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!!7 Days to Die Asset Mod!! ....? What do ya think?

:lol:


What's really funny is the only two people who seem to be behind this grand idea of yours absolutely refuse to find out for themselves the legality. You've spent far more time positing and debating than it would have taken to, I dunno, ask somebody from the asset stores in question and get a definitive answer one way or the other.

Spider created this thread with the phrase "What do ya think?" directly in the title, and almost invariably, people including content creators AND a game dev. have said they think that it's probably not a good idea.

You guys do you, just don't ♥♥♥♥ up everybody else's ability to be able to import custom assets due to your hubris.
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Hey:
https://forum.unity.com/threads/legal-question-about-the-usage-of-assets.578605/

I agree with you do you and such. But, I mean, look at this thread. All the personal remarks, the attacks. Those who don't like the idea are all over the place.

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Okay, so I think I have a way to explain the issue in a manner that will make sense. I'm going to make 1 assumption and use my own mod as examples.
Some things people complain about in this game are the plants. So let's assume the "master mod" is actually going to be a "Total Overhaul." That means it'll be replacing the billboard plants with actual models, maybe change some of the player "hand" items (like better stone axe models, better gun models, improved bow models, etc). For lack of a better term, it would be a graphics overhaul just to make the game "look" better and maybe even perform a little better if low-poly models are used. I use this as an assumption/example because that is a totally valid use of the asset store and models in a mod, without the master mod being hugely complicated (which I believe is the intent).

So we now have a master mod called "Total Overhaul". It's just models and XML to make the game look pretty. All legal and above board.

I'm working on Darkness Falls and I see this mod. I think it's a great idea, and thus have 2 options to integrate it.

1) I distribute my mod in it's current form, but have edited versions of items.xml and blocks.xml so folks can go and download the Total Overhaul, apply the edited XML files I have included and my mod would work in conjuction with the Total Overhaul.

2) I edit the items.xml and blocks.xml and tell people that Total Overhaul is REQUIRED in order to play Darkness Falls.

Option 1 is legal, because they are two seperate projects, by different people that have the option to be merged together.

Option 2 is NOT legal, because my project REQUIRES the other to function and I don't own the licences to those assets. It doesn't matter that I am not distributing them, I am integrating that project into mine when I don't have the licences to do so.

That's why the master mod needs to stay away from asset stores and hire artists/modelers to create custom content. Either use case would then be 100% legal. Using the asset store would just put extra work on the moderators of this forum to check that every single mod is using option 1, and taking down anything that's using option 2 to prevent any legal issues. Any modifications to Total Overhaul that people release as "patches" would have to be very small. As an example, someone released a bigger backpack mod for Starvation, which was literally just edited UI and a patched DLL. Totally legal in terms of asset store EULA, but any massive edits to that mod might end up being considered either a separate mod, or a derivative work and those are NOT ok by the EULA.
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I mean it's nice that you try to explain things, but I need this to be deducted from the EULA. This is just an explanation of your interpretation or your understanding. How do you conclude that option 2 is not legal? How do you conclude that I cannot mod a mod? Which passages in the EULA forbid this? And, as I said before, if it is forbidden to mod a mod, why can I mod a game? Where is the essential difference?
 
Thread has been purged. 54 posts were removed for a variety of violations. Keep it civil, and if you don't have something nice to say, or want to attack another forum member, just go mow the lawn or something instead.

 
This.
Oh wait, this already happens. A lot, lately.

@spider @kub

Never involve money or any expectation of money in a mod project. Find an artist, or two, or three, who just want to build their portfolio and will do the work for free, to eliminate ANY concerns of violations. Profit.

When I joined Medieval I set aside $500 for the project, out of passion, nothing else, with ZERO expectation of a financial return. The result? Our team has never had a fight about money, who owns what, who did what, or who contributed what.

...yall are arguing for a utopia modding community, but that /can only work/ when money is not a consideration.

