grisamentum wrote:
Um, what? Why aren't the pencils valueless? If you need pens, end of story, then, yes, 10,000 pencils are valueless.
All developer time spent on backgrounds is gone. You can't get it back either way. At this point you just have to make the best choices possible for the game.
roctavian wrote:If the pencils aren't what you need, they're irrelevant to the issue of the pens -- you could throw all those pencils in the trash and you aren't losing anything. You might not think that sounds logical, but it is explicitly logical.
I realize this is very far gone from the point of the thread, but I can't let this go, for some reason. I simply can't understand this disconnect between what several of you think is logical and what I think is logical. I need, in some fundamental way, to understand where you are coming from.
In my view, a thing isn't valueless just because it is not
exactly what you need. I realize analogies are often supposed to be used in a vacuum with no external factors, but consider the pencil/pen analogy I made:
You have ten thousand pencils, you need ten thousand pens. Why on earth would you throw the pencils away (getting no value for your money)? Why wouldn't you:
A) Sell the pencils to partially finance the cost of the pens
or
B) Since pencils have a use similar to pens, look for a way to use the pencils until you can afford the pens you need. Even if there is no overlap, pencils still have a use, either present or future. Owning something (assuming there are no issues of maintenance or space, which there could be) is always better then not owning it.
The only time where your logic makes sense is where buying the pencils was such as mistake that keeping the pencils costs you more than simply throwing them out, and we are keeping them due to some sort of ego or pride issue (which is what Duvessa's link was about).
Applying this to backgrounds in crawl, and equating developer time as being equal to money, gives me these thoughts:
A) As Grisamentum said, all developer time spent on backgrounds is gone regardless. The 'pencil', meaning a background that is not interesting or unique, still had a cost in developer time that cannot be reclaimed. However, unlike actual pencils, you cannot sell backgrounds back to return time spent. In fact, they cost you developer time to dispose of them (even if it might be trivial).
B) Keeping a background cost no maintenance and take up negligible space. Having a 'pencil' background in no way prevents or limits the addition of 'pen' backgrounds (in other words, backgrounds that ARE interesting or unique).
C) Even 'pencil' backgrounds add positive value to the game, and can fill roles, such as thematic or roleplaying value, until better 'pen' backgrounds are available, even if these roles are not optimal.
Thus, I conclude that these backgrounds add net positive value to the game, despite not being optimal, and should be kept. This is what we've been arguing about the whole time, and I simply cannot see how you feel that these backgrounds are net negative, meaning they are actively harming development and gameplay, and so ditching them is the correct solution.
I agree that if they ARE net negative, then ditching them IS the correct solution, as per Duvessa's link. If you are implying that I am somehow ignoring facts or information because I cannot admit that I am wrong (due to an irrational investment on features that we have 'determined' to be net negative) I can only say that you seem to be skipping to the end of the discussion and assuming you were right all along.
I mean, it's the Internet and convincing anyone to change their opinion on anything is hard enough in real life. But I assure you I am listening rationally to your arguments. I have been persuaded before, even in this thread, as I was with the value of Berserkers and Gladiators. But you have yet to convince me that these removed Zealot backgrounds were so bad for the game that it cancelled out the value they provided.