Would Those Who Oppose Paid Modding Have an Issue With it Being Limited to Consoles?

[RustyXXL]

 

 

I'm curious if it's an issue of principle, as you believe that there should be paid mods, or that you think it's unfair for console users. Assuming it's the latter, there's potentially a very good reason why it would be paid for consoles only, which I think Bethesda might do. For paid modding to work on consoles, it's going require a fair amount of screening from someone. This is doubly so in the aftermath of the debacle that occurred on Steam. That means you have hire or task people with going through these mods and either approving them or not. Moreover, modders will have to conform to higher standards of QC to ensure nothing really game breaking slips in. You have to realize that unlike the PC, the consoles are FAR more regulated. It's why it takes forever to release a patch on the consoles as opposed to the PC. So my point is, if there is going to be some QC on Bethesda's part, then paid mods make sense to help cover that cost. After all, Bethesda is a business and not a charity and there not giving away mods on the console for free.

 

 

No, it's neither of those. I really don't care about console modding all that much, and as a modder myself without additional incentives I won't be using Bethesda.net, and by extension offer my work to console users, for various reasons I already explained elsewhere.

 

First off: the screening procedure you mentioned already has to happen for bethesda.net, thus a seperate screening of mods for consoles is obsolete. Bethesda themselves stated somewhere that they won't allow illegal and/or nsfw mods on bethesda.net, regardless of the system they are used on.

 

If you add paid modding for all systems, you will end up with 2 groups in general.

1. those users and modders who support paid modding

2. those users and modders who don't support paid modding

1 of those groups will be opposed to what you are doing.

 

if you add paid modding only for consoles you will have the following groups.

1. those users and modders that support paid modding

2. those users and modders that don't support paid modding

3. those modders that fear paid modding will come to pc later

4. those modders that want to get paid modding to the pc

5. those pc users envious of the pervieved or real higher quality of paid modding on consoles

6. those console users, that are envious of everything being free on the pc

... (those that I did forget)

at least 4 more groups of people tha potentially get antagonized by your actions.

 

so in short splitting paid modding up in consoles vs pc is just calling out for troubles. the KISS-Principle should be used here.

 

TL;DR: Either antagonize one group or the other, whatever you think is best, but don't needlessly create new groups that potentially antagonize you. Thats just plain stupid.

[Guest Messenjah]

Being a long term modder, who has spent years designing mods, here is some food for thought:

 

 

1. Less honest folks would label themselves as a mod author and upload blank files with a nice screenshot to dupe people into purchasing their "mod".

 

2. It would be difficult to divide profit between multiple mod authors who work on a single project. I can see legal battles resulting over this. In a single project, I may have 6 voice actors who show up and do their job, another 10-15 or more that sort-of contribute but never send completed files or finish acting, another 3-4 people who contribute assets because they sign up to work as a mesh artist but only complete one model and give up, another 2-3 animators due to the same problem as previously mentioned, about 5 or so authors at deviant art, for borrowing art for paintings/posters etc, a few music authors, possibly may have to pay royaltees to other 3rd person parties for sound/music, and on and on.

 

3. Difficult to divide profit between the primary mod author and those who contribute or otherwise allow borrowing of assets from their own mod or otherwise, to be used in a larger project. In other words, you are working on a large quest mod, you ask your friend Bob to make models. Bob makes one really nice model for the project and never shows up again to work on the mod for the next year, but you need that model. Now you get paid for the mod, but Bob needs to get paid too. Oh wait, you have been on this for over a year. Not only is it Bob, but about 10 other people as well that need to get paid.

 

4. Bethesda will likely take 75% or greater of the profit, just like they attempted with Skyrim, while 25% or less will make it's way to the author or will be split between it's authors.

 

5. Due to infighting between mod authors, mod authors will no longer share their work with other modders for use, and many larger projects will get scrapped. Most of the time, a single author on a "team" will carry the rest. It is sometimes difficult for that person to voice multiple characters, create 3D models/animations from scratch, perform all programming/scripting, all story boarding, and all cell design, sound, music, etc.

 

In short, paid modding would result in; dishonest posers that dupe consumers into purchasing by false advertisement, constant legal battles dividing royaltees, a less sharing, open, and overall friendly community. Modding works because it is FREE.

[RustyXXL]

Being a long term modder, who has spent years designing mods, here is some food for thought:

 

 

1. Less honest folks would label themselves as a mod author and upload blank files with a nice screenshot to dupe people into purchasing their "mod".

