Vinata

I've been talking about writing a blog post on the new reputation system for a while now, and am only now getting around to it. I hope to make this blog post as explanatory as possible, but I am writing this while also taking notes during my Texas History class, so I apologize if the words Texas or massacre show up inappropriately

One of the things about the recent rep systems I was most disattisfied with was the inability of users to +rep or negrep people who had a lot more rep than they did. Previously this was set so you had to have at least 100 posts and 50 rep before you could actually +rep or negrep someone. This has been changed to 1 posts and 0 rep needed. The amount of rep given to everyone upon registration is 10, so a single post is all that is needed to be able to +rep people. This does, however, mean that people with negative reputation won't be able to give (or take) rep from other people.

Rep Power

The amount of rep a person can give is based upon a few things. The amount of days registered (previously 1 point per 365 days, not 1 point per 180), amount of rep (previously 1 point for every 1,000 rep, now 1 point for every 500 rep) and also amount of posts (previously 1 point per 500 posts, now 1 point per 250 posts). This all adds up to your +rep power. It is different than your negrep power. Your negrep power is half of your +rep power, and then rounded down if it wasn't a whole number.

For example: RansomList has 4298 posts (giving 17 points), 3455 rep (giving 6 points) and has been registered for enough days to get 4 points. Altogether this adds up to a +rep power of 27. His negrep power is determined as half of 27, which is 13.5. After rounding that down we get a negrep power of 13.

However there is a different formula for admins. An admin's negrep power is equal to their +rep power. For example: Xutech has 1800 posts (giving 7 points), 1407 rep (giving 2 points) and has been registered for enough days to give him 3 points. Altogether this adds up to a rep power of 12.

As you can probably guess, this means there is a lot more rep being passed around. This was actually done on purpose, as these changes were all made after the next set of changes.

Rep Titles

Previously there were three negative reputation levels. One was at -10 rep, another was at -1000 rep, and the last was at -10,000. This is why you didn't see more than one red bar - most people would never even hit -50 rep.

There were numerous positive reputation levels, which went up to 2,000 reputation points. These levels have become more spread out, with the maximum now at 100,000. This inflation of the rep titles is part of the reason there is now more rep being handed out.

Those Darned Pips

What is a pip? It is those dark red, light red, light green, dark green, and gold stars that show up depending on your rep level.

I have attempted to customize these bars, but to no avail. For some reason the forum software is just not co-operating. My customization is not to change their image, but to try and change how they display.

I am able to (once an option is turned on) to make it so each bar signifies a certain amount of rep. Then I can also say how much of a certain type of pip shows up before the next occurs. The wording is kind of unclear, which left me with two ideas of how it might
work. I then had the numbers I wanted entered to see how it would work out. Here are the two options:

Option 1: A roman numeral type system. Each dark green pip signifies 100 amount of rep. Up to 9 of these pips will be displayed. On the 10th, they will be replaced by a light green pip worth 1,000 amount. This continues with the light green being replaced by a gold pip, and those possibly being replaced by stars.

Option 2: 9 dark green would be displayed, before light green began being added. Pre-existing ones wouldn't be wiped out.

If you take a look at people's rep you'll see the problem with this. People will have 5 dark green and more than 5 light green, which doesn't go by either option. I have no clue what the problem is or how to fix it.

Other Things

If you have any clue what is going on with the rep system's pip display, please contact me with instructions on how to fix it. Other than that I don't see making any more changes to the rep system in the immediate future.

Oh right, also I've made it so you can rep up to 20 people per day. The previous limit was 10.