Dawn of War 2 modding petition

[IBBoard]

As with most petitions, I don't know how much effect it will have on the target, but Ira from Relic News Forums has started a Officially support modding in Dawn of War 2 petition.

Following comments that suggested Dawn of War 2 may not have modding it's not surprising that the community is petitioning. Lets hope that whether it was just a miscommunication or whether the community petition gets a change of heart then modding makes it in to Dawn of War 2.

[stfas]

meh, we don't really have anything to demand from them, i mean there making a game just for the public, and what does the public do at like every frigging game? complain, they should try making an game from scratch themself and see how hard it is.

[Ira Aduro]

stfas, you are right that someone always complains about a game, no matter what. Working with the Firstorm over Kronus mod I know how you can't please everyone. But here's the thing about allowing modding, it benefits the company. Moddable games grow passionate communities, plus mods extend the lifetime of a game and sometimes even offer creative ideas for gaming companies to run with. So, I think it's quite acceptable for me and those that sign the petition to point out to Relic the benefits of a moddable game. Also, unlike most people who complain, we are doing something constructive by starting a petition. If Relic decides to not listen to us, we still love DoW2 and will most likely buy it. We aren't holding a gun to their head and saying "mod or else." Finally, even if DoW2 isn't moddable hopefully this petition will show Relic how passionate the modding community is. Hopefully in the future Relic will incorporate moddability into their game planning. So, this petition is a good thing and hopefully you will support it by giving it your signature.
cheers,
Ira

[IBBoard]

stfas: While I agree in principle, I agree with Ira in this situation. Petitioning for moddability (which will benefit the company in the long run, and which is something Relic is know for in DoW, Impossible Creatures and Homeworld) is different from demanding that race X or unit Y is included. One is saying "give me X or I throw my toys out of the pram and go and find another game" and the other is saying "give us X and we'll build a community to add Y and Z to the game and extend its life"

Also, just look at Counter-Strike. That started as a mod and became a whole game with expansions. Where would Valve be without it? No-one has quite gone that far with Dawn of War, but depending on the flexibility of DoW2 then they might be able to (and they have done with Homeworld, which is still going).

Ira: I guess most people probably will still buy it, just because they like the game. As you said, though, without the mods then the game life can be shorter and less enjoyable. I'm still borderline on the whole "buy it or not" issue.

[Ira Aduro]

I've seen a lot of positive for DoW2, but also some unexpected negatives. So, for right now it's a wait and see the reviews. Actually, that's what it is for me for almost any game, except for the Orange Box.

[stfas]

well everyone got their opinion, my opinion is pretty pointless to someone else because they think different of it.

[IBBoard]

Every opinion has some weight. It's just that overall the weight can be small, which is why petitions work (sometimes) by showing how many people think the same way. The petition is only approaching 350 signatures at the moment, though, so unfortunately it isn't yet at the stage where it'll have an impact.

Worryingly, even ill-conceived and ill-informed opinions based on nothing but rhetoric and lies also have weight, but that's just the way the political system works.

[stfas]

well nothing is perfect, so we just got to live with it.

[IBBoard]

But if you have influence over the imperfection (e.g. showing Relic how much the community wants moddability) then why settle for something that is inferior?

[stfas]

well being inferior is something we got to live with, and i don't see having no modding as inferior, i just see it as "different" just because you can't modify something doesn't mean you can't have fun, and yes i do know you didn't say anything about that.

[IBBoard]

IMO if you can't do as much with it then it's inferior. Which is better - a TV that lets you go up and down channels with +/- or a TV that also lets you type in specific channels, set favourites, search based on channel name, etc? It might not be inferior in terms of "a bad game", but by not fulfilling all of its potential that makes it inferior to what it could be.

Now, if they removed modding because it allowed them to add something else that was good and wasn't compatible with modding (i.e. not downloadable content, which would just be money-making at the expense of modding) then it'd be 'different' instead of inferior. I doubt that's what they're doing, though.

As for living with it, I can see that's the only option when things are set in stone, but why does it need to be the case when the game isn't even close to finished yet? Accepting something that doesn't have to be gets you in to all sorts of bad situations (Digital Restrictions Management on everything, terrible privacy invasion in laws, etc).

[IBBoard]

Just to clarify based on what I've just (finally) discovered and read and based on stfas's comments: At the time I was unaware of the additional detail Relic had made public about modding. All I'd read up to that point was a thread about some ambiguous comment that read as "probably won't be moddable but we're not really saying anything either way because we're trying to comment on something else". Now that I know it's a definite "no" then I realise the petition may have a slightly bad phrasing to it and would have been better put as "we the undersigned believe removing modding from DoW2 is a bad idea because...". As it is I can see how the existing petition can seem like a whinge because at this stage if they've made the engine that awkward then there's not going to be any changing it.

[stfas]

oh you haden't read it before posting? i thought you had. (yes i do realize i misspelled >.<)

[IBBoard]

No, I'd read the original topic that the other "no modding in DoW2" thread links to, but not that one. I gave up on DoW modding for a while and focussed on table top gaming. At that point I didn't visit the Relic News forums, and I've never had enough time since then to visit (except when I get topic notifications about some of the main threads that I'm subscribed to).