Goal setting for the new team

[MattyG]

Goal setting for Aberrated, phase II

I have read through most of the threads and, considering the members of our creative team and their interests, I have compiled this priority list for our work.


Short term goals

1. Fix known bugs. (could be completed in mid-May)

2. Complete the redistribution of cultures in Europe, Middle East and North America, updating the province.csv to ensure we have a solid template for the next stages of the work. (could be completed for distribution to team members by end of May)

3. Divide among us leadership roles for the following major projects. Note that I have not prioritised these, but I have grouped them together where I see their events as having considerable shared content. (creative leads to be determined by the end of May)

A. Aberration of North America

B. Significant changes to Western Europe, especially the files for Brittany, Burgundy, Savoy, Swabia and Bavaria.

C. Minor changes to eastern Med files, Byzantium, the Khaliphate and Kingdom of Jerusalem

D. Minor changes to northern Europe files, specifically Scotland, Hansa, Norway and the Union of Kalmar.

E. Minor changes to north-eastern Europe, especially the Teutonic Order.

F. A general sweep through the files of the remaining countries to ensure compatibility, to add new events and to edit for balance.​

Medium term goals

4. Establish playtesters for these project supergroups, and continue to create content and make amendments until the new file sets are ready for publishing.

5. Begin discussion on the next major project. Note that beyond North America and Europe/Near East/North Africa the projects are much grander in scale, as we are not building upon the excellent foundations of an earlier team. Clearly, China/Korea/Manchuria/Japan looms as an important area. Of equal gravity would be the aberration of India/Persia region.

 

[unmerged(31994)]

Im in

 

[Rythin]

I'd like to participate (though I am new to Aberration).

 

[unmerged(16159)]

I'm in, would be interested eventually in D and E, since the work I am doing on Hansa will affect TO, UoK and Norway closely.

Love your work MattyG.

 

[unmerged(33565)]

I am all up for helping with B, however come the 17th I will be on vacation for 3 weeks, so I don't know how much help I can be before the 2nd week of June.

One side note, I think A should be pushed back until the rest of the stuff is done. I know it is your baby, but maybe you should look at the rest of the stuff on the list and compair them. The work on North America as far as testing and coding is almost as much work as the rest of the list combined. I know that you have some it done already, but the rest is just modifing exsisting files.

 

[MattyG]

I am all up for helping with B, however come the 17th I will be on vacation for 3 weeks, so I don't know how much help I can be before the 2nd week of June.

One side note, I think A should be pushed back until the rest of the stuff is done. I know it is your baby, but maybe you should look at the rest of the stuff on the list and compair them. The work on North America as far as testing and coding is almost as much work as the rest of the list combined. I know that you have some it done already, but the rest is just modifing exsisting files.

Glad to have you along whenever you will be able to make time. I do NOT think we should rush any of the work we do, as no-one wants to burn out and, as the great quote goes, "Nothing good was ever done quickly". Yes, not a verbatim quote.

The Aberrating of the New World I consider to be a work-in-progress, much like Euopre and every other part of the world. If we were to wait until it was perfect before we released it, it would never come out. As long as it isn't crazy out of whack and bug ridden, the initial part of the Aberration could be included in the second upload (the first being the bug fix for the current version).

This first installment will include the heavy Aberrating of the Maya and Navajo, the Smallpox events, the alterations to country set-ups for all pagans, changs to the province.csv and medium-sixed alterations to Zapotec and Aztec. It's about 60% done. Most of the North American pagans and the Inca and Chimu will best be done in light of extensive playing through of the game with the first set of Aberrations, I think.

Matty

 

[Rythin]

Hi.
So now a few words from me. I have already worked on MDS scenario and helped in doing/scripting some small things for other mods. Now I would like to participiate in reborned Aberration as I have always thought it is a damn good idea to create such fantasy-like, balanced scenario.

I can offer a little gaming experience, fair scripting skills and a lot of free time that can be spend on working for your mod. But there is a trick - I have imagination of sixty year-old conservative shopkeeper. If you want me to contribute efficient, you have to assign me some tasks (with deadlines preferably ). Oh, and show me around because I don't know what to read first.

Stay cool,
R.

 

[MattyG]

Welcome aboard.

As a shopkeeper and the brain behind the EUWiki, perhaps the right role for you might be the Archivist that I had mentioned in another posting. With all of the content being produced from potentially many sources, there needs to be a central point where files are compiled. There need to be master copies, kept separate from current working versions which may or may not be based upon different regional projects etc.

The position would require the person to work out how it would be best done, and to then tell all the content writers what is expected from them, so that you can do your job.

It would also be for the archivist to put together each new version and send it to the Archduke for posting, including a list of the things included in that new version.

Interested?

