High Elves Graphic Improvment [WIP Standby]

[Pyres Δt Varanasi]

Isso é bonito, uma enorme quantidade de trabalho e bem feito!

[Arthalion]

Hello Arthalion,

Sorry for the late reply but here it goes.

Your modifications while well made are exactly what I don't like being done to my textures, so I cannot for the time being grant permission for release.

This is really hard for me because like you I started making units by editing existing textures and building enough familiarity with the tools to begin creating my own textures.

Feel free to contact me whenever.

-Louis

So louis lux dont allow to release this work, you can contact him if you want to try to convince him.
I do all my best, sorry mates.

[Hummingbird]

*sniffle*

[Jmonstra]

Lame as a 1000 man march of men with clubbed feet.

[Zarathos]

This didn't surprise me at all. The trade off between the benefints provided by his works to this community and the obstructions to new mods based on his works has dropped to absolute zero over the years.

[Goth]

Shame I would love those units in my game

[Dutch-Balrog]

I can see where he is comming from tho, since this is more than just a graphical improvement, but rather a style change aswell, which is often not approved by the origional creators of the units.

[Ngugi]

There's always a gamble accepted when a work is initiated before a permission is obtained, and sometimes that's how it ends up.


Well, you're most talented Arthalion, so hope you'll get back on the horse using some source material that is free or permitted, and entertain all the blokes who yearned for your work.
Lack of permission has brought down great modders work before, but those who got back working (be it after a break) has since been of great value and joy to the community and players; as for example seen with Taro_M and his beloved Gondor unit works.

[Everto]

Edit; couldn't it be argued that your upgraded models of sword and bow quendi can be released to the community and re-named, since after all they share no resemblance with the original quendi? The only units that use plentiful elements and designs from LL are the Lindon Longspears, Nosterino Models, Mithlond Nobles and Eldarinwe Nobles. Would I be correct in this assumption?

[Hummingbird]

Edit; couldn't it be argued that your upgraded models of sword and bow quendi can be released to the community and re-named, since after all they share no resemblance with the original quendi? The only units that use plentiful elements and designs from LL are the Lindon Longspears, Nosterino Models, Mithlond Nobles and Eldarinwe Nobles. Would I be correct in this assumption?

I don't think so, no. They still incorporate elements of other High Elf models and (though heavily modified) textures unfortunately and LL's rules seem to be pretty uncompromising when it comes to their use.

[Jmonstra]

Of course it's his prerogative to deny permission to anybody he likes, but it's tough on the guy who obviously worked hard to make something new and awesome out of something old. Getting told "Nice work, but get rekt" at the end of it all is a pretty ignoble end for what would have been an amazing contribution to the community.

[Everto]

Of course it's his prerogative to deny permission to anybody he likes, but it's tough on the guy who obviously worked hard to make something new and awesome out of something old. Getting told "Nice work, but get rekt" at the end of it all is a pretty ignoble end for what would have been an amazing contribution to the community.

I agree. Arthalion, your work is spectacular, please don't let this set-back stifle your desire to further add to this mod. Your models have rekindled a desire in me to start playing this mod again. I don't see Third Age being updated to a 3.5 or 4.0 anytime soon, but it's work like yours, combined with the phenomenal collaborations of submods such as MOS and DaC, that keeps this community excited and thrilled by the prospect of a better Third Age experience. You are an awesome modder, and I hope you haven't had the wind taken out of your sails enough to not take another stab at making some epic High Elven units

Warmest Regards,
Everto

[Mr.Jox]

I agree. Arthalion, your work is spectacular, please don't let this set-back stifle your desire to further add to this mod. Your models have rekindled a desire to in me to start playing this mod again. I don't see Third Age being updated to a 3.5 or 4.0 anytime soon, but it's work like yours, combined with the phenomenal collaborations of submods such as MOS and DaC, that keeps this community excited and thrilled by the prospect of a better Third Age experience. You are an awesome modder, and I hope you haven't had the wind taken out of your sails enough to not take another stab at making some epic High Elven units

Warmest Regards,
Everto

I'm sorry, I don't want to but I'll say it. Almost sure there will never come new ofc patches for TATW or new overhaul submods upcoming(DCI:LA doesn't count, it's almost has first public version(only my thoughts)). And this is not because many members of TATW team are inactive. Even if they go active again they will better try to make smth same for new games (just look how much times Gondor roster was remade and imo vanilla roster of the better ones), it's not really smart to work on old successful project. Well I don't say KK can't combine all better submods into one last final patch, but no really completevily new stuff may come. You can see the situation, not much stuff coming for TATW recently (even good submods in comparison with few previous years), old great modders have stopped developing smth for TATW.
I'm an optimist, btw (you can see it when I said KK may combine most recent best submods into latest TATW patch after 3.2). And you can see, there is not really much left to add to the mod, it's already a heaven of perfectionist

[Arthalion]

Thx all, im really affected by your positives comments.
Actually i put this project on standby and go work on Attila total war, perhaps after i will go back to it.

[Taro_M]

To be honest I have very mixed oppinion about this whole permission troubles. I mean yeah, the original creator can withhold it, but why? Since TA is non-profit mod the materials should be avaible to people who wish to use it in modding (with credits of course). I put a LOT of work into my units, but I decided to release them as an Open Source thingy, so people may use them in any way they want as long as credits are provided. Someone can take my Gondor Soldiers and change the textures to replace the white tree with purple donkey ding dongs and then release it, I wouldnt mind really. There is nothing to gain here by withholding permissions. The more materials are avaible to the community the better stuff may be created (thank god that Rusichi team allows for their stuff to be used freely).

