A message for the Foundry Community

iandarksword · February 2016

As many of you have become aware, Cryptic made clear during the AMA Reddit for Maze Engine that there are no plans to improve the Foundry for the remainder of the year. I expect many of you who have spent an incredible amount of time promoting and creating Foundry content to leave for greener pastures, and I can't blame you.

I'm going to remain here, at least a while. I may not maintain the presence I've been recently, but I'll be here. I plan on proudly keeping Foundry Author in my log on status for as long as I'm with the game. Beyond the game, I'll still be active on the infamous Facebook group, posting updates as needed especially any that pertain to the Foundry. I've friended many of you in-game and will miss seeing your login information as my list dwindles away, slowly into oblivion. Eventually we might all be considered something of a myth, like the Lorax.

To those moving on, I wish you all the best at creating new adventures and interesting characters. I've enjoyed helping, translating, object placement checking, and playing your quests. I have also enjoyed having your help with my own quests from time to time, that will be greatly missed. I hope that you all find a far less frustrating experience wherever you go to create UGC. I'll continue to steer new players towards your quests, even though there's no reward for completing them. You're some of the most creative and resourceful people I've come across and those traits will serve you all well wherever the road of life takes you.

So, like the stubborn lighthouse keeper, I'll leave the light on and blow away the dust from time to time. See you when your sails break that horizon.

sandukutupu · February 2016

This saddens me to no end. The last year we saw 11 dungeons removed for repairs and never returned to the game. Countless times over the summer of 2015, witnessed the developers remove and not put back. The Foundry hour is no longer an event, Rix no longer gives players incentive to play our stories, and the game itself melts into a grind fest and PvP match. Allow me to tell the authors and players my story, because there are no developers hearing our words.

I am Wendy Black, a 50 year-old house wife, who is disabled and has nothing much to do other than to watch TV, and spend my money foolishly on games. Over 25 years ago, I met and married my husband who I met playing Dungeons and Dragons, ah sweet nerds in love. In 2012, I read how Cryptic was going to launch "Neverwinter D&D" but what interested me more was the new aspect of writing and adding MY stories to the game. Neverwinter wasn't ready so I read on to find out they were beta testing the Foundry on "Star Trek Online".

I signed up for Star Trek, I don't even care much for Sci-Fi, but I wanted to learn the ropes. After making my fifth mission on STO, Neverwinter asked me to alpha test. I went every day, but all they wanted me to test was Ebon Downs. No one seemed to care about the Foundry even during the alpha test. When I reported bugs they thanked me for the ones I found in Ebon Downs but scolded me for telling them about issues with the Foundry.

The Foundry is "THE" unique hook to this game. I may as well be playing DDO or Guild Wars 2 without the Foundry. They made poor decisions on items that worked so well on the STO version. In general they broke the Foundry changing and fixing things that were not broken. Don't misunderstand, I applaud the 3D editor, STO cannot 3D edit to this day. But there was many postings on the STO forums telling them in advanced, what worked and what was needed. All the old knowledge is lost now, they changed the forums not long ago and even if the postings exist, they won't read them.

Just like Iandarksword and some of you, I will remain steadfast the optimist. Maybe Cryptic will someday learn the error of their ways and begin making changes for the better. I live in hope for tomorrow.

torontodave · February 2016

"We’re looking at some of the most frustrating foundry bugs (creators can’t test their content because of a bug with portals), but we don’t currently have plans to add anything new to the foundry this year."

SEE YOU IN 2017! @goatshark

TEAM ROCKET IS BLASTING OFF AGAIN!

instynctive · February 2016

I am actually quite devastated by this news.

I initially joined this game for two reasons: it has the D&D logo plastered all over it, and the Foundry.

Well.. this game is a lot less like D&D and more like "all the other MMOs out there" (gotta keep the instant gratification masses happy, right?) and the Foundry, for all intents and purposes is dead.

Wow. I'm actually mad.

I've been biding my time, doing a lot of Foundry experimentation and learning, and published a few simple little ones with some pretty hefty plans for some bigger and better ones.

No point now, right?

Yup. I'm mad. REALLY HAMSTER mad. But being mad won't help anything. Would a letter-writing campaign help? Most likely not.

And unfortunately I have way too much time, effort and money wrapped up in this game. I have a (small, but hearty) guild that counts on my continued guidance and leadership. So look at me, and others like me.. trapped like a rat. :-/

@strumslinger , @terramak , @goatshark , @asterdahl , @panderus (and whoever else I've forgotten)..

