Please allow commenting on Foundry quests if you cannot/have not finished.

donnyth · June 2013

I've done this so many times where I've started a quest someone made, and the objectives are so vague I have no idea what the hell I'm doing. Sometimes a quest is broken or item unreachable, etc. The quest creator will have no idea how his quest is bugged if people cannot finish it and comment.

zbkolde · June 2013

Just send the author an in-game mail to their @handle. They've tried allowing reviews without finishing, but people abused it.

kamaliicious · June 2013

No, it would lead to trolling. Send them an ingame email via their handle.

izatar · June 2013

kamaliicious wrote: »

No, it would lead to trolling. Send them an ingame email via their handle.

This is silly. They can troll your email too.
Nobody is going to bother sending email to the author of a quest that didn't work.
I think allowing players to easily communicate their issues to the author is best.

kamaliicious · June 2013

izatar wrote: »

This is silly. They can troll your email too.
Nobody is going to bother sending email to the author of a quest that didn't work.
I think allowing players to easily communicate their issues to the author is best.

They could, but it won't stuff up the reviews (as if things there aren't broken enough already) if they do. As was already pointed out, review without completing was allowed, and it lasted for all of a day.

izatar · June 2013

kamaliicious wrote: »

They could, but it won't stuff up the reviews (as if things there aren't broken enough already) if they do. As was already pointed out, review without completing was allowed, and it lasted for all of a day.

What we are asking for is for review commentary, not rating. Rating without completion is a bad idea as was shown.

ambisinisterr · June 2013

I started a quest last week which looked like it would be an awesome quest but it wasn't able to be completed because an item is "out of line of sight."

It'd be nice to have an easier way to inform authors when aspects of their content is broken without rating them. However these messages should remain private and preferably not be tied into the PM System.

The sad part is that while such a system is, in my opinion, needed it will likely get filled with pointless insults due to an author purposely not creating content that appeases certain people. I.E. Not enabling the '**** line' or having large portions of the quest involve puzzles. I can just imagine the spam bin of insults now.

Perhaps such a system should be able to be author community moderated and be able to black-list players from cluttering the messages. Have some sort of community group authors could join with their own private list of players they feel are unhelpful when dropping quests so these messages are never actually transferred to the authors.

The road sadly goes both ways so some middle ground should be reached. You guys do an awesome job and it sucks to get rotten responses simply because the person refused to read quest dialogue but when things get broken players should have an easier way to inform you when they are.

redneckronin · June 2013

ambisinisterr wrote: »

Perhaps such a system should be able to be author community moderated and be able to black-list players from cluttering the messages. Have some sort of community group authors could join with their own private list of players they feel are unhelpful when dropping quests so these messages are never actually transferred to the authors.

A better solution, IMO, would be to allow Foundry Content to first go to a "Beta Review" stage of publication. So that the Author can get feedback of issues like this, but not be able to accrue Ratings or Tips. When the Quest comes off Beta Review and goes "live" all the Beta Review Comments are wiped (or made viewable only by the Author) and the Review/Plays mechanisms that exist now kick in.

Perhaps even make it so that the "Beta Review" list is only viewable by Authors.

All The Best

ambisinisterr · June 2013

Well the issue is that patches can break content.

The quest I had an issue with was a 4-5 star rated quest which others were obviously able to complete but for some reason one of the objects I needed to interact with was "Out of Line of Sight" on two of my characters: A Dwarf and a Half-Elf.

The quest well surpassed the beta stages and was functioning. Now it seems broken.
The only way I could infomr the author was to go out of my way to PM them using the messaging system. This should stop the average jerk from sending insults but it also prevents a lot of valid feedback.

vuelhering · June 2013

ambisinisterr wrote: »

Well the issue is that patches can break content.

The quest I had an issue with was a 4-5 star rated quest which others were obviously able to complete but for some reason one of the objects I needed to interact with was "Out of Line of Sight" on two of my characters

I've had to fight with this issue when I placed an object near an npc. I finally had to make the object non-collision, and put an invisible clickable object on top.

