Can Wesnoth be more than just a great game?

[the_beagle]

I recognize that I am new here, as a registered user, but I have been a longtime user of Wesnoth. At the moment I am trying, with very little knowledge of coding I might add, to create my own campaigns and scenarios. However I recently spotted a thread discussing the expansion of Wesnoth (lore-wise) into other areas ie: maps, stories, poetry, etc. I have always been (IMO) a highly skilled writer. Although I lack ethos on these forums, I would be very interested in expanding Wesnoth in these categories if such an interest still exists. I am especially interested in escaping the void of fan-fiction, although I recognize that this would be an involved process and it is more of a long-term goal. Any feedback is appreciated. Thanks!

[rmj]

I would be very interested in expanding Wesnoth in these categories if such an interest still exists.

You are certainly free to do so, but do not expect it to become an established part of Wesnoth. Wesnoth is run largely by those early contributors who have stuck around. They are pretty opposed to new blood, new innovations, new anything unless they carefully guide its development. There is a recent post in which it was stated that the powers that be have pretty much decided that there are enough mainline campaigns. If one reads the post in the artistic forums one finds the recurrent theme in response to a newbie's art: "you have skill, but your work falls short of the quality wanted for Wesnoth.
I believe that the enthusiasm for Wesnoth contributions has waned over the last couple of years, because no one can hope to get their work included.
I would like to hear other's opinions on this.

Regards, RMJohannessen

[Iris]

They are pretty opposed to new blood, new innovations, new anything unless they carefully guide its development.

That is an incredibly wrong and limited perception of how Wesnoth development works.

There is a recent post in which it was stated that the powers that be have pretty much decided that there are enough mainline campaigns.

Was it this post in which I said I felt like there were enough mainline campaigns already? Because I was merely expressing my personal opinion on the subject — I am not part of the decision chain for mainlining any kind of user-made content, and I wouldn’t rule out the user community providing us with nice surprises in the future either.

If one reads the post in the artistic forums one finds the recurrent theme in response to a newbie's art: "you have skill, but your work falls short of the quality wanted for Wesnoth.

Okay, I think you are now confusing technical aspects of the art creation process with some form of traditionalism. If new core game art wasn’t required to meet certain quality standards we’d have a rather visually-incoherent product as a result. In fact, this used to be quite obviously the case before (back then) new, innovative artists came up with new sprite and portrait design standards, and continues to be the case for some mainline campaigns using old art (e.g. UtBS).

In any case, I thought we were going to talk about writing here, not art? Users’ Forum should be better suited for a more general discussion than Writers’.

EDIT: Added link.

[wolkenwand]

yes the beagle, because you good at writing please make good race description for saurian, woses, and gryphon and apply it to the developer, maybe they will use it in the game. as you know these race description are missing in the game. i really want to make one but as you can see my grammar are terrible -_-

[Coffee]

wolkenwand is correct in that the help file entries are completely missing for these races (but not for the individual units).

If you are interested in making a UMC campaign and your skills are in writing/art I would suggest maybe teaming up with someone else who has the skills of coding (speaking from experience in making one). It is very rare for someone to be good at story writing, coding, and art at the same time and new campaigns are a dime a dozen in the addons list nowadays.

[the_beagle]

yes the beagle, because you good at writing please make good race description for saurian, woses, and gryphon and apply it to the developer, maybe they will use it in the game. as you know these race description are missing in the game. i really want to make one but as you can see my grammar are terrible -_-

I'll certainly look at them! I did not realize some entries were still uncompleted. I will do some lore-checking and try to drum up a description or two and submit them. If you have anything you personally want included in them (you mentioned you wanted to do descriptions yourself) tell me and I will try to incorporate it if it makes sense!

[the_beagle]

wolkenwand is correct in that the help file entries are completely missing for these races (but not for the individual units).

If you are interested in making a UMC campaign and your skills are in writing/art I would suggest maybe teaming up with someone else who has the skills of coding (speaking from experience in making one). It is very rare for someone to be good at story writing, coding, and art at the same time and new campaigns are a dime a dozen in the addons list nowadays.

Your points are very good, I'll put myself out there, proverbially speaking, on an appropriate thread and see if anyone is interested. Thanks for the input!

[taptap]

As far as I understand there is no actual lore above the descriptions in game, the sprites, the campaign texts etc. but no official world building. As this would only constrain development I believe it is better like this.

Yes, team up with one of the wml-gurus short of campaign ideas and write us nice storylines for Khalifate and many other UMC factions that are not or barely featured in SP. I guess (without any knowledge of the procedure) your best chance for going mainline would be a good Khalifate campaign ready when the faction returns to mainline.

[lipk]

wml-gurus short of campaign ideas

I'm afraid this is a very rare species, if existent at all.

[8680]

I'm afraid this is a very rare species, if existent at all.

Perhaps, but there are those who have no serious intentions of publishing a campaign any time soon — I at least am one.

[fabi]

I would be very interested in expanding Wesnoth in these categories if such an interest still exists.

We are interested.
Please have a look at the "encyclopedia" section of the ingame help, still in an early state,
waiting for engaged people, just like you.

You are certainly free to do so, but do not expect it to become an established part of Wesnoth.

