D&D 5E What is Quality?

[Oofta]

I don't think the wine taster metaphor works very well.

Judgment of Paris (wine) - Wikipedia

Several studies have shown that most people can't tell the difference from one wine to the next. The judges were experts in their field and judging by criteria that most people would not detect. They used the criteria developed by the wine aficionados to judge some wines as higher quality. Saying that one wine is a higher quality than another is largely based on artificial constructs.

 

[Oofta]

Is everything you don't care for good quality? Is everything you care for good quality?

I never said that. Put it this way - if we could do a poll and 99% of the respondents said something was high quality, could we say that for most people it's high quality?

 

[Oofta]

I feel like this conversation keeps getting rebooted to post #1. Whatever anybody says, you just repeat your OP again like the previous 365 posts simply didn’t happen. It’s quite frustrating. You’re literally ignoring anything anybody says and just repeating yourself over and over.

So how do you judge quality?

 

[Oofta]

On the product's actual merits using pertinent criteria! There are other metrics you can use to judge something's quality than just appealing to popularity or engaging in pissing contests. These metrics will vary based on the type of product (e.g., food, furniture, clothing, electronics, software, media, etc.). As a metric popularity tends to be a misleading indicator regarding a product's overall quality - i.e., "the mob can't be wrong" - which is why appealing to a product's popularity is fallacious, bad reasoning when it comes to discussing a product's quality.

How do you determine what the pertinent criteria is?

 

[Maxperson]

Quality will always be in the eye of the beholder and what they value. If you like schlocky slasher films then [insert slasher film I don't watch here] it will be a quality film for you. If I were to judge the overall quality of slasher films, I would look at which ones became cult favorites amongst people that enjoy that type of film.

This is not true. My wife loves horror movies. So I end up watching them with her...............a lot. We see the occasional quality horror movie, a bunch of okay quality horror movies that we still enjoy, and then some really crappy horror movies. Just because you like something and the genre, doesn't mean that everything in that category is going to be quality if you like it.

If you can't judge quality by how well it's received, by an attempt to determine aggregate satisfaction, how do you judge quality? Which was my question: if you disagree with me, that's fine. But if you disagree with me how do you judge quality?

By looking at the specifics of whatever "it" is and discussing why you think each part of "it" is quality or not. Something can be wildly popular with the majority of those people who like it thinking that it's pretty decent, but not fantastic(high quality).

Some things end up(Kardashians) being wildly popular(Kardashians) just because they are popular(Kardashians). There's no quality in the Kardashian's. They're just popular for being popular.

 

[Oofta]

I suspect there is an unspoken underlying premise or set of circumstances to which we're not privy; or some other unspoken component. Otherwise, yes, we got it, there's no one objective measure for qualify (discussion over in 5 seconds, because OP clearly isn't looking for how others measure it, since anything people bring up are shot down with the same response).

OP, is this in response to a specific person or general trend of people making what are, in your mind, unfair disparagement towards 5e?

It was meant as a question - how do you judge quality? To reiterate, if we could do a survey and the majority of people said something was high quality, would it be considered high quality?

Related is that when people state "X is bad design" they are stating a fact, not an opinion with the implication that if I like X then I just don't truly understand. It's perfectly fine to say "I like/dislike X".

 

[GMforPowergamers]

Some things end up(Kardashians) being wildly popular(Kardashians) just because they are popular(Kardashians). There's no quality in the Kardashian's. They're just popular for being popular.

I bet we could fill this thread with examples like BvS and Kardashians.... thing a majority of us we agree were poor to low to mid quality AT BEST... and still made bank and was popular

 

[payn]

It was meant as a question - how do you judge quality? To reiterate, if we could do a survey and the majority of people said something was high quality, would it be considered high quality?

You dont judge quality with surveys. You do it by using expert opinion on like for like items with measurable criteria.

Related is that when people state "X is bad design" they are stating a fact, not an opinion with the implication that if I like X then I just don't truly understand. It's perfectly fine to say "I like/dislike X".

X may be bad design, but I just might happen to like it. Y might be good design, and I might just happen to not like it. The first statement is about quality, the second is about value. They are not one and the same.

 

[eyeheartawk]

Related is that when people state "X is bad design" they are stating a fact, not an opinion with the implication that if I like X then I just don't truly understand. It's perfectly fine to say "I like/dislike X".

If someone says "X is bad design" and lists out their arguments, as is often the case in these threads, how is that different from saying "I dislike X's design" and making the same argument?

It really seems like your entire point is that because somebody didn't write "in my opinion" after their statement (which, I would wager, most would assume anyway) that somehow that's a completely different thing.

Do you really think the people phrasing that "X is bad design" don't know it's just an opinion? That this is somehow lost on them?

 

[Maxperson]

I feel like this conversation keeps getting rebooted to post #1. Whatever anybody says, you just repeat your OP again like the previous 365 posts simply didn’t happen. It’s quite frustrating. You’re literally ignoring anything anybody says and just repeating yourself over and over.