Why? It's a reverse-handicap system. Why should only the best authors have access to the "best" placeeble content? That's not a reward for them... it's punishment for those who haven't been fortunate enough to have missions become popular.
In no way is it a "win win" system. At best it's a "win lose" system; it neuters the capacity for new authors to make as good of missions as those who are established.
Why? It's a reverse-handicap system. Why should only the best authors have access to the "best" placeeble content? That's not a reward for them... it's punishment for those who haven't been fortunate enough to have missions become popular.
In no way is it a "win win" system. At best it's a "win lose" system; it neuters the capacity for new authors to make as good of missions as those who are established.
Why, well that is easy.
When it comes to getting excellent UGC missions...you want the stronger writers to get stronger.
If you put all your efforts into getting poor writers 'better' what do you get ?
10,000 forgetable adventures
If you give everyone a fair shot, then get the best writers extra stuff, what do you get ?
9,500 so - so missions, slightly worse than forgetable and 500 epic adventures.
The forget the best, help the worst...sounds good, makes you feel good...and it fails.
This is not a required part of the game...if your not good at it, don't do it...or work at it
to get better...but don't expect cryptic to hold your hand.
Put your star players on the field, don't bench them in hopes your weaker players
will improve ....they do that in pop warner....little kids
This is not a cute little learning program designed to teach kids to desgn stuff.
It is a major worldwide MMO, if you think you can write stuff good enuff to entertain
the players? Give it your best shot..if ya can't, oh well. Welcome to bigtime MMOs.
When it comes to getting excellent UGC missions...you want the stronger writers to get stronger.
Giving all authors access to use all content makes everyone stronger, including the stronger writers.
If you put all your efforts into getting poor writers 'better' what do you get ?
10,000 forgetable adventures
What do you get if you have a bunch of poor authors with little content to use in their missions? Yeah... you still get 10,000 forgettable adventures...
If you give everyone a fair shot, then get the best writers extra stuff, what do you get ?
9,500 so - so missions, slightly worse than forgetable and 500 epic adventures.
So unproven writers or those still learning should be given a disadvantage. This... doesn't make any sense.
The forget the best, help the worst...sounds good, makes you feel good...and it fails.
This is not a required part of the game...if your not good at it, don't do it...or work at it
to get better...but don't expect cryptic to hold your hand.
Or just give everyone access to use all content...
They don't have to treat the "best" and the "worst" different. There's no reason to do so and it only weakens the hand of those who are trying to get better.
Put your star players on the field, don't bench them in hopes your weaker players
will improve ....they do that in pop warner....little kids
This is not a cute little learning program designed to teach kids to desgn stuff.
It is a major worldwide MMO, if you think you can write stuff good enuff to entertain
the players? Give it your best shot..if ya can't, oh well. Welcome to bigtime MMOs.
This... just makes no sense whatsoever.
You're acting as though there's a finite amount of content to go around, so it should go to those who will make the most of it. There's not a finite amount. Cryptic can give all authors access to all content.
Giving all authors access to use all content makes everyone stronger, including the stronger writers.
What do you get if you have a bunch of poor authors with little content to use in their missions? Yeah... you still get 10,000 forgettable adventures...
So unproven writers or those still learning should be given a disadvantage. This... doesn't make any sense.
Or just give everyone access to use all content...
They don't have to treat the "best" and the "worst" different. There's no reason to do so and it only weakens the hand of those who are trying to get better.
This... just makes no sense whatsoever.
You're acting as though there's a finite amount of content to go around, so it should go to those who will make the most of it. There's not a finite amount. Cryptic can give all authors access to all content.
In simpler terms
Give all writers the tools they need to do well.
Offer perks to writers who take the time to produce decent..clean..playable missions
To encourage writers to produce clean, playable missions.
By your same logic all players should start with a Tier 4 ship, it is unfair to limit that ship
to only the dedicated players that earn it...thats not fair. What about all those players that
don't have a lot of time to play, or are not good at combat ?
Its an MMO....waa too sad so bad.....get better or live with it.
effort ---> reward
no or little effort ---> no reward
In simpler terms
Give all writers the tools they need to do well.
Offer perks to writers who take the time to produce decent..clean..playable missions
To encourage writers to produce clean, playable missions.