My opinion is that LOS issues should generally be handled early, and worked around to fix before a future patch breaks them. Obviously, you can't forsee everything, but you should try to do everything as straightforward as possible, in order to prevent such issues from arising.

zahinder · June 2013

Yeah, patches do weird things.

I have a quest where there is a prominent central platform (the bigger of the two Selune disks).
Up until last patch, no problem.
After last patch, the disk suddenly became no-collision, and if the player goes through it, the camera goes haywire.

(This is one reason I'm probably not going to submit any of my quests to Cryptic's spotlight, because it locks spotlight quests -- on STO there have been some crippling patch issues that end up making the author look bad from players who don't understand why the quest wasn't fixed)

wuhsin · June 2013

Yes, patches are the devil when it comes to UGC on any game. I remember back on Starcraft we used to fear them because they'd break maps.

redneckronin · June 2013

ambisinisterr wrote: »

Well the issue is that patches can break content.

The quest I had an issue with was a 4-5 star rated quest which others were obviously able to complete but for some reason one of the objects I needed to interact with was "Out of Line of Sight" on two of my characters: A Dwarf and a Half-Elf.

The quest well surpassed the beta stages and was functioning. Now it seems broken.
The only way I could infomr the author was to go out of my way to PM them using the messaging system. This should stop the average jerk from sending insults but it also prevents a lot of valid feedback.

This isn't our (as in we Authors') problem then is it?

This is a Problem for Cryptic to investigate and then mitigate against.

I would question several things.

Was what is now broken in any way changed in the Patch?
Were those changes listed in the Patch Notes?
Was the Foundry Community specifically made aware that the Patch had changed their published content in such a way?
If the item that is now broken wasn't changed in the patch and/or notified to the effect in the Patch Notes then how are we, Authors, supposed to maintain any kind of content integrity?
I know "unintended consequences" happen in Patches, but was there any real connection between the changes made and the effects they had on "now broken" content?
Was this just a case of "sloppy quality control" at the pre-launch phase of the Patch?

The Foundry is one of the "Big Draws" for this game, because lets be honest the "official content" is hardly ground-breaking and is, when compared to things like "Bonderleaf's" and "Mind Of Darkness", distinctly below average. It therefore seems to me that Cryptic need to do as much as possible to protect the integrity of not only the Foundry (Tool Set) but also the extant Foundry Content.

Releasing Patches that "break content" is not the way to do that.

All The Best

vuelhering · June 2013

redneckronin wrote: »

This isn't our (as in we Authors') problem then is it?

This is a Problem for Cryptic to investigate and then mitigate against.

If your quest bugs out for any reason other than smoke pouring out of someone's computer, that person is going to blame you no matter what. And probably even then.

Patches breaking one's quest is very much the problem of the Authors.

Not only is there nothing you can do about your quest until after the patch possibly broke it, you can't prevent such patches from getting applied. I've written wow mods, and you should've seen how many mods broke when they added taint features to prevent breaking the system calls -- nearly all of the mods in existence broke. But mods routinely break in wow during patches and new releases, too.

One thing that often breaks stuff is fixing bugs... let's say there's a font scaling issue that's been overlooked. All the foundry or mod programmers work around the issue by making their fonts extra big. Suddenly, they fix the bug, and for anyone using a big monitor the fonts are unreadably large. This type of thing happens all the time.

redneckronin · June 2013

vuelhering wrote: »

Patches breaking one's quest is very much the problem of the Authors.

Yes, but implementing communication channels between Cryptic & Authors and then Authors & Players, to deal with issues is not something we Authors can do, that requires carefully considered and implemented input from Cryptic.

Sorry, that I hadn't made it quite as clear as I should have done that that was primarily what I was talking about when I said it "wasn't our problem".

All The Best

ambisinisterr · June 2013

Chances are that mission breaking during patches are completely unforeseen.

