GJK

I would love to see this. I think many if not most folks here would love to see this, but unfortunately, I bet it doesn't happen. Adding a "Mod Forum" almost encourages people that have purchased the game to either create or install modifications to the game that aren't neccessarily endorsed by the company. Silly thing yes, and maybe BTS doesn't care, heck even supports it. And if so, maybe they will open up a mod forum? The other reason that they may not though is because of the simple "if we now make a mod forum, we'll have to make a forum for every other major topic in the general discussion area". Or something like that. I should of just kept this short and said "yes, I would love to see this".

It's on mine (or will be soon). Now famously named the "ILLO_BMPS".

As a follow-up, in the search for opponent feature, have a pulldown list that automatically populates with scenarios as they're uploaded so that someone could select the scenario that they're looking to play a match in. This would make the search for scenarios by name/by opponent more exact as we know some scenario names can be difficult to spell correctly.

Got it. I can add a small board where you post what you're looking for in an opponent and that board could have a search feature so that somebody could find people looking to play particular scenarios, or if by TCP/IP certain times of day/days of the week for availability or if by PBEM, the frequency of turns a player would be willing to play per week or combinations of all of the above. Good idea.

Thanks Lucero. This is certainly a concern. I can think of 2 options, well 3 but I think the 3rd is out of the questions. 1. Make the rating system as simple as possible. Maybe not even require the reviewer to type a word but simply select on a 1-10 a dozen or so ratings for various aspects of the scenario. Maybe have an optional field that says "It is ok for the author to contact me regarding my ratings" and then they provide their email address that is sent to the author. The author can then do the follow up and ask the questions that they want to ask. 2. Have a full review as it is on the Depot and just make it clear to folks that these scenarios are first-runs and that the key to having them fully developed is the participation of everyone that downloads that scenario and plays it. Again, let the reviewer provide their email address (optional of course) but instead of for contacting, have it provided as a promise by the author that as soon as it's a done scenario they will get an emailed copy. That could be a hefty promise though if the reviews runs into the 100's. 3. This one I'm not keen on at all, but I'll throw it out there. Force visitors to login before they can download a scenario. The scenario downloaded and by whom is forwarded to the author so that they can follow up with questions. I don't see this flying well at all though. Any other suggestions? [ October 10, 2002, 08:59 PM: Message edited by: GJK ]

As in a sort of "want ads" type of board where people can post their contact information and what they're looking for in an opponent? Or do you mean more like what is on this board with a realtime "opponent finder" where somebody posts something as simple as "game at xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx" ? Or both?

Well, I figure that without too much of a time investment, I can make a simple site that will allow for uploading/downloading of scenarios and a simple comments/review section that can be automatically emailed to the author after a new review is submitted. Couple that with a simple "Author's info" database so that an author can provide as much (or as little) information as they want about themselves (for contact info, etc) but most importantly, provide a way for them to generate their own authentication scheme so that only they can overwrite their scenarios with updated versions and make changes to the info screens pertaining to the scenario. Should this become useful to more than a handful of people, I can add additional features such as a more complex rating system and whatever else comes to mind. I would like to go ahead and add a thorough search feature for scenarios, where a visitor could search by date range (of scenario, not just submitted dates), forces composition, location, and more. This would require that the author enter such information in a provided form. If any scenario designer's who might be interested in seeing this site come to fruition want to email me giving any suggestions or ideas please do so. Michael has already given some good points on what kind of feedback a designer would look for on the reviews of their work. Comments like that would be most helpful to me. I'll periodically update on this board the progress of the work as it becomes available. Gary

Well, I think the question to ask is if there will be enough dedicated players that will take the time to download the scenario and play it AND THEN go rate/review it so that the author's have the feedback they need to make improvements. Otherwise, the site just becomes a dumping ground for untested & unproven scenarios.

I'll judge by the opinions this thread generates as to whether or not to take on the project. And, since it would be a "proving grounds" for the scenarios, and since I'm not a scenario designer, I'll ask those of you that are what the best kind of questions to ask would be for the review/voting process. I'm not sure how elaborate the voting system would be, except a mean average of all votes in either an overall rating or individual ratings. Maybe have it to where once the average goes above 9 (or reaches 10) the scenario is labelled "just about ready for prime time" and an email notice is sent to the author letting them know how its ranking. All kinds of possibilites...

