RC/ReC/ElC/CC Policy Changes

[Reika]

As some are already aware, I have been debating and discussing some potential changes to my third-party modifications policies.

For those not aware (or who wish to be reminded):

Due to the backlash that the rules have generated, and the fact that I have since realized means with which I can permit some 'legitimate' modification without reintroducing all the old problems, I have been working out a new ruleset.

This ruleset would permit the kind of modification most packs want or need while still protecting me against users who break the mod then blame me for the changes, people playing modified versions of the mod then assuming I am responsible for the modifications, and helping me ensure the integrity of the mod.

I have mentioned versions of this idea before, and was met with some support. I have decided that I am going to move ahead with a version of this plan.

Basically, under the new rules, pack authors would now be permitted to make some changes to RotaryCraft, its addons, or ChromatiCraft, within certain restrictions. Server operators, unless making a custom pack (in which case they become pack authors for the purposes of the rules), remain bound by the old rules, and must use the mod 'as is' or 'as the pack set it'.

The new freedoms for pack authors would allow them to do things like change recipes, so long as the following criteria are met:

• Someone representing the pack (usually the author) must come to me and explain all of the changes they wish to make. This allows me to allows me to inform pack makers that their changes may be detrimental, redundant, or similar, and to ensure the other criteria are met; I will only disallow a change if it violates one of the criteria. Any changes not disclosed to me are assumed to have been kept as such in order to avoid following the rules, and are strictly forbidden.
• The pack author must have a fairly clear understanding of the effects their changes will have; for example, pack authors may not make changes without even having tried unmodified versions of a mod, or without understanding the system they are modifying.
  
• A few specific things will remain disallowed; almost all of these are "sounds like a good idea but really a bad idea" kind of changes. A few examples will be given near the end of this post.
  
• All modifications must be in good faith. Any modifications done in bad faith are totally disallowed. Bad faith modifications include but are not limited to:
  • Modifications intended generate headaches for me, such as by spawning bug reports
  • Modifications designed to enable monetization of my content
  • Modifications designed to "justify" taking partial or complete credit for the mods
  • Modifications designed to tarnish my or my mods' reputation, such as by worsening its stability or deliberately unbalancing it
• The mod's fundamental identity must remain intact. For example, RotaryCraft must not be converted to an RF mod, ChromatiCraft may not be turned into a ThaumCraft addon, and ReactorCraft reactor design may not be subverted. This also means that the resulting product has to make some sort of sense; things like "all RotaryCraft crafting is done as TC infusion" or "all ChromatiCraft items are TF dungeon loot" do not.
  
• I will maintain a publicly viewable list all packs that make changes and what changes they make. This serves primarily as a record of who does what, but also provides a defence against people who want to blame me for the changes, as well as filtering out the occasional "I want to make changes that noone knows about" (that I cannot see a legitimate reason for existing).
• Also for providing defence and reducing bug report count, I will be adding a functionality to my handbooks that adds a special config file that allows for a pack author to specify any changes they make, so that any pack-level changes can be documented in the handbook. All of the pack's changes to my mods must be documented here.
• The pack developer must make it reasonably clear in their pack description (or its equivalent) that they have made modifications to my mods and have gotten permission to do so, linking to the list mentioned above.
  
• If a modification starts spawning rumors, bug reports, harassment, or similar and the pack author makes no attempt to take responsibility or dispel the effects, the modification must be revised so as to try to keep its original purpose but stop causing problems. If this is not possible, or the pack author is unwilling to make that effort, the modification must be reverted.
• All modifications must be done though accepted tools, such as MineTweaker. Things like ASM or bytecode editing are not permitted, not least because they severely harm stability or carry a strong connotation of subversion.

Any modifications not granted permission through this system remain disallowed.


EDIT: Read through some of my other posts on this thread; that first point has been revised to be a bit more open.
http://forum.feed-the-beast.com/threads/rc-rec-elc-cc-policy-changes.91274/page-7#post-1241637




Sample "sounds like a good idea but actually a bad idea" modifications that will not be granted permission:

• OreDicting my Sintered Tungsten ingots with those from another mod, especially one directly obtainable from ore; this is a change that sounds like it "promotes intercompatibility and mod harmony", but in actuality allows players to skip to near the end of the RC techtree, something very likely unforeseen to the pack author
• OreDicting my Bedrock Alloy ingots with ExU bedrockium; similar reason to above, and even more severely unbalancing
• Unification of my jet fuel with BC fuel; same reason as above
• Removing the power converter (like magnetostatic) gating systems, either by adding easier recipes for the upgrades, making the T5s craftable directly

These changes will take effect with the release of v7; pack authors must update to v7 to take advantage of the new freedoms.

 

[TomeWyrm]

That... that sounds awesome. Tedious, but awesome.

