But he did answer your question. You wrote:

Do you have suggestions for either: a. dealing with it b. getting people to answer the right question

And Artaxerxes wrote:

One thing you could do as an example is some variation of "oh sorry, I must have phrased the question poorly, I meant (the question again, perhaps phrased differently or with more detail or with example answers or whatever)".

Isn't that an answer to your point b?