The next CM scenario site???

[British Tommy]

I've kick started this thread off so you guys can express your opinions as to where the next CM scenario site should be.
My view is that it should be linked to the Proving Grounds. This is the natural way to go as scenario designers can get their beta scenario's well play tested before it's uploaded to the new CM scenario site. This then will help to reduce the amount of badly made scenario's that show up now and then.
GJK at the Proving Grounds has shown an interest in building a site but not for a few weeks yet due to work pressure.
There again, should there be two or more sites hosting scenario's?? :eek:
Maybe you think it shouldn't be linked to the PG site?? :rolleyes:
Post your views here! :D

[macnab]

YEs logical place for it to go geared up already ,and with the scene makers and testers

[GJK]

I'll give a brief summary of how I anticipate a scenario site would work/function should I do it:

1. Functionality would be close to what TPG has/does now. We wouldn't need the discussions area for each scenario but instead, have a reviews section that is displayed with the scenario listing.

2. This would be a log in system type site. Again, the *only* reason that it's controlled via log in is that scenario authors are adamant about knowing who has downloaded their wares. I can only log that if people first log into the site before downloading.

3. The big new "key" feature would be an easy export function to take a scenario from TPG to TSD. Authors will have a link for each scenario at TPG that would then present them with an encrypted text file (a scenario "card" if you will) that they can then take to TSD and do a one-click scenario upload (ok, maybe 2 clicks). The "card" would then input all the same information that they entered once pertaining to the scenarios parameters.

4. The bug-a-boo: scenario ratings. How it should be handled will be up to you guys. I know that the original SD had some issues with people - you either hated it or loved it. How can I do better? FWIW, have a look at www.boardgamegeek.com (http://www.boardgamegeek.com). I like the way that they do simple ratings there. It's on a curve - which I could implement. Should we have ratings on individual components of the scenario or just on the scenario as a whole? Do we really need ratings at all? Your thoughts here.

5. We can have a front page discussion board as TPG has. Authors can post notes about the new scenarios that they've posted etc.

Other features?

A "spoilers" section for more in depth discussion of individual scenarios where spoilers/AAR's can be posted?

I'm sure it will come up - an AAR section. Perhaps I can adapt what is the "Discussions" area on TPG to function like an AAR section at TSD. I will have to weigh the option to allow screenshots. The problem with allowing them is that you'll get screenshots that are 1600x1200 in dimensions weighing in at a mb each or more all the way down to a tiny 150x150 image that nobody can see. I have no way of resizing or controlling the images that would get uploaded except to individually modify each image myself. If somebody is familiar with "Image Magik", perhaps you can give me some scoop on it (it reportedly will allow image manipulation via code on the fly).

What else would be wanted/needed? Suggestions, ideas, thoughts needed.

[Philippe]

I think the two things you want in any site are stability and longevity. The ideal would be to set something up at CMHQ, but to have someone from outside run it. Matt doesn't have the time to run something like this himself, but the CMHQ site seems well-armored against the inevitable events that cause the other sites to eventually wink out.

The Scenario Depot is a universal resource, and as such should be aimed at serving everyone, rather than one particular group of hobbyists. One of the nice things about CMHQ is that in the years that it has been in existance it hasn't gone down very often, in spite of the low maintenance. Not many hobbyist sites can say the same thing.

Another possibility would be to set the new site up at CMMODS, but to get BFC to subsidize it. That would at least take the financial burden off of COH, though it wouldn't do much about the demands on time and energy.

[Fredrock1957]

WOW... From your reply GJK it sounds like you are interested in the proceeding with this challange. Go for it as UDAMAN!!!

I agree with most of what you said... for Screenies in an AAR you can always have the author place the screenies at The Photo Dump (http://www.photodump.com) which is a free site and can be linked to. Granted an extra step for the author but small compared to the time of writing an AAR.

As far as ratings, that is always a touchy subject. To me basic feedback (1-10 or somefink simple) is cool.

Ease of use is another key for both the designers and players.

I do like the idea of the 'linking' of The Proving Grounds (http://www.the-proving-grounds.com) and the location of the 'New Depot', as mentioned by British Tommy...

Heck when you think about it you could almost mirror what you are doing for TPG , with some minor modifications and thus not create a big headache for yourself... You have all the basics there and more...

If I can be of any help please let me know...

That is all...

-FR

[Carl Puppchen]

If someone is going to do the work I would be willing to contribute. The admiral had a paypal link on his site, I think that once it is figured out where things go someone should put out a call and then people can donate up front to someone who is going to put in a lot of effort.

My 2 cents is that the site ought to start out simple, just a way to get scenarios, and then get more complex. We don't want to wait 6 months to get the site back up again and have it perfect, rather have something workable sooner and then add to it. The review and upload should be simple up front, can get more complex later.

[Pzman]

Originally posted by Philippe:
I think the two things you want in any site are stability and longevity. The ideal would be to set something up at CMHQ...
CMHQ almost went down earlier this year (see news info on the site). I don't think that is a option at this point, the site is dead for anything but early CMBO mods and some CMBB and CMAK ones.

