Did redacted really quit because someone was mean?

[battaile]

dpeg is over on the SA thread whining that redacted has been driven from crawl development because someone was mean on the internet (and by mean, I mean they made a single post complaining about a death). Is this true?

[XuaXua]

dpeg is over on the SA thread whining that Dracoomega has been driven from crawl development because someone was mean on the internet (and by mean, I mean they made a single post complaining about a death). Is this true?

And there it is.

[Wahaha]

GDD: Game Dev Discussion

[battaile]

Design discussion is rendered moot if internet baddies chase away all the devs.
QED

[Mankeli]

dpeg is over on the SA thread whining that Dracoomega has been driven from crawl development because someone was mean on the internet (and by mean, I mean they made a single post complaining about a death). Is this true?

Over where, when, who? What?

Edit. And why in GDD?

Edit. 2 I think I found the posts you were referring to.

[battaile]

Edit. And why in GDD?

Design discussion is rendered moot if internet baddies chase away all the devs.
QED

ie this is such a serious issue that it threatens the very fabric of GDD itself.

[Kate]

Edit: re-opened.

[njvack]

Edit. 2 I think I found the posts you were referring to.

It might be useful if you'd link those? Or if they're too horrible for the masses to see, at least PM 'em to mods. (Or were they on SA?)

If the Tavern (GDD in particular) is driving devs away from contributing, that is bad. I'm not sure that's what happened here, though?

[battaile]

Edit. 2 I think I found the posts you were referring to.

It might be useful if you'd link those? Or if they're too horrible for the masses to see, at least PM 'em to mods. (Or were they on SA?)

If the Tavern (GDD in particular) is driving devs away from contributing, that is bad. I'm not sure that's what happened here, though?

realise that you are calling a wanker the man who brought you the new Vaults, the new starting Conjurer book and the new evokable items?
There are good chances that outright hostility like yours have driven away a great developer. It is such a shame! You were playing trunk, not stable for god's sake. If you don't understand that this can lead to features which are under construction or unbalanced, then just go with the stable releases.

People like you ruin DCSS for good.

You can rest assured that I don't care if you play Crawl, or how good you are at it. I do care if people like you drive away developers.

lordfrikk: Seems a bit like it. When I heard about the problem, I started looking through the feedback he got (someone told me that Dragoomega has been looking feedback)... and it was devastating. I just replied to Coyo7e because his comment was recent and precisely of the type which constituts a needless personal attack (including a name, which makes it a lot worse), gives no clue as to what is wrong, let alone coming up with ideas how to improve matters.

If you guys can't be bothered to behave slightly decently, why should we bother to make the game decent?

The second "people like you" was directed at me for inviting dpeg to gtfo after his first post, so I guess he's saying he's being driven away also as I never mentioned dracoomega. Or maybe he's just making sweeping generalizations with no basis in reality. Hard to say.

http://forums.somethingawful.com/showth ... t419492445

[reaver]

The SA thread is here.The post that triggered the discussion is the first on the page. Note battaile has made some not entirely constructive comments to the discussion as Kekekela. I don't think It's too horrible for the masses, there's a couple f-bombs and an unjustified attack against DracoOmega using a British curse. The important quotes from the thread are below:

Wait, what? DracoOmega quit the development team?

There's been a lot of personal attacks thrown around for the last several months, he's taken the brunt of them. I speak to him sometimes and I can say he's very disillusioned with the way things are, and he's not the only person who feels this way. It's a shame, because he's one of those rare people who has a talent for game design and is a good coder... I find most people tend only be good at one or the other.

SA has been pretty polite for the most part, but from what I've been told this stuff is getting really bad with some other parts of the DCSS community. In the time I've been involved with the project (several years now) this is the first time I've seen this kind of stuff have such a negative effect on the development of the game.

lordfrikk: Seems a bit like it. When I heard about the problem, I started looking through the feedback he got (someone told me that Dragoomega has been looking feedback)... and it was devastating. I just replied to Coyo7e [origin of said unjustified attack] because his comment was recent and precisely of the type which constituts a needless personal attack (including a name, which makes it a lot worse), gives no clue as to what is wrong, let alone coming up with ideas how to improve matters.

