A Call to Modders! Lets try being Original!

[Osceola]

It seems every week a new mod pops up that isnt original at all. 90% of mods, and this is not much of an exaggeration I'm afraid, concentrate on the same era the game does!

This would all be fine and dandy.. IF WE DIDNT HAVE ABOUT 5 HUGE, EXTREMELY GOOD, MODS THAT HAVE DONE THE SAME THING! AND THIER ACTUALLY FINISHED OR AT LEAST IN PLAYABLE, ENJOYABLE VERSIONS!

Lets look..

Europa Barbarorum
Rome Total Realism
Res Gaestae (almost there)
S.P.Q.R.
Imperium Total War

Now lets look at the ammount of high quality, original mods we got.

Arthurian
Ran no Jidai
Zhanguo
Sanguo
Napoleonic
Zulu

Now lets look at 2 mods that died, and 1 that MUST NOT be allowed to die.

Native America Total War - I joined this mod as a concept art/resourcep citure supplier. Let me tell you this mod couldve been something. We had one helluva team asides from our leader who unfortunately was an immature 12 yr. old boy. Our mod was set in medieval America, several hundred years before the arrival of Europeans. This was when populations in America were skyrocketing. Before the arrival of diseases, people lived to good long ages the land was plentiful. Many nomad tribes of later times, at this time were settled down civilised ones. Then you go to Mexico, S. America. You had the Aztecs, Incas, Mayans, etc. They were extremely advanced as well. The Incas even having bronze weaponry. As did several other American civs.

But the thing most interesting was the unit diversity. We had guys that shot 6 foot arrows, martial artists, guys who had entire suits of armour, dog sled chariots the works! Add that to the huge populations of America at this time along with the greater number of cities and such and we were providing you a radical reeducation and a whole new look on how "primitve" warfare in so called "primitive" societies really was. Andthe best thing of all, it was all real. The ammount of research we did on it was staggering.

But no, we didnt get a 50 man team. We had a huge ammount of work, a bad leader and hardly any public support. So thanks TWC community.

Now lets look at The Great War Total War. A mod that was going to bring you modern warfare. WWI. You had it all, machine guns, artillery, cavalry, elite troops, trenches. A crash between Napoleonic war and the Dawn of Modern Warfare. And you know what? It was doable. I stayed in good contact with Comrade Alexeo, the one behind this mod. He recently revealed to me that he and his tiny team had figured out how to put tanks in the game. And it never happened, none of the things, while difficult, but doable never happened. You know why? No help. That tank never happened because he didnt have anyone to implement the damn thing. Another huge opportunity gone. Thanks TWC community.

And finally the one mod thats come close to death so many times, only this ones different. It's finished. It needs implementation coders. It's not getting them. Last I checked things have improved dramatically as far as that goes and thankfully it's not dying anymore, but it's not out of the realm of danger just yet.

Yes I'm talking about the infamous Troy TW. They have seriously done it all. They took the era of Homer's myths, and showed them how they really happened. It's all real, maybe some artistic license but this is the true story of the Trojan War. This mods skins are beyond excellent! The entire thing is a work of art. Just look at what it offers. The famed Amazons, who it's been proven really existed. The Athenians and Spartans of ancient times. The men who brought iron to the civilised world, just look at the sites faction descriptions! There isnt a single dull unit! The skins are top notch, theres unique units everywhere. Interesting ones.

This mod has showed you an era of history that most people still think is entirely myth. But it's not, it's history. This mod has released 3 trailers, the last of which is very long and absolutely beautiful. And countless of the skins have been released to show you just how excellent they really are and just how interesting the units are.

And heres the kicker. ITS DONE! IT IS FINISHED! IT ONLY NEED TO BE IMPLEMENTED! A CODER! THERES NO SKINNING LEFT! NO MODDELING LEFT! NO MUSIC LEFT! NOTHING LEFT BUT THE CODING!

And it's flatlined about 3 times thanks to no help. Finally they are recieving help, but they need more! PLEASE HELP!

And to keep this from turning into a solely "HELP TTW!" post, I'm going to close with this.

Some of the best experiences in TW that couldve been had have been lost thanks to you, TWC community. So quit starting projects that are nothing but reskins and maybe one or 2 new features to the same damn game. Thier probably gonna die anyways. And we have 5 that are donig everything you want to.

There are dozens of eras out there that havent been done. Dozens of new experiences to be had both in history and in this game. So quit letting them die.

You have an excellent skinner/moddeller, excellent game idea, and he gets hardly any help. This is disgusting.

Rant over.

