[crossfire] Organizing efforts, was Re: Project: New Intro

[Juergen Kahnert]

On Sat, Jun 30, 2007 at 05:49:24PM -0700, Mark Wedel wrote:
> This mail more focuses on how to do group efforts - ideally to come up
> with some scheme that can be used as a model,

Is there a list of deciders?  Who needs to nod, before something could
be implemented?

If there is no such list, create it.  Or better extend the developer
list with the responsibilities.


> there are lots of big projects on the list beyond just a new starting
> village.

On the CF 2 todo list are a few high priority projects.  Most of them
are independent (without dependencies to the other projects).

"Character Creation" and "Game Balance" have a strong dependency by each
other.

Those two needs the highest priority for CF 2, and it has to be clear
what's the goal before a single line of code is written for it.


> Some projects/changes may have dependency issues (rebalancing spells
> should likely be done after redoing classes/races as an example).
> Those need to be identified and ordering sorted out.

Exactly.  Touching this part of the game means, you have to abandon old
characters.  Everybody has to start over with a level 1 character.  You
can't change the game balance and keep the old unbalanced characters.

This has to be clear and stated.


> But for any volunteer project, it is difficult to force people to do
> anything.

It's not necessary to force someone.  It's finished when it's finished.
You don't have to pay a contract penalty if you can't keep your
timeline.


> My thought here is that each month (or maybe more/less frequently,
> based on how long it takes to do the different things), the developers
> should decide what is the most important thing to change/add/fix.

If one project is finished, than there are free capacities and that's
the time you have to decide what's made next.  Should they help others
to finish their project faster or is there another project needs to be
done?  There is no need for peridical polls about the priority.


> In this particular case, I agree that a new intro should be something
> at the top of the list.  But going forward, I think we need some way
> to decide what is done.

See beginning, who are the decision makers?


> but someone that just plays the game probably shouldn't be included,

I don't think so.  They can help testing.

If you like to rebalance and reorganize the world, you need player who
likes to test it.

I think about a set of standard characters on different levels.  How
does it feel to solve the map as a sorcerer on level 5 compared to a
warrior on level 5.  Is it possible with a fireborn, what's the
challenge for a dragon, ...?

Create a standard character for each class on different levels.  Don't
say this is a level 5 map if not all the level 5 standard characters
classes passed through it.  Maybe you'll see that this map is a level 1
dragon warrior map but a level 8 fireborn sorcerer one.

Yes, this needs extensible testing and this will only be able with a lot
of players.  You'll need a "game balance coordinator / leader " which
will collect the player comments and discuss this with the developers.


> I tend to think that it is best of the project lead starts by sending
> out a fairly detailed document - the reason I say this is that a fair
> number of developers have been around a long time, and can probably
> come up with a fairly complete starting plan without a lot of input.

And I think that you should develop the idea with the others.  Out of
the discussion the leader has to make a detailed concept.

Creating a detailed document and nobody likes the idea is a waste of
time.


> Some of the basis here is also that some points have already been
> extensively discussed in the past - new points are welcome, but we
> don't necessarily need to fully discuss all the issues again.

Instead of discuss it all over again, send the link to the archive.


> Once the plan is more or less agreed to (hard to get 100% agreement),

And again, who has to agree before the work should be started?


> but lots of things has been extensively discussed, and all the
> discussions in the world don't really make it so that the project gets
> done any faster.

That's the coders point of view: "need to code", "can be changed later",
... ;)

If something is already extensively discussed, than there has to be a
summary and a concept for the work plan.  If this is missing, the
discussion is not finished, yet.

    Jürgen