Talk:Modding brainstorms

I don't deny the distinction between AE and "indie modding", but this still means scope creep in the minds of the few modders who can contribute quality stuff to the Edition, including Loser and myself. Instead of consolidating a few radical/spectacular improvements, we are flooding ourselves with possibilities, without producing anything releasable or showcaseable - at the most, we illustrate our research with videos that are only informative or interesting for fellow modders, and then we move on to something completely different. Maybe this shouldn't be called "scope creep": instead of a project with an ill-defined scope, we have creative skills that just bypass any project whatsoever and are spent "systematically mucking about". Maybe this is a consequence of AE's scope creep rather than a cause, and I have no one to blame but myself. So I can't complain about this whole brainstorming business (and who knows, maybe something interesting will come out of it... eventually). But I can still assess the features being suggested here from a developer's point of view. If Loser is motivated by this section and tries to mod w1_tap bullets (or SBG grenades), it will be scope creep: a feature definitely worthy of the Edition, but in the ever-growing list of defintely-Edition-worthy features, it's less kick-ass than many. You can't revive Oni with bullets that don't shatter glass or with grenades that do. That's pretty much what I meant with my scope-creep warning: yes, this thing is feasible, as well as a zillion other things we've come up with before and a zillion other things we haven't come up with yet; but I'm begging you, try to forget this thing and focus, focus. --geyser 04:26, 16 November 2008 (CET)

Well, when I created this page the other day, it was accompanied by a feeling of, "I should have done this a long time ago." I had a few ideas floating around my head or on my user page that really belonged in a central place with others' ideas, and, seeing the activity this page has brought in the last two days, I think it was a bit like opening a pressure valve to let some steam out. The steam is good - it's creative energy -- but of course it can also scald us if we don't contain it and focus it on something specific, for the most part. The idea of this page was basically that if you liked something, you could add it to the AE's feature list. But if not, I fully expect you to ignore it and focus on the AE Requests page. Perhaps some of what is left there is also scope-creepy and more of it should be moved here. I leave that to you; I only moved the stuff that really felt out of scope, to me anyway.

As far as whether we are bouncing around like ping pong balls because we haven't been given specific targets, I won't deny that you have no one to blame but yourself; projects don't lead themselves. Someone has to say, "This is going in the AE, this isn't -- at least, for now." It's not like everyone is guaranteed to work on things even when they're laid out in a list, but at least we'll be able to focus on the AE when we want to, that way. I encourage you to go through the AE subpages and distill them into a list of things that we can help you with. We'll take the most important things first and see what else we can add in the months (year?) before some PR might be coming our way, if Feral holds up their end. Focusing hard on the AE is the least we can do for Oni, at this juncture, what with people at companies who are actually paying for work to get done on the game. Granted, they expect to make some money back by selling it, but they know full well it's not going to line their pockets. So let's do what we can, even if it's just a little time here and there from week to week. If we pace ourselves and keep RL stuff and Oni stuff in balance, I think we can produce something we'll all be happy with.

So, in short, if this page irks you, geyser, ignore it completely and see what you can do about giving us a To-do list (a refined one, not "Category:AE_to-do"), based only on what's really in the AE namespace. Then we can move forward. --iritscen 05:18, 16 November 2008 (CET)

The kind of stuff you're dumping here is never ignorable for an expert unless the expert takes a big time out. I'm saving collective time by commenting on those things, even if I may be favoring "scope creep". So, ignoring this completely is easier said than done. Another thing that's easier said than done is that to-do list you're requesting: synthesis takes time and effort, and if the pages categorized as AE_to-do are too much for you guys to take in, then we're screwed anyway; basically, make a step in my direction, and then we'll see about leadership. The only thing you can expect from me at this point is raw modding output (either stuff I'll do on my own, or more or less intensive collabs with others) and updates on corresponding mini-pages. Given everybody's real-life priorities, I can't tell you what to do, and as for "what to pick from", the AE_to-do category is there: I'll keep it up to date with the work I'm aware of, and it's also up to the truly motivated and capable of you to update those minipages (as in "I'm on it") or add new ones that you're personally dedicated to. Projects don't lead themselves, but I can't tell I haven't tried, either. And "true leadership", however timely, is something I can't afford right now. --geyser 05:52, 16 November 2008 (CET)