I'm all for a GJK run SD, I like the way the TPGs is setup and I think having the systems linked would be great for designers and players alike.

[GJK]

Well, I guess this means that I won't be playing "The Mighty Endeavor" (http://www.vassalengine.org/community/index.php?option=com_vassal_modules&task=display&module_id=190) this weekend as much as I wanted to. :(

:D

Sorry for the OT, but if anybody has the game Carrier by Victory Games, I just finished the map on the remake of my Vassal module for it: Carrier Map (http://www.garykrockover.com/uploads/CARRIER_MAP_hexed.gif) (very big image!). Those are fun to redraw. smile.gif

Ok guys, I'll start putting some stuff together over the weekend perhaps. I'm not going to get into a bickering match regarding the ratings of the scenarios at this point. Personally, I think do a rating/review should be quick and easy. If you have it broken down into multiple sections and you start asking for detailed reasons about x, y and z - you'll get that many fewer reviews overall. I *think* that's what the problem was at the old site, it was too much of a chore to leave a review so very few people were doing it. Again, I like what BoardGameGeek (http://www.boardgamegeek.com) does for their game ratings. I simple 1-10, single paragraph review and then it's compared and rated on a curve with other games. We can build upon that at a later point if we must.

[GreenAsJade]

(Just so you guys in this thread know, the other thread (entitled "Death of the Scenario Depot" was actually the place where this discussion was happening. A second thread on the topic kinda dilutes that ... I'd encourage you to wander over to the other one).

GaJ

[British Tommy]

The reason I started this thread is to get away from 'death of the scenario depot'.We are all sorry to see it go but something else needs to replace it. A new thread such as this one would just talk about GJK and his idea's ( as well as other people ).
So I don't encourage people to post there!

[Kip Watson]

TPG is a cool site, that would be a neat idea.

Likes, dislikes...

TSD:
-loved the side bars,
-loved the top 20 lists,
-loved the bare-bones (quick loading) HTML,
- the search engine was good, the icon-ised lists search results were neat
- wish I could've seached for 2-player-preferred games
- would like an 'omit' feature in searches (eg. omit night games or whatever... or omit scenarios by Panzerman and Steve Overton - only joking!)
- the scoring was cool, screen shots were cool
- the reply-to-review was really cool (although the TPG full forum is even better)

TPG:
- the forums are super-slick
- the rollovers etc. work a bit funny on my system and the 'designer' html is kind of slow to load (IE for Mac, it hates lots of other web sites too). I like the bare bones look like CMMODs.
- The search parameters are a little bettter than TSD was. (like being able to pick 'best played as')
- I like the way the search results are returned in some ways better than TSD (eg. includes designer name), but the TSD unit icons etc. were cooler
- I liked the way TSD had reviews and ratings right at the end of the game description

Both very good - anything similar to either one would be immediately well received.

Wish list:
- For those designers you really want to punish (haven't we all felt like that?) a top 20 most hated scenario list?
- A balance parameter that shows which side is stronger and by how much rather than just a balance rating. (did that make sense?)

[Steiner14]

Whatever you guys decide to do, please do not allow to rate balance! Much better would be a rating from easy to hard for a certain side.
Because of rating the balance, unbalanced battles revceived a lower rating at TSD, no matter how historically accurate, exciting and great they were, because everyone expects always balanced battles and so we have the situation, that only balanced battles have a good image now, which is absolutely wrong IMO.
And it makes a huge difference, if i play every battle with the ideal of balance in mind. Victories or defeats are always judged absolutely and therefore no one wants to play unbalanced battles - who wants to lose? But if you know, the side you play is rated HARD, while the other side is EASY, then the battle result is seen with completely different eyes. And then it also gets more attractive for scen. designers, to make unbalanced but exciting battles again.

[ August 28, 2005, 08:35 AM: Message edited by: Steiner14 ]

[Mad Russian]

(eg. omit night games or whatever... or omit scenarios by Panzerman and Steve Overton - only joking!)

Okay Kip, the gloves are off after that!! :mad: tongue.gif

Just like always, 10% of the people do 90% of the work... :D

Steiner14...an easy - hard rating is no better. What you may consider easy I will more than likely consider hard. Every rating system is a judgement call by the player and we are all at different levels. When the SD was up and running I watched for reviewers that seemed to have about the same skill level as I do and noticed how they rated a particular scenario.

Something that I think would be of particular worth along those lines would be to allow a search for particular reviewers.

Just a thought.

[GreenAsJade]

FWIW I agree that allowing a balance rating is very problematic and should be avoided.

In place of that, allowing actual results to be recorded would allow people to reach their own conclusions.

My experience with the CMxx Scenario Balance Indication Tables (http://www.webandofbrothers.de/tablescharts.htm) has taught me that even very experienced players can make the wrong call about a scenario balance based on only one playing of it.