If they knowingly break a feature they'll certainly let the community know but chances are that most broken quests are the result of changes done for completely different purposes that just happen to effect a select number of UGC. If every time they patched they listed out everything that could have possibly been broken in UGC due to the change then the list would be too large to read.

You're better off just playing through the mission and seeing if you notice any issues. If you don't then just hope a caring player will point out any goofy occurrences.

Welcome to the world of development where creepy stuff happens in the middle of nowhere. Get used to it if you plan on sticking around the development scene.

zahinder · June 2013

Repeating myself, I think this highlights a fundamentally flawed design for Foundry Spotlights.

It's just a really really bad idea to lock-in Spotlight quests, given how chaotic the underlying system is.

deimoses · June 2013

maybe add bug report option for players unable to complete the quest, make it a box with various options that can be checked indicating why the quest was not able to be complete, giving the author the opportunity to contact that user for further information if he/she wanted to.

ambisinisterr · June 2013

*Clicks Report Bug*

What are you stupid!? Too dumb to even properly implement the **** line!? Learn to script ****!
*Didn't read the description or opening text stating the author doesn't like the Golden Path and purposely chose not to implement it into the quest*

redneckronin · June 2013

ambisinisterr wrote: »

*Clicks Report Bug*

What are you stupid!? Too dumb to even properly implement the **** line!? Learn to script ****!
*Didn't read the description or opening text stating the author doesn't like the Golden Path and purposely chose not to implement it into the quest*

Suggesting that there is no point in implementing something because someone, somewhere will find a way to abuse is it a vacuous cop-out.

Everyday people are abusing/exploiting parts of this game's code, but you don't advocate shutting the game down.

If we all lived by the "can't do it, someone might abuse it" ethos you seem to be promoting then no games, much less MMO games, would ever have been launched.

All The Best

ambisinisterr · June 2013

What I am pointing out is the necessity of the system to be mitigated.

Honestly the vast amount of players who drop quests were the ones making ridiculous comments like that which is why, despite the issues it causes, it's almost good to not allow players who drop quests to send feedback to the authors.

Getting hundreds to thousands of those comments from people who dropped the quest will cause authors to stop reading the feedback to avoid unnecessary grief. Most people who drop quests, in all honesty, do not give valuable feedback to improve it to begin with. Without some way to prevent the spam authors would find it more troublesome than helpful.

siderax · June 2013

ambisinisterr wrote: »

*Clicks Report Bug*

What are you stupid!? Too dumb to even properly implement the **** line!? Learn to script ****!
*Didn't read the description or opening text stating the author doesn't like the Golden Path and purposely chose not to implement it into the quest*

Personally, I can deal with this kind of stupid report, by ignoring them.
But on the other hand, even if it's one or two report like explaining why somebody just drop my quest (broken, too hard etc...), it will be a big help to improves/repair my quest.

redneckronin · June 2013

ambisinisterr wrote: »

What I am pointing out is the necessity of the system to be mitigated.

Honestly the vast amount of players who drop quests were the ones making ridiculous comments like that which is why, despite the issues it causes, it's almost good to not allow players who drop quests to send feedback to the authors.

Getting hundreds to thousands of those comments from people who dropped the quest will cause authors to stop reading the feedback to avoid unnecessary grief. Most people who drop quests, in all honesty, do not give valuable feedback to improve it to begin with. Without some way to prevent the spam authors would find it more troublesome than helpful.

For the record, and I have no idea if this is WAI, but because of something going on at home I just had to drop a Foundry Quest midway. The moment I abandoned the quest, I got the "You have completed Quest XYZ and may now review it" message, and the Review Box popped up.

Now, I didn't use it, because I haven't completed the quest yet.

But the option was there.

All The Best

zbkolde · June 2013

redneckronin wrote: »

...

But the option was there.

...

It really wasn't. If you would have clicked "Review," you would get a message saying you cannot review it because you didn't complete it.

zahinder · June 2013

People are free to comment on spotlight threads and use mail.

