reputation aka. downvotes on the forum since if ppl just say "aeon t2 bad." without giving any explanation, you can just show it while on Discord messages tend to get reacted to with emotes which can be quite meaningless or just mocking.
So ye, I do like the feedback-system on the forum there, as well as the fact ppl usually tend to put more effort into messages here than in the discord.

@sladow-noob said in Posting Restriction for Balance Discussion:

This is actually not entirely true because the ladder and MM will impact your global rating til a point like 1.4k iirc

I don't think this is true.
My global rating has been 1170 ever since my games played was 12 - which was about a quarter of the way 'in' to the journey of discovering the game. (the 1132 rating in the above post is not my acccount)
The client lists it as 1170 to me, (much higher when I get into a game and find the mean rather than the minimum, though my 1v1 rating is lower, and that's mostly what I play!)
If it is true, I'd be very interested to know how the global rating and games played never changes despite my ladder rating going up hundreds of points in the mean time (I can provide an old screenshot proving this).

@Deribus Do you have an answer to it by any chance? Afaik I remember talking with you about that impact

@sladow-noob It's perhaps not massively important, I just wanted to point out what a bad idea choosing that one metric is in the way snowy 'named and shamed' above; particularly given that they've played less games than I have by other metrics!
This seems particularly poignant given that global rating / custom games are the easiest to 'game' to farm rating, which we'll be forced to do if we enjoy exploring 'what ifs' / chatting about the game, and want to be allowed to do so.
Personally, I think people should absolutely be allowed to discuss balance. As long as the balance team are balancing the game with the top ratings at the highest priority (not the only priority, mind).

It's my opinion that the balance decisions that go behind some of the massive changes need to be far more visible. Tons of players get frustrated when big changes are made without any explanation or discussion, and when I've personally asked about them (like the +15% vision change to almost every unit) it was because I was unable to find anything when searching forums and discord.

Please note that I'm aware that all ratings are different and a 1800 ranked 3v3 TMM player can't be compared to a 1800 ranked 1v1 player. Each time I say something such as "<1200 ranked players" it's just a general thing talking about any low ranks from 0-1500 rating, not specifying the rating exactly. For me it's just a rough guide to e.g. differentiate between 1500 and 1800.
Since I'm actively training all ratings from literally 0 to up to 2000, I found a destribution for myself which I stick with. But I wasn't asked about it so far so I didn't bother explaining it.

Referring to the explanation:
There are explanations, both on the website together with the changes as well with a stream of farms where he's talking about it for multiple hours, going through each change and answering questions / discussions and if you ask on the Discord there is a high chance someone will explain it to you even after months have passed.

@sladow-noob While looking for explanation of the vision change, all I was able to find was 'it's a bugfix, not a balance change', despite it obviously making a difference to balance. I did ask about quite a bit, and it quickly became apparent that it hadn't been discussed anywhere public on discord or the forums. I'll try to keep a more vigilant eye on farm's stream, although without a 'search function', it sounds like a pretty bad place to have to go to understand how high-rated players felt about the change. (I do think I watched a relevant twitch video at the time, looking forward to the explanation, and getting none; but I might have dreamed it!)

Regarding rating and discussion, I've personally enjoyed exploring 'what if' scenarios in general discussion areas, but as I said I don't make official 'balance suggestions', and when I comment on those threads I only try to re-iterate what I've heard to players say, or reference actual unit stats for objective discussion (such as me mentioning that an ED1 shield costs <5% the cost of a T3 power for cybran). Still, I might well have been grossly mistaken about the 'pro'/balance team opinion on that, and maybe cybran will be getting hitpoint buffs to ensure that their reduced hp buildings never actually result in cybran structures dying to less shots.

What I've found about rating as I've been playing and chatting more, though, is that many of the players who I've been listening to quite avidly don't even play certain game types, and it takes time to learn which voices are relevant to the game types we personally play. This 'required rating' metric for discussing balance would have to ensure that a player was versed in all areas of the game, I imagine; so that they know all the implications of their suggestions? Or is that not the suggestion, and as long as someone is good at something, their opinion is valued?

It all sounds a bit elitist to me tbh. I think there's already too much elitism in this community, where a newcomer can't get a game precisely because they're a newcomer!
I think the best solution is to let people discuss what they want on discord or the forums, and ensure that the balance team aren't clueless wackos like us peasants!