Well, that depends.
Say you produce a novel settled in Irdya, it might be difficult to find a place in the game for it.
Still this work would be appreciated by the community, IMHO.
If it is a really good one, I think it could also find a prominent place on the Website to spread its distribution.

Wesnoth is run largely by those early contributors who have stuck around.

This is not quite true nowadays.
Most of the early developers aren't that active anymore.
Most of our actual coding work is done by new developers.

Still many older developers claim to have some word on the actual work, no matter how involved they are currently.
The last sentence sounds unfriendly to the old crew, but it is meant in a neutral way.
There are examples where this is a bad thing (IMHO) and some where this ends in good results (also IMHO).
Again: This is my personal opinion.

They are pretty opposed to new blood,...

This is certainly not true.
After one successfully submitted 3 medium sized contributions to the game, she gets the developer rank with all privileges.
This is not hard to archive.

... new innovations,...

Yes, that is true to a certain degree.
Our community (the developer community, not necessarily the players and UMC authors) is quite conservative, a little too much for my taste.

... new anything unless they carefully guide its development.

The development of Wesnoth is more or less chaotic, don't expect much of a guidance if you join our ranks.
Nevertheless, we are a friendly community and help each other.

There is a recent post in which it was stated that the powers that be have pretty much decided that there are enough mainline campaigns.

The problem with including new campaigns is mostly the fact of lacking resources.
We currently don't have a developer able to polish a campaign's prose to mainline quality, for example.

I guess every developer agrees that we should have at least one campaign for every mainline faction/race as the player's army.

Still I don't consider this as a major problem, we have already a lot of mainline content, and there is always the addon server to get more.
But I must admit that it is hard to find the best addons, without a proper rating system.
Maybe that will change in the future, the current situation is really suboptimal.

If one reads the post in the artistic forums one finds the recurrent theme in response to a newbie's art: "you have skill, but your work falls short of the quality wanted for Wesnoth.

Shadowmaster answered on this issue already.
I only want to add that having a set of artwork/music/prose/whatever that looks like a unity is what distinguishs the project from most open source games.
Including everything regardless of style and/or quality just for the sake of having more content, won't do the game any good.

I believe that the enthusiasm for Wesnoth contributions has waned over the last couple of years, because no one can hope to get their work included.

Well, yes. The quality we reached is already quite high.
Still there are countless of UMC designers, willing to make use of content that does not fit into mainline in its current state.

Every mainline campaign except the first one (Heir to the Throne) originated from the addon server.

I would like to hear other's opinions on this.

Me too.

Regards, RMJohannessen

Regards, Fabian

[pyrophorus]

They are pretty opposed to new blood, new innovations, new anything unless they carefully guide its development.

That is an incredibly wrong and limited perception of how Wesnoth development works.

Are you serious ? You're regularly asserting things of the like, but assertions are not enough when coming across facts. Nobody knows exactly (except you), how Wesnoth dev works, and instead explaining how it goes, you regularly invoke secrets and things you're not allowed to speak of.

More of it, how would you qualify this ? I would say it's exactly "carefully guiding its development".
I went across this where Mordante discussed add-ons server enhancements some years ago (2008), and we're still discussing the points he suggested five years later . How would you qualify that ? Responsiveness ? Innovation opening ?

At the same time, you're regularly complaining about the lack of time and volunteers, but where and when did you asked for help ? Never and nowhere.

I'm not personally complaining about this, but I'm not surprised to regularly read opinions like rmj's, and really, I think you shouldn't. From an external pov, Wesnoth team really looks like he says: opaque and close on itself. Working like that is your choice, you're not asked to change it but to take responsibility for it and stop denying obviousness.

Friendly,

[Sapient]

At the same time, you're regularly complaining about the lack of time and volunteers, but where and when did you asked for help ? Never and nowhere.

Hello: why did you think this Writer's Forum was created?

I think the fact that someone like vodot can come in here and basically rewrite the dialogue for the flagship HttT campaign shows that new blood is definitely welcome and appreciated, especially where there is a recognized need for improvement. It's widely acknowledged among the developers that this is an area that needs improvement. That's why the writer's forum was added.

So rmj's comments were, in my opinion, misinformed. Maybe he meant to post a critique of some other area of development and decided to air his grievances in here by mistake.

[Coffee]

Pyrophorus: please see the timeline list of contributors (in an easy to see animation form).

I am a new dev here, and it is because I contributed some good work like Sapient says anyone can do with the right approach and skills. If you go through the proper channels (it's always a good etiquette not to step on anyone's toes who already has invested a lot of time on that area) and are willing to really put in the work in your own time you really can do anything here. This is a community driven project after all.

[lipk]

From an external pov, Wesnoth team really looks like he says: opaque and close on itself.

From a forumer's point of view, maybe. Most dev communication and planning happens in either #wesnoth-dev or the dev ml (both of which are open to everyone, including you!)

At the same time, you're regularly complaining about the lack of time and volunteers, but where and when did you asked for help ? Never and nowhere.

I'm really curious what do you mean by this. Do you miss us discussing our daily crashes and other technical stuff on the forums?

And finally, to add something on-topic: for aspiring writers, we also have Poetry of Wesnoth