Reviewers not using tag system

chewdog888

After the reviews were turned back on. I have received roughly 20+ reviews. I know that is not much but talking to a few other authors they have same issue with no one leaving tags.

I think the problem is most players are not informed of this new tag system. Maybe make the tag system on the side of the review window so all the tag boxes are visible or have a tutorial window pop up. I am not sure the answer but on my end the tag system is not getting used.


Chewdog

karitr

chewdog888 wrote: »

After the reviews were turned back on. I have received roughly 20+ reviews. I know that is not much but talking to a few other authors they have same issue with no one leaving tags.

I think the problem is most players are not informed of this new tag system. Maybe make the tag system on the side of the review window so all the tag boxes are visible or have a tutorial window pop up. I am not sure the answer but on my end the tag system is not getting used.


Chewdog

Tagging isn't compulsory - I have played a few quests in the last 2 days that I didn't tag. Of course I have also reviewed plenty that I have tagged, but it is quite annoying as it 'saves' tags instead of clearing them. What happens then is, when I come to review the next quest, it shows all the tags from the previous one and I have to clear irrelevant tags before applying relevant ones.

This is inevitably why the tagging system looked fundamentally 'broken' from the onset - if you do a search for tag threads, you will find complaints regarding quests having all tags checked very quickly. Without any apparent 'weighting' of the tag system, a search using tags means unless your own quest has a very high rating it will be lost among the plethora of 4+ star quests that push yours off the page.

Still, players who don't use the tag system at the review stage are also unlikely to use it as a search function. When the player opens up the catalogue, the first thing they see is a keyword search field. Using that returns results based off the title and quest overview and is arguably more efficient than using tag searches.

runebane

Not sure I even trust the new tagging system. Its inconsistent between my own characters/accounts.

I log in with one character and look at a quest and it has 4 tags for challenging. I check with a different character and it has 8. I thought it might be some sort of delay so I log back and check on the first character and it still only showed 4. I just don't get it.

ephiroll

I think another reason the tags aren't being used is because of confusion over what to put there because everyone has a different opinion of what those tags actually mean and can conflict with what the author says is in their description. Rather then leave a tag that conflicts with the description, I think players are bypassing it or checking randoms in response. One person may think 'story driven' means the combat had dialog before and after it, another may think you better have a story arc, custom characters, and all the combat be directly related to the story and god forbid you put something int there out of place. And so on for each and every tag that can be checked on a review. When there's nothing saying 'this is what this means' it gets left up to individual perception, and once 1000 people have a 1000 different meanings of something, it doesn't really mean anything to anyone. That's why the tags are broken. They're generalized and mean so many different things to different people, and that's without even getting into the translation and cultural issues that will affect a person's decision if they're reviewing outside their first language.

Best thing to do with the tags is get rid of them. Sorry folks, but if a player doesn't get across what they thought of a quest with a couple lines of text and a star, you're not getting anything else from them regardless of what you want.

trishani

I think tagging is a great idea in general, but tags should be entered by the author, not reviewers.

Reviewers have some very very wide opinions about what a foundry is, or should be. Some don't even realize its UGC and leave reviews wondering where the voice overs are, for example.

Authors know best what the intent of their foundry was. When publishing they should choose the tags. Granted not even authors will all agree, but I think its a better option.

adylhere

I have plays but I am not on the visible lists. The explanation I have is the tag system. So for me it works

chewdog888

My foundry was the 4th down on the "New" tab. Now you have to search for it but my foundry has more reviews/plays then 25% of the foundrys on the new section. I did not see one foundry in the new section that had tags. Why is "Tired of Being the Hero" in the new section. If some of above posts are correct and its going to take tags to get them sorted....

Then I vote get rid of the tag system. This should have been in the game at the start.

My main question now is...

How long till the tag system sorts out correctly? We talking months/weeks?

My most popular foundry has 650+ plays and 280+ reviews. I went from making 30-40k AD a week to 1k a week.

agentjaspor

The "New" tab got screwed up when they had to republish every single quest as part of the Feywild update. So essentially everything is considered "New" because the system thinks they were first published on that day. It should go back to normal once enough time has passed. (How long does something stay new anyways? About a month? 6 weeks is it?)

