RMT Posters: Stop Breaking the Rules

[TAY]

I feel silly making this thread with such a glaringly obvious title...but I just logged on and locked six threads for having one sentence descriptions. Guys...read the rules and the 'How to RMT thread' before posting. It's a one-time thing you have to do that takes about fifteen minutes.

I also would strongly recommend that you take a look at the teams in the RMT archive before posting a team of your own. Your descriptions should be at least as detailed and descriptive as the ones in those threads. If you cannot think of anything to write to give your descriptions more substance, then there is a very simple solution: do not post the team. If you don't know enough about your own team to write five sentences on each team member, then you should not be posting it in the first place. Test more, ask a friend for help, I don't care. Do whatever it takes to make the descriptions acceptable before posting.

Let's get this forum back on track, guys.

P.S. I chose the number five arbitrarily...I know some people will get pedantic and hold the RMT mods to it unless I clarify this, lol
P.P.S. Feel free to post comments here.

 

[EspyJoel]

Its about time something was said about it, it is annoying when every 2nd or 3rd RMT thread is breaking some kind of rule and often if informed of this, they still don't get the message. It's not that hard to write 5 lines so I don't see why people are having so much trouble.

 

[darknite]

A suggestion I have is to direct posters to the rules and then to the new post when they click the "post a new thread" button. That way they will be forced to see the rules before beginning to make a thread. I realize this doesn't guarantee they'll read them, but at least they won't have any excuse for not following the rules. Just trying to think of ideas.

 

[StarmanXL]

Somehow, if people were ignoring the other stickies concerning RMT rules and guidelines then I doubt they'll bother to read this one either, especially since it really doesn't seem to add anything, but that may just be me.

 

[VKCA]

Is it just me or do the rmt's that are breaking the rules just get lazier. like the first two pokes desription's are pretty good, but then the rest are just one line
of "u-turn for scouting, bullet punch for seeping, roost for healing and superpower for coverage" its ridiculous. they put the effort into the first third and then the rest is just garbage.

 

[EspyJoel]

The most annoying ones are those who say they have been doing well with the team because if they are doing well with it, they must know the roles each pokemon plays, and yet they decide to be lazy and put the sort of descriptions Mr.Void noted.

Maybe if like a pop-up of the main rules occured when they entered the RMT forum the first time, then they may actually bother to learn them, but due to the laziness of many people, I highly doubt it.

 

[MetaNite]

I must disagree with some of the threads you locked. The rules say to not post "Pokemon X is so awesome!!!" It does not say you have to write at least 5 lines of text or something around there. If it should, then add it.

http://www.smogon.com/forums/showthread.php?t=56428
http://www.smogon.com/forums/showthread.php?t=56360
http://www.smogon.com/forums/showthread.php?t=56279
http://www.smogon.com/forums/showthread.php?t=56420

These four have descriptions. Not the most thought out or longest for sure, but perhaps they just have nothing else to say. Frankly, there's not really much new things to say about many Pokemon out there, other than its role in your team specifically. No need to repeat the Pokemon's analysis. A lot of newer players also don't have much to say, and you can't really blame them for that. They want you to put the words in their mouth, because they don't know exactly why they picked Pokemon 'X'. I don't see how a n00b who only knows so much would write as much as Obi.

There are those out there that really do get annoying to read, like what joel22 said. People who think they know so much but it really makes no sense. For instance, something like 'Weavile counters Starmie, Latias, and Blissey amazingly!'

 

[EspyJoel]

MetaNite it actually states this in the RMT rules part so your first point isn't valid: *Detailed description of the Pokemon's purpose to the team*

Those threads you pointed out did not have detailed descriptions and the first one when they actually remade the thread had a lot more written and stop making stupid comments like your last point. I understand many people have trouble writing these RMTs and am sympathetic towards that but if we are going to rate something it can be a lot harder if we don't know the role they want that pokemon to have in their team.