The only way to tell is to look at what results are achieved over many playings.

GaJ

[Steiner14]

Panther Commander,
if you've played against humans, you know, where you stand.
Judging a scenario easy - medium - hard - very hard should be for scenario designers with some experience no problem.
To have at least a subjective rating from the designer is better, than absolutely no knowledge.

[Mad Russian]

Originally posted by Steiner14:
Panther Commander,
if you've played against humans, you know, where you stand.
Judging a scenario easy - medium - hard - very hard should be for scenario designers with some experience no problem.
To have at least a subjective rating from the designer is better, than absolutely no knowledge. I don't understand the, "played against humans" comment. I've playtested dozens of scenarios against people, many of them in this thread, and have often found that we differ on how we view the results of the battle.

I do almost exclusively historically based scenarios, both designing and playing, so I might well accept a scenario as being very unbalanced, while you on the other hand may care nothing for the historical value of the scenario and see it as being grossly out of balance.

IMHO, any balance rating is a very subjective issue. I do think though, that you will find reviewers whose views you share, and when you do you can go with their view of scenario balance as it closely concurs with your own.

I am a scenario designer with some experience and that is exactly the problem. I have made and posted to the Scenario Depot more than 100 scenarios. With that level of experience, whatever that means, if I put a difficulty level on my scenarios it will only be good for anybody at the same experience level as I am at. Also, would I rate a scenario that I did when I first started making my scenarios with the same rating I would if I made that same scenario today?

As a scenario designer I am constantly striving for a way to determine where the scenarios I make land. I've had scenarios reviewed that were supposedly both too hard and too easy all at the same time.

How can that happen? Easy, it is the skill level of both the designer and the player that come together to determine if the player had a good gaming experience. I came up with a scale to use for my vs AI scenarios that works as well as anything I have ever seen. It works like this...

Computer Experience Bonus: Computer Experience Bonus: Add computer experience bonus relative to the experience you have as a player. Good player +1, above average player +2 and very experienced player +3.

While this is not perfect it is at least an attempt to allow you to determine how to play my scenarios. But once again, this scale too is subjective to your own interpretation of what skill level you think you have as a player.

Using an easy-hard or a number rating system is at best subjective and at worst subjective. It is also the best system out there. At some point in a review I want to know if you liked it or not and why. That is always going to just be your opinion and bottom line is that is what I'm asking for. Both as a designer and a player.

[GJK]

For those interested, I have a screenshot of the template that I've worked up thus far for the new TSD:

SCREENSHOT (http://www.garykrockover.com/uploads/TSD_screenshot.jpg)

Suggestions, requests, opinions, ideas, complaints, whatever; welcomed.

[General Bolt]

Looks good.

What's the bookmark for this page? :rolleyes:

[Richie]

That does look good!

[GreenAsJade]

Humdingen!

[GJK]

Originally posted by General Colt:
Looks good.

What's the bookmark for this page? :rolleyes: It will be www.the-scenario-depot.com (http://www.the-scenario-depot.com) once it's ready.

Someone at TPG suggested adding a "2" (or "II") to the title "The Scenario Depot" out of respect for the original, which I will do later today.

[Philippe]

My one suggestion about the site is to make it as easy to access for outsiders as possible, and go very, very light on the fancy graphics and moving parts.

I frequently have problems downloading scenarios from TPG when I haven't visited in a while. I've also found that the delays for loading up the download page can be pretty long if you have a slow connection. Perhaps a way around it would be to show a list of scenarios and then give someone a choice between reading the description or going direct to the download. By the time I've researched a scenario enough to decide that I want to download it I don't usually want to wait for a huge html page to reload.

Perhaps you should consider doing away with the registration step altogether. After all, why do you really need it? (Unless it prevents bandwidth piracy).

[GJK]

Originally posted by Philippe:
Perhaps you should consider doing away with the registration step altogether. After all, why do you really need it? (Unless it prevents bandwidth piracy). Registration is so that it can be recorded who has downloaded what - one of the major requests that scenario authors had.

As for the loading of the pages - I'm curious about what OS and browser you're using. I assume you're on dial-up as well?

[Philippe]

Internet Explorer, Windows 2000, and a 56 k modem.

Knowing who downloads their scenarios is actually something of an invasion of privacy. Tolerable to some extent at TPG, but not really appropriate for Scenario Depot II. It's a very slippery slope. Designers may want to know, but they don't need to know. It won't improve the feedback they get. If someone is going to give them quality feedback, it is not because they receive an intrusive e-mail out of the blue.

Advertisers want to know that kind of thing too, and for obvious reasons. Registration is a bit like a form of tracking software, in that case, and it has the added disadvantage of interfering with the free and open distribution of the product. Keep it by all means at TPG if you think that is what your clientele wants, but don't use it at the new Scenario Depot because your clientele is very different there, and values its privacy.

[GJK]

Was it a problem at TSD I, which had registration as well? Hey, it doesn't matter to me - in fact, if there's no registration it's easier for me to code the thing. ****, guess we'll have to start a discussion to see if we want it at TSD or not.