Well, how about this. I was working on my own Scenario Depot (which was not to compete with THE Scenario Depot!) but one that had some extra search features added. Since I hear that Keth is already adding this extra search to the depot, I dropped my plans...but, here's an idea. I have a version that is JUST for untested scenarios. Anyone can dump them off there and we (the public) can download and play them and right small reviews. Once the author feels that he's tweaked out the scenario and it can move to the playtesting phase, he can then look to upload it to the Depot. Possible issue arises though: You have a copy of the scenario that is in "debug" mode on my site and possibly the final version on the depot. So, it would be important for the author to remove the test version from my site once it is ready to move to the Depot. I see the potential though for this being overlooked and thus, we have 2 versions of the scenario floating around. Possible solution: I automagically attach the phrase "BETA" to the filename as in: kick_butt_scenario_BETA. "Beta" is loosly used here, I can use whatever term we want. I'm just offering this as a possible solution and again, I wouldn't want to compete with Keth's site, but perhaps complement it in a way or assist in getting scenarios developed, tested and produced. Questions/comments welcomed as always.... GJK

The 4 .sit files comprise the entire .zip version of AJ's summer grass mod, so you'll need to grab all 4 parts (or just the one zip, they're just .bmps). And yes, you need both parts of the Winter grass to complete the entire set.

Michael, I just downloaded and extracted fine on one of my Mac's so I think it's an isolated issue. What version of Stuffit are you using? Might grab the latest if yours isn't. We can send them 1 bmp at a time...there's only 30 of them.... [ October 10, 2002, 09:52 AM: Message edited by: GJK ]

Absolutely correct

Ok, just got the mod. Will be posting it after I send this.

Okay, I'll send Keith an email and see if we can combine resources/talents then. I agree, no need to reinvent the wheel if he's already working on enhancing the search function on the depot.

The search on the depot only allows for a search by first letter of scenario name. If you don't know the name of the scenario, or you want to search against a set of criteria other than just the first name of the scenario you'll have that option.

It just downloaded and extracted fine (PC version). Let me stuff those bmps up and then I'll upload it.

Go ahead and send it to me AJ, I'll get it posted on my site.

I assume this was downloaded from my site... I'll check into it. I can make a .sit version if you like....

I'm working on a scenario selector/upload/list/search by criteria addition to my cmbb site that will do what you're asking (outside of the game of course). You'll be able to quickly search for text inside the mission briefings or the composition/size of forces, year, weather, other criteria to get a list of scenarios that you might want to play. If it's not one of the originally provided scenarios from the game, then it would be available for download from the site. This of course is going to rely on user participation and I *don't* want to get in direct conflict with the Scenario Depot which I think is an excellent site for just about everything scenario's. My site will be more of a reference listing of available scenarios to help players quickly find a scenario that best fits the parameters that they are looking to fulfill. I'll post more as it becomes available. Comments/suggestions/questions welcomed. GJK

Now if only I could download them from Tom's. Sorry to keep harping on that guys, but I've really been wanting to try these and a few others on the site but have never been able to connect successfully (FTP) to download. Any word on the status of this and the Mozilla issue?

Sheesh Tiger, you let me host your grass mod, the least you could do is let me host your small explosions mod as well. I don't have an email size attachment limit but if you do on the outgoing side, maybe you could break it down into multiple segments with winrar and send it over. Unless of course you can get it posted to your FTP where I could grab it. And unfortunately, I just can't afford to open up an anon FTP on my server, there's too many business sites on there to risk opening the box up to everyone. But get it to me or give me a way to get to it and I'll host it. GJK

Actually, you guys did all the hard work, I just have to import the data into a database and build the pages that will have the search queries on them. I can import new data as you come out with it. I am splitting up some of your cells where data is combined so that they can be searched upon individually. I don't know, it's a bit of work but could be fun (I do this for a living anyways). I'll see how the response is here as to whether or not people would actually use such a thing.

Chris, would you object if I created a searchable database web application from the hard work you all did? Appropriate credits would be given of course. I think it would be neat to quickly pull up a list of say, all armor who's main gun is at least 45mm and who's front armor is at least 30mm with a minimum speed of 25mph and a psi of 10 or higher. Stuff like that. Maybe combine this with the screenshots that Garry Kump has taken (or do my own) for visual images to go along with the data. Would anybody find any use for this?

Unless you used a white colored font, the spreadsheet was empty of data, just had some gridlines..... Ha, it was a white colored font...maybe the background didn't set properly but by changing the font to black I can now see all the data. Might want to double check that, or maybe it's my settings?