BLOG PIECE: supporting modding in totality

[Ahvaren]

In response to post #7836700.

I can answer #3! They're planning on implementing something where you're asked to either endorse or abstain from endorsing, just like what you said. I'm not sure when it's rolling out, but, uh, Dark0ne did a blog piece about it some time ago.

[FTNex]

In response to post #7836700. #7837964 is also a reply to the same post.

if the staff actually cared... well it doesnt matter because they dont.
they have shown that time and time again, so i think you are probably barking up the wrong tree. (in other words dont hold your breath)

if they actually do something that is consistent with their rules and actually helping the community, ill probably die from shock... i think im pretty safe though.

[Dark0ne]

In response to post #7836700. #7837964, #7838010 are all replies on the same post.

You seem to have a chip on your shoulder about something, FTNex. Care to elaborate, or are you just here to troll? Edited April 16, 2013 by Dark0ne

[FTNex]

In response to post #7836700. #7837964, #7838010, #7838058 are all replies on the same post.

gladly, will just get banned... but i really dont care.

you need to hear this.
i said that because it is true... between 'regular' member and the 'paying' premium members there is a rift, one that is caused not by any of the members themselves but by you and the staff at large.

not mentioning certain facts about the site itself and its dubious origins in regards to code... or the problems that causes regularly between the site(s), the forums, and software that has been or is produced specifically to interact with the site.


no this issue is one that belongs to you and the staff alone, because in regards to 90% of the members (those who dont pay for a premium membership) get banned outright for saying anything against you or anything against the staff whether its true or not... the most expedient answer for any of you is to just ban the individual (account) and it goes away (out of sight out of mind right?!) instead some come back and no longer try to post any more mods here, just creep about picking up the extremely rare mods that are actually worth bothering with out of the thousands of mods here.

that said, the crux is that when it comes to desputes on content or ideas or well pretty much anything at all, anything that could possibly show nexus or you or the staff in a more realistic view... banned. whats worse is when it is proven that a premium member has indeed (or staff which sometimes comes to the same thing) stolen someone else's work, there is supposed to be a inquiry as to what the truth is and who should be punished etc.... however the one who has the regular membership always loses to the one with the premium membership without having once looked at the scripts of a piece of work or actually even asking any questions to begin with.

that is the sum and total of the rules here in regards to the elite and the rest of the people who would try to make mods. the elite get all the rest get whats left.
your own forum archives hold the truth, including the hidden archives...

instead of owning up to your own (whatever the hell is driving your insanity) you will ban anything that threatens it... instead of trying to build a truly balanced and justice oriented mod community (specially since its been made almost illegal for people to own their own mods) you have turned it into those who fear being banned and so dont speak up ever, and the elitists who will do or say whatever because they know they can (and have been shown often enough) get away with anything and everything they want.

kinda sad that the truly gifted modders have almost all been driven away, if there wasnt a very small handful left i wouldnt bother with putting up with you or the staff and its backwards ways, or the premium assholes who have more money than brains or talent for that matter.

and with that i say, blow me!

[Dark0ne]

In response to post #7836700. #7837964, #7838010, #7838058, #7838308 are all replies on the same post.

You need to back up what you're saying with actual factual evidence.

You are suggesting there's a rift between Premium members and normal members in regards to how they're disciplined. In that I can agree up to a certain point; the reasoning is simple. Someone who has paid to support these sites suggests a number of things to me; they aren't so young and immature as to be unable to afford to pay for the service and that they actually want to support the sites. Similarly banning a Premium Member requires closer scrutiny as there are legal implications about paying for a service that you are no longer receiving. That doesn't mean we don't ban Premium accounts; I can recount plenty of Premium Members whom I've banned personally (and then proceeded to offer them a refund). What it does mean is it becomes an added factor when we analyse whether to warn or ban a member, much like we go through a user's posting and modding history when we assess what action to take. So you say Premium Members get preferential treatment, and I agree, in the same vein that mod authors who make awesome work and have one bad day get preferential treatment, or long-standing members who have a great posting record but have stepped out of line get preferential treatment. I'm not going to feel bad about this point. And if you don't like that then you know where to go.