Thanks Phillipe.

G.

[GreenAsJade]

Rubbish. Registration is good, knowing who downloaded is good, and especially knowing who submitted a rating/review is mandatory.

If you can't be bothered registering, get your scenarios somewhere else.

GaJ

[Philippe]

The registration mechanic at SDP I, while annoying, was much less of a problem than at TPG. CMMODS, by the way, has the easiest system to work with.

Reviews should certainly be signed and not anonymous, because knowing who the reviewer is is often the only way you can tell whether to take the review seriously or not. But that has nothing to do with registration.

The mechanical issue is not about being bothered with registration. What I am saying is that if you create a step that is mechanically clunky and that isn't strictly necessary, you will discourage people from downloading your scenarios. That is cliquish and contrary to the whole spirit of posting mods or scenarios in a public forum. The Scenario Depot is supposed to be the only place where anyone would go to get their scenarios, and since it will be a near-monopolistic provider it is essential that it be held to a higher standard: the people who will be coming there will be a captive audience, and that mustn't be abused. The Scenario Depot has to look after the interest of the community as a whole, and not just a particular segment of it. It needs to be open and set up in a way that doesn't smack of exclusivity or a closed club. And it must be very easy to use.

There is really no reason to burden people with having to remember one more screen name and one more password. It's not so bad at CMMODS because at least there you can set the log-in screen to always remember your password, so logging in doesn't interefere with the process.

I would dearly love to know who downloads my mods, but I don't need to know. In fact, I shouldn't be allowed to know. Merely knowing how many have attempted to download is enough to satisfy prurient curiosity. And the designer's need to know doesn't wash: when I play a new scenario I often send e-mails with lists of any glitches I've found to the designer because I'm a compulsive editor. I rarely get a response back. I've taken to simply correcting the file and sending the corrections back with a note explaining what they were. That doesn't get a positive response very often either. What I'm beginning to suspect is that many designers really want adulation rather than feedback or proofreading.

So if the rationale behind registration is not standing on as firm grounds as it pretends to, and is somewhat invasive to begin with, do away with it or water it down to the point that the unscrupulous wouln't eventually be able to use the information collected for their own nefarious commercial ends.

[ September 06, 2005, 06:21 AM: Message edited by: Philippe ]

[GJK]

Originally posted by Philippe:
The registration mechanic at SDP I, while annoying, was much less of a problem than at TPG. CMMODS, by the way, has the easiest system to work with.How so? I have 2 ways to register at TPG. If you want to be put in the player registry, you fill out the long form. If you just want to download scenarios, you fill out the short form. The short form includes 3 difficult fields: 1) provide a username (handle), 2) provide a password, 3) provide your email address


Reviews should certainly be signed and not anonymous, because knowing who the reviewer is is often the only way you can tell whether to take the review seriously or not. But that has nothing to do with registration.Nope, it does have to do with registration. How else do you prevent someone from giving a crap review and then signing somebody else's name because they want a little payback for a bad review that one of their scenarios got?


The mechanical issue is not about being bothered with registration. What I am saying is that if you create a step that is mechanically clunky and that isn't strictly necessary, you will discourage people from downloading your scenarios. That is cliquish and contrary to the whole spirit of posting mods or scenarios in a public forum. I'm sure that I will have just the "short form" as described above. If you could provide an example of the "clunkiness" of the sign-up process at TPG, I'd be happy to look into that and make any changes needed for TSD2.


The Scenario Depot is supposed to be the only place where anyone would go to get their scenarios, and since it will be a near-monopolistic provider it is essential that it be held to a higher standard: the people who will be coming there will be a captive audience, and that mustn't be abused. The Scenario Depot has to look after the interest of the community as a whole, and not just a particular segment of it. It needs to be open and set up in a way that doesn't smack of exclusivity or a closed club. And it must be very easy to use.I think other scenario hosting sites will disagree with the premise of TSD being the "only" place to download scenarios, but I agree that it must be easy to navigate, easy to use, functional for both the scenario authors and the visitors and provide a simple interface for providing reviews for the scenarios that are both accurate to the reviewers opions and useful to the scenario author.


There is really no reason to burden people with having to remember one more screen name and one more password. TPG uses cookies so that you don't have to log in ever again after you initially sign-up if you so choose. You must have cookies disabled or you've only been to TPG one time.

It's not so bad at CMMODS because at least there you can set the log-in screen to always remember your password, so logging in doesn't interefere with the process.That is telling CMMODS to put the cookie on your computer - he gives you the option, I just intrude and put a cookie. So, since you do save cookies, I assume you're not a frequent visitor to TPG. I'd like to invite you back to the site and have a look around, maybe download a couple of scenarios and most importantly, provide a playtest review for the author of the scenario(s) that you download. You'll like the AAR screen in the discussions area I think.


