Yes, that is our current offer. It will be increased in a near future.

We use a custom building tool which can be downloaded from the website. The areas are used in a custom java codebase.

If you are interested to build and be part of a real project (and not a kindergarden mud without a future) check us out.



Emil aka "Hephos"

I think I should point out that this "real project" has no more security than any other "kindergarden mud" - despite the fancy "Mythicscape Entertainment" name, there is no company, nor any commercial backing. It's just another guy working on a mud.

But in particular, you should be warned that the $20 (which would generally work out at around 1 or 2 cents per hour) "may be changed at any time by Mythicscape", and isn't just for the area - but for the entire copyright itself. In other words you give up all rights to your own work. You cannot take your area elsewhere, you cannot later use it in your own mud, you cannot distribute it to other muds, etc.

The agreement on the website is also extremely dubious looking, and I would strongly advice anyone considering the offer to have a lawyer check it over first. From my understanding, it seems to suggest that once you've signed it, Hephos can claim the copyright of anything you have ever produced or will ever produce with his tools, or anything submitted to the mud. If legally valid, that would mean that once you've signed the agreement, he will automatically own the copyright to any further areas you produce (and thus not be required to give any additional payment). You also give up the right to take any sort of legal action should such occur. In addition, the agreement seems to act somewhat like an NDA, which might even be used to prevent you from taking your own ideas elsewhere.

While I'm sure Hephos doesn't have bad intentions, the fact still remains this "offer" is extremely misleading, and personally I wouldn't touch it with a 10 foot barge pole. I would very strongly advice anyone considering it to first consult a legal expert, because otherwise you have the potential to be royally screwed.

So in summary: Be careful. I wouldn't want to see someone get ripped off.

Also; building a normal 100 room area takes 80-100 hours of effective work.

Apart from the lousy payment offered and the legal applications that KaVir so aptly pointed out, I'd avoid throwing that amount of work down the drain, just for the pleasure of being ripped off by some get-rich-quick jerk.

On the other hand, how many mud admins give you pizza money for completing a zone? It doesn't look like it's money to wholly compenstate the large amount of work that goes into creating a zone. That would be stupid. It very much appears to be something to show appreciation, like when your boss pays for pizza on friday after work.

Anyway, I don't think it's a very big deal =).

I'd say around the same number that try to strip you of your rights to that zone, and all future zones, for the price of a pizza.

Yeah, but he also pays me a salary...

It might not be a very big deal for you or me, but it could be for someone else. It looks like it has the potential to seriously screw the unwary builder. I'm just trying to make sure that such builders actually realise what they are getting themselves into before they commit themselves.

Plenty of people don't mind giving up their copyright for some of their works, but I'm not contesting your rightly pointing out the consequences of it. I'm primarily referring to Molly's statement about it being a "lousy payment".

So? =)

Well I'm not really sure how else you could interpret a thread entitled "Get paid for building areas". Following the link clarifies the issue further, by stating "This offer does in no way give you a job at Mythicscape. It is a contracted hire. You work for yourself and sell the copyrights of the material to Mythicscape. You will be paid only for the submitted work once it has been approved."

Sounds like a payment to me. Thus my response to your analogy - my boss does not pay me a pizza per month.

First, mythicscape is a registed company in sweden.

Well, 20 might be "lousy" payment to you guys that got your jobs (kavir mainly, since he been bragging about his salary in the past).

20 is not lousy to someone that does not have a job, that can't even afford to play a pay2play game that cost you 10/month (eq, daoc) etc.

If they build 1 area for us, they can play daoc for 2 months or more.

Also, 20 is our beginning offer, it will be HIGHER in a near future.

We haven't ripped off anyone so far, and are not planning to, so you can mind your own business kavir and go pester someone else, please.

I'm confused why there is so much fuss about this offer. $20 per area may not be much compared to someones professional salary, but it is significant when compared to the big fat nothing that you would get for building on most MUDs. I've never played one of your MUDs, Kavir, so I'm not sure if you've ever paid your builders. Have you?

Also, why would someone be paid a salary for a work for hire job? The point is that you're contracted to do a job, and then you get compensated for it.

Regarding assigning the copyright... well duuuh! Why would this guy pay someone to make an area for his MUD without getting the copyright to it? Doing so would allow anyone who ever built for him to yank their work away at any time. Of course he wants the copyright.

And if you don't want your future work being assigned over, don't submit it to Sharune MUD. If you don't submit your work, you retain your copyright. I don't see how this is sneaky in any way. In fact, that agreement looks pretty standard for a work for hire.

Where is all this hostility coming from? Bias against the commercial guys?

- Ryan

More likely bias against commercial guys who prey on the work of others.

Builders usually gets a lousy deal in all muds. this is just taking the lousy deal a bit further.

Ideally a mud is a teamwork, where code and zones are valued equally high. In reality Coders usually get all the best positions, and Builders - even good, productive, experienced Builders - are looked upon as second rate imms.

Now it seems this is extended to being second rate serfs for commercial muds too. I bet people who start commercial Muds don't expect their coders to work for 2 cents an hour and give up all right to their work on top of that. Or?

I'm also confused. That agreement looks unobjectionable. Of course they're going to own your work if they pay you to do it. Besides, it's hardly as if there's some big payoff for being able to take your area to another mud. Few muds of quality are going to accept an area from an unrelated mud.

And while Kavir is correct that there is not some guarantee that this project will get off the ground it already looks like a more professional and organized effort than 95% of the muds out there.

--matt

Well consider builder X builds an area for a mud.

Why would he not give the copyright to that mud, along with receiving a written agreement that the mud will ALWAYS give credit WHEREVER the work is used?

The only reason would be to use the work elsewhere...

Now any mud accepting this, would not have unique or original material = crappy (in my opinion). All good muds, will not accept their builders to send off the work elsewhere.

Now considering MOST muds out there, whenever a builder submits an area (or builds it online the mud with olc) they get NO written agreements that they will always have credits for it. In fact, mostly they have to agree that their work will not be used elsewhere, and that the mud owners can do whatever they want with it.

Getting paid, and getting a written agreement that credits will always be there, is in my opinion better, even though the salary might not be so great.

Exactly how is he preying on anyone? He's offering more than most muds offer.

We've had many volunteer coders over time. Our CTO and three of our producers all started as volunteers (ie being paid LESS than Hephos is offering) and now all have attractive full-time jobs. Three of the above people now own significant portions of the games as well. Two other volunteers-turned producers are developing our fourth game, Lusternia, and are doing so for a year, for free. We own all their work. If they quit, they get nothing. On the other hand, once the game opens next summer, they get employment, a big percentage of the profits, and ownership.