If you guys can't be bothered to behave slightly decently, why should we bother to make the game decent?

I hope DracoOmega sees that the people attacking him are neither correct nor the majority of Crawl's player base. I've enjoyed his great contributions to the game.

[battaile]

I hope DracoOmega sees that the people attacking him are neither correct nor the majority of Crawl's player base. I've enjoyed his great contributions to the game.

How is it even plural? One person made a comment about draco and dpeg came in on a soapbox.

[pubby]

The whole thing is very community-driven. The people who develop crawl these days often come from the player community, and want to remain a part of it. So, when the reactions a dev gets from the community seem overly hostile (whether it's real or percieved), it saps a lot of the motivation to keep working on it. It's not really about drama or being unable to take criticism - it's just that at a certain point, you're going to be happier working on a different project, on your own terms.

In the complainer's eyes, the game isn't very community-driven. Things will get changed based on 5 people agreeing in ##crawl-dev, and once the change gets coded there is little desire to remove it.

[battaile]

Edit: re-opened.

Feel free to close again. The original question has been answered outside of this thread, and as I strongly suspected this was nothing more than a fabricated pretext for dpeg to go on a self-righteous tirade in yet another venue.

[Bloax]

I certainly hope he won't call it quits for long, because while some of his contributions may have been controversial, they were generally also very good ones. (and seriously <3 on those gargoyles)

Silly humans don't realize what they lose until after they've lost it.

[njvack]

Edit: re-opened.

Feel free to close again. The original question has been answered outside of this thread, and as I strongly suspected this was nothing more than a fabricated pretext for dpeg to go on a self-righteous tirade in yet another venue.

I'm honestly a lot more inclined to ban people who make dickhead comments in this thread than I am to close it.

[Klown]

Why not ban the bad guys and continue on a quest of good?

[njvack]

This post:

http://jeff-vogel.blogspot.com/2011/01/ ... never.html

reminds me why things like GDD and a publicly-playable trunk are really really rare.

[and into]

How is it even plural? One person made a comment about draco and dpeg came in on a soapbox.

If you are saying dpeg's chiming in on the SA thread is just a pretext for "getting up on a soapbox," I have to ask, what does making this thread in GDD accomplish exactly? More chances for drama-mongering, now on two forums instead of one? It is really a shame if someone was turned off development because of people being assholes online, hopefully it is only temporary, I doubt that making a thread and discussing it here is going to help anything at all.

The whole thing is very community-driven. The people who develop crawl these days often come from the player community, and want to remain a part of it. So, when the reactions a dev gets from the community seem overly hostile (whether it's real or percieved), it saps a lot of the motivation to keep working on it. It's not really about drama or being unable to take criticism - it's just that at a certain point, you're going to be happier working on a different project, on your own terms.

In the complainer's eyes, the game isn't very community-driven. Things will get changed based on 5 people agreeing in ##crawl-dev, and once the change gets coded there is little desire to remove it.

Yes, there are actual developers, thank god for that because it helps maintain continuity and an actual point-of-view even as things change over various versions. A lot of what distinguishes Crawl derives from the fact that the devs have a specific design philosophy and don't just throw in every idea they come across into the game, even if those ideas are sometimes amusing and might be fun. On the flip side, the forums here provide lots of opportunities to have people's ideas taken very seriously. In general if you put some time into a proposal you'll get good responses, and sometimes very high-level constructive criticism. Unless you code you are kind of limited to lobbying, making arguments, suggestions, etc., but there is a LOT of interaction from the developers, most of them read this forum with interest and that's a really rare and amazing thing. You could argue Crawl is not as community driven as it could be, I guess, but when someone (the guy on the thread, not you pubby) says "not community driven" in the midst of personal attacks on a developer, it comes across to me as a pretty transparent attempt to make one's own petty discontents and way-out-of-proportion anger toward someone appear as if they are actually based in some sort of principled disagreement. I doubt they are, it is just people being a-holes online.

