Why was my answer deleted?

Question

My reply was in answer to this question about 'How to make players settle differences IC?

I posted my answer, got a comment from SevenSidedDie, replied to it, then he replied and deleted my answer in one swift move.

Here's the whole thing:

My answer:

I believe there was a few other discussions around this site about settling differences between players and the answer is usually quite simple: talk then act.

Especially since you're in the early stages of your game, it's a problem that you can nip in the bud by having a calm and frank OOC talk taking place with the whole group.

Get everyone together and discuss the issue at hand to try and find a solution. And don't forget to chime in as a GM as well, by stating what kind of campaign you're going to run and what you would like to see as well.

Roleplaying is a group effort involving the GM as well, and everyone must find a common ground so that everyone, including the GM is having fun.

As with most things: 'Communication is key.'

SevenSidedDie's comment:

This could be improved by how this can be accomplished while following the GM’s rules and Principles that Dungeon World requires GMs to follow. In particular, this advice collided with the “Address the characters, not players” Principle; it’s not impossible to talk OOC without breaking this rule, but an answer should discuss how to accomplish that and what repercussions it will have on the GM’s rules later. It may also be worth discussing how to accomplish this using the existing GM mechanics, before it’s a problem that needs a chat OOC.

My answer to his comment:

I have no knowledge of Dungeon World or it's rules and principle. The question is pretty game-agnostic, and answers that are as game-agnostic would be useful to many people, while answers based solely on the tools provided by the DW might not be as useful for people unfamiliar with this particular game.

His last comment before his deleted my answer a few seconds later:

Actually, DW works very differently from most RPGs and it has explicit rules about how the things in the question are supposed to be handled, so the question is deceptive: it’s not at all system agnostic when they’re playing DW. As a pro tip: don’t answer questions about games unless you are familiar with the game. Being useful for others but off topic for the game in question does not provide value to future readers; it’s misleasing to DW readers, and we already have system agnostic questions about this topic.

Checking the relevant article in the Help Center didn't help at all. And the accepted answer doesn't mention the DW techniques as well, indicating that the author of the question wasn't specifically asking about what tools DW has to find a solution, but general techniques to help him deal with the problem.

So, from my point of view, it makes little sense that my answer was deleted, and it feels like, based on SevenSidedDie's last comment and his comment on the accepted answer, that my answer was deleted solely because I have no knowledge of Dungeon World and that the only reason the accepted answer wasn't deleted is because it has been accepted.

Answer 1

Because

Being […] off topic for the game [is] misleasing to DW readers, and we already have system agnostic questions about this topic.

It is a really bad idea to answer questions about games without any knowledge of the game. Even deciding that the game is irrelevant requires being an expert in the game.

We often have the problem that people feel entitled to answer questions about games they're ignorant of, because they assume that the game doesn't matter.

And other users ignorant of the game vote those answers up. This is a terrible outcome for everyone involved.

To players of those games who are experts, this makes RPG.se look like a terrible resource for any game that isn't mainstream. We already have the unavoidable situation where the site is dominated by questions about mainstream games — we can't afford to make what little non-mainstream Q&A we have be obviously bad to experts of those games, or to naïvely “help” novice players of those games with bad advice: the blind leading the blind is the opposite of the purpose of this site.

We can't force people to vote a particular way. But we can remove answers that are obviously off topic for the question.

Our answer-writers are expected to provide expert help. You cannot know if you're providing expert help if you don't even know the game being played.

(The accepted answer hasn't been deleted because the author is getting the same chance to improve the post you were offered, and they haven't declined yet.)