Official forums for BZFlag.org

Umm... I woke up this morning, looked on this forum and found that everyone is now a private first class. Well, almost everyone. What happened?

Jeff changed around the ranking system a bit. Nothing to worry about. What's wrong with being a private? It will help to get rid of people just trying to get high rankings, so they just post crap.

I know he was talking about trying to get the ranks to be based on time since you "enlisted" (registered). But as a stop gap or maybe permanently, this is what he did.

maybe that will hold some people to post 10-15 (crap)posts a day to increase their rank

we can only hope!

The fact that there is a freaking topic about the ranks changing just goes to show that people think they actually _mean_ something.
Geez, it's a damn image on a website, get over it. Posting spam gets you a better image but makes you look like a moron.

There are now only 3 ranks based on post count.
Other ranks are set manually based on community involvement. Anyone with 5 posts or more is a PFC, it's as simple as that.

Ranks are not a real feature of the game or forums since they mean nothing, so we don't announce changes to them.

This is how they will be until we get better forum software and authentication systems. Then they will ether be removed, or changed to a time based system.

How about some form of rank scheme similar to that on this site: http://muselive.com/

Users are given points evey time they do a cirtain action - very little points are given for forum posts, however lots are given, for example, the development of a plugin.

There should also be points gained for days since registration, and the ammount of time actually spent playing the game. Obviously the rank is in relation to you points.

I would suggest that points also be handed out by moderators for less general things.

ranks are not something we want to spend a lot of time or effort on.

Yes, I realize that the ranks mean nothing. However, I just thought something might have gone horribly wrong with the forum. But how come some people stayed at their rank while others got moved down?

JeffM2501 wrote:Other ranks are set manually based on community involvement.

they were manually set.

If they mean nothing at all, why not get rid of them completely...

Seems like it just gives those few superiority complexes.

/me ducks

Strangely enough, even though I like the ranks oh so much, I have to agree with holey. Of course, the people with the important ranks like Jeff, Saturos and Louman might keep their ranks, but it's not all that important for the rest of us.

If the change in the ranking system is because you are all worried about spammers posting to boost their rank, then the new system means that admins no longer have a basis to delete alleged spam posts. And as most of you will agree, rank boosting is the main incentive for people to spam. Now that rank boosting is not a viable outcome, spam posting should theoretically stop for the most part (Except for the people who were a Private First Class when the ranking system was changed and don't know enough not to spam, or the occasional spammer advertising for some obscure website). But then again, the real issue comes down to how strictly you define "spamming".

All in all, I think this move is a step in the right direction.