@sylph_ Farms usually announces the balancetalk-streams in the announcement-channel on the FAF Discord and it should be on the news as well afaik. so that's definitely something to watch out for. Besides that I do remember explaining the vision change like two or three times, however I cannot tell you whether it was in public, in DMs, ingame or in the FAF-client since I'm active everywhere. There is also an explanation here though? Even tbf that wasn't the first thing which came into my mind but I was pretty biased since I've talked a lot about it in the past.
https://patchnotes.faforever.com/balance/3761.html#vision
If you don't get an explanation in the stream, feel free to ask in the chat - that's the whole purpose of it.

What I did forget to mention in a previous post: There sadly are so many clowns/trolls already which ppl don't take serious anymore nor listen to, compared to actual useful posts they clearly dominate. So it's really easy to get put into that "troll"-drawer.
Not exactly sure what you mean with the "which voices are relevant to the game types"-part. Imho as long as the player is good at something, I try to understand their thought process more. E.g. it doesn't matter whether you play ladder, gap, astro or 4v4 TMM, if I read smth like "I just kill sniperbots with two bombers all the time" it's simply an opinion I don't value as high cuz it completely ignores the existence of shields and AA. There are patterns however, e.g. <1200 tend to waste a lot of mass, or gappers tend to snipe a lot and turtle, or ladderplayers tend to avoid mex upgrades etc., so it's not really a question I can answer in a simple reply like this.

I was actually thinking about something the other day though, it kinda fits your last paragraph. Since I've joined the balance team for the simple reason I play low rated games and get their opinion, I was thinking about being the "go to"-station when asking for a (serious!) balance-take. E.g. the TML-one which I'll mention in a meeting. But since I know that I'm not the most non-toxic person on FAF, it's not as easy to tell whether it'd help or how I should even announce that effectively; The core thought of "balance team are elitists and 2000+ ladderplayers are the only relevant people" is simply way too deep in some minds out there. (e.g. Evildrew's post)

Since the messages are getting a bit long atm, if more ppl want it, I can create either a discord-message which I'd link or a forum-post about my opinion what situation the balance takes from lower rated people have and how large their impact is

@sladow-noob said in Posting Restriction for Balance Discussion:

Not exactly sure what you mean with the "which voices are relevant to the game types"-part. Imho as long as the player is good at something, I try to understand their thought process more

When people are talking about when to upgrade MEXes, or how to fight against PD creep and the like, the fact that they're playing 4v4 or 1v1 is absolutely massive. That's all I was getting at - that it took me a while to start to understand which 'expert opinions' actually applied to the games I was playing.
For example, your comment: "There are patterns however, e.g. <1200 tend to waste a lot of mass, " really doesn't apply to 1v1 games! I play against 1v1 ladder 700's and 800's that never waste a single point of mass, like the 700 and 800 teamgame/global players seem to. It's very much the norm to waste zero mass at 700+ 1v1 rating.

The fact that Snowy picked a single metric to make a few people look really bad, when many other, less-exploitable metrics would cast far less of a shadow over those involved, is only an aside...
The bigger issue is telling people of any skill that their contributions are not welcome -it's a great way to kill a community, not improve it!

"the simple reason I play low rated games and get their opinion" - You mean you make custom games to play them? Or you make smurf accounts? I imagine it's the former, for training? You'll have to play some with me sometime, I could use some advice about where to move my commander to resist raiding!
That being said, I think lower-rated players do a far better job of communicating the experience and potential changes that might make lower-rated play more fun, than pro players can, whether the pros are destroying low-rated players in custom games or not!

"The core thought of "balance team are elitists and 2000+ ladderplayers are the only relevant people" is simply way too deep in some minds out there"
, FWIW I don't think that in any way! I'm very glad the balance team are top-rated players. I've been a top-player in other games, and totally appreciate how much better they understand the ebb and flow of any game! I do think that contributions can be valuable at all skill levels. I also believe that balance discussions could benefit from being publicly viewable, but this might just be because the first major 'issue' I saw from a patch, which I had lots of questions about (vision change) didn't really yield any discussion when I was searching.

I'll get onboard with hanging up my balance-discussion cleats (my rating is 400 git.at.me) if the message given to low-rated players when they try to contribute is "snowy801 decided your rating was too low for you to have an original, nuanced, and relevant opinion".

Seriously: It's a bad idea. There's like four people who are consistently clogging up the balance discussion channel with bad takes. Warn/ban those people and moderate the channel if you want it to improve.