The problem with having an "answered question" flair is that it implies that there are no more answers to be had, and that we're basically done. This is obviously never the case in history -- there is always more questions to be asked, and everything can always be expanded on.

Furthermore, we're not experts at literally everything; moderators, flaired users, and regular users all have gaps in our knowledge. Moderators are obviously better equipped to generally understand what a "decent" answer might be, but even the mods are fallible sometimes, and mods do make mistakes. If the moderators are fallible, regular users are even more so.

Both of these are the main reasons why mods are generally reluctant about adding an "answered question" flair.

This is something that's been floated here fairly often (we probably get this question/suggestion in modmail more often than any other).

The issue with an "answered question" flair is, who decides when a question's been answered, particularly when it's one that's about a contentious historical topic? The question asker, who by nature doesn't know the answer? A moderator, who may not have any specialty in the area (though we can generally separate out the wheat from the chaff)? Another flaired user (and consider here that we have many specialities that just don't overlap at all)?

Leaving aside the mechanics, a thing that you learn when studying history is that it's never settled. Oh sure we can agree on the basics, like dating Lee's surrender to April 9, 1865; but does that mean that April 9, 1865 is the end of the American Civil War? Or was that April 12, when Lee's army was formally disbanded? Or was it Joe Johnson's surrender, the largest troop surrender of the war, on April 26? Or does it stretch until Nov. 6, when the CSS Shenandoah was the last Confederate military unit to surrender? Or is the Civil War still being fought in our courts and in our politics, is it over or does its legacy haunt us yet?

You can see how a simple question like that becomes complex, and that's not even taking into account questions in history that were once thought settled and are now unsettled, as voices previously absent from the narrative are added.

EDIT It's also worth pointing out here one of my great frustrations with Reddit, which is that its voting and sorting system prioritizes quick, off-the-cuff responses that a drive-by user will see, nod and upvote, over thoughtful responses from people who want to spend time marshaling sources and being sure of their argument. I've passed on answering questions before, and I can guarantee you other flaired users and moderators have as well, because I just don't have the time to write a few thousand words on the issue that will sit around unread because it's buried under up votes from someone else who got in first with a hasty, vaguely accurate paragraph. (This is also why we have such strict moderation here.) Is it really unreasonable to say you have to read the comments to find an answer?

What about a "good discussion" flair that the OP can add when the comments reach their own subjective threshold of quality? The point isn't to discourage further discussion but to highlight the threads that are worth reading -- even or perhaps especially when there's not a clear answer.

Is it possible that we can sort by number of comments? I know that the traditionally Reddit sorts by up votes, but as mentioned earlier that isn't the best for well researched answers. It rather supports easy to digest answers.

I know more comments doesn't necessarily mean better answers, but should track a little better. I have been using it for a rough screening for good answers because I don't know enough to comment.

So I misunderstood what the OP was proposing when I first read the title and thought that they were proposing a new user flair for people who have answered someone's question well. That's not actually what was proposed, but I kind of like the idea. It would encourage people to respond and would be sort of a middle-ground flair for people who've been able to provide a helpful answer but aren't able (or haven't yet been able) to get an "expert" flair. Anybody else have any thoughts on that?

Other than the good points already raised here, for me, visually I don't like a lot of clutter - having an "answered question" flair makes most of the front page (and other posts) will have the flair that makes it look dense and annoying. A compromise would be to make it less visual, but then that kind of defeats the purpose of the flair.