Just saying.
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Not 100 percent true, there was that time when you axed all of my uma npcs from the mod and i was a little bit upset. Just sayin :smile-new:

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Man!
I tell ya! I go to work and boom blows up again. This is why I asked for this to be closed. Let me try and help.

First Kubikus I have to admit they are right you are not helping in fact I brought some of them around and you turned them back away again. There is a reason I made my own thread to discus this and didn't jump in on one of yours, you can come off very aggressive in forum chat form and that is not always a benefit when trying to win hearts and minds.

Second I will be managing this mod not Kubikus(not sure yet if legally it can even be a team) so though he is ineffectively trying to argue for my side please do not assume his words and actions are mine or connected to any future mod made from these discussions, they are not.

@Guppycur -

Yes I was thinking after I buy what I need for TS I would just start working on what I think would be the most popular free assets(but they to will still not be allowed to be redistributed) Also about hiring or working with an artist, I'm not against it at all and would happily do it if it was available to me but between life and TS and this new mod I don't have the time to search out artist that could & would be interested. If you do I would be happy to showcase and reimburse them for their work of course.

@TSBX-

Between here and what I have looked into I don't see any legally problems left in the idea, they have been addressed and the idea adjusted. If you do please let me know.

O! and I think the mod name might be STUFF. Because thats what it will be just stuff to load in game.
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you have to look no further than gups think tank, um i mean discord

 
Good luck getting this community to agree on ANYTHING.

You can all hate me or ignore me or whatever but I have been part of a handful of modding communities in the past 4 years and I can without a doubt say this one is the one that always disappoints me.

There are some very nice and considerate modders here do not get me wrong Im not lumping in the lot of you lol. But EVERY community works together to get results, to produce bigger and better things. This community? VERY much divided into segments.

Some agendas are to help other modders, some agendas are more subtle. Unless workshop support is one day added and things are unified, I dont think we will ever see this community unite as a whole. Not truly.

Ive always been 100 percent open to sharing anything anyone wanted as long as they are respectful enough to ask first and they give back to the community in a positive way. But thats just me. I wish the entire community had this same opinion.

That said this idea will never truly work here. Its a great one though Spider for sure. But I wouldn't hold my breath.

 
I truly wonder what you (and others) think workshop support is going to bring, other than just be a formal place to host mods?

Honest question, I know nothing about steam workshop, but it doesn't seem like it would do anything towards community modding? What am I missing?

 
I truly wonder what you (and others) think workshop support is going to bring, other than just be a formal place to host mods?
Honest question, I know nothing about steam workshop, but it doesn't seem like it would do anything towards community modding? What am I missing?
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It does not have to specifically be Workshop, but it DOES have to be something not under the control of someone making and distributing mods. It has to be fair. Because if it is not fair to everyone who submits to it it can cause more problems than it fixes.

Aside from that its a universal way of distributing mods. As much as I love the Launcher and what it has done for the community, as well as what SDX has done, its not universally approachable enough for the more complex mods. This may be changing in 17, I dont know as I dont have any way of knowing, but as it stands now compatibility between mods is skethy at best.

I could piecemeal Ravenhearst bit by bit into categorized mods but with SDX as the specific way to build and the Launcher as the general way to compile modpacks theres a very large chance for human error. With Workshop type integration you upload the darn vegetable mod and anyone can add it to their own mod pack and design what THEY want without having to take apart mods already assembled.

This community has been one of the only ones where I see such a tight grip on a limited way of distribution. Im sure it is because it lacks a workshop type distribution. Even Minecraft has its OWN mod distribution app. And its mods are easily combined and built and can constantly be added to.

Not everyone wants to play Ravenhearst, but there are people who would love to be able to have the zombies of RH and the food system of Walkers etc. Now you have to literally tear both mods apart. With workshop or something similar MAYBE modders would be more compelled to make that veggie pack or something along those lines.