So are they dumb for having done free work for us (all of which we own) for years in some cases? Did we prey on them? They sure don't think so.

--matt

Have you ever offered a builder more than $20 to build an area for your MUD? If not, you have no right to suggest that Hephos is preying on his builders. Making a lousy deal worse by adding payment to it? I really don't know where to start addressing this, it literally makes no sense at all to me.

Thats just plain economic reality. The more specialized a skill someone has, the more they will be paid for it. Coding is infinitely more complex than building. Besides, all of these arguments assume the poor builders are being coerced into something, although thats clearly illogical.

Still waiting to be convinced that this is born of something other than knee-jerk bias.

- Ryan

You're going to get flamed for that I do believe.

Ytrewtsu

I have never bragged about my salary. In fact I've specifically said in the past that I don't earn as much as I could, because I prefer the working conditions where I am (I work to live, not live to work). However you're right about one point - I consider 1-2 cents per hour to be a "lousy" payment.

No, as I keep telling you every time you try this, I will not simply ignore your posts. I consider your "offer" extremely dubious, and feel obliged to warn any prospective builders. If they still want to build for you, that's their choice, but at least they'll have some warning in advance.

You're completely and utterly missing the point. Most muds grant builders a position on the mud, and in return the builder allows them to use their area for non-commercial purposes. Hephos isn't asking for permission to use the area though - he's buying the copyright (meaning complete ownership of all rights) to the area for what basically amounts to 1-2 cents per hour of work (and retains the right to change that at will), within a commercial mud (so assuming $10 monthly payments, he'd get the money back from a single player in 2 months). Furthermore, his agreement is phrased in such a way that he could also claim ownership over all past and future areas submitted his mud, or using his building tools, without having to pay a single cent more.

And if, like most of these ventures, his mud falls over, your hundreds of hours of creative work have just been flushed into oblivion. You cannot take them elsewhere, or even use them as examples of your work, because you no longer own them.

No, it wouldn't. I've explained several times to Hephos how he could go about ensuring that they couldn't. I've even explained to him how he could go about ensuring that they didn't use their work on other muds, which is what he claimed was the reason why he wanted the transfer of copyright. But each time he's instead opted to take the entire ownership of the work away from the original author.

Actually that's not true. According to the agreement, once you've signed it you automatically give up your copyright simply by creating work with his building tool.

No, bias against exploitation of builders. Don't you think they at least deserve to be warned what they are letting themselves into? There are more than enough mud coders who have stopped contributing after being repeatedly burnt, the last thing we need is for builders to start getting treated the same way.

Wow, yeah, cause you'd get so much by being able to submit it to different muds!

What do you think the builders he's trying to attract do with their areas, man? It's not like they're going to Bioware and saying, "Hey look, I wrote this area for a text mud. Hire me!" It's not as if the builder is going to go sell that area to another mud. What does said hypothetical builder lose that actually matters? Nothing that I can see, but he gains $20. Better deal than most muds.

--matt

Quoting kavir
>Actually that's not true.  According to the agreement, once
>you've signed it you automatically give up your copyright
>simply by creating work with his building tool.

Actually, the copyright line of the agreement is changed. The submitee only give up copyrights of things submitted that has any connection to the game.

It does not affect anything you have built, and not submitted.

So someone can perfectly fine create whatever they want with our tools without giving up any copyrights. It is when they actually submit the work to us and let us use it, that the agreement comes in.

(Not that i see how anyone would want to build an area with our building tool, and NOT submit it to us... its not like it can be used in any other game.)

You appear to have missed the part where I said "And if, like most of these ventures, his mud falls over, your hundreds of hours of creative work have just been flushed into oblivion. You cannot take them elsewhere, or even use them as examples of your work, because you no longer own them."

Well that's an improvement at least.

Although they still lose the copyright, even if you decide not to approve (or, therefore, pay them for) the area.

Of course it can. The layout of an area isn't the creative part, nor is it particularly difficult to change. If they create an area and discover that there is no demand or requirement for it, why would they want to just throw away that work?

Actually, feel free to give suggestions on how to change our agreement then kavir, so we can skip all this since it both is bad for us, and takes up your valuable time.

These are our main points we want to have secured:

1. Any material we send the builder should be kept confidential. (NDA like)

2. The builder do not wish to send in a written agreement for every area they create. Only 1 agreement. (It is perfectly fine with us if every builder sends in an agreement for every material they create, but they don't want that, too much hassle.)

3. Any material that the builder submits to us should NOT be submitted to ANY other place, or used in any other ways. We don't want our game theme to be popping up in other games, books, movies or whatever.

4. We should be allowed to alter the material as we wish, and publish it in any of our games or products.

5. The original creator should always get credits wherever the material is used.

6. Payments should not be included in this agreement. Payments are based on our current offers at the website, with a deadline date. (Example, until the 20th january 2003, we will offer 100 bucks/finished submitted zone).

For this i think our current agreement is ok... If this can be changed to use exclusive rights, (as kavir mentioned in the past) sure give some suggestions.

All we want is areas and happy builders.

Sounds reasonable, but you may need to address the scope of the confidentiality. If you send to the builder information that is also available to the public (eg history or theme which is on the mud's web page), and try to treat  this as "confidential", then it is (quite sensibly) likely to be regarded as invalid, and the whole "agreement" (or at least the "confidentiality" part of it) could also become invalid.
Fair enough, but you might  find it useful to have a similar agreement for "one-off" deals for any builders who prefer them, and possibly to incorporate the current rate in the agreement (to avoid any possible misunderstanding/dispute)
I'm not sure if I misunderstood what you intend here, but your requirement appears unreasonable. It implies that you can reject work by a builder, thus not paying for it, but that the work is effectively "yours" (insofar as it can't be used anywhere else). I think you need to allow a builder whose work you reject to use it elsewhere.
Possibly amend it to something along the lines of "The agreement becomes void if the work is not approved/accepted within 30 days, or is rejected, and the copyright ownership of the work reverts to the builder."
You would probably want to extend that to ensure that any references unique to your mud would be removed before the work can be used elsewhere, to protect your IP.
This is too ambitious. I think you would be wise to apply some reasonable restrictions. To take some extreme examples, using that area as an example "How not to write an area" in your manual, or to use it in a way that the builder is philosophically opposed to (eg on a porn site) would be unreasonable, and risks making the agreement invalid. I realise that it's going to be difficult to find a suitable form of words to define "reasonable" limits for how far you can change the work, but at minimum I think you need to allow the builder the option of insisting that the work should be "anonymous", rather than credited to them.
Fine - except the point I made above, where the work has changed to the point where the builder wishes to be uncredited. Allow the builder an option to insist on removal of the credit.
Understood, in the context of a "standing agreement" rather than one agreement per zone.

