Don't take it personally - A lesson to authors - TavernUGC Editorial

zorbane · October 2012

Hey guys,

Iad some issues with the STO Foundry which inspired me to write an editorial for TavernUGC. It's an important read for those of you who are planning to make UGC Missions in Neverwinter. Gotta keep those feet firmly planted on the ground ya know!

Oh yeah, the issue isn't what you might expect.

I also wrote an article on StarbaseUGC highlighting some things I'd like to see different in the review system.

Excerpt:

Alternate Title: Hug a developer day

When you?re an author you often switch between being your biggest fan and biggest critic. However, regardless of which hat is being worn you?ll be extremely proud of your work. You?ve spent weeks if not months writing the story, implementing the story into your mission and then even more adding details. Still, realistically not everyone will like what you?ve created and may leave negative feedback.

Link to TavernUGC article: Don't take it personally - A lesson to authors

Link to StarbaseUGC article: Recommendations for the Review System

gillrmn · October 2012

They should disable default 3 stars and take "mode" instead of average. That will be better.

adaram648 · October 2012

I am hopeful that, at the end of the day, people will do what they are passionate about with respect to the Foundry missions. Maybe then it will be fun to dao and there will be less pressure on what others think about the final product.

Having said that, I don't disagree that improvements to the reviewing system would be a good thing!

iamtruthseeker · October 2012

adaram648 wrote: »

I am hopeful that, at the end of the day, people will do what they are passionate about with respect to the Foundry missions. Maybe then it will be fun to dao and there will be less pressure on what others think about the final product.

Having said that, I don't disagree that improvements to the reviewing system would be a good thing!

I'm sure any changes that progresses the modules from their current system would be beneficial.

And personally, I'm writing a Campaign series. Already finished three "Chapters" (and am sketching out the fourth.) I look forward to when I can publish them in the Foundry!

adaram648 · October 2012

iamtruthseeker wrote: »

I'm sure any changes that progresses the modules from their current system would be beneficial.

And personally, I'm writing a Campaign series. Already finished three "Chapters" (and am sketching out the fourth.) I look forward to when I can publish them in the Foundry!

I am also approaching my plans as a "campaign", although I am not as far along as you. I have my first major block "sketched out". I have a fairly good idea how I want things to end. I just don't know how many major blocks will be in between. And then, once I get that figured out, how many "missions" it will take to finish the major blocks (I'll call them chapters).

I hope people like what I do; it will actually have an impact on whether I continue after the first few "missions" I suspect.

jadescimitar · October 2012

Looking forward to playing and exploring more than create but who knows when muse may strike!

tinyish · October 2012

That was a very thoughtfully written blog post and I enjoyed it very much, but...

No combat. 1 star.

tinyish · October 2012

gillrmn wrote: »

They should disable default 3 stars and take "mode" instead of average. That will be better.

If you only took the mode of the ratings than every rating would be an integer value. Your adventure would either be rated 1, 2, 3, 4 or 5 stars. There would be very little differentiation. I'm guessing that there'd be a whole lot of 3 and 4 star missions and very little else.

Also, if you had an adventure that had the same number of 3-star and 4-star reviews then you'd have to classify it as one of the two, whereas it probably deserves closer to a 3.5 star rating, which would be impossible while using the mode method.

The average is really the better way to go. Also, I think that they should allow any value between zero and five, and continue to take the average. This would just give a slightly more broad range of ratings. Maybe its just the programmer in me thinking that way.

gillrmn · October 2012

tinyish wrote: »

That was a very thoughtfully written blog post and I enjoyed it very much, but...

No combat. 1 star.

Its like playing a sim game and then complain that its a sim.

Its a diplomatic mission and:

One of them ?The Galaxy?s Fair? is a non-combat mission and the fact that it is non combat is stated very clearly in the description.

zorbane · October 2012

tinyish wrote: »

That was a very thoughtfully written blog post and I enjoyed it very much, but...

No combat. 1 star.

grrr I'll get you! b:angry

zorbane · October 2012

gillrmn wrote: »

Its like playing a sim game and then complain that its a sim.

Its a diplomatic mission and:

*Shrug* Some people don't read descriptions, and since it had only 1 review at the time and it was a 5 star, it was at the top of the list.

It's just something you have to deal with. It's easier to take if your mission already has a lot of plays so it has less of an effect on average.

I also suspect that the person may not have even played the mission and 1 starred it simply cause it said no combat. I was refreshing the mission list like mad eagerly waiting new reviews. Of course I might be paranoid...

On that note if anyone here plays STO give my two missions a shot:

Duritanium Man (41+, FED)
The Galaxy's Fair (Any Level, FED)

Can I do that here haha b:surrender

geddings12 · October 2012

nice but you might want to look at proofreading what you post :-). I think the foundry for Neverwinter will provide us with even more tools for our missions, it will be nice to create custom interiors just hope they provide enough building blocks so it doesnt feel too samy but with the updates for STO they have managed to add a bunch of content over time. Looking foward to it for sure i just wish they would come out with the beta soon to tide us over for the final game!

iamtruthseeker · October 2012

geddings12 wrote: »

nice but you might want to look at proofreading what you post :-). I think the foundry for Neverwinter will provide us with even more tools for our missions, it will be nice to create custom interiors just hope they provide enough building blocks so it doesnt feel too samy but with the updates for STO they have managed to add a bunch of content over time. Looking foward to it for sure i just wish they would come out with the beta soon to tide us over for the final game!