It will likely take a few months for the tag system to be widely adopted, used, searched on, and effective. I'd expect to see a few tweaks along the way as well based on performance and feedback.

And I'm sorry, but you're probably not going to find a lot of sympathy if your quest was previously making 30k-40k AD a week when most non-Featured quests have not come close that amount of tips total. :P

antonkyle

chewdog888 wrote: »

My foundry was the 4th down on the "New" tab. Now you have to search for it but my foundry has more reviews/plays then 25% of the foundrys on the new section. I did not see one foundry in the new section that had tags. Why is "Tired of Being the Hero" in the new section. If some of above posts are correct and its going to take tags to get them sorted....

Then I vote get rid of the tag system. This should have been in the game at the start.

My main question now is...

How long till the tag system sorts out correctly? We talking months/weeks?

My most popular foundry has 650+ plays and 280+ reviews. I went from making 30-40k AD a week to 1k a week.

They screwed up the new tab good and proper, that is for sure. As far as I can see all the tabs look the same more or less now.
No matter what you search for. An Epic fail, I've lost all interest in making foundry content for the time being which kind of leaves me with nothing. At the moment the only reason I log in is for the Summer festival.

I'm just glad I'm going on holiday in a few days. If things have not started to balance by the time I come back I doubt I will bother any more.

karitr

As jaspor said, everything is 'new' at the moment as the slate was wiped clean for the expansion.

Featured quests cannot be edited and were also first to be published, so expect to see them come off the 'New' tab ahead of everything else.

chewdog, I don't know when your quest was 4th from top of the 'New' list, but you have misunderstood the posts if you think that anyone was suggesting 'tags' would sort the lists out. Tags are there as a search function only, they do not determine if and where your quest appears on the list. That is still determined by ratings.

anton, not sure what you mean by 'balance'. Sure the 'Best' and 'New' tabs look the same at the moment, but that's not a static situation. If you can't get your quests out and noticed now, what hope is there for you as more quests continue to enter the catalogue?

winterswitch

agentjaspor wrote: »

How long does something stay new anyways? About a month? 6 weeks is it?

A quest stays on the "New" tab for 21 days after it leaves "For Review." (Confirmed with two of my quests.) I'm fairly ticked off that all of the ancient quests with 40,000 reviews are currently clogging up the New. Once they drop off, my just-published offering will have only 5 or 6 days to actually appear on that tab.

chewdog888

karitr wrote: »

As jaspor said, everything is 'new' at the moment as the slate was wiped clean for the expansion.

Featured quests cannot be edited and were also first to be published, so expect to see them come off the 'New' tab ahead of everything else.

chewdog, I don't know when your quest was 4th from top of the 'New' list, but you have misunderstood the posts if you think that anyone was suggesting 'tags' would sort the lists out. Tags are there as a search function only, they do not determine if and where your quest appears on the list. That is still determined by ratings.

anton, not sure what you mean by 'balance'. Sure the 'Best' and 'New' tabs look the same at the moment, but that's not a static situation. If you can't get your quests out and noticed now, what hope is there for you as more quests continue to enter the catalogue?

My quest was 4th/5th the week before the tagging patch and the tree bug but what you say makes sense. TY

I just trying to get a clear answer here. So the new/best tabs will get sorted out on there own or a patch is going to fix it?

Chewdog

karitr

So the new/best tabs will get sorted out on there own or a patch is going to fix it?

They will get sorted out automatically as 'new' quests only remain on the New tab for a set amount of time.

The Best tab is working as intended. That is, it lists quests in order of adjusted rating and obviously has a limit on the amount of visible quests it can show in game. Before the patch, a quest needed to achieve a rating of over 4.2-something to get on that list. I haven't checked to see what rating is needed now - should be less as there are far fewer quests up now.

antonkyle

winterswitch wrote: »

A quest stays on the "New" tab for 21 days after it leaves "For Review." (Confirmed with two of my quests.) I'm fairly ticked off that all of the ancient quests with 40,000 reviews are currently clogging up the New. Once they drop off, my just-published offering will have only 5 or 6 days to actually appear on that tab.

