32
votes
Please give your feedback on a new "Subjective Citation Needed" post notice
I do not like the assumption that answers are not drawing on experience.
My experience with being pestered about explicitly certifying that my answer is drawn from my own experience is that I don't ...
- 33.1k
26
votes
Why is one +21 question On Hold when a similar question is ok with +53 votes?
This is gonna be long. You've asked some very important, very complex questions and I'll try to do them justice--but you don't have to take my word for it. As we get deeper into the material I'll be ...
- 53.1k
17
votes
Please give your feedback on a new "Subjective Citation Needed" post notice
Too Many Words for a post notice: be concise
Let's do some liposuction on the proposed post notice:
Answers should be supported using evidence and/or experience. See citation expectations for ...
- 142k
17
votes
Accepted
How do we appropriately back up a subjective answer?
This answer won't discuss the policy or why we do it, that's well covered elsewhere. It will take the Good Subjective/Bad Subjective policy as gospel and explain how to give Good Subjective answers ...
- 175k
17
votes
My question got too popular - what should I do now?
Unfortunately you're the second case in recent history of a popular question being dragged afield and closed (Why is one +21 question On Hold when a similar question is ok with +53 votes? discussed ...
- 175k
15
votes
Are spell comparison questions on-topic and sufficiently objective?
The good, bad, and ugly of comparison questions can be found analysed in the Gorilla vs. Shark blog post. They can work well as long as you're specific about the scope of the comparison. That tends to ...
- 36.3k
14
votes
Accepted
How should I provide examples of experience as support for my answer?
Your question restated: How should I provide examples of experience as support for my answer?
Use an organized packaging method (see below).
I'm willing to accept that and edit my answer ...
- 142k
14
votes
How should I provide examples of experience as support for my answer?
I like to refer to the advice about what good answers look like which can be found in (strangely enough) "What types of questions should I avoid asking?" It tells me to:
explain “why” and “how”
write ...
- 53.1k
14
votes
How are you meant to provide personal experience on mostly mathematical questions?
You don't have to show personal experience. The idea is to show support for why your answer is a solution to the OP's problem
Not all questions are asked in the same mode, and not all types of answers ...
- 21.6k
12
votes
Why is one +21 question On Hold when a similar question is ok with +53 votes?
This question is complicated, because there's a lot of different things going on here.
In general, "Why is question X treated different from question Y?" isn't a real good question. Well, they're ...
- 175k
12
votes
How should I phrase my question about gaming's early days?
(Disclaimer: This isn't a definitive statement on what the guidelines on this type of question are, but a statement of what I would like them to be. Upvote/downvote agreement/disagreement ...
- 12.5k
12
votes
Please give your feedback on a new "Subjective Citation Needed" post notice
An advisory rather than a warning
This answer could be improved if you were able to cite experience (your own or someone else's) to help users judge whether it fits their situation or not. This ...
- 29k
12
votes
Uncomfortable about inconsistent application of criteria for valid answers
Answers aren't useful if they just tell you what to do. They're useful if they help you understand what you're doing.
Or: a supported answer is an answer you can put your weight on.
Even if an answer ...
- 39.6k
11
votes
How to revisit citation expectations for subjective questions
Can we stop already?
We literally do not need to discuss this. We do not need examples, we certainly don’t need an exhaustive list, we don’t even need rules. The GS/BS guidelines are exactly that, ...
- 343k
10
votes
Accepted
Confusion regarding the "Good Subjective" post notice and the policy on backing up answers
Speaking for the citation expectations meta I wrote, something seems to have gotten lost in communication. That's on me, I should've made it clearer. Specifically in the second paragraph I say this:
...
- 36.3k
9
votes
How are you meant to provide personal experience on mostly mathematical questions?
Encounter design is not even close to "mostly mathematical".
Sure, there is guidance in the Dungeon Master's Guide that attempts to rationalize Challenge Rating and encounter design as ...
- 141k
9
votes
Would this question about the Deck of Many Things be allowed?
No, it would not.
Your updated question doesn't fundamentally change the opinion-based issue that has closed your initial question. What is a concrete negative consequence is still going to be opinion-...
- 124k
8
votes
Accepted
When do we close a question for drawing opinion-based answers and how can we try to get ahead of such closures?
We should take a hard line on unsupported answers
I don't like questions drawing large numbers of unsupported answers having to be closed either. But last time we tried the alternate path of deleting ...
- 175k
8
votes
When do we close a question for drawing opinion-based answers and how can we try to get ahead of such closures?
Questions getting closed because of runaway opinion-based answers
Things have changed very recently, such that hopefully this won't happen often anymore. To talk about that, I first need to talk about ...
- 36.3k
7
votes
How to revisit citation expectations for subjective questions
Back to Stack Basics
Guidelines have already been provided. We have a thorough explanation of those already, but the original SO/SE guidelines have been good enough since this site was initiated.
...
- 142k
7
votes
How should I provide examples of experience as support for my answer?
The second one is better, if a little tortured and perhaps better broken up into two sentences.
Here's the thing. Without any experience cited, you're just some guy giving opinions off the top of ...
- 175k
5
votes
What can we do to help promote supported opinion-based answers rather than closing a good question due to bad answers?
This is an informational post. It’s not a solution. It’s important information that we’ll need to keep in mind to tackle this.
The mods don’t like having to police answers. It’s a lot of thankless ...
- 242k
5
votes
How should we handle editing questions that are seemingly opinion-based?
Focus on what the querent wants to ask, even if it means we can't answer it here
When we edit an open question we should always be improving the question that OP asked, but we should not be changing ...
- 93.5k
5
votes
Why is one +21 question On Hold when a similar question is ok with +53 votes?
If we're optimizing for expert answers, I can understanding needing some way to prevent sloppy, subjective answers from being submitted when the question sort of "baits" them out. I don't think that's ...
- 4,837
5
votes
Please give your feedback on a new "Subjective Citation Needed" post notice
↑ Just to demonstrate: I have marked this post with our current “citation needed” post notice. It currently covers objective citations perfectly well. The post notice we're asking about will be a ...
- 36.3k
5
votes
Accepted
How are you meant to provide personal experience on mostly mathematical questions?
Tucker's Kobolds are not just math
Tucker's Kobolds live off one thing that is not math: Battle Tactics. They are the embodiment of The Art of War (Sun Tsu version) applied. They are the 36 Strategems ...
- 38.9k
4
votes
Please give your feedback on a new "Subjective Citation Needed" post notice
Moderator proposal:
All answers must be supported by citing evidence or experience. Please review our citation expectations for subjective answers, as well as our guidance for asking and answering ...
- 93.5k
4
votes
Accepted
What can we do to help promote supported opinion-based answers rather than closing a good question due to bad answers?
What can we do? Two things.
Up vote answers that pass muster (Back it up!)
and
Down vote (and / or flag for deletion) those answers that do not pass muster.
The tools for that are already in hand. ...
- 142k
3
votes
How do I ask this question about house-rules for the Simulacrum spell in D&D 5e without it being closed as opinion-based?
Play test your rules and then ask about what they didn’t fix.
As written, the question mirrors one of the “questions to avoid asking” from the help center:
To prevent your question from being flagged ...
- 141k
2
votes
Revisiting citation expectations of good subjective answers
Explicitly state that what qualifies as "backed up" is subjective (up to human judgement), and provide examples of ways to back up an answer
I do believe that explicitly stating that "evidence" and ...
- 75.2k
Only top scored, non community-wiki answers of a minimum length are eligible