I've done that on missions where I've been blocked. Sometimes authors are receptive, sometimes not.

zbkolde · June 2013

zahinder wrote: »

... Sometimes authors are receptive, sometimes not.

Exactly. I've sent and received in-game mail about foundry quests, and have made some new friends doing so. Some of them i still keep in touch with about our quests, what we've done, what we're working on next, et cetera. I can see how it could be a bother to some people under some circumstances, but for me it's been a help for both my quest and my favorites by other authors.

zahinder · June 2013

Whereas some authors are HIGHLY defensive about anyone not appreciating their arte.

The challenge of Foundry is that an author needs a lot of different skills to be good -- visual design (lighting, modeling, creative use of details and effects), various writing skills (including pacing, dialog, economy of phrase, character development), very light coding skills (logic, creatively thinking around Foundry obstacles, using the quirks of the system and dialog).
Among those skills are attitudinal ones -- perspective, taking criticism well, integrating feedback judiciously (some feedback is worth using, some isn't, and determining this is a skill), and the ability to delete stuff that doesn't add to the story (this is perhaps the hardest creative skill -- deletion).

mrthebozer · June 2013

So far, at least for me (and yes, I'm going off only one quest here, so there are definitely users here who can speak from more experience), forum PMs and in-game emails have been the most reliable source of help in these cases. However, I can see how some form of directly linked reporting system would be a far more convenient user experience.

As others have said, this is open to tons of abuse. I've had one or two people wade through my 40ish minute adventure just to leave me some less than helpful words. They don't phase me, but I appreciate the gate keeping all but the most dedicated of trolls off my lawn.

With all that in mind - has anyone yet suggested a "mission drop feedback" UI form using radio buttons? Something where only the author would see the feedback, and does not allow text input. Just a list of the most common reasons for dropping.

quest objective obstructed/unreachable
fell off the map
combat balance issues/my cleric keeps dying
too long (I'd never use this one, and probably ignore it regarding my own work, but hey, it is a common reason.)
other reasons I can't think of right now

Followed by "To leave a more detailed description of the issue, please email the author at (author_handle) (If you want to get really crazy, give the author the option to hide this last part when publishing)

I think this would open up a few options while limiting the potential for *self-censoring*-baggery. The lack of specifics regarding the issue isn't ideal, but it would be a good starting point for the author's own troubleshooting if a lot of people drop for the same reason. Some people might use the email prompt for their own malicious purposes, but as our handles are already plastered all over the quest information, I don't see it being much of a change from how things are now, and it points people who want to be extra helpful in the right direction.

Thoughts? Also, am I totally ripping off someone else's idea and just didn't look hard enough first?

ambisinisterr · June 2013

I mentioned that a few pages back mrthebozer,

As you said and I've pointed out, it removes the gate that prevents the trolls from entering your lawn.

I simply think the good comments will be lost amongst the massive amounts of troll comments which will do nothing but hurt even the authors with the thickest skin.

I'm all for adding a private dropped quest feedback section but I believe groups of authors should be able to moderate those responses. If somebody plays your quest and gives a useless dropped quest response it's unlikely that they'll play your quest again but it's likely that they'll do the same thing to other authors.

Simply allowing authors to make their own individual lists of players to ignore I don't think would help the situation to make the feedback from that system overly useful. I believe authors should be able to form groups that can choose to blacklist unhelpful dropped quest reviews to save them unnecessary grief.

deimoses · June 2013

ambisinisterr wrote: »

*Clicks Report Bug*

What are you stupid!? Too dumb to even properly implement the **** line!? Learn to script ****!
*Didn't read the description or opening text stating the author doesn't like the Golden Path and purposely chose not to implement it into the quest*

My suggestion has nothing to do with allowing a text area like the review does, but a check list of common bugs or issues the player might have,

such as

*Items required to complete the quest being out of sight.
*Required items not droping or available.
*Dialog not advancing or completing quests
*Mob difficulty
*Mob placement

or any other possible reason someone might have abandoned the quest.

ambisinisterr · June 2013

That could work.