I would dearly love to know who downloads my mods, but I don't need to know. In fact, I shouldn't be allowed to know. Merely knowing how many have attempted to download is enough to satisfy prurient curiosity. And the designer's need to know doesn't wash: when I play a new scenario I often send e-mails with lists of any glitches I've found to the designer because I'm a compulsive editor. I rarely get a response back. I've taken to simply correcting the file and sending the corrections back with a note explaining what they were. That doesn't get a positive response very often either. What I'm beginning to suspect is that many designers really want adulation rather than feedback or proofreading.If the mods were reviewed, where a downloader was asked to leave his name, you'd want to make sure that who said what about your mod was really who they say they are. Only way to do this - have them log in and authenticate it before they can leave a review or download the mod. But mods and scenarios are different as you suggest; knowing how many downloads seems to be enough to satisfy the modders. Not so for scenario authors, the really want/need that feedback to help them either improve the scenario or help them with their next project. Hopefully though, the scenario has been playtested thoroughly via sites such as TPG and thus it will gain mostly positive reviews, but whether or not the author decides to go that route will be impossible to control.


So if the rationale behind registration is not standing on as firm grounds as it pretends to, and is somewhat invasive to begin with, do away with it or water it down to the point that the unscrupulous wouln't eventually be able to use the information collected for their own nefarious commercial ends.I think I've outlined the reasons why registration is needed. Basically, it's identity theft control as far as the reviews go.

Now, I invited you back to TPG, I also invite you to ask anyone of the 2000+ members if I've EVER spammed them with email or commercials or pop-ups or any other commercial information in the 3 years that the site has been running. I'm so anal about this NOT happening that I've taken the precaution to not broadcast a persons email address on the site at any time. You can even DISABLE all notifications from others by deactivating your account (but you can STILL download scenarios - cool, ain't it?).

Phillipe, I can understand the headaches of registering for yet another site - but check this out, if you've already registered at TPG - you wont have to do it again at TSD! Rockin'! And, if you've never signed up at TPG, then the sign-up at TSD will be as painless as I can make it, believe me. 3 little boxes to fill in, that's it. I don't even verify your email address, though I really should.

Suggestions, comments, opinions, bitches, gripes and praise; always welcomed. ;)

[ September 06, 2005, 07:45 AM: Message edited by: GJK ]

[Philippe]

Just to clarify, I've visited TPG several times and have downloaded scenarios from it. My problem with the site is not really registration in and of itself (apart from the fact that I don't like anyone seeing a list of what I have chosen to download). And if registration is the only way to authenticate reviews, that's fine. Though I would suggest that you require log-in only for review-writing and not for downloading.

My problem is with navigating the site, and with coming back to it when I've been away for a while. And yes, it is a cookie issue. I don't know if that is what makes it so hard for me to navigate from one screen to the next on your site, but I do think that that is the crux of the problem. I'm not going to lower my computer defenses across the board just to visit one site, especially when trips to the web are becoming more and more fraught with people trying to shove things inside my computer without my knowledge and against my will.

I am not a frequent visitor to TPG because it is hard for me to use it (but I do go there from time to time, nevertheless). If it is hard for me to use, it is hard for others like me. And I think my point of view is going to become more prevalent over time as internet security continues to deteriorate.

[ September 06, 2005, 01:59 PM: Message edited by: Philippe ]

[Michael Dorosh]

Originally posted by Philippe:
The registration mechanic at SDP I, while annoying, was much less of a problem than at TPG. CMMODS, by the way, has the easiest system to work with. CMMODS has the most annoying in my books; it never seems to remember registration info whereas TPG always does, and CMMODS has that clunky and slow + and - keys to go through the options. TPG has never given me a problem whereas CMMODS is so slow I rarely go there.

[Michael Dorosh]

Originally posted by Philippe:
Knowing who downloads their scenarios is actually something of an invasion of privacy. Not if there is a disclaimer in advance. GJK you may want to do that - IF you are providing download lists to scenario authors (which I would love to see).

[Philippe]

CMMODS is certainly slow once you get inside it, but I think the log-in procedure is pretty good, considering. There's a little box you can check in the lower left-hand corner of the password screen that saves you from having to remember your password and screen name.

I'm not proposing making any changes to TPG. However, the log-in at CMMODS is a lot more user-friendly than cookies, especially if you block most of them and flush the rest once a week.

[Philippe]

Originally posted by Michael Dorosh:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by Philippe:
Knowing who downloads their scenarios is actually something of an invasion of privacy. Not if there is a disclaimer in advance. GJK you may want to do that - IF you are providing download lists to scenario authors (which I would love to see). </font>[/QUOTE]And Proctor&Gamble would love to see who buys their soap. That doesn't mean they have the right to know.

[Sergei]

Well, you're not exactly buying any of our scenarios, are you? Otherwise, I wonder where the money went...

