Modders

I think its about time we shared our modding experience here with the younger ( ) generation. Many of modders have their own things that none of the players know. How do you deal with stats? What kind of orders make you happy? How do you structure the upates? What kind of NES files do you have on your HD?

If we shared our modding experiences and little tricks we developed we could help some of the newer mods and help each other.

Here's how I structure the update:
- Get orders from PMs and post them in a .doc file. Do the same with important stories and votes/laws. Read (scan) it all.
- Copy the orders file and name it expendableorders.doc .
- Update the stats according to automatic growth.
- Update the stats according to stories and orders carrying out orders. Delete the orders I alraedy wrote from the expendableorders.doc. Write the update as I go along.
- post everything and then edit some other stuff on the first page

How do you handle an update?

pretty much the same, not to many different things. Hmm, am I still considered part of the "younger" generation here?

all my games have been (and will be) board ones, but i figured i'd share anyway.

most of the "stat" info in my games is just how much money who has, and in some cases it gets prety complicated as to how much they should have at start of turn.
i've found that a spreadsheet that lists every single step that could affect the money is a neccessity. dont skimp on colomns, dont think "i can combine money spent on buildings and money spent on armies into one colomn, its prety much same thing" an extra colomn wont kill you, but forgeting to add that 2 gold spent on some backwater town can cause days of arguments a couple days later (it usualy gets caught more then one update later, so its hard to fix).

Read stories, copy orders, find a suitable polar bear picture ( ), open four files ("Updates", "Nation Stats", "Orders" and a map in paint) and begin updating. First, the random events, then, the stats (growth), then domestic events, then military events. And spotlight. Technically, my write-up is quite mixed up, i.e. I can sometimes write about floods in China and then about a revolution in Spain.

Ive found a very nice formula for my NES'

Two files, usually in wordpad, because Word takes up alot of memory and makes my comp run slow....I usually like to have 2 wordpad and 2 paint files opened up. One is for Orders, the other for the update itself.

I update the map as I do the writeup, so I dont forget. I also do stats afterward, because If I do stats first Ill be tired and the writeup wont be as good...

Also, I like to inject some humor. People dont want to be serious all the time, this is a game afterall.

Oh, and very important. I like to stick to weekly updates, more than that and it usually tends to be a big strain...and every NES thats tried more than 1 update per week has failed, atleast recently.

Hmm...

I get orders, then, on an ideal update:

1) Make cup of tea
2) Get food.
3) Eat and drink these.
4) Make more.
5) Consume more.
6) Finally get started.
7) Open Word, Paint, three windows of CFC (stats, PMs, thread for order searching), and Windows Media Player to listen to something while I work.
8) Go through all peacetime orders for every nation, change stats and map as I go. Note all wars.
9) Collect all war orders in one place.
10) go through wars, one at a time, considering all sides.

But I'm going to reform this my next NES anyway.

Next NES, NK? Will it ever get off the ground?

Btw, I might have a really great an idea for a fresh start NES, but I'm really bad at those. Maybe you could make something useful of that idea?

I do basically the same thing, and have been doing it for years (literally, lol).

I keep IE open, and go through the thread, starting at last update, post-by-post (or PM by PM). When i find the orders, i do whatever stat orders (increase army,etc) and then write about what they do. I then edit the map if necessary.

So, I usually have five windows open: IE, stats, write-up word doc, map, another IE (for whatever i need, going to compare orders to another person's, research, pictures, PMed orders to compare if I need, front page for rule clarification, etc).

The one weakness I probably have is that I dont copy orders to a wordpad. No real reason that I dont, other then that ive been doing updates for so long doing the same routine, and I dont intend to break it, lol. I believe there was one NES that I modded where I copied orders to word pad, and that was stJNES2, nearly a year ago (or is it more? :???

And btw, this isnt the first thread of its kind, lol. This is probably the second or third time I have explained my system in a thread like this, lol.

And one more thing, Geilon is still part of the younger generation, lol. The intermediate generation would include people like amir and azale, and the older would be myself, das, eq (if he still played) and to a lesser extent sheep.

Jason The King said:

And one more thing, Geilon is still part of the younger generation, lol. The intermediate generation would include people like amir and azale, and the older would be myself, das, eq (if he still played) and to a lesser extent sheep.

Click to expand...

I know I know, just wanted to sound older for even greener newbies .
I've been here for less than a year.