 

[Incompetent]

Well I suppose E is something I want to focus on, but after that I'd like to play around with the 'great crossroads' region of the world: Anatolia, the Levant and the Caucasus. I could also give an outline for Zanj, and I have a few 'interaction' event chains I'd like to put in, eg between the Hansa and Bohemia.

But as I've said, I can't promise much before mid-June.

 

[Rythin]

MattyG,
Of course, I am interested I am thinking of Abbie's CSV repository - it would let me track forks easily and coordinate further changes. I will think it over, prepare neccessary online tools and start a thread of how I think it should be like.

Stay cool,
R.

 

[MattyG]

Well I suppose E is something I want to focus on, but after that I'd like to play around with the 'great crossroads' region of the world: Anatolia, the Levant and the Caucasus. I could also give an outline for Zanj, and I have a few 'interaction' event chains I'd like to put in, eg between the Hansa and Bohemia.

But as I've said, I can't promise much before mid-June.

Once we have determined the changes to the province.csv then we can post the list of project areas. I know already of three people who's chief interest is the Levent/nearEast to India. This means we will see some fantastic events and themes produced, but it will also ean that those involved need to be able to compromise on their personal visions for the area.

As you say, this will be a prject starting in June.

 

[Rythin]

MattyG,
I don't know any better place to post it and I don't want to start a new thread yet, so I shall write it here.

I was thinking about starting the most efficient and easily-coordinated system for such things and I have came to two conclusions.

First one is that when ArchDuke was a lead scripter/manager, he could coordinate everything easily and quickly as he didn't really have to discuss anything with anybody. Of course, he used to ask supporters about many issues, but he held the right of a final decision. This time, as it is rather a group effort than individual-supported-by-others, we should debate often and confront our ideas as often as possible. Thus evaluating particuliar events/concepts and judging whether they fit in for a next release is much harder and more complicated. Although it may seem that the system I am going to describe is far too biureaucratic and unfair, it is the only way of keeping everything centralized.

The whole work with releasing would be grouped in two main threads - RQT (Request of a Quality Test) and RC (Repository of Compontents that passed quality test). I think the best way to describe the idea is using an example. Let's say Tom and Jimmy are working on Teutonic Order flavours in special Teutonic Order thread. The next version is soon to be released and as they think they did a good job, they decide to post their request in RQT. That's where MattyG comes in. He reviews their events and concepts and then makes a judgement - passed or fail. He thinks the events are cool, so he accepts the idea (that was ArchDuke's job). Then the Archivist copies the events, assigns the ids, fills 'recent changes' table and places Tom and Jimmy's work in RC.

It may seem to be an innovatory and unneccessary idea, but believe me, if you decide to coordinate so big project, you shall soon end up with terrible mess... unless you of course decide to keep everything listed and bookmarked (like in RC thread)

What do you think?

Stay cool,
R.

 

[Incompetent]

...

In practice, I think your system would lead to the mod taking on the character of whoever's in charge, just as the old mod was ultimately controlled by AD, and I don't know if any of us is ready to take on as much responsibility as AD did. It could also result in people spending a lot of time on major event series, only for them to be rejected. It's a good system for areas which are only getting minor changes, but for the areas where we're mostly starting from scratch, I would suggest a different approach, namely the 'specialist-first' approach:

1. Contributors are assigned primary responsibilty for a particular area of the mod, mostly by just volunteering, but with some division of labour if several people want to work on the same area (eg if two people want to work on the whole of America, we could give one of them NA and the other SA).

2. The primary contributors (PCs) set to work. They can of course incorporate suggestions from other people, and it would be good if they put their work-in-progress in the forums for people to look at, but they're the ones who actually put the files together.

3. Once the primary contributor feels he's laid out a reasonably complete setup, he passes the files to the Editor/Archivist, who incorporates them into the current (beta) version.

4. Control now passes over to the Project leader (PL) and the general community. It might be decided that the new material just isn't up to stratch and has to be completely redone (in which case we go back to 1.), but more likely what will be needed is testing, minor tweaks to balance it out, and a few more leaders, events etc for flavour. In this stage, the PL would be the one approving changes, but for any changes which are likely to be controversial he'd want to consult other people (such as the PC) and come to an agreement. If drastic changes to the overall flavour of someone's 'baby' are agreed, the files might temporarily pass back to the PC to make sure they are implemented in a harmonious way - after all, he's the expert on the overall flow of his events, the basic storyline of his country etc.


There are some parts of the mod which are in stage 4 already: Byzantium, for example, has a pretty complete set of events, monarchs and leaders. But in other areas, particularly outside Europe, I think we have to let specialist contributors have a fairly free hand to form at least the outline of their event chains, monarch tables etc before we hand over to central control.