Spot on! And we are still left with only the new tab to gain plays, as the search system is backwards. It will go back to how it was but what about all those quests caught in the middle.

antonkyle

karitr wrote: »

anton, not sure what you mean by 'balance'. Sure the 'Best' and 'New' tabs look the same at the moment, but that's not a static situation. If you can't get your quests out and noticed now, what hope is there for you as more quests continue to enter the catalogue?

I mean that good quests are not seen at the moment. Obviously good is speculative, but well rated quests.

For example my latest quest An Orc Massacre has 47 reviews

25 - 5 stars
18 - 4 stars
04 - 3 stars
00 - 2 stars
00 - 1 stars

Now go find it without using my handle. Nope not possible. That is why I'm losing interest. The only reason I'm getting ANY plays is because I was really, really lucky.

narayansingh

karitr wrote: »

They will get sorted out automatically as 'new' quests only remain on the New tab for a set amount of time.

The Best tab is working as intended. That is, it lists quests in order of adjusted rating and obviously has a limit on the amount of visible quests it can show in game. Before the patch, a quest needed to achieve a rating of over 4.2-something to get on that list. I haven't checked to see what rating is needed now - should be less as there are far fewer quests up now.

Yes it is working as intended. Like HAMSTER! There should never be a cut off for the best tab. Because it is ambiguous. If there is a limit as to how many show up on the list. Lest make this easy... Let's make the cut off 4.3. And the limit is 50 quests. Now let's say there are 75 quests that have a rating of 4.3 or better. Who gets on the viewable list? If you go with the top 50 rated quests, then the cut off is not 4.3, but actually higher. If you go with the first 50 quests, then higher rated quests are not on the list. What it should be is what is names... The top 50 (arbitrary number) rated quests period. NO MINIMUM RATING.

Narayan

narayansingh

antonkyle wrote: »

Spot on! And we are still left with only the new tab to gain plays, as the search system is backwards. It will go back to how it was but what about all those quests caught in the middle.

antonkyle wrote: »

I mean that good quests are not seen at the moment. Obviously good is speculative, but well rated quests.

For example my latest quest An Orc Massacre has 47 reviews

25 - 5 stars
18 - 4 stars
04 - 3 stars
00 - 2 stars
00 - 1 stars

Now go find it without using my handle. Nope not possible. That is why I'm losing interest. The only reason I'm getting ANY plays is because I was really, really lucky.

I agree with you both. But we all know that they (Cryptic) anly really care about the 0.004% of authors.

Narayan

karitr

narayansingh wrote: »

Yes it is working as intended. Like HAMSTER! There should never be a cut off for the best tab. Because it is ambiguous. If there is a limit as to how many show up on the list. Lest make this easy... Let's make the cut off 4.3. And the limit is 50 quests. Now let's say there are 75 quests that have a rating of 4.3 or better. Who gets on the viewable list? If you go with the top 50 rated quests, then the cut off is not 4.3, but actually higher. If you go with the first 50 quests, then higher rated quests are not on the list. What it should be is what is names... The top 50 (arbitrary number) rated quests period. NO MINIMUM RATING.

Narayan

I don't understand what you are trying to say.

And really, what is ambiguous about the 'Best' tab? 'Most popular' may be more apt, but you can't deny the fact the quests that appear on it have achieved the highest ratings. Someone once suggested a 'what's being played currently' tab in addition to the 'all-time best'. A nice idea but I suspect the lists would be almost identical. Cue more complaining.

Narayan, I don't even know if you are an author. If you are, don't you think it a little hypocritical to expect Cryptic to be doing more to promote your quest and get it/them on the list, when you apparently have no interest in promoting it/them yourself?

antonkyle

Karitr, why do you defend it? Do you think it is working how it should? Would you not rather authors tag their own quests or at the very least quests show up in number of tags per play when searched?

