The new trust points system is awesome! I think it is a good idea that when a non-staff user rate a user with positive points but then a staff user rate the same user with negative points make the non-staff user lose some trust points. I believe it could reduce abuse of trust points!

Davideo7 : THIS WAS A GOOD IDEA. i had 4 tp taken from (i forgot his username) and he wasnt site staff once

I really like the system, and it certainly covers a lot of the problems the old system had, but I just wish it was simpler to gain or give trust points.

Just like Shogun Gamer said, it can be hard to judge a person's character and give them something as useful as Trust Points. They could be nice and resourceful in one forum but a total bum in another.

I think that trust points should be easier to give. For example, a + - system for board posts. Plenty of other websites, Cracked.com, Youtube.com (I think) and various others have fairly stable trust systems just from "voting up" comments or posts. The only problem is that people don't normally vote up informative or helpful people so much as funny ones.

The plus to this is that more people will be voting up or down in more place, which will help to even out cheaters and honest people.

DEFINITELY give this system (which is very well done, might I add) a good month or so to test it out. It sounds absolutely brilliant, and I hope it works as well as it looks. If it doesn't work so well or you want to make the trust system more prevalent, I think you should try adding in some of the elements of other sites from around the web.

It's nice to know that my trust points were reset to zero since I got negatived for jokingly asking, "Can I haz points plz?" I said that in the chat room by the way. I'll never joke about that again.

Hey David, I'm liking the new trust points system. It seems like much less of a popularity contest now.
I have a question though. I am considered a normal member, so my trust points went to 0, but I am also a netplay chat room moderator (can mute or kick). You said that site staff, including moderators, can rate users. Do I apply to this, or were you referring to board moderators? In relation to this question, would that affect my power level, or would I still be as the normal member rank?

David, you have outdone the system yourself again! I loved the idea. Now we just have to sit back and see how this system going. What if some users find a way to abuse the new trust points system?

I think this is cool. I'll admit I haven't been here for a good while but I like the new idea of Trust points.

So everyone's TP are reset to 10 you say?

patar4097 : You get a notification that you got trust points but not from who.

Jordanv78 : 30 already? Wow, I'm only at 15.6!

jasonZed : A post voting system is different than the trust system and I'll eventually get something like that as well.

bobq : Doesn't apply to you, sorry.

Vizzed Ghostblood : I can always make adjustments.

Markeith21 : The ones that were previously trusted.

Davideo7 : Cool system,I like that you made rules too,it even stops us from rating yourself! (yeah,some members want to  be trusted so they rate themselves! )

After about ten minutes I got it. This new system will really shine and not be as abused compared t the last one.

I greatly appreciate the improvement Davidio7 ! Maybe people will quite taking trust points just because they disagree on something silly now.

Hurray!  XD

Davideo7 :

Question for you.

Say I rate summon +2. If I later go back and rate them a 0, they lose those 2 Points correct? By that logic, any user can take Points away. Only difference is they can't give negative Points. If everyone who contributed to getting someone trusted gets mad at them because they lost an RGR challenge or something, they can drop that person down to 0 even though that person did nothing wrong. Just an observation.

Other than that, I love this

I'm not going to be like everyone else and kiss up, I can't say I like this new system very much at all.

Yes TP needed rethinking but this just seems like everyone regardless of maturity is now being treated like a 5 year old.
The amount of times you can rate per week is one silly thing, I mean as I understand it if I wanted to give 4 people I trust 2 points each I'd have to wait a whole month to do it.
And another thing, it feels more like a punishment the resetting of all the trust points, I mean there are users like myself who had 150+ TP that have been here for years yet we're being treated the same as any regular joe that became trusted a week ago.

Honestly the site would be better off without trust points at all rather then this system, it would be better served with a way to rate posts as helpful or pointless and a display of that.
And in my time staff have been no exception to the abuse of TP with "agreements" made that certain members should not be trusted, so I wouldn't say this new system will "greatly" cut down on abuse...

As I said, it more feels like we're all being treated like we're in kindergarten and not allowed to use the sharp scissors.

DarkHyren : If I may, I'd like to show the other side of the coin here.

First and foremost, why should it matter that the trust points were reset for Elite members? You and I are in a rank that is beyond what the TP system can do. We have this rank because the staff (current, former, or a combination of both) truly trust and value having us here. Trust points may be the starting point for getting noticed, but it doesn't get anyone real far.

What point was there in having 150 TP? It was only a couple weeks ago that someone gave me the last few points needed to reach 51 giving me the ability to rate users at a maximum of either -4 or +4. Even then it didn't matter much to me because I did not trust myself to rate users fairly.

In addition, this reset doesn't just affect those who have high TP counts, it affects those who had negative ratings. Now those members have a real second chance to redeem themselves. We know that second chances have brought some positive things to our community. Multiple members came close to being perma-banned yet managed to change their attitudes and even join the staff.

Look, I myself am not entirely sure how to look at this new rating system, but I am thankful that we are trying something new. What would happen if we removed the TP system entirely? There goes the purpose some hidden forums, and that takes away the the only reward some people will think about when choosing how to behave on Vizzed.

DarkHyren :

But I like sharp pointy things

DarkHyren : i dont mind the points being reset but i do not see how this new system will help, the only thing that has really changed is we cant give negative points. it will still get abused.

Hmm... I'm with DarkHyren on this one.
I appreciate the effort for making a new TP system, but I have to say that it's still flawed.

1. Why can't non-staff members give negative points? If they don't think that a person doesn't deserve to be trusted, I don't think it's fair that they can't give negatives.