By your same logic all players should start with a Tier 4 ship, it is unfair to limit that ship
to only the dedicated players that earn it...thats not fair. What about all those players that
don't have a lot of time to play, or are not good at combat ?
Its an MMO....waa too sad so bad.....get better or live with it.
effort ---> reward
no or little effort ---> no reward
Getting bigger and better ships is part of the MMO game that is based on progression.
UGC tools aren't a progression-based game.
If you want to make the case that UGC authoring should be a competition, that's another matter. And personally I don't think it should be. We're talking creative works here... not sports. I shouldn't have to be an expert piano player to buy a nice piano. And I shouldn't have to be an expert content author to use all the art assets.
I do agree with the notion that the creation of good content should be encouraged, however, which is one of the benefits of my reimbursement proposal. If someone makes a mission that's popular and leads to many hours of entertainment for others, they receive a proportionate reimbursement.
Wrong. The character would clearly be Picard, wouldn't it? How can you say that a bald white guy doesn't resemble (look like) Patrick Stewart? I'd bet that very thing will be expressly prohibited. Unless I completely miss my guess, those actors are entitled to residuals from the use of their likeness and that's why it's verboten. Anything even close is too close.
So following your logic William Shatner played Kirk in JJ Trek.
UPDATE:
In the Screenshots for the Seven of Nine Costume. Did they go out and get Jeri Ryans Likeness rights or are they using it without permission? Again, using your logic as the premise.
In my opinion, the reward is having a game that stays online to be played, and anybody who thinks they can take Cryptic for a ride and 'profit' from the foundry will just be wasting resources that could be better spent elswhere. Just my opinion.
It's not "taking Cryptic for a ride" to expect our part in the creation of the mission to be recognized. Cryptic is getting paid for the use of the engine making the mission possible, the art assets used in the mission, the sound effects and any music used in the mission, etc. And they should. They contribute a lot to authors' missions. However, authors contribute a part as well; the storyline, dialogue, and general mission structure and instructions.
Cryptic is certainly entitled to profit on what they contributed to the missions.
And so are the authors.
The only people being taken for a ride here are the authors who aren't getting their cut of the profits.
Honestly, if you will ONLY write new content pending 'payment' - then your plots are not your dreams of what could be done, but rather mere rote generic Trek filler, Trek For Pay Is No Trek At All - in this case.
Anyone who goes to make UGC for payment is an idiot. We're talking, with my proposal, "payment" in proportion to the value-add of the content they create. So the only time they would get anything is if their content is played. And then their content would have to be played a lot for them to get anything of notable value.
At 1CP for every hour of playtime with a 30-minute cap per playthrough, their content would have to be played for at least 1200 hours just to buy a T5 vanity ship for themselves. That's a very well scaled compensation system, if you ask me.
If you assume an average player plays 2 hours a day for a 31-day month, that's 62 hours of playtime that Cryptic would make $15 for. 1200 hours of content then equates to roughly 19 monthly subscription incomes, which comes to roughly $290 worth of value-add.
So that person's content has a value-add of $290 for Cryptic. I think the dude deserves his Galaxy-X, don't you?
$290 would normally be worth at least 23,200 C-Points, so the compensation of 1200cp is only 5% of normal C-Point cost. I'm sure Cryptic can afford the lost of that potential income, given what they're getting in return. Emphasis on "potential" since it assumes the player would have bought C-Points to begin with.
P.S. I hope my math is right. I often work with basic billing math as part of my job.
Getting bigger and better ships is part of the MMO game that is based on progression.
UGC tools aren't a progression-based game.
If you want to make the case that UGC authoring should be a competition, that's another matter. And personally I don't think it should be. We're talking creative works here... not sports. I shouldn't have to be an expert piano player to buy a nice piano. And I shouldn't have to be an expert content author to use all the art assets.
I do agree with the notion that the creation of good content should be encouraged, however, which is one of the benefits of my reimbursement proposal. If someone makes a mission that's popular and leads to many hours of entertainment for others, they receive a proportionate reimbursement.
I will meet you halfway
Perks should not be based on how highly rated your missions are,
however they should be linked to how many missions you create that are published (passes basic
rules for published mission)
In that way the perks arrive as the writer gets more experience with the tool.
The perks should reflect the amount of experience the writer has..as in, the early rewards
are simple to use....placeables and such. The later rewards, scripted items, kick in later
as the writers experience increases to the point where they can make better use of them.
