My description work so far
has been uploaded. Apologies if I'm not as far along as people would like: I'm about halfway through bug_slug_new. In my defence, birds_new is the largest file and almost all of it needed updating. The creature_standard file is larger, but at a glance I doubt there's anything in there in need of updating.
I first committed vanilla Modest Mod so it's easy to see precisely what changes I've made so far. There are plenty of changes here and there, so apologies for that--make use of what you want--but further diversions from vanilla aside from simplifying creature names won't occur. For what it's worth there's a proper creature_reptiles.txt update in there for the current version, with the new attacks added in where appropriate. Might help, as Modest Mod is officially still two versions behind.
As indicated in the repository an editor would be appreciated. If you're not very good at GitHub/Git and have any recommendations, feel free to send me a private message. Fire away with criticism. My ideal end goal would be to have these widely adopted (by Toady as well, if possible).
I have no intention of giving up, but I doubt I'll be done anytime soon, either. I'm not going to continue spamming this thread as my progress will be visible in GitHub.
FWIW I'll express a VERY STRONG preference for git/github/proper VCS over google docs or email.
This kind of structured editing is a solved problem for programmers; better to take advantage than reinvent the wheel badly!
I agree. Done.