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Originally posted by Martin Turner:
**Actually, Zhouj, the plugin diverges from the novel. Like most SF novels, there isn't anything beyond what you see. I know this may be spoiling the illusion somewhat, but the whole point of art is that the whole is greater than the sum of the parts. The characters have no life outside of the text you read, but the illusion is (hopefully) that they seem like real people. In the same way, the governments have no intrinsic reality but while you're playing the game, you feel as though they do.
As far as I know, no-one has ever released a major plugin that people actually wanted to play based on the 'create every detail' model although any great plugin will look as though it was. A mid-point that seems to work for a lot of people, though, is writing back-story. A back-story is a narrative that explains the motivation of things. Writing it is often better than reading it, because it's really an exercise in the imagination. On the other hand, you don't need to write a set of back-stories if you can get everything fixed in your mind.
Having read your original article again, I find I disagree with it more now than I did the first time. Your strategy for universes seems full of numbers, structures and technical details. The plugins I admire, though, are filled with people. The two plugins that I loved and respected most were Angels of Vengeance and Eye of Orion. Both of them sucked me into personal involvement with the story and characters. Yes, I know that these characters never actually existed and are just numbers and letters, but they gave the illusion of life.
My objection to teams is simply this: show me the plugins that were produced by teams. People have been talking incessantly about teams on this board for as long as there has been an EV Developer's Board. The teams that have actually worked began with people who knew each other before they started making plugins. And, even then, more plugins were released by single individuals than by teams.
I also deeply object to websites, and people who try to persuade other people that their plugins will not be vapourware. It's one thing to announce a product once you already have one in the bag (but even then, be careful), it's another thing to join the ranks of hundreds of plugin websites which have come and gone without ever producing a plugin. The fact is, you cannot know that your plugin will ever be released until you actually release it.
As far as your response is concerned: you're writing as if you have a proven method which I'm trying to destroy. Actually, your method hasn't even been proven once. What I'm saying is, whatever works for you, go with it but don't imagine that you can codify a process you haven't yet bottomed out. I'm on my third plugin, and I haven't used the same process more than once.
You say that mediocre writers must write to rigid principles. My response: if you write to rigid principles, everything you write will sound rigid. You also suggest that people like Tolkien knew that there would be a market before they started writing. Not so. Tolkien was told that his books were unpublishable. J K Rowling was rejected by publisher after publisher before Bloomsbury were willing to take a chance on Harry Potter.
Finally, on subsidiary governments in FH and FF. Publish your plugin, and let people decide if your mechanically developed governments seem more real than my organic ones. Anyway, what do you mean by 'FH would have been better...'? Better according to what criteria. I was happy with it for what it was. The new version (which I may or may not choose to release) is bigger and more developed, and the graphics are much nicer. But I don't have any regrets about the original game, which was as good as I could make it at the time especially since it was made entirely with free software from the internet or the covers of magazines. And I don't see the lack of detailed documents about every government or world as a flaw. A lot of my worlds New Venus, Devore, Aphrodite, Cosa Nostra, Heartsease, Shadow, Fortuna don't have what you would call a proper government anyway. EV's 'govt' is just a resource which I choose to use in the way which most suits me. Some of my 'govt's have no ships, no worlds, no allies and no enemies. On the other hand, I have groupings of worlds - Rigellian, Magellan, Nine Worlds, Non-aligned - which would never show up on your system. Rigel is defined by its conquests, Magella by its common attitudes, the Nine Worlds by adherence to a political philosophy, Non-aligned by their refusal to join any of the other groups.
I suppose that my universe would be 'better' from your point of view because it would satisfy your requirements for a mechanically complete structure. From my point of view, it wouldn't add anything.
The point I'm trying to make: no-one yet came up with a proven system for making plugins, but lots of people have come up with one off processes that worked for them. Go with what works for you.
**
I see that my post elicited the response I wanted from you.
