Using assets from other mods

[Rob (R8XFT)]

We've had a long standing tradition that it's okay to use assets from mods that have been downloaded from the site or link from the site - provided full credit is given to the original creator and that the mod is simply not a slightly altered version of the parent mod and renamed as the amender's own work. On Civfanatics, we've called it the modiquette. I've benefitted from this greatly in the past and have equally been happy for others to use my work in their own mods, which, to be fair, happened a lot more back in Civ 3 days, but there you are.

So...what's the score in Civ 6? I can make my mod a dependency of that mod I want to use the assets from; the user would need to download the other mod, but that's ok right? The originator would still get credit and have another download of their mod and further distribution. It can, however, get a "bit much" for the user if they're having to download multiple mods and also there's the "danger" of an original mod being changed in a way that crashes the beneficiary mod.

How about importing the .blps and associated .xlps for art assets into the new mod and giving full credit to the authors? Is that acceptable?

I know that in all cases, the best thing is to ask the authors themselves; I just wanted to start the discussion to get a feel of what people thought should be the situation going forward before it became a potential issue.

 

[Chrisy15]

I think the best way - and in most cases only way - will be to ask the author on an asset-by-asset basis, and make no assumptions based on the results of other cases.

Art in VI is very demanding, and so for large projects (such as Anno Domini, which I'm assuming this is for ) it'd be understandable that you may not want to get bogged down in trying to deal with art stuffs yourself - especially if you're including the civ itself.

However, asking first should always be the first thing to do; while you might get away with it, because we trust you and know that AD is a huge deal, it'd be a different story if some nobody came along and just took Suk's Stele for their own civ without asking or giving any credit. Additionally, it shouldn't be assumed that just because a modder allows someone to use one of their assets, everyone now has free access to said asset; nor should it be assumed that because permission to use an asset was gained, that all of said modder's assets are now available for you to use; nor does a modder giving you permission to use their assets mean that you have permission to use any other modder's assets because one guy said you could.

Code is perhaps a different story: if you want to do something, then you should feel free to look at other people's code to work out how they did their effect, and alter it to achieve yours. Credit would be nice, either in the code or in the Special Thanks section or something, but the idea of code "ownership" isn't really a thing. Of course, if you just copy out the code word-for-word, then you're gonna get frowned upon for copying the existing design as much as everything; but taking inspiration from other designs is certainly no sin.

The final aspect to this would be time. If a modder "dies", then do all their assets become public property? If permission is not gained due to the modder being inactive, can you take it anyway? I don't really want to draw a conclusion here, because it really isn't my place; in V unused assets were generally "vultured", but even this came with risks as showcased in the Turkey fiasco. Thankfully this area shouldn't need to be debated for some time, but it will need to be settled eventually.

So to conclude: Always ask permission; each individual asset has an individual "contract" with each requester, and as such someone else using it doesn't mean you can and permission being gained for one asset doesn't grant permission for every asset; code is far more relaxed on this front, but credit is always nice and for your own sake don't just copy it word-for-word; and please can no-one die for a couple years I dun wanna cross this bridge kthx

 

[Rob (R8XFT)]

Thanks for the response. Just to mention about the artwork - it's not that I can't create the art myself of course, it's more a case of it being that good that it falls into a category of "I'd be a fool not to include it". The same goes with the code.
Perhaps a way forward when we are considering Anno Domini is for me to write an Anno Domini compatibility xml and ask the authors if they'd be kind enough to include it in their next update.

What would probably resolve the issue and be best all round for everyone is if we knew how to add some "bridging" code which checked if the user had the mod and used it if it was active. I'll have to use Anno Domini as an example to explain what I mean:

• If the user is playing Anno Domini, but foolishly hasn't downloaded JFD's Nubia, then the AD mod plays quite happily and only has Amanitore as a Nubian leader.
• If the user is playing Anno Domini and wisely has JFD's Nubia active, the code recognises that JFD's Nubia is available and adds the extra leaders to the selection pool.
• On a slightly more complex level, the user is playing Anno Domini and wisely has JFD's Greece active, the code not only recognises that JFD's Greece is active, but makes Menander the leader of Bactria and adds him to the selection pool. I would guess that Bactria could be a "live" civilization but without a leader unless JFD's Greece is active.

Is that even plausible?

 

[Chrisy15]

Thanks for the response. Just to mention about the artwork - it's not that I can't create the art myself of course, it's more a case of it being that good that it falls into a category of "I'd be a fool not to include it". The same goes with the code.
Perhaps a way forward when we are considering Anno Domini is for me to write an Anno Domini compatibility xml and ask the authors if they'd be kind enough to include it in their next update.

What would probably resolve the issue and be best all round for everyone is if we knew how to add some "bridging" code which checked if the user had the mod and used it if it was active. I'll have to use Anno Domini as an example to explain what I mean:

• If the user is playing Anno Domini, but foolishly hasn't downloaded JFD's Nubia, then the AD mod plays quite happily and only has Amanitore as a Nubian leader.
• If the user is playing Anno Domini and wisely has JFD's Nubia active, the code recognises that JFD's Nubia is available and adds the extra leaders to the selection pool.
• On a slightly more complex level, the user is playing Anno Domini and wisely has JFD's Greece active, the code not only recognises that JFD's Greece is active, but makes Menander the leader of Bactria and adds him to the selection pool. I would guess that Bactria could be a "live" civilization but without a leader unless JFD's Greece is active.

Is that even plausible?

