I'm not a met/forecaster, but over the last 10 years I've gotten to be a decent META forecaster. My forecasting rules, for other non-mets:
1) If Bob Chill and psuhoffman agree on a forecast it's likely to verify. Both are extremely level-headed and keep emotion out of their thinking.
2) There are a number of otherwise sane, intelligent and knowledgeable people, including forecasters, who are so afraid of it NOT snowing they downplay the chances of snow even when it's likely. I'll spare them blushes by not listing them, but ignore their negative comments.
3) Any forecast discussion that includes a lot of people saying IF in front of [something not currently happening or not currently modeled] is unlikely to result in significant snow. If it feels like grasping, it usually is.
4) Related to 3... if the serious posters and forecasters disagree with each other about events inside 48-72 hours it's unlikely to snow significantly.
5) Most of the big/historic storms are telegraphed a week or more out and tend to be ~locked in at least 3-5 days ahead of time.
Some of this probably wrong, and there are obviously exceptions, but it's served me well when the discussions get technical. Hopefully it's useful to other lurkers.