Then again maybe im just a dreamer.

 
Workshop isnt going to fix a "community" issue though.

Its not really one of distribution, and any issues with stricter licencing can be resolved quite easily if the entire community here gets behind modlets properly. (as no redist would happen, or be required)

one of the catches though, will be the large overhauls releasing as uncompiled SDX mods allowing modlets to be compiled in at build time.

That way people could download Starv, RH, WotW, UL etc and then add any combination of mods on top at build time. Be it textures, vehicles, weapons, zombies, plants, whatever.

At the moment it requires mod authors to build in, this is counter-intuitive to building/maintaining/achieving the community you want.

Until such time, nothing will change. Not even with Workshop.

And we didnt even touch on load orders and other gotcha's.

So, would you be inclined to release RH in an uncompiled state?

 
I get why, but, imagine:

Where as an end user you could download medimod.

then add someones currently unmade extreme weather mod.

Add in a plant pack

Add in manu's vehicles

Add in xtra's zombies

Layer Mumphies over the top.

Add in a weapon pack

Add in some special randy savage NPC

Add in 4Sheetz ambient lighting changes

Any other thing you can think of

And then the player just hits build/play. Jax doesnt have to build it all in. Neither do you.

The end user would have to sort load orders etc.

I would like to think we could get everyone on board with modlets as a standard and to a place where *not* releasing your mod in a open enough way to allow such shenanigans to take place would be detrimental.

No Redist of other mods ever need to happen. Just let the players pick and choose and build which mods to play with.

We've had multiple requests for vehicles in starv but currently, they're all SOL.

 
Workshop isnt going to fix a "community" issue though.
Its not really one of distribution, and any issues with stricter licencing can be resolved quite easily if the entire community here gets behind modlets properly. (as no redist would happen, or be required)

one of the catches though, will be the large overhauls releasing as uncompiled SDX mods allowing modlets to be compiled in at build time.

That way people could download Starv, RH, WotW, UL etc and then add any combination of mods on top at build time. Be it textures, vehicles, weapons, zombies, plants, whatever.

At the moment it requires mod authors to build in, this is counter-intuitive to building/maintaining/achieving the community you want.

Until such time, nothing will change. Not even with Workshop.

And we didnt even touch on load orders and other gotcha's.

So, would you be inclined to release RH in an uncompiled state?
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Actually yes I would. As a player as well as a modder I think it would be amazing for people to have control over the type of mod THEY want to build.

How many arguments do we ALL have over balance and play styles etc. Imagine if we could somehow form together and release modlets with alternate balancing sheets.

So my Plants Mod could come in three styles. Each with different growth length so people could choose themselves what they wish to play. RH itself was born out of being surrounded by so many great ideas, and wanting to put my spin on some of them, while adding the things I felt were missing for me.

Imagine being able to offer those options to the general public. But Guppy has a very valid point. Uncompiled code changes can be....troublesome. And that takes us back to self moderating and self policing I suppose.

Like Guppy I poured hundreds of dollars into RH so would I want to see people download ALL the assets and then release their OWN mod in their own name and give ZERO credit? Honestly the idea of that bothers me as it would anyone who invested. The hard work that myself, Starvation and Medieval also shouldn't just be dismissed and that is also a potential outcome of something like Workshop. Ive seen that happen too especially with Ark.

There would have to be a way to possibly "bake in" credit into the modlets and that is where i think SDX and the idea of modlets run by the community fails us. Its TOO open source and too unrestricted. We either release it precompiled and limit the free usage which defeats the point, or we release it into the wild and anyone can claim it as theirs.

Rant over LOL

Dust, i love that idea personally. I'd be all over making all types of small modlets for people if something like that became a reality. A one stop webshop created by us, the modding community? I mean why not. The mods can follow basic rules like they have to be built off vanilla code so they ENSURE compatibility with each other and with the default game. People could build their OWN Modpack.

