28 ответов в этой теме

[AndarianTD]

I would like to take this opportunity to invite members of the Neverwinter Nights and Neverwinter Nights 2 communities to consider volunteering to join the Academy for Modding Excellence, or AME.

For those who may not know, the AME is a group of community players, builders, and reviewers who are dedicated to RPG "modding." We award the annual Golden Dragon Awards, or GDAs, in recognition of excellence in module and custom content design for NWN and NWN2. Our members turn their passion for NWN modding, including playing, building and reviewing modules and custom content, into an opportunity to support the players, and to give recognition to the content creators, who keep this great community alive.

Despite the aging of the NWN communities, we in the AME believe that these games still have some life and interest left in them. We also believe that the AME mission would be a valuable one to at least consider expanding at some point in the future to other moddable games, such as Bioware's Dragon Age. For the last couple of years, however, the AME roster has been declining due to members moving on from the community or to other projects, and to
fewer new members joining each year. This has made it increasingly difficult for us to meet our goals for awarding the GDAs -- especially for NWN2, which we had to forego entirely last year due to lack of particpation. For that reason, I would like to take this opportunity to issue a special appeal to members of the NWN and NWN2 communities to consider joining the AME, and helping us to maintain what we consider to be a valuable community tradition: awarding the AME Golden Dragon Awards for Achievements in Modding Excellence.

One of the perennial responses that we've always received to invitations to join the AME has been that, while interesting, it sounded like it would be more work than they could afford the time for. In past years, this has been a legitimate concern: the AME has had an often considerable workload, especially with the sometimes limited number of members available to do it. So upon re-assuming the Chairman's position earlier this year, I undertook to reorganize the AME's rules and procedures to try to make them significantly more friendly toward potential members
who would like to participate in the awards, but who may have limited time with which to do so. I believe that with these changes, helping to fulfill the AME mission is something that individuals with limited time would be able to undertake effectively.

To help explain how the AME and its new procedures work, I've posted the following summary:

Overview for Prospective Members of The Academy For Modding Excellence (AME)

The basics are fairly straightforward. The AME maintains a running "queue" of award categories that are currently being worked on, which move through several stages -- starting with "Nominations," then proceeding to "Finals," and finally to "Awarded." At the end of each quarter, each award category is checked for eligibility to move from one stage to the next. For example, a category with four or more nominations having three or more seconding votes each will have the top three nominees proceed to the finals. Members can work on whatever categories they are interested in, with whatever time they have available. Which awards proceed through the stages to being finally awarded, and at what pace, will depend on member interests and choices regarding which categories to work on. Categories include things like "Best Storytelling Module," "Best Custom Content," "Debut Author," and so on.

Member eligibility for the AME basically depends on having some experience as a player, builder, or reviewer for one of the games and some of the categories that the AME covers. The main qualifications for membership are:

• A genuine enthusiasm for the game and modding community that they serve;
• Experience as a player, builder, or reviewer of modding content for their game; and
• An ability to carry out the AME’s mission of giving awards for modding excellence in a responsible and trustworthy manner.

I hope that some of you will consider volunteering to join the AME. If anyone is interested in or has questions about the AME or about AME membership, please feel free to email me (at andarian@ame-gda.net), or to post followups here, or on our forum thread:

AME 2011 Call for Membership

Sincerely,

Andarian
Current Chairman, The Academy for Modding Excellence

Сообщение изменено: AndarianTD, 30 Май 2011 - 10:38 .

[Lugaid of the Red Stripes]

As a builder, I just wanted to express my support and sympathy for what you're doing, and bump your thread. Getting feedback, especially considered criticism, is a vital part of the whole building process. Usually the vault comments and reviews are aimed at prospective players, and so tend avoid talking about innovative design or interesting plot details, lest they give away too many spoilers.

We really need a part of the community that takes the long view of things, recognizes all the great work being done, and reminds us of the community's triumphs of the past year. Thank-you for all your hard work, even if NWN2 had to get cut last year.

[M. Rieder]

I'd also like to echo what Lugaid said. I'm in the middle of buliding a three part trilogy, so I would not be able to do justice to the AME, but I would like to say that what you do is important for the community and I appreciate it.

