A cross-post comparing wesnoth and other writing communities

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MathBrush
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A cross-post comparing wesnoth and other writing communities

Post by MathBrush »

At intfiction.org, I wrote a blog post that compares my experience writing for Wesnoth with other writing communities.

https://www.intfiction.org/forum/viewto ... 22&t=25915
Last edited by MathBrush on March 26th, 2018, 4:23 am, edited 1 time in total.
Drake Campaign: A Fiery Birth | Knalgan Alliance Campaign: Drunkards, Dwarves, and Doubloons | Dunefolk Campaign: Asheviere's Shadow | Northeners Campaign: Goblin's Glory | Undead Campaign: Shakespeare's Ghost | Rebels Campaign: Santa Must Die
adramolokh
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Re: A cross-post comparing wesnoth and other writing communities

Post by adramolokh »

MathBrush wrote: March 4th, 2018, 7:50 am At intfiction.org, I wrote a blog post that compares my experience writing for Wesnoth with other writing communities.

https://www.intfiction.org/forum/viewto ... 9f2b190453
Funnily enough, my favourite Wesnoth campaigns, and the only ones that I've been able to get through, are the ones that lean further towards originality, though I haven't seen anything that isn't earnest. I've been looking to create something more self-aware and less earnest for a while, something somewhat contrary to the norms.

There's a definite note to be taken about the providence of the tester-editor category. Most of your players will never contact you to talk about your campaign, therefore the amount of feedback is very limited. The only campaigns I've seen with significant amount of feedbacks are those which are massive and demand mechanical questions, those that are particularly buggy, and those that are intricate lorewise and again demand that people ask questions to completely understand the story.
gnombat
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Re: A cross-post comparing wesnoth and other writing communities

Post by gnombat »

"Remember, some cliches are cliches because they work."
- Eric S. Raymond, Battle for Wesnoth Campaign Design How-To
Can-ned_Food
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Re: A cross-post comparing wesnoth and other writing communities

Post by Can-ned_Food »

Horrible writing gets mocked to scorn in an effort to drive away new authors.
(in robot voice) Clarification required!

Did you mean that their purpose is to drive away new authors, and so they scorn whatever gives them acceptable opportunity, or that they would rather not allow new authors if the new author has no prerequisite appeal? You place them on the “originality” end of your canonicity–originality grade, so I would suppose the latter.
However, one could split Content and Style, and figure that they are leaning towards Canonicity when it comes to Style — and that any who do not conform are unwanted.

If all that was the NoSleep Reddit group, then you should probably mention that nearer the beginning of the short essay.
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MathBrush
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Re: A cross-post comparing wesnoth and other writing communities

Post by MathBrush »

I was referring only to NoSleep. And what I meant was, horrible writing is mocked to drive away 'horrible' new authors, not all new authors! You're right, that's an important distinction.

As to conformity, you're right that content and style could be split, in which case NoSleep does in fact lean more towards canonicity in style.
Drake Campaign: A Fiery Birth | Knalgan Alliance Campaign: Drunkards, Dwarves, and Doubloons | Dunefolk Campaign: Asheviere's Shadow | Northeners Campaign: Goblin's Glory | Undead Campaign: Shakespeare's Ghost | Rebels Campaign: Santa Must Die
shevegen
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Re: A cross-post comparing wesnoth and other writing communities

Post by shevegen »

adramolokh wrote:

> Funnily enough, my favourite Wesnoth campaigns, and the only ones that I've been able to get through, are the ones
> that lean further towards originality, though I haven't seen anything that isn't earnest.

I feel somewhat similar in the sense that some of these add-ons offer unique ideas that are quite nice. I love simplified
"skill trees", e. g. you can choose some unique abilities for heros. Some of the history is also nice in some add-ons, like
invasion from the unknown (I keep on getting the names wrong ... you know what I mean though).

Summonables are pretty nice, e. g. summon circle and using different elementals.

> I've been looking to create something more self-aware and less earnest for a while, something somewhat contrary
> to the norms.

Creativity is quite time-intensive. Right now I can invest more time into finally starting on my first campaign. But I know
in 2022 my time will be more limited again, so I can not promise much at all for 2022. I guess people can realistically
focus only on some things, and then have to do something else. If you look at Iris Morelle's homepage, I think the
oldest campaign was started in 2008 or so and is still maintained right now. (I think 2022 is kind of a polish-up
quality year for Iris in this regard); in between there is a lot of inactivity though where probably not much was
changed for years.

> There's a definite note to be taken about the providence of the tester-editor category. Most of your players will never
> contact you to talk about your campaign

This is quite true too. So authors only get a subset of opinions. A simple reason is that I tend to forget giving feedback.
For 100 add-ons to be played, I give perhaps feedback only for 20 in the thread. May be useful to think about a
"consider giving feedback" after finishing the campaign and be able to do so from wesnoth itself directly. That
could encourage more people to give feedback. I don't think the number of feedback giving folks will ever reach
100% though, so the only real improvement one can make is to make it as simple and trivial as possible to
provide feedback.

> The only campaigns I've seen with significant amount of feedbacks are those which are massive and demand
> mechanical questions

The epic campaigns get more feedback indeed!

Also if more people chime in.

And the new campaigns with unique things too, like that campaign that focused on boat/sailing as a theme.
Or the witch dancer campaigns, where magic is done by dancing. That's quite unique too.

> those that are particularly buggy

That's also true and understandable. People are more likely to report a bug that affects their gameplay. :)

> and those that are intricate lorewise and again demand that people ask questions to completely
> understand the story.

I often don't really focus on the story though. I am more interested in the mechanics, and work from
there. So like a game focusing on heroes and stories through that is best IMO. Oddly enough I think
for my campaign I'll actually go the story-first approach, simply because it makes more sense for me
as it taps into already written game lore as such. The drawback I can already see is that a LOT of
the story can not be modeled 1:1 into the game, due to various constraints as such. For instance if
part of the story says "200 pirates stormed the village" then placing 200 units on one side is a
bit ... much to handle. So I think the game in itself can only focus on a smaller part of "the whole
picture". E. g. a too large game map is probably also difficult. I remember the editor struggling a bit
(or when loading a large map).
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