 

[kd24]

metanite, the point is to write about your 'team', not just the pokemon. we want to hear synergy and why you chose that pokemon on your team. if you are just telling me about what each pokemon can do, thats nice, but i can just look up that information on a strategy pokedex myself.

so yeah, more synergy and why you picked that, less "pokemon x does .... and move a can kill ... and move b can kill ... etc". we want to know, why does it killing those pokemon help with your team strategy as well as the rest of the team in the longrun.

personally, im happy tay is cracking down on this

 

[Sc4rfCh0mp]

Is there a way to get all threads in this forum checked by mods, then either not posted or approved and posted? I know PokeCommunity does this in their Strategies and Movesets Forum, and it usually blocks out the majority of the garbage RMTs that contain very little description.

 

[Umbreon Dan]

The problem with most of the solutions here is that they take too much time from the mods or are just annoying. I for one would not want to see the rules every single time I try to post.

 

[musiquev24]

Thank you for this post Tay. Now lets just hope people actually read the stickies... I think thats the first major problem.

Another thing that bothers me is the poor quality of replies. I feel like some people, especially new members, are getting really stupid information from other stupid users, making them worse players and worse advice givers. I don't know what we can do about that though.

edit: I just remembered there is a sticky for people posting replies. I guess the answer to everything is:

READ THE STICKIES

Perhaps only then can the quality of this forum get better, I guess :|

 

[mtr]

Agreed with Umbreon Dan. Pokecommunity is small, and has far fewer users per moderator, thus making what they (well actually, I also have an account there) do more feasible than what we would do here.

Plus, the quality control usually doesn't get everything...

http://www.pokecommunity.com/showthread.php?t=181404

Aisde from that, I also thank TAY for making this, though I fear the fact that many people don't read the stickies anyways may diminish this thread's utility.

 

[polelover44]

I, too, want to thank TAY for such a wonderful thread. I admit, I have been guilty of this in the past, but have learnt my lesson. As such, I think you should at least give a minimum. Five sentences can be: "Standard. Kills x. Also kills y. Is countered by z. Has max speed." You should give a minimum like four lines per Pokemon (what I use), or maybe five. This would make it clearer to some of the more lazy (and newer) RMTers what you mean by "detailed".

 

[Umbreon Dan]

Five sentences can be: "Standard. Kills x. Also kills y. Is countered by z. Has max speed."

I would not read a RMT if someone put that little effort into it. I don't care how many periods you've got, that person just didn't try. It has to be more than that.

 

[BurtonEarny]

I would not read a RMT if someone put that little effort into it. I don't care how many periods you've got, that person just didn't try. It has to be more than that.

Agreed, an rmt can take me the better part of four ro five hours... I over post them, but they are so much fun to do BECAUSE you get to explain and defend your choices. Not just get spoonfeed "run this poke" garbage.

 

[Caelum]

A suggestion I have is to direct posters to the rules and then to the new post when they click the "post a new thread" button. That way they will be forced to see the rules before beginning to make a thread. I realize this doesn't guarantee they'll read them, but at least they won't have any excuse for not following the rules. Just trying to think of ideas.

That's annoying and completely unfair to people that don't need that inconvenience. I don't see why people that manage to follow the rules should have to suffer an inconvenience because people can't read. Not to mention, I'm not even sure if this version of vbulletin supports that plug-in.

I must disagree with some of the threads you locked. The rules say to not post "Pokemon X is so awesome!!!" It does not say you have to write at least 5 lines of text or something around there. If it should, then add it.

http://www.smogon.com/forums/showthread.php?t=56428
http://www.smogon.com/forums/showthread.php?t=56360
http://www.smogon.com/forums/showthread.php?t=56279
http://www.smogon.com/forums/showthread.php?t=56420

These four have descriptions. Not the most thought out or longest for sure, but perhaps they just have nothing else to say. Frankly, there's not really much new things to say about many Pokemon out there, other than its role in your team specifically. No need to repeat the Pokemon's analysis. A lot of newer players also don't have much to say, and you can't really blame them for that. They want you to put the words in their mouth, because they don't know exactly why they picked Pokemon 'X'. I don't see how a n00b who only knows so much would write as much as Obi.

There are those out there that really do get annoying to read, like what joel22 said. People who think they know so much but it really makes no sense. For instance, something like 'Weavile counters Starmie, Latias, and Blissey amazingly!'