First off, I said the universe was largely done within the novel. So the fact that it diverges from the novel is irrelevant. Please keep refutations relevant. After mentioning something irrelevant, you proceed to lecture me on the meaning of art. Do you think Im idiot or something? With such condescending tone, you proceed to tell me what should be completely common knowledge. Who doesnt know that fictional characters are part of an illusion designed to entertain or deliver a message. While were on the matter of the value of art, you realize one thing: art itself makes little bearing upon the real world. The Mona Lisa may well be the most famous piece of art in the world, but how has it truly affected it? Has it caused world peace? Has is inspired people to conquer the world? In the end, it is what you say it is, a combination of items with no life in the outside world. It is my belief that some must learn to shed the artist mentality of thinking of art as more than it is.
Am I advocating a create every detail method of plug-in creation? Last time I checked, I was advocating preparation beforehand and the general need for organization. Perhaps you should stop speaking for others. I also dont need the definition of a narrative, as I somehow doubt you are superior to me. Again, we have an issue of what sort of group were designing for, Im suggesting that plug-in teams keep records of their details. Humans arent telepathic so I think a non-mental form of communication is needed between members.
You seem to have misinterpreted my article, whether it be intentional or not. My article for development of TCs is about creating creative details. Im suggesting that you figure out items of who hates who, what the government structure is like, and how the geography of the galaxy is like. Are you advocating the opinion that none of those details will affect your characters in the storyline? If I didnt make it clear before, Im also suggesting that people create the major characters in the plug-in as well. For instance, for my plug-in, Ive done biographies and analysis about major characters in the plug-in as well as potential NPCs and Ive also detailed the mentalities of the average citizen on various worlds and from various cultures. Please quote the line where I mentioned anything specific about numbers. I do not tell people to go out and create a world by setting the number of citizens a government has, the number of planets, or such things. I suggest that they make sure that they know the basic details of their government.
Your objection is noted. I cannot note your logic since none of it seems to be visible and Ive looked quite hard. Just because less plug-ins have been released by teams does not suggest that it is inferior. Teams are by nature harder to assemble given that they require more people with just as much talent as an individual working on a plug-in. Take a look at all the plug-ins run by individuals who never made it either. Again, you have not addressed the issue of whether the failure of a team is the result of the nature of a team or because of the lack of competent leadership. History has shown us quite the difference between the effects of competent leaders and incompetent ones.
I am and was writing a defensive argument for my method in which you are trying to suggest is completely flawed. Where the hell am I suggesting that I want to codify it? Im creating a guide, not a set of laws. Physicists write theories about phenomenon that have never been seen in person, are they banned from writing that theory too?
Yes, mediocre writers must write to rigid principles. Take for example the 5-paragraph essay format or all the traditional requirements about position of conclusions and introductions. Students in normal classes are expected to write with that standard and only students in college or upper-level classes are given more free rein in formatting in their essays. I ask you to prove that if its written with rigid principles, then it sounds rigid. Ive actually seen quite a few essays and stories that are quite creative despite the rigid pre-writing process they had to follow. They have a complex pre-writing process for a reason: to present a better story or essay. Read essays written without an outline and those will out, and then youll notice how the one written with the outline will flow far better.
J.K. Rowling had a book and then instantly could write that way because she knew that people liked it. Stephen King could do the same thing. I am more referring to books after the initial one in that assertion.
I mean it could be better as in it could have been more realistic and had an intricate plot. A certain Perfect Character problem did appear in your plug-in as it has in Nova and quite a few. You shouldnt have regrets about the original game as it is quite good. However, as we all know, there is no such thing as perfection. It is irrelevant whether they have a real government or not. They have some sort of influence and therefore there is someone or some group in the backroom manipulating the usage of that influence. Those people would have as much motivation as any of the politicians of other governments.
Tell me a government or group that would have no enemies and no allies. Even if such a group existed, they would still have an agenda. And an agenda is defined.
Explain why they would not show up on my system. Do you somehow know my system better than me? Because Im pretty sure I intend to conceptualize and detail the large groups, cultures, and the like. The governmental web is only one part of the interconnected web of life.