[Caius Britannicus]

sounds like a lot of bitterness and jealousy to me. People do want they want to do. If they want to make their own Rome era mod thats what they want them to do. I'm getting tired of these kinds of NOLM'd posts. Also, to quote you

"But no, we didnt get a 50 man team. We had a huge ammount of work"

I have a three man mod team and making alot of progress with the crusades (btw I like its exclusion from the original mods list along with chivalry) , Prom has done very nice with Res and Jidai also small teams. Size of the team doesn't matter at all. Its all about peoples dedication. And guess what its the interent, people don't feel they are responsible for anything on the internet. Heck even eb has team size issues. Then theres the myth that RTR was done with a huge team, which is completely bogus (6.x was developed with about 6 people and mostly only an active core of 4 thats right FOUR). So lets stop being jealous and bitter and actually do some work by learning stuff for yourself. Look at Wlesmana and LOTR-TW hes totally self taught, he learned modelling and animations, the RTW coding system. ALL ON HIS OWN.

well thats my rant.... And I pray that these kind of threads don't show up again (seems to be a thing the TTW team likes to do)

[Osceola]

I'm not in the TTW team. The thing the TTW thing likes to do is beg for help. I geuss theres not much else you can do when you NEED HELP.

Oh and yes we were a little jealous but I was being fecetious with the 50 man team remark. We'd of settled for 20. Or even 10. 10 that didnt run off and leave after a week.

And as for you, hey your experienced. You kinda need alot of help when you have an excellent idea and all the research done but no experience. Or modding skills anyhow.

[Caius Britannicus]

how do you think people get experience... it just magically comes out of no where? You work at it, you practice, you experiment... You are looking for sympathy and you aren't gonna get it... at least not from me cause this just screams "No one loves me."

[Osceola]

Btw, I noticed your own jealously remark. About your mod not making it in the list of original mods along with Chivalry. You've got alot less to be jealous of dude.

Oh and I'm not sure if I posted it in your topic, but your mod happens to be one of my favorites. I've been using your Saladin wallpaper and even unit screenshots for wallpapers for awhile now actually. There were a few I left out. I didnt glance through the entire damn board and look for them all jesus christ! I added the ones most radically different/original and the ones that popped into my head.

How am I looking for sympathy. I'm long over NATW.

[Caius Britannicus]

Btw, I noticed your own jealously remark. About your mod not making it in the list of original mods along with Chivalry. You've got alot less to be jealous of dude.

I pointed those out because they were high quality mods and off the list which you were TRYING to have look really short to show people everyone is doing the same idea. So if you are trying to persuade people not enough content is being made and yet deliberately leave several quality and original mods off the list.... well you can see why I brought it up.

[Osceola]

Btw, I noticed your own jealously remark. About your mod not making it in the list of original mods along with Chivalry. You've got alot less to be jealous of dude.

Oh and I'm not sure if I posted it in your topic, but your mod happens to be one of my favorites. I've been using your Saladin wallpaper and even unit screenshots for wallpapers for awhile now actually. There were a few I left out. I didnt glance through the entire damn board and look for them all jesus christ! I added the ones most radically different/original and the ones that popped into my head.

Aight, now youve gone too far. I just posted why your mod didnt make it in the list. I also notice you only quoted the top of my post so as to avoid my explaining myself. And then you turn around and say I'm deliberately (which bolding it doesnt make it any more true) leaveing it out? I didnt throw accusations at you, and I fail to see how I'm looking for sympathy considering only one of these mods I worked on. Thats low m8, really low.

[spirit_of_rob]

So if im understanding your point here you are complaining because people who can mod... do so on topics they find interesting?

Hmmmm

So you want people who mod because they enjoy it to concentrtate on the mods that you want?.... Regardless of the fact wether they are interested or not in the particular area...

[Patroclus]

If complaining was an Olympic sport, you'd get a gold medal man. Seriously this topic is old and has been discussed many times. Besides, it's not as if you or I or anyone else could really do anything about it. So I say, get over it.

Ach!

[repman]

I agree Caius,
even if there are 50 Rom mods out there so what ? Every modder wants to realize his certain ideas and likes special twists. So if mods are not getting the necessary people, its because people are not interested in participating in this area or too lazy. Modding is a time consuming work and can be done with dedication only for a certain time range

repman

[tFighterPilot]

I agree with the title of this thread. People keep making new realism mods, because they feel all the others are no accurate enough...

[Lusted]

I have frankly had enough of people saying "why don't you work on this mod instead of hleping this othe rmo,d your mod has been done before".

Now my mod TE was mainly done by me. It just trys to improve the RTw experience. It isn't a realsim mod like RTR or EB, or quite as hardcore as SPQR. It just trys to improve the game. But i bet that if i'd started a thread to recruit hlep for it i would have got replies along the lines of "oh, but SPQR does this!" "help so and so mod instead". For the record, i have helped the following mods:
-Fall of Rome
-Imperium
-Paeninsula Italica
-Fourth Age
-Punic TW
and other mods have used my work. But i work on what I want to, im the persons who's doing it, i want to spend my time on doing something i enjoy, not working for ammod i don't like but need to help because im not being original.

Please people, we do this for fun, don't demand stuff from us.

and the best way to gain modding experience is to TRY. A year ago i knew nothing about modding, now i would consider myself an average modder who is good at certain things. But i only got this way by slowly developing my skills.

[Osceola]

Just to let you know, only a few of the original/unique mods I'm interested in. For instance I have zero interest in Zulu period, but I sure as hell would love to play it because it's not the same ol' same ol' Legions and Phalanxes. I'd also like to, OMG, learn something about that era of warfare! And I learn better when I'm as close to actually fighting in it as possible in this era.