Perks should not be based on how highly rated your missions are,
however they should be linked to how many missions you create that are published (passes basic
rules for published mission)
In that way the perks arrive as the writer gets more experience with the tool.
The perks should reflect the amount of experience the writer has..as in, the early rewards
are simple to use....placeables and such. The later rewards, scripted items, kick in later
as the writers experience increases to the point where they can make better use of them.
.... a compromise
Problem.is.. there's nothing preventing abuse. In fact it would give authors an incentive to make a lot of crappy missions. They'll all be approved so long as they don't violate the EULA, and they'll be rewarded with items for doing so.
Any reward really has to include quality in some manner, to avoid being exploited with many crappy missions. Even ratings isn't safe since it'd be so easy for fleets or third-parties to speed through the content and slap a 5-star rating on it.
The best way to programmatically detect quality is go by total amount of time played with a safe-guard time cap per playthrough to prevent idlers. The only way to exploit that system requires third-parties to dedicate massive account time which, with low-increment rewards, isn't worth their effort--there'd be no profit.
Publish count, playthrough count, rating... all of those statistics are too easy to exploit.
You know I am amazed that a rewards system is being considered a necessity, if we were being ORDERED to make missions or ELSE (lol) THEN I would understand. Even though us making content does help cryptic on some level, the end product is a "feature" not a flaw. We are being given the chance to create our own stories and missions IF WE CHOSE TO. For anyone with a creative mind that is a reward in itself. If anyojne feels like it's some massive chore and they dont want to do it, then they dont have to. They can continue the STO experience unhindered...with the added bonus of extra missions to play.
For mission makers it is anything up to a dream come true. Dont get me wrong if cryptic considered a rewards system of some type that would be great. But it would be a bonus not (IMHO) a necessity.
As far as SPOKK and CIRK, well I understand that people can do what they want. Just as they can name ships the way they want to etc etc. But as the OP asked for opinions, mine is simple. I would be really dissapointed to see that in this game, in some way(for me) it woud cheapen things badly. My hope is that the missions we make add not only content, but new characters and rather than the missions "feeling " player made, we are going to have a toolset(by the looks of it) that will enable us to make equal..or even better missions than many that are currently available. For me personally thats is the goal, to creat missions that feel likle they were meant to be in the game. Missons that ADD to the game. With such a huge universe I also wonder if we even need to look at known names when there is so much scope for originality.
Like i said it is each to thier own and i am certainly not even close to trying to tell anyone what to do, but for me personally..even a really good mission is going to feel a bit "cheesy" with thse kinds of names in it. But it's just an opinion no offense intended here.
After 100 posts to this thread, is it about time that you gatherd your core statements together and started a fresh thread called 'compensation' or something relavent? I think that you have a good point on your side, I just see it spread kinda thin through 100 posts, a bit of a big read for the newcommers to the conversation.
Been considering that. Going to write up a formal proposal to send to dstahl.. might make a thread based on that writeup.
Update: Well, wrote up a proper proposal with all points and sent it to dstahl, but I imagine he gets a billion messages a day so I don't know if he'll ever see it.
Unfortunately I don't think I can access the Beta... and would love to be able to read the EULA....
However, a thought,, I believe US laws allot us the right to make Parodies in which we can use likenesses of characters without licenses as long as it can no way be consider the real deal or possibly be endorsed as canon.
Granted, then were likely to see mission that are so demented, we know it can only have been caused by Q on an acid trip.
I too would very much like to see the content restrictions for what is acceptable use of the IP. I guess we'll get an iteration of it soon. It also makes sense to compare with the CafePress restrictions, which I believe are fairly lenient.
I'll say that however restrictions are implemented, I'll review personally with an open mind. Star Trek means things to different people. I'll review against the restrictions but then rate if the mission was fun and interesting, regardless of whether it was "Trek". That's of course my opinion.
I'd like to ask specifically about characters Cryptic has already used. To my knowledge, Cryptic only has used McCoy, Leeta, and Worf as a kind of crazy older version with radically different skin pigmentation (which perhaps suggests either someone else called Worf or, more likely, the rights were not completely secured). Of course, there are probably more; feel free to correct me. Could these be implemented with such likeness restrictions in mind?