[AndarianTD]

Thank you very much for the support, Lugaid and M. Reider! It means a lot to us.

About having the time to "do justice to the AME" -- not surprisingly, lack of time for the AME workload is something that many prospective members have mentioned as a concern. It's always been a concern of mine as well, since I'm actually in the middle of building a (four part) module series in NWN1 myself. It's one of the reasons why I've made a special effort this year to draw on my past experiences with the AME to try to streamline its procedures to make it better suited to participation from a larger number of members with more limited time to help out -- who would like to have the option to be able to join and "do what they have time for." It's also the case that individuals who are involved in the community and active in playing modules and testing CC may already have done much of the work needed as an AME member, which they can then "apply," for example in making and voting on nominations and finalists that they may already be familiar with.

So while I completely understand and respect anyone's reluctance due to concerns about available time, I hope that I might be able to convince a few of you to "try us out" anyway and see what you might have time for -- no strings attached. Even if you can only spare the time to participate in one award category, every bit helps.

Cheers --

Andarian

Сообщение изменено: AndarianTD, 01 Июнь 2011 - 02:48 .

[kamal_]

Best companion? Best area? Best boss/villain? Best surprised the player can do that?

[AndarianTD]

kamal_ wrote...

Best companion? Best area? Best boss/villain? Best surprised the player can do that?

Right now we're actually discussing the possibility of adding a new category or two, so we'd welcome suggestions about that. We typically focus on broader / more genre oriented categories, mainly because when you get too specific it's easy for the number of award categories to start to get out of hand. Still, It'd be interesting to come up with a new one that's a bit outside the mold, even if just to spice up the list -- so if you have a catchy idea, feel free to put it out there. 

[M. Rieder]

So it looks like the basic activities are playing mods/using or evaluating content and voting/nominating accordingly, is that correct?

[kamal_]

How about some PW centric awards? I don't see any.

[AndarianTD]

M. Rieder wrote...

So it looks like the basic activities are playing mods/using or evaluating content and voting/nominating accordingly, is that correct?

Yep, that's a pretty accurate description.

kamal_ wrote...

How about some PW centric awards? I don't see any.

Technically, PWs are eligible under the "Best Multiplayer" award. The complication we've had in the past with PWs is that it can be difficult to evaluate a PW as a builder project apart from the contribution of the player base, which is one reason why members have shied away from nominating them. We've also mostly had volunteers from the SP community, so the MP awards have gotten short shrift much more than I'd prefer. If we had more members with an interest in supporting MP-oriented awards we could change that and expand our MP-award coverage for both games (NWN1 and NWN2). Personally, I'd like to see that happen.

Сообщение изменено: AndarianTD, 01 Июнь 2011 - 05:48 .

[Arkalezth]

I've joined the AME recently, and I have to say that I'm enjoying it. I was reluctant at the beginning, but there's no obligation to play any specific module, you can just play at your own leisure and vote whichever categories you want, no pressure to vote or nominate.

I think anyone should be able to contribute if s/he plays modules or uses custom content regularly. If you're a regular (maybe even occasional) player, being a member of the AME shouldn't take away much time.

It's also worth mentioning that the current votations cover the 2009-2010 period (and a few of them, 2008), so if you have played modules in the past two years, you'll most certainly are able nominate or vote under some category.

[kamal_]

To help encourage membership, I will make new members an npc in an inn in my Crimmor campaign. Andarian can pm me a list next month or so. The npcs will be bards who like to judge other bard's tales, so things will stay in character. The npcs must be a normally playable race, so genasi are ok, but no ogres.

[Arkalezth]

Sounds good, kamal, thanks. BTW, when I was considering to join the AME, Andarian told me I could get a "temporal pass" to the forums to see how things work there, and stay only if I wanted. I can't speak for him, but if someone's interested, I guess the same could be done for others.

Сообщение изменено: Arkalezth, 10 Июнь 2011 - 04:30 .

[AndarianTD]

kamal_ wrote...

