Redditors! How influenced are you by the number of replies to a post?

I will typically read through the comments and if I think I can add something new or pertinent to the discussion I will. I suppose it depends on how I see the purpose of the post. If it is a question that has been asked countless times that means that the OP either didn’t search for an answer first, or doesn’t care about an answer and just wants engagement to earn fake internet points. If I think that OP genuinely wants an answer and it is an answer I can provide then I will still reply days after the post was made in the hope that it will help. It’s typically a naive hope. I have answered some very specific questions in the past and have had zero replies. Sometimes it feels like shouting into the void, only the void is now half full of bots. I like interacting with people, so it is nice to get into a post early and join a discussion, but I have found that a lot of conversations get fractious early on. Some people jump right into throwing insults around as if someone holding a different opinion to them is a personal affront. I think that there’s a nice middle-ground in which you can still be heard, but in which the conversation hasn’t completely died.