;)

[GJK]

Originally posted by Michael Dorosh:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by Philippe:
Knowing who downloads their scenarios is actually something of an invasion of privacy. Not if there is a disclaimer in advance. GJK you may want to do that - IF you are providing download lists to scenario authors (which I would love to see). </font>[/QUOTE]Nobody can see a complete list of what somebody downloads - not even me (well I could if I wanted to write a custom search query). Authors (only) can see that you downloaded one or more their scenarios, but nobody sees a complete list of downloads by any person.

[Philippe]

Throwing in a disclaimer does not change the fact that we are dealing with an invasion of privacy. It's merely a legalistic attempt to dodge responsability on the part of the invader.

What might work for TPG would be to give someone a choice as to whether their downloading would be revealed to anyone. If they can check "no, it's nobody's business what I'm downloading", then that should alleviate the problem somewhat if their specific data were not added to the lists when they downloaded.

But it doesn't belong in TSD II in any form if the idea is to create a replacement for TSD I. TSD I was a universal resource that wasn't pandering to any particular group. TSD II should be the same if it is going to fulfil a useful purpose.

[ September 06, 2005, 02:03 PM: Message edited by: Philippe ]

[Sergei]

Originally posted by Philippe:
Throwing in a disclaimer does not change the fact that we are dealing with an invasion of privacy. It's merely a legalistic attempt to dodge responsability on the part of the invader.Is it an invasion of YOUR privacy when you're downloading stuff from GARY'S site? No, it isn't.

[Michael Dorosh]

Originally posted by Philippe:
Throwing in a disclaimer does not change the fact that we are dealing with an invasion of privacy. It's merely a legalistic attempt to dodge responsability on the part of the invader.

What might work for TPG would be to give someone a choice as to whether their downloading would be revealed to anyone. If they can check "no, it's nobody's business what I'm downloading", then that should alleviate the problem somewhat if their specific data were not added to the lists when they downloaded. This line of thought strikes me as idiotic and unnecessary. If you want to protect your "privacy", don't use the internet, and don't use private websites that require registration, or simply use a false registry name.

[Philippe]

The invasion of privacy does not come from the act of downloading. It comes from the act of collecting information about a third party and disseminating it against their will. And the point is that your personal habits are being monitored and tabulated and then distributed to others without your knowledge.

[Philippe]

Originally posted by Michael Dorosh:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by Philippe:
Throwing in a disclaimer does not change the fact that we are dealing with an invasion of privacy. It's merely a legalistic attempt to dodge responsability on the part of the invader.

What might work for TPG would be to give someone a choice as to whether their downloading would be revealed to anyone. If they can check "no, it's nobody's business what I'm downloading", then that should alleviate the problem somewhat if their specific data were not added to the lists when they downloaded. This line of thought strikes me as idiotic and unnecessary. If you want to protect your "privacy", don't use the internet, and don't use private websites that require registration, or simply use a false registry name. </font>[/QUOTE]Doesn't change the fact that TSD II is supposed to be replacing a site that fulfilled a universal function, that is, that served the *entire* community. By collecting and distributing information about people's downloading habits you've essentially failed by unneccesarily discouraging a segment of the community from using the site so as to gratify another segment of the community.

[GJK]

Originally posted by Philippe:
The invasion of privacy does not come from the act of downloading. It comes from the act of collecting information about a third party and disseminating it against their will. And the point is that your personal habits are being monitored and tabulated and then distributed to others without your knowledge. So download your scenarios from CMMODS, SZO or any number of other resources - no big deal. I can respect your privacy, and if you don't want the authors to know that you're taking a look at their work, that's cool. Be anonymous, leave no feedback, and don't support the authors, just do your leeching elsewhere.

Sorry to sound harsh, but this is just ridiculous. This is one of the reasons why I was hesitant about taking on this project - I can't satisfy everybody. I know that the logging in is going to be an issue (obviously) and so is the rating system, how scenarios are displayed, what's displayed in the "lists", etc, etc, etc. I should of really thought hard before I so readily accepted. But, I did say I would do it, so I'm going to do it as best I can, the best that I know how.

P.S. If you didn't use IE, you wouldn't have to tighten the screws so hard on your browser and you'd have a much more enjoyable (and still safer) surfing experience. My opinion of course. ;)

[GreenAsJade]

GJK - you know that you can't please everyone, and so do we all. Heck, you'll do somethings I don't like, probably. At least if you asked and listened before making the decision then no-one can complain.

Indeed - I hope we all also enthusiastically support your taking on this project and any decision you make in the process.

- For every decision you make there will be someone who doesn't like it... but there will be many who do.

- Having the TSD built by you with whatever decisions you make is better than not having it at all.

We'll all give you our strong opinions strongly - just like Phillipe & I are now, but we'll all also back up whatever decision you make and use the resource you provide gratefully. Or at least, I will and most of us will... there will inevitably be someone who'll bitch & moan beyond what's reasonable, but just ignore them smile.gif

GaJ

( 25 / 30 people in this poll said GJK should just GO FOR IT ... whatever he thinks we'll love! (http://p204.ezboard.com/fwebandofbrothersfrm53.showMessage?topicID=279.top ic))

[ September 07, 2005, 12:54 AM: Message edited by: GreenAsJade ]

[GJK]

Thanks GaJ - good stuff and you're right.

