Stepping on any toes?

[Talkative]

I used to love the (edit, 1.6) add-on Empires (from Blueblaze, I believe). Unfortunately Empires didn't survive the transition from 1.6 to 1.8. If I made so bold as to find a way to put Empires (with full disclaimers, obviously) back onto the add-ons server, would I incur the wrath of the admins?

I might add that I know nothing about game development or add-on creation and so if your answers are somehow technical, Keep It Simple for Stupid. Thanks s'much.

-Talkative

[Anonymissimus]

1.6 to 1.8 you mean probably
Maybe the wrath of the add-on's author but certainly not the admin's. Try sending the last author/maintainer a pm to get his okay for taking over the add-on...

[Jozrael]

Anything in Wesnoth is free and open source, so you're well within your rights to do whatever you like.

It's taken as a courtesy to request/notify (depending on the situation) the previous owner, but by no means is it mandatory or you face eternal bannination.

However, as you said you lack expertise with the technical side of things Wesnoth, it might end up being more difficult than you first imagined. Best of luck!

[norbert]

However, as you said you lack expertise with the technical side of things Wesnoth, [...]

Yeah, I've noticed that some folks think that porting packages merely means changing "campaigns" to "add-ons" everywhere...
...but a proper port also includes other syntax changes (like the Pango Markup).
Some predefined macros have also changed (like SET_LABEL_PERSISTENT).
Blueblaze might be willing to port the add-on himself; his Survival Fusion was kind of entertaining too.

[Talkative]

Can you say active forum? I'm impressed.

My sources told me that Blueblaze was devoured by spiders sometime last year, but I sent him a PM just in case.

I am not completely ignorant in the ways of code (read: one course in Python and Java) but I might as well be a sandwich-fixated hobo off the streets of Baltimore as far as WML is concerned. I'll read through the ReferenceWML and Create wikis and hope that I don't have to master the entire language just because I want to go back to the golden days of sending Yetis after peasants.

Thanks everybody, you've set my mind at ease.

[monochromatic]

AFAIK, Blueblaze doesn't really use the forums anymore. You'd be best off finding him on IRC in #wesnoth-music on chat.freenode.net.

[Blueblaze]

Go ahead and port/update as necessary or desired. I do have intentions in getting back into working on Wesnoth related things, but life/college gets in the way. For the record, unless otherwise stated at a later date, I have no problem with any modifications of my work, so go ahead and have fun

[Jozrael]

If you picked up Java/Python with ease then WML should be similar. Also, as you say, you don't need to know the whole language to edit some small stuff, so long as you know where to go for help. The previously mentioned IRC is a good bet for immediate interactive help if you're lucky, with the forums being a great backup.

[Talkative]

Golbeeze has been kind enough to take me under his wing and is doing... pretty much all of the actual work now. WML isn't particularly complex as a language but the "game design" aspect of the coding is entirely alien to me (what you need in your code to make gameplay viable). But with the go-ahead from Blueblaze and such marvelous support I'm sure it'll be fine.

Is there a Dumb As Dirt Newbie Wiki for the IRC client itself? I keep hearing about it and I actually have the client on my machine, but for the life of me I can't find a place where it explains the Wesnoth side of IRC. I've even found the "SoC People to bug" thread, but not a treasure map showing where those people could actually be bugged.

...And if I'm in the wrong place with these questions I humbly apologize and request redirection.

-T