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This is inspired by Force comments and IP, but I wanted to start a new thread since it's a different idea.

Why don't we just link ratings and comments? When we rolled out comments a decade ago, user ratings weren't so ubiquitous, but now every site that has 'em links comments / names / ratings. 

So, what about just changing it to behave like this?

I agree with having ratings displayed alongside comments.

One reason not to link ratings and comments would be to avoid trolls and immature people in general from retaliating against people who rated their stories low. The people who write low rated stories in general are more immature, so they're more likely to go to every published story made by the rater and vote low ratings in retaliation. If they're hardcore, they might even go to the lengths of making multiple accounts and downvote multiple times to really torpedo the "offender's" story ratings. Not knowing who left which rating protects people who rate honestly.

It would be very hard to differentiate between "troll ratings" and honest low ratings, so it would be better to just leave it as is, and let people leave their ratings in their comments if they so wish, like "4/8" like some people do.

I agree with urnam0 here. There's a reason for closed ballot elections. The current system encourages honest ratings from the majority of readers. Forcing folks to openly rate stories will lead to a shit-ton of bad stories rated high by the author and then with little or no other ratings. Good stories will have plenty of comments, but bad ones will have none.

I strongly loath the idea of changing it.

As for IPs showing - I think they should only be visible to mods, but not to regular users. But in this light, I wouldn't be opposed to the mods being able to see a list of how users rate stories either. I'm just opposed to users being able to see how users rate stories.

You guys raise a good point about not wanting to leave candid, negative feedback. I guess I would feel if they saw me leaving a 1/8, even if it deserved it. 

People seem to post their ratings anyway ("7/8, was awesome"), though having something like this...

Leave feedback anonymously

... would encourage better feedback maybe. That's what we want/need -- high quality comments that provide author and other player insight. 

I've thought about this. It should be added in conjunction to Force Comments with Ratings. BUT I think that we should only be forced to comment on stories that we rate lower than their current rating. I've elaborated on this in the Forced Comments feature request thread.

I like the idea of your rating being shown if you comment on a game (for convenience more than anything), however I don't think they should be linked, mainly because some people may just want to read and rate a story without commenting. Commenting should be used for praise/advice, if it's required I think it would just deter people from actually rating a story.