Any tip on conflict solving and order format you'd like to share?

gelion, how long have you been nesing? i think it's been 6 months for me...

hmm.. i don't use wordpad either, I always just use the cfc window for some reason, i have no idea why. I usually have a window in rules, pms, stats, and writeup.... and a mango... mmm... mango

Im not sure what you mean, Gelion?

EDIT: I guess youre not a newb anymore if youve played almost a year.

Here is how I go about this.

1 - I read all orders as they come in, and address any problems I have with them before I get started.
2 - I write down in a list all the orders I have, and then post how many I have in the thread, in order to hopefully enlicit more orders.
3 - When I am ready to begin, I open OpenOffice (Or another such program), and 3 Internet Browers, one for Stats, one for Orders PMed, and one for the Thread. I sometimes have another open for E-mail, if people E-mail Orders. And, of course, the Map.
4 - The I just go through the orders one by one, doing the stats as I go, composing random events, and fiddling with the map.
5 - Then i look over everything, scratch my head, make sure I didn't make any overly obvious mistakes, them post it.
6 - Then I answer the flood of complaints of error I made.

Ya, that's the method to my madness.

das said:

Next NES, NK? Will it ever get off the ground?

Click to expand...

Come on, das, don't remind me of mistakes at EVERY freaking turn.

Btw, I might have a really great an idea for a fresh start NES, but I'm really bad at those. Maybe you could make something useful of that idea?

Click to expand...

Care to share? (via PM, perhaps, so as not to threadjack further)

Goober, it is not a good idea to not write your stats and stories in word first...you could loose them in internet explorer, and if your computer shuts down for some reason, word sometimes may have a backup file so that you dont loose ALL of what you were writing.

Trust me, I learned this the hard way three years ago.

My system seems pretty effecient-

1. Create Word file for eco distribution and domestic orders
2. create second word file for military orders
3. sort the orders into those to catigories
4. calculate the eco distrubtions and the conflicts
5. change the stats acording to those
6. insert random events
7. change stats accordingly
8. change map accordingly to military conflict
9. Post!
10. Kill my NES since the idea for it i wasn't good at.

Jason The King said:

Goober, it is not a good idea to not write your stats and stories in word first...you could loose them in internet explorer, and if your computer shuts down for some reason, word sometimes may have a backup file so that you dont loose ALL of what you were writing.

Trust me, I learned this the hard way three years ago.

Click to expand...

Which is why I use OpenOffice (Linux equivalent to Word) to do my actual Update in, and them copy/pastage.

Trust me, I learned that the hard way. And it was the 4th Update, IIRC.

Doing Maps in the linux Paint Equivalent is very interesting, to say the least . . .

When I am modding I generally like short strategic orders rather than the tactical kind.
I write it all down on a piece of paper, go to work and do the update using my pieces of paper so when I get home all I haver to do is type it up, do the map and then get around to the stats.

Honestly if it werent for the stats I would mod better, perhaps I need to create a stat-less nes. Perhaps I should start a new thread to discuss this idea.

Oh and btw Jason, I term the fact that anyone who played in rtor2 is an old player now, that was almost three years ago now, man how the time flies.

Funnily enough the one nes that still stands out for me is Jason's stJNES4 in which I won with the Empire of the Nile and then like every other time got screwed over in its fast forwarded reserection Either way though that says something about how I rate Jason as a modder. For me he is by far the best modder, so long as he updates on time, and thus every Jason nes I see, I join just about. I must admit if you a newbie looking at this the current mods doing good work are, goober, jason, stormbringer and das. I am sure there are others and I am sorry for missing out on you, but those would definently have to be my personal top four mods.

I feel that the most important thing for a modder to do is to - my impressions as a noobie player and lurker :

>first analyse their own committement ... its no good starting a game 2 weeks before you start a new job or have mid term exams ... in those scenarios if would be better to postpone the start .. yes

>secondly realise that you have an obligation to all the players so keep them informed about your time constraints ... and maybe when you are losing interest ...

>If you lose interest let everyone know ... don't stuff people around

>Lastly and most importantly have fun ... no point if it becomes a heavy obligation ... and if you have fun it translates into the game ...

Very good points Fe3333au ... I realise you are upset about Nessos and I am still working on it. I recommend you play a couple more games and then try and make your own one to see how things are "on the other end"...

I despise doing stats I can't stand it....