To help encourage membership, I will make new members an npc in an inn in my Crimmor campaign. Andarian can pm me a list next month or so. The npcs will be bards who like to judge other bard's tales, so things will stay in character. The npcs must be a normally playable race, so genasi are ok, but no ogres.

What a novel idea! Can veteran AME members qualify too?

Arkalezth wrote...

Sounds good, kamal, thanks. BTW, when I was considering to join the AME, Andarian told me I could get a "temporal pass" to the forums to see how things work there, and stay only if I wanted. I can't speak for him, but if someone's interested, I guess the same could be done for others.

Absolutely! For anyone on the BSN who wants to pursue this, here's what to do. First, send me email (at andarian at ame-gda dot net), and I'll help you create an account on the AME Forums. If you're a known member of the NWN and/or NWN2 communities here on the BSN, we should have no problem signing you up right away if you want -- or letting you look around as a "trial member" if you'd prefer to do that first.

Having a known handle with a good reputation on the BSN makes it much easier for us to approve new members. If you're not known on the BSN, though, that's not necessarily an obstacle. We'll just set you up as a trial member first and ask you to introduce yourself so that we can get to know you first. One of our new members came to us in exactly that way, so I don't want to discourage "lurkers" from looking into AME membership as well.

Сообщение изменено: AndarianTD, 12 Июнь 2011 - 01:30 .

[kamal_]

AndarianTD wrote...

kamal_ wrote...

To help encourage membership, I will make new members an npc in an inn in my Crimmor campaign. Andarian can pm me a list next month or so. The npcs will be bards who like to judge other bard's tales, so things will stay in character. The npcs must be a normally playable race, so genasi are ok, but no ogres.

What a novel idea! Can veteran AME members qualify too?

I suppose it would depend on how many npcs I had to place. Around 6 or so I can simply place around a table in an inn with some quick content where they have lines about different bard's tales. If there's like 20 people or something I'd have to get them set up in their own room or their own building, and give them enough content that it fit into the world and didn't look like something tacked on. Mostly I name quest related npc's, so 20 named npc's would seem strange if they didn't have content, a small number of named npcs without particular content would still fit.

Anyway, I'd need npc name (a reasonable fantasy name, no names like "dEaThEaTeR_cLaN_cRuShEr"), race and sex, and maybe a short anecdote if desired about a favorite thing from some mod (even if you want to talk about a mods area design, I can work that in in character as saying the story of such and such does a wonderful job of making the bard think he's there). I will dress them appropriately for the campaign world and make sure they are not pushovers if the pc tries to fight them.

[AndarianTD]

All,

Unfortunately, I've had to disable new account registration on the AME Forums due to a large and unprecedented attack of spam account registrations. If anyone has a legitimate interest in creating an AME Forums account (for example, as an interested NWN community member or someone interested in joining the AME awards panel), please email me directly at andarian at ame-gda dot net and I'll help you get set up with one manually.

Andarian
AME Chairman

Сообщение изменено: AndarianTD, 12 Июнь 2011 - 01:31 .

[dunniteowl]

Sorry I've been so absent lately. New roof (roofer issues to boot), car searching, hot hot HOT temperatures, and now a fried power supply (again!) have pretty much kept me off the internet or forums of any degree for the last couple of months -- and there's no clear light at the end of that tunnel just yet -- and when there is, I have to hope it's not the train coming my way instead.

Meanwhile...

I was once a member of the AME and I think it's a really great idea and institution for this Community of modders, players, builders for NWN and NWN2 (and yes, possibly DA:O as well if they ever get up to the point where that's likely) or any other moddable game that this Community of people tend to prefer over SP Only scripted run throughs by the Devs only, or MMOGs of whatever type (and yes, I do occasionally find myself transported to LotRO.)

There are a lot of folks out there who play regularly and who have probably played enough of the modules in this genre that being a module reviewer and nominator of modules for a specific category shouldn't be too hard to do. If you don't have time, then what are doing playing games for? Get back to work you slackers! (tongue completely in cheek here, folks)

The issue of time is that we all think we have to put in some extra time. Well, yeah. Sure. Of course, but how much time is entirely up to you and there isn't so much more to do as a reviewer than to be able to reliably and responsibly critique your experience with an eye to appreciateing what's been set before you. Again, if you play the modules in the first place, then you're probably a prime candidate for being a good AME reviewer anyway.