You play more foundry quests than anyone probably, do you not get frustrated that some of your favourite authors are not getting on the new tab or seen?
I don't play all that much but 2-3 a day and I find it frustrating that it is so hard to find content that I am interested in.

What I want are quests that a) provide a challenge for me. don't break the Lore of D&D and C) (most importantly) I haven't played before. D) not over 30-40 mins. (this one is loose)

That's not to say I won't play quests that don't fit into this if they get good reviews, but this is what I would like to search for and there is no way to do that.

redneckronin

So the lists are even more broken than before they were "fixed".

Teleporters still aren't fixed, and reviews are enabled.

Really Crytpic, why should we authors even bother making an effort when it is abundantly clear that you are not making any effort at all to get things right?

All The Best

antonkyle

redneckronin wrote: »

So the lists are even more broken than before they were "fixed".

Teleporters still aren't fixed, and reviews are enabled.

Really Crytpic, why should we authors even bother making an effort when it is abundantly clear that you are not making any effort at all to get things right?

All The Best

My teleporters are fixed in every quest. I had to do it myself and not wait for them but they are working same as before now. Just to let you know.

karitr

As a non-author I am afforded the luxury of being a little more pragmatic, I guess. I understand there has to be a limit to the number of quests shown in game, just as there is a limit to the number of quests we can have in a quest journal. It's probably also important to realise the OP didn't understand how the tags work, which resulted in this thread being made - basically, his initial complaint is invalid.

"Do you think it is working how it should?" Yes, I do. Which isn't to say it couldn't be improved.
"Would you not rather authors tag their own quests...?" No, absolutely not. Sorry anton, this isn't directed at you or anyone personally, but it has been proven time and again that authors generally cannot be trusted to be objective and/or honest. However, you can add tags to your description and they will show up in a basic keyword search.
"...or at the very least quests show up in number of tags per play when searched?" I would love tags to be weighted yes. Though everyone has to bear in mind this will still favour the most-played quests.
"do you not get frustrated that some of your favourite authors are not getting on the new tab or seen?" Not really as I have my favourites on my subscribed tab. However, I do get frustrated at all the dross that gets churned out as a completed quests, especially when they have been five-starred by fellow authors.

What I would like to see is a database of quests accessible from the official website. Expect to see me say this a lot, because I truly believe the results we get from the catalogue as it is now is about as good as it is ever going to get.

antonkyle

karitr wrote: »

What I would like to see is a database of quests accessible from the official website. Expect to see me say this a lot, because I truly believe the results we get from the catalogue as it is now is about as good as it is ever going to get.

Sadly I agree that it will never be better. That's not to say it couldn't be. Why not display quests based on an average rating rather than an adjusted rating. All this would do is change the look of the best tab so a quest that has 30 plays and 30 5 stars will be top. If like you said it gets their by dishonest authors then it will soon fall of the list.

I have never rated a quest I would consider dross. That is not to say I haven't rated one that you would consider dross. That's just opinions I guess.

I don't see how you can say authors can't be trusted but players can be. Just look at the tags that Tired of being a hero has. Lore indeed. Great quest though and it deserves it's place at the top. Just not on a Lore search.
Like I said I don't mind which they choose, Authors tag or tag numbers mean something in the display. But imo authors are much more trust worthy than many players. My Dwarven Rebellion quest has 4 tags for adjustable combat. I must have missed something there. If the numbers had weight then it would even out over time. Which I agree would be even better than Authors tagging that's not to say authors shouldn't be able to start it off though.

Also I agree that number of quests shown should be limited. Not as much as they are though, it dose seem to be a little bigger now.. Also this recent change in republished quests should have been anticipated, why can't they set a function that means quests can only go onto the new tab once. There wouldn't be a problem then.

A database of quests accessible from the official website would be great.

karitr

I think it was one of lolsorhand's quests that reached the 'Best' tab with only 30 plays. Can't be sure though, it came up in one of Wuhsin's posts if I remember correctly. By and large, once a quest gets to the Best tab, its average and adjusted rating are one and the same, so you are already getting what you think you want.

