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So, apparently we recently had two closure/reopen wars on questions about and specifically the upcoming Reaper of Souls expansion ("What armor and weapons do Crusaders use?" and "How much XP is needed for levels 60 through 70?").

Since we already have a meta Q about the Crusader question, I'm now going to ask about the other question:

What the hell happened here? First, the question looks like this:

Does anyone know xp table values for 60-70

With RoS coming out soon, I was wondering if anyone (perhaps from the beta) had any information on what the xp table from 60-70 would look like.

Then it gets edited into this:

What was the XP needed for 60-70 in the beta?

I was wondering if anyone had any information on what the XP table from 60-70 in the beta looked like.

Then, close votes come in and the question soon (after the next edit) ends up closed as "about unreleased content". The final state of the question, shortly after the closure, was this:

How much XP is needed for levels 60 through 70?

With Reaper of Souls coming out soon - and already having gone through a Closed Beta phase -, I was wondering what the XP table from 60 - 70 looks like.

What happened here? Should this question be and remain closed for that reason?

4 Answers 4

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Nonsense is what happened.

Before the edit, we had a crappy question, asking if someone had information. We love those questions, don't we? But this is just a phrasing issue. Editing the question can fix that.

Now let's look at what that first edit did:

What was the XP needed for 60-70 in the beta?

I was wondering if anyone had any information on what the XP table from 60-70 in the beta looked like.

Suddenly, the question focuses solely on the beta. Not only is this distinction nonsense (We do not distinguish between a pre-release version and a released version. We never did.), but it also made this question irrelevant. Now this question is about "historical trivia" - this is something we hammered close votes for in the past.

But that isn't even what worries me about this so much. I can definitely see the angle of "the only information we can go off at this point is the beta, so "ask about that"". Sure, go ahead. I'd still edit it back into a "what is it like right now?" to future-proof it, but the problem this caused is different:

If this question was asking about something that was released in the past, why is it closed as unreleased content? Seriously, that is absolute nonsense. That is literally the opposite of that close reason. The content was released. It was publicly available per our standards.

This question was closed for the wrong reason, and should be reopened.

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  • Nit: at least up until the point where I stopped caring about the game, we have had plenty of questions about, say, pre-release Minecraft weeklies. No one seemed to mind at all. That said the close reason should be fixed by reverting to the original revision — which you did.
    – badp Mod
    Commented Mar 21, 2014 at 22:16
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    @badp The close reason would still be invalid - the content was released to a sufficiently "public" audience per our standards, so the question is not about "unreleased content".
    – user98085
    Commented Mar 21, 2014 at 22:17
  • Yes, we do. It's all about what's playable. Beta was playable. The actual expansion is not. THAT is the difference.
    – Frank
    Commented Mar 21, 2014 at 22:30
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    @Frank The beta was the expansion content. There is no magical difference just because the content is subject to change. So is every other pre-release content.
    – user98085
    Commented Mar 21, 2014 at 22:31
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    And if you want to actually argue this in chat, you had better do so civilly. I refuse to debate with someone who decides insults and swearing is the way to go.
    – Frank
    Commented Mar 21, 2014 at 22:31
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    And I refuse to debate with someone who pretends they single-handedly run the site and refuses to follow well-established consensus even when it's laid out in detail. Good job.
    – user98085
    Commented Mar 21, 2014 at 22:43
  • If it was well established consensus, why are they closed? Obviously, consensus isn't as laid out and pretty as you like it to be.
    – Frank
    Commented Mar 21, 2014 at 22:43
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    I have never played D3 but here's my interpretation. Three scenarios: 1) If the beta is still ongoing, and the question asks for beta content, then I don't see the problem. 2) If the beta has finished and the question asks for beta content, then it's a question we can't reasonably be expected to answer (how can we go and check the answer?). 3) If it's asking about the unreleased expansion (and the beta's closed), it's 'unreleased content'.
    – Robotnik Mod
    Commented Mar 21, 2014 at 23:06
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    @Robotnik The "beta is no longer live" scenario is an interesting one indeed (and the one we currently have). It makes sense to say "no questions while it's offline" (and if we'd come to that conclusion, I'd certainly agree with it), but then we cause new problems: The same question can be asked during the beta and after release, but not in-between. That's terrible. We can still ask about no-longer-available games (MMOs that closed down are prone to this) now, they're not off-topic either. And they could be re-released or emulated at some point, so that's essentially the same situation.
    – user98085
    Commented Mar 21, 2014 at 23:10
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As one of the people voting to close on this particular question, I figure I should chime in with how I saw it:

As originally written, the question wasn't about the beta. It was very much about what will be present in RoS when it releases. Revision two edited the question aggressively to make it about the beta, in hopes of making it something not off-topic, but ultimately, it changed the subject, from being about RoS, to being about a pre-RoS beta that may or may not bear resemblance to it. That sort of change in topic is not what edits are for, and was 100% vandalism.

