Since additional trophies are in the works, I believe it's time to voice this as its own topic. There's one inherent flaw in the Notable Writers list. If my observations are correct, then names organized on this list based on the total number of trophies acquired, then by who reached that number first (the latter I am uncertain about, but it's definitely chronologically in some way). Done like this, the list is inherently going to stagnate. Consider the following hypothetical: Suppose for a moment every writer currently listed as a Notable Writer achieves every possible trophy available (a feat currently achieved only by three of them). The result of which would be seven users with 13 trophies and three with 12. At that point, seven slots are permanently taken until more trophies are implemented. Additionally, it's quite possible, depending on the trophy's nature, that these seven users already qualify for that trophy the moment it implements. Now dig a little deeper. There are well more than three Veteran accounts that are active writers but are not Notable, though I won't be naming names. Suppose for a moment we take three active Veterans and bump them up to 13 trophies. Until more trophies are implemented, the list is completely locked. Even if we rewrite the code to represent the newest 13 trophy bearer at the top, the list could only be challenged by another Veteran. Even once we add the new Trophies, the Veterans hold an advantage that can lock out other users quickly. The list barely changes. It changes so little I barely check it. This is a problem that new trophies aren't going to solve. The most new trophies will accomplish is creating a berth for other users to sneak in for a brief time, and the least they will accomplish is nothing because the Notables were already qualified before the new Trophies were even a thought. However, this is somewhat easily resolved, though (with my limited understanding of programming) it will require a vastly more sophisticated code. It's actually right here on the forums. Scrolling to the top of the page and following the "Members" link reveals that the forum categorizes users based on Number of Posts, Number of Likes, Number of Trophy Points, and Staff (which is empty for some reason). Besides breaking up the categories into different metrics, it bases the order off of something perpetually changing. We can even turn to the main page to see the latter in a different capacity: ranking stories and threads based on numbers that also change. Apply this to the Notable Writers. We categorize based on Most Likes, Most Favorites, Most Threads, Most Comments, etc. We could keep Most Trophies with the seniority tie-breaker as a metric for how quickly certain users developed into Notable Writers and add a Staff tab to that as well in case someone wishes to quickly PM a moderator for rule violations. I'll leave which Metrics should be employed for a debate, as well as the sorts of protocols we'd need to implement to minimize gaming of the system, but overall I believe this should be a consideration. It's bad enough Top Stories and Top Threads don't change too often, but they have the positive of being based on values that can be challenged by anyone at any point with little need to attach a time parameter. This, at the very least, should be applied to Notable Writers as well, and basing them off of Trophies simply doesn't permit that sort of freedom.
Before I did read your post, I thought that the Veteran Achievement is the problem, because it is unattainable by newer members. But you are right that even without it, we still have a static list. Using additional criteria besides the achievments seems like a good idea.
While I, as one of those top writers with every trophy Which it is possible for me to obtain naturally see a certain value in the present system, I admit your multi-part system has merit, yet, I myself form a counterpoint right here on the forum. I've only been around two years: how many of those metrics do I occupy the top slot?
Could the notable writers not include - during a four week cycle, of writers stories that have attained SOW? That would at the very least change the list on monthly basis and send readers down the list to then check out the individuals other stories / contributions?
Well, I think that — after some years of having the new version — the Veteran batch could also be given to users who have an account for a very long time. (I don't know if the old database had a registration date, so it could be that it was impossible back then.) There could also be another trophy only for those who can't get the Veteran batch. But regarding the topic... I think the main problem is what we want to say with the specific sections. Currently, Notable Writers lists the most active (now or in the past) writers as it is almost exclusively (11 of 13 awards) about Chapters (4 awards), Stories (2 awards), and Likes (5 awards.) If the site would be a library, we would basically show a list of the authors with the most books in the library. But I would rather call that "Most Known Authors" (The Top Stories section is similar as it rather shows the "Most Popular Stories") Shorter Chapters, more Chapters. More Chapters, more Likes. More Stories, more Favorites. More non-average (good or bad) Chapters, more Comments. More Quest Chapters, more Comments. So all these metrics are all based on the quantity of published content (means Chapters). I would rather like to see metrics which would show the quality. That suggested multi-column list could be interesting anyway, though some of these metrics (most Stories, Chapters, Likes) could also be viewed on the search page.
A notable consideration in your triple-crown on the forum comes from the fact that you initiated more than 25% of the total RPG topics, and should I continue I would likely find your total number of posts within the RPG section would be similar. In fact, discounting Friedman and gene.sis - who are quick to assist other users facing a technical hurdle or post about major updates to the site - the top slots favor users who had a long run in RPGs at some point. While I don't have the time to dig much deeper at present and confirm this, I'd theorize the relationships built in RPGs are a contributing factor to increasing interest in non-RPG topics created by the members, and subsequently earning more on-forum views, leading to more on-forum Likes. Also of consideration is that FallenSaint, who recently admitted to being heavily restricted for the last two years, occupies high spots in Most Trophy Points and Most Messages. This strongly suggests that forum activity in general is very low. A problem we would not have on the main site due to the low percentage of users who use the forums compared to those who use the main site. For the first two, those same metrics were used to assign Trophies. The only difference is dynamicity. The third has been mentioned as an untracked metric a few times, so this resolves that concern. Beyond that, it's no different than the prior two Trophy metrics. As for the final two, I should clarify. It's not about tracking the threads with the most comments, it's about tracking users who leave the most comments. Which again is no more easily exploited than the metrics used for Trophies. The distinguishing characteristic of the Trophy system is it minimizes the impact of gaming the system. However, in exchange for that control, we've made it nearly impossible to create a dynamic list. We would need a certain degree of oversight to compensate for this loss of control, but I think the reward outweighs the risk. For that to happen, we'd have to find a way to reintroduce the Dislike feature. Disliking is the only way to introduce a quality control system, but none of us can agree on how to re-implement it. Same could be said for Top Stories. Had we not implemented a restriction into Top Threads, the same would apply there as well.
Oh, yes. Though that would be rather a reader's stat. Well, actually the Dislike feature isn't able to offer real quality. It only compares Likes with Dislikes which would be fine if each and every reader would use it on every chapter they. But currently, only a fraction of all users use the voting system. So there would be three votes "bad", "average" and "good" while average isn't taken into account. Now only having "Like" and "Read but no Like" would still allow a way to do it without the negative impacts of a Dislike feature as we can calculate the "Likes per View." Using this percentage would allow comparing the values in every regard (Chapters, Stories, Authors). In addition to that, the effect of upvoting would be smaller as a higher attention would lead to more reads which would kind of correct the value. It is only necessary to count +1 every time a user uniquely read a chapter. (This data is already in the database.) (I partly introduced that in a suggestion thread, though maybe I didn't explain it quite clear.) Same could be done with Author Rankings. Then there could even be categories like "Rising Author" which shows a ranking of authors which have between 10 and 50 chapters or sth.
