Or you could just ignore it.

So people could like spam you with 100 bot accounts to take all your points away?

Would be awful...

obviously not

I get all sorts of awards. Jester or other stuff, free points. Especially amusing when I get the mad scientist award which matches the name.
People are free to sacrifice their points to me instead of award farmers if they want to.
But no, awards don't do negative things, so they're not going to do subtractions.

That's actually a very good idea op, it would stop a part of the flamewar by people trying to farm the clown points.

Absolutely NOT. We OPs and posters put work into our threads and posts, and an award of any kind shows people are listening.

It is not fair for we content creators to subtract, negate, prevent any points presented.

Therefore the answer is NO, Ms Pocahawtness

Clown man bad.

Originally posted by Pocahawtness:

Yes, often the topic of "Suggestions"

The Clown is being abused by points farmers. The simple and fun way to combat this is make the clown subtract from the points awarded in a thread. They still cost 200 points but instead of awarding 200 points they take 200 points away from the total award for the thread.

The real solution is the original purpose needs to come back. Originally you could get a $5 voucher for steam points. This would literally solve the problem overnight. Ive been borderline stalked by a dude for the past year who gave me over 400 clown awards on every comment to attempt to belittle any arguments i made.

It was kinda funny at times because other users would accuse each other of giving me the award to try to shame me despite it being some guy with mental issues following me.

If you could block an account from giving you awards this would also fix it. But steam likes to protect the anonymous and allow them to harass users like yourself. Ive made a few reports on it and they never ever hear you out. They just want to close the tickets so they can scroll their phones or something,

Originally posted by Pocahawtness:

Yes, often the topic of "Suggestions"

The Clown is being abused by points farmers. The simple and fun way to combat this is make the clown subtract from the points awarded in a thread. They still cost 200 points but instead of awarding 200 points they take 200 points away from the total award for the thread.

Just ignore it everyone. I don't get the issue at all. Its as innocuous as a like or dislike, or thumbs up.. Imagine if developers said you shouldn't be allowed to give their games a negative review anymore.

Originally posted by Moonbreaker:

Originally posted by Pocahawtness:

Yes, often the topic of "Suggestions"

The Clown is being abused by points farmers. The simple and fun way to combat this is make the clown subtract from the points awarded in a thread. They still cost 200 points but instead of awarding 200 points they take 200 points away from the total award for the thread.

Just ignore it everyone. I don't get the issue at all. Its as innocuous as a like or dislike, or thumbs up.. Imagine if developers said you shouldn't be allowed to give their games a negative review anymore.

You misunderstand my man. Its an issue with being taken seriously. The clown award has given any troll the ability to make any post look like satire or bait. A good example is say you need technical help for a game. You make a post asking for help and get a clown award. Now 3 days later zero replies. The award sure didn't help.

The problem is the evolution of its usage. Its purely used to shame others. Thats the only use of it now. If something or someone is funny they get the hilarious badge. Clown=idiot pretty much.

So imagine for an entire year every post, review, dev chats, screenshots, or even workshop submissions getting a "this guy is dumb tag"

I dont care who you think you are. You are going to either get upset. Or assume mentally disabled people are stalking you. Neither is particularly comfortable. And thats the issue. One person can without restriction stalk you and give you the idiot tag. You cant even block the user. They can still view all posts you've ever made.

You are trying to argue its used to judge someone like a game review while also saying you dont get the issue at all. Just imagine those reviews being false and made by bots. It would become problematic.

Originally posted by Chris:

Originally posted by Moonbreaker:

Just ignore it everyone. I don't get the issue at all. Its as innocuous as a like or dislike, or thumbs up.. Imagine if developers said you shouldn't be allowed to give their games a negative review anymore.

You misunderstand my man. Its an issue with being taken seriously. The clown award has given any troll the ability to make any post look like satire or bait. A good example is say you need technical help for a game. You make a post asking for help and get a clown award. Now 3 days later zero replies. The award sure didn't help.

The problem is the evolution of its usage. Its purely used to shame others. Thats the only use of it now. If something or someone is funny they get the hilarious badge. Clown=idiot pretty much.

So imagine for an entire year every post, review, dev chats, screenshots, or even workshop submissions getting a "this guy is dumb tag"

I dont care who you think you are. You are going to either get upset. Or assume mentally disabled people are stalking you. Neither is particularly comfortable. And thats the issue. One person can without restriction stalk you and give you the idiot tag. You cant even block the user. They can still view all posts you've ever made.

You are trying to argue its used to judge someone like a game review while also saying you dont get the issue at all. Just imagine those reviews being false and made by bots. It would become problematic.

Please don't speak on my behalf, I just wouldn't care. I encourage everyone to give me the jester or whatever they are called. Isn't it free points?

The idea that developers or support staff are ignoring you because of a jester tag isn't really grounded in reality.

What actually sounds problematic is the idea that blocking someone would still allow them to see your posts, that doesn't sound right to me. But then again, I have never blocked anyone or been blocked as far as I am aware.

Originally posted by Moonbreaker:

Originally posted by Chris:

You misunderstand my man. Its an issue with being taken seriously. The clown award has given any troll the ability to make any post look like satire or bait. A good example is say you need technical help for a game. You make a post asking for help and get a clown award. Now 3 days later zero replies. The award sure didn't help.

The problem is the evolution of its usage. Its purely used to shame others. Thats the only use of it now. If something or someone is funny they get the hilarious badge. Clown=idiot pretty much.

So imagine for an entire year every post, review, dev chats, screenshots, or even workshop submissions getting a "this guy is dumb tag"

I dont care who you think you are. You are going to either get upset. Or assume mentally disabled people are stalking you. Neither is particularly comfortable. And thats the issue. One person can without restriction stalk you and give you the idiot tag. You cant even block the user. They can still view all posts you've ever made.