You are going to get some level of resistance simply because that is going to eat a LOT of time for the approval process, which is already a bit of a chore even with blanket permissions because some pack hosts are absolutely OBSESSIVE about making sure you have EVERY. SINGLE. PERMISSION. I actually made WayBackMachine links to every single permission, screenshotted them, and had text copies. Simply to make sure I could provide incontrovertible proof that yes, when I made my pack that is actually what the license said. Even for Forge!

But as a compromise between letting pack authors have some leeway for integration/molding your mods into a pack (instead of AROUND your mods), and preventing the absurd amounts of ill-will and stupidity you attract when you allow things like this? I can't think of much better. Though you may be inundated with pack authors at first. Just putting that possibility out there

 

[Reika]

Sample image of the handbook notification system:

 

[InfinityRaider]

I'm glad to see this change, I'm always in favor of customizability. It also sends a good message to the community (showing goodwill)

 

[BaileyH]

You almost made enough steps forward for it to count, but then this:

• Someone representing the pack (usually the author) must come to me and explain all of the changes they wish to make. This allows me to allows me to inform pack makers that their changes may be detrimental, redundant, or similar, and to ensure the other criteria are met; I will only disallow a change if it violates one of the criteria. Any changes not disclosed to me are assumed to have been kept as such in order to avoid following the rules, and are strictly forbidden.

and this:

• Also for providing defence and reducing bug report count, I will be adding a functionality to my handbooks that adds a special config file that allows for a pack author to specify any changes they make, so that any pack-level changes can be documented in the handbook. All of the pack's changes must be documented here.

I was actually kind of hopeful to try out Chromaticraft to see if it would be worth putting in a future pack, but this simply isn't worth my time, and even if it was I wouldn't out of principle. Can you imagine if every single mod author did this? Even smaller packs have upwards of 50-70 mods easily. Documenting changes to each mod author would be silly.

You make cool mods, but to expect everyone to make exceptions in their entire pack development for YOU is outrageous. This feels like a kick in the jaw, did the mod pack community insult you or something?

 

[HeilMewTwo]

^And this is why I advised no give-ins, because the modding community is never going to be satisfied until you give in to their whims completely.

 

[Pyure]

You almost made enough steps forward for it to count, but then this:

• Someone representing the pack (usually the author) must come to me and explain all of the changes they wish to make. This allows me to allows me to inform pack makers that their changes may be detrimental, redundant, or similar, and to ensure the other criteria are met; I will only disallow a change if it violates one of the criteria. Any changes not disclosed to me are assumed to have been kept as such in order to avoid following the rules, and are strictly forbidden.

and this:

• Also for providing defence and reducing bug report count, I will be adding a functionality to my handbooks that adds a special config file that allows for a pack author to specify any changes they make, so that any pack-level changes can be documented in the handbook. All of the pack's changes must be documented here.

I was actually kind of hopeful to try out Chromaticraft to see if it would be worth putting in a future pack, but this simply isn't worth my time, and even if it was I wouldn't out of principle. Can you imagine if every single mod author did this? Even smaller packs have upwards of 50-70 mods easily. Documenting changes to each mod author would be silly.

You make cool mods, but to expect everyone to make exceptions in their entire pack development for YOU is outrageous. This feels like a kick in the jaw, did the mod pack community insult you or something?

While I agree with this in principal (this would be an unquestionably massive detrimental blow to modpacks in general if all developers took this stance) I take solace in the fact that its a strong step in the right direction.

Given his strong efforts to try to make this work for both pack designers and himself, including adding actual code to facilitate it, I like to think that as time progresses and the changes he's effected work to his satisfaction, the rules may continue to ease off even further one day.

 

[Reika]

You almost made enough steps forward for it to count, but then this:

• Someone representing the pack (usually the author) must come to me and explain all of the changes they wish to make. This allows me to allows me to inform pack makers that their changes may be detrimental, redundant, or similar, and to ensure the other criteria are met; I will only disallow a change if it violates one of the criteria. Any changes not disclosed to me are assumed to have been kept as such in order to avoid following the rules, and are strictly forbidden.

and this:

• Also for providing defence and reducing bug report count, I will be adding a functionality to my handbooks that adds a special config file that allows for a pack author to specify any changes they make, so that any pack-level changes can be documented in the handbook. All of the pack's changes must be documented here.

I was actually kind of hopeful to try out Chromaticraft to see if it would be worth putting in a future pack, but this simply isn't worth my time, and even if it was I wouldn't out of principle. Can you imagine if every single mod author did this? Even smaller packs have upwards of 50-70 mods easily. Documenting changes to each mod author would be silly.

You make cool mods, but to expect everyone to make exceptions in their entire pack development for YOU is outrageous. This feels like a kick in the jaw, did the mod pack community insult you or something?

