@ topic again: is it possible to show accumulated merit points on the front page of the forum section? Like +10000 (over 9000!!) to show that this is a really interesting thread?
Maybe remove the icons for normal topic, hot topic and very hot topic and replace them with icons based on merit score given in a thread?
A thread having 100+ replies (very hot topic right now) isn't a good thing anymore (I assume it used to be back in the days).
Could have normal topic, quality topic and high quality topic, with increasing merit score.
And yes, I know that can be tampered with, but it at least provides a little more value than than the currently reply based ranking.