Meta-PokéBase Q&A
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I'm asking this mostly because of what happened to this question. Fizz said that, while the answer was on the site, the person who asked the question couldn't have known in advance to look there. Okay, so maybe it is possible for people to not know that the site has HM locations. Does that mean it's possible for people to not know the site has information about Pokemon movepools? Is it possible for people to not know the site has any Pokemon information at all? Where do we draw the line?

Edit: Even if the asker didn't know how to navigate Pokemon DB, I think allowing these questions would be like allowing duplicate questions. It clogs up the site with information that we already have.

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This is why the ‘look it up’ rule is by far my least favourite that we have. It’s unnecessary, pisses people off and just causes ambiguity as you’ve shown. I’ll say it now that I’d rather we just get rid of it.

The reason I let that one go is that the asker’s confusion was not about where they could find Strength. It was clear they thought they knew where it was, and were only asking why they weren’t finding it there. That’s a whole different question, and where the distinction was for me. Obviously the answer in both cases would have ended up identical, but we don’t take questions down assuming knowledge of their answer.

Think of it this way: if the asker had been correct as to Strength’s location, would we have taken down the question? No, because there would have been an alternate explanation, e.g. ‘you picked it up already’. If that’s true, then the question is no longer as simple as ‘look it up’. Of course, in the end it really was that simple, but again, we don’t moderate assuming the answer goes one way or another like that.

If you want a hard and fast rule, I’ll only take down the question when looking up the location is guaranteed to resolve the question. In this case, it was not, because there was the possibility the asker was correct in their assumption, and the answer would have needed more explanation.

To answer your other question, if we give leniency because people might not know where to find information, then the rule is even more arbitrary and basically impossible to moderate. If the answer could be looked up on the site, no matter where/how, the question goes basically. Another reason why this rule sucks, it just leaves askers confused.

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As for the rule in general, I still think it's a good rule for the same reason why "no duplicate questions" is a good rule. Questions asking about information already on Pokemon DB can easily be resolved by linking to the appropriate Pokemon DB page and then hiding the question, and if not hidden, clogs up the site with information we already have. This logic seems to apply to every question whose answer is easily looked up.
As for that question specifically, I understand that the person who asked the question was expecting an explanation, not for someone to say "that assumption is wrong." Still, Pokemon DB already has the explanation, and looking up the answer was guaranteed to resolve the question. If we allow these questions, then we might start getting stuff like, "Rowlet learns a move called apweofhsdzlfa at level 6, right? Why is my Rowlet not learning it?" Is this the kind of content that you want on Pokebase?
Good response, it's probably a good idea to compare this to the duplicate questions rule. Though I like that one a lot more, since it directly involves content we've all already seen in the community before. But I digress.
Fair point about clogging the site with information we already have. I guess we might have to agree to disagree, but I feel like it makes sense to moderate based on what's already in the actual PokeBase. It's not great quality content, but allowing questions that can be looked up is an easy point grab (which is never bad), and they don't come up often anyway. As I mentioned, I just don't think it's necessary to ban them. I like a minimal approach to moderating, but that's just me.
Still don't think looking it up would have resolved the question 100% of the time, though. If the site verified the asker's assumption, what would happen? The site would list a location, but asker would have already known it, and we're back where we started. It's good that you're thinking of the type of thing we might get with the precedence... though it'd take pretty extreme cases for this type of question to be a problem, and we'd just take the post down if it was silly, regardless. I can take any type of question we get around here and make it stupid like that, but it doesn't mean we take down every question like it.
If the site verified the asker's assumption(s) AND didn't give the full answer, then the question would be completely allowable. If the site did have the answer, then the question breaks a rule. I don't get what a theoretical, similar allowable question has anything to do with the allowability of the real question.
Second, the whole point of asking questions here was to "make Pokemon information clear and easy to digest". If the information asked for in a question is already on Pokemon DB, then I think the question is completely pointless and should not be allowed.
Third, when we let people ask questions, we hold the asker responsible for "checking the question was not asked already." Should this not include checking Pokemon DB to make sure it doesn't have the answer?
‘I don't get what a theoretical, similar allowable question has anything to do with the allowability of the real question.’
That’s the problem: to me it has everything to do with the allowability of the real question. Because the questions are principally the same, taking one down sets a precedence that we take down all questions like it, or else we’re inconsistent/unfair. You’ve correctly identified a question that should be allowed: that question would not be allowed under the presence set by taking down the real one, because they ask the same thing. In other words, we cannot moderate based on what the answer to the question is, only what the actual question is. I’m sorry if I’ve again failed to illustrate my point.
I’m not quite with you on how these questions sacrifice how digestible the site is. If anything, they’re the precise kinds of posts that’ll get picked up in a Google search and will deliver info directly. And the questions being ‘pointless’ aside — mind the subjectivity of that — they’re not harming the community, nor are they common to begin with. Even if the posts aren’t high quality, at least they’re genuine questions that get people involved with the platform.
For me, the ‘no duplicates’ rule is not about failing to fulfil a responsibility, or about the notion that you could have found the answer yourself. It’s there to stop bothersome repeat questions the community has seen before, and to stop responses to the same topic going on multiple threads. It’s a multi-faceted rule, whereas the one about searchable questions is just a debate as to whether they’re trite or too low-quality. But again, this is just how I see it, and we’re clearly at odds in that sense. That’s fine, and it’s good for making high quality rules in the first place.
Just because we take down one question doesn't mean we have to take down every question like it. I thought the whole point of moderators was to enforce rules on a case-by-case basis.
That’s true, but we also need to have consistency with our decisions. If we don’t, then it’s a) unclear what breaks the rules, b) unfair on everyone else and c) making the job harder.
And I neglect to mention, this isn’t just about precedence. For all we know, the original question’s answer might not have been resolved by the DB, i.e. it could have been the type of question we agreed would be allowed. If we preemptively took it down assuming it wasn’t, then we could have removed a perfectly fine question. Again, you can’t hide a question because its answer makes it break the rules — it’s not a consistent approach.