CardTaken

I have not been closely following things. But I did decide to re-download NMM today. Thought I'd poke my head into Skyrim again. I found a .NET issue first. I guess that is on my end. So I had to search around for older versions of NMM. Which, as far as I can tell, do not show up on the main download page. Some observations: - If your goal is for the most recent releases to be used "at your own risk" by "people who want to help test the newest updates," why does the main download page only have a link for the newest version? And why is it that when I open NMM, I get a notification that there is an updated version available? (As a popup of all things.) My reaction to both of these are, "Nexus really wants me to use the latest version." Not, "Nexus only wants me to use the latest if I'm willing to deal with some buggy update pains." - I appreciate the work you put in this. I appreciate the work of all the volunteers that make this community what it is. And I don't expect professional anything. That said, I think communication is key here. Those who want to be guinea pigs for beta software should probably have a signup list or something. There are other ways to alert people to updates than using a popup. And if you don't actually want everybody participating blindly in beta updates, then alerting everyone to updates in a big way, within the program itself, is probably a bad idea. Calling the program Beta may shield you from some complaints, but if the entire program is considered Beta, no matter what version, then it loses all meaning. It's like the phenomenon where the "are you sure you want to delete this file?" prompt used to get largely ignored because it was on everything (disclaimer: my memory of this phenomenon may not be entirely accurate, but the principle of it should be intact). The general idea is: People are only warned by things that are out of the ordinary. You can still call the program Beta if you want, but I would then call new releases Alpha, even if you feel they are past the Alpha stage. The importance is in distinguishing between the two for the user, rather than the name itself. Most users, regardless of their intelligence in a debate room or in the workplace of their chosen profession, react to interfaces in the same way - that is, they react to interfaces in a way that mirrors how they react to the real world. Basically, look up the word Scotoma if I'm losing you.

In response to post #28662864. Depends on how we're defining quality. Quality in terms of scope and design? Sure, I'll give you that, on a handful. But no mod has the kind of support and bug-testing that a (good) company is going to have, simply because of resources (I say "good" because some companies botch releases and they get major flack for it). Game companies pay people to work support on their games and they pay experienced testing teams. Modders don't and would likely never have the kind of cash to do so (if they did, it would reach a point where they might as well be an honorary branch of the company whose game they are modding). I mean, if modding becomes that big, then the people doing it might as well start their own companies and make indie games.

Legality aside, the issue with mod authors *asking* for donations is all in the quality. There is a small percentage of mods that are *almost* on par with an officially released/supported game. But most are not anywhere near that realm of quality. Most mods offer: A) No support B) No (or limited) bug fixes C) No (or limited) accounting for compatibility This is not meant as an insult to mod authors. There is a lot of work done that I really respect and has given me tons of extra hours of gameplay, especially in Skyrim, which seems to be the biggest one of all for modding. But I am already iffy about dropping $20 bucks on a game that might turn out to be crap and that's from *professional and paid* developers, whose entire livelihood depends on both releasing and supporting a quality product. So sure, legality aside, if I really really like a really really well-put-together mod, I might be apt to support it. But I'm not rich and I have enough trouble deciding what games to throw money at. I know the pain of doing creative stuff for no reward, but to me, the lack of money in modding is a big part of what makes it work. There is no obligation of quality, so people can learn as they go and enjoy what is provided.

I was thinking about Pickpocket and wondering if anyone had made improvements to it (so far, my searches have been fruitless, but I found this topic, which was interesting). My thought is, rather than trying to fix the broken values, if there is some way to trigger a mini-game, in much the same way that lockpicking or hacking does, I suspect that would make it far more engaging. I've no idea if such a thing is plausible given the game setup, but here are some design thoughts on the matter: What I'm imaging first of all is, if possible, is keep Sneak affecting Pickpocket success chance in some capacity, but get rid of the whole "you need to be Hidden to have a chance at successful Pickpocket." It's so stupidly arbitary to begin with, trying to find an angle where nobody sees you so the monitor will change to "Hidden" and you can attempt to Pickpocket without automatically being detected. It's not remotely realistic anyway, unless you're Pickpocketing someone who is sleeping. Like, "Yeah, I'm Sneaking around your office in plain sight. Oh hey, I got the right angle so you can't see me for a moment. Now I have a chance to take your stuff" ??? Second: Mini-Game - I'm trying to think of something that would be both in the spirit of Pickpocketing and relatively easy to program with pre-existing assets. Much like Lockpicking and Science, item value might lock you out of trying and tell you that you need higher Sneak. So for example, if you're trying to steal a 2k cap item, it might require something like 75 Sneak to make the attempt and it'll tell you that when you click on the item in the person's inventory. One way might be a mini-game that functions like the Shell Game (see: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shell_game). You have three objects (something NV-themed that are like shells). Under one of them is an icon, which represents the item you're trying to Pickpocket. The game is not rigged at all, unlike some forms of the Shell Game. Instead, it's simply a reflex game, keeping your eyes on shells as they move and then picking the correct one (if you've ever been to a baseball game, it'd be like the animated shell games that they do there). You'd get something like 3 attempts to do this before you get caught and much like hacking, you can back out before you use the last attempt, with no penalty. Item Sneak level requirement (25, 50, 75, etc.) would determine the speed at which the shells move. That's just one idea. Again, I don't know if it's plausible. And mind you, this is nothing along the lines of a mod request. I simply figured I'd share my design thoughts on the matter, since I'm in the dark at the moment on NV's modding limitations. And cause honestly, the concept is burning a hole in my brain in much the way that money burn's a hole in one's pocket.