However to suggest that a Premium Member always wins in cases where a non-Premium Member is arguing a case of stolen work/work used without permission with a Premium Member is false, through-and-through. If you've got examples where a Premium Member has "won out" to a normal member in these issues then the fact the member is a Premium Member will have been a superfluous fact in the inquiry. We've banned Premium Members for stealing content, either from other authors or from copyrighted sources. It's daft to suggest otherwise as there's serious legal implications involved.

I don't mind arguing these points. You seem to suggest I do. Clearly, I don't. What I roll my eyes at and ignore as the random rantings of people who like to make stuff up or completely take out of context for the sake of being bitter/having a chip on their shoulder are these accusations that come out of thin air, with no proof or evidence to back it all up. It turns in to this ridiculously bemusing circle of chinese whispers where someone says one thing about how we moderate, that isn't true, which then gets blown out of proportion with more un-truths in these amusing little "anti-Nexus" communities that operate on the fringes of the community. Such places are more than welcome to their opinions, and frankly, I couldn't care much less about the opinions of people who don't even use the site and have so much vitriolic hatred brewed up about me and the Nexus that I can only class as pitiful. I pity them, I really do.

Talking through how we operate and why we do what we do is fine, I don't mind doing it at all. But these sorts of discussions always turn out to be these massively over-hyped, ridiculously blown out of proportion affairs where phrases like "all the good mod authors have left" and "your community is dying because of the way you moderate" get thrown around as though they're actually true. From where I'm sat, looking at the mod author forums where it's talked about a lot and having great personal conversations with some of the brilliant mod authors in this community I disagree completely. In fact, if there's one thing I get told time and time again by mod authors about why they choose the Nexus over other sites it's because of how we moderate, and how they know we'll try our hardest to do what is right by them. So you can sit there pretending that it's all going to pot and that all the good mod authors are leaving. But they're not. Some have, and some might be, but there's plenty of mod authors still here and plenty more new authors adding their mods each day and guess what, shock-horror, they actually like the Nexus. I know, crazy.

Now I am going to ban your account. Not for arguing or bringing up points you thought needed to be brought up, which I've no doubt will be what is claimed as the reason why I banned you on the previously mentioned anti-Nexus communities out there, but because you felt the need to call Premium members "assholes" with more money than brains, after I'd given you a formal warning for the exact same thing only an hour ago. And this is exactly what's so bemusing about these ridiculous viewpoints and situations; you've broken the rules, very clearly, you knew you were breaking the rules and you've been given a warning about it, but I've no doubt that this will be taken massively out of context and changed in to "Dark0ne banned me for arguing about how he runs the sites". It's laughable, it really is. Such people with such opinions are better off on the outside looking in, for all our sakes.

[DrakeTheDragon]

In response to post #7836700. #7837964, #7838010, #7838058, #7838308, #7838548 are all replies on the same post.

And I can answer #2. It was removed by a majority voting, because it had turned into a massive instrument for 'anonymous' trolling, without being caught and without the backlash.

There were whole groups of people organizing their attacks off-site and mass thumbs-down'ing the comments of authors they didn't like or their supporters, for no other cause but spite, and thumbs-up'ed the comments which were attacking the author and supporters.

The thumbs system for comment self-moderation lost all its use in an instant, and as such it was voted away by a majority decision. You could call it 'a small minority ruined it for the rest' again, but that phenomenon is getting far too common lately to be further endorsed.

I'm clueless about #1 though. I for one was never able to delete my own comments. Could be simply because I'm not a Premium member already though.

[Dark0ne]

In response to post #7836700. #7837964, #7838010, #7838058, #7838308, #7838548, #7838722 are all replies on the same post.

#1 was a small glitch in the new moderation tools for mod authors that let anyone delete their own comments. It was never an intended feature and we fixed it as soon as we found out about it.