So, my two cents, just close this thread, but that's not my call so... I'll just shut up now.

[twelwe]

Mindless slander is a problem everywhere on the internet, it demotivates people for very obvious reasons. A mod on this forum once led a campaign of personal attacks against me so I just stopped posting. I would probably recommend that someone talk to this dev (who is clearly not experiencing his first bad comments directed towards him) and advise staying away not from criticism but the brand of vitriol certain losers on the internet feel the need to perpetuate.

If you create something valuable, whether it is good writing or a good service, people will follow you. The normal ones will discuss you, the fans will obsess over you, and the creeps will do something creepy. Unfortunately the creeps are getting harder and harder to suppress/ignore and their activity drives away the creative people.

[Daggtex]

I may be new, but I find this to be an amazing game with awesome community leaders, all of which is done for FREE as a VOLUNTEER. And there is massive community interaction, moreso than any other game I've seen, so its not like actual complaints with real details and reasons won't be considered. Moreover, it is in no way required that someone play the latest version if they dislike it. Complaints like Coyo7e's show such ungratefulness (and sheer lack of humanity in how he later was proud of driving DracoOmega away,) that it could easily cause actual caring people like dpeg to become upset and lash out. It is glaringly obvious which side of this quarrel is in the wrong, and which is in the right.

I hope DracoOmega sees this thread and can get a sense of how much the human part of this community respects him (even if the thread probably doesn't belong in GDD). Always remember that negative posts are a-dime-a-dozen, but supportive ones mean infinitely more.

[njvack]

One other route (not one I'm advocating, mind you) would be for Crawl to adopt a less-open development process. The mailing list could be invite-only, the trunk branch could be on a private git server until merging for a numbered release, and the server(s) running trunk could be restricted to a few dozen testers who know how to evaluate new content without being abusive.

I love being able to check out new content as it's developed -- but honestly, I'd rather have a sustainable devteam.

[njvack]

even if the thread probably doesn't belong in GDD

It's a little meta, true, but quite apropos to Crawl's development.

[savageorange]

One other route (not one I'm advocating, mind you) would be for Crawl to adopt a less-open development process. The mailing list could be invite-only, the trunk branch could be on a private git server until merging for a numbered release, and the server(s) running trunk could be restricted to a few dozen testers who know how to evaluate new content without being abusive.

I love being able to check out new content as it's developed -- but honestly, I'd rather have a sustainable devteam.

Personally I think having restricted access to the servers running trunk could be a good measure. Having the trunk -code- not publically accessible, on the other hand, would be terrible for quality -- it would mean orders of magnitude less testing and feedback, and fail to motivate developers to write clean, understandable code. This is one of the main reasons closed source products are pretty reliably more buggy and poorer quality than open-source software.

To me, having the trunk branch available to "everybody who actually has a clue how to compile stuff, and therefore is unlikely to mindlessly criticize coders" would be achieved by just restricted-access to trunk server, with no need to restrict access to the -source-. (no comment on mailing list, I have no experience with it)

[evktalo]

One other route (not one I'm advocating, mind you) would be for Crawl to adopt a less-open development process. The mailing list could be invite-only, the trunk branch could be on a private git server until merging for a numbered release, and the server(s) running trunk could be restricted to a few dozen testers who know how to evaluate new content without being abusive.

I love being able to check out new content as it's developed -- but honestly, I'd rather have a sustainable devteam.

Openness is crucial to the sustainability of the Stone Soup development effort, closing it would dry it up. For instance, the devteam gets replenished by new members (while older ones retire) who have already learned how to develop Crawl and proven themselves because they can see how it's done and how to fit in.