Additional point. Whilst I'm sure you don't expect your mud to fail, it's wise to take precautions and allow for the possibility. In that case, the ownership/copyright of the work should revert to the builder.

I would prefer to see this situation resolved via a suitable form of exclusive licence (irrevocable except under extreme conditions), but I think that if you reconsidered your "requirements" in the light of my comments above, and amended your agreement appropriately, it would be fairer to builders without weakening your position unreasonably.

Final point - I think KaVir may have misplaced a decimal point in saying that this represents 1 or 2 cents per hour. Sounds more likely it should be 10 to 20 cents an hour (for 100 to 200 hours to make a 20 dollar zone). Still falls some way below a "reasonable" wage, but it's better than nothing.

Actually, for creative writers (which are what builders mainly are), that's about par for course in payment. Think about how long it takes to write a short story from conception to final edits and then get $50 for the average sale (assuming you can secure a sale). There are higher paying rates that may pay you up to $500, but competition is fierce. Even for a novel, which could take years to write, IF it gets published, you are lucky if you make $5,000. For the most part, writers make pennies per hour and feel successful when they do.

In any event, aside from legalities raised (I think $20 for an area really isn't payment but an honorarium), I believe most builders generally don't look for cash as compensation but rather the joy of having people participate in something they created. I've personally never expected anything in return for any area I built and never felt cheated. Once I did unexpectedly receive a $50 Amazon gift certificate from an admin at the end of the year and was pleased as punch.

I'd say whatever a builder agrees ahead of time to is fair. No one is forcing anyone to build on his mud.
--matt

I wouldn't agree that it's automatically fair because it's agreed beforehand.

For example, there are many cases where people consider software sales terms unfair, despite having "agreed" by clicking on the EULA, opening the package, etc.

In general, I think you can only regard "agreement" implies "fairness" if
(a) both parties fully understand the terms and their implications
(b) neither party is being "reluctantly forced" into the agreement by poor negotiating position, or lack of alternatives.

Well, you and I have different definitions of fair.

Don't agree to or sign a contract if you don't agree with it and understand it.

--matt

Since this thread has turned into something pretty interesting, let me try to explain a bit better what lies behind my, in retrospect, rather blunt statements.

First:
I don’t have anything per se against commercial muds, in fact I am involved in a potential commercial project myself, where my partner is coding a Mud from scratch, while I am going to provide the areas for it. What I DO have a problem with however, is commercial Muds that aren’t up front about being commercial and that attempt to rip their players and/or staff off – or at least have as their first priority to squeeze as much profit as possible out from them.

Let me give you some examples of what I consider ‘ripping off’:
1. Claiming that your Mud is ‘totally free to play’, while in effect players will have an almost crippling handicap, unless they shell out an amount of RL money on equipment, weapons, skills, spells and special commands.
2. Hiding the fact that your Mud is commercial, by putting the info about it in some obscure place of the Website, while at the same time allowing players to play for free for a month or so, in the expectation that they then will be ‘hooked’ enough to accept the fee.
3. Hiding the cost by calling it ‘donations’ and then hassle the players that choose not to donate, until they either submit or quit the Mud.
4. Paying your staff ‘peanut money’ for putting a lot of work into something that you yourself are making – or expecting to make - a pretty big financial profit from.

Secondly:
Builders – and even Coders – can get a bad deal in both commercial and free muds. Usually the nature of it is a bit different however.

You have to realise the fundamental difference between free and commercial Muds in a discussion like this.
In a free Mud, nobody makes any profits. Not the Owner, not the Imps, and consequently not the Coders and Builders either – NOBODY. It’s a totally voluntary enterprise, a hobby that we do for FUN, and that requires free contribution from everybody involved. The owners/implementors are usually the ones that put up the largest amount of free work, and they are also the ones that actually have to shell out some money, for the hardware and the server.

In a commercial Mud, the owner makes a profit. It can be big or small, depending on how successful they are in selling their product. (Note that ‘most successful’ here, doesn’t necessarily mean ‘highest quality’ of the game itself, it only means how many players they can get to pay a maximum amount of $, i.e how good they are at marketing their Mud and how smart they are at inventing features that generate money).

Now you can naturally get a bum deal in a free Mud too. In fact there are tons of Muds, ran by immature twinks, who not only treat their players like crap, but also their staff. (Totally crappy commercial Muds like that don’t exist, for the simple reason that nobody in their right mind would pay a cent to play a mud like that).

BUT, there is also a rather limited number of free muds that are run ‘professionally’, (in spite of the non-profit condition), by mature people, who try to be as fair as possible both to their players and their staff. These Muds do exist, and in many cases their game quality equals that of the commercial Muds. They also set up Build Policies that guarantee the people that work for them a fair treatment, although payment in cash is generally not even an option for those free Muds – for a very simple reason:

Most free Muds don’t have a totally custom code. The majority of them run on DIKU or any of its derivates – MERC, CIRCLE etc. – where the licence that goes with the code expressively forbids anyone from making any kind of profit. It doesn’t matter how much the code has been modified or added to; if it started out as a Diku derivate, it’s still a derivate, and the licence applies.

That said, here are some comments to some of the posters:

Hephos1 cent – or even 10 cents - per hour, for pretty qualified creative work is and will always remain a lousy payment. They’d be a lot better off taking a job at McDonalds, which I hear is not all that hard to get. I’m not sure what the current wages are, but one thing is for sure; that would allow them to ‘play daoc’ for a considerably longer time, for the same amount of time put down on the work.

Hephos2:Hephos3: I can think of at least one reason why a Builder would want to yank their area away from a Mud, even if they DON’T plan to use it somewhere else.

If they leave the Mud on very “unfriendly” terms, it would be quite understandable to me if they no longer want their area to be used there. Fall-outs between owners and staff are not exactly uncommon. But a fact is; they are a lot more likely to occur, if the staff member figures they have been given a bum deal.

Most serious Muds give full credit to their Builders, and they also recognise the fact that the author deserves the copyright to their own creative work.

