Modders Beware ...

BarbyW · February 09, 2007, 03:30:05 PM

As far as I am aware, Glenni, the Texture and Prop IID indices will remain at ST as long as the Admins want them there. If that should change they will be removed here.

Colyn · February 09, 2007, 03:30:14 PM

Quote
blaming me for why you left st...

If only it was as simple as that ... but that is not important and is not needed in this thread.

Barby will answer on the Indexes.

meinhosen · February 09, 2007, 05:09:05 PM

I can attest to the damage a bad lot can do. From it, I have lost a region but have also gained some experience. I'm not sure how other players do things, but I started a region where I can plop lots in copies of my cities to see if those lots do anything.

Colyn - I like the idea of an apprenticeship, too. That should give some of us (I include myself) some incentive to release a few things that the SC4 community might enjoy as well as give us a chance to learn from some of the more experienced BATters, MODders, and lot makers. It's a good idea that I hope gets off the ground.

sam · February 09, 2007, 06:47:10 PM

I think the apprentice's section is a great idea. There is a lot of knowledge in the community for people to make use of, but sometimes its a problem finding it. This sounds like a good way of collecting some of that knowledge together and passing it on.

I know the pain of losing a favourite city or region because of something that wasn't modded correctly. However in my case it wasn't really the modders' fault, it was something that no-one knew was a problem at the time. Sometimes there is a risk in using new discoveries.

However there are things that are known to cause either an irretrievable crash or to cause ongoing problems in a city. Its important for modders to avoid these and I think it would be really helpful if we could compile a list of the known issues as a ready reference.

I think also a list of things to check would be helpful, or signs that you can look for to tell if you may have a bad mod on your hands. For example the other day I noticed that in one of my residential cities I was having to place large power plants every few game months just to maintain power. This was definitely not normal as most of my residential cities need only very little power compared to industrial cities. I eventually found the problem lot. But some people, especially those new to lot making won't necessarily know what to look for.

Another thing I think would be useful is some pointers on how to balance a lot's growth in a city, particularly to avoid the annoying "weed" lots, or to fix a lot that doesn't grow enough. Its a particular problem that I think many people have experienced their cities, and growth frequency is essential to maintaining a good balance in the game and therefore makes for a better city.

So I think the tutorials section will also be very useful, especially in conjunction with the apprentice's section.

Masochist · February 09, 2007, 07:44:00 PM

That apprentice section sounds appealing, it does! I don't know how to mod too well, but I'd be willing to learn if I knew that my lot wouldn't be thrown out into the open for everyone to scoff at...

Ahh...there was something I was wondering. On ST, there was a sort of Modding School that someone hosted, where they would teach you the basics of modding, what to use, what to change, and stuff like that. They'd have little projects every so often that would apply what they had learned. Hmm...well, actually, now that I think about it, that may have been a BAT school. Either way, I was wondering if there was something to that effect on this site, and if not, would anyone be interested in doing something like either one of those? Or both? I'd be willing to learn if someone were willing to teach...

Doc · February 11, 2007, 02:14:58 AM

Colyn, I think that is an excellent post and appreciate your efforts to keep the quality as high as possible. One of the major reasons I really appreciate and respect the evterans who upload to this site, besides the obvious excellence of the creations, is that the veterans HAVE been around and doing things for a long time. They've experienced the growing pains and recognize what will work and will not work. As they gained experience and found flaws, they went ut of their way to not only amend them but also notify the community and make "corection" mods or lots if necessary. This is true professionalism in addition to the artistic mastery that can be found in these veteran's creation and why they are, to me, so highly respected.

Hopefully only a few have ever experienced having downloaded some moron's lot that caused the game to crash. Hopefully only a very few are stuck, like I am now, with cities having a certain water treatment plant which, if removed, will cause pollution rates throughout the entire city to skyrocket until the lot is replaced. Experiences such as these make playing a headache or worse, a nightmare, and this is why your keen eye and zero tolerance policy is so greatly respected by me.

I will add one thing about the apprentice thing. I am not a BATter. I have no idea what I'm doing or even how to do it though I've tried. However, one day, hopefully, I will be able to figure out how to get started and maybe one day even be able to create something I feel might be a contribution to the community. When that day comes, I can tell you unequivocally that I would want someone with knowledge and experience to look at what I have made, check it out, test it and tell me where corrections would need to be made. I have "met" and converse with enough people on the side that I'm sure I could get several to check and test for me. However, if I was to upload to this site, I would certainly appreciate and want someone with extensive experience to go over my work for the safety and sanity of the community. As in real life, messing around with an unknown, untested person could get you an STD very quickly and that's the equivalent of what could happen in SC4 life. If, one day, there is some kind of apprenticeship program, I would definitely find it an asset.