One, if I you do not come to me first, how can I ensure you are going to follow the other rules (like good faith or similar)?
Two, do you really object to the idea of having to spend 5 minutes adding a few lines of text to a file, and would really rather just let people think the changed recipes or similar are native RC behavior?

 

[BaileyH]

One, if I you do not come to me first, how can I ensure you are going to follow the other rules (like good faith or similar)?
Two, do you really object to the idea of having to spend 5 minutes adding a few lines of text to a file, and would really rather just let people think the changed recipes or similar are native RC behavior?

Your rules of good faith scream paranoia. No credible pack author is out to hurt you or make false bug reports I promise you. This is a fairly close community and I can't imagine a pack that would receive a decent amount of downloads to matter to you would ever make it a goal to hurt your feelings.

And if it is 5 minutes here, it would be 10 minutes to post it to Azanor, 15 to Vazkii, 20 to KingLemming, 25 to mDiyo, 30 to Techbrew, 35 to FatherToast, 40 to bonusboni, 45 to Mintion, 50 to pixlepix, 55 to chickenbones, 60 to ProfMobius 65 to RWTema 70 to AlgorithmX2, 75 to Pam.

See where this is going? That is 15 mods. In fact most of those are some of the most popular mods to exist. That doesn't touch utility mods, add-ons or many of the others that I am sure I missed.

Just because you are the only one that would be silly enough to create this policy doesn't make it good or reasonable at all. If you want to play with a community, at least put yourself in our position.

 

[Watchful11]

Eh, this is a change. But not nearly enough to be significant.

Editing the book is great. Requiring in your license that people edit the book is a bit extreme, but completely understandable. But requiring people to have you approve the changes is almost silly. And restricting the types of changes just as much so.

As I've always said, trying to control how users consume your content through policy is the wrong way to go about it. If people dislike your content so much they want to change it, you should take a look at changing the content yourself. If you let them change it, but are afraid of them creating a better user experience than the base mod can offer, you should also consider what they want to change so much.

I've always respected you, and I still do, but this is more of a step back than forward. Your mods are good, but not good enough for pack authors to go to this kind of extreme to incorporate them in a pack.

Two notes, first a policy one just for your information. The third party pack system at FTB only accounts for specific categories of permission. Mainly, open permission, request permission and notify permissions. We won't be checking that mods follow this new policy. If you find a pack on the launcher that violates it, report it to me and I will happily take it down. But it's unlikely we'll notice it on our own, there's only so much we can do.

Second, on a more personal note. DrasticDemise is the author of a fairly popular magic based pack and is deep in the process of making another one. He's exactly the type of person who would jump at the chance to include chromaticraft. If he says it's simply not worth it, that's a good representation of the average pack dev.

 

[Reika]

But requiring people to have you approve the changes is almost silly.

Again, how do I enforce without people having come to me? How do I maintain the public list, or ensure anything about what they are doing?

And restricting the types of changes just as much so.

........Seriously? This reminds me of a discussion from a few days ago, where someone said "noo mod that tells me what I can and cannot do with their mod is going to be in my packs"; though they in fact misspoke to only mean things like gameplay-type rules, someone else came forward and openly said that I had no right to stop anyone from doing anything, and explicitly mentioned my forbidding selling mod content as "sticking [my] nose where it doesn't belong". Are you also of that sort of opinion?

If people dislike your content so much they want to change it, you should take a look at changing the content yourself.

No. Just no. For one, as we have discussed before, much of, possibly even most, of this community hates the very things my mods are designed to be, and the only way to make them happy is to totally destroy it and remake it as another RF-powered magic box clone. Secondly, much of this community also wants to do things like sell mod content. Thirdly, much of this community hates me, and will jump at the chance to cause me more headaches unless I prevent it.

Two notes, first a policy one just for your information. The third party pack system at FTB only accounts for specific categories of permission. Mainly, open permission, request permission and notify permissions. We won't be checking that mods follow this new policy. If you find a pack on the launcher that violates it, report it to me and I will happily take it down. But it's unlikely we'll notice it on our own, there's only so much we can do.

I would not expect you to; I can catch that on my own.

And if it is 5 minutes here, it would be 10 minutes to post it to Azanor, 15 to Vazkii, 20 to KingLemming, 25 to mDiyo, 30 to Techbrew, 35 to FatherToast, 40 to bonusboni, 45 to Mintion, 50 to pixlepix, 55 to chickenbones, 60 to ProfMobius 65 to RWTema 70 to AlgorithmX2, 75 to Pam.

See where this is going? That is 15 mods. In fact most of those are some of the most popular mods to exist. That doesn't touch utility mods, add-ons or many of the others that I am sure I missed.

If you spend so much time changing mods that you have to spend 5 minutes documenting every mod that you change, the 75 minutes doing that is inconsequential. Also, the "what if everyone did this" argument does not apply.