I run a Mud with 100% unique zones myself, so naturally I wouldn’t be very happy if any of our zones turned up in another mud, and our Builders are made well aware of this fact, when they sign up for us. Our Builder Policy also states that any zone approved and entered in the Game Port will NOT be removed under any circumstances - unless the Imps decide so for reasons of their own. Also our OLC and our Mob-script engine are so far from stock, that it would be hard to adapt a zone built in 4D to another Mud. Basically it would have to be rewritten from scratch. That leaves us pretty well guarded, as well as the Builder.

Still, there would not be much I could or would do about it, if anyone should decide to break this “gentlemen’s agreement”. To my knowledge this hasn’t happened yet, in 6 years time. If the problem should ever occur, I guess we’d deal with it when it happens. Most likely our decision would be to remove the zone in question from our Mud, in spite of the hassle that would mean, to get rid of the objects in the pfiles. We have over 160 zones by now, so the loss of one or two would not be that big a blow.

Malaclypse:  Since I run a free mud (= not making any profit from it whatsoever myself) – no, I haven’t. Our Mud runs on Circle code, so even if I wanted to, the licence prohibits me.

I do however provide as fair conditions as possible for those that build for me. Including Builders getting full credit, retaining full copyright to their own work, and getting an Immortal on the Game Port in return for the first 100 room zone they produce. They also get a copy of their zone, on demand. (Actually very few demand it, strangely enough).

For a commercial Mud, I’d say, that if you cannot afford a fair payment, (for instance if the Mud is just starting up), a fair deal would be some part of the future profit, if and when the project ever leaves the ground.

The_Logos: No, that actually sounds like a pretty good deal, much like the one I got myself on my current Mud. I wasn’t promised anything when I entered it, not even an imm on the game - in fact the contrary, since I came there with the reputation of being a troublemaker. I ended up Imp and co-owner. That’s what I call a good deal, even though I never did and never will get a penny in real money for all my work.

BUT – how many of the Builders out there get the same good deal? – even the good, talented hardworking Builders?

One question of interest, though, matt. You are talking about Coders here, aren’t you? Or do Builders get the same deal from you for putting down the same amount of work on the project?

Regardless of the relative morality of this, it does not exist for one simple reason: It would be bankrupt before it started.

Imagine I hired a team of builders to help me create a MUD, and paid them standard fare for writers. I would end up paying something like a few bucks a room. Multiply that by thousands and I've already spent several tens of thousands of dollars. Lets be modest (for professional writers) and say you pay $3 a room. Lets continue the modesty and say you only have 5000 rooms in your mud. You're up to $15,000, and haven't even begun to think about a backstory for this world.

Now you have to hire coders, who lets say earn $50 an hour. Depending on the complexity of your MUD, this will cost you anywhere from $20K up to, well, the sky is the limit I suppose. But for modesty's sake, say you have a small game in terms of functionality and only spend $20K.

Now you're in the hole $35,000 and you haven't even begun looking at hardware, bandwidth, legal fees, business fees, and marketing. You're looking at -minimum- $40,000. And thats compiled with extremely conservative numbers. Actual numbers are probably closer to well over $100,000 to hire people at what you call "fair" prices to create a mud.

Luckily, there are lots of people who not only don't feel exploited, but enjoy creating things to enhance the community that they are a part of, regardless of whether someone makes money from it or not. Do you honestly believe the community that a good MUD creates is not existant in commercial muds?

But from the volunteer builders point of view, there is no difference. A builder does the same amount of work, assuming the expectations are the same, whether someone else is making money off the game or not. If fun is a sufficient motive for a builder to build for free in a non-commercial game then fun + $20 is even better motivation to build.

Well, in a commercial mud the owner HOPES to make a profit. Most commercial muds both text and graphical never turn a profit.



Still better than no cents per hour though! All other things equal, $20 is better than $0. (I'm not saying all other things are equal in this case.)

Understandable from the builders' perspective but no well-run operation is going to let people just take areas away. That kind of dispute may not be uncommon but it sure as heck is exceedingly rare on professionally (not just in the commercial sense) run muds. Everytime I see one of those "My coder stole my code" posts on TMC I just roll my eyes.

Disgruntled staff members are inevitable in any operation and regardless of whether they are employees or volunteers. When they become a problem you kick their asses out the door, ban their ips, and that's the end of it.


This is the part I honestly don't understand. What does the builder need protecting from exactly? It's not like his area is a saleable asset. What does the builder stand to lose that has value, precisely?



Why, exactly? Our non-employee builders are happy to work for free, for instance, because they enjoy it. Exactly the same as in a non-commercial mud I'd imagine. Everybody wins as far as I can see, and the builder is getting exactly the same thing in both cases.

[quote= ]
The_Logos: Well, we don't have any dedicated builders on staff. We're not a big enough company for it to really be worthwhile particularly considering our games are not focused on PvE gameplay. Plus, there are a lot of quality builders willing to work for free because they enjoy it. There are a lot less quality coders willing to work for free. And as an aside, there are even fewer quality graphical artists or UI experts willing to work for free which is, in my opinion, why the open source movement so consistently fails to produce visually-pleasing software useable by the average person.

On Lusternia, one of the guys is purely a scripter (technically it's scripting since it's using our interpreted Rapture language. It's a powerful enough language that we've written other scripting languages in it though.) and the other does all the design, building, and some scripting (obviously. Designers who can't script are called unemployed.)

However, if we had two positions open: full-time coder and full-time builder, there is no way the builder would be offered close to what the coder makes. How much they work isn't really the issue. How much their work is worth is the issue, and the coder's is worth more. Just the way it is. Similarly, level designers make far less than coders on a graphical mud. Coding takes much more skill, experience, and education to do at a professional level than building on a text mud does.

I'll give you a real-world example. I'm negotiating some positions right now for a graphical project. The lead client programmer will make between 130k and 150k/year plus benefits and royalties. Lead level designer, on the other hand, is probably looking at the 70-80k range with benefits.