I'm pretty upset about this, I've seen DracoOmega in particular as an impressive "new guy" who has been able to address long-existing large design issues (such as boredom of Vaults monster set) with admirable vision and effort. Also he's been ready to monitor how the changes work and rework them as necessary.

--Eino

[eeviac]

I don't know exactly which portions DracoOmega is responsible for, but I can say that I've really liked the direction crawl has taken since I started playing in .10 trunk. I can't think of a change that's stuck around that I've straight-up disliked (other than cold Dr ugh). You devs do good work.

I don't think restricting trunk access will solve many problems, as people are about as likely to complain about stable as they are about trunk.

please, some intrepid dev let mummies cast regeneration. thank you.

[and into]

I don't think restricting trunk access will solve many problems, as people are about as likely to complain about stable as they are about trunk.

I don't think restricting trunk access is a good move either (though admittedly I'm not in any position to have a really informed opinion there), and it is true people can and will complain about, well, anything.

But I do think the fact that Trunk is open and there is in fact a forum for the crawl-playing community to voice concerns can potentially lead to some people thinking they can actually *ACCOMPLISH* something by being complete asshats, so long as they are sufficiently consistent and draw enough attention to themselves. This wasn't just complaining about the game it was deliberate character assassination and the guy is basically bragging about doing it. So people think they can influence the course of game development through these sort of antics and, unfortunately, they may sometimes be right about that. Of course the question is if that risk is outweighed by the positive things that come about through the openness of the forums and the thought process behind crawl development, and I think probably so. But njvack is right that there is a trade-off.

I'm pretty upset about this, I've seen DracoOmega in particular as an impressive "new guy" who has been able to address long-existing large design issues (such as boredom of Vaults monster set) with admirable vision and effort.

Whoa wait he's the guy (or gal) behind the Vaults redesign, and someone was giving him shit as a designer?! That was a big step in the right direction for that branch: New mechanics, a more unique feel (so it isn't just like dungeon but without digging), different types of threats from enemies, etc. Of course not all of those new mechanics will work out perfectly in practice but that's why things are experimented with in Trunk before being added definitively to the game.

People don't know shit about shit.

[Tiber]

If this is true, it's such a shame. I don't think crawl needs to be more closed; one of my favorite things about crawl is the ability to discuss things and actually have them changed. However, the community can be hostile at times, and I think sometimes the mods let some things go that I wouldn't. I've seen a fair share of new people suggest an idea that usually isn't very good (sorry), a regular giving a borderline insulting or overly sarcastic response, and putting the new person on the defensive. This almost always ends with the new person being chided and/or the new person leaving.

[evilmike]

Well, closing things down isn't even on the table, so don't worry about that. I really doubt things will change from the status quo any time soon. The devteam does have a private mailing list, but it's only used for stuff that needs to stay private (eg discussions on handing out commit rights). Everything to do with the game itself will stay public, either in ##crawl-dev or on the official mailing list.

[BlackSheep]

With respect to the moderators who keep this thread open and in the development forum, this isn't a dev issue, it's a personal issue. I don't see anything on that page that should cause a moderately well-adjusted human being to quit a hobby, and if there's more to the story, this hardly seems like the manner in which to discuss how to handle criticism. If there's more going on than what's been said here, and if it was sufficient to upset someone so, I don't want to read about it here. If you like DracoOmega's work (I do), and you feel compelled to weigh in, send a PM or an email with support. Otherwise, Internet forums in general, and SomethingAwful in particular, are rife with words which would be totally unacceptable in polite company. That isn't going to change no matter how much it's discussed.

[claws]

There was common, repeated IRC and tavern advice from people somewhat respected to skip one, then both branches that DracoOmega had recently overhauled, inherently negative both on the developer and on the development process.
There have always been key issues with people involved in Crawl, with disorganized feedback and situation/taste-oriented viewpoints, the process of open development, and the varied directions given developers take. It seems more than appropriate to discuss them in this topic, rather than brushing off the internet being the internet.

