Modders- a moment of your time

[Riprock]

I'll be right to the point. After getting Dawnguard and Hearthfire this weekend, I went on a hunt for a few mods. I didn't d/l them before, because I didn't have the needed DLC

 

While looking, I've decided to bring up a topic that I've thought of many times because I tend to look at a whole bunch of mods while I'm mod hunting

 

It may be worth it, as modders, to bear in mind that any unhappiness, disappointment, or bitterness towards the game developers really has no place in any mod. I'm fine with the fact that you may not like the way something was implemented, I don't like all of it myself. I could write a thousand words on things that don't make sense or are screwy in Skyrim right here in this thread. I'm also fine with being disappointed that something was forgotten. More than fine with it- it needs to be pointed out.

 

But for example, I am more likely to download a mod that has a description stating "I found this thing in the CK. I made a mod for it. It looks like Beth forgot to enable X in location Y. I enabled it in this mod". I am less likely to download a mod in which the modder says in his description something like "I hate the way Bethesda did this, if you're sick of it too, here you are".

 

You might say, "well F you Rip, who do you think you are?"

 

That's a good question. I'll answer it:

 

I'm your target audience :teehee:

 

I'm going to have a first impression from your mods by the Pics you put up and the text you put into your description. That seems fair enough, right? Pics are wonderful, but the words you use to describe your mod, appropriately enough, say volumes when somebody reads it. Frankly, you won't know this unless I tell you, so here goes, and I'm being bluntly honest here:

 

If you seem considered, intelligent, and impartial in your description, if your description seems to be from somebody that wanted to share a mod with the motive of sharing, then that makes the mod seem worthwhile. But if you sound like you're airing your sour grapes and your motive is that you're upset and you're out the fix the things that damned Bethesda broke, seriously, you sound like a punk kid to me. That directly translates to the perceived quality of your mod: I think punk kids do lousy, halfassed work.

 

That's just honesty. That's my opinion based on a lot of things and a lot of real experiences, not a game or a game forum. Attitude has a correlation to quality, to some extent. Be it a mod, or a used car, performance of a job, or anything else, if I perceive the seller or provider as a punk, I'm not likely to participate if I have the choice.

 

Now yes, while I may miss a few great mods due to my opinion, on the overall picture I seriously feel I come out ahead. And this is why I've asked for a moment of your time.

 

Please consider that how you describe your mods is also a yardstick that helps the player determine whether or not to download. We've all seen it: one mod has "This mod is for U if U like MOAR GOOD PLAYING", and another says "This mod rectifies the following issues and add the following content (please see changelog and details below)" The first mod immediately seems like a stinker. the second one immediately sounds like it was done by somebody who thought about what he was doing. The same holds true, in my mind, to mods with descriptions that have things like "If you're sick of Beth doing this wrong..." That's a red flag- the motive was anger, not enthusiasm

 

So I beseech you: when you've made that killer mod, even if you hate Beth's guts all through the ages of Eternity for what they did to pauldrons, seriously re-consider letting that venom out in your mod description. It doesn't reflect well on your efforts intentions or character, and it will make me, and probably more than a few other players, think that your mod might not be high-quality. It is worth saying, if it has not been noted, that nearly all of the top ranked mods have descriptions that seem professional and thought out, instead of petulant or petty.

 

Thanks for your time and thanks for the mods

[t55]

Please consider that how you describe your mods is also a yardstick that helps the player determine whether or not to download. We've all seen it: one mod has "This mod is for U if U like MOAR GOOD PLAYING", and another says "This mod rectifies the following issues and add the following content (please see changelog and details below)" The first mod immediately seems like a stinker. the second one immediately sounds like it was done by somebody who thought about what he was doing.

 

This is probably the only part I really agree with you, and even then it's not up to us to determine what the modder does to his mod. You are not the modders target audience, the target audience is whoever he wants it to be, and if he wants to give his mod to all the people that think bethesda screwed up so be it. Secondly the anger of bethesda having done things wrong has sometimes fuelled me to get so much into modding that I almost worked for 8 hours straight. While it sounds reasonable a lot of modders do not care what you think, we do mod the game for us and anyone who thinks similar.

 

Don't get me wrong, I don't feel that modders shouldn't adjust there description not to turn people off but I have rarely seen anything extreme and I personaly feel that any description that states that they fixed one of bethesda screw ups actully makes me more intrested than bug fixes for example.