Thank you again, Colyn, for continuing with policies that will maintain the quality and dignity of this most excellent site. It the things like this that make it one of the reasons we love this place!

Colyn · February 11, 2007, 02:18:53 AM

Thanks Doc ... but remember ... I am merely a small part of what is known as the BSC ... that is the collective pool of information and dicipline that makes it possible for us to present a high standard in our LEX content.

Doc · February 11, 2007, 07:36:24 AM

Yeah...when I said "veterans", that's largely who I was referring to. You guys and gals rock!!!

moganite · February 11, 2007, 02:22:48 PM

I would be interested in the sorts of things that are required to get clearence for the lots side of things. I already have some experience modding and was participating in the modding school.

I am looking to extend my modding abilities but also BAT as well as maintaining a high level of quality in mapping.

I do test all of my lots before release as extensively as I can or the other approach i use is to mod one part of it then test to nsure it works then mod the next bit etc till completion.

I dont have experince in growables and I am reading what is required for the testing and ensuring that the lot functions properly.

Colyn · February 11, 2007, 02:45:54 PM

Basic modding is not rocket science ... it is just a case of knowing which properties to set and which to leave alone ... obviously it takes time to become a master modder that will make a lot do almost anything but that is not the yardstick ... beauty is that once you have a good set of templets you just stick to that by the way of SAVE AS.

comptongb · February 11, 2007, 05:51:24 PM

So everything on the LEX will be high quality?

Because long time ago at SimPeg, BSC mentioned that all their work there would be proffesionally modded and tested but then I grabbed some work by SG and others and they growed like weed on my cities.

Hope this case doesn't happen to me again

Cali · February 11, 2007, 05:57:48 PM

All i know how to do(and do it right ) is map, i would also love to learn the BAT and some modding skills.and no it's not rocket science. i look at the reader all the time, but i never touch nothing, just for the shear fact i am inexperienced in that area.

jmyers2043 · February 11, 2007, 06:32:23 PM

Hello Comptongb

Even Maxis made weeds. There is a point in every cities development where one building seems to grow a lot. I've found one way to deal with a weed is to bat more weeds. That is to say – other buildings with the same stats placed on similar lot sizes so that the game has a variety of things to pick from.

A recent example of my own? The Maxis MPR Metals is an early game dirty industrial. And it often grew in bunches in my games. So I did two dirty industrials of similar size and modded the exact same statistics as the MPR Metals. The first time time I tested them I got 2 MPR Metals, two of my first factory and two of the other. I was very pleased.

I don't know what Simgoober building you're speaking. But one possibility is that you may need to download other similar buildings?

comptongb · February 11, 2007, 07:11:26 PM

Thanks for the explanation

P.s the BAT that I was talking about was Simple Pets

Colyn · February 11, 2007, 10:27:57 PM

Ah ... Simple pets ... I am sure SG will glad to hear it grew like "weed" ...

... there is a very special reason why he would be happy ...

On a serious note ... JMeyers gave the best response ... we all see some lots that grow like weeds at some stage.

daeley · February 12, 2007, 03:07:16 AM

Quote from: Colyn on February 09, 2007, 02:42:42 PM
PS ... also dont feel bad about your past releases ... see it as an experience and try not to make the same mistakes again. We all had to learn how to do this modding thing

amen to that! the first special query I designed (what... 3 years ago?) took me 4 hours to complete, and all I did was change a bit of text here and an icon or two.

and a saying I've heard a couple of times in the last few weeks... you dont need to invent the wheel twice

Shadow Assassin · April 05, 2007, 07:13:47 PM

Hmm, I agree with you about badly modded lots. I used to have a golf course set by joerg, and when I plopped it, my mayor rating went through the floor, and even after deleting it, it refused to come back up.

That city is long gone, though.

Anyways, I have (shamefully) made a couple of badly-modded lots, but I have learnt from those mistakes. But they have not crashed the game. Unfortunately, I have two or three lots in my cities where if I query them, the game will crash. So, I don't query them.

I know how bad it is to lose your work, having been the victim of a hard drive failure (this one sounds noisier than usual, might have to buy a new one... ick), and having lost a large city because the computer crashed while loading a city tile.