[Goth]

@Taro M I agree entirely, I always put a statement that any of my work can be used by anyone else, the only work of mine I cant allow is work I did on EB because it belongs to the EB team and they are the ones to give permission. its a community after all and benefits everyone

[malwabar]

Maybe Louis means that your units are not enough "lore-accurate" when he says "exactly what I don't like being done to my textures"

[Taro_M]

Lore accuracy? This whole thing is one giant fanfiction. Besides, its just textures. It dosent matter if elf warrior textures are used to create other elf warriors or something cempletely different (bits of armors like belts and such used on space marines or something).

"exactly what I don't like being done to my textures" - so he just dosent people to edit his stuff and release submods using those edited textures? I still fail to see the point of that (its still his right to say that though).

[Zarathos]

I still fail to see the point of that (its still his right to say that though).

"You are improving my textures and this is exactly what I don't like."

LoL

Anyway I'm not totally sure hi has the right to do that and the main reason is that his work has no kind of copyright on it (not even creative commons) and the only protection it can obtain comes from the "moderation" of this community. Because if you infringe the permission you can get your mod banned and/or your account banned. Outside TWC this kind of permission can only make people laugh his ass off loud.

I'll make you a better example of what I'm speaking off. This is an uncopyrighted image I found using Google Images:



It has an author. Someone made it... and left it uncopyrighted (maybe pretending that people inside the community in which it was first published is not allowed to use it for other creations without his permission, who knows). And this, this is the same image made by me from scratch:



How? I opened Photoshop creating a transparent image of the same size, then I picked the same colors with the Eyedropper Tool, then I put the original image on a new layer on the top with opacity set at 30%, and finally I used it as a reference to create selections with the same shape (Pen Tool), filling them with the same colors. I can upload you a video demonstration on YouTube if you want me to prove it.
The result is identical. Who is the author of the first one? An unknown guy. Who is the author of the second one? Me. Are they identical? Yes. Is that guy allowed to tell me how I can use my image? No ing way, because it's a freely inspired copy of his uncopywrighted work.

Arthalion, in my opinion, never copy-pasted LL's textures. You can't create such good quality textures starting from existing so and so ones. He probably used the original ones as a trace reference on Photoshop on an overlapped semi-transparent layer just to make sure he was drawing the same things on the same spots. So he basically redraw them from scratch. Again, it's a freely inspired copy of an uncopyrighted work and LL should not be allowed to claim any right on them.
Did Arthalion used the original models? I don't know. The answer is probably yes. And this is not good because LL can claim his rights on them But again, if he reshapes the models from scratch using 3DS Max and remaps them on *HIS* textures using ZBrush, what can that guy do then to deny his permission? Nothing.

Honestly, I'm ing tired of this permissions thing. The TATW community is totally involved into this hilarious bureaucracy and many incredibly good models haven't been released because of it that the trade off between the advantages produces by the original works and the disadvantages provoked by permission obstructions is dropping down to absolute zero.
I'm tired to read things like "you can edit my scripts but only in February and in August", or "you can reshape my model but you can touch my textures only if you sacrifice your first son to your Gods during a full-moon night". It's . Either you release something, and agree to let people do whatever he wants with, or you keep it for your mod denying any permission to be used elsewhere. Especially when all this concerns a modding community creating non-profit mods.

And I'll be more than glad to reshape the models for Arthalion if he is not skilled enough to do it by himself just to have the satisfaction of circumventing some stupidity (which is something I *LOVE* to do in my life).

If we want to dig deeper into this problem... do anyone has the permission to touch the game files in order to create mods? The all famous EULA.txt indeed says no:

(e) sell, rent, lease, license, distribute or otherwise transfer this Game Software or any copies without the express prior written consent of Sega;

(f) reverse engineer, derive source code, modify, decompile, disassemble, or create derivative works of the Game Software, in whole or in part (except as the applicable law expressly permits, in which case all and any modifications, adaptations, improvements, etc. shall belong to, vest in and be the exclusive property of Sega and/or its licensors on creation, in any event);

(h) export or re-export the Game Software or any copy or adaptation in violation of any applicable laws or regulations; or

(i) create data or executable programs that mimic data or functionality in the Game Software.

Do someone has the right to create a permission policy on reverse engineered data coming from a proprietary, cracked format (MESH/TEXTURE)? Absolutely not. It's crazy, utopic and completely hilarious. And the fact that CA gives no s about what we are doing with M2TW files doesn't implies it's an open source format we can use and abuse as much as we want, even putting personal restrictions on it.

Still the original author should have the the possibility to put the boot down if someone uses your work in truly evil fashion or tries to monetize it. However, if someone really wants to screw you over, no amount of permission withholding or complaining is going to stop such person. Saying "nobody is allowed to use my work in any shape or form" while you can use it anyway just stifles the creative community that does resect your decision, while doing nothing to the people that dont care about your rules and do whatever they like.

Hard quote on this. Permission denials should be limited to very unrespectful usages. Like copy/pasting a full mod and releasing it under another name. Or releasing things claiming you made them when it's not true.
Everything else is and should be forbidden if we want to keep producing good content that makes this community evolve into something better.

[Araval]

Notes:

-Regarding the use in sub mods of the models and textures of the high elven units, they may be used freely as long as the unit models are not reshaped or made to fit other textures other than the ones originally intended for them. Also the textures and skins may not be edited without my consent, which includes but is not limited to cutting, colorizing, texture overlaying or obstructing. Any questions related to permissions feel free to contact me.