Edited November 25, 2012 by t55

[Riprock]

Please consider that how you describe your mods is also a yardstick that helps the player determine whether or not to download. We've all seen it: one mod has "This mod is for U if U like MOAR GOOD PLAYING", and another says "This mod rectifies the following issues and add the following content (please see changelog and details below)" The first mod immediately seems like a stinker. the second one immediately sounds like it was done by somebody who thought about what he was doing.

 

This is probably the only part I really agree with you, and even then it's not up to us to determine what the modder does to his mod. You are not the modders target audience, the target audience is whoever he wants it to be, and if he wants to give his mod to all the people that think bethesda screwed up so be it. Secondly the anger of bethesda having done things wrong has sometimes fuelled me to get so much into modding that I almost worked for 8 hours straight. While it sounds reasonable a lot of modders do not care what you think, we do mod the game for us and anyone who thinks similar.

 

Don't get me wrong, I don't feel that modders shouldn't adjust there description not to turn people off but I have rarely seen anything extreme and I personaly feel that any description that states that they fixed one of bethesda screw ups actully makes me more intrested than bug fixes for example.

 

 

I never told any modder what to do with his mod. I suggested that the way he or she presents it is the perceived reality to the person that considers downloading. I presented that suggestion as my opinion, many times

 

I also never stated that merely saying that a modder has fixed something is to be seen as "bad". You have completely missed the point.

 

Also, I most certainly am the target audience- I am the general public in regards to the community that plays the game- and you are also that target audience. I never uploaded any of the work I've done for games with the expectation that nobody would think the mod was intended for their consideration or use :happy:

 

You can be mad at Beth all you like. Didn't I address that, lol? But if you spew that all over your description, you'll seem like a punk to me, and I won't d/l. Be mad. Be furious. I'm not a flipping jedi master; I don't care if you embrace your anger. But if you put "Who else is sick of the dumb way that the devs..." or something like that in your description, I will pass

 

I'm sorry that you don't understand but I explained myself very well. If you skimmed through my words above because it's a wordwall, well then that also tells me that as a modder, you aren't into taking constructive criticism, and that's a red flag too. My point is that there's an entire package to your mods. You might not agree or believe that the way you present your mod is part of that package, but that doesn't really impact on whether it's true or not.

 

You can agree or disagree as you like, but that's my opinion. There's really no argument. I just ask that you consider it. if you didn't take the 3 minutes to read my initial post entirely, please do so, and think about what I'm saying

Edited November 25, 2012 by Riprock

[Grimoa]

You know, I agree. I skip mods with next to no description. I skip mods that have a description with so much spelling mistakes I can't understand it anymore. I skip mods that add "moar uber itemz for teh lolz". I just think "screw you" and close the browser tab. There's more tabs with better mods.

 

But reading this from a person who has no mods uploaded and given one endorsement so far makes me all defensive. I believe my mods have some reasonable well descriptions so I'm probably not the target audience of your little talk here. But still I'm a mod author so I can't help but feel like you're telling me what to do. (And actually you are not the first one to start a topic like this, you are just the first one I reply to.)

I mod because it's fun. I upload to share with people who like my work. If you don't you're not my target audience. I'm not selling a product here. Noone is.

If a mod with a bad description gets no downloads but the author had fun doing it he/she is probably already working on the next one no matter if you download or not.

 

Do you stop your weekly fitness exercise because noone is cheering? No, because you are doing it for yourself.

Edited November 25, 2012 by Grimoa

[ghosu]

The creation of most (not all of course, some are very simple) mods needs a certain level of skill/intelligence. These people normally manage to form a few straight sentences (except when english is not their native language, like for me :D).

 

I rarely run into GOOD or more complex mods (like armors done from scratch, new races/meshes) that use descriptions like "ADDS Ub3R armoaR to the gamez!". The chance is higher when it comes to SIMPLE things that most people can accomplish, like scaling up a chicken, raise CK values, retexturing a vanilla armor to a plain pink color and whatever - and tbh, nothing i would download so who cares for the file description.

 

Someone that spend dozens or hundreds of hours to create a mod knows that he did something special and wouldn't spoil his whole work with a bad presentation.

Edited November 25, 2012 by ghosu

[t55]

Please consider that how you describe your mods is also a yardstick that helps the player determine whether or not to download. We've all seen it: one mod has "This mod is for U if U like MOAR GOOD PLAYING", and another says "This mod rectifies the following issues and add the following content (please see changelog and details below)" The first mod immediately seems like a stinker. the second one immediately sounds like it was done by somebody who thought about what he was doing.