This hurts.

reiwulf · February 2016

it's very sad indeed. Most companies know how important is to capitalize on their added value. for NW the added value IS the foundry. it's the ONE thing other MMOs don't have. and intead of finding a way to capitalize it, they decide to ignore it to give preference to whatever other generic MMO feature they care more about.
I do appreciate the honesty though, it's been YEARS they've been telling us "we will look into it in the future" and nothing has been done. at least now we know for sure there's no plans for it for the whole year, and while it's sad, it's good to be told the truth.

strumslinger · February 2016

I feel you guys. I was there when Scott dropped the bomb. Lindsay, Scott and I were in the room pretty bummed about it, but in the end, I do appreciate their honesty. There just isn't enough time.
That being said, though an update won't occur this year, I'll still continue to fight for major bugs and feature it in community events. Not sure if it's enough, but I completely understand your sentiment about this.
I'm really sorry.

instynctive · February 2016

strumslinger said:
I feel you guys. I was there when Scott dropped the bomb. Lindsay, Scott and I were in the room pretty bummed about it, but in the end, I do appreciate their honesty. There just isn't enough time.
That being said, though an update won't occur this year, I'll still continue to fight for major bugs and feature it in community events. Not sure if it's enough, but I completely understand your sentiment about this.
I'm really sorry.

Thanks Andy... that actually means a lot.

zebular · February 2016

The foundry saddens me, rather the lack of focus on or there-of. The foundry, the lore (and the name "Forgotten Realms"), and the combat system are what drew me to Neverwinter and the latter two have been what has kept me despite the former, and what I truly desire the most in NW, continually disappointing me.

(Just to be thorough, the Artwork of Neverwinter is among my favorite also. Gotta give kudos to the Art teams!)

Please consider, "Module 10: The Foundry Reborn." Thanks.

arabatur · February 2016

When the most loyal of fans are treated like this, you might just as well switch of the servers for good.

valcontar73 · February 2016

That must be a joke...

So you have planned all the year, what to do and what not to do. Ok.

How are you going to prevent the flow of players who will left this game? Did you think about that?

Because there will be amazing games outhere this year that I'm pretty sure will grab a lot of players that are actually playing Neverwinter.

They will choose between fun or refinement, any bets what will they choose?

They will choose between same content over and over or a new game content, (with better and new graphics), any bets what will they choose?
No, don't tell me that Castle Never and the other 3 dungeons are "new" content.

You don't even create new maps for PvP, when I'm pretty sure there are some big whales pvp players. (And we offered to make them for free!)

Did you see how characters are created in the next upcoming mmorpg game? Did you see that?

What do you have to offer to the players?

Same content over and over?

Infinite refinement?

Oh! You've a shop where you can buy amazing things... but who will buy, if no one plays the game?

And your answer is: "but we don’t currently have plans to add anything new to the foundry this year."

The "only" thing that makes a difference... Bravo!

hustin1 · February 2016

I'll still be sticking around, though this also deeply saddens me. The two things that would make my authoring infinitely easier would be the ability to set an asset's size and, of course, more assets (for me, the older assets would actually be more useful). I guess I'll have to do without, though quality will suffer. Anyway, I already have too much time invested working on one of my custom maps to stop now, though I still haven't decided on exactly what the story should be. That's how I did my first quest, so I hope the model still works. And, like others, I also have a ton invested into my characters, and I still enjoy playing a few. Nonetheless, the calls from my guild members for more content keep growing louder over time, and it is the Foundry that could best fill that hole between expansions.

cushparl · February 2016

The Foundry was important enough that they used their precious time to disable its rewards.
The Foundry needs adequate rewards. The developers know that, too. ("the in-game reward structure for playing UGC needs to be as good as the rest of the game or all that content will be ignored.")
What's the point in "fixing bugs" while at the same time doing nothing about the feature's most crippling flaw?

At least the Daily Quest should be reenabled. Inadequate rewards, but rewards at least.

(Last attempt to reason. Goodbye, Foundry.)

mrgiggles651 · February 2016

cushparl said:
("the in-game reward structure for playing UGC needs to be as good as the rest of the game or all that content will be ignored.")

And people wonder why I said the playerbase as a whole won't play for story, that they want shinies as efficiently as possible.

hustin1 · February 2016

Andy, would you at least point out one teensy, tiny, glaring missing item to Scott?

THERE ARE NO SKULL MODELS!!!!

I mean, seriously! What kind of self-respecting crypt or evil dungeon-builder doesn't have a skull he can place here and there?