 
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Like Guppy I poured hundreds of dollars into RH so would I want to see people download ALL the assets and then release their OWN mod in their own name and give ZERO credit? Honestly the idea of that bothers me as it would anyone who invested. The hard work that myself, Starvation and Medieval also shouldn't just be dismissed and that is also a potential outcome of something like Workshop. Ive seen that happen too especially with Ark.
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I am not advocating for this at all. Nor would it be tolerated for anyone to do such a thing.

What I am suggesting is that players could mix and match mods and overhauls as they see fit.

Load orders would need to be done by the end user not the mod author.

Mod bugs would still be the mod authors problem.

If someone added manu's vehicles to RH and there was a bug that occured, and the bug doesnt occur when you dont have manu's mod included then it would be up to Manu to fix, or someone else to make a compatibility patch.

At no point would ANY of the mods be redistributed by any other user. The compatibility patch maker would specify that RH and manu's vehicles are required mods for his mod.

The end user downloads each from each author individually.

There would have to be a way to possibly "bake in" credit into the modlets and that is where i think SDX and the idea of modlets run by the community fails us. Its TOO open source and too unrestricted. We either release it precompiled and limit the free usage which defeats the point, or we release it into the wild and anyone can claim it as theirs.
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Again no need as it wouldnt be a *master mod*, just end users mixing and matching mods they downloaded. No need for other authors to give credit as nobody is redistributing anything.

Dust, i love that idea personally. I'd be all over making all types of small modlets for people if something like that became a reality. A one stop webshop created by us, the modding community? I mean why not.
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Not my idea, Im just behind modlets as a standard 1000%.

I see no reason that this game cant be as free form to "play your own way" with whatever mods you like.

I see no reason that one guy who badly wants a Randy savage npc in RH cant have it, but why should you Jax do the work when someone else already made it?

The only reason I see is that people dont want to release in that fashion (support & other reasons), to which again, I hope enough get behind that doing so is detrimental.

"Oh I cant include this and that in your overhaul?"......

as opposed to

"I love RH but I also love Randy so now I have both and this is awesome"...

What Im advocating is the freedom to mix and match that of skyrim/fallout modding communities.

 
Isnt that "freedom" allready there? You can download any mod you like and mix m like you never did before. BUT, having the freedom to do so will not make any compatibillity issues go away. I think that that is gonna be the main problem. A mod maker will have an extra dayjob just making sure his mod will play nice with all the 100dreds other mods that would be out there. And thats a n on n relation, because all "combo's" would have to be compatible with eachother too. And if mixing lets say 7 mods, something goes south, which of the modmakers is "responsible" for "fixing it"? Sounds like hell to me tbh.

Cheers

 
People already do this all the time, ive done it i bet 100 times at least, taken features from a bunch of mods and added them to my fav overhaul of the day. Only big problem is if the mod is already compiled with sdx then you cant compile other smaller sdx modlets in, i get it. Not everyone does though, and a big question i get is can you please add this to that. If someone wants to use a modlet or whatever in their personal game or on a modded server great, i think thats the whole point of having modlets. As long as its not redistributed in another mod then there is no problem. I agree that xml mods are great and could be the base for adding on modlets. If you can get a modlet for say vehicles that you can plop into your xml mod great, no need to add it to the mod when the client can add it at will. Were still a long way off from this i think though when comparing to a game like fallout 3 or new vegas, where there are utilities like fallout mod manager and fallout new vegas edit to make merged patches and such.

 
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Combined mod conflicts come from id conflicts, which can be resolved easily with a 17 if everybody uses a standard naming convention.

Med-bedroll

RH-bedroll

Etc.

Mod makers need to at least use standards when deciding the naming convention to prevent conflicts from other mods. That way individual modlets can be released, and if I release a palm tree and so does Jax, they would never conflict because neither one is just "palm tree".

That's a start, at least...

Same with buffs, etc...