And frankly, there are more specialized skills involved with graphical level design than with text mud area building. Lots of people with absolutely no experience or formal training can be quite good builders as soon as they learn to use the building tools. Heck, there ISN'T any such thing as formal training for mud building. Hand a non-coder a compiler and text editor though and he's just going to sit there looking at it blankly.
--matt

As a builder who hires volunteer builders like most of you, I’m somewhat amazed by the perception that ‘good builders grow on trees.’ That, to me, is tantamount to lumping all writers into a generic mass and randomly selecting Salvatore or Tolkien or Burroughs as just competent grammaticists who got lucky. Perhaps I live in a fairytale world where I presume the senior managers I respect here actually have high standards for zonal creations used within their worlds. Consistency, congruity, content, theme, imagination, timing and a fair amount of zeal for the art builders have chosen to pursue has to count for something. I agree only the mechanics are learned through professional education but I submit that the nuance and flavor of the DnD or Sword and Sorcery or Time Warping environment creation is based on long hours of study and interaction via many different media. ‘Doom’ style writers abound and do seem to grow on trees, or perhaps under them depending on your viewpoint, but the ones who shine are truly rare yet they suffer the same disdain for ability and value as the 12 year old ‘Doom’ writer. I can understand this perception from the elitist coder world of graphical MUs that thrive on eye candy to the PlayStation addicted masses but not from successful text MUs.

To digress to the original announcement that started this, “heck yah,” 20 bucks is a good deal in an environment that so often treats builders as third class citizens in a coders world. I have one builder who can cough up an easy 5 zones per week and would love the deal. I strongly applaud KaVir for posting a caution note to accepting the offer though for the same reasons he stated and would advise the builder I know to be very careful before jumping into an agreement like that.

Quote: the_logos

This is the part I honestly don’t understand. What does a builder need protecting from exactly? It’s not like his idea is a saleable asset. What does a builder stand to lose that has value, precisely?

Coming from someone I’ve seen high on the pedestal spouting the sanctity of intellectual property, I’m considering this is your comment intended to draw this thread out to another 50 pages of the_logos vs the world in intellectual debate. Perhaps a short “whatif” might nip your confusion in the bud. What if, Salvatore just happened to take 20 bucks to write Menzoberranzen for a MU that bought his copyright when he was just 18 and ignorant of the true hack and slash ways of the world? A good zone is the child of a good author and as a parent they never give up their children.

I fully support the sanctity of intellectual property just as I fully support an author's right to sell it or give it away to Hephos' mud.

If you seriously think all these builders running around writing areas are going to compromise future careers as best-selling authors, put down the pipe. ####, I challenge you to find a single successful professional author whose career has ever been hampered by giving away -mud areas- (MUD AREAS for gods sake. We're not talking about the next Great American Novel being given away or sold for $20. I mean come on, let's maintain some sort of reasonable perspective. I'm hardly saying anything that should be controversial.)

--matt

Hephos:
If decent Builders grow on trees, where do those trees grow? And how come so many muds are screaming for Builders and/or have such crappy zones?

Anyone, who believes that being a good Builder is mainly a question of learning OLC, is just showing their total ignorance about what quality building entails. Sure, any twelve-year-old kid can learn to use OLC within a few days, and even whip out a crappy zone, provided they got the patience for it. Does that make them a quality – or even a ‘decent’ - Builder? Not any more than knowing how to work with a word-processor makes anyone a good author.

Building is an art form of its own, which more resembles writing the synopsis for a film than a novel. Because, even without graphics, a zone is dynamic and interactive and springs to full life first when it gets played, something that has to be considered when building. Creating a quality zone entails both research and creativity, thinking out and putting into words the background story, plots, environment, population, and all other aspects of your world, all of which must be logical and consistent, within the laws of nature and society of the Mud you work on. A Quality zone is usually entertaining, and has flavour, atmosphere, suspense, surprises, sometimes humour. Other aspects that need to be considered are challenge versus playability, game balance, scripts, quests, puzzles, how to utilise all the options the code offers – and how to invent new engines if the existing game mechanics aren’t up to your ideas. Good zones are often the result of close cooperation between Builders and Coders, even if an amazing amount of things can be done with scripts.

Talking about OLC in connection with the subject of quality zones is next-to an insult.

The_logos 1:
Are your ‘happy’ Builders aware of how low you value their work and their ideas on public discussion boards?

The_logos 2:
I think this statement speaks for itself. With an attitude like that, no wonder disgruntled staff members are ‘inevitable’ in your operation. It never once entered your mind that the fault might lie with the Mud Owner and not with the staff member, right?

Possibly  the main problem with arrogant people like you is, that you never even encountered a quality Builder. Probably because no quality Builder would even consider working on a Mud run by arrogant people like you. And if they did, they would probably turn into disgruntled staff members pretty soon, and you’d ‘kick their asses out the door, ban their ips, and that's the end of it.’

Most muds are screaming for builders because while builders are willing to work for free they don't want to work somewhere where their efforts are hamstrung by "that idiot running the place". Unfortunately, far too many muds fit into that scenario very well.

It's not just a question of just knowing OLC but for many people it IS a question of simply having to learn OLC to put their existing imagination, writing skills, and understanding of how players experience text muds to work.

Molly, there's no need to get defensive. Nobody is suggesting that builders lack skills. But there's no arguing with the fact that not things require the same amount of experience, knowledge, and skill to do. There's also no arguing with the fact that some activities are worth more than others. Coding, for instance, is just worth more than building. You can rail against it but it doesn't change the fact.

I most certainly value our Builders, consider most of them my friends and would consider them so regardless of whether they continued building or not. I'm dropping a few thousand dollars on a bunch of rooms for us in Vegas next month. Did the same last year. Got a big condo in Beaver Creek, Colorado for us the year before. (Well, not just builders, but immortal volunteers and staff generally.) I've given them jobs, helped one get financing for a new house, helped them start their own entreprenurial ventures, bought them Amazon certificates, and more.

Of course, those bonuses are not why they build for us. They build because they enjoy it which, presumably, is the reason you also build (you're not getting paid if I recall). The hotel rooms and everything else is just a little extra something on top of that.

Really, builders want, I think, three main things:
1. Players to appreciate their work. Empty muds are not gratifying to build for for most people.
2. Stability. They want to know their work isn't going to go to waste when the mud shuts down tomorrow.
3. Support. They want tools and permissions that allow them to create as freely as possible.

You attract and keep good builders by providing those. Anything on top of that only helps. We give them all three, in spades, plus the little extras, which is probably why we can turn down 95% of people who apply to build.

[quote= ]
The_logos 2:
Now Molly, I know you're not dumb. I know you cannot possibly believe that it's possible to maintain 100% of relationships (in anything) 100% of the time. Over half of marriages in this country break up. No company manages 0 turnover. People leave the Army. People leave muds.

It's not really about fault. I mean, of course it's the mud owner's fault sometimes but how does that impact on what I said? If a staff member is disgruntled and causing problems and doesn't seem likely to stop, and you as the mud owner find out it's your problem, what do you do, say "Oh, well, it's my fault he's acting this way so I'll just continue to let him." No. You kick him out and hope you can do better next time. The good of the mud must come before the good of any single volunteer, employee, or player.

