The Undrinkable Score

i peruse/use BA scores as a guide far less now than i used to, but, esp taking into account score inflation, i frequently find anything hovering around (or below) an 80 pretty meh. that said, i am a fan of finding out for myself, taste being subject and all that.

 

I don't have a limit, sometimes if something has an awful score I might want to try it just to see if it's really as bad as everyone else says it is!

 

Aggregate ratings do influence my buying habits slightly, but there are other factors that usually play a more important role - i.e. price.

In general, if the aggregate score is above 4.0/5 (not sure what percentile that is because I still think in letter grades), I will probably be more inclined to go out of my way to pick it up even if it's kind of expensive.

If it's less than 3/5, chances are I'll put it off until it's on sale. I like pale lagers more than the average BA, so if a beer falls into that broad (and usually cheap) category and doesn't cost much, I'll probably tick it whenever I have a chance. I'll admit there are a few beers with such impressively awful scores that morbid curiosity is really the only excuse I have for bothering to try them.

If it's somewhere between 3-4 out of 5, I'll probably try it at some point. If there seems to be a consensus that it costs too much for the quality, I'm more likely to put it off though.

 

I was tempted to pick up a sixer of the Maui Brewing/Jolly Pumpkin collaboration today but after seeing that it averaged a 77 here on BA I put it back down. At $14 a sixer I didn't feel like taking a chance. I'd still buy a single of it if available, but definitely not a full six pack.

Generally though, I don't use the ratings here to determine whether I should try a beer or not. I'll look at different comments/descriptions about the beers, see if there might be any patterns that show themselves, and then decide if I am still in the mood.

 

Never thought about it, but brews scoring 85 or so IMO would seem to pretty average stuff. Depends on style I suppose, I don't like Sours so even a world class brew that scored highly wouldn't work for me. I love IPA's and after drinking the best the world has to offer it takes a lot to make me open my wallet. My standard is Two Hearted as far as ratings go, it's a nice test medium and easy to get everywhere. If it's not as good at 2H I won't bother.

 

I have a healthy amount of self loathing, so I never check, just buy it and despair.

 

Thread title should be "Unbuyable Score". There's a huge difference between beers I wouldn't buy and beers I would refuse to drink.

 

If it costs more than 2 dollars per 12 oz, for me to buy it regularly I need to score it above a 4.

If it costs more than 5 dollars per 12 oz, for me to buy it regularly it needs to score above a 4.4/4.5ish unless it has some unique flavor profile that I can't get elsewhere.

For me to drink it at all, for free, it needs to score a B- or better (what is that now, a 2.75? I can never keep track of all the half-assed crash repairs/alterations they make to this site).

 

I usually purchase the beer first and check the rating after.

Especially if I don't know WTF it is. Then I like to drink it, try to figure out the style/ingredients. I don't want other people's opinions to color mine, and I like to test my palate (as depressing as that can be sometimes)

I mean if you look on BA and the description says "brewed with cassia bark and curacao peel" and all the reviews are like "smell is curacao and dark spices" it's a pretty useless review. It's so obvious when people are tasting what they're supposed to taste in the beer. I'd rather know what someone actually tastes in the beer, not watch them stroke themselves off like they're Mr. Supertaster. So I try and do that myself.

Obviously a lot of times you can't help but know what's in a beer when you buy it, but I still would rather taste and score it myself and see what other people thought after. I think it's helped me improve as a taster.

 

That's a hard question to answer. I find that it depends on the situation.

Something like a wheat beer or a fruit beer, I'd go down to a 3.5. These beers rarely garner high scores so that seems reasonable.

On the flip side, if it's an RIS or an IPA, I generally don't bother unless it's around a 4 or higher. These beers tend to grab much higher scores in general, plus there is such a huge variety of high-ranking versions of these beers that it's tough to waste money on something that's just "decent".

Adding to that, if it's something unique and specific to my own tastes, the score cutoff changes even more. A chile chocolate stout I will probably try if it's anything over a 3, just because I happen to like chile peppers and chocolate so chances are I will enjoy it more than the average person.

Finally, further complicating things is the brewery. A brewery like Founders I tend to "trust" innately. They have proven themselves to be one of the best, if not the best all-around brewery. So regardless of score I will generally try anything new from them because I happen to like their beers in general and rarely do they put out something I dislike, regardless of average score. Same goes for local brews, I generally try to support local breweries and will give them several chances no matter the crappy scores. This has burned me a bunch of times (Night Shift, Mystic) but also has yielded some amazing finds (Pretty Things, Clown Shoes, Maine Beer, etc).

Dope

 

Totally depends on the brewery. If its a brewery I trust, and a style I am partial to, then scores be damned.

 

actually, if I find beers in a store that I haven't tried yet, I generally try to NOT look at the BA reviews, so as not to alter my perception of the beer that I might be trying.

 

I never check the scores before hand. If "grade inflation" is taken into account, there are a lot of really good beers that have scores below 70, so I think that folks who set a cut-off number for themselves are missing out on a bunch of tasty brews. I think the average beer is pretty good. Average here is 3/5. Those who won't buy a beer under the score of 4 (or whatever their line is) are missing out.

 

Came here to say this. When I first started dabbling in craft I. Relied on BA scores a lot. Now I don't even care. I have figured out what styles I like, and I know which ones I don't. I have also figured out the breweries I like as well, so i'mm hard pressed to find a beer I don't like by following my tastes.BA has become a way to keep an eye out for upcoming events and releases for me now more than a beer rating site.

 

I'll pretty much try anything if I'm just buying a single bottle.

 

Doesn't matter to me. If I want to try it, I buy it.

 

If a beer looks interesting to me, I'll try it. I used to look at scores, but knowing many stores have single bottles to select from, I can try something for a pretty reasonable price and decide whether or not I like it. I'm probably not the first to say that some breweries just make lousy beer, while some breweries get a bad rap because of scores on certain products. There are many mediocre breweries out there that have a diamond in the rough.

 

Really depends on whose doing the scoring. But what I will or will not drink or buy more depends on my own knowledge of the beer, its availability, the brewery and the reviewers.