Nice attempt to spin it. My requirements arent for mechanical completion. I want realism which requires knowing the details of the motivations and nuances of governments. You may be fine with a government with an incomplete profile but I certainly believe in completing work to the best of ones ability.
The point youre trying to making is that your process of development is superior to mine. It is quite clear throughout your posts that feel a completely free-form method of creating a universe is far superior.
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Originally posted by AnubisTTP:
**Well, I suppose I should jump in and say something. That article was long and detailed, but it beared pretty much no resembelence to how Polycon was developed. In my opinion the PR website, design manuals, and the like are all things that should be secondary to actually jumping into the engine and getting some content in there. All that time spent writing up the detailed biography for Goverment Handler 7 is time you could have spent writing the mission briefings that Goverment Handler 7 gives the player. I did not even bother making a PR website for Polycon until it went to the outside beta testers, and the only reason I made one then was because I could do no more work on the plugin without it becoming out of sync with the copy the beta testers had.
**
I think the key difference between the development of your plug-in and the type Im writing for is that you had a large of source materials already to work with. You already had the Polycon RPG and what your needed to do was to convert it from the pen and paper game into a Nova plug-in. IMHO, I believe that simply jumping into a plug-in development could lead to issues later on. For instances, you may have decided to make a government xenophobic and have ships with a philosophy of defense. Youve placed systems, written descs, finished the ships, and done graphics. What happens if you realize that within your universe, an xenophobic nation could not exist given the incredible exchange of ideas and trade between governments and civilizations? Would you just go back and change everything? Many people would be instantly turned off to that prospect. The question now comes: how can we prevent that sort of occurrence? My answer would be plan the map and galactic socioeconomic status first. How does this government relate to another? Do their citizens get along? Do they have ideological differences. Im not telling you to figure out the population of every planet and then calculate a viable economic situation. Im not saying that one should go use calculus to optimize the economics of a corporation and then use it. What Im suggesting is that one create the basic details about the personality of a government and its people?
Using your example, I would argue that if you had a detailed biography of GH 7, you could visualize the knowledge and culture GH 7 would have when making decisions. In event of a large unknown enemy fleet, would they go looking for it or would they just not worry about it? The United States of America chose to do virtually nothing about the missing fleet that attacked Pearl Harbor. That lesson has taught us to act upon a threat and not react upon it. Currently, weve postulated a doctrine of pre-emptive war and if we had had it during World War II, we would have simply attack the Japanese naval bases before they had a chance to deploy. What would the Chinese do? Would they follow the teachings of Sun Tzu or use Western doctrine? The point is that history tempers our decisions and affects our judgment is affected by the culture we inhabit and are part of. Sociologists have created a term for this: socialization, the process of assimilating a cultures values as your own. Without knowledge of a governments past, present, and future prospects, one cannot take on the mindset of that government.
I do agree with you on the issue of PR though. Finish writing your plug-in instead of trying to advertise. If you dont have anything at the end, that PR was useless.
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Originally posted by Bomb:
****Not to jump on the 'zhouj is wrong' bandwagon here, but on this particular issue I have quite a bit of experience and I agree with what Martin is trying to say.
Essentially- team plug-in projects are more often than not just great in principle but poor in practice. Anybody can sit down with a bunch of friends and think "oh, we'll have X amount of systems and Y amount of planets and fifty thousand missions and forty different versions of every ship-" the real test comes in who is going to spend all those endless hours debugging the missions or putting in the time doing the monotonous programming. And more often that not, those tests fail- once you start to crash back into reality, the idea just isn't as attractive anymore- except to those individuals who are driven to finish it, which more often than not turns out to be one person.
But you are correct in one regard- EV Nova development is a terrible paradox. Since teams have always failed so badly in EV/O, there is seemingly no way they would succeed for an engine that is infinitely more complex. However, to find a person with both the programming and graphical know-how (not to mention drive, which might be the toughest part) that can work at or even just below the level of EVN is extraordanarily rare. Hence, people turn to teams, and inherently, they tend to start off strong but then eventually slowly fade away. It's the nature of the game, really.