 

2. It would be difficult to divide profit between multiple mod authors who work on a single project. I can see legal battles resulting over this. In a single project, I may have 6 voice actors who show up and do their job, another 10-15 or more that sort-of contribute but never send completed files or finish acting, another 3-4 people who contribute assets because they sign up to work as a mesh artist but only complete one model and give up, another 2-3 animators due to the same problem as previously mentioned, about 5 or so authors at deviant art, for borrowing art for paintings/posters etc, a few music authors, possibly may have to pay royaltees to other 3rd person parties for sound/music, and on and on.

 

3. Difficult to divide profit between the primary mod author and those who contribute or otherwise allow borrowing of assets from their own mod or otherwise, to be used in a larger project. In other words, you are working on a large quest mod, you ask your friend Bob to make models. Bob makes one really nice model for the project and never shows up again to work on the mod for the next year, but you need that model. Now you get paid for the mod, but Bob needs to get paid too. Oh wait, you have been on this for over a year. Not only is it Bob, but about 10 other people as well that need to get paid.

 

4. Bethesda will likely take 75% or greater of the profit, just like they attempted with Skyrim, while 25% or less will make it's way to the author or will be split between it's authors.

 

5. Due to infighting between mod authors, mod authors will no longer share their work with other modders for use, and many larger projects will get scrapped. Most of the time, a single author on a "team" will carry the rest. It is sometimes difficult for that person to voice multiple characters, create 3D models/animations from scratch, perform all programming/scripting, all story boarding, and all cell design, sound, music, etc.

 

In short, paid modding would result in; dishonest posers that dupe consumers into purchasing by false advertisement, constant legal battles dividing royaltees, a less sharing, open, and overall friendly community. Modding works because it is FREE.

 

1. Less honest politicians accept money from companies to push their agendas. Less honest Policemen accept bribes from criminals. Less honest doctors care more about collecting money then treating patients, and thus recommend treatments that maximize profits over treatments that help the patient. Lets get rid of politics, the police and doctors and hospitals.

 

2. if you plan on earning money with your mods, plan on how to solve these problems before starting. That's how business works, and every company has to do that s#*!, or else they will face bankrupcy and legal measures. If you don't want to deal with that make free mods.

 

3. If you don't tell bob beforehand that you plan on making money with your mod, and expect results, and clear all that stuff beforehand, stick to free modding.

 

4. The last time there was a third party involved. While I agree that bethesda will try to maximize their profits, and while I agree that in general I don't trust Bethesda with these kind of decisions, it's still each modders choice if they want to work under these conditions, and when they make the wrong decision, the whole concept will break down on itself, and be another fail. So no need to worry before any kind of details are known.

 

5. Yeah, those groups will break up, reform, some will leave modding other new modders will start modding, pretty much the same as each time when someone has pronounced the death of modding. This is seriously getting old.

 

In short, free modding wouldn't be all that much affected by paid modding, and will continue to exist, some of the more dishonest types will try to abuse the system as everywhere else in the world, and some modders will have to learn the hard way what it means to get your business strategies sorted out. And all the naysayers and end of times prophets will do their best to paint the future in the bleakest colors they can find, to attract the largest crowd of followers. Same old, same old.

[danteinferno101]

I have not and would not now or ever pay for a mod. I have found from past experience that people post art of various types in order to generate interest in their work, establish credibility in the arts community, or attract the interest of a patron. This is just part of what happens when you set out to make a living as an artist no matter what the medium

[Aeradom]

 

 

 

I'm curious if it's an issue of principle, as you believe that there should be paid mods, or that you think it's unfair for console users. Assuming it's the latter, there's potentially a very good reason why it would be paid for consoles only, which I think Bethesda might do. For paid modding to work on consoles, it's going require a fair amount of screening from someone. This is doubly so in the aftermath of the debacle that occurred on Steam. That means you have hire or task people with going through these mods and either approving them or not. Moreover, modders will have to conform to higher standards of QC to ensure nothing really game breaking slips in. You have to realize that unlike the PC, the consoles are FAR more regulated. It's why it takes forever to release a patch on the consoles as opposed to the PC. So my point is, if there is going to be some QC on Bethesda's part, then paid mods make sense to help cover that cost. After all, Bethesda is a business and not a charity and there not giving away mods on the console for free.

 

 

No, it's neither of those. I really don't care about console modding all that much, and as a modder myself without additional incentives I won't be using Bethesda.net, and by extension offer my work to console users, for various reasons I already explained elsewhere.