Well, if you define "quality builder" as "someone who will not work with Matt" then I have never worked with a quality builder, by definition.

On the other hand, considering we do more for our builders than virtually all muds do (and yes, it's because we're commercial but that doesn't change the fact that we do) it's probably unsurprising that in Achaea's 6 year history it has had exactly one builder leave in a fit of disgruntlement. Others have been asked to leave and others drift away after getting bored of course but that's a pretty good record. I strongly suspect those team vacations we take helps though I'm not able to quantify it.

Why don't you tell me what you would do besides kick him out and ban him in this real situation:
Last year right after we got back from our group vacation I found out that our head builder (who had undergone a really drastic personality change after a nasty divorce. He decided he was bisexual suddenly, etc) was playing with himself on webcams while members of his religious Order (he was a God), including minors, watched.

The solution was obvious: Kick his ass out and ban him. We tried being nice and letting him have his old mortal back to log in with now and then but too many players knew who he was as a mortal and it made them uncomfortable to have him around. So we banned him from his old character as well.

Do I feel any regret over kicking his ass out and banning his IP? Not even a smidgen. I just regret he made it necessary. Perhaps you would have kept him on but I sure hope not.

--matt

the_logos:
You hope that is why.  I wish I could remember where I read the survey, but about 3-4 years ago a study was done within Fortune 500 companies, and it was found that "Benefits" was the #1 reason why disgruntled employees stuck around a job they didn't really like.

the_logos:
I don't believe that is what Molly meant.  When I read your posts (and I suspect when others do as well), your attitude towards builders seems flippant.  "Coders are better, Builders are just regular people" is what it seems your saying.  Now don't go quote me quoting you, quoting me ... I know you didn't say that word for word, but that seems your attitude.  The Fact is good builders usually don't make good coders, and good coders usually don't make good builders.  They have different sets of qualities, which make them good at different things.  And a MUD wouldn't exist without both.  There are many MUDs that have great machnics and horrible areas, or vice versa.  So a callus, flippant attitude towards either seems dangerous.

As for the horrific situation you described the_logos, I don't think that has anything to do with the discussion up until then.  The discussion was more about disgruntled builders and situations that could possibly be handled or discussed.  Because, in a situation like that, I would think you would want to remove his/her areas since just seeing the name of the person could invoke further problems/harm.

Well still coders work are more valuable (and hard to come by). If you are satisfied with a stock codebase, patched up with snippets, of course you can manage with a bad coder.

However, if you want a procifient coder, the chances are that you will NEVER find one working for a free mud (that is not already taken). The chances that you will find an exceptionally great builder is infinitly much higher.

Of course the coder is then more valuable.

We (I) have never said that builders works are not appreciated. Evidently a mud with only great coders are equally bad (or even worse) than a stock code with amazing zones.

BUT it is much easier to find the builders. You can generally find them roaming all over the net. If you want a great coder you must normally look around yourself in rl for friends, atleast if you want one that you can also trust.

This does not mean that I think it is easy to find great builders. During the years we have had thousands come by our game and only a handful have been accepted and granted staff status and built tenfolds of zones. We have over 20.000 rooms today, and it is neither stock or bad quality.

Finding a great quality builder is like looking for a needle in a haystack, and finding the equally great coder is like finding the needle in 10 haystacks. Not only does the coder need more hardtocomeby skill, you need to have a deep trust for him/her too before you let him/her loose in your code. You can hand over your building tools to just about anyone, but you can't let anyone get your game's source.

Emil Nilimaa

Yes, I work for free.
BUT - I work for free in a Mud that values and respects my work, and the work of all Builders.

I would never even dream of working for peanut money – or even somewhat bigger money - in a place where the owner publicly states that the work of Builders isn’t worth a tenth of the work of Coders.

And getting an occasional patronising pat on the head or a lollipop in the form of a free weekend in Vegas once a year wouldn’t help either.
Rather the opposite.

But I guess a person who can post something like:      would never realise the difference.
You know, that remark rather reminds me of the sleazy salesmen, who sell unsuspecting and naive people things they don’t really want or need, and then say ‘Well, you didn’t read the fine print’ when their targets try to cancel the contract.

Like Iluvatar, I also remember you climbing on a very high horse in a thread about ‘intellectual property’ some while back. But obviously ‘intellectual property‘ only means something to you, if it also has an established commercial value - to quote yourself again; ‘is a saleable asset’.

Yet another of your cute quotes in this thread is this one:
Yeah, right, could that possibly be because talent, imagination, ingenuity and creativity cannot really be trained? And in case you never realised, these are not qualities that everybody possesses.

I am actually going to climb out on a limb here, and state that a Mud coder that doesn't possess a certain amount of these qualities too will never become a really 'great' coder, however many years he spends on formal training in using his tools.

I do however actually agree on your three points about what generally attracts Builders. It’s encouraging to see that there are at least SOME things we can agree on. Personally I would of course have added a fourth point to your three:

4. Respect. Builders want a Mud owner that respects their work for what it is worth, both in the Mud and publicly, on boards like this one.

Finally, I totally fail see how the case of one of your staff members going paedophile has got ANYTHING to do with the present discussion about Builders getting respect for and retaining the copyright to their work.
Naturally I’d kick out and ban a moron like that too. Who wouldn’t? Moreover, I would have reported him to the Police and the Net Authorities. And I wouldn’t even have dreamt of even THINKING of I’d kick that mort out faster than you could say siteban, and not wait for the other players to complain about it.
But then again, my players don’t pay me to play.

Quoting molly
So you disagree there? You seriously think the average muds can get a great coder as easily as a great builder?

Now, this is based on that builders are 10 times easier (grasping a number from thin air) to come by than coders. And this is evidently the case (looking at most muds and how they are coded, and how many posts there are about needing coders).

Lets say a coder was easier to find than a builder. Of course i would personally value the builders work more.

Now, at Sharune, we have plenty of proficient coders, what we need are builders. At the moment, we value builders much more than coders. Thats one reason to why we want to show them that we value their work a lot, and give them both a contract to have credits, and a handful of dollars. If I could I would gladly pay them 200/zone. Perhaps in the future we will be able to do that too...

Our coders sign a contract that gives them nothing, but credits and the pleasure to code and be part of our team.

So I (we) personally don't value coders more than builders, since we have a great deal of coders available.

