[Wesnoth-dev] On the recent arguments over art... (long)

[Asa Swain]

Hi everyone, 

This discussion over how artwork and units is added to
the game is really a matter of philosophical
differences in game design. Watching the arguments
spiral downhill I would hate to see it end with one of
our key developers or artists leaving. I think there
are really several issues at the center of these
arguments. 

For one, many of us have CVS access, and the ability
to edit Wesnoth can be a double edge sword. Like the
wiki, if people change various parts of the code
without coordinating their changes, they can have
unexpected consequences with other people's
projects/code and mistakes or sloppy coding can breed
malcontent. As an open source project I think that
sometimes editing the CVS is a bit of a free-for-all,
people make changes and it Dave (or another developer)
doesn't like it they may reverse the changes, but
otherwise it becomes "official". Do we need a more
streamlined process for vetting and okaying changes
before they happen? Can we assume that the select
people with CVS access are all careful enough to do
changes that won't break other people's projects? I
know it is popular among some developers to sidestep
long angsty arguments in the forums over proposed
changes by just making the changes and then seeing if
anyone notices or complains. Which they usually don't.
I don't have CVS access myself, so I admit that I am
ignorant of how much vetting Dave (or others) do of
changes made by the inside circle before they are
implemented. Do people with CVS access need Dave's
permissions before they change the game code? 

The whole point of this paragraph is that the current
system seemed fine to me, but I think that we may have
a problem if some developer's changes are
inadvertently causing problems and making other people
to be angry. 


Onto the bigger issue of including more new artwork
with the Wesnoth applications. I'm a scenario designer
who loves using new artwork and new units. While i
don't need new artwork to imagine new units, (I have
many units I'd love to include if I can get the
artwork) it is true that new art does help inspire me
to create new units. Neorice left behind a panel of
random unit art (found here:
http://www.wesnoth.org/forum/viewtopic.php?t=4466 )
which has been a great inspiration for tons of new
units. So ignoring the discussion of more units being
added to the build, beautiful artwork by great artists
is always a great thing to have. Unfortunately art of
Neorice's caliber is hard to find. 

When we talk about units, like the dwarven smith,
being added to Wesnoth, we're talking about two
things: Adding them to campaigns and adding them to
the multiplayer game. These are two separate
considerations. Any campaign can use whatever extra
units they want, there's no limit on what units or
stats or art a campaign designer wants to add (I'm
ignoring the official campaigns whose content is
nominally controlled by Dave). So of course any
campaign developer can add units like Disto's elvish
horse archer, or the goblin flag bearer or Neorice's
undead horseman to their campaign. 

But adding a unit to the multiplayer game is very
different. When we work on balancing units, I think
people are more worried about balancing factions then
they are about balancing single player campaigns.
Because it's easy to re-balance a scenario to fix
changes to unit's stats, but balancing multiplayer
games is more difficult. So I have no objection to
someone adding the dwarvish smith to their campaign,
but adding him to the knalgan faction is a different
matter entirely. 


The graphics library on the wiki is a good way of
storing art but we have seen that it can be destroyed
by a server crash. I think the solution to our
problems is to create a repository for artwork and
units that can be used by scenario designers and other
people. I'm not a big fan of forking the development
of Wesnoth, but since it is an open-source project,
why can't people create modpacks of extra units or
races that they want to add to the game. While images
and files could be stored on a website, Dave's idea of
a content server is probably the best solution. Easy
access to the content server will mean that just like
campaigns no longer have to be included with the
Wesnoth app for everyone to play them, likewise new
art and units don't have to be included with the
Wesnoth app for people to use them. 

Implementing and managing a content server won't be
easy, but I think that it is the natural solution to
the philosophical debate over how we decide what
artwork and images to include with Wesnoth. I can't
decide what to include and what not to include, so in
essence let's dodge the question and let the users
decide what extra content they wish to download. 

P.S. I know that Shadow has done a lot of hard work on
his Dwarven unit. I don't like the idea of feeling
required to reward artists for their effort instead of
based on the final product. Realistically I know that
not continually rejecting an artist's work as not good
enough is a great way to make them leave. 

I don't have huge issues with the unit idea and stats,
I'll let other people argue over whether it is too
weak or strong. But looking at Neorice's unit images,
and Jetryl's and Fmunoz's I think there is still a
Wesnoth style that Shadow doesn't have. The dwarven
unit just seems wrong in ways I can't explain. I think
that it is the look of the hammer, which seems to
change shape and length, and is often held by the end
of the handle which doesn't look right. The unit seems
a bit big for a dwarf, but my biggest issue is the
coloring. The armor and body of the dwarf is very busy
and somewhat blurred, it's hard to distinguish his
shield from his armor from his clothing. Maybe I'd
feel better if someone like Jetryl went over it and
fixed some of the graphical problems, but that would
be unfair to Shadow. I have objection to people adding
it to their campaign, but in the current graphical
state, I don't think it should be added to the
multiplayer game.  


                
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