 

First off: the screening procedure you mentioned already has to happen for bethesda.net, thus a seperate screening of mods for consoles is obsolete. Bethesda themselves stated somewhere that they won't allow illegal and/or nsfw mods on bethesda.net, regardless of the system they are used on.

 

If you add paid modding for all systems, you will end up with 2 groups in general.

1. those users and modders who support paid modding

2. those users and modders who don't support paid modding

1 of those groups will be opposed to what you are doing.

 

if you add paid modding only for consoles you will have the following groups.

1. those users and modders that support paid modding

2. those users and modders that don't support paid modding

3. those modders that fear paid modding will come to pc later

4. those modders that want to get paid modding to the pc

5. those pc users envious of the pervieved or real higher quality of paid modding on consoles

6. those console users, that are envious of everything being free on the pc

... (those that I did forget)

at least 4 more groups of people tha potentially get antagonized by your actions.

 

so in short splitting paid modding up in consoles vs pc is just calling out for troubles. the KISS-Principle should be used here.

 

TL;DR: Either antagonize one group or the other, whatever you think is best, but don't needlessly create new groups that potentially antagonize you. Thats just plain stupid.

 

 

And by incentive, you mean being paid? As that's what we're discussing. Also that is not the screening I'm referring to. Yes there is the initial one that makes sure that the mods are family friendly and not going to get Bethesda sued. And this sort of system works fine for PCs where the ecosystem is more open and you can really do what you want as there's very little consequences for Bethesda. However, assuming the worse case scenario and Bethesda just copy and pastes the steam workshop into the consoles, there not only going to get backlash from consumers, but the console makers themselves as they would be breaking them. Believe it or not, every game that gets released to consoles has to be screen and approved by someone. I'm sure at times it's a simple check, but other times it could be. Not only do the games get screened, but also the patches, which is why consoles lag behind the PC when getting updates.

 

Finally, that stuff at the end of your post is, as you say "just plain stupid". The reason being because that's already an issue for paid modding on the PC! Don't believe me, let me show you:

 

1. Those that support paid mods altogether

2. Those who support paid mods but only through donations

3. Those who support paid mods as long as it doesn't effect pre-existing mods

4. Those who support paid mods but didn't support the Steam system

5. Those who support paid mods IF the revenue split is fair

6. Those who support paid modes IF after a time they release them for free

.... (and many more)

 

And that's not even going to all those who oppose free mods for an equally wide variety. In the end, what you and I are just doing is just throwing in caveats to try and inflate the issue. This is just about this issue either, this is common throughout politics. In fact, I dare you to find an issue that is black and white, you aren't going to. But as far as the subject of paid modding goes, in the end it does boil down to one thing; do you believe modders should be paid for their work or not? After that, most people will say "Yes, if..." or "No, butt.." however it all goes back to that core issue.

 

 

Being a long term modder, who has spent years designing mods, here is some food for thought:

 

 

1. Less honest folks would label themselves as a mod author and upload blank files with a nice screenshot to dupe people into purchasing their "mod".

 

2. It would be difficult to divide profit between multiple mod authors who work on a single project. I can see legal battles resulting over this. In a single project, I may have 6 voice actors who show up and do their job, another 10-15 or more that sort-of contribute but never send completed files or finish acting, another 3-4 people who contribute assets because they sign up to work as a mesh artist but only complete one model and give up, another 2-3 animators due to the same problem as previously mentioned, about 5 or so authors at deviant art, for borrowing art for paintings/posters etc, a few music authors, possibly may have to pay royaltees to other 3rd person parties for sound/music, and on and on.

 

3. Difficult to divide profit between the primary mod author and those who contribute or otherwise allow borrowing of assets from their own mod or otherwise, to be used in a larger project. In other words, you are working on a large quest mod, you ask your friend Bob to make models. Bob makes one really nice model for the project and never shows up again to work on the mod for the next year, but you need that model. Now you get paid for the mod, but Bob needs to get paid too. Oh wait, you have been on this for over a year. Not only is it Bob, but about 10 other people as well that need to get paid.

 

4. Bethesda will likely take 75% or greater of the profit, just like they attempted with Skyrim, while 25% or less will make it's way to the author or will be split between it's authors.

 

5. Due to infighting between mod authors, mod authors will no longer share their work with other modders for use, and many larger projects will get scrapped. Most of the time, a single author on a "team" will carry the rest. It is sometimes difficult for that person to voice multiple characters, create 3D models/animations from scratch, perform all programming/scripting, all story boarding, and all cell design, sound, music, etc.