As for the overall planning process of plug-ins, I agree with some things you said, and some things Martin said. And that basically sums it up in a nutshell- do what works for you. I've always found sitting down and planning every detail to be an utter waste of time because things will inevitably be lost to practicality or superior ideas- which is why I only tend to write down the most basic stuff- a guideline of sorts from which I can branch out. Then, as I write the plug-in, the world begins to evolve and expand and slowly it all comes together. Problem being with this theory is that if you're like me, you'll come out with a whole ton of inconsistencies, where you abruptly changed your mind and forgot to change things previous to match.
Also, one other thing; don't be afraid to change your ideas or completely dump something. It might sound awesome one day then the next you'll realize you were just bull****ting yourself. You'd be amazed what kind of good stuff can come from your less popular ideas: an example: I was writing F-25, and it was sucking, per the usual. So I took a two week break from it and just dabbled with other stuff, to kind of get my creative energy back. I wrote an evil little scenario called "Reign of the Voinians" and released it, just for the fun of it. To this day, I think it is still more popular than F-25 ever was. (even though v.2.0 is by far superior to anything I've done before)
Point being, don't be afraid to admit failure- which happens often when working in teams. Learn from the experience, and hopefully, come to terms with the fact that if you do want to really get something done, you'll more than likely have to do it yourself.
_bomb
**
**
I think people here are attributing the cause of the failures of a plug-in team to the concept of plug-in teams themselves. However, this is misplacing the blame. The true blame lies with poor leadership. As Ive stated before, the difference between good and bad leadership is enormous and profoundly visible in the real world. In the process of the development, this principle is just as applicable. A team is often only as effective at completing quality work as the ability of the leader to motivate and lead. So instead of saying that plug-in teams dont work, I believe one should say that plug-in teams dont work without an effective leader. Sephil Saga is progressing very well as is mine, because Masamune and I are able to run the team effectively.
Ive already detailed what I believe to be good leadership in the other post but Ill post it again here for emphasis. First, the ideal plug-in team leader would be a good judge of character and be able to determine whether an individual will continue in the face of adversity, whether he is talented or BSing, and the like. This is rather important for determining whether an individual will be a valuable addition to a plug-in development team. Second, the leader must been to identify their own weaknesses and deficiencies. A good leader cannot be blinded by his ego and when he cant program or write planetary descs, he better realize it and attempt to fix it. In addition, a leader cannot become enamored with his own work. It is not sacred and can, even needs to, be changed in order to improve it. Third, a leader must be dedicated, motivated, and willing to motivate his plug-in team. He has to be the last person to go on month-long breaks for no reason and he must set an example for the rest of his team by meeting deadlines, planning effectively, and keeping his workers busy. The final trait I believe a leader needs is adaptability and organization. Adding onto the point of a leader should not become enamored with ones work, a leader must be flexible and willing to adapt to changes. I created my plug-in as a guide and I encourage any project director to modify it, test it, and send me the results back to me. It is not intended to be the US Constitution, the absolute law. Back to my point, a leader must be organized in knowing what needs to be done, when it needs to be done, and how to get it done, be it finishing it himself or sending it to someone else. These four traits I believe to be equal in importance because in order to succeed as a leader, you must have all four traits. The unfortunate thing is that competent leaders are very difficult to find, which doesnt help the case for starting a development team.
That point is very well-said, _bomb. It is indeed true that an individual with the drive, talent, and time to finish a TC by himself is rare, especially with the must increased amount of work necessary to complete a Nova TC. Hence, I feel the need to form development teams with Nova is even greater. I do disagree with your point about how teams inherently tend to fade off. Its not inherent but again a result of poor leadership. If ones project fails while one is the project director, then one has failed.
Your example of inconsistencies and my example of how people may change their minds during mid-development shows that good planning should occur beforehand. Again, I must clarify that I am not advocating you create every detail and certainly not the numerical ones as UE R&D; demonstrated. I am advocating you create the major details of motivations, culture, and history which are necessary to create a consistent universe.
