Bad ratings

[nosisab]

The rating system is a good one, but can be troublesome if someone low rate a new mod and worse if is not put the reason to this. The new viewers will see the rate and just skip to the next, it's a psychological fact, a low rate is a low rate, very few would see the comments page and confer the motives to it.

[DarkWarrior45]

The rating system is a good one, but can be troublesome if someone low rate a new mod and worse if is not put the reason to this. The new viewers will see the rate and just skip to the next, it's a psychological fact, a low rate is a low rate, very few would see the comments page and confer the motives to it.

 

I think you bring up a good point. And it can be a potential problem simply because if some 14 year old troll, who doesn't like a mod, rates it very low on the mod's first rating. Which would simply, suck.

 

It is my two cents worth that the rating system should be set up to only allow ratings between the numbers 5 and 10 instead of 0-10. That way a mod that was initially bashed by trolls can still have a decent chance.

[Vagrant0]

Nah, it would make alot more sense to make it to where the rating of mods doesn't get seen until atleast 10 unique people have rated that mod. That way people may be more inclined to give their actual opinion, rather than vote with the crowd, atleast initially. Although, really there is no good system since there seems to be some people who actually make it their purpose to downvote mods so that theirs looks better.

[LHammonds]

I have yet to see a really good public voting system but the one TESNexus uses works but only if people such as yourselves report votes that are obviously skewed, unjustified or by somebody who has not even played the mod yet.

 

Because the voting system was not defined clearly in the beginning and is still somewhat vague right now, people's voting scale varies drastically from person to person.

 

Here are some examples as to how some people vote based on what I have seen:

 

1 = Hardly anything is this bad, 2 = Bad, 5 = Mediocre, 7 = Good, 9 = Excellent, 10 = Hardly anything is this good and doesn't need improvement.

1 = Broken, 5 = Average, 10 = Better most anything

1 = Bad, 10 = Good

1 = Didn't Like, 10 = Liked

1 = No Screenshots (and didn't DL), 10 = Nice Screenshots (and didn't DL)

 

Here are my thoughts about mod feedback from different viewpoints:

 

PLAYERS POINT OF VIEW:

 

You have MANY tools at your disposal for finding the right mod(s) for you.

- Search tags

- Voting systems

- Top ### lists

- Recommended mods lists

- Mod(s) of the month and/or Hall of Fame lists

- # of downloads vs # of views vs date of initial upload

- Readme file

- Comments on mod pages

- Comments on Release thread(s)

- Images / Screenshots

- The author (might normally like his/her style)

- Installing and Playing the mod yourself

 

Relying completely on just one of these as your means for evaluating a mod (other than playing it) is rather silly and is a sign for the author and others to ignore you.

 

AUTHORS POINT OF VIEW:

 

You also have tools at your disposal for feedback:

- Voting system

- # of downloads vs # of views vs date of initial upload

- Comments on mod pages

- Comments on Release thread(s)

- PM or email messages (if you provided that as a feedback option)

 

Similar to the player comment above, none of these options should be considered a magic bullet for how well your mod is received. I have yet to see any voting system work well for every mod...whether handled completely by private critics or by the public at large. If, as an author, you are serious about feedback and improving your mod based on community feedback, DO NOT rely on an open-ended feedback of an empty reply comment page. Most people downloading your mod have no clue as to what went into it and do not really know "how" to give feedback in such a way that you can utilize. Instead, create a feedback form that people can use while evaluating your mod. I've been wanting to create something like this to include on my readme generator but I am easily side-tracked. I also do not usually release a mod with the intension of collecting feedback to make changes to it.

 

Example:

 

You have a mod that contains a quest, NPCs with AI, new weapons and clothes. You might want to help guide feedback in the areas you are interested in improving and ignoring areas you care nothing about such as the following:

 

When rating or leaving feedback on this mod, please copy and paste this form in your reply to help me improve this mod:

 

(Y) or (N) ___ I would recommend this mod to a friend

(Y) or (N) ___ The quest worked without any issues

(Y) or (N) ___ The new weapon looked good enough as a reward

(Y) or (N) ___ The new weapon enchantments was fitting for a Level 20 character

(Y) or (N) ___ The clothing did not clip or stretch strangely

(Y) or (N) ___ NPCs seemed believable and worked as designed

(Y) or (N) ___ The readme file was helpful to get the mod running

 

Of course, forms like this are highly tailored for each mod but for those authors that are looking for constructive criticism (especially in areas that interest you), a form such as this is your BEST tool and can be placed in your description, readme, comments and release thread. Your 2nd best tool is the "REPORT" button for any comments that are offending. I'm quite surprised at how seldom the report tool is used. When the report tool is used, it has usually gone on for far too long and many posts and ill feelings could have been avoided if the report tool was exercised earlier.

 

The 1 to 10 vote system is completely casual and how people vote can vary quite drastically from person to person which only means that votes should be taken with a grain of salt...not because they are worthless but because your "view" of all the votes cannot fit into a single judgment on the overall because each vote had different criteria.

 

LHammonds (File Admin)

[nosisab]

I'll put the statistics over one mod, my mod in this case but not the only one to suffer from the problem. It is not a mod that would figure on hall of fame, in fact it is a simple mod that required just basic script codding skill.

 

in the early ours it received something like 58 views 50 dlds and 2 comments. the first comment just suggested pics, the second one rated it 3 under the reason: 'not good' and some unintelligible

characters. After this the mod received 1848 views and just 2 dlds at the moment of this reply.

 

Clearly the viewers look at the rating and pass on.

 

Vagrant0 have a point, but as himself said and LHammonds confirmed, no rating system is perfect. The only way is the one already used, moderator intervention, weighting the fairness of the vote.

[Dark0ne]

The tools are there to report any ratings that don't come with a clear description of their rating to the staff for moderation. Ergo the people complaining about unjust ratings have no reason to complain; your salvation is just a few clicks away.

[SickleYield]

Don't hurt me, anybody, but I don't actually look at those ratings very much. Generally if I DL a mod from here it's because I was browsing a section and liked the screenshots, or because it was linked from the forum I spend the most time on (Canadian Ice & Howndog's Place). I've never given a negative rating and not very many positive ones.

 

Usually if I like a mod I leave a comment, because that's what makes the most difference to me when people do it for my mods. Only a few mods are going to be extremely popular; for the rest of us, it's great to hear from the few people who liked it a lot (rather than a whole bunch who liked it a little but didn't download it).