The latest revision (which post-dates my close vote by a fair bit) muddies the question a fair bit; it's asking about RoS again instead of the beta, but it oddly includes the line "having gone through a Closed Beta phase" while talking about RoS. And I think this is where the problem lies. RoS did not go through any beta. A version of D3 which Blizzard may or may not change at any point went through beta.

Yes, the content of that beta is a pretty good indication of what RoS will contain, but ultimately, information from a pre-release beta isn't somehow infinitely reliable. It has all the pitfalls of pre-release PR, early demo videos, E3 presentations, etc. No matter what was in the beta, we just don't know for certain what will be in the actually-released RoS until it's here. Which is the very reason we close questions about unreleased content.

Now, if the question had actually been asking about the beta? I'd have probably given it an upvote, just on principle of a new user having asked a question without a bunch of grammar and spelling issues. but it wasn't; it was about what is going to be in RoS, not what was in the beta. I'd be fine if the OP had come back, learned about our policy, and decided to change their question to one about the beta so it was on-topic (I'm all for improving things), but because there's no guarantee that they'll be the same, it's not anyone else's place to change the question like that, since it really does change what question is actually being asked.

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    For the record, I had left a comment about the beta being acceptable, and he replied that beta information was fine. I deleted my comment after editing, and I guess he did, too.
    – Frank
    Commented Mar 22, 2014 at 0:06
  • @Frank Then that really should have been mentioned in the edit comment thing.
    – Billy Mailman
    Commented Mar 23, 2014 at 18:38
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Ok, this is my take to the whole "unreleased" stuff.

SE is based on getting answers. If that question right now isn't answerable in it's current form due not being released, which is one of the things you said were off-topic it should be closed. I think I'm right until there. Now, what we should try to prevent is early askers asking questions hours before the release, when there's no information available even if the information is next to release.

Why? Because it start causing a broken window. People asks questions days before release, a week or two before release, two to six months before release, when the release time is synced with HL3. If the release delays indefinitely, we will have an unanswerable question until then.

So, the question right now should remain closed, whenever it gets released, then reopen it.

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  • We do not "reopen on release". Never did, never do. It's also irrelevant if and when it will release - the content was already released, so this is, fundamentally, no different from a discontinued game, or a game temporarily unavailable for some reason (update/maintenance/whatever).
    – user98085
    Commented Mar 21, 2014 at 23:22
  • @FEichinger I'm talking more general, and the whole close/reopen stuff was meant for questions that can be fixed later by external/internal actions that made the question off-topic in first place, like on AU.
    – Braiam
    Commented Mar 21, 2014 at 23:24
  • We don't reopen questions asked before release because it leads to question-camping, i.e. people asking questions they know will be closed and later reopened simply for the rep-gain/views/badges etc. Questions should be organic and come from actual scenarios and problems you face.
    – Robotnik Mod
    Commented Mar 21, 2014 at 23:55
  • @Robotnik if that's the case, just close it, delete it. Whenever someone will get the problem re-ask it.
    – Braiam
    Commented Mar 22, 2014 at 0:03
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There very much is a difference between the beta and the unreleased game. The beta is what players were able to play, when they had the chance. Since then, the game has undergone changes. Changes that we are not privy to, and cannot verify. There is nothing about the expansion we can currently play, vet, verify, certify, or in any way, determine it's accuracy.

That is where I see the difference between what is being asked, and what is currently available. We allow questions about games we can play. The expansion beta, we could play. The live expansion, we can't. They are two different versions, and makes all the difference.

For the record, I retracted my close vote from the crappy 60-70 question once the asker said that beta information was acceptable. I even edited it to specifically answer the beta, because that was playable content. That's an answerable question. Asking about Reaper of Souls right now, is not, because we can't play it.

A scenario occurs to me that I had not considered: if the closed beta is still ongoing. If it is (and I can't find any information to confirm or deny), I have zero issue with these questions. My understanding comes from the beta being playable, but no longer, making it and the live product two separate instances. In the event the beta is still currently playable, I have no problems at all with these questions.

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    The fact that it was a different version that was available simply causes some of the answers to become outdated when we pass the release date. BF4 questions were accepted between the public beta's end and the actual release. What makes Diablo different?
    – Once Upon a Dev
    Commented Mar 21, 2014 at 23:04
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    As I've been saying in chat, this one is kind of wonky. We have questions that through their wording, are specifically asking about the release version. If the beta was still on-going, I'd have no problems at all, since we have up-to-date information available to anwer it. It's this time frame between beta ending and prior to release that we need to specify.
    – Frank
    Commented Mar 21, 2014 at 23:18

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