Third, I'd like to be somewhat philosophical and ask what we're defining as "likeness". In my opinion, Mr. Nimoy has expressed his likeness in the game as Spock through the use of his voice talent. So therefore, could we express Spock in Nimoy's image if his sonic likeness exists in adition to character models that Cryptic have used?
Comments
Why? It's a reverse-handicap system. Why should only the best authors have access to the "best" placeeble content? That's not a reward for them... it's punishment for those who haven't been fortunate enough to have missions become popular.
In no way is it a "win win" system. At best it's a "win lose" system; it neuters the capacity for new authors to make as good of missions as those who are established.
Why, well that is easy.
When it comes to getting excellent UGC missions...you want the stronger writers to get stronger.
If you put all your efforts into getting poor writers 'better' what do you get ?
10,000 forgetable adventures
If you give everyone a fair shot, then get the best writers extra stuff, what do you get ?
9,500 so - so missions, slightly worse than forgetable and 500 epic adventures.
The forget the best, help the worst...sounds good, makes you feel good...and it fails.
This is not a required part of the game...if your not good at it, don't do it...or work at it
to get better...but don't expect cryptic to hold your hand.
Put your star players on the field, don't bench them in hopes your weaker players
will improve ....they do that in pop warner....little kids
This is not a cute little learning program designed to teach kids to desgn stuff.
It is a major worldwide MMO, if you think you can write stuff good enuff to entertain
the players? Give it your best shot..if ya can't, oh well. Welcome to bigtime MMOs.
Giving all authors access to use all content makes everyone stronger, including the stronger writers.
What do you get if you have a bunch of poor authors with little content to use in their missions? Yeah... you still get 10,000 forgettable adventures...
So unproven writers or those still learning should be given a disadvantage. This... doesn't make any sense.
Or just give everyone access to use all content...
They don't have to treat the "best" and the "worst" different. There's no reason to do so and it only weakens the hand of those who are trying to get better.
This... just makes no sense whatsoever.
You're acting as though there's a finite amount of content to go around, so it should go to those who will make the most of it. There's not a finite amount. Cryptic can give all authors access to all content.
In simpler terms
Give all writers the tools they need to do well.
Offer perks to writers who take the time to produce decent..clean..playable missions
To encourage writers to produce clean, playable missions.
By your same logic all players should start with a Tier 4 ship, it is unfair to limit that ship
to only the dedicated players that earn it...thats not fair. What about all those players that
don't have a lot of time to play, or are not good at combat ?
Its an MMO....waa too sad so bad.....get better or live with it.
effort ---> reward
no or little effort ---> no reward
Getting bigger and better ships is part of the MMO game that is based on progression.
UGC tools aren't a progression-based game.
If you want to make the case that UGC authoring should be a competition, that's another matter. And personally I don't think it should be. We're talking creative works here... not sports. I shouldn't have to be an expert piano player to buy a nice piano. And I shouldn't have to be an expert content author to use all the art assets.
I do agree with the notion that the creation of good content should be encouraged, however, which is one of the benefits of my reimbursement proposal. If someone makes a mission that's popular and leads to many hours of entertainment for others, they receive a proportionate reimbursement.
So following your logic William Shatner played Kirk in JJ Trek.
UPDATE:
In the Screenshots for the Seven of Nine Costume. Did they go out and get Jeri Ryans Likeness rights or are they using it without permission? Again, using your logic as the premise.
It's not "taking Cryptic for a ride" to expect our part in the creation of the mission to be recognized. Cryptic is getting paid for the use of the engine making the mission possible, the art assets used in the mission, the sound effects and any music used in the mission, etc. And they should. They contribute a lot to authors' missions. However, authors contribute a part as well; the storyline, dialogue, and general mission structure and instructions.
Cryptic is certainly entitled to profit on what they contributed to the missions.
And so are the authors.
The only people being taken for a ride here are the authors who aren't getting their cut of the profits.
Anyone who goes to make UGC for payment is an idiot. We're talking, with my proposal, "payment" in proportion to the value-add of the content they create. So the only time they would get anything is if their content is played. And then their content would have to be played a lot for them to get anything of notable value.
At 1CP for every hour of playtime with a 30-minute cap per playthrough, their content would have to be played for at least 1200 hours just to buy a T5 vanity ship for themselves. That's a very well scaled compensation system, if you ask me.
