Is there any actual benefit to merits? Do higher merited users get more features?
No man, no extra benefits, the
only benefit is that it allows you to rank up. The side effect is that you build kind of reputation of non-shitposter as the spam is a big issue nowadays.
You can quick look here >
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=2534500.msg25841174#post_guide_meritCheck Extra info links too.
Actually the fact that you can wear more complex signatures is something you'd call it extra feature/benefit.
Newbies can't wear signatures at all
Jr Members (30 activity + 1 merit) can wear a short signature
without links, special characters and colorful text.
Members (60 activity + 10 merits) can have longer signatures with links and at special characters, but no colors.
Full Member (120 activity + 100 merits) can have even longer signatures and colorful text. They can also add an avatar.
I think the only difference above Full Member rank is the longer text allowed in the signature, nothing else.
Now if you're really a newbie here, you might wonder why people are trying to cheat the system just for a better signature. That's because our beloved ICO scams are distributing 0-value tokens to forums users who are posting
(spamming?) in the forums with an advertising signature.
There are also legit projects though, but those few legit ones will filter the users manually and select only those with good history. The merits earned are an important factor for the filtering.
Aaaaand a question: What does "nuke" mean? I noticed the stats are mentioning "bans and nukes".
Merit alone gives you no benefits. As I mentioned above it helps you only to Rank-Up and all the benefits with the higher ranks are not only merit but activity related too.
Aaaaand a question: What does "nuke" mean? I noticed the stats are mentioning "bans and nukes".
Ban means that your post history will be preserved but you cannot post anymore/send pm anymore.
The Nuke as it sounds, in addition to the ban, wipes out all the post history so you end up with 0 posts and activity. AFAIK only newbies can be nuked, but I guess theymos and cyrus can also nuke higher ranked members.