A question about etiquette and the workshop-
SaintPhillip
Member Posts: 59
Okay guys - By next week it looks like anyone wanting a steam key will be able to have one and the workshop will/should be up and running for testing purposes.
This is a huge opportunity to really start attracting a playerbase and having a ton of modules already in the workshop is going to really make this game attractive to a whole lot of people and really start getting some word of mouth flowing.
I'm wondering what proper etiquette is regarding getting some of these mods added in- Is it something only the creator can/should do? Is it in bad form to start transferring some of these ourselves without asking? Obviously full credit would be given but I'm speaking only of the act of downloading the modules and getting them set up for workshop.
If its fine to do this I would like to propose getting some of us together to volunteer to start doing this as soon as we're able. I'm pretty noobish with how this all works but if someone can take the time to teach me I would be glad to get going on this... With some help I believe its possible to get a nice selection of mods and pw's of different styles up there and really make shine.
So what is the etiquette here and would anyone be interested in helping out (either helping to get the files added or to teach those of us who dont know what we're doing how )assuming that there wouldnt be hard feelings for doing so?
If its okay and we can get a few people to do this for only a few hours each, we should be able to get a decent selection up right away and kind of showcase a variety of cool modules.
This is a huge opportunity to really start attracting a playerbase and having a ton of modules already in the workshop is going to really make this game attractive to a whole lot of people and really start getting some word of mouth flowing.
I'm wondering what proper etiquette is regarding getting some of these mods added in- Is it something only the creator can/should do? Is it in bad form to start transferring some of these ourselves without asking? Obviously full credit would be given but I'm speaking only of the act of downloading the modules and getting them set up for workshop.
If its fine to do this I would like to propose getting some of us together to volunteer to start doing this as soon as we're able. I'm pretty noobish with how this all works but if someone can take the time to teach me I would be glad to get going on this... With some help I believe its possible to get a nice selection of mods and pw's of different styles up there and really make shine.
So what is the etiquette here and would anyone be interested in helping out (either helping to get the files added or to teach those of us who dont know what we're doing how )assuming that there wouldnt be hard feelings for doing so?
If its okay and we can get a few people to do this for only a few hours each, we should be able to get a decent selection up right away and kind of showcase a variety of cool modules.
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Comments
speaking as the neverwintervault techadmin: this is something you will have to check with the authors of the content you want to upload. Some authors will not care, some would rather do it themselves, some might have terms attached to where and how it may be used, where it may be uploaded, some might not want to see their stuff on Steam Workshop regardless of incentives; and others simply might consider it poor form to have a third party upload their work without asking even if they were fine with the rest. It's tricky stuff.
Thanks.
Letting go like this is not the right way, but you have to get up and move and try to try things out.
From the legal point of view, the workshop means you distribute stuff. To distribute stuff created by someone you have to get the author's permission.
I'd just ask you to consider that niv's reply wasn't "never!" but rather that it just depends, and you should talk to the author.
If your personal goal was to rip years of content from the vault for a (somehow urgent) private beta release on the workshop, were you also planning to support that content where it has present-day authors? Are you sure you'd properly credit, because from this post and others, I'm skeptical. Would you link together related content, release the updates when they are out? Are you going to pass on reported bugs, and are you otherwise going to be responsible for it? If the creator decides later that they would like a workshop presence, are you going to be an aggressive competitor for their own content because you feel like you were somehow "first" ? If someone posts, "hey, how did you do x, I've been wanting to try something like that!" are you going to know where to direct them to learn more?
Of course I'm not saying you personally would be a problem, only that the vault is a collaborative community for the most part. Custom content creators share a wealth of knowledge and tutorials on how others can build on what went before, and if some members seem worried about that atmosphere devolving into something focused entirely on one-click drivebys that see the CC makers as toy factories instead of colleagues, well... I understand that, too. No one is asking you to "stop progress," only to be courteous to authors and respect their wishes. Presuming you want to keep those authors around making more content, it doesn't seem like a hard ask.
(Edit - FWIW, I don't think the topic is a bad one and to preserve a lasting community vs selling it for some clicks in the short term it's worthwhile to agree on some ground rules for this kind of thing. It's something the vault has had to deal with as well, having migrated over the IGN vault and then flipping back to "owners" when they return
In general, I'm always in favor of breaking things! It's still good to ask though. You might get more favorable results if you make it clear it is only for the duration of the beta, and others may not end up caring if you post it on the Workshop forever.
We're really going to want people's Workshop content to also be on the vault for long-term preservation, but if someone doesn't mirror it themselves, we'll need to contact the author to ask if it's okay with them.