I hadn't seen nor heard of that poll; very supportive, thanks for posting the link. For those interested, I'll try and put together a list of "features" that I have in mind. I'll start a new thread with it and then if there's some requests that others have that I have not thought of I'll see about adding those in as well.

Philippe, sorry about the "leech" comment yesterday, but really, I think it's stretching it a bit to call it an invasion of your privacy if the authors of the scenarios that you download have your name in a list amongst others that have done the same. And since you've already registered at TPG, the new TSD will already recognize you as a member, so there will be no new sign-up for you or 2500 other CM players.

[Richie]

I think no matter what you do it will be great, and there will be a heated debate about features...

Clearly you're taking on board peoples opinions, but...

Do what 'you' think is right. You're doing it!

;)

[Sergei]

Originally posted by Philippe:
The invasion of privacy does not come from the act of downloading.It's not a part of your privacy, and no-one's INVADING it. It's your choice, and arguing against that is legalism itself at worst. Don't let the terrorists win. :mad:

But, as for TSD, this isn't needed like the case is with TPG - I'm just interested if people who have downloaded a scenario that is out for testing, has been played by people who dl'd it. A scenario that is in SD is, hopefully, finished from my part.

[Philippe]

At the end of the day the only way to get anything done is to do it yourself. Only go the advise and consent route if you're really, truly out of ideas (which you aren't).

There's a poem in spanish that says something to the effect that:

Bullfight critics ranked in rows
Crowd the enormous plaza full.
But only one is there who knows
And he's the one who fights the bull.

I bet if you check your hands you'll find you're holding a sword and a cape...

[Steiner14]

Originally posted by Panther Commander:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by Steiner14:
Panther Commander,
if you've played against humans, you know, where you stand.
Judging a scenario easy - medium - hard - very hard should be for scenario designers with some experience no problem.
To have at least a subjective rating from the designer is better, than absolutely no knowledge. I don't understand the, "played against humans" comment. I've playtested dozens of scenarios against people, many of them in this thread, and have often found that we differ on how we view the results of the battle.</font>[/QUOTE]It's not about results. Difficulty rating should be about how difficult it is to bring the battle to a successful end (according to the goals in the briefing).

I do almost exclusively historically based scenarios, both designing and playing, so I might well accept a scenario as being very unbalanced, while you on the other hand may care nothing for the historical value of the scenario and see it as being grossly out of balance.That's even a good argument for a difficulty rating: those, who are only interested in equally balanced battles, those who don't like battles, if the oponent has the better cards setup wise, like ladder-players know prior about it, that this battle is nothing for them.
But someone who plays a battle from the side rated "very hard", knows, that nothing is wrong with the balance, but it is intended.

IMHO, any balance rating is a very subjective issue. I do think though, that you will find reviewers whose views you share, and when you do you can go with their view of scenario balance as it closely concurs with your own.I don't agree. If you have enough experience, you can't judge if a battle is hard or easy to win from a certain side?

If it would be so subjective, then it would be impossible to make balanced battles.
Playtesting and then the designer knows where to tweak? Why, if the opinions are only subjective?
Ofcourse not: battles can be judged objectively if they are balanced with equal chances for both sides, hard or very hard for one side.

If battles can be balanced out by the designers, then they easily can be rated.

[Sergei]

Originally posted by Philippe:
At the end of the day the only way to get anything done is to do it yourself. Only go the advise and consent route if you're really, truly out of ideas (which you aren't).

There's a poem in spanish that says something to the effect that:

Bullfight critics ranked in rows
Crowd the enormous plaza full.
But only one is there who knows
And he's the one who fights the bull.

I bet if you check your hands you'll find you're holding a sword and a cape... That doesn't help with testing a scenario, I'm afraid. I don't make scenarios to play them against the AI, and by myself cannot guess how others would play it, not to mention that I have likely become blind to my stoopid mistakes and omissions. Such things. Especially I have learned while making scenarios that writing briefings is an art which very much dictates how the battle is fought, and that's where testers are particularly important.

[Philippe]

Testing a scenario is a TPG issue. I'm not really talking about what goes on at TPG, my only concern is with TSD II, which has a whole different gestalt. What might be kosher at TPG, a closed circle of consenting adults, is not necessarily appropriate for a universal site.

As for testers, I couldn't agree more that they're necessary. I was part of the CMMOS cabal, and the whole point of having the cabal was to make sure that everyone in the group looked at everything. And we killed a lot of pink spots (a common side-residue from mod-making), among other things.

I gather that posting a scenario at TPG triggers comments from the active members, which is a good thing. They're known quantities, and if one of them makes a comment about one of your scenarios I'm sure you know how many grains of salt to take it with. The problem with unsollicited comments is you have to evaluate the critic before you can take his comments seriously. I would think that recruiting a few experienced testers by a one-on-one e-mail campaign would ultimately yield better results than dealing with a lot of unknowns.

