Hi!
I see actually two issues here, one being basically just implied by the thread title while the other is the real meat.
One thing is the joking about Toady being a deity/God/almighty/whatever. These jokes go readily across the board and are taken in light spirit in general. However, occasionally, they can grow annoying. But even that is not a real issue, I think, and I don't see it as the point really discussed here.
The real issue here is, in my opinion, the difference between thinking and saying/writing. We can not really know what Toady, Three Toe or anyone else is thinking. We can only know what they are saying/writing and claiming otherwise seems rather arrogant to me. Sure, we can speculate about motivations and awareness, but we can't be sure until we are told.
Transferring this to the suggestions forums, all we genuinely know about what Toady has considered are the exact words he used in the dev log, his goals, the bug reports, and other statements he has made. Anything else would be a deduction and we can never be certain whether we are right about it.
Thus, I think it is quite valid to make suggestions that are derived from existing goals as long as they somehow refine or reconsider the aspect. This is not to question Toady's intelligence, but people sometimes miss even the most obvious things, and that happens to geniuses as well as morons. It may be that Toady has thought of the thing suggested, but it may also be that some additional aspect is mentioned he had not really seen before and may wish to investigate after all. And even if the initial suggestion may fall into what Toady has actually thought of, the fact that it is refined from what is publicly known may actually increase the probability that the discussion based on that suggestion may bring forth thus far unconsidered possibilities. Who can really tell?
Besides, arguing about what can obviously be deducted is also dangerous when dealing with a suggestion forum. Is not the existance of goblins themselves reason to expect them poisoning wells? Could you not argue that their existance automatically brings with it many military suggestions? Is it not obvious that a fantasy world is likely to have at least some kind of magic? In other words, where does the deductable material end and things you can suggest start? Is it not so, that all we are suggesting here can actually be deduced from what the game already offers - the realistic physics, the merciless directness of violence, the complex history and personal relationships? I think any of the suggestions made can be proven to be directly derived either from these features or from technical issues like the user interface - so all the suggestions would be meaningless as "Toady wouldn't let us down.".
I am sorry, but I think that putting it so bluntly is necessary.
In the end, I think, considering this as well as other threads, there is a question of what people come here for. Do they want to share their stories? Do they want to help newbies? Do they want to brag? Do they want to intimidate others? Do they want to impress others? Do they want to return something to the community who helped them when they started playing the game? Do they have an inspiration they simply need to talk about?
As I said before, no one can claim to know what someone else thinks. Only the person in question can ask themselves whether they really want to be constructive or destructive by doing whatever they do. And because of that, only that person can really say whether their actions actually achieve whatever goal they are aiming for.
Deathworks
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Topic: [FORUM] Toady is not God. (Read 3839 times)