In the case of Anno Domini I think it'd be easier to work it like V, since that way you have personal control over everything and won't be subject to any changes modders make for themselves; you'll just have to ask for permission to do so, which you'll almost certainly get given because it's you

My post was aimed more at dealing with more common and more numerous cases: scenarios, individual civilizations, TC mods that aren't made by universally respected forum mods...

An example of this being used in the wider world would be the TC mod Relive World Wars, which takes the approach of handling modded leaders internally rather than altering the modded Civ's mod. This approach works better here because it saves him having to update RWW if the modder updates their Civ and causes an issue. His mistake however was that he didn't ask permission before using the assets, which has gained him flak which would otherwise be undeserved (so if you're still around @Allein , then better late than never...).

An example where your suggestion would be more appropriate imo would be a mod similar to Enlightenment Era, which might make adjustments to modded Civ UCs to make them more thematically placed. In this case, the modded civ is not integral to the mod and so including it would probably cause more issues than simply modifying it.

So for AD just ask people for permission to ensure watertightness, rather than having to update your large TC mod to accommodate for changes to small individual civs; and as a general rule permission should always be obtained before taking assets from anything, and probably even when just altering a civ as part of a larger mod.

[EDIT] And fwiw most of the "you"s in the previous post were aimed at the "reader" as opposed to you yourself Rob; the one in italics was the only one directed at you specifically. Sorry if this wasn't clear

 

[Gedemon]

We've had a long standing tradition that it's okay to use assets from mods that have been downloaded from the site or link from the site - provided full credit is given to the original creator and that the mod is simply not a slightly altered version of the parent mod and renamed as the amender's own work. On Civfanatics, we've called it the modiquette. I've benefitted from this greatly in the past and have equally been happy for others to use my work in their own mods, which, to be fair, happened a lot more back in Civ 3 days, but there you are.

So...what's the score in Civ 6? I can make my mod a dependency of that mod I want to use the assets from; the user would need to download the other mod, but that's ok right? The originator would still get credit and have another download of their mod and further distribution. It can, however, get a "bit much" for the user if they're having to download multiple mods and also there's the "danger" of an original mod being changed in a way that crashes the beneficiary mod.

How about importing the .blps and associated .xlps for art assets into the new mod and giving full credit to the authors? Is that acceptable?

I know that in all cases, the best thing is to ask the authors themselves; I just wanted to start the discussion to get a feel of what people thought should be the situation going forward before it became a potential issue.

I've copied the modiquette thread in Civ6 C&C for reference, it's the same post for Civ4 and Civ5 corresponding sections.

As you said it's more a tradition than a rule, but IMO it's a good tradition: always give credit and be creative with the assets you use.

And personally I'd prefer if people does not ask me if they want to reuse my code in their mods: just do it and give credit if it's big enough to deserve it, don't waste a few hours of your modding time waiting for an answer that will be yes (as long as your mods are free to use of course...)

 

[Rob (R8XFT)]

Thanks guys - good to know. Perhaps approaching the creators is the best option. One of the reasons why is because, of course, Civ VI isn't "done" yet in terms of output. If it's like the other iterations, then we've a couple of expansion packs to come which will potentially mean changes for the civs and changes to my mod, so to save me from having to check compatibility with everything, constantly hassling the creators with an updated version of the compatibility code and having to make amendments every time the original civ gets updated. So, to keep a tight ship running in terms of the mod, I'd need to be able to use the assets freely.

So it seems like the likely way forward, is it was previously. Ask the author's permission, credit them with what they've done. Don't just do an updated version labelling it "improved XXX mod".

 

[HandyVac]

What would probably resolve the issue and be best all round for everyone is if we knew how to add some "bridging" code which checked if the user had the mod and used it if it was active. I'll have to use Anno Domini as an example to explain what I mean:

• If the user is playing Anno Domini, but foolishly hasn't downloaded JFD's Nubia, then the AD mod plays quite happily and only has Amanitore as a Nubian leader.
• If the user is playing Anno Domini and wisely has JFD's Nubia active, the code recognises that JFD's Nubia is available and adds the extra leaders to the selection pool.
• On a slightly more complex level, the user is playing Anno Domini and wisely has JFD's Greece active, the code not only recognises that JFD's Greece is active, but makes Menander the leader of Bactria and adds him to the selection pool. I would guess that Bactria could be a "live" civilization but without a leader unless JFD's Greece is active.

Is that even plausible?

That all sounds plausible. I'm doing something similar in a mod I'm working on at the moment, to change unit upgrade paths if the player has Moar Units active as well.

If you use sql instead of xml then you can add conditional clauses to your database updates, so it only does an insert, update or delete when value x exists in another table. E.g:

INSERT INTO TableName (ColumnName)
SELECT data
WHERE EXISTS (SELECT * FROM Leaders WHERE LeaderType="LEADER_JFD_NUBIA");

achieves the same as:

<TableName>
  <Row>
    <ColumnName>data</ColumnName>
  </Row>
</TableName>

except it will only add the row if there's a LeaderType called LEADER_JFD_NUBIA in the Leaders table. If that LeaderType doesn't exist then it does nothing.

There's an SQL modding for dummies tutorial over in the civ5 forums which I found very helpful, and is just as relevant for civ6.

 

[Rob (R8XFT)]

Thanks HandyVac. I think I need that SQL modding for dummies .

 

[Deliverator]

You may also need to use LoadOrder in your .modinfo if you want to force your mod to load after another one (if it's enabled).