I have noticed, in my time on all the Stacks, but RPG.SE especially, a tendency for some users to collect all the answers already given for a question, and post them as one big omnibus answer.
These answers usually don't add much, if anything, new. They usually just collect the wisdom, or bad ideas, of everyone else in one space.
I do not like these answers; I feel they are a lazy attempt to earn fake internet points. But are they problematic? Should there be policy about them?
I think voting is sufficient to take care of it. The downvote tooltip is
This answer is not useful.
If you find omnibus answers actively not useful, go ahead and downvote.
On the flip-side, the upvote tooltip is
This answer is useful.
On the (rare?) occasion that you find yourself saying "well, it really is nice to have all the stuff I just read together in one post," that sounds like an upvote =)
The answers you're talking about, meanwhile, are probably the dozenth-or-later answer in the long tail of "meh" answers coming after the top few excellent and thoughtful ones. They're going to attract attention/votes from regulars the day they're posted, then languish in that long tail.
Unless they're somehow particularly excellent, garnering a dozen upvotes their first day and rising above hoi polloi. So the only easy points someone's getting out of them is in proportion to how useful others find having that omnibus answer in existence.
I, personally, don't find them problematic, nor do I feel they need concrete policy. Voting will out.
I've been accused once or twice of this even when I do add new content. My goal is to give a complete answer, which will contain content already said, but offering clarification or addition. I won't answer if one answer or the thread of answers is/are already complete, but upvote the answer(s) I agree with. If I roll up other answers into my answer, the content I add from other posts will typically be paraphrases and may mention the other post I rolled up (but not depend on them being read).