Everything but a damn spell-checker! When you review mine. If it's spelling issues, please don't mark me down on that in the future!

zorbane · October 2012

iamtruthseeker wrote: »

Everything but a damn spell-checker! When you review mine. If it's spelling issues, please don't mark me down on that in the future!

Yes definitely! One thing a lot of people beg for is a spellchecker in the Foundry. I don't know if this will ever happen, it probably isn't trivial to add it.

What I do is type everything in google docs which as a built in spell checker, and copy paste it into the Foundry.

Other people type it into the Foundry and then copy paste it into a word processor for spell check.

tinyish · October 2012

Naw wee dont ned a spel chekr.

iamtruthseeker · October 2012

tinyish wrote: »

Naw wee dont ned a spel chekr.

George Dubba, is that you?

zorbane · November 2012

Hi an update to this thread. There was a recent update in the STO test server where users are now forced to put a rating. Previously it defaulted at 3 and you'd end up with a lot of mysterious 3 stars which are by users who didn't know any better.

gillrmn · November 2012

iamtruthseeker wrote: »

Everything but a damn spell-checker! When you review mine. If it's spelling issues, please don't mark me down on that in the future!

+1 for spellchecker. I believe zeb will also agree as he is always bent on correct grammer and spellings :P

zorbane wrote: »

Hi an update to this thread. There was a recent update in the STO test server where users are now forced to put a rating. Previously it defaulted at 3 and you'd end up with a lot of mysterious 3 stars which are by users who didn't know any better.

Do they have an option of "No Rating" (not bad or good, but refusing to rate) also? I think some people would want that if they are forcing them to rate.

zorbane · November 2012

gillrmn wrote: »

Do they have an option of "No Rating" (not bad or good, but refusing to rate) also? I think some people would want that if they are forcing them to rate.

Gotta leave a rating

valas625 · November 2012

zorbane wrote: »

Gotta leave a rating

That sounds incredibly annoying. We need some well placed eggs on certain homes to make sure this doesn't come to pass here...

zorbane · November 2012

Well you could also not leave a rating, but then you don't leave a review all together. When the review pop up appears you just close it...don't think that's what you guys are looking for by "no rating" though!

skittlelolz · January 2013

Is there an option for the authors to label the genre of their creations?

elemberq333 · January 2013

iamtruthseeker wrote: »

Everything but a damn spell-checker! When you review mine. If it's spelling issues, please don't mark me down on that in the future!

One way you can use a spell checker is to write all of your dialog in your word processor then copy and paste to the Foundry, that is if they allow the copy and paste function though....

stormdrag0n · January 2013

Well in the STO foundry there are certain authors that get a lot of one stars or negative comments simply because they rubbed someone the wrong way on the forums or someone is doing a drive by on their Mission, diametrically certain community darlings get the highest ratings for the most simplistic shallow missions ....I expect that NW will have the exact same issue, I never paid much attention to ratings, there are some really good missions that have two stars and some laughable pieces of HAMSTER that are highly rated.

lyfebane · January 2013

it would be nice at some point for authers if they doing a "campaign" to be able to link them together and maybe offer special loot for doing them, maybe part way through and final? Certainly in STO the Story "campaigns" are there for cryptic devs, surely can use that as a template for foundry?
Must be a way for players to create items without being able to exploit it?

Edit, could do a geta token from player made quest then can spend these token on loot that deves make? That could work too

gillrmn · January 2013

Although I agree that it is important for authors to be famous, it is my opinion that it is wrong to expect that. It is much better to stick to your own vision while suffering trolling, criticisms, backlashes and fighting against conformity and establishing a niche by making a quest which is well liked by a small group of people who actually talk back to you.

One word of meaningful praise from such people, even criticism, outweighs any stars, "cool", "nice" and other such comments.

Making a quest while sticking to conformity... where is the fun in that? Fun is either presenting your imagination faithfully, or making something challenging.

gillrmn · January 2013

elemberq333 wrote: »

One way you can use a spell checker is to write all of your dialog in your word processor then copy and paste to the Foundry, that is if they allow the copy and paste function though....

That is how STO people do it currently. But it is too inconvinient due to crashes while alt-tabbing etc - foundry you see, is just as heavy as running a game in background - maybe heavier (heavy in technologically resource consuming sense)

skittlelolz wrote: »

Is there an option for the authors to label the genre of their creations?

No, they currently do it somewhere in the description field willingly.

iamtruthseeker · January 2013

Unfortunately, it's true about alt-tab crashing.

Don't take it personally - A lesson to authors - TavernUGC Editorial

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