But speaking generally, of course you have to understand that people value the coders more, since they are much harder to find.

Value is based on demand and availability...

And you disagree with this Molly?

Hephos: Value is also based on merit and quality.

You disagree with this, Hephos?

Of course not.

But now we were comparing two people with same merit and same quality, just in different proffessions. Where one of them is from a proffession where there is much more demand and a lot less people available.

Oh well…
I figure we could hash this back and forth for weeks, without ever agreeing on anything, except for the fact that we disagree.

But I am not about to do that. I’ve made my points of view clear, and I am not about to repeat them ad nauseam.
So. I propose that we instead discuss the topic that the_logos, brought into this discussion, the one about the paedophile on his mud.

Now, I’ll admit that my instinctive gut reaction to this was to ignore the subject, since I suspected that he brought the incident up mainly to divert our intention from the original subject of this thread – namely Builders’ right.

But then I read his post again.

And, if his intention really was to divert the attention – well, he succeeded, at least as far as I am concerned. Compared to the scenario he paints, ‘Builders’ Rights’ suddenly seems rather petty.

I mean, take a closer look at what the guy actually is saying:

Here is a Mud, and not a small stock Mud run by some immature teenager either. It’s one of the big, commercial Muds, in fact the one that tops the voting list of this site, and that he himself likes to refer to as ‘the # 1 Mud on the net’.

Now, this owner of this big, commercial Mud, with hundreds of players, discovers that one of his top staff members is a sicko, who likes to ‘play with himself’ in front of a web camera before an audience of some of the Mud’s players, some of which by his own admission are minors. Apparently there is some hard evidence about it too, judging from the details he provided. So what does he do about the situation?

Does he report the pervert to the Police or the Net Abuse authorities? Judging from his own story - no he doesn’t.

Does he warn his players about the pervert (considering that the latter most likely already has established a network, has access to players’ e-mail addresses, etc)? Again, judging again from his own story – no he doesn’t.

His only action, as it seems, is to remove the pervert from his imm position, while – again by his own admission – trying to be ‘nice and letting him have his old mortal back to log in with now and then’. Leaving him free to hunt down some more prey to his sick game. Not until some of the players protest, because they are feeling ‘uncomfortable to have him around’ does he finally kick this sicko out of his game.

And that is not all. From what it sounds like, he is expecting applauds from the audience – us – for the way he is handling the situation too. Just look at the way he is taunting me: ‘Perhaps you would have kept him on but I sure hope not.’

So, who was he trying to be ‘nice’ to here? His players, the paedophile, or his own wallet?

Again, this is a person who frequently stresses how  ‘professional’ his operation is run. In Swedish there is another meaning of the word ‘professional’, but let’s not get into this now.

Maybe this is a knee-jerk reflex on my part, but considering the details of his story, I believe my reflex is understandable. Paedophilia is something I really hate profoundly.

Indeed, but being your average Fortune 500 company employee is a miserable soul-sucking job. Being a builder on Achaea generally (but not always) involves getting to roleplay one of a handful of Gods. I mean, it's fun! No required hours, no forms to fill out, etc.

I'm not sure how disgruntled builders can cause problems for a decently-run mud. Any trouble they can cause is easily protected against. I also don't really see why one would disrupt one's world by removing an area from it. Imagine Wisconsin suddenly disappearing from the US. Highly distrubing to nearby residents no doubt! I suppose it's understandable if you're running a non-coherent world, but if you've got a world that's attempting some sort of conceptual coherence then removing an area is just not an option this side of a major roleplaying event.

From my point of view as a mud player too (not that I claim my player POV represents anyone but me), I wouldn't like to see treasured areas removed.

--matt

--matt

You're free to disagree. I'm not really giving you an opinion though. I'm just pointing out what the reality of the situation is, and the reality is that coders get paid more than writers because they are worth more to the people doing the paying. I'm sorry if that doesn't sit well with you but it's your hangup, not mine.

The rest of your post isn't going to be dignified with a public response.

--matt

Some of this discussion parallels the old war between yui and angelbob about which is better, c or c++...

Yui took the position that 50 mediocre programmers working on the same project in C++ (which is apparently easier to learn and use...) would, given similar work days, produce a lot more viable code than 1 brilliant C++ or C programmer working equivalent hours (to one of the mediocre programmers, assumedly).

The parallel is builders v. coders for MUDs.  Now, my friends and I have always made a distinction with regards to coding: patch monkeys, and generally people who add in the freely distributedcode of others, add color options to their channels, and then use specslay or other kid-toys to increase the "variety of their imm powers" don't count as coders.  They just dont.

That being said, there aren't a whole lot of coders out there.  I'm not going to get into the argument of who is more/less motivated on average, builders or coders; for now lets assume that the interest and motivation is similar enough not to be discussed.

If I hire 20 13-year-olds, set them on a separate port, give them a few nifty toys on the main site with their mortals, and tell them to go build, chances are I'll have 10-20 crappy but workable areas in the same time as I would have had 1 really good area from 1 really good builder who I managed to coerce into building for me.  Possibly less time; crappy areas don't exactly take months to kick out.

I take those 20 areas, rotate the builders, let them all play with each others' areas and tell them that they all get "in-game benefits" from making the areas acceptable for the pbase....

And in a slightly longer period of time than it takes a good builder to create 1 or 2 areas, I have 20 usable ones.

I'm not a fan of quantity over quality normally.  But in a situation where it's obvious that you can mass-produce mediocrity and approximate good work, why not?  (I wouldn't PAY for it most likely, but I'd figure out something the builders consider worthwhile.)  Hephos is just working a numbers game at the moment; grab 2000 builders, get 1 in 200 areas usable for your MUD, and you have 10 new areas lickety split.  Plus, other areas from the pool that seem to have potential can get emails back to their creators saying keep up the good work, and you will eventually get money too.

I wouldn't do it.  I'm not sure I'm completely opposed to it though; especially for a commercial enterprise, it sounds like a smart way of doing things.  The NDA and retention of copyright needs to be played with more, from what I've seen, but the rest of the idea is fine.

Besides.  Hephos's "ethical ambiguities" strike me as relatively minor when compared with current major businesses we're reading about in the news lately.

-Visko

Quick edit:

P.S. Crappy coders crash things, and unless you're INCREDIBLY lucky and have free unlimited hosting, or a nice fat checkbook, you probably don't have a separate development port (although you should, all of you out there.) Much more painful things happen when you crash MUDs as opposed to just putting in a bunch of idiotic areas with typos.