I probably would've let one of them slide, but I don't think you can really believe that those RMTs are prime examples of effort.

Is there a way to get all threads in this forum checked by mods, then either not posted or approved and posted? I know PokeCommunity does this in their Strategies and Movesets Forum, and it usually blocks out the majority of the garbage RMTs that contain very little description.

We could get the forum settings changed so every thread goes into "moderation" waiting a moderators approval. Simply put, we don't have the man power to review every thread. I suppose you could counter with that we should promote new moderators, but we'd need at least double what we have now to accomplish that in a timely manner. You could be waiting quite a bit of time before a moderating approves the thread for posting and I can't imagine that is desirable. Plus, it's just a pain for everyone.

Thank you for this post Tay. Now lets just hope people actually read the stickies... I think thats the first major problem.

Another thing that bothers me is the poor quality of replies. I feel like some people, especially new members, are getting really stupid information from other stupid users, making them worse players and worse advice givers. I don't know what we can do about that though.

edit: I just remembered there is a sticky for people posting replies. I guess the answer to everything is:

READ THE STICKIES

Perhaps only then can the quality of this forum get better, I guess :|

We can't read and delete every bad reply. If you see a poor reply and you are there rating the team, why not just quote that person and explain why it is bad advice? The original posting can judge who makes a better argument and if their advice is truly bad you should be able to easily win that fight.

 

[Bad Ass]

those kind of rmts is why i dont rate the average joe's pretty well detailed, well thought out rmt. glad we're cracking down

 

[SoT]

Ohhhh before I forget.


Stop posting in threads that you know will be locked, or even borderline. If nobody rates these half-assed teams, sooner or later they'll catch on and realize they need to put more effort into the teams.

 

[Taylor]

It's unfortunate that these lengths have to be taken.

I recommend including the RMT Archive URL inside the rules itself; after a quick glance in the rules thread, I did not encounter it. There, you can give reference to the archive itself and you can insist newcomers use it as a guideline.

 

[Solidus]

A lot of newcomers is what I think is causing this. In just this past week, I've been seeing more rule breaking RMT's being posted than normal. Some people tend to get lazy on the last few descriptions and put a one sentence description. Re-familiarizing the new members with the rules should hopefully put a stop to this.

 

[Super Weavile]

A lot of newcomers is what I think is causing this. In just this past week, I've been seeing more rule breaking RMT's being posted than normal. Some people tend to get lazy on the last few descriptions and put a one sentence description. Re-familiarizing the new members with the rules should hopefully put a stop to this.

I agree with this, but they just don't want to obide by the rules. It's starting to piss me off that every RMT i look at has no pictures, is set up poorly and has a 1 sentence description.

 

[BurtonEarny]

I agree with this, but they just don't want to obide by the rules. It's starting to piss me off that every RMT i look at has no pictures, is set up poorly and has a 1 sentence description.

T-T. I give a link to add images sometimes included in my rate. But I'm going to stop rating teams that dont show a decent amount of effort.

Newness is not really an excuse. They should at least play the team enough to be able to recognize some problems it has. They can discuss those problems as well as their team's strengths.

That brings me to my biggest pet peeve with RMT's:
something like "Just wanted to get my team rated, its 5- 1 which is good, but I think it could be better" makes me a bit angry. If you have a team you want rated after 6 games or so, you basically have no experience with the team and probably little experience at playing in general and are looking for spoonfed handouts which is the opposite of what I think this forum should be for...

 

[SoT]

A lot of newcomers is what I think is causing this. In just this past week, I've been seeing more rule breaking RMT's being posted than normal. Some people tend to get lazy on the last few descriptions and put a one sentence description. Re-familiarizing the new members with the rules should hopefully put a stop to this.

They're stickies. Not much more we can do, I mean if you want to go pm every new member the link to the rules be my guest. We've made them as available as possible.

 

[Objection]

If the rules have not been made less subjective already, I think they should be. "Detailed description" and "experience with the team" and "experience with the metagame" need to be quantified so that newbies don't get confused when they find that their two-and-a-half-line-long descriptions of pokemon on a team that has battled only 10 times are deemed as insufficient.