No single-skull models? Really?!

melinden · February 2016

It's a tough thing. We asked for them to be honest if they weren't going to update the foundry and they were. But of course it isn't the answer we wanted to hear because it shuts the door on the hope that -maybe this NEXT- patch/Mod will include Foundry material.

I appreciate that Scott had the guts to be honest with us. We all know how easy it is to lead people on because you don't want to hurt their feelings. His reward is that he is now the target of a lot of ire. I'm not entirely sure that is fair.

It's still very early in 2016 and a year is a long time. Hard to say what will happen in that time. Even this decision could change for some reason or another (although extremely unlikely).

I guess my bigger concern is this: is there something we can do as a community to prevent knowledge and culture loss? I'm not trying to be overly dramatic by using those words here, but what I mean is that we were all taught by another foundry author. We know the written materials and guides are poor or out of date. I was taught by Neverwinter1776 and many folks who are long gone. In turn I taught several of the people who are now posting on this thread. We also passed along what we considered "best practices" that weren't technical errors but community norms.

It's very likely that this body of knowledge will be lost. If, in a year, the Foundry does get updated, those Authors may be starting from zero.

Maybe it is the fact that I am a historian that this troubles me so much. I get that it might feel satisfying to say "Well that would serve Cryptic right to never have Authors as good as us again!" I think in the end that would be cutting off our nose to spite our face, however.

I don't have any answers for this, or any other of the good questions raised here. I am also deeply saddened that our work was not considered good enough to support. Because really, didn't we all dream of become Cryptic's favorite, that they would come ask us to write for them because we were the -best- Author? It hurts so much because we wanted them to love us back. Sure, it's a bit silly, but so are all fantasies.

We were pretty great though, this group on the forums. Your stories were funny, heartbreaking, snarky, and beautifully designed.

Wherever you go next, or if you stay, I wish you the best of luck.

Always your @DoctorBadger,
Kerry

torontodave · February 2016

Not to mention this is easily the most literate of NW's forums. ;D

reiwulf · February 2016

I dont think we are angry at scott. Its finally their call and we all understand that.

I think what bothers is is that the "no dev time" excuse isn't really credible, i mean it takes no longer than 5 mins to at least put the foundry 4k ad rewards back on. And probably just a few hours to add some sort of way to have a reward that helps with campaign progression.

So it is not the dev time the problem, is that they do not want to improve rewards to the foundry, simple as that. Why? Maybe fear of exploitation, or they dont want players to progress doing other content than the one they designed.

Also, a company that doesnt understand how to capitalize on their added value is incredibly short sighted, and will only end up hurting itself.

valcontar73 · February 2016

I hope you don't get mad, but I don’t currently have plans to buy anything new at this game this year.

instynctive · February 2016

torontodave said:
Not to mention this is easily the most literate of NW's forums. ;D

Oddly enough, I noticed that as well..

valcontar73 said:
I hope you don't get mad, but I don’t currently have plans to buy anything new at this game this year.

Same here. I bought a $20 gift card that will be drawn and given away at noon today to a lucky Guildmember. But that's it. I've encouraged my partner to not spend any more money on the game as well, but whether or not she does is a different story.

$2600 in the past year between us. That alone is what.. two weeks of Dev time? A lot of things can be fixed in 80 hours.

mrgiggles651 · February 2016

cushparl said:

$2600 in the past year between us. That alone is what.. two weeks of Dev time? A lot of things can be fixed in 80 hours.

Between the direct dev salary, salary for non devs (HR, PR and such), office space, etc. It's probably closer to one week.

sandukutupu · February 2016

If you are on Facebook you can stop in and say hello or just lurk. You don't have to join the group to view it. Click my siggy below and you can read what we have talked about there. Lots of opinions and lots of positive ideas on how Cryptic should fix the ONLY unique item in this game. Ironically I wrote a letter to Rob Overmeyer the Executive Producer of Neverwinter just last month about the lack of reward killing the Foundry. There was no response. I suggested they could give blue and purple items (bound to account) for playing the Foundry. Something is better than a kick in the pants.

grimah · February 2016

Problem with the foundry, the essence of its design is for offline/standalone play. Don't get me wrong, the tool is great and I had alot of fun using it. But it's target is not for the MMO gamer.

Sure, you have had traffic in the past, during the heydays when we had all types of gamers, gamers who enjoyed and played foundry quests (Like myself).

But as time grows on and the player base dwindles but and the players who are left are the ones who do not have any interest in the foundry (vast majority)

For an MMO, the custom content creator should have been PvP maps, player made dungeons with a focus to spotlight and get the company free content, not the singleplayer quests we have today. It could have been their biggest hook, but instead we got a tool that did not quite fit with the crowd.

