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Community Projects => The FreeSpace Wiki Project => Topic started by: General Battuta on January 10, 2013, 02:09:30 pm

Title: Should veteran comments be banned from discussing mods?
Post by: General Battuta on January 10, 2013, 02:09:30 pm
Hey guys,

TopAce has a suggestion on the wiki that I would like a ruling on. The point of contention is this veteran comment by Titan from 2008, on the Manticore article.

Quote
I actually find this and the Aeshma hard to hit, for some strange reason. They are at the same time slower than a bomber and as agile as a fighter to me. If you've ever played the Knossos mission in BP, you'll know how deadly an attack run by a wing of these can be. And watch out, they tend to be loaded with Hornets. Break them up before your screen fills with yellow streaks.

TopAce would like to remove the sentence "If you've ever played the Knossos mission in BP, you'll know how deadly an attack run by a wing of these can be." His original reasoning was 'shameless BP advertising'.

I reverted it on the grounds that this was a veteran comment from 2008 by a non-BP team member and couldn't be taken as advertising.

TopAce would again like to remove the sentence on  the grounds that "People should stop pretending that BP was the first that did everything sensible. It isn't. Campaigns have used Basilisks with Hornets before, despite the BP fanbase's selective beliefs."

I agree with the broad point that people should pay attention to mods other than BP! However, I don't think it's up to us to decide what individual users write in their veteran comments, beyond the general standards set out under VC policy.

I suppose I'd also contest the point that Titan is a 'BP fan' with 'selective beliefs' rather than an average user picking out a memorable mission where Basilisks were notoriously tough to deal with.

If we are going to regulate how independent users discuss mods in veteran comments, I would like a firm policy ruling. Which one of these should we enforce?


My personal opinion is that users are free to discuss mods. This is a modding community. While I'd be upset if the wiki were used to discuss BP and nothing else, I don't think it's up to us to police which mods people are interested in.

Thoughts?
Title: Re: Should veteran comments be banned from discussing mods?
Post by: Zacam on January 10, 2013, 02:19:16 pm
I see nothing wrong with commentary including adjuncts to proper mod usage. (No saying "Mod X sucked at using this ship" for example).

I personally only ever give Retail based commentary on Retail ships. However, that's a personal preference of mine, but nothing that should be a universal policy.

As mentioned by The E in IRC: Any mod that uses a retail ship (with or without retail characteristics but that distinction is my own) in a memorable way should be admissible.

Some mods can adjust the behaviours of retail ships (such as: Activating Glide and what not) but that doesn't and shouldn't invalidate the commentary of the ship in general.
Title: Re: Should veteran comments be banned from discussing mods?
Post by: NGTM-1R on January 10, 2013, 02:25:48 pm
If we were discussing something that involved gameplay changes I would agree to remove it. We removed a number of comments that involved reminders or advice to FRED users on changing armaments of ships on this grounds. (Which I think was a bad decision, but oh well.) In this case, however, I can't help but think this is sour grapes from TopAce, as the commentary mentions BP, but the ship is using a Retail AI and a Retail loadout.

Any mod that is not altering the behavior (AI), statistics, or loadout of the ship should be useable as an example of what the ship can do. (This would disallow WiH for AI-ness and armor-table shenanigans that are usually occurring, but not AoA as released and which the comment is in reference to.)
Title: Re: Should veteran comments be banned from discussing mods?
Post by: An4ximandros on January 10, 2013, 02:26:32 pm
As an alternate suggestion, how about making mirror pages for common ships used on various mods and have comments related to the mods restricted to those pages?

Example: Manticore (Retail) ---> Manticore (Blue Planet) - Manticore (Inferno) - Manticore (*Mod Name*)
Title: Re: Should veteran comments be banned from discussing mods?
Post by: General Battuta on January 10, 2013, 02:30:34 pm
As an alternate suggestion, how about making mirror pages for common ships used on various mods and have comments related to the mods restricted to those pages?

Example: Manticore (Retail) ---> Manticore (Blue Planet) - Manticore (Inferno) - Manticore (*Mod Name*)

I would think this was a good idea if the mod changed anything about the ship, but in this case it doesn't.

It feels like the issue here is not so much 'it's a comment about a mod' as 'it's a comment about Blue Planet'. I would love to see discussion of all kinds of mods in the veteran comments, but I can't single-handedly make that happen, and I don't think it's up to us to enforce quotas.
Title: Re: Should veteran comments be banned from discussing mods?
Post by: NGTM-1R on January 10, 2013, 02:34:32 pm
The Scorpion once upon a time contained a reference to InfR1. I edited it out because it was my comment, and it wasn't just that place where it happened as I realized playing the Port again.

Other than that very few of the comments are even phrased in such a way as to make reference to mods, though some (Mentu) make suggestions on how to get the most out of a class, stock, in a mod.
Title: Re: Should veteran comments be banned from discussing mods?
Post by: General Battuta on January 10, 2013, 02:56:03 pm
I definitely feel TopAce's concern. I want people to play and talk about all kinds of mods.

But I don't think we should ever say 'don't talk about this' or 'don't play this'. As a community we should focus on positive action - 'play this and this.' We're in this together.
Title: Re: Should veteran comments be banned from discussing mods?
Post by: Mongoose on January 10, 2013, 04:52:19 pm
I don't see any reason at all to remove the comment.  We shouldn't be censoring the context in which people think of certain ships.
Title: Re: Should veteran comments be banned from discussing mods?
Post by: Black Wolf on January 11, 2013, 07:48:16 am
Regardless of how this thread goes, I want to hear Topace's opinions on here before any decisions get made.
Title: Re: Should veteran comments be banned from discussing mods?
Post by: Phantom Hoover on January 11, 2013, 08:14:11 am
I can see absolutely nothing wrong with using missions from mods as examples of ship behaviour; frankly this just seems like a bizarre case of sour grapes.
Title: Re: Should veteran comments be banned from discussing mods?
Post by: headdie on January 11, 2013, 08:42:33 am
Personally I dont think entries should be censored because it involves the hot mod of the moment, in fact I personally think it should be encouraged if it brings something new to the table because it will involve events that more people reading it will have experienced.

would perhaps a better solution to have a second VC section under the first for all mod specific comments, readers will then know that these comments involve non canon works and thus dont relate to canon usage, a FRED advice one might be a useful idea.
Title: Re: Should veteran comments be banned from discussing mods?
Post by: SypheDMar on January 11, 2013, 03:24:32 pm
If it is certain that the Basilisk in BP: AoA is using only retail data, then there should be no reason why the comment should be removed.

Regardless of how this thread goes, I want to hear Topace's opinions on here before any decisions get made.

This too.
Title: Re: Should veteran comments be banned from discussing mods?
Post by: Mobius on March 12, 2013, 06:11:42 pm
I would like to see a poll here, at least to partially justify any potential decision.
Title: Re: Should veteran comments be banned from discussing mods?
Post by: General Battuta on March 12, 2013, 11:01:35 pm
This issue has been dead for two months.
Title: Re: Should veteran comments be banned from discussing mods?
Post by: Mobius on March 13, 2013, 06:46:14 am
But it's important!
Title: Re: Should veteran comments be banned from discussing mods?
Post by: General Battuta on March 13, 2013, 07:02:27 am
Apparently not.
Title: Re: Should veteran comments be banned from discussing mods?
Post by: NGTM-1R on March 20, 2013, 09:29:04 pm
But it's important!

We never really managed to establish a dialogue on the issue because one party never decided to sit down and discuss it, so the issue was/is dead on arrival.