I have some private information heavily relevant to these matters, but I'm going to frisk around for permissions first.
There are additional problems with the development process that lead up to him leaving, but I'll need time to write it out, and it'll involve a lot of other, distracting issues that would detract from the discussion at hand; at minimum, it'd involve examining his history of commits and the general opinions on them throughout.

[dpeg]

With respect to the moderators who keep this thread open and in the development forum, this isn't a dev issue, it's a personal issue.

You may be right that this does not belong into GDD, but I don't think it's a strictly private matter either. Losing an industrious developer is a serious blow to DCSS, and it's even worse that it may scare of future contributors.

I don't see anything on that page that should cause a moderately well-adjusted human being to quit a hobby, and if there's more to the story

You say this, but you are already implying that someone is not "moderately well-adjusted". Heck, I don't know if DracoOmega truly stepped back, and what I dug up on SA was just one glaring example. I do think that you underestimate the use of names. There is quite a difference between "What asshole would write a comment like this" and "Only this BlackSheep asshole would write a comment like this." It gets even worse if real names are used; which happens on SA. If you see this a couple of times, you start wondering if you chose the right hobby, and I'd say you're moderately well-adjusted to do the wondering.

I completely realise that nothing what we say here will change the attitude of some obnoxious people. So that's not my intent. (As far as I see it, you should never go to SA or ##crawl to look out for useful feedback or even interesting ideas; I certainly don't, and I regret that DracoOmega did.) However, what we can do is to try and teach folks how to come up with useful feedback. Criticisms is the best way to improve the game, but "This sucks" falls flat. "This sucks for me because ..." works; as with filing bugs, relevant context always helps. The only other option I see is to rely on the feedback of a few, selected players who know what they're doing and can communicate. However, we have taught our players to embrace the design philosophy (which some of them do more ardently than the developers), so I think it might be possible to teach quality feedback as well.

[Swiss]

There was common, repeated IRC and tavern advice from people somewhat respected to skip one, then both branches that DracoOmega had recently overhauled, inherently negative both on the developer and on the development process.

There's a lot to say about all of this, but I'm quoting that because it's an obviously important aspect of this that I hadn't really considered as such.

The thing is that when people ask for that sort of advice on tavern or IRC, they usually are just concerned about winning or getting far with a character and don't specifically have any interest in testing things, even if they happen to be playing trunk. Given that, if those of us giving the advice are actually trying to help them win and we legitimately feel that the changes to those branches are such that it's safer for most people to skip them than try to do them, isn't that what we -should- be telling people? It may well be detrimental to the development process, but there might not actually be a good way around that for the purposes of such advice.

A similar question going a different way: If the result of such a change is that a lot of people start skipping the branch for whatever reason, isn't that something to keep in mind as feedback itself? Although in this case, I would understand if that got mixed into all the hostility.

[BlackSheep]

You say this, but you are already implying that someone is not "moderately well-adjusted". Heck, I don't know if DracoOmega truly stepped back, and what I dug up on SA was just one glaring example.

The only implication about someone being maladjusted comes if one assumes that this whole situation turns on one SA post. Given that you agree there's more than just this one example, you can surely infer why I said someone well-adjusted wouldn't react extremely to what's been displayed here. Already we're starting to see talk about ##crawl vibes contributing to the situation. This is not SA and this is not ##crawl. Discussing problems in those places here seems inappropriate, but that may just be me.

I do think that you underestimate the use of names. There is quite a difference between "What asshole would write a comment like this" and "Only this BlackSheep asshole would write a comment like this." It gets even worse if real names are used; which happens on SA. If you see this a couple of times, you start wondering if you chose the right hobby, and I'd say you're moderately well-adjusted to do the wondering.

