Almost all of them don't count posts made on "off-topic" board.
Posts in off-topic counted or not depends on managers and companies, but if companies and managers do their works well, shitposts will not be counted and rejected posts likely appear in any boards, not only in off-topic.
I don't think anyone is hunting for merit in the Off-topic section. Almost nobody with good reputation is checking the section regularly. The majority of those posting there are for to gain activity and to spam posts for their signatures campaigns.
Of course there are good discussions there and I've seen regular members posing like OgNasty and Vod.
There are good topics in Off-topic. Sometimes moderators move good topics to that board, and if users who posted in those topics before it moved to Off-topic board, they will see those topics when they check "Show new replies to your posts". I agree that there are less interests in that board, nevertheless.
I don't think any of those shitposters will move to the main sections to shitpost, it won't take long before they get banned.
Their dumb posts will be reported, but I see shitposters make their merit-hunting posts around (with low quality, of course).