Logos,

‘I'm just pointing out the reality of the situation, and the reality is that programmers get paid more than writers do because they are worth more to the people paying their respective services.’

The reality of the current situation, regarding the payment offered to builders and programmers, is irrelevant to the stance you are taking. One could easily say that men are still paid more in the workplace and that employers paying for their services are justified in doing so, based upon traditionally supported and conventionally accepted salary calculations.

The reality of the current salary climate may be that male employees are allocated higher monetary awards and in some cases esteem than their female counterparts. However, this does not necessarily support the illogical deduction that one of them is of greater value to an organisation than the other party. It is organisations that think in this limited manner that are frequently suprised when their vital employess hand in their resignations, after being head-hunted by a more astute company.

If we wish to employ a broader-based comparison with another field of construction why not refer to the reality of house building. A MUD is after all a collection of built areas and components for the use and amusement of people. And in this appeal to reality, who is paid the highest salary in the development of a house, the constructor of the house’s shell (the programmer), the interior designer that furnishes the house (the builder), or the architect (the game designer).

Arguments centred upon our current conception of reality are often very poor arguments, just because it ‘currently is so’ does not entail that ‘it will be also be so tomorrow’. The world is constantly changing and with it our conception reality, the construction industry framework might well become the accepted game-design framework of tomorrow. After all programming involves a language and recent advances have created translators for a number spoken languages, how long will it be before we have Online Code-creating tools with simple interfaces? And if such tools are developed what commodity will command the highest salaries? I dare say it will be creativity.

In the case of a specific scenario, such as graphical games, it may be safe to say at the outset that programmers warrant a higher salary. When dealing with the rendered eye candy and tile based approach of graphical building tools the basic skill requirements of a builder are relatively low. Even the creation of original actors is based around a small collection of tools that are quickly mastered in relation to the skills required to develop the supporting systems infrastructure.

However, I am certainly not saying that all graphical builders are created equal and that mastering the technical requirements of graphical building tools is all that is involved. To use a metaphor, two woodcarvers could be taught how to use the tools involved in their craft. The first, after many hours of failed inspiration could produce a very tidy pile of shavings and wood chips. The second, after a similar length of time but with the creative muse seated upon his/her shoulders, could produce a veritable work of art.

Mastering the tools used in a piece of work is only one of the aspects used in determining the worth and value of a crafter. As Molly, in my opinion rightly pointed out, the difference between a great programmer and a competent programmer is often their ability to write creative code. By this I mean code that takes the program in novel new directions and squeezes every ounce out of the resources available to them. It is one thing to modify an existing function and give it minor twist, it is another thing entirely to write function that opens up a new and previously unexplored dimension to the activity of gaming.

Viewing a working system in one game and replicating it another is the work of a competent programmer. A great programmer would simply view the working system as a source of inspiration, recognising its contents, its limitations, and its relation to other functions employed elsewhere, similar or otherwise. Then, by using their creativity, they would improve upon the general idea and code a fresh version – propelling the idea forward through a number of evolutionary or revolutionary phases.

The same is true for builders and in the case of textual games this value multiplier is of tenfold importance. Not only do they have to fabricate zones, without access to preformatted tiles and rendered textures they have to create every visual elements of each room they build virtually from scratch. It is creativity that defines the difference between a great builder and a competent builder, not the mundane mastery of tools.

Having visited more than my fair share of MUDS the general quality of building IS pitifully low. Grammatical errors, spelling errors, descriptions with engagement factors reminiscent of watching paint dry, historical inaccuracies (a cuirass is a back and breastplate it never covered arm slots), replicated rooms (either direct copies or shallow semantic facsimiles), objects without extra descriptions, rooms without any extra descriptions. Object placements and obstacle settings that meet with gaming stipulations/agendas but have no sense of realism or logic, and above all else a distinct lack of thematic or creative originality (I’m new here where is the nearest goblin village/cavern). I could go on, I haven’t even mentioned scripting, but it is relatively safe to state that GOOD builders are few and far between.

The misconception relating to the number of GOOD builders available commonly arises from the lack of building knowledge exhibited by those hiring. One need only place a zone built by a GOOD builder into a game to highlight the difference and quality such a person includes in their work. Most employers believe they are merely looking for a needle in a haystack when attempting to attract a GOOD builder. However, most employers have never seen the needle in question because they are so rare. Only when they are confronted by the work of a GOOD builder do they finally realise what they have been mistakenly calling good work and what it was they where really looking for all along.

The intrinsic worth of a GOOD builder is every bit the equal of GOOD programmers. In relation to their importance to a game the two positions are also equally important. A GOOD builder involved with a poorly coded project will have few options available to maximise their creativity. A GOOD programmer will be able to code a great project but to the players it will appear sterile, disenchanting, and possibly unfinished - if it has not be furnished by a GOOD builder.

Programmers provide builders with the tools their creativity needs to glorify the finished project. Neither a builder nor a programmer can create an engaging and enjoyable end product by themselves, unless an individual is highly skilled in both areas. The work of one is required by and exemplified by the other, it is a symbiotic relationship and as a direct consequence each party must be accorded equal value. To allocate either party less than equal value is to be guilty of naivety and gross indifference to their particular talents and contributions to the creation of a GOOD game.

On a more specific note I would be interested to hear how you define the worth of contributors to the franchise operations of iron realms Entertainment, such as Imperian.

Being that the engine used is - or one would realistically assume - already developed to a high degree of completion, would a programmer involved in such a project be accorded a lesser value than the one attributed to its builders?

Are we to assume that the code changes a franchise project requires are extensive enough to warrant the allocation of equal billing to programmers involved with such projects?

And if so what would be the point of starting out with the limitations of the Raptor Engine? Other than having something to strip down to its core and virtually rebuild.

If the programmers of such a franchise are merely modifying an existing game engine then surely they have little value. In this situation the builders are directly responsible for generating the diversity required to distance the franchise from its parent game, along with the simple thematic code changes made by the programmers. Wouldn’t the builders be of greater worth to such an enterprise?

-------------------------------------------
Never mind the width feel the quality

I don't think I took that position =).

Usually I prefer quality over quantity of coders. I find that the brilliant workers can do far better work in far less time for far less money overall than an army of mediocre workers However with proper guidance your mediocre workers could turn into brilliant workers, so it pays to nurture a few of the more promising ones =).

Hrmf. Will I didn't check archives and my memory isn't as closely resembling a steel trap as it used to...

Apologies if I misquoted you or mistook you for someone else.

-Visko