All known abuses of repbot:
1) New players do not know it exists or how to use it.
2) The formula of weighting a complaint = a voucher is in question.
3) Players with large reputations can more easily abuse with little to no penalty
4) User's can create multiple accounts to abuse.
I'm limiting this scope to improve on #2 and #3
In real life, a company or an individual also has a reputation - and in real life, that reputation can be destroyed by even one complaint. If a person has stolen once before, it doesn't matter that he does not steal 2 times for every time he steals - if he steals even once, he is tarnished.
HOWEVER, in the repbot system, if a player drops one game for every 3 games he plays, he can end up with a reputation of infinitely good, given he's playing players with all equal weights. In fact, if he were crafty enough, he could drop 99 out of 100 games, and still have an infinitely high reputation. How? He drops with a user experience = 1 99 times (and we assume he is complained on EACH TIME for that matter) - his rep is -99. But, if he plays one match til completion and gets a voucher (he can just ask for it, many of the times, people will vouch them), against a user with just 100exp (up to 10,000), he will have a positive rep of 1-9999..
The question is, does he deserve this positive reputation?
The resounding answer, by every sane person, would be no.
Case #2, a person with a large reputation, say 400,000 (extra large here), can drop even more games. In fact, he can play 30 top users (10,000 exp or more) and EVEN IF they ALL complain, will still have a 100,000 rep.
This may rarely, if ever, happen, HOWEVER, it stands to reason, that at such a reputation, if they have to go somewhere during a match they are losing - what is their incentive to play it again? Furthermore, when they have such a rep and request to finish later, do you complain on him until he returns? (I do, but how many others?)
Such a system makes for easy abuse. How to easily solve this?
As in real life, if someone complains, they are given far more weight than someone who vouches for them. Your rep is constantly earned, and even a little tarnish degrades it, regardless of how high and mighty they are revered.
So should be with the repbot system. People tend to only complain against real jerks, or more often, against droppers. But people vouch for any reason, they were asked to vouch, they enjoyed the company, etc. Do 10 games played by a person who was nice = 10 times he was an #ss#o## and or 10 games he dropped?
If you do not believe so, then please comment.
My suggestion:
1) LIMIT REPUTATION. If your rep is never vulnerable to complaints (as it virtually is at 100,000 or more), there is less incentive to resume games, and more incentive to be an #ss#o## or not comply with good sportsmanship. Again, if there is no safeguards, or little safeguards, it WILL be abused. This is simple Murphy's Law at a work, "anything that can happen, will happen".
2) As in real life, complaints should carry far more weight. In real life, it's hard to build a good rep, and constantly needs work. On fibs, it's actually EASIER to build a good one than a bad one.
Old formula : Complaint = Experience of user complaining. Voucher = Experience of user complaining. Both are currently capped at 10,000.
NEW FORMULA: Complaint = Experience*10, capped at 10,000, Voucher = Experience, capped at 2,000.
Why this formula? Users who are new should have very valid complaints, but not TOO valid. But at the same time, experienced users should not be given TOO much power either.. It strikes a balance between the two, it also makes complaints far more weighty. And why not? If you drop, you should need at least 5 people to vouch you to make up for it, should you not?
Discuss...