And this is exactly why it's a bad idea to have discussion about player reactions in a thread titled "Did DracoOmega really quit because someone was mean?" Everything in the thread, supportive or otherwise, perpetuates the notion that this person is fragile or something. At best it's bringing more attention to a topic that obviously upset someone. If you want to have a broad discussion, start a broad topic, but leave this poor person out of it.

I am utterly unsurprised that people were rude on the Internet in those venues, and yes I'm going to assert that talking about it is pointless. What would have shocked me is to hear that this is the first time a developer was harassed online. (I've seen enough to indicate that this is far from likely.) If you really care about DracoOmega and want to bring him or her back to developing, do so directly. If you want to keep devs on the project, start a discussion about how to handle criticism as a developer. If you want people to stop being mean in unmoderated forums, you're tilting at windmills.

[dpeg]

Swiss: You bring up a good point. I'd say that it is absolutely okay if players play trunk with the goal to win rather than to playtest. This is still very useful for development, by the way, as it helps to catch crucial bugs very early in the cycle. Anyone who remembers the 0.2 debacle will know what I am talking about.

The other thing is that most people who recommend X or "not Y" are doing this on hearsay. I've seen how innocuous comments -- on Forest, say -- have been inflated and exaggerated until they were truly distorted and patently wrong. To put this another way: if someone is playing trunk and asks your for an expert opinion (with the goal to win), then it really helps if you're honest and admit if you don't know a new feature. (For example, lots of feedback on new trunk features is based on old versions: things are tweaked quickly, and it's not helpful if one bad experience from a dozen commits ago is regurgitated over and over.) It also can help to try and instill an "explorer" mentality in trunk players: "I don't know myself what it's like, haven't been there in a while. If you go, please tell us!"

What you describe at the end of your posting is, in my opinion, a self-enforcing cycle of opinions, which will do neither the trunk players nor the developers any good.


BlackSheep: Maybe I shouldn't but I feel I have to make some remarks. I thought it goes without saying that a whole lot more was going on than just that one SA posting. I disagree that discussing these problems over here is pointless: I don't want anything to do with ##crawl or with SA, and we just lost a dev to these channels. Where else can I discuss this?
And you don't have to tell me that I should communicate with DracoOmega directly: this is what I immediately did. Finally, I really don't like your euphemism here:

If you want to keep devs on the project, start a discussion about how to handle criticism as a developer.

We're not talking about criticism, we are talking about verbal abuse.

You can also be sure that I will take this up in the devteam-only channels. I still think this point is important enough to merit a discussion over here. (You are probably right that it is not a good idea to use a thread started by an aggressor for this in the first place, but this is where we are...) If the Crawl community is largely indifferent to this, then you will get sooner or later results that affect the game itself (like developers trying to cave in to vocal player opinions -- I have already seen examples of this).

[BlackSheep]

I still think this point is important enough to merit a discussion over here. (You are probably right that it is not a good idea to use a thread started by an aggressor for this in the first place, but this is where we are...)

You speak as though you have no choice in the matter.

[battaile]

Everything in the thread, supportive or otherwise, perpetuates the notion that this person is fragile or something.

Yeah, good point. I never really entertained the idea seriously that the dev in question had quit development over one post on SA, I basically just wanted to call bullshit on dpeg for that accusation. In any event, I removed his name from the OP although its probably too late for that to matter.

[battaile]

Spoiler: show

I have to ask, what does making this thread in GDD accomplish exactly?

My point was that dpeg is a jackass, sorry if that was unclear.

Mod edit: Kids, don't do this.

[Galefury]

I'm pretty sure dpeg is not the jackass here.

[njvack]

... and now that I've exercised the "ban people who make dickhead comments" option, I'm going to also exercise the "close the thread" option. Should someone have something of value to put here, PM me and I'll unlock it. (devs, I think you can maybe just do it yourselves).