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Slightly more complicated mods like my blood moon mod would not work with say whatever tin has going on that is killing so many people in His mod.

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The point is, we will all need to restructure how our mods are set up in order to be remotely compatible with one another. Modlets should be the future, if we want to do this.

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Using separate xmls to be COMBINED into blocks.xml like stompy did for medieval... Block-tree.xml, block-decoration.xml, etc.

In the end, when they are combined for our mod, they form one blocks.XML. But it would allow another user to take just my trees and combine it to Jax's decor.

So we would both have vanilla-tree.xml, I would have medi-trees.xml and Jax rh-trees.xml.

... that would take an incredible amount of coordination and egos we need to be left at the door. One person would need to be in charge of setting up the conventions, and I vote sphereii.

 
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Make your fully in-depth mods and label it as [standalone] when you release it.

Then go back and parcel out the areas that can be used as a modlet, if you feel the need.

This way you have your main mod that showcases everything, the way you want it to be, without needing to compromising it. Then-

ppl can use the modlets as a patchwork mod without the all bells and whistles of the main mod.

Even with making them a modlet though, some areas are just not going to mix well with other modlets or mods, but it'll help reduce compatibility issues some. There will never be a one size fits all solution, even with workshop support added at some point.

 
Isnt that "freedom" allready there? You can download any mod you like and mix m like you never did before. BUT, having the freedom to do so will not make any compatibillity issues go away. I think that that is gonna be the main problem. A mod maker will have an extra dayjob just making sure his mod will play nice with all the 100dreds other mods that would be out there. And thats a n on n relation, because all "combo's" would have to be compatible with eachother too. And if mixing lets say 7 mods, something goes south, which of the modmakers is "responsible" for "fixing it"? Sounds like hell to me tbh.
Cheers
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It is but it isnt.

You cant take starv/medi/rh etc currently and build with new SDX mods as its already compiled.

As for authors making sure mods play with 100 others, no.

You make your mod. Someone else makes theirs. Third person comes along and says I want both, but there is an issue. Both you and someone else go eh. Forth person comes along and makes that compatibility patch. Forth person releases his compat patch as a mod and states you and someone's is required.

You arent forced, nor need to keep up with everyone elses or make sure it works with everyone elses. That would be insane.

There was an unofficial big back pack mod for starv. We allowed it but would not offer support if you were using it. Go to Sirillion or Stallionsden for that support, but the option *was* there.

And while the option is *there* for a lot of xml mods, its also a lot of manual work for the end user.

Could SDX one day behave like the NMM/Vortex, maybe.

Gup started to cover the rest regarding naming conventions, and yes, Sphereii for convention pres.

 
Just a friendly reminder that the whole combining mods discussion is off topic. The idea of the master mod is to collect and provide assets for modders, and it sprang from the case of the Chinese modder who stole resources. Unfortunate, that a creative talent has to remain in the shadows of illegality.

If - which I am not - y'all convinced that my proposal is illegal as well, creating a master mod with free or custom assets, or assets for which the creator has given explicit permission to use it as intended, would be, as I mentioned before, the next best idea. And still a great one, of course, that should certainly be discussed.

 
@Kubikus -

No this thread is right on topic better than I could of hoped for. There is no Master Mod and no one is talking about one. We have discussed the legality of making a small asset modlet that players could play with both in game and code and that mod makers also could link to and reference in code(not redistribute) . The conclusion was that it was legal if done properly and within the giving license rules. We are now talking about making 7D2D Modding more in line with Steam Workshop's standard operating procedures. Such As combining many small mods and mod interaction like requiring one mod for another to work.

You mistake this thread for your own. No one here is talking about that Chinese modder but you. We are talking about the future of 7D2D modding and preparing the community for Workshop Support. Please keep the conversation civil and to this end. You are always free to make any mod you want and I would be happy to check it out once you have posted the dl link

ya your mailbox is full.

 
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