And quit attacking me please, funnily enough 2 of my favourite mods (The Crusades and Hegemonia) seem to have something against me. I get the feeling if I included them in my list that took all 6 seconds of my immediate memory to make they wouldnt be so bitter. And people accuse me of jealousy.

[RZZZA]

Yo...I dont think Zhanguo is getting the love they deserve either....but whatre you gonna do? I think people are just burned out on RTW, the community is not large enough to play/support all the mods that are out there.

[John I Tzimisces]

Yo...I dont think Zhanguo is getting the love they deserve either....but whatre you gonna do? I think people are just burned out on RTW, the community is not large enough to play/support all the mods that are out there.

What I'm hoping is that these late-release mods are planning on using their RTW releases to build hype for possible versions for MTWII...
Although Zhanguo is quite amazing, I recommend anyone reading this to take a look.

edit: A hint? I need people who can skin, and help with a map, and a tech tree, possibly model, and all the other things mod projects need! But not *yet*.

[westy159]

Im sure there are plenty of people who would like of liked to help in those mods that failed but the problem is there are few people who know how to do these things. Im sure that there are many people who would like to get into modding but they dont really have much help on that. Theres no one to teach them. If i could have an experienced modder by my side here giving me instructions on how to do all this stuff that you want people for to do then i would be more then happy to do that it but my only option really is to ask a few questions in the mod workshop, hope to get a few answers and figure the rest out on my own which is time consuming and needs a lot of effort that will most likely end up wasted.

Do you know what im saying?

[quadrille]

time consuming and needs a lot of effort that will most likely end up wasted.

Congratulations, you have just defined the word "modding" Get used to it!

As for my opinions on the subject I think that the main problem most TC mods will face sooner or later isn't a lack of people but a lack of MOTIVATION. No matter how skilled or how many you are you won't get crap done unless you have some serious amounts of motivation. As has been pointed out earlier -in this thread and elsewhere- a mod developed by one devoted modder can have a bigger chance of success than a mod by a team with lesser amounts of motivation. With sufficient amounts of motivation pretty much anyone can learn how to mod - at least the basics.

Modders are not CA.We dont get payed from modding .So if anyone wants to start a new project or help out some of the existing ones they should prepare to do that them selves not to expect that others should do it for them.

Agreed, very much agreed. A general rule in the world of modding: if you want something done, you better do it yourself.

I think all modders here will agree with me about the pleasure we have reading commentaries and encouragements about our work. So, for those that are only reading, don't hesitate to post a little comment after a preview, we always like it

True. Modders are very vain, praise is the second best motivation (after money, which we don't get anyway).

In the end, what mod people choose to work on can only ever be up to themselves.

[Caius Britannicus]

Just to let you know, only a few of the original/unique mods I'm interested in. For instance I have zero interest in Zulu period, but I sure as hell would love to play it because it's not the same ol' same ol' Legions and Phalanxes. I'd also like to, OMG, learn something about that era of warfare! And I learn better when I'm as close to actually fighting in it as possible in this era.

And quit attacking me please, funnily enough 2 of my favourite mods (The Crusades and Hegemonia) seem to have something against me. I get the feeling if I included them in my list that took all 6 seconds of my immediate memory to make they wouldnt be so bitter. And people accuse me of jealousy.

LOL

No. Its because we are SICK AND TIRED of people complaining. This topic, as achilles said, has been brought up ad nauseam and I as a modder am tired of it (and so are others judging by the posts). You sound jealous in your post, you come off as bitter and well its just plain old annoying. Why should people have to please you by doing things they don't like?

ITheres no one to teach them. If i could have an experienced modder by my side here giving me instructions on how to do all this stuff that you want people for to do then i would be more then happy to do that it but my only option really is to ask a few questions in the mod workshop

a fair amount of modders are self taught. like Lusted and I, we learned things by trying and experimenting. Same with Wles (who is now a top notch modder). You don't need someone to hold your hand, thats just a convenient excuse....

[spirit_of_rob]

Just to let you know, only a few of the original/unique mods I'm interested in. For instance I have zero interest in Zulu period, but I sure as hell would love to play it because it's not the same ol' same ol' Legions and Phalanxes. I'd also like to, OMG, learn something about that era of warfare! And I learn better when I'm as close to actually fighting in it as possible in this era.

And quit attacking me please, funnily enough 2 of my favourite mods (The Crusades and Hegemonia) seem to have something against me. I get the feeling if I included them in my list that took all 6 seconds of my immediate memory to make they wouldnt be so bitter. And people accuse me of jealousy.

There was no attack in my statement, at least not a personal one Caius is 100% correct we all do this because we want to and people sat there saying the same "you should all concentrate on mods that are nearly done etc etc etc" doesnt help motivate us.

There are loads of tutorials out there to teach people who are interested. If you get stuck you post and for help and the people who know it help when they can. Loads of modders taught themself. I taught myself skinning. I learnt some modeling by myself but when i get stuck i just posted and asked what i was doing wrong.

[John I Tzimisces]

Keep an eye out for an announcement of a mod from me in the coming month or so. I need to clear up some RL things, and then I will present one of the most uniquely themed mods yet