 

This is probably the only part I really agree with you, and even then it's not up to us to determine what the modder does to his mod. You are not the modders target audience, the target audience is whoever he wants it to be, and if he wants to give his mod to all the people that think bethesda screwed up so be it. Secondly the anger of bethesda having done things wrong has sometimes fuelled me to get so much into modding that I almost worked for 8 hours straight. While it sounds reasonable a lot of modders do not care what you think, we do mod the game for us and anyone who thinks similar.

 

Don't get me wrong, I don't feel that modders shouldn't adjust there description not to turn people off but I have rarely seen anything extreme and I personaly feel that any description that states that they fixed one of bethesda screw ups actully makes me more intrested than bug fixes for example.

 

 

I never told any modder what to do with his mod. I suggested that the way he or she presents it is the perceived reality to the person that considers downloading. I presented that suggestion as my opinion, many times

 

I also never stated that merely saying that a modder has fixed something is to be seen as "bad". You have completely missed the point.

 

Also, I most certainly am the target audience- I am the general public in regards to the community that plays the game- and you are also that target audience. I never uploaded any of the work I've done for games with the expectation that nobody would think the mod was intended for their consideration or use :happy:

 

You can be mad at Beth all you like. Didn't I address that, lol? But if you spew that all over your description, you'll seem like a punk to me, and I won't d/l. Be mad. Be furious. I'm not a flipping jedi master; I don't care if you embrace your anger. But if you put "Who else is sick of the dumb way that the devs..." or something like that in your description, I will pass

 

I'm sorry that you don't understand but I explained myself very well. If you skimmed through my words above because it's a wordwall, well then that also tells me that as a modder, you aren't into taking constructive criticism, and that's a red flag too. My point is that there's an entire package to your mods. You might not agree or believe that the way you present your mod is part of that package, but that doesn't really impact on whether it's true or not.

 

You can agree or disagree as you like, but that's my opinion. There's really no argument. I just ask that you consider it. if you didn't take the 3 minutes to read my initial post entirely, please do so, and think about what I'm saying

 

Slow down man, you can't just make a tonne of asumptions and go on the offensive, I read your post, admittedly not clearly as I have I had a headache but I never said anything that should evoke a response like yours. I agree with you to an extent but like grimoa said it's up to the modder what he does to his description. Undoubtedly your post will have little difference to any mods because modders are doing this for themselves and you are trying to tell them what to do

that any unhappiness, disappointment, or bitterness towards the game developers really has no place in any mod

.

[steve40]

The point is, the punk kids won't read your post, and even if they do, they either won't comprehend it or won't have the attention span to get past the first couple of words :tongue: You really need to consider your target audience when writing :whistling:

[ghosu]

That's for sure...if you have some kind of straight reasoning you need no one that tells you how to do that. I would understand it, when it comes to something complicated but this is no rocket science, it's basic stuff. So if you are too "stupid" to to it yourself you wouldn't understand a manual neither. Edited November 25, 2012 by ghosu

[DrakeTheDragon]

Another one of those topics...

 

While I'm all for informative, descriptive, well-written descriptions and readmes, and usually write mine that way as well, I fail to see why I shouldn't be allowed to express my disappointment with the way Bethesda again and again half-arsed implementation of certain features in my descriptions, if I feel like doing so. I don't and usually won't, although I could ramble on and on for several pages worth of well-founded complaints, but I don't see why I shouldn't be allowed to.

 

You might say, "well F you Rip, who do you think you are?"

 

I for one would never use that word though.

 

That's a good question. I'll answer it:

 

I'm your target audience :teehee:

 

No, sorry, you are not. There is no such thing.

I'm releasing my mods after I created them, because I was asked to share. I am "not" creating them with releasing in mind. "Creation" always comes first, then maybe "releasing" follows afterwards.

Once you start "paying" me, so I become somewhat responsible for what I create to you, you may call yourself "target audience". But as it is forbidden to give mods for money, that's rather unlikely to ever happen. Not that I would even accept it, if it wasn't.

I'm not even "targeting" a release, so how could there possibly be a "target audience"?

 

But if you put "Who else is sick of the dumb way that the devs..." or something like that in your description, I will pass

 

Oh, yes, please do! I don't give a damn if someone uses my mods or not.

 

Not that I would ever put a line such as this into my description, but that's besides the point.

 

 

+1 for no longer sharing my mods in public. Keep these topics coming. We're getting closer.

[ghosu]

EDIT Edited November 26, 2012 by ghosu