 

In short, paid modding would result in; dishonest posers that dupe consumers into purchasing by false advertisement, constant legal battles dividing royaltees, a less sharing, open, and overall friendly community. Modding works because it is FREE.

 

1. Less honest politicians accept money from companies to push their agendas. Less honest Policemen accept bribes from criminals. Less honest doctors care more about collecting money then treating patients, and thus recommend treatments that maximize profits over treatments that help the patient. Lets get rid of politics, the police and doctors and hospitals.

 

2. if you plan on earning money with your mods, plan on how to solve these problems before starting. That's how business works, and every company has to do that s***, or else they will face bankrupcy and legal measures. If you don't want to deal with that make free mods.

 

3. If you don't tell bob beforehand that you plan on making money with your mod, and expect results, and clear all that stuff beforehand, stick to free modding.

 

4. The last time there was a third party involved. While I agree that bethesda will try to maximize their profits, and while I agree that in general I don't trust Bethesda with these kind of decisions, it's still each modders choice if they want to work under these conditions, and when they make the wrong decision, the whole concept will break down on itself, and be another fail. So no need to worry before any kind of details are known.

 

5. Yeah, those groups will break up, reform, some will leave modding other new modders will start modding, pretty much the same as each time when someone has pronounced the death of modding. This is seriously getting old.

 

In short, free modding wouldn't be all that much affected by paid modding, and will continue to exist, some of the more dishonest types will try to abuse the system as everywhere else in the world, and some modders will have to learn the hard way what it means to get your business strategies sorted out. And all the naysayers and end of times prophets will do their best to paint the future in the bleakest colors they can find, to attract the largest crowd of followers. Same old, same old.

 

When I first created this thread, I did so with the intention of finding SOME common ground. I admit, perhaps that was foolish but it just seems to me that assuming Bethesda does this right (which I grant is a huge IF, but if we're not going to assume that then this argument is moot as no one will support it), the console mod market is going to have to be rather vigorously maintained. If that's the case, free modding on the PC will continue and be encouraged as said mods will be glorified beta tests to work out the kinks. Then when they are as bug free as possible, it will get added to the console marketplace for consumers to pick up. And since mods have never had been on the consoles, nothing is being taken away.

 

Then I see a post like this (first one) that is full of assumptions and fear mongering. Rusty countered every one of your points so I'm not gonna bother doing the same, suffice to say that all the things you were brought up could be handled if you really wanted to. But the thing is, I don't think you want to because you think mods should always be free and will never pay for mods no matter what. And that's fine, you are certainly entitled to your opinion. But just come out and say it, is all I'm asking.

Edited April 27, 2016 by Aeradom

[Aeradom]

Edit: Merged with previous post as I thought there was a character limit.

Edited April 27, 2016 by Aeradom

[dspeed]

This is an unfair question.

 

I would support highly moderated paid modding which only allowed DLC/quest heavy expansions to be purchased.

 

I wouldn't support no-moderation paid modding for some intermediate currency where every gimp with Blender wants to sell you Deathclaw armor for $200.

 

It's a nuanced argument and not as simple as yes or no.

[RustyXXL]

 

[...]

 

Yes, you are right, that wasn't my best argumentation, and it didn't bring my original point across that I meant to bring up. I guess I knida lost myself while writing.

Let me try again to explain te point I meant, maybe this time it's clearer.

 

With paid modding you have basically those that are pro, those that are contra, and those that are indifferent, or simply don't care.

Now bringing in a disparity between consoles and PC, 2 systems that tend to have a rather vocal set of fans, that tend to bash each other for much less reasons than paid or free mods, you run in the danger of antagonizing groups that belonged to the "we don't care" faction, or just use this disparity in their very vocal "war of the systems". This can be a very dangerus path, were it's likely that additional big youtubers pick a popular side, hurting your reputation in the end more, than if you "just" said Okay, paid modding is a thing now, but this time we massively improved the system.

I hope this was clearer. Of course it is still speculatively, but seeing how the last try went down and all the bashing in either direction that happened, I don't think this is to far fetched, and has a good chance happening, if beth isn't very careful on how to attempt paid modding the next time.

[tartarsauce2]

microtransactions are a scourge and destroy every community they're in pretty much
now - that and my general disdain for monetizing otherwise free hobbyist communities aside...


