You want to ask a question and get great responses that can quickly and definitively answer or solve your problem.  

Understand that everyone who comes seeking answers on AR15.com has a different level of understanding and frame of reference.  

Before anyone can answer a question for you they are likely going to need to know the following.
1. How much shooting you have done in the past and of what type.  
2. What you will be using the gun or item on or for.  
3. About how many rounds per year and or range season you plan on shooting.


When someone poses a question that is asking about precise shooting and what works well the folks who will be able to help you are going to need to know more.  Expect and understand this.  You can get better and faster answers to your question if you give as much information in a blocked out matter as possible.

How not to be noticed or taken seriously
A "wallotext" is not going to get you the answers you want because many useful members will skim right over your post and move on to something more pointed they care more about.  

You solve this problem by breaking your question or explanation into multi part sections.  This can be a simple 123 approach as
1..I want to do this..
2..I have done this before..
3..what are your suggestions within these parameters.

The 1 and 2 sections are much more important that asking for the 3 part because what YOU want to do and what you expect from the final outcome is important and what YOU already know will let us know if you are even in a position to begin begin looking into something.

Supporting factors can also play a huge role in questions that surround this vs. that.  We regularly get questions that relate to "Should I get a 6.8, 6.5 or 300BO???"  This goes back to the good old #1 what do you want to do with it but includes #2 what you have done...What you have done may include what you are currently capable of doing and what you have around to support you.  If you have a suppressor currently and wish to have more this should be listed.  If you reload you should mention this because it may have a great sway in what you ought to get.

A general point is there is little point to make questions using less jargon or slang than then there needs to be.  There is no reason to say you want a 'sniper rifle' and to go on about 'sniping' when you want to put together or buy a gun that can shoot targets at 300 meters.  

How to attract the right people to answer your question out in the rest of the forum
AR15.com has a huge wealth of knowledge.  It also has a very very large population.  Much of the population is fodder little more than simple minions laughing at simple jokes in the general discussion and occasionally throwing out a sentence of gibberish in technical forums.  It is important to wade through the minions and pick out the useful bits from all the rubbish.  

So how do you get the right people to bother with your thread in the first place?  Lets see..
1.  Post in the right section.  This is hard.  There is a whole bunch of AR15.com and you want to get your specific question answered.  Take a tour around before you post your question.  If you want to know about buying an AR15 with a piston that is chambered in 5.45 then you need to start breaking it down.  You have section ar15...then you also have piston and variants section.  I personally lurk about the variants section a whole bunch but not in the piston section.  You have to look at what part of your question distinguishes itself from rest of the sub categories and post there.  
2.  Once you have found the right section that you think you should post in skim the first 3 pages.  Not just the thread titles but the main subject of each one.  Searching is hard I understand if you can't search simply look over the first three pages.  If there isn't a post about what you want to ask a question about then maybe you are in the wrong section go back to section one and reconsider.  If you feel you are in the right section than you might actually have a good question to ask...how exciting.
3.  So you are in the right section and you have a question that isn't covered over the last several pages.  The thread title is everything.  If you want to learn about precision rifles or an AR type rifle that can make hits at 4-600 meters what do you name your thread?  You do not name your thread "sniper rifles help plz"  Everyone worth a damn has skimmed past your thread.  Likely the people who are clicking to read are looking for a person who is trolling or looking for an internet fight along with a few sympathetic moderators who will likely move your thread to another area.  

Practical exercise.  
We know we want to learn about precision rifles or getting accurate hits at 4-600 meters.  We have looked over a few different sub forums and have decided where our topic should be made.  In reading over the first 3 pages or so of topics we have picked up some new terms and cleared some ideas or generalities we have held that just don't make sense.  The specific situation you find yourself in does not seem to be covered and by god you want a thread so lets make it.

Topic.  New Shooter looking to build rifle for 400-600 meter range use

I am looking to put together a rifle for long range for me shooting out to 400-600 meter use.  I don't really care about the over all weight of the rifle as it will mostly be a bench rest and prairie dog gun in my back yard range.  

I have been hunting for about 20 years now with bolt action rifles mostly inside of 100 meters I take a deer almost every year and hunt upland game and the occasional coyote when it jumps out in front of my tractor.  I used an AR type rifle in the Army for a few years but never past 300 meters and I never had to do much more than basic cleaning.  I reload 30-06 now and could buy dies for .223 if it makes sense.  I have seen the 'clone' build threads and don't particularly care about my rifle following those guidelines but I am looking for a basic SPR type rifle.

I have looked around and have seen a lot of people say basically the barrel, optic and trigger are most important.  I would like to spend about 1500-1600 dollars on a nice set up to include the optic and am curious what general suggestions you would offer me on what products to buy and some back ground info on what you suggest.  So far rainier arms barrels, vortex optics and geissele triggers have been repeated as being a good choice are there others I should continue to look into?

Thanks for any suggestions and help in the future.
Nick


Ok we posted the thread now what....tell everyone who answers they are noobs right?
After you drop this thread into one of the sub forums you can continue to search around the sight for additional information surrounding the question you have asked.  You may have answered your own question and that is OK.  When others answer or attempts to answer your question you should thank them and continue dialog on that comment with a quote.  If someone disagrees or calls you a fool for thinking something again thank them and take into consideration that you may in fact be a fool.  I have yet to see a thread that the original poster has argued with everyone who tried to help him yield good results.  No one wants to help someone that is combative.  

Finally when you have made your mind and have gone through all the options post about it.  Not in a new post but the one you started fishing for answers in the first place.  The reason this is so important is that AR15.com is actually an archive.  Yes we are live and running right now but someone on google is typing in something about ar15 600 yards and we would like for them to land on information that includes your question.  After your question they will see the answers given and a month later there is a picture of your rifle along with groups at 550 meters and a range report on how the process went.  This is the best possible result.  It will not only help you but will help others in the future.


good luck out there guys.                                                                                                                                                        and salam bros

nvm

Very well put Nick.

Needs a tack at the top.

Awesome post Bro.

TL;DR.



J/K, but unfortunately the target audience probably won't read it.

Unfortunate but true. Good post regardless.

Thank you Nick. I needed to read this. Hopefully I will make better use of the forum now.

Superb post!.............

Be positive and ask good questions, you will have a great time here.

You know this is no stretch.  If you are positive and try to visualize it as a conversation with someone else so many questions can be smoothly answered by the right people.  

If you really sit back and watch too you will see that the people who form the question properly end up getting fewer responses but they are the right responses.  Some people only know to ask what are you going to use it for or how much do you shoot.  When a question is broken down so far that only the right answer will suffice the right answer ends up finding you.  There are some very good people wandering around here who are more than happy to help you along your way all you need to do is feed them the info and they will help out.

TL;DR.  Skimmed tho, good point.

Great post!

I'd just like to add, that before posting your question, do a search first.  It might have been recent and you'll be able to find it.
Also search with google and/or bing.  You might find the answers in the archive that way, or even on other forums.  It'll also help keep you from asking the same question many see every month.  That can save you the annoyance of the smart assed answers about, "is it Thursday already," or "use a seach," from people who just can't hold back.  And if you find the answer that way, you just saved yourself a few minutes.

Have patiende! When you do post a question, don't expect answers in the first hour!  Even if 100 people viewd it.  Many of them might be new to ARs also and have a a similar question, and some people migt have looked t the title thinking they could help, but found out the question wasn't quite what they thought it was.  Or it might have just been an interesting sounding topic and they wanted to ccheck it out.  There are a LOT of people here so there might be a lot of looking without anyone answering. for a day.

Love the practical exercise