I agree though that the adjusted ratings system could use a little work - and is probably one of simplest areas to make adjustments to? I've never done the maths, but if it is true that a quest needs over 100 plays to adjust to its true rating, that seems a little on the high side to me.

If the tags were weighted, it is quite possible that a search for 'lore' would not return "Tired of Being a Hero" - the number of lore tags it has received being a relatively small percentage of the total tags it has been given. But at the end of the day, is a quest is good and the author promotes their own work, it will get plays.

PS: When I say it is as good as we can probably expect, I refer to the automated system. I would love Cryptic to appoint a dedicated Foundry mod, even on a voluntary basis, who could go through the New and Review tabs, marking abandoned and broken quests for removal.

agentjaspor

karitr wrote: »

I agree though that the adjusted ratings system could use a little work - and is probably one of simplest areas to make adjustments to? I've never done the maths, but if it is true that a quest needs over 100 plays to adjust to its true rating, that seems a little on the high side to me.

It's way more than 100 plays. Undercover Brother has 334 plays and 170 reviews, an adjusted rating of 3.89 and an actual average rating of 4.2. So it's still got a decent ways to go before the adjust rating matches its "true" actual rating.

karitr

It isn't a "true" rating though is it. It only accounts for those that leave ratings, not those who don't.

agentjaspor

karitr wrote: »

It isn't a "true" rating though is it. It only accounts for those that leave ratings, not those who don't.

Your word, not mine. That's why I put it in quotes. :P

karitr wrote: »

I've never done the maths, but if it is true that a quest needs over 100 plays to adjust to its true rating, that seems a little on the high side to me.

koboldbard2

karitr wrote: »

I think it was one of lolsorhand's quests that reached the 'Best' tab with only 30 plays.

It was. Based on the adjusted rating formula, 30 plays or 30 reviews, it should be impossible to do that.

karitr

agentjaspor wrote: »

Your word, not mine. That's why I put it in quotes. :P

Yeah, sorry it gets confusing. There is an adjusted rating that accounts for outliers (I presume plays without ratings are outliers too), the author's rating where only the reviewed plays are counted, and a "true" rating being some point where these two numbers marry.

@koboldbard2. I'll take your word for it that it should be impossible, but some numbers would be appreciated. For example, what if a quest had 30 plays and 30 five star reviews...what would its adjusted rating be then?

jennut

I decided not to add tags when I review a quest, because I prefer not to use this tagging system. When I read about how the tagging system works in the forum, I decided it would not be a tool suited to me. If I am browsing, I tend to just read the descriptions of quests until I find one that sounds good and is the proper time (the worst reviews I've given are the ones that were inaccurate on time). My husband does the same thing. Neither of us rely on the tagging system for Foundry quests.

As a player, I don't feel it's appropriate that I tag someone else's stuff, and I see a lot of risk in trusting tags from the 13+/anyone audience. I keep picturing the Mayhem commercials - a player could be that girl who got dumped and was like "OMG, any time the word love is used in a quest, I'm totally going to tag it dungeon." It's like Google Maps letting users edit the names of cities. I would not mind being asked at the end (during the review process) if I feel the quest is appropriately tagged.

I can't call myself an author - I don't know if I'll ever hit the publish button on my first quest - but I am familiar with the tools and the process. Honestly, I see tagging as an author's tool, like a blog post. If I write something, there is no way I am going to let anyone come to my site and tag it. I believe as an author, if you are trusting me to supply entertainment, you should trust my ability to tag appropriately. Like anything that I have ever built publicly, every piece that I add is my responsibility... and that's where tagging ends and the player review/feedback process begins.

I agree with some others here, that it would be a lot nicer if to allow the author to place the first tags, and let players agree/disagree with the tags. It would provide more data to use to sort. A player searching for a quest could then choose to filter either by author tags or player tags. The tagging system is a much lower priority for me, though.

karitr

Unless your 13+ audience is going to expand the search, all they will see is one search field. If they use that it will return results based on the tags and description in the author's overview.

There's your 'first tag' place, use it to your advantage