I was talking with a friend on the phone about an idea I had to agregate various mods, have bethesda scrub through them, clean them up a little bit, bugtest/fix them, then put them together into a DLC that's actually notable in size - paying based on contribution via a portion or % per every 50-100 units sold (instead of calculating for every unit in real time - might screw someone over 5 dollars but I'm not entirely sure that matters if you can get a DLC that'll sell thousands of units - might be overthinking this aspect a bit, just an idea)

would also probably appeal to console people more because it's "one buy, simple to grab"
but they said the legal department would say no to that, my only thought was "tell the legal department to shut up and do their job not interfere with marketing"
:ninja:
I don't know if people have any understanding of what this as a business would take with a large corporation, liability is a serious issue in fact, that's why I said give it to bethesda to scrub, this starts getting into contractual obligations and so on territory though
and if you try to short around it by doing it with already existing mods you get redundancy issues and the negative PR of taking things away from the community at large to sell things (if the mod is good enough to garner community approval it's probably not really able to be improved on much further which takes away from the things bethesda could do to make a release version of theirs better enough to get people really interested in actually buying - wasteland workshop's situation is an example in a sense of this issue - I'll be buying it myself later regardless though, once I've got enough money after paying bills to eat as well)

I grew up with a parent who did contracts as a programmer for a living and worked at home a lot, he doesn't do contract work anymore, he works for a company, it's a lot simpler and safer for him monetary wise
so there's a lot of issues with the entire idea of paid mods to begin with
said person worked on some pretty big stuff too which I don't want to say in case any of it is something I'm not supposed to talk about, was mostly about databases, if they're facing the issue then modders will too, sorry

make no mistake, I want to get good at modding so I can make a portfolio of work and start making games for a living or something down the line, or at least programming - myself
but I seriously doubt that aside from content modders (people that put in new skins etc) that this paid mods thing would do a lot, fact is bethesda's sales points are generally speaking the creation kits + the large worlds, they bank on loyalty in a sense, this is exactly the wrong thing to be trying to get rich quick off of, it'll screw the entire relationship up - look at blizzard's desperation with WoW for instance, and what that fiasco with so much of diablo and starcraft led to, betrayal is not forgotten quickly - and reputation is king

Edited April 28, 2016 by tartarsauce2

[slapdashbr]

microtransactions are a scourge and destroy every community they're in pretty much

 

...

 

I grew up with a parent who did contracts as a programmer for a living and worked at home a lot, he doesn't do contract work anymore, he works for a company, it's a lot simpler and safer for him monetary wise

so there's a lot of issues with the entire idea of paid mods to begin with

 

...

 

make no mistake, I want to get good at modding so I can make a portfolio of work and start making games for a living or something down the line, or at least programming - myself

but I seriously doubt that aside from content modders (people that put in new skins etc) that this paid mods thing would do a lot, fact is bethesda's sales points are generally speaking the creation kits + the large worlds, they bank on loyalty in a sense, this is exactly the wrong thing to be trying to get rich quick off of, it'll screw the entire relationship up - look at blizzard's desperation with WoW for instance, and what that fiasco with so much of diablo and starcraft led to, betrayal is not forgotten quickly - and reputation is king

 

You seem to get it.

 

Also, for f*#@s sake people, paid mods will be a shitstorm of s#*!. Look at, for example, the google play marketplace for phone apps. Because google does a terrible job organizing, evaluating, or even checking to see if any app is what it claims to be, it is full of shitty apps. Probably 90% of the apps on the play store are essentially fraudulent, either stolen IP, invasive of your privacy, overpriced for what they actually deliver, etc. The few apps that ARE good, and worth paying more than $0.99 for, are rarely recognized by the user base and their publishers have to slash prices or make them free with ads (and f*#@ that noise). *There is no way Bethesda is going to do a better job than f*#@ing Google, either*.

 

We have ALREADY SEEN from their experiment in Skyrim's paid mods, Bethesda is not willing or capable, or neither, of ensuring that paid mods are worthy of their customer's money. Even though it was an apparently important venture of their business, Bethesda utterly botched their attempt to have paid modding added to Skyrim. They *featured* mods made by content creators who had no idea what they were doing, and others who blatantly ripped off the work of fellow modders.

 

In a perfect world, could some game be a good platform for paid mods? Maybe. I seriously doubt any video game company will ever have the combination of competency and honesty required to make paid mods which aren't an unfair cash grab that ruins their games. Bethesda certainly isn't that company and if they think their goodwill will survive another attempt at paid mods, they are even stupider than I thought.