Board Thread:General Discussion/@comment-454133-20170831212602

I'd like to get an opinion from LasseKaa, DragoonKainKatarn, the big boss (Cbyehdio) if possible, our regular contributors, as well as the wider community. If you're just popping in for the first time, please give me your opinion!

The "Problem"

Right now there are a number of cards whose ultimate effect are very contested. Three examples are:


 * Can Etahn modify Snap Shot?


 * Does Targeting Synchronizer allow spending the TS ship's lock to reroll a primary weapon attack?


 * Does Minefield Mapper + Extra Munitions allow discarding all your Munitions Tokens + Bomb Cards at the start of the game, or just the munitions tokens?

Please don't discuss your interpretations here, though I suspect someone will fall to the temptation and try to start that discussion. That is, in fact, exactly what I want to discuss with you. -_^

Each of these (and other) rules questions are extremely compelling. When people look at them, many will immediately be certain of how to interpret the rule, and will consider any other interpretation absurd, stupid, or deliberate cheating. Because you know, humans are only human. However the way the rules are written is extremely ambiguous, often deviously ambiguous, and when you read up on these in the FFG forums, it becomes increasingly clear that there are two or more very well-argued points of view on how to interpret these cards. It's not clear or obvious, and if you take certain rules of interpretation for granted to get one side or the other's way, then other cards become nonsense. But people can be very devoted to their interpretation...

And that's a problem: vague rules text naturally creates fights. On FFG's forums, for example, this devolves into very toxic arguments spread across multiple threads where people basically talk down to each other for viewing a rule in any other way than their own interpretation.

It gets mean. It sometimes goes on for a very long time (until everyone fights to exhaustion or enough people walk away to leave a clear "victor"). Any time someone asks the question again (not realizing the vitriol boiling under the surface), it can start all over again.

The basic problem here is, FFG's rules are not clear, and FFG needs to fix it. But they're not doing that at this time, and as admin, I feel I need a way to respond to that.

Philosophy and argumentation have proven inadequate to resolve these problems. It needs to be an official ruling from FFG, or it just amounts to nothing. Fighting it out doesn't help, and there's usually no argument we can have here that hasn't already played out tragically multiple times on the FFG Forums.

And I don't want to repeat that here.

My Current Strategy

My take on this thus far has been.

1) Take a neutral stance: "We can't resolve this ourselves.  I've got my opinion, but I recognize there are two or more well-reasoned positions on this matter, and I don't want to enforce one side or the other"

2) Send it home: "It's FFG's problem; let's put all that toxicity on their doorstep, not here.  They need to release a FAQ".

3) Rely on local jurisdiction: "If you need to use this card in a local game, ask your opponent if he's ok with your interpretation.  If you need to use this card in a tournament, ask your TO well in advance on how they'll interpret the card."

The FFG forums are already pretty toxic and they won't be ruined by one more holy war, so that's the ideal place to fight out these battles. They churn through topics pretty fast and bury stuff when it finally dies, but arguments on the wiki stick around under the article for quite a while, and they can glut the "latest changes" section. I really prefer to spend my time answering answerable questions, not intractable monsters. ;)  And there's a better chance of generating a FAQ by discussing it on FFG's forums instead of here.

So every time one of these unresolvable rules questions springs up, I've been asking people to please take their discussion to the FFG forums. This only works in as far as people know about the last time I stepped in and tried to stop the fight. Someone unaware (and to be fair, reading all the comments under all affected pages is tedious and doesn't always occur to someone) will just start the fight anew.

My Thoughts For Going Forward

I'd like to create a standard blurb that I put on articles for cards that are contested (or each card in the combo). It will basically say the 3 things I have listed above (neutral, ffg forums, local jurisdiction), and provide a direct link to a discussion on the FFG Forums where people can read up and argue their point.

If someone ignores this (by accident or bullheadedness) and asks the question again or wants to push for one side or the other, they'll get a friendly reminder to please take the discussion to the FFG forums (and I will repeat the link). That's almost always enough.

However if they keep pushing, I want to push back. Give them one final warning. Then if necessary, suspend them for a day or whatever to give them time to cool off.

This is... I really doubt it'll ever come to that. People tend to respond well to the friendly reminder, and honestly I hate using my admin tools as a weapon. But... I want it there as an enforceable rule in case we get someone who wants to be right and wants to do it here (e.g. one of the FFG Forum guys comes over here hoping for a victory, and won't let it go).

Feedback

I think this sounds good. But it might be evil.

I try to be a really nice admin, to the point where I dig pretty deeply into suspected spam posts, read them over again and think about them, send them through a translator... lots of work before deleting them or issuing a ban (just in case they're not spam and I'm just misinterpreting). I prefer to abide some mess rather than enforce strict or arbitrary rules of design or content. I've been on wikis where the admins were trash   (helloooo Minecraft Tekkit Wiki), often wholesale-deleting contributions they didn't make themselves, or that weren't formatted right, etc. I don't want to go down the road of tyranny, and it starts in small steps.

So... Does this sound like an appropriate way to answer questions clearly for people looking for help, inform people that the card is contested and we don't take a side here (it's FFG's problem), and redirect arguments to the FFG forums?

Is that even a worthy goal? 