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Vanilla DF 40.x

Still playing Masterwork for DF 34.x

Both equally.

Both, mostly the new vanilla.

Both, mostly Masterwork.

[Meph]

Maybe we need a new mod list, not just profits smallish one. Something that shows larger mods, with screenshots and longer description, a summary and a rating, download links...  I still believe that masterwork gets so much attention because it has so much attention. To get more attention to other mods, dont make the mods better, make the presentation better. I will get to it after my next update.

And now I have to have a look at Dark Wizard Tower.

Edit: Had a look, the idea is nice. But you have no new graphics, items, workshops, pets... and you get lots of errorlogs in dfhack, and you still get migrants. Which results in more errorlogs about killunit and projectileexpansion, which I assume should kill all migrants. I just unpacked the graphical version and run that, installing wizards towers with the "s" menu on startup.

The workshop could be a bit more... lore-friendly. Instead of a "conjuration location" that has one reaction "conjure stuff", you could as least make some sort of magical building that uses some kinds of reagent for different things. Minor conjuration, using animal parts, Major conjuration using sapient corpses or migrants... to get some sort of balancing. The way it is now, most people will spend 1h typing things into "conjure item X", get full adamantine masterwork armor, and then watch that one guy who needs no food/drink run around. It might be different from vanilla DF, but its not well designed. Its amazing work for one day, but I dont think that players would have much fun with it. I could be wrong, but you get everything instantly, there is no progression and no late-game, no goals to set.

Using this for a hardcore difficult hermit-mod, with a hermit that kills all migrants and has to survive alone getting food and drink and shelter... I think that would get more attention.

Edit2: Now I want to make some kind of hermit race/mode for MDF, which probably results in several people saying: "Thats a great idea meph", and you saying "see, thats what I mean."

[Samarkand]

For what it's worth, if somebody took dwarves and made a lot of dfhack stuff run through lore friendly buildings it would be my favorite mod ever. I think a lot of dfhack tools are great, but it breaks gameplay so much to have to go to the console.

[Meph]

For what it's worth, if somebody took dwarves and made a lot of dfhack stuff run through lore friendly buildings it would be my favorite mod ever. I think a lot of dfhack tools are great, but it breaks gameplay so much to have to go to the console.

Many mods do that. Masterwork does it so much, it utterly breaks when you remove dfhack. But most players dont know which parts are dfhack, and which are just raws. Look at the Gnome Mode, its almost exclusively dfhack.

[Samarkand]

For what it's worth, if somebody took dwarves and made a lot of dfhack stuff run through lore friendly buildings it would be my favorite mod ever. I think a lot of dfhack tools are great, but it breaks gameplay so much to have to go to the console.

Many mods do that. Masterwork does it so much, it utterly breaks when you remove dfhack. But most players dont know which parts are dfhack, and which are just raws. Look at the Gnome Mode, its almost exclusively dfhack.

I know MDF does, that's why is my favorite mod right now. But something slightly closer to vanilla might be nice. Just a mod that interfaces dfhack and vanilla with as few changes as possible, if that makes sense. Personally I haven't been able to get into gnomes because I'm not interested in the techy stuff.

[Putnam]

See, I never hear about errors because somehow I apparently test things in a way that doesn't rigorously enough go through usage cases (I.E I need to test better) and nobody plays the damn mods. Meanwhile, I get the (not too much sarcasm) joy of explaining the same error over and over to people who ask about DFHack errors in the Masterwork threads.

[fricy]

I agree: Mods/modders need more exposure and I think we need to take steps to provide easier access.

The solution I was thinking about is to create a platform for distribution/promotion based on the Starter Packs. Just as we promote tilesets, we can promote mods too. Instead of providing only vanilla, I'd like to package optional mods that can be merged into the raws by even a 2 year old: just click a button, select graphics, load the game and it's there.
The best'd be if there were total conversions to choose from, and also mini mods/addon packs that expand the base game, like streamlined leather and display case for eg.