If you assume an average player plays 2 hours a day for a 31-day month, that's 62 hours of playtime that Cryptic would make $15 for. 1200 hours of content then equates to roughly 19 monthly subscription incomes, which comes to roughly $290 worth of value-add.
So that person's content has a value-add of $290 for Cryptic. I think the dude deserves his Galaxy-X, don't you?
$290 would normally be worth at least 23,200 C-Points, so the compensation of 1200cp is only 5% of normal C-Point cost. I'm sure Cryptic can afford the lost of that potential income, given what they're getting in return. Emphasis on "potential" since it assumes the player would have bought C-Points to begin with.
P.S. I hope my math is right. I often work with basic billing math as part of my job.
I will meet you halfway
Perks should not be based on how highly rated your missions are,
however they should be linked to how many missions you create that are published (passes basic
rules for published mission)
In that way the perks arrive as the writer gets more experience with the tool.
The perks should reflect the amount of experience the writer has..as in, the early rewards
are simple to use....placeables and such. The later rewards, scripted items, kick in later
as the writers experience increases to the point where they can make better use of them.
.... a compromise
Problem.is.. there's nothing preventing abuse. In fact it would give authors an incentive to make a lot of crappy missions. They'll all be approved so long as they don't violate the EULA, and they'll be rewarded with items for doing so.
Any reward really has to include quality in some manner, to avoid being exploited with many crappy missions. Even ratings isn't safe since it'd be so easy for fleets or third-parties to speed through the content and slap a 5-star rating on it.
The best way to programmatically detect quality is go by total amount of time played with a safe-guard time cap per playthrough to prevent idlers. The only way to exploit that system requires third-parties to dedicate massive account time which, with low-increment rewards, isn't worth their effort--there'd be no profit.
Publish count, playthrough count, rating... all of those statistics are too easy to exploit.
For mission makers it is anything up to a dream come true. Dont get me wrong if cryptic considered a rewards system of some type that would be great. But it would be a bonus not (IMHO) a necessity.
As far as SPOKK and CIRK, well I understand that people can do what they want. Just as they can name ships the way they want to etc etc. But as the OP asked for opinions, mine is simple. I would be really dissapointed to see that in this game, in some way(for me) it woud cheapen things badly. My hope is that the missions we make add not only content, but new characters and rather than the missions "feeling " player made, we are going to have a toolset(by the looks of it) that will enable us to make equal..or even better missions than many that are currently available. For me personally thats is the goal, to creat missions that feel likle they were meant to be in the game. Missons that ADD to the game. With such a huge universe I also wonder if we even need to look at known names when there is so much scope for originality.
Like i said it is each to thier own and i am certainly not even close to trying to tell anyone what to do, but for me personally..even a really good mission is going to feel a bit "cheesy" with thse kinds of names in it. But it's just an opinion no offense intended here.
Been considering that. Going to write up a formal proposal to send to dstahl.. might make a thread based on that writeup.
Update: Well, wrote up a proper proposal with all points and sent it to dstahl, but I imagine he gets a billion messages a day so I don't know if he'll ever see it.
However, a thought,, I believe US laws allot us the right to make Parodies in which we can use likenesses of characters without licenses as long as it can no way be consider the real deal or possibly be endorsed as canon.
Granted, then were likely to see mission that are so demented, we know it can only have been caused by Q on an acid trip.
So if someone here would just start killing off the Star Trek stars one by one...
(obviously I'm kidding)
I'll say that however restrictions are implemented, I'll review personally with an open mind. Star Trek means things to different people. I'll review against the restrictions but then rate if the mission was fun and interesting, regardless of whether it was "Trek". That's of course my opinion.
I'd like to ask specifically about characters Cryptic has already used. To my knowledge, Cryptic only has used McCoy, Leeta, and Worf as a kind of crazy older version with radically different skin pigmentation (which perhaps suggests either someone else called Worf or, more likely, the rights were not completely secured). Of course, there are probably more; feel free to correct me. Could these be implemented with such likeness restrictions in mind?
Third, I'd like to be somewhat philosophical and ask what we're defining as "likeness". In my opinion, Mr. Nimoy has expressed his likeness in the game as Spock through the use of his voice talent. So therefore, could we express Spock in Nimoy's image if his sonic likeness exists in adition to character models that Cryptic have used?
Thanks