Elder Scrolls Forum: Mod Conflicts - Responsibilities of Mod Makers and Mod Users

Now, I actually agree with most of this or the general thrust and, in my view, the sentence - "I believe players need to take some responsibility in choosing which mods to run during a game." - is a generous understatement. I think a player is entirely responsible for choosing which mods to run and getting and keeping them going.

That said, there were some parts of the quote that gave me pause. Generally, I think there may be some responsibilities on the part of both maker and user. Putting it another way, there are some things that can be done to assist the player in discharging that responsibility in the most effective and least painful way.

First, to some kids to get off the street:

No one truly expects anyone else to use only one mod [not TC], so the issue of compatibility and conflict is always there and probably should be considered by the mod maker as part of their design criteria.
Mods are freeware into which the creator pours their time, energy and creative juices. They are a gift and that fact is appreciated.
It is therefore not a question of what mod makers should, ought or have to do. They do not. However, that consideration does not make the issue of what they could usefully do go away. And craft places its own demands.
Mods are made for the enjoyment of the maker. Quite a few people tell us that and, given the work involved, you have to hope that's true. I believe it. But once you upload a mod, you have intentionally made it available for the use of others and that suggests, at least to me, not an obligation but a desire on the part of the maker that their mod be useful to its potential users. And that suggests giving some consideration to things like conflicts.
You do not have to be a mod maker to know something about mod conflicts or hard work.
It is acknowledged that there are apparently some mod users who seemingly could take greater responsibility for the selection of mods in their game and for learning how to work the magic. I suggest though that most mod users do take that responsibility once they have had a little time to learn the basics.
Not everyone has highly developed CS skills and hardly anyone does at the beginning. 'Just move the building/landmass/NPC/city" is easy enough to say if you have done it successfully a few times. Not so easy at first and for some never likely to happen.
"Examples" are just that; an instance meant to illuminate a point being made in discussion. They may not be the best example or the only example nor do they exclude other similar or opposite instances. They are just examples.
If a few mods get named as examples to demonstrate a point, please understand this is not intended as criticism and put away that Nomex underwear.

Secondly, it is worth pointing out that there are different kinds of conflicts and, I suggest, differing expectations for the conflicts presented by different kinds of mods. Try this - locations for landmasses are relatively limited and pretty full. Large adventure mods with a landmass, settlements and a coven of quests are therefore likely to find few locations to set up where they will not bump into another of their kind, another "big location mod". It therefore seems perfectly reasonable to me, as they do not depend on each other, to expect that I could choose between them. I can always play the other one in a different game or sequentially in the same game.
There are some things that a mod maker can do that are very helpful, that indicate a very high standard of craftsmanship and artistry and that are much appreciated. They are:

An awareness of the location conflict issue and a reasonable effort to avoid or mitigate its effects. Most large mod makers seem to do this quite naturally. I have read a few too many readmes for my taste though that say, "No known conflicts" when you could bet on the basis of the rough location that it will conflict and when you load it up, so it does.
The 'real estate' questions in WIP threads and beta testing approaches employed by many appear to define these potential location conflicts early on. It is perhaps worth suggesting the obvious, that some pre-release tests with as many other mods loaded as possible are much more informative than a nearly bare Data Files test drive.
Some folk precisely indicate the locations modified by their mod by cell co-ordinates. This is very useful and it is unfortunate this is not common to all releases and readmes. Others have a 'big hand, small map' approach - NE of Dagon Fel, NW of Khuul, SW of Seyda Neen etc - OK but where?
The most effective approach, in my view, is that employed by only a few mod makers and that is to supplement co-ordinate descriptions with a map in a release thread screenshot and a copy in the download file. If I can compare several of these maps, regardless of my CS or TES utility expertise I can make a pretty accurate guesstimate of likely compatibility or conflict before I load anything.
Finally, I suggest it is important that large location or landmass dependent mods are positioned so that they do not conflict with other mods providing services or facilities and requiring a modest amount of real estate, the "small location mods", see below.

