Hmmmm. Picking your battles is the most important thing to learn. The vote systems are both off in my opinion. DDO was mostly unmoderated, but DART wants your reasonings for your vote. I believe there should be moderation, but votes that are still intellectually raw will encourage more votes. A summary of your view why one argument is superior to the other as well as necessary conduct, spelling and sources check. It seems difficult to have a simple break down of reasoning and balance that with "feel" voting.
Another thing that i would do personally would make the author of forum topic not able to see posters comments whom they have blocked. Sure it can be taken advantage of, but its up to each of us to consider the opinions of others, what we can handle and what we disregard (ie troll posters who go off topic) to simply make their comments not appear to those who blocked them.
Being able to cancel your own debate would also be a life send. Or make it where unmoderated debates can be cancelled. I cant tell you how many times life gets in the way or the other person simply just trolls.
Also why is comments of debates backward from forums? Make it where we see on BOTH that the first comment is newest or the first.
That being said, i dont believe in debate structures DDO and DART. Its like an arena setup instead of a reasoning setup. Sure people can value sound logic, but i believe trying to discuss the merits of your topic to the other person is more important than kritics and semantic loops. Sources and their origins are worth exploring.
Me? I care only about spreading the TRUTH. The gospel of Jesus christ. So i usually use 1 or 2 sources for most of my views.
Until humans become omnscient, knowing the most accurate facts at the time is more important to me. And we all have the ability to do that without insulting each other or putting definitions in other people's mouth.
Remember, spock (a person regarding things through pure logic) is an ideal, not the reality. Consider the feelings of others, if we dont understand the person we are discussing or debating with, no one wins.