Douse your pants. To access GD, a new user has to follow this link. Under "Game-specific forums", a new user has 5 forums listed unchecked: TW2, TW3, and three classic games (Fallout, Baldur's Gate and NWN if I recall correctly). So TW3 is just as easy to find as GD.

And that is the excuse for being rude to someone new to the forums? It's different when someone new is creating an outrage thread, but I saw many threads where someone was asking for help and all they got were snide remarks and rudeness. Not surprised they never came back.

I've been on many games forums, but this is the only one were most people are rude to new people asking questions in the wrong forum...

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Since the rep-system is heavily corrupted by now, I rather check people's board history before gifting anything to them and can recommend this to anyone, but I only gift to people I know already anyway at the moment.

I really have to disagree with that.
I spent quite some time in the past telling people there are specific sub-forums for games, I usually say that in the most direct manner (which people might get offended about because they can't bear remarks), but "rude" doesn't cut it.
An I don't think 'most people' are rude either.
Then, I agree that reading 'wrong forum wrong forum go there go there this is not the place this is not the place' over and over again gives the impression of rudeness. But it really isn't.

And I jump on the occasion to raise awareness : when you have a question about a game, write it in the specific sub forum, so that if you get an answer a quick search in the sub forum will help future people needing that answer too. If you got your answer in general it will most likely get lost in general discussion (But posting in General a link to a sub forum for help is more than welcome IMHO).

EDIT : and to begin with, I wanted to say that your 1) and 2) target old users, when 2)a) is not specific to old users I think.

I wouldn't even call it effort, just investment.
But great point overall.

Says the guy with 1800 rep.

I saw a lot of threads and while one person might point them to the correct link, the next 15 were all complaining about why all the new people can't post in the correct forums. If I were a new user and made that mistake, and there was one helpful person and 15 more complaining about my mistake, I wouldn't be likely to come back.

And how many times did someone forget to name the game (Witcher 3) they were asking for help with, and a dozen people chose to pile on with their inanity "Maybe they are talking about X" "No maybe Y". I remember a thread where the first non-snarky response came on the second page. One full page of people "making fun of the new guy" before someone tried to honestly help.

I will grant your point 2a, in fact all the points aren't limited to old users, I just worry that it seems the older users tend to lead others in this way. How many times have you heard the "distraction police" claim they are "helping" the forums because it was a shitty thread anyway or they thought a topic had gotten too heated? Do you think the person making the thread thought their thread was "shitty"? Do you think the people in the heated discussion appreciate a thread getting totally derailed by recipes and silly links?

In short, especially when Witcher 3 came out, I did think more posts were being rude rather than helpful and even today, its rather rude for a group of people to pick threads they don't like in a vain attempt to derail them.

Apology not accepted!!!

Heh! He is right though.
But I did give and receive games. So I'm probably a hypocrite.

I'm curious about how the forum would change if the giveaway stopped for a few months. Hell, even if just the non-GOG giveaways stopped.

Another thing. GOG could do a separate forum for giveaways which would mitigate the issue, but it would look like they support them and I don't think they do. I seem to remember a blue's suggestion to fix the scammer issues was to just stop giveaways and/or trading. Take away a scammer/leecher's reason for being here and they go away.

Anyway, last point. I don't have any sympathy for either side in this. Meaning the "he's a scammer!!!" and "I'm not a scammer!!!" sides. One side stop going giveaways / other side stop entering giveaways. Nobody will scam you / nobody will call you a scammer. As long as you can do something about it I have no sympathy for you when you chose not to and then moan about it.

Me, I'll probably continue to do both. I did mention I'm a hypocrite. But I'll try no to bitch about it whatever happens.

I agree that there are a lot of snide comments in those threads. I always thought "let's not pick that up, it can only go worse", then in the end it doesn't seem to improve. But I really consider them apart the helpful posts that unmistakably happen soon(-ish).

I think just trying to make one's part of good is enough, but as of late I am under the impression that the 'this community is going awry" threads are more present, in one way or the other (goodbye threads for instance). Maybe less people are doing their part of good (like those who said goodbye for instance), which shouldn't be taken for granted.to begin with.

I wasn't rude, I was funny. There's a limit to patience.

I have to say, I have an idea for a giveaway planned out, but I don't feel like executing it because I feel like I have to set up some access rules and it's a pain.

i highly recommend to not waste your time by discussing here with an alt of some wanker

I've been here since just about the start. And for years I posted every day. You get +1 rep automatically for every day you post. Even without anybody repping me up I'd be well over 2500 by now if I had posted every day and nobody had repped me.
People giving gifts are not all equally generous. People have various motives behind it some are more universally accepted as generous than others.

The more strings and rules you attach to the generosity, the more it becomes about control and the less it becomes about generosity.

I've met plenty of people over the years that use "gifts" as a way of buying affection or controlling people. I wouldn't personally consider that to be particularly generous. And it's difficult to find anybody that would find that anonymous gift account's owner to be selfish, I don't think anybody even knows who that account belongs to other than Mr. Gog and the owner.

It's a matter of degrees, but considering how much bitching I see in the forum about people not playing the games right or how they behave afterwards, I have a hard time considering that to be generosity. I've had people not thank me for gifts and I haven't bitched about it at all. In fact, I haven't even mentioned it until these recent threads and I sure as hell haven't shamed the person for it, even though I probably should have. A new account with no rep and no activity fails to say thank you is probably a bot.
In the long run, the folks offering giveaways are probably just going to need to find a way of requiring more investment of the people that want to participate in the contest. The more something like time or work is the factor that determines the likelihood of success, the less likely it is that alts are going to be a competitive advantage.

What happens after the prize is awarded is completely outside of the givers control and folks just need to accept that to be the case. Or not give any games.

Personally, I'm kind of tempted to start doing my giveaways on other fora where it isn't expected and where it might at least benefit the community.

Not that difficult : if you are orange with a pH > 5 you are out !
(apricots look like sympathizers, damn them !)

What a top-notch thread.