[Brigand231]

vipermkii, on 16 Apr 2013 - 00:10, said:

...A more detailed endorsement system could alleviate some of that "does it work?" anxiety.

Perhaps the "malfunction" here is assuming that endorsements indicate a good mod that is what the user is looking for and in their taste.

 

A mod that introduces, for example, an anthropomorphic pony race might get hit by so many users and those users are very enthusiastic and 90% of them endorse. If I'm not a fan of anthropomorphic ponies that information means nothing to me.

 

Having said that, if someone were to ask me to check out their mod and it's the mod in my previous example I will download it and assess its functionality. I might even endorse it because it was well-implemented and I could tell that multiple authors spent a lot of time working on models and rigging. The textures might be amazing and the scripting fantastic. I would endorse the file even if I'm indifferent on anthropomorphic ponies.

 

The same goes for body texture replacers, "too-modern" items, sex quests, god items and cheats, or player homes. When it comes to number of endorsements there is simply no accounting for taste.

 

Edit: If a specific mod does not appeal to a large crowd, it is very likely it won't have a lot of endorsements. That has absolutely no reflection as to its quality.

[d181sp1]

In response to post #7836655.

I'd be happy with some sort of middle ground. When checking out the mods I'm thinking about using I read at least the bulk of the comments. I want to know if there are any serious problems with it. I want to see how the mod author reacts to those claims. Those two things will tell me a lot about the quality of the mod and the creator. Will it fubar my game forever? No. Will it cause me problems with my game, sure. I'm one of the ones that doesn't back up my saved game very regularly, like hardly ever. So I like to see varying points of view on a mod and not just the good.

Mods that have no commenting enabled I won't download for that reason unless there are a ton of endorsements. Even then I'm apt to walk on by.

Point in case, there is a mod that adds a cool sounding faction to Oblivion. One that many people would be and were interested in. I'll withhold the name though. Anyway, it sounded amazing and I wanted to dl it immediately just on the premise of it. However, there were several complaints about problems with it and they were all similar situations, many identical. That tells me there is a problem with the mod. The author was aloof and kinda took an attitude of that's not from my mod, it's your fault and your problem. That tells me a lot about the mod author. Sure, that can be the case but when there are so many reports of the same or very similar problems, it's either your mod has one or more of these issues or the droves of people that took the time to tell you about it are running the same load out and that's why their games are now bugged.

That said, a comment that is just trash talking should be removed.

There were no solutions as to how to correct the problems in the above mod but I wouldn't know how to either. Most of us are not possessed of that ability. I tracked the mod for several months to see if it'd get fixed, the problem comments continued to come in but more slowly. The interest in the mod was dying and probably from the reported issues and the lack of interest in the authors responces. I PM'd the author and asked specifically about them and if there were any plans to fix it because I wanted the mod and was told that there are and never were any problems with the mod. End of message. Sucked because it had such potential to be epic. Just needed some revamping on about half a dozen points. I think if he could have made this mod he could have fixed this mod too and had something worthy of my voting for FOTM on. Instead, it went to the obscure nether regions of the Nexus.

Feedback from the community is important. So, going back to that middle ground thing how about mod authors can whack a comment but then it gets flagged for final approval from an admin or moderator? If it's not malicious or full of vulgarity or something breaking the TOS, it gets reinstated?

[jediakyrol]

In response to post #7836700. #7837964, #7838010, #7838058, #7838308, #7838548, #7838722, #7838761 are all replies on the same post.

@FTNex Umm...yeah...I've been a regular, non-paying member for years, and never had any problems...but then I try not to act like a whiny kid, and when I do have an actual problem with someone/something, I talk directly to the person or a moderator and we work through it like adults. That's what most of the people you are complaining about do, and that's why they get "preferential treatment".EDIT: yes, I realize he's been banned already, but maybe he'll look over this, and try my suggested strategy of treating the moderators and everyone else like decent human beings and they might let him back....I really need to buckle down and register for a paid account...I've definitely used up more bandwidth than the cost would cover in my time here... Edited April 16, 2013 by jediakyrol