The problem with this approach is that,
a, The launcher's features need to be rethought and expanded.
b, Mods need to be standardised somehow, and most likely provided as delta patches for merging, and if there are optional settings (like in MW or modest mod) then a common settings file need to be agreed on.
The biggest issue is somewhere here, as Milo and warmist have started working on this direction (rubble, dfhack mod manager + there's blast too), but they are competing solutions to the same basic problem, and fragmentation won't help.

So, does it make any sense to you?

[Meph]

It makes perfect sense to me, thats what I wanted to create for years. The problem is simply that it becomes increasingly difficult the more mods you add, and its hard to compartmentalize them. I would love to have ONE MOD download that includes content by everyone. But as soon as things use the same ID, or if vanilla content is altered, it doesnt work. You cant put two different TCs in it, let alone ten.

At some point I wanted to import all items and entities and creatures and materials from practically any mod, Genesis, LfR... and make a tab in my GUI for each. Play Masterwork with a LFR race, fighting against Genesis megabeasts and Lord of the Rings civs. In the end I didnt, because I didnt want to steal all the content from all the people.

Anyway, I of course like the idea. I tried starting Masterwork from scratch (after deon made genesis4 from scratch) and have the GUI revert it back to true vanilla, but I couldnt do it. Too many things alter vanilla content, too many dependencies...

Milo Christiansens Rubble kinda does that, but not many people use it (me included), because its not user friendly enough.

[Putnam]

Fantastic got that exact goal early on. I already have Sparking as a module in it. Sparking is a total conversion. Fantastic is exactly what you want.

...Or rather, it would be if built on vanilla raws.

Which will take no time at all. Fantastic DF v.2: modularity explosion. Imma do it.

EDIT 2: and call it something else. Something like "collection of DFHack modmanager compatible mods".

[Meph]

Call it Mod Starter Pack. That goes better with the DF Starter Pack, since its aimed at people that are new to mods and want to try out a few, or a few mixed mods.

[arbarbonif]

For some reason the following comes to mind....  (XKCD covers everything)


I'm still playing MDF, mainly because I am addicted to DFHack shinies (and some of the quality of life MDF additions).  I don't play other mods because they are generally inserting other IPs into DF, which I'm just not interested in (Ponies/DBZ/Dr.Who etal).  I don't even play anything other than dwarves mode in MDF (though I am tempted to try gnomes).  Most of the smaller tool-like mods (spells, twbt and the like) are basically already subsumed in MDF.  I'll probably switch to DF 2014 with the next release for a while at least.

It seems to me that Putnam is kinda complaining that people suck, which is pretty hard to argue against .  The reddit comments he posted here seem to be people wanting to belong to the "cool" group and denigrating those not in that group.  Unfortunately, that is kinda how people work.

[Meph]

Well, as it currently stands, he has found enthusiasm for a new project. I hope it doesnt backfire, if people dont give enough feedback on it, but I honestly think a mod starter pack would be great. Even though my customer base might run away and join the competition. *hiss at Putnams direction

On the other hand, I like the idea of his Dark Wizards Tower, with a hermit that isntakills all migrants, and might use this idea as basis for a more balanced hermit mod.

[palu]

Mod starter pack sounds good. How will you decide what mods to put in?

[Meph]

Mod starter pack sounds good. How will you decide what mods to put in?

Not sure if its possible to put in larger mods in one go, I assume it starts small with modules.

[Putnam]

Mod starter pack sounds good. How will you decide what mods to put in?

Any mods that will work and that I have permission to. I can legitimately include pretty much anything; all I need is a sufficiently robust creature variation system to patch stuff in to creatures just in case everything is modified. I could probably also program in better categories to the mod manager to make it less hackish and more like legit categories (filtering, mutual exclusivity, prerequisites etc.)

[Meph]

You have permission to use anything from Masterwork. Even though these parts will be the hardest to make compatible with other mods.

Good luck.