That being said I am happy I was here for the ride. Without the foundry, my time with this game would have been largely unproductive, but instead I've come away from this having made something. Even though it will be forgotten and i'll likely never mention it in the future, but I am still proud of what I achieved, which is something I couldn't say with any other MMO, or even game for that matter.

I thank all you other authors for creating content that has kept me entertained in the past. Being creative is it's own reward.

instynctive · February 2016

It is unfortunate that we don't have a "safety net" that can be used to hold Cryptic to a higher standard like XBoxers do.

It only took three pages of outrage before:

strumslinger said:
Update: We're reviewing all the feedback and are currently in discussions on next steps. The Neverwinter team aims to provide a great experience adventuring throughout the lands. More updates to follow.

Now, I know Andy is really stuck in the middle here.. and our mods are as well. But whoever is making all the decisions has not been doing a very good job, which is really sad. This game has the potential to blow away every other MMORPG on the market.

dzaims · February 2016

grimah said:

I thank all you other authors for creating content that has kept me entertained in the past. Being creative is it's own reward.

Sure, I do enjoy the creativity aspect of Foundry creation. I also like to share the experience w/ others. This game has become such a grind past level 60, you'd think that players and programmers alike would love the concept of crowdsourced creative content.

So be it. I've got some other ideas for new quests, and may continue to challenge myself with the current limits of the toolset and playerbase for these Foundry quests. I raise my glass to you, makers and storytellers all.

richarddalamir · February 2016

waryur · February 2016

I haven't been in the game, built in the foundry, or read anything in the forums or facebook group for three months. Until today. I went from playing nearly every day, to once a week, to nothing. And I've been around since beta. Today, I caught up on all the patch notes, all the news, all the foundry posts since I left.

Frankly, when something you used to love to do causes more anger/frustration than anything, you should take time off from it. Walk away. Take a breather. And come back with renewed energy, refreshed eyes. And to keep hope alive.
... that is so hard to have right now.

I have a lot of fond, fond, memories for the foundry. The authors, the quests, the thrill of a tenuous idea taking form in the map editor, helping each other figure out work arounds for the broken bits. And I had gotten used to those broken bits, the same old tired assets. I enjoyed trying to challenge myself to make something out of the nothing I got handed. And I had a lot of fun doing so.

But I got tired. Seeing the player pool dwindle. Awesome authors vacating the premises. People's quests languishing in review tab hell. Contests fizzle out from apathy.
And now, definitively, nothing new to be added, not for a whole year. And *maybe* some things will get fixed, maybe this year. There has been no new content, pretty much nothing fixed, for what, a year and a half? Lost track honestly. But at least I am no longer teased with "We'll get to it next mod!". Thank you, Cryptic, for stopping stringing me along.

I want to echo Melinden's words. If, by some crazy bestowment of the gods, the Foundry is revamped, renewed, monetized, whatever in that year's time(or less)... the knowledge base would be nearly gone. Gone. Ground zero all over again. But who wants to update the wikia and how-to's, if no one is building quests? Who wants to update Eldarth's bug fix list, if no one is fixing them any day soon? Who wants to build a quest, if noone is playing them anymore?

I want to step up and say, sure, yes me. I want to. But...

Staying around, is it an exercise in creativity, or futility? Can I look past the futility and keep flexing that creative muscle? Do I have too much of a bitter taste in my mouth to go learn another UGC system even? Can I be big enough to let go my disappointments and enjoy things as they are for the simple pleasure it brings? When is enough... enough?

I don't know..... it's not good bye yet.... but I'll have to sleep on that.

For those that have left/are leaving, most of you are my favourite authors, inspiration, and teachers. Wherever you land, you will be missed, and hopefully our paths can cross again one fair day.

imaginaerum1 · February 2016

This is pretty much the end for me here.
I've moved on to greener pastures, that aren't infected with virulent plague, covered in rocks, periodically flooded, and owned by people who just don't care about the condition of their pastures.
Specifically, I've started modding Fallout4 over at Nexus Mods.
Feel free to look me up there if you're interested. I'm Gruffydd there.

torontodave · March 2016

They could easily have said "hey foundry guys, make us new PVP maps, we're thinking about finally listening to the PVP'ers and giving them a new PVP map.. Here's what we need: ... ... ... It will hopefully be on live by 2017"

Boom. Two communities happy in one fell swoop. A nice prize for the map creators, and the PVP'ers know that something is coming.

And they still dont have to do anything till 2017. =X

A message for the Foundry Community

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