There are scripting conflicts as well and I suggest, that as some mods become more and more script intensive, there will be more of these.
There are script conflicts or effects that are unavoidable to accomplish the mod's aim and these must needs be accepted to use the mod. But it seems to me that they should usually be known to the mod maker and communicated to the user. An excellent example is Monica's Shield Rotation mod: it permits shield placement but the existence of the scripts to do this prevent stacking of shields in Inventory. This was known and stated up front. Fair enough - the user then has access to the information on which to make a rational choice about using the mod.
In other cases most mod makers seem to take a good deal of care to ensure that the scripts they build do not conflict with other game play. That would seem to be a reasonable approach, to limit the script effects wherever possible to the desired outcome and nothing else.

Some dialogue conflicts also are reported. It seems that the usual response by the maker is to define the source of the problem and to rectify it, usually very quickly. This seems to me to be a reasonable approach and one that we could hope would normally be adopted, with the game dialogue and that of the older mod having precedence.

There are other location situations that are not so clear-cut. Quite often these are conflicts between the locations of NPCs or buildings, sometimes buildings that are utilized within a larger adventure mod.
My best example is Suran. Fortunately, I did not have House of Spears loaded but Suran Underworld, Suran Archery Tradehouse, an essential quest-giver for the Serene Tower mod and another essential quest-giver for Archemage's Tower [because of a dialogue/naming conflict between the two Tower mods, I think] were all trying to operate out of the same building. [This is intended as illustration, not criticism: the authors of the more recent mods have gone to considerable lengths to resolve this and seem well on their way to doing so. Also, Pseron Wyrd has posted 'fix location' mods for both of the two merchant mods.]
My point here is that I do think it is reasonable to hope that mod makers take particular care not to conflict with existing and reasonably well known "small location mods", normally service-providing mods - merchants, fast travel, banks, guild houses and the like, precisely because these are the mods that you really do not want to play sequentially like you can quest mods.

Nor are these location conflicts primarily from "big location mods" conflicting with "small location mods". The "smalls" seem to conflict with each other quite often. I know of at least two in Seyda Neen where the placement of an NPC in a later mod 'broke' the function of an existing mod. In both cases, the conflicts were eventually resolved by relocating one of the conflicting mods. There are several measures that mod makers can take to limit or accommodate these instances of location conflict:

The same awareness of real estate issues referred to in discussing "big location mods" above.
Similar provision of a screenshot or sketch map in the WIP and release threads and the download file to provide the mod user with the information on which to make an informed decision.
"Get out of Dodge!" Mods that place NPCs in close proximity to NPCs from other mods can have unfortunate effects upon the playability of either or both. it is true that Vvardenfell is really not that large and that there are a now a lot of "small location mods" that one could hope would 'play nicely together.' But it seems to me that much of the crowding is self-inflicted. Who decreed that new underwear or armour had to be available the instant the adventurer got off the boat or very soon afterward? When I look at some older mods, this seems to be a fairly recent phenomenon. Seyda Neen, particularly the Customs and Census Office and Arrille's, is grossly over-crowded with mods. So is Balmora, to the point of cliché, and increasingly Suran. An excellent example of the solution is Canadian Ice's Dagon Fel location for Metal Queen Boutique , out of the city but connected to fast travel: any new character can get there safely long before they have enough money to make the trip worthwhile. This is not accidental: her house location is also placed so as not to conflict. Gnisis, Maar Gan, the eastern outskirts of Dagon Fel, Vos and Molag Mar are all under-utilized. Hopefully, the makers of 'small location mods" will realize this and begin to locate new mods in those places.

In summary, I think that mod users are entirely responsible for their mod usage. I also think that truly skillful mod making delivers the mod into the game world with a minimum of conflict, especially by "small location mods", and there are many of these very well tuned mods. I suggest that mod makers might want to consider locating their new shoppes and traders somewhere other than Seyda Neen, Balmora and Suran. Morrowind places many quests suitable for lower level characters along country roads. It seems odd to me that many mods do not do the same.

More than two cents worth of words there. What do other people think?

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"And to everyone seeing naked and headless people, READ THE README!!! It's the answer to all your troubles." Neoptolemus

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Edited by Ronin49 (08/15/04 01:30 AM)

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