You are trying to argue its used to judge someone like a game review while also saying you dont get the issue at all. Just imagine those reviews being false and made by bots. It would become problematic.

Please don't speak on my behalf, I just wouldn't care. I encourage everyone to give me the jester or whatever they are called. Isn't it free points?

The idea that developers or support staff are ignoring you because of a jester tag isn't really grounded in reality.

What actually sounds problematic is the idea that blocking someone would still allow them to see your posts, that doesn't sound right to me. But then again, I have never blocked anyone or been blocked as far as I am aware.

Then you are lucky. It's as you said an issue you don't understand. Just having a person litteraly hovering every post is for over a year is downright obsessive. It doesn't matter how uncomfortable he makes me. I have zero action I can take.
Look at my profile. My pictures reviews and even my post history. Even to this day he does it.

I dont want steam points. I want to be able to discuss important stuff without a joker award removing any abilty to communicate. I've had talks with devs and have actually seen change in game because of it. This is just a filter now on my comments that make it statistically less likely for devs to converse. I should be able to prevent this. This person Also reports every comment that slightly steps out of line.

Go look at some older communities, they have some pretty heinous and genuinely offensive discussions.

The guy has reported my comment insulting another user for advocating child labor. When I get banned I can't sell my items and my profile is worth some real cash. It's litteraly been limiting my free speech. Which I know it's a private company but there WAS leniency. Now it's a tight rope walk every time.

I guess my real issue isn't with the clown so much as a stalker being able to abuse it.

Originally posted by Chris:

Originally posted by Moonbreaker:

Please don't speak on my behalf, I just wouldn't care. I encourage everyone to give me the jester or whatever they are called. Isn't it free points?

The idea that developers or support staff are ignoring you because of a jester tag isn't really grounded in reality.

What actually sounds problematic is the idea that blocking someone would still allow them to see your posts, that doesn't sound right to me. But then again, I have never blocked anyone or been blocked as far as I am aware.

Then you are lucky. It's as you said an issue you don't understand. Just having a person litteraly hovering every post is for over a year is downright obsessive. It doesn't matter how uncomfortable he makes me. I have zero action I can take.
Look at my profile. My pictures reviews and even my post history. Even to this day he does it.

I dont want steam points. I want to be able to discuss important stuff without a joker award removing any abilty to communicate. I've had talks with devs and have actually seen change in game because of it. This is just a filter now on my comments that make it statistically less likely for devs to converse. I should be able to prevent this. This person Also reports every comment that slightly steps out of line.

Go look at some older communities, they have some pretty heinous and genuinely offensive discussions.

The guy has reported my comment insulting another user for advocating child labor. When I get banned I can't sell my items and my profile is worth some real cash. It's litteraly been limiting my free speech. Which I know it's a private company but there WAS leniency. Now it's a tight rope walk every time.

I guess my real issue isn't with the clown so much as a stalker being able to abuse it.

I didn't say I don't understand, I just wouldn't care. Doesn't the jester give you free points and nothing else? Do you have actual evidence that a jester appearing means you posts are being ignored by support?

If you are breaking rules, that has nothing to do with free speech.

Hey if you think about it, every time someone gives a clown award to someone else out of spite they're giving that person Steam points.

Because THAT wouldn’t be abused at all. Someone disagrees with a post so they get to anonymously take away points another user has EARNED because they have a different opinion?

NOPE.

With how much people complain about it (one way or another) just remove the “jester” award from the pool of awards at this point. That way if someone wants to essentially call another user a “clown,” they have to do so in text and non-anonymously.

Originally posted by Chris:

Originally posted by Pocahawtness:

Yes, often the topic of "Suggestions"

The Clown is being abused by points farmers. The simple and fun way to combat this is make the clown subtract from the points awarded in a thread. They still cost 200 points but instead of awarding 200 points they take 200 points away from the total award for the thread.

The real solution is the original purpose needs to come back. Originally you could get a $5 voucher for steam points. This would literally solve the problem overnight. Ive been borderline stalked by a dude for the past year who gave me over 400 clown awards on every comment to attempt to belittle any arguments i made.

It was kinda funny at times because other users would accuse each other of giving me the award to try to shame me despite it being some guy with mental issues following me.

If you could block an account from giving you awards this would also fix it. But steam likes to protect the anonymous and allow them to harass users like yourself. Ive made a few reports on it and they never ever hear you out. They just want to close the tickets so they can scroll their phones or something,

That’s very disturbing. I’ve also encountered “stalker” behavior (on a steam subforum-I blocked a mod’s favorite who replied to my posts for days with increasingly OTT harassment and personal attacks despite me no longer responding to them at all-only thing I did was report every single post quoting & attacking me for breaking subforum rules and although they didn’t get banned-since they were one of the mod’s favorites-I’m guessing the mod told them to stop stalking my posts and responding with harassment/personal attacks).

But that was for days-and while I’m sure that same subforum had a toxic little group who enjoyed giving posts of mine they disagreed with jesters, I never encountered anything like this. Needless to say though, I don’t play that game or participate in the forums for that game anymore. I have enough toxicity to deal with in my RL, I don’t need to deal with it in gaming spaces too.

I’ve suggested a “shadow-block” for jesters before (so the people awarding jesters would still see them on the posts/profile they awarded-but if a user toggled the “shadow-block,” no one else-including them-would)-but I honestly think the best solution is just to get rid of them. Yes, they’re free points, but who (other than jester farmers-which most of us can agree are a bane of Steam forums anyway) specifically wants jester awards? As you said, they’re mostly used to insult/belittle/harass other users.