Since the language of the request can have a strong influence on not only the answer but the reader's opinion of the "faction" the asker is from (ugh, all the Workshop people, those vault asshats), I wonder if it would be worthwhile to hash out some things we could include in such a request as sort of "pinky promises" to abide by as part of the general etiquette? For some people there's a big difference between a request that goes something like, "hey your content isn't on x site so I'm willing to do this for you even though I don't get anything out of it, you'll get more downloads and you'd be an idiot not to!" and something that "gets" the sticky parts and sets some boundaries...
My own feelings on the issue are that any author who chooses to avoid workshop (for whatever reason they may have) is only limiting themselves and their prospective audience... If they made these modules for others to enjoy then why would it matter where they were posted at so long as all documentation, credit and such stayed exactly the same? Its not as if theres a monetary reason to want to be at one place or the other- The "pay" these creators are receiving is in others enjoying their work and having the credit for the creation.
However, I can totally respect that there is etiquette here and thats why I was asking- I'm not going to take the time to email a bunch of creators and then wait around to slowly add the modules as I get responses and permission (or not)- I was more or less looking to spend a few hours or an evening getting everything I could into workshop the second I have beta access to just get a good start so prospective buyers could see a nice variety of easy install modules on the workshop.
My goal was really in just grabbing a mod or two from each campaign setting and be done with it in one sitting- But I'm not going to do it if it breaks etiquette or makes more work on myself so...
edit- lol I just reread that and I came across like a bit of a jerk- While I'll admit that I can be a jerk at times that wasnt my intention here.
And since the worst thing that would happen to me would be the removal of the "offending mod" I dont really consider that much of a backfire- Do you? Assuming I was just asking here for no reason other than to waste my time since I was just planning to go and go and do it anyhow.
And yeah- Any good intentions I had here would seem to be a waste of my time
As I no longer reference the words above please allow me to explain. The reason why Steam workshop is requesting permission of the author before uploading something there, is to do otherwise is theft. WOTC owns D&D, Beamdog owns all of the base code, however the mod creators own the additional scripts they create (U.S copyright law states that program code is copyrighted the same was as a writer creating a story. Which is copyrighted at creation automatically, filing for such sets a clear record). This means the story of a module is copyrighted by its author. This is not an etiquette issue it is a copyright issue.
I believe your idea is wonderful and to protect yourself I would ask the author. Worse case they say no, best case the module creator may upload it himself and work on some improvements or even a sequel. Knowing others enjoy your work is a great motivation to continue on.
Migration without the consent of the author would be an illegal act of piracy. In addition to take-down, authors might well lobby for other sanctions, such as a lifetime ban for the pirates.
I suspect that the Vault will remain the download site of choice for a very long time to come. There are hundreds of great modules there (many migrated under licence from IGN). Only a fraction of the authors are still active, so permission to publish on Steam presumably won't be forthcoming.
If Steam is an important promotional tool for EE, perhaps thought should be given to how Steam might direct players to the Vault for the archive material.
I wasnt asking for a favor-I wasnt asking for some benefit for myself- This wasnt some grand dream of mine to spend a day uploading mods that have nothing to do with me.
I was asking a simple question which was answered and the more this goes on the more I want to go ahead and just upload something to shatter the lives around me by showing them that steam in no way is going to ban paying customers and will merely remove the mod, and any legal route taken (lol) the result would be exactly the same- The mod would be required to be pulled down.Recently with release of Grimoire people were posting links to an actual pirated version of a 'for profit ' $40 game (to tick off the dev) and steam did nothing to them- Dont worry, I have no intention. But threats of "legal action" over this "Illegal act of piracy" and lobbying to ban someone from steam over uploading a mod are cute.
Worry not though- I have no intention of uploading, any mod at all- I have no intention of promoting or talking about any mod that isnt in the workshop-
I'm not sure what Beamdog plans to do to promote anything but imho they would be silly to promote the vault when Steam Workshop is superior in every single way and the Vault is a mess where people will find a mod they wish to play and find this https://ibb.co/co5WgS - I'm not sure thats a good promotion for ease of use modding and mod installation to a the masses.
I apologize for even asking such an insulting question as this- But let me assure you once again I wasnt asking for some favor so I could pursue my lifes dream here. I was merely seeing if it was within etiquette (spare me the legalities and leave that to actual attorneys who YOU are going to pay to take a case that will show zero monetary damages and result in just removing something from a specific site ) to get a small selection of mods onto the workshop to make the game more attractive for sales which benefit everyone who wants to see this succeed-
At this point I wouldnt place mods on Steam if I was paid to do so.
