Testing the waters: The Succession Modding Project

[Song]

So we've had nearly 1.3 succession games now, made up of 1 successful run, one failed, and one in process. And each time they've had a "succession mod" set up to heavily modify the game. It's caused lag, but also some pretty awesome moments. Lots of peoples work together in one place to change the game massively.


But then today I thought "What if you had a real succession mod? Not a mod for a succession, but a mod made as a succession game...."


So here's the idea. If enough people are interested, I'll go and ask for a UNID to be allocated for succession/community mod projects. I'll then make up a shortlist of themes, which will then have the final theme selected, either by poll or by "Shrikey Likey!" selection.

The rules would be as follows:

1. Each person adds a certain amount of new modding work to the mod, in keeping with the chosen theme. They make sure it works, then they hand over the XML to the next person.
2. This continues until we have a mod.
3. All bits of code would have to be labelled with the author who wrote it, and any modifications to earlier work (eg. Fixing a bug that turned up later) would need to be noted. No complete rewrites/removals of other people's stuff without their approval. All indecipherable tlisp must be labelled with what it does.
4. All additions would have to be playtested by the person who writes it. This doesn't excuse other people from making sure everything works, though.
5. There would probably be a 5-day or 1-week time limit per turn. The next person on the list (if there is one) would have 2 days to announce that they've started work, or they'll be skipped. If there's no one on the list after someone finishes, anyone can grab a turn by saying that they want one. Alternatively, the current player can roll over to a new turn. They can only do two consecutive turns this way, however.
6. The mod will be designed to run on vanilla, and no other mods must be run at the same time EXCEPT for development-aiding mods like G.O.D . This isn't to say it can't be designed to run with other mods (in fact, that would be the best idea): It just has to work on/be balanced for an otherwise vanilla game.


So that's how it'd work, more or less. Things would change eventually, and by the end it'd probably turn into "succession EXTREME BALANCING AND TWEAKING!". But that's part of modding, so that's fine by me. It'd be pretty awesome if we managed to use this to make something that can be an official extension, or get ported into (or inspire new bits of) the vanilla game in some form.

Is anyone interested in taking part in this type of event? If there is demand, I'll run it.

[FourFire]

This sounds like a very good idea!
Unfortunately, I have neither the time, knowledge or adequate skill to contribute... I'd love to playtest various iterations and the finished product however

[RPC]

I'd like the theme to be zombies. I'm in regardless though

[Song]

Current themes I'm close to settling on "Background events/details" and "Autons". Might do one, might do both (and have a choice per turn of doing one theme at a time).

However...in order for me to start this, I think I'll need 4-5 modders. Given I may be going overseas fairly soon, let's make that 5. Currently we have two, and a playtester. So if three more modders say they'll take part, I'll set up the event.

[Watch TV, Do Nothing]

I don't post in the mod forums much but I can contribute a little xml of my own. I like the "Background Events / Details" idea because it is a logical extension of Transcendence itself. A lot of modders have great big ideas and go all out with them, and resulting product is often very different in tone and pacing than the vanilla game- not that there's anything wrong with that, of course. A multi-creator mod that fleshes the game out a little bit without introducing major new concepts will be very welcome.

[TVR]

Sure, why not?

[Song]

I've had confirmation that I am in fact going overseas soon. This means I'll only be able to START this event. If one more modder signs up, I'll go grab a UNID and set things going. The theme will be "Background details/events", and if it's still going when I get back (I hope it is), then I'll catch up with it then. I'm away from the 26th of November to the 2nd of January.

[FourFire]

Well now that Skrike is back, are you other modders still interested in this project?
I might even be able to vaguely contribute some code in some sense or another (It will mainly be me copypasting other mods' code and editing to do things that I want) so I suppose you could say you might have 4.2 modders.