I agree with you completely about the necessity of the willingness to change. In the more final version of the guide, I explicitly state that it is a guide and not a set of codes. It is intended to help and guide you, not tell you what to do. Creativity is a process not easily controlled by a set timescale and I realize that you will always change your mind somehow. However, it is far easier to think of a new, better idea when you have something to base it off of. I am suggesting that one always keep a workable and detailed set of information on things. If anything, it should help your creativity. However, Id like to note that popularity is not the metric for measuring true quality. Any Mac user should really know it.
In the spirit of your last point, Ill admit that parts of my theorized process could certainly be improved upon but thats one reason I posted a preliminary summary and am having these discussions on this board. Discussion and thought about any subject allows it to evolve and generally become better. I welcome your responses.
On another note, hows your TC going? Itd be rather ironic if you wrote the 2nd plug-in FAQ only to have your plug-in vaporware. However, I hope that that is not the case and that progress has just been slow. Anyways, good luck on it.
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Originally posted by TheRedeemer:
**I totally agree. That's the creative process summed up In one sentance. You should be prepared to change your Ideas. I've wrote page after page of general notes, mission briefings and concept sketches just to go back and look over them and realise what a crap Idea it was in the first place. But it didn't upset me, It's just another learning experience. That's what it's all about in the end for most of us, If something doesen't work out, then fine, just leave it, hopefully with the skills you've learnt from that it will help you in the future. Don't carry on with something your not liking just for the sake of finishing it.
Like many have said, It's about what works for you. I personally disagree with the principle of having everything planned out before starting a plug/TC. General Ideas and Notes are of course extremely helpful, but having something planned out to the last detail can only lead to trouble. Your bound to come up against problems, engine limitations etc which you will have to work round, you cannot plan for every eventuallity.
And about Teams. I've mixed feelings on this. In some cases it works, In some cases it doesen't. You can't just say teams don't work. I know it hasn't been released yet, but Sephil Saga is going extremely well, and that has about 8 members on the team or some really high number like that (check on the website) But on the other hand, the Star Wars Nova TC has a large team, and has just been put on Ice. If you want a Team (any team for that matter) to work then you have to have good leadership. Without it it's going to fall apart.
Also, the problem with 1 man plug-ins is the sheer amount of work and quality of work. With most people, you can't have it all. Not many people are excellent story writers, aswell as great graphics artists, computer programmers and sound mechanics all in one, (there are a few people like that, but not many) and you don't want to risk sacrificing the quality of one aspect for another. If your really good at writing you should be able to concentrate on the writing if you want and not have to worry about the other aspects, and If the story's of a high enough standard than I'm sure you'll get interest from the odd graphics artist looking for a project to work on.
- Just my two pence.
**
Im not sure why people think that I suggested everyone create detailed files that covered absolutely everything. I will proceed to correct this misconception again: my intent is to encourage people to create detailed documentation on their universe but certainly not to detail them to the point of being pedantic and such. Knowing the names and biographies of major political figures is good but knowing the family history of a minor planetary governor is unnecessary unless he is an integral part of the storyline. Engine limitations can mostly be worked around as Masamune and Uncle Twitchy have demonstrated numerous times as have many other developers. It is a matter of your analytical talent, and ability to continue on in the face of a seemingly unbreakable barrier.
As for any team, it is a question of whether the leader is competent or not. Masamune is competent at his job and the person for SWN before does not appear to be. Simply put, if you dont have leadership skills, dont organize a team.
As a leader, you must determine what talents you need and then find those people with those talents. They dont have to be qualified or talented in every of the aspects of developing a plug-in but they need to have at least one of them and the ability to work well within a team. Like I said before, a good leader would be able to get them work together or dole out tasks to them in order to maximize their productivity.
1000th post and I think Ive set the record for the longest post ever. 
Anyone want to confirm or correct this?
Best of luck to everyone on their plug-ins. Hope to hear responses to my arguments. As I said before, discussion and criticisms only benefit an idea.
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(url="http://"http://www.zhouj.net/days/")Days of Glory(/url), Upcoming TC for EV: Nova
