Sanctioned Trolling

[THETRUEDOZAH]

Why does the Nexus allow modders to release unfinished mods with high game-breaking potential, who leave them unfinished for years but yet still haunt the mod page's release and ban anyone giving an accurate depiction of the mod's condition?

 

Recently went through just that, then found another game issue where I was having massive frame drops around Leyawiin. Thought I was going to have to re-install from scratch but finally found the issue was caused by a Tes4LodGen error brought about by a mod that was, guess what, created by the exact same author that just banned me for saying their mod didn't work correctly.

 

I can't even look at the pages of the mods released by this person now, even though I did nothing more than use the comment section exactly what I thought it was intended for - to communicate with other users. I didn't realize that a mod's page is effectively 'owned' by that modder and they can exercise absolute control over it. Seems like something that has an incredibly high potential for abuse, to prevent users from getting an accurate description of their mods.

 

I read the comments section of every mod I download before I install it, and if there'd been comments warning me about what I was about to experience with these mods before I installed them, I probably would not have bothered. That's the real problem, is that both mods have high potential to break the game and do not function with other Oblivion standard programs that every other mod cooperates with and yet the mod author is sitting on dead mods, that aren't being updated, are unfinished, but still blocking and banning any negative comments to this day.

Edited April 11, 2021 by THETRUEDOZAH

[THETRUEDOZAH]

We're not talking about a little mod, here. Nobody's going to run this with OCOv2 and a couple other mods they stumbled into. This is a mod with a patch that requires 5 or 6 other esps as masters, so people who get that far into modding Oblivion are going to be using Tes4LodGen. For a mod that requires all of that to give error messages and be incompatible with a basic tool of the modded Oblivion setup thus creating game-crippling performance issues while the modder uses nexus policies to block any accurate comments about the condition of their work and threatening the commenter being infringed upon with further punishment is wrong, and bad site policy.

[Striker879]

Mod authors are people, and as such they differ greatly and respond to "inputs" in their own unique ways. The site allows each mod author to administer their own mod page.

 

That said mod users are also people, and as such they vary in as many ways as there are people on the planet. They also give "input" in many and varied ways (and for many and varied reasons).

 

As you may have learned in chemistry class, not everything mixes peacefully, and what applies to chemistry also applies to people. That is neither right or wrong ... it's just how it is. Even if your intentions were benign the site moderators won't intercede on your behalf. The only advice I have seen offered is to try contacting the mod author via private message.

 

Keep in mind, the more you try to convince that you are right the less likely you will be well received. Step one is always establish rapport.

[THETRUEDOZAH]

I'm not going to contact them at all. I'm just glad I don't have to rebuild my entire game. The problems are documented here: https://github.com/TES5Edit/TES5Edit/issues/558

 

I have no idea how to fix it except remove the mod and all dependents. It's fundamentally broken, trying to use it in a setup with LODgen drops the framerate tremendously when looking in that direction from anywhere in the southern part of Cyrodiil. It's practically malware for the game, so why is it allowed to remain on Nexus and create such problems due to it not working with common programs every other mod I've used for this game does?

 

I shouldn't have to stumble into this kind of situation on a mod that's not been updated in 3 years. My intuition says omebody, at least one, has gone through this before and been banned and had comments removed by this same mod author and the mod sits there like a trap, waiting for the next person to stumble into. Hence the title of the thread, 'sanctioned trolling'. I've already written an email to nexus support, it's not right.

[THETRUEDOZAH]

You're right about there being a huge personality clash. I've never made a mod, closest I've come is some custom campaigns for TABS. However, I would never leave a half-finished project up in a public space, that I know full well doesn't meet basic quality expectations, and have the temerity to argue with people and lash out at them when they state the obvious flaws in my work. I would be too ashamed of my shoddy workmanship to do something like that.

 

Which sort of tells me that the intention of a person who creates mods that have a very high probability to either permanently leave your character trapped in a cell with uncompletable quest-chains, or fails to work with a basic program that every serious modder of the game uses and leaves the game near-broken is to troll people. Why else would a person be daily haunting a location of someplace he hasn't needed to use in three years?

 

I mean, I'm here now because I'm playing these games, using these mods and site. This person is here to catch people in his troll trap mods and threaten them with a permaban, seems to me.

[Striker879]

I'm not going to contact them at all. I'm just glad I don't have to rebuild my entire game. The problems are documented here: https://github.com/TES5Edit/TES5Edit/issues/558

 

I have no idea how to fix it except remove the mod and all dependents. It's fundamentally broken, trying to use it in a setup with LODgen drops the framerate tremendously when looking in that direction from anywhere in the southern part of Cyrodiil. It's practically malware for the game, so why is it allowed to remain on Nexus and create such problems due to it not working with common programs every other mod I've used for this game does?

 

I shouldn't have to stumble into this kind of situation on a mod that's not been updated in 3 years. My intuition says omebody, at least one, has gone through this before and been banned and had comments removed by this same mod author and the mod sits there like a trap, waiting for the next person to stumble into. Hence the title of the thread, 'sanctioned trolling'. I've already written an email to nexus support, it's not right.

 

So are you saying that the version that Sharlikran linked to on Oct 7 2018 no longer works, or are you saying that what was fixed back in that version (which subsequent posts by ElminsterAU give me the impression that it is fixed) is no longer fixed in the latest version?

[THETRUEDOZAH]

The mod causing the problems has never been fixed, still throws the same error messages, and causes massive fps drops anywhere in Cyrodiil simply by looking in that direction. It's not a problem with LODGen, it's a flaw in the mod that's never been corrected, and is not pointed out on the mod description or in the comments section, most likely because the author bans them.

[THETRUEDOZAH]

Let's say you're making a mod, or I'm making one, doesn't matter. Somebody's making a mod, wants to upload it. Fine, Great. However, known issues with the mod is that the quest chain is easily broken, permanently trapping a character, requiring usage of console or reloading previous save. Or another that doesn't work with LODGen, a basic program that nearly everybody who gets to your mod is going to be using.

 

How would you, or I, or anyone rationally deal with that kind of information?

 

Would they work diligently to correct those problems, play-test the mods thoroughly until all issues were corrected and players could download the mod and play through it without encountering gamebreaking problems?

OR

Would they sit on the nexus, everyday, 3 years after the last update for their mod, making sure to ban anyone who says anything about the problems readily apparent in their mods.

 

Seems to be some cognitive dissonance, because I know you're trying to give the modder the benefit of the doubt. It's not a complex situation, though. There's a modder releasing mods that are unfinished and game-breaking while using the absolute authority granted to them by the nexus to squelch comments and prevent users from warning other users about what their mods actually entail. Pretty cut and dry.

[Pickysaurus]

I'm sorry that you're upset about being blocked from an author's mods. Whatever the conversation/comment was it obviously caused the author to feel that you should not be about to interact with their content anymore. We allow mod authors to moderate their own pages based on their own judgement and do not get involved in such cases. If you want to get unblocked I would suggest you sent a politely worded PM to the person who blocked you to see if you can work something out.

 

From what you've said, the issue may not be with the mod itself, but with your selection of mods and tools. I'd say it's safe to assume if you don't use TES4LODGen this problem would not occur. Ultimately it's the mod author's choice if they want to update their mod to support this. So I wouldn't say the mod itself is "broken" but your interpretation is as such because it doesn't work in your setup.

 

I'm going to lock this thread as it's mainly a rant and is indirectly "calling out" another user of the site.

 

 

Within this community, you are not inherently entitled to another's time, work, or creations. Comments or posts that imply otherwise may be subject to moderation.