Will you make it possible for players to monetize work on modules, PW's, custom content and whatnot?
superfly2000
Member Posts: 76
This time perhaps you can struggle more to get this option?
I mean, somehow...it should be possible, right?
It would be huge for the game I think. I mean, just imagine, if the players did all that last time...imagine what some of them (naturally not all) could do if there was monetary gain possible as well :-o
I mean, somehow...it should be possible, right?
It would be huge for the game I think. I mean, just imagine, if the players did all that last time...imagine what some of them (naturally not all) could do if there was monetary gain possible as well :-o
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If a new work is commissioned on a professional, commercial basis from the outset, no problem.
However, most community-made work depends on countless small components made by other fans. That's a bottomless can of worms for the lawyers. Most people generously give their work on open source terms. That friendly behaviour can quickly turn petty if there's a sniff of money in the air. We've seen that before.
I also seem to remember Steam got into hot water
So I'd rather there was no talk of monetisation or adoption of amateur works.
I could sell my services (And do) to professional companies from time to time. But I do them for this community for free, because at the end of the day it's something I genuinely like doing to help people out. It helps me hone my skills which I could sell elsewhere, builds my portfolio of knowledge and experience, and most importantly contributes to the community that I enjoy being a part of.
I don't have skill with Aurora. I don't have skill with programming and coding. So it allows me to help out in my own way with organizational skills, project management skills, and helping facilitate the jobs of others. I am also good at collecting and using information in a meaningful way.
Honestly? I'd suggest instead that content creators for NWN, be they administrators who help handle organizational issues such as myself, or actual builders, coders, or modelers, put the work they do on their resume's. It's volunteer work, but I can assure you that companies look for a lot of the skills that people do here for free, and learn from their successes and failures. Use this as a platform, if you're so inclined, to try and get into game development industries, or similar jobs if you have the interest and wish to continue pursuing the skills you demonstrate here.
Donations are a completely different thing. Helping take in donations to keep servers running, and to help build a feeling of community allows for it not to hit the wallet too hard of the one needing to pay to host professional servers, websites, and additional support systems for players as an example. Not everyone can pay it out of their own pocket but still wish to offer that quality service to their players.
Also, Beamdog asking for payment for content is an entirely different thing, as they are adding much more value in a very different way and are the license holders of the current game and are doing much to add more tools and options not previously available, as well as giving more life to the community at large.
This is before we even talk about the legal issues that would surround putting servers up behind a paywall. I will leave that to the lawyers, but in general the usual response is that it's exceptionally messy as most legal issues tend to be.
TL;DR: Non-monetized, open communities for players are better than paywalls.
Struggle more? They had the premium mod program back in the day, which is basically what you are talking about. I can't even think of another game that had such a thing.
Just thinking about it makes me mad.
For those who mention this upsetting everyone, it didn't people paid for what they wanted and didn't pay for things they did not want.
Most posts I see on this topic deal with entitlement. People want the work others have for free (the same as asking for the free backwards comparability with the 1.69 severs). Often times these arguments are framed as something benevolent as if they are looking out for someone else. Such as "the developer may become upset once the work they released with an open license is sold". When there are simple solutions the first being any developer can have a license saying 'for non commercial use only'.
At the end of the day regardless if premium (paid) modules return or not. There will always be assets which the community will not have access to. There are a lot of amazing systems on persistent worlds which is not handed out to the general audience.
Myself I would rather pay some of these freelance developers to create some amazing things so they will have time to do so. This community has existed for so long off the work of those who have done fantastic things. Imagine if they could dedicate more time to doing such simply because they made enough to live off doing so. We would all be win in that case. As for those who might produce horse armor and sell it. Don't buy it. If you do not buy garbage, people will stop trying to sell it.
I think there was already a lot of waiving when it came to NWN mods which might be impacted if you monetize mods and haks. Technically without a license somehow originating in some way from WotC you cannot reproduce any non OGL content and especially not their product identities like mindflayers and beholders.
I'm not sure how it would work with patreon however since you tend to pay for work not content.
So, we are a relatively open community, and many of us are here precisely because it has that spirit.
I'm fine with Premium Modules, just concerned to avoid a disorganized commercial feeding frenzy.
Both well known and first time authors use Amazon for exclusive books. That the CEO of Beamdog worked on the original project (was lead) I am pretty sure he understands what WoTC and the law allows. It leads me to reassert the belief that the I don't want premium modules do to X is simply a straw man argument.
As @WarChiefZeke said, if you want to support a modder using PayPal or some other service is the way to go.
Now just having a no pressure donate button? I'm all for that.
Otherwise people have already stated what was needed. So many current servers and modules use work that's been compiled from numerous sources and you'd be pulling some god-awful Sims 1 mod packs where other people's work was taken and sold without compensation.
I mean, comon, lets all imagine a PW created by a company and how great that could be....but yeah, perhaps they should actually make a new game instead if they are really going to put in that effort...but again....that is kind of the sad story that in 15 years there was nothing similar made...
I on the other hand prefer choice. If any content creator wants to sell their work (aand is legally able to do so) that person should be able to do it. If the creator wishes to give away their work for free that should be their right as well.
Because some people want to use everyone's creations for free is no reason for it to be free.
If some people choose not to purchase others works, that would be their right.
It is rather arrogant to say, if you want to make money go play a different game. The owners of NWN1 has never said that (hence premium content existing in the past) so what right does someone who paid nothing (actually paying WotC for the right to make a D&D game) to tell both the party who licensed the right to make this game as well as WotC (who likely approves what may or may not be done) who gets to be part of this community or not? I
If you are using materials that exist within the vanilla NWN experience and repackage some of those to sell on your own, do you not violate the intellectual properties of the license holder for NWN? If you use any official WotC refernce material, and make money off of these, does this constitute then making money off their IP? These are the questioms that make this the sort of thing I would rather stay away from.