If you think this leaves too much to go wrong, we can have two versions of the mod at any one time: a 'public' version, which only includes areas that have been extensively tested and is intended for general players, and a 'beta' version, which is for testers and contributors to examine the new stuff carefully. New events, countries or whatever would then pass to public once we think they're in a fit state to give to casual players, with all the major problems ironed out.

 

[MattyG]

Rythin,

I like your plan. It is simple enough but should work effectively. Although I am not really an AGCEEP player (I have played EEP but found it too event heavy, and very buggy at that time) I have been too their threads many times. I like that they number the requests they receive which draw to completion and gain assent of the high council. It would be good if your system would include some manner in which the events where numbered or named such that contributers could track the progress. Or perhaps it isn't necessary at this point. Simply because of the size of our team.

Thank you for the vote of confidence. I am a collaborative person by nature. While having one person to make final decisions is certainly swift, I suggest that instead in this case we have a two person team, to afford more variety and accountability. This would be an Aberrated-sized High Council. Given the number of people currently contributing, we require less structure than the AGCEEP, which is well-managed for such a weighty project, burdened by social and racial tensions.

Accordingly, I suggest that Incompetent and I become the project leaders who make final decisions on content. And if we need later to expand this or to alter our apporach, I will be happy to adopt an alternative system. Given that Incompetent and I will be active in most of the threads, I cannot imagine a project getting to the final stage without both us us already accepting the direction and content. The most we ought to be doing by that point is ensuring the content relates properly with existing material, and perhaps altering values so that the game and its events have internal consistency and logic.

To this end, I will suggest to Incompetent that we continue our series of discussions on the use of certain commands in Aberrated events, so that the creative folks have more of a context within which to work. By this I mean the use of BB, stability hits/gains and some of the other thorny issues such as cores, Monarch ratings and manufactory give-aways.

Now, I'd love to hear from others about this as well. That said, thanks again, Rythin.

MattyG

 

[MattyG]

OK, Incompetent and I were writing our responses at the same time. Hilarious.

For me, both of the structures can work, in part because the community we currently have is very small. Small groups require less structure and communication within that group will be easier.

And I actually think that Incompetent has outlined something similar to what I was suggesting. However, I would make the following comment.

I still think it is important that the project leads (Incompetent and I? Others?) ensure that we are part of the various project discussion threads. What we don't want is for someone to be given a free hand and spend a lot of creative energy, only to have their event/leader/monarch structure declared unworkable. There need to be decision makers and those decision makers need to be involved early on to ensure that each project is not heading in a tangential direction, or has some thoroughly flawed premise.

I think we can manage this all for two solid reasons.

1. We are a small group. That could change, but I don't think it will in the medium-term; and,

2. We are not rying to rush a major project out the door. There are no deadlines to live up to, no real expectations from anyone except ourselves. We can and should take things slowly and carefully. This approach will help ensure quality and compatability.

Matty

 

[Rythin]

I think both of you are perfectly suitable for project leaders.

Well, anyway, the whole idea of RQT was rather a flavour to the Repository thread, that I really plan to start. I just wanted to create system that would ease me job, because if there were no hierarchy, anyone who would think his/her (her? riight ) job is good enough, would plead me to include it in the release. And I don't want to be someone who makes evaluations whether somethings fits or not - I'd rather like someone for me to do it. But anyway, if we do plan to create such group like Project Leaders By The Grace of God, it is even better for me, for I will accept only requests from them, not from anyone.

To sum up,
I will soon review the progress on Byzantium and the other things that seem to be pretty advanced and then start a Repository thread for 1.07 (BTW, we should change the numeration to 2.0b or something), where I shall write ideas/work (with links) to be included in the next version.

 

[Incompetent]

I still think it is important that the project leads (Incompetent and I? Others?) ensure that we are part of the various project discussion threads. What we don't want is for someone to be given a free hand and spend a lot of creative energy, only to have their event/leader/monarch structure declared unworkable. There need to be decision makers and those decision makers need to be involved early on to ensure that each project is not heading in a tangential direction, or has some thoroughly flawed premise.

Indeed - that's why I suggested that work in progress (especially when people are outlining their general ideas) needs to be put on display for everyone to look at, including the leaders. It's also why we need general policy discussions. I think we're in agreement about how things are going to work, but it's good to spell it out so that a) everyone knows what the plan is and b) if anyone disagrees, they can say why they disagree and what they'd rather do.

@Rythin: Under the scheme I suggested, the Archivist wouldn't have to make any tough decisions about what to put in and what not to put in. The primary contributors would be agreed upon beforehand, with their names displayed in the forum, and initially you'd only accept submissions from them. Once an area passes to stage 4, adding or changing the content would be the decision of the project leaders, though of course you'd be welcome to fix any obvious bugs you spot.