Your rules of good faith scream paranoia. No credible pack author is out to hurt you or make false bug reports I promise you.

And you are simply and completely wrong. How do I know? It has already happened. More than once. And these were people with name recognition on a level that I cannot even mention them here or this thread will be locked because of a drama war.

 

[epidemia78]

What, this again? I just dont see there being much likelyhood of Reika ever approving of most modifications someone might want to make.

Honestly this is ridiculous, should we have attorneys present when we play Rotarycraft so we dont get sued? I think everyone should boycot Reika's mods because he is setting a terrible precedent and has a very low opinion of the community he makes mods for.

 

[Reika]

What, this again? I just dont see there being much likelyhood of Reika ever approving of most modifications someone might want to make.

Did you skip the majority of the first post?

 

[Watchful11]

You don't enforce them. You expect people to adhere to your policies, then ignore them when they don't. Or report them if possible.

I'm giving up on this argument. You spend way more effort defending your mods than I'm willing to put in to convince you otherwise, much as I would like to be able to use them.

Let me know when you have completely unrestricted polices for people modifying your mods and I'll look in to making a pack based around them.

 

[Slikrick98]

Reika, i just wanted to say that i am very happy to see you opening up your permissions, i respected you for your hard work and dedication but i obvioisly disagreed many times on your locked down philosophy for packs. I wont go into too much depth since i am on my phone but i think having reika review changes is fine, that is just you putting yourself through that extra work to ensure that you your mod is being used in a way you like and so that the end user is pleased. My question though: would you allow disabling of content if they dont fit the philosophy of the pack maker? Obviously you and them may have different views on specific machines and items and if they want to change a tier or disable an item how will the process go for them? Will you force that all of your mod is available to be used, in the specific tiers or any such changes?

Overall though i dont mind the book thing, its good to inform users and i like enchiridion 2 for most of those changes overall in my private packs, it just means some of that would be duplicated in the handbook.

Glad to see you opening up your policies, it'll be nice to play around with your mods and be able to have minor tweaks and or be able to make things fit.

 

[Reika]

Reika, i just wanted to say that i am very happy to see you opening up your permissions, i respected you for your hard work and dedication but i obvioisly disagreed many times on your locked down philosophy for packs. I wont go into too much depth since i am on my phone but i think having reika review changes is fine, that is just you putting yourself through that extra work to ensure that you your mod is being used in a way you like and so that the end user is pleased. My question though: would you allow disabling of content if they dont fit the philosophy of the pack maker? Obviously you and them may have different views on specific machines and items and if they want to change a tier or disable an item how will the process go for them? Will you force that all of your mod is available to be used, in the specific tiers or any such changes?

As long as the criteria are followed, machine/tool removal would be acceptable. That said, it is dangerous, as it can quickly go into the "makes the mod unusable" category unless you know very well what you are doing.

The only machines I can think of whose removal would be disallowed, aside from the irreplaceables like the bedrock breaker, are the engines themselves.

 

[Demetricus]

I'm happy about this change in the policy.
In my opinion if pack authors won't spend 5 minutes asking you about your mods and what they want to do with them, then they obviously don't want to use them that much.

 

[1M Industries]

You don't enforce them. You expect people to adhere to your policies, then ignore them when they don't. Or report them if possible.

I'm giving up on this argument. You spend way more effort defending your mods than I'm willing to put in to convince you otherwise, much as I would like to be able to use them.

Let me know when you have completely unrestricted polices for people modifying your mods and I'll look in to making a pack based around them.

You can very easily make a pack based around Rotarycraft without modifying it at all. In all honesty, if I made a pack with RoC in mind, I would tweak other mods around it, so requiring RoC machines and materials to get into TE, AE, MFR, etc; such as requiring a laser/heat ray from RoC to make a laser drill in MFR, or making RoC machines the only source of power, and requiring converters for everything else. See what I mean? You could create a brilliant pack with not modified to lightly modified RoC, and heavily modified everything else.

 

[VapourDrive]

Hmm, interesting topic, a note to all: This is tricky territory, tread carefully ​

 

[Slikrick98]

As long as the criteria are followed, machine/tool removal would be acceptable. That said, it is dangerous, as it can quickly go into the "makes the mod unusable" category unless you know very well what you are doing.

The only machines I can think of whose removal would be disallowed, aside from the irreplaceables like the bedrock breaker, are the engines themselves.

Okay, that sounds fine. Obviously you dont want the mod to be unusable as at that point it shouldnt be in the pack. I will definitely be looking further into the mod. I definitely enjoy seeing this type of thing as it is something we have conversed about a few times and most of your concern was in people who didnt know what they were doing and server owners and this solves both of those to people who abide by the rules (obviously in every case there will be those who dont, and i think that was a big point in our disagreement, limiting the people who were following the rules).