But as I said earlier, this thread is not a critique of TPG. If what goes on there works for you, great. It doesn't really matter whether it would work for me or not because I don't design scenarios. Please don't mistake my concerns for how things should be done at TSD II for an attack on TPG.

I suspect that my biggest practical concern is really about cookies. It's not a matter of what I do or don't do, or what I would be better off doing. What I can or shouldn't do is irrelevant. I'm not thinking about myself - I'm extrapolating from my own internet behaviour and concluding that there will be a class of users with similar quirks who will become easily discouraged. That's fine for a site like TPG where I would think that you only really want the committed anyway. Not so good if you're trying to serve the largest possible audience (who don't post messages on this forum and probably wouldn't know how to loosen their screws with Netscape anyway). If you must have registration, I would suggest doing it CMMODS-style so you don't have to bother with cookies. I don't mind logging in there every time because, having checked that little box on the pop-up I don't have to remember my screen name or my password. And yes, I agree with Michael that CMMODS is slow. I usually read a book and visit other sites while I'm waiting for the pages to load.

As an aside, I believe that people who live in Europe tend to have a different concept of the appropriate limits of privacy from North Americans. I think it better that we agree to disagree, because arguing about that kind of thing is really more suitable to the old General Forum prior to the ban on politics. But just remember what I said twenty years from now when they're grilling you on your moral fitness to be a memeber of the Supreme court, and someone pulls out a list of all those games about Nazi's you downloaded in your youth. One of the many differences between Finland and the U.S. is that witchhunting has been a national sport over here since the 17th century: we just don't call them witches anymore.

[GJK]

I can respect that Philippe and I had a feeling that you might eluding to something like that (type of scenario or rather, who is involved in the scenarios). I can make the storing of the cookie optional, no problem at all. I'll put that on the list of proposed ideas thread that's located in this forum.

[GreenAsJade]

Nice poem, Phillipe. I think we're on the same page in what this is all about, even if we don't agree about the finer points of registration.

(I don't understand Sergei's response to it at all, but "eh - who cares!")

smile.gif

GaJ

[GJK]

I believe Sergei is in a state of confusion from the beating that I'm giving him in an unbalanced (in my favor) pbem game. Sweet revenge is mine finally!!! :mad: :mad: tongue.gif

[Sergei]

Originally posted by Philippe:
Testing a scenario is a TPG issue. I'm not really talking about what goes on at TPG, my only concern is with TSD II, which has a whole different gestalt.Ah, then I just missed what you were answering to. Well, I'm still not sure what it was about, but that doesn't matter. smile.gif

[Philippe]

No worries, mate. Keep on truckin'.

[British Tommy]

The answer is quite simple. If you don't like the idea of having a cookie from a site, DONT GO THERE.
Also, they are other sites on the internet which has CM scenario's... use one of them.
And last of all, just make your own scenario's!

[frozen]

Having blown the dust off of CMBB recently, I decided to take a look at the forums and TPG. Just to get caught up.

{{ jumping in with both...}}

I think it is awfully generous that some folk(s) are willing to donate their time, money and energy to making a place for expanding the base of this series of games; and happens to use a common form of authentication in the process. Yes, yes he could have gone completely with some form of sessions and lost some of the obvious benefits, but he could also force us all to rush out and buy RSA fobs is some paranoid effort to factor up the protection for my newest CMBB creation.

Philippe's concept seems valid, but not when logically applied to TPG or similar soon-to-be sites.

A review of existing U.S. Federal laws and the type of business that is currently being conducted by doubleclick and others would seem to support this conclusion: GLB, HIPAA, Fair Credit Reporting Act, COPPA do not apply (most TPG folks are probably over 13, and the data collected seems far from the definition of what ‘personal’ is). If your from the US, of course your State could have it’s own take on the issue.

Review the code, there doesn’t appear to be any evidence of third parties supplying the dreaded “loaded” image file (except that funky sucker fish…lol). If those bastards that run the site sell my sad record of downloads in an effort to shame me at TPG combined with some slick ad scheme to entice me to buy T-72, oh well….

The harsh words used seemed out-of-place for a fan’s web site authentication scheme. They seem better suited for those responsible for the erosion of those rights, in important matters. The list is too long to site, but visiting the ACLU, EFF, EPIC or CDT web sites should give you plenty of information from those who consider the 4th Amendment dear.

If he starts asking for a SSN I’ll take it all back….

[michael_wittman44]

You'd think with how many people on this site that like combat mission there would be a heck of a lot more scenario sites. I've found a few by searching but mostly get sites with one or two scenarios with the website creater's declaring their undying love for combat mission or maybe not!

[BirdGunner]

To get to a more important point, When can we expect to see the site up and running... GJK I know you have taken on a large undertaking, But I, for one, am anxiously awaiting your unveiling.

So when shall we see this Work of Art???