Compatibility of TS v6.11, and general problems, [Topic split by Vlad, move by Baronius] Options

[cmorgan]

Currently reviewing TS v6.11 code alongside DR code to look for what could be causing hassles. ETA on summary is 6 weeks unless I am sidetracked (plenty of stuff going on) - please feel free to drop off specific problems on G3 or PPG or SHS boards.

(IA compatibility is a completely different question, please see the readme in that mod for more information).

While each of us in the IE community are allowed their own opinions, I think a constructive way of addressing those questions would to be to go to the NPC mod makers in question, and ask the same question. My current Tutu and BG games run with a large mod loadout for testing, and they all work extremely well, including several BWL mods (TGCep1 and Herbs and potions, and Jastey's Slime Quest on Tutu). At SHS, there is a section of MegaModders who successfully handle various versions of BP/BGT/etc., incorporating TS and NEJ, etc, on the same installs as many other NPCs from PPG and G3, et al.

I understand the frustration of two opposing philosophies of modding, but I am afraid that the choice of words indicating that development of G3 mods makes them widely incompatible is neither accurate nor fair. Nor is the development process a short one; widespread testing among several platforms, with anywhere between a handful of beta testers and an entire set of 12 or so folks specifically providing testing and feedback (depending on the mod, of course). Cooperation among teams of coders and an open policy of producing joint public code and testing it, then writing up tutorials on it and updating it with feedback allows modders access to many helpers, making coding review a strong and vibrant process.

The way to get folks to be able to identify the specific incompatibilities and give information on tracking the difficulty down is to experience the problem, get a savegame, and write up what the specific dialogue/action was that was taken. Then the modders in question can attempt to isolate and fix whatever is causing the trouble (assuming they wish to be friendly enough to help eachother out).

[Tervadh]

I see a lengthy philosophical or perhaps political discussion in this thread, but no concrete examples of what the problem is, or more importantly, what the solution is.

Why is it, that the g3 no NPC-mods are incompatible with the Blackwyrmlair mod

With which Blackwyrmlair mod exactly?

If you mean that many of the G3 mods are often incompatible with other mods, it's because their development doesn't follow certain important guidelines (for example, that's why the G3 BG2 Fixpack may break almost any other mod in unfortunate cases), and BWL's more complex projects are more sensitive to these crucial aspects.

Can you give an some examples of these guidelines? As an independent modder (i.e., not affiliated with the staff of any particular forum), I'd be interested in seeing these.

Feel free to split this topic off, but I see no reason why something this important to the modding community should be kept to private discussions.

The problems with this are excellently reflected by the G3 Fixpack, which still hasn't been split to two mods up to now -- despite the fact it's now obvious for everyone that it ceases the possibility for mods even to be compatible with the original game by introducing and changing too many dependencies.

Obvious to "everyone"? It's not obvious to me. Some examples of what you're talking about here would help too.

Unfortunately, I don't have the time, and -- after I've seen the lack of interest -- neither intention to provide more material about how you can improve the process. Let's just keep up everything in the way it has been going so far...

This statement conflicts with this one:

However, incompatibility risks between mods could significantly be decreased if modders made a little bit more effort to learn (instead of crazily producing and extending mods).

If you're not going to provide any concrete examples, how are modders supposed to "learn" what you're talking about?

[jastey]

Have a look at Baronius' arguments concerning the G3 fixpack here: http://forums.blackwyrmlair.net/index.php?...c=2968&st=0

Feel free to split this topic off, but I see no reason why something this important to the modding community should be kept to private discussions.

Be aware that this discussion deals with what I call "community politics", and what seems to be presented as facts often come from precudices, attitudes and (un)wishful thinking, unfortunately. Statements like "most mods of xy-community are not compatible" and "modders of community yz don't care about compatibility" are bound to be exaggerations, unless the poster can provide proof of his statement. (Further for some modders it's quite funny to read these allegations at BWL, that hosts incompatible mod(s) EDIT: That, in some parts of the IE modding scene, shares the prejudice of a mod site that hosts incompatible mod(s) (Improved Anvil, that per design is recommended not to be played with other mods EDIT: For example Improved Anvil, which is, as far as I understood, a mod that has a concept that is meant as a whole experience of BGII. So, principally, the idea is a mod that changes the experience of the game in a way that in some points would be disturbed by other mods. Therefore, the way the mod is implemented into the game makes it incompatible with some other mods, from a technical point of view. Since the mod is intended to change the game in exact the manner it does, the author does not see the necessity of making it technically compatible in these cases, since such a compatibility would destroy the intended game experience the author wants Improved Anvil to give. Nevertheless, this reluctance and "planned incompatibility", so to say, raised some aversion in some parts of the community. I hope this was the politically correct way of saying what I meant.) and with modder(s) that openly stated that he doesn't care about compatibility with other mods (Vlad with the Never Ending Journey mod. This might have changed, though), but that's a different thing.)

This post has been edited by jastey: Oct 21 2007, 08:45 PM

[Sikret]

Improved Anvil, that per design is recommended not to be played with other mods

Recommended not to be played with some other mods or with all other mods?

The natural reading of what you wrote indicates the latter (= all other mods) which will make it a false statement about IA and about my recommendations. Is this an example of the sort of exaggerations you warned us against in your own post? (Perhpas you just forgot to add the term 'some' to your sentence, or Perhaps you deliberately dropped it because with that term added to your statement, it wouldn't have the psychological effect you wanted it to have on the innocent third party readers, eh?)

In fact, BWL mods and IA in particular have been victims of such exaggeration more than any other mod. People say false things about our mods; later after being refuted, they claim that they were exaggerating or joking. I'm sure you don't need the links.

But yes, Improved Anvil is incompatible with some other mods, but they are not many compared to the total number of available mods and compared to the huge amount of new content IA adds to the game. Some of those incompatibilities are due to cosmetic changes some of those other mods have applied to the game (which removes the dependencies, as Baronius has nicely explained before); some other incompatibilities are conceptually unavoidable (ex: you can't have the "improved Firkraag" simultaneously from Improved Anvil, Improved Battles and Tactics all in the same installation). In general, the number of conceptual incompatibilities naturally increases when we are talking about mods which add huge amounts of new content to the game. In such cases, the player can play mod x in one game session and mod y in another game session and it's not the end of the world. All this said, I'm always willing to cooperate with other modders to remove incompatibilities as long as they are removable without sacrificing any content of the either mods. aVENGER and I have nicely done this kind of cooperation with each other.

Edited to fix a typo

This post has been edited by Sikret: Oct 21 2007, 11:39 AM