2. I also don't like the part about getting negative points through rating someone up that had been rated down by a mod. Even a mod isn't perfect when it comes to judging people. We all have different criteria for trust, although the basic is being a good member of the board. Some of us base our trust lets say on a person's attitude. Others maybe through a person's activity around the site.  If it ever happens that a mod dislike or doesn't trust a member, and it happened that you trust that member and you gave him a plus, but you got negative points for trusting a person a moderator mistrusts, that would be unfair.

3. Conspiracy. As I've said, everyone isn't perfect, and that includes mods. All those years I've witnessed this conspiracy thingie happen between moderators, and there is still a chance for it to happen again maybe in the future. If the mods happened to dislike a person and they decided to gang up on him, the TP system will still be abused.

4. A person rated down by a mod will be thrown to the depths of despair. He'll be treated like someone with a killer virus that can take a person's life away with just a single touch. Of course if I rated someone up, and then I got negatives due to it, I'll know that he was rated down by a mod, and I'll have a chance to tell it to other members  so they can protect their TP from going down through avoiding giving him trust points in the future.
 
5. The oldies. Once upon a time there was a season of light with the old TP system. (remember when we only have game boy games in RGR? ) Users at that time were, I think, given points more accordingly than not. Resetting everyone's TP is unfair for those people who have accumulated TP's in the right way. I think there should be something to compensate that. 

I'd rather have TP system to be taken down instead and make a whole new system that we can use to make a new set of user ranks (That weren't based on "trust" ).

BNuge : This is technically true... but you're only taking points that you originally gave them anyway. That's not the same as taking away points they never had to begin with. In this way, it's still an improvement.

DarkHyren : You know there's a reason for all that. The community as a whole couldn't use the old system right so it had to be changed in hopes of reducing abuse. You may view it as treating everyone like 5 year olds, but apparently that's what needed to be done because the old way wasn't working. Unless you have an idea how to prevent abuse another way, I see this as the best option we've seen thus far.

Yes there's a limit to how much you can give a way in a given week. TP was spammed out like crazy among circles of friends. This will try and help control that.

It's changed like this because it was necessary. The members of this forum created this situation themselves. Not every one of them, no... but enough. It made it so that TP was completely worthless and being a trusted member was entirely meaningless. All David is trying to do is make it so maybe the trusted system will actually have some meaning for a change and not RandomSpammer doesn't become trusted within a month of joining.

I disagree that there's any punishment. There were people with like 20 trust points before who were unproductive spammers with a lot of friends. It wasn't an issue of trust, but just popularity. If you got 150 TP and actually DESERVED it, then it shouldn't be that hard to get it back. But if you were a garbage spammer, you'll find a harder time regaining all that TP considering people will be more wary of giving points to people who the mods may assign negative TP to.

How well this system works remains to be seen. I do believe David eventually wants to make a post rating system separately as well. But for now let's just sit back and see if this new system improves TP before calling for it to just be tosses out.

drag00n365 : Clearly, you didn't look into the changes well enough because that's not the only change made intended to reduce abuse. You may be overlooking what I feel is the most important change and that's penalties to those who give TP to members that get rated negatively afterwards. Once members realize that they stand to LOSE TP when they give TP to members who are detrimental to the community, they'll stop the whole "TP agreement" crap and thus the system won't be abused so much. I'm not saying it can't be abused at all now... but I really do believe that it's at least a little harder to abuse... which is progress.

Juliet :

1. Abuse reduction. We can't trust just anyone with the power of giving negative points. I've heard complaints that they were bullied by other members and had points taken away for no reason. Staff members are a bit more reliable when it comes to this decision and if a staff member abuses the right, they'll get demoted. This is a lot easier to regulate.

2. Once again, abuse reduction. If there's no penalty for giving points to people who are not trustworthy, there's nothing to prevent people from making agreements to do TP exchanges and other stuff where they soar through the trusted ranks too quickly. It's not like you lose THAT much... it's a usually a fraction of a point at best from one staff down-rating after your positive rating. But if you continuously give points to bad members and they are subject to tons of down ratings, you'll stand to lose more of course... and it's probably fair because you won't see multiple staff members giving negative points unless the member is REALLY problematic. And as I said above, if the staff abuse this, they can be demoted.

3. If you believe there is a conspiracy, I would urge you to either contact the globals or even David himself and request an investigation. I assure you that David is very much against the idea of abuse and wouldn't hesitate to strip people of their power if they're abusing said power. No, the mods aren't perfect but if they're doing things they shouldn't be on purpose, there ARE ramifications for this. Don't believe it'll just be overlooked or go unpunished.

4. I think you're being overly dramatic here. Losing TP shouldn't be THAT big of a deal and 9/10 if it happens, the person clearly deserved it and isn't someone you should have been giving TP to anyway. If someone was good and actually deserved it initially but then changed into a bad member, you could always change your rating for them to 0 to protect yourself before the mods get to them. Then you get no penalty.

5. Unfortunately, it would be near impossible for David to shift through the entirety of this user base and figure out who earned their TP legit and who didn't. It's unreasonable to expect him to do this. The only thing that could be done is a clean reset to all. There really was no other way unless he were to keep those who didn't deserve what they got right where they were. In recent times, there are too many people who got to trusted undeservingly. I would have actually preferred a more intense reset so that current trusteds would be dropped too but David wasn't on board for that idea. He let people who obtained trusted status keep it.

As I said to Hyren, if you REALLY deserved your TP, you can probably earn it back pretty easily. It's only going to be hard on those who never deserved it in the first place. And if you earned it years ago and don't show up anymore... why do you even care? You're not really around to enjoy the TP you have anyway :| if you're at least active, you shouldn't have to worry, though. You'll earn it back and under a system where it actually means something for a change.