Keep it simple
Is it possible to simply reply to a post rather than quote it? Sometimes there are two or three quotes in that one quote and it makes for an unnecessarily long thread to wade through. I understand when there have been several other replies are between so it would be unclear what the reply relates to. The @ works too. Would cut out a lot of scrolling.
Above all, be kind!
I sometimes quote to keep things in context, especially if the post I'm replying to was several comments earlier, but you're absolutely right. Once you hit quote you can go in and delete out a lot of what's in there (like responses and quotes from 3 different posts) and just leave the part that puts it all in context.