Greetings,
As a developer, over the past few months, I’ve seen tens of #help-and-feedback:cool-creations “progression topics” in a series that fall under a common game, but each individual one is for each individual step of the game.
Example: game/project “Willow”
(I honestly do not want to post the real topics I’ve seen, even with a no-witch-hunt disclaimer.)
- Willow #1 - Made tree trunk
- Willow #2 - Added leaves to trunk
- Willow #3 - Added vines
- etc.
However, this “step” has gotten so minor, that it seems like spam to post as multiple topics instead of merging them into one. This allows for unnecessary cluttering, in which I’d be forced to mute entire categories against my will so that the important topics don’t get drowned out. I mean, in the above example you might as well post #1 and #2 together because getting feedback on a trunk and some leaves is too minor to have individual, dedicated topics. (I mean come on, what the heck is there to talk about a simple trunk other than the color and shape. If the focus is too much on that, then completing a game will take a hundred years.)
I’ve seen that these multiple topics usually contain the same users posting, and giving likes. This can mean, although pure speculation by me, people can post multiple topics to get multiple likes from the same user. I have not seen any obvious attempts at this, but this is very possible.
Now, Global Rule 7 talks about spam. It mentions that, for replies, it is much better to reply using @ in a single post rather than multiple. But it doesn’t necessarily outlaw any “minor” topics that can easily be merged into one; it only prohibits exact repeated topics, which is too narrow. It’s like not allowing people to write “hell,” but the word “he11” is allowed. 
Therefore, for the aforementioned reasons, I propose that the rule should add something along the lines, but not exactly:
“Progression topics with insignificant tweaks will count as spam. [Definition of a progression topic]”
Obviously, if it’s major additions to the game such as creating an entirely new building of sufficient detail, then it can be a separate post in order to not overwhelm readers.
Of course, the wording could be better, but if this were added, it would improve my forum experience because explicitly including this will at least discourage people from “tweeting” on the DevForum, causing unnecessary clutter.
Thank you.