Seems my simple question has turned into some multi person lecture after it was answered almost immediately and the idea was dead the second I heard it.
So my apologies if I took you (or anyone else) wrong but it was pretty well over with the first response. Cheers.
I think having a healthy-looking workshop is important for NWN's future, but I do not think it needs to happen overnight in closed beta by people with no relation to the content they are posting, and I don't think we need to tick off the few creators left in our community to do it :P (Not that they all would be upset!) But there is also going to be a ton of content without active authors, content by authors that don't want to deal with the hassle of a new medium but don't care about their work on it (but who would care if it "felt" stolen), as well as those that want Steam to die, and dealing with all this respectfully is going to play a part in the place of creators in the larger community and whether or not this is a place they want to keep creating in.
So it's still worth talking about, to me, and this is a good time to hash out how everything is going to work. Considering my thoughts are geared more towards dealing with authors and communicating with them, however, it may be best for that conversation to take place at the vault and then move the resulting info to these forums in suggestion/advice form in a new thread, especially if further comments respond only to the OP - who very understandably is probably tired of getting notifications on this subject, ha.
https://neverwintervault.org/project/nwn1/module/lord-ravenloft
I mean, this conversation aside- People who are mod authors either use the workshop or they dont. Thats on them - I personally felt that mod authors would be thrilled to have a potentially huge and untapped audience coming their way- If they feel that audience is heading to the vault and want to keep things there- Thats entirely their right.
@Sylvus_Moonbow - As to the link I posted- You say its not 'representative'of the vault and maybe thats true but that highlights my point that the vault is a mess. I clicked a link from this subforum that listed all the mods broken down by campaign setting because I have a thing for Ravenloft. That link was posted right here on this forum- When I clicked it, that is exactly what I got and I looked at it and said...No way... That was like 5-6 rar files, a 7zip file, Xml file, html file etc...etc... I'll wait for workshop support, thanks.
Of the mods loaded onto the workshop they show how easy it is to click one button and have it installed and click another button and uninstall it. Why someone wouldnt want that (along with a new playerbase to expand your work to) reflects that there is clearly some 'us' against 'them' mentality going on or something deeper because I cannot for the life of me understand why anyone would not want that if the mods were created for people to actually play and enjoy.
For Lord of Ravenloft to be available on the Steam Workshop, the original author Kenneth J. La Mella will need to upload their module to the Steam Workshop. To make that module playable by nothing more than a click of a button, they will need to link to the authors of the custom content they use in this module.
CEP 2.6 (different owner)
RLCore Denizens of Darkness Volume 1. (different owner)
Lord of Worms Tilesets and Arbor Falls PW Server Haks. (different owner)
Someone could upload Lord of Ravenloft to the Steam Workshop, perhaps it is even Kenneth J. La Mella who does so, but if the three individual authors of the required content have not, you just clicked to install a module via Steam Workshop that is not going to work.
CEP 2.6 will need to be uploaded to Steam Workshop.
RLCore Denizens of Darkness Volume 1 will need to be uploaded to Steam Workshop.
Lord of Worms Tilesets and Arbor Falls PW Server Haks will need to be uploaded to Steam Workshop.
There is no 'me' against 'you'.
That is how Steam Workshop works. If the owner of the content has not made the content available on Steam Workshop, clicking a button to install a module but not the required hak files by another author or authors, is not going to be as easy as clicking a button.
You will install a module by clicking a button, but still receive a module that simply returns a "hak file missing" message.
Now the Steam Workshop will be great for new content that authors upload themselves, or even modules still being supported, but if any of those modules use content by an author who has not uploaded that content to Steam Workshop, a road block exists.
For much older content, one may still have to rely on Neverwinter Vault and be comfortable installing files manually to get it up and running as designed.
Its way off topic but I have nothing against the vault but it is disorganized imho, not intuitive and even someone who knows modding inside and out will find adding and removing mods far more time consuming than a noob using workshop.
I appreciate that the people on the vault busted their butts and kept this game alive for this long- And I can totally appreciate than nobody was being paid to do it and it was done for the good of the community who has stuck with NWN...But even beyond that example posted I found it really outdated and kind of difficult to navigate.
I just think all around that theres a better way now. I wasnt trying to diminish the work you did putting together that list.
Naturally when people want to play something on their free time, they would want to spend that time playing and not hunting down files and reading guides about which file goes where. I'm like that, too. If something takes too long to set up I give up and do something else.
Easier ways to find and install stuff will definitely benefit the community.
TR