Nothing is stopping a person from claiming the code that you used in a module was first developed by them and they did not give you express permission to use it, or even part of the story being told, or created a character similar to one that appears in the module.
And how many people are going to attempt to monetize portrait packs from images gathered on the internet? Whose responsibility will it be to prevent these modules from making money? Even using ONE picture in any module that was not properly licensed can have legal ramifications for the creator; the host; and the parent company who did not take measures to prevent its sale.
That little checkbox from your vaguely mentioned store is to cover their ass if a product that they are hosting gets dinged with a copyright infringement since they are also making money from its sales. Without that little box, a company can go after "one of the largest companies that sells products" if someone uploaded copyright infringed material (or stolen goods) knowing they can get more money from them than a fraudulent start up.
To make Modules a creator must also agree to the user licence (under about in the Toolset if you haven't read it yet) which states:
as well as (if you want to make money)
Change Beamdog to Infogrames if you are looking at the 1.69 agreement.
If you want to talk about entitlement, what thinks you are entitled to make money off of a toolset you've been given access to for free?
Licence the engine and go ahead and make the next Witcher if you think the modules you create are popular enough to make money.
If you have a marketplace app and releases your mod for $10 then I can buy that mod and re-release it for $8 so people will pay me instead for your work.
This is what is happening if you use any of the following:
- Trademarks
- Product Identities
- Names and other references from copyrighted works
- Anything published by WotC that is not released under the OGL which is more or less only what is on the System Reference Document
- Assets flipped from other products and games
- Modifications of other people's custom content
- Anything without contract of license for use from every contributor to a project
- Anything that uses existing content released under a non compatible license
Most NWN custom content doesn't even try to comply with the OGL requirements. Trying to monetize these things just opens up a huge can of worms and would likely require some kind of negotiation by Beamdog and then restrict the things that can and cannot be made in their custom content store. In all liklihood it would be very similar to the deal DriveThruRPG has with WotC for the DMsGuild which both allows and restricts the selling and creation of D&D 5th edition content. One of those restrictions is that you cannot release material for a custom setting, another rule I think is that WotC has rights to use derivatives of your work in their products.Ignoring this is ignoring that Beamdog and Wizards of the Coast are legally accountable businesses.
If you want to see how that goes, go and look at the Minecraft modding community and how long it took their developers to actually allow the end user the privilege of putting multiple mods together and having them work together. Do you know why they accepted mod packs in the end? Because the positive feedback from having things working together outweighed their lack of getting 1 cent per click from Adfly. And that's ignoring, you know, the guy who released his mod for free, but made you have to pay for the instruction manual so you actually knew how to use the thing
I mean, if you wanted payable custom content, you'd destroy the CEP right there and then. That's just how it'd go.
Regardless Hasbro/WotC hold the rights to much of the NWN assets and are apparently extremely prickly to work with.
Not to poo on BD's work but there are far better platforms to work with when designing commercial games.
So while others may continue the strawman defenses on copyright, or mention other D&D games. If Beamdog does allowed premium modules to be included in this game again as was done when the game launched.
For those seeking to make their own premium modules I am quite sure they will do one of two things. Find what they legally may use or just as people have posted in a dozen other threads. Create new scripts which do things differently. While I do love some of the modules used in current games, I am quite excited about the graphic improvements. Several of my friends have discussed doing mods. Among us we have two published authors, two who have gone to University for programing, and one who has gone to the University for creating 3D art. I am quite certain none of us (or other groups of mod authors) will sue the others if we make something new for Neverwinter Nights.
Premium modules are a completely different thing entirely and in real world publishing it's more like when WotC loaned out several settings licenses to other companies to make content. This is why White Wolf published the Ravenloft supplements for D&D 3.5 and why they had to stop when WotC wanted to make a Ravenloft boardgame.
1. You can not compare Amazon to gaming modules. I cannot go on Amazon and publish a book entitle "The Adventures of Drittz" without having WotC and Salvador knocking down my door. A gaming module, with no vetting process can have a character, or an entire module revolve around a Drow Ranger. As I said prior, thr site hosting said paid module, the content creator and the company who gave you licence to make the module can all be held accountable if it is determined a copyright infringement took place. A person who makes a module has little IP invested, especially when using the 3rd Edition D&D rules, this doesnt own the copyright to the work they are attempting to monetize. A person who sells a book on Amazon owns the copyright to do so.
2. Premium modules are a different animal than pay to play modules. This is how it would (probably work). A company or person will approach Beamdog about an idea about a module, Beamdog will then go to WotC, the company who holds the IP of the game, if this module would be suitable for their licence. If it is, Beamdog would fund (read pay for) the module that is created and collect all the sales money from the premium module and owning the copyright to it. THAT is how Bioware did it in the past.
3. As I stated previously as well, the User licence has a stimulant that, if Beamdog likes what you've created and they put it into the base game, they will attempt to credit you for your work. So if you do find a way to make the game more beautiful (without breaking everything else) than Beamdog might pay you for it.
Well, obviously not, if the developer and distributor of the game license that content for such use. And they could have an excellent motivation to do so, if they also took a cut as a condition of allowing such commercial mod development.
I would certainly like to see that option. And while it's a little more complicated for game development, I think the analogy to Amazon is pretty apt. Democratizing the field a bit by opening it up to small development teams wouldn't necessarily be a bad thing.
How blessed we must be to have your expertise.
You must be saving Hasbro a small fortune in legal fees.