Plenty of people talk about "giving back" something to a Community that gives them so much enjoyment and this could be your ticket to doing just that. And the best part is you don't even have to get up in front of a crowd and wave, or debate or -- well anything other than play modules, review them and suggest their induction into a category and vote. It sounds a lot like getting paid to do not much of anything you aren't already doing --

(What? Oh, that. It's just a reference I know no-one gets paid to do this... Huh? Confused about what? Getting paid? Oh, right, I see, okay, I'll tell them.)

-- I've just been informed that it's important to tell you this is a voluntary position and you will not be paid. Shoot, dang legal types, always worried about something. I knew you all were smarter than to be fooled into thinking someone got paid or anything.

So if you think you've played a fair number of modules, have an interest in 'giving back' to this great Community, then the choice is clear -- submit your application to join the AME and review, play and review, play and review, play, and review, play, then vote. Simple, safe and fun.

best regards,
dunniteowl

[AndarianTD]

Thanks for the terrific endorsement, Dunniteowl!

[LeeMer47]

Didn't all the NWN2 members move over to Dragon Age? Good luck replacing them.

[AndarianTD]

I would like to thank the NWN2 community for the very positive response we've had to our AME 2011 Call for Volunteers!

Since posting our call, seven new members have joined, and some former or inactive members have returned to help out as well. Several of those have been NWN2 players, and as a result we've finally been able to begin getting the NWN2 Golden Dragon awards back on track again. I'm pleased to be able to announce that due to those efforts over the last month and a half, two of our previously delayed NWN2 awards categories have been able to enter the finals: Best Storytelling Module and Veteran Author of 2009. In the coming days I'll be posting the list of finalists for those awards.

We do, however, need just a little more help. In particular, we need at least one or two more active NWN2 members to reach the "critical mass" of voters and nominators required to get the NWN2 awards fully back on track again. Right now, for example, we have seven NWN2 categories that are near or on the verge of qualifying for the finals, needing just one or two more votes or nominations to complete our review. So if you are an avid NWN2 player, modder or reviewer, and think you might be interested in helping with the AME's mission to give recognition to the content creators who keep this great community alive, then please feel free to contact me (andarian at ame-gda dot net) about joining or learning more about the AME panel.

Andarian
Chairman, The Academy for Modding Excellence

[AndarianTD]

Thanks to the ongoing efforts of the new and returning members of the AME panel, another award has been able to enter the finals : Best Roleplaying Module of 2009-2010. The finalists for this category will be announced soon, and the winners should be able to be announced at the end of October.

[AndarianTD]

Please consider volunteering as a member of the Academy for Modding Excellence's NWN2 awards group. We're still desperately in need of NWN2 members, and still have a backlog of two years worth of NWN2 awards that we can't award because we don't have enough members to nominate, play and vote on them. There's very little commitment -- as
I've written here before, it's strictly "Do what you can, when you have time for it" -- and another three members or so would probably allow us to start clearing that backlog of un-awarded awards.

For more information, see my "recruiting call" post on the AME Forums, and feel free to contact me (via PM on the BSN, or at andarian at ame dash gda dot net).

AME 2011 Call for Volunteers

Andarian - AME Chairman

Сообщение изменено: AndarianTD, 02 Ноябрь 2011 - 02:55 .

[Arkalezth]

As Andarian said, if you've played some modules for the past few years, you should be able to make some voting in no time. I know some of you play modules regularly, so consider going in and taking a look.

The NWN2 award votations have being mostly stationary for several months now, we should be able to solve this with just a few more members.

[PJ156]

As has been said, there are too few of us on the NWN2 team at the moment but it won't take many more to get things rolling along.

The AME is a great way to be a part of the NWN2 community, all that is asked of you is that you do what you came here for and play modules or use and review custom content.

The time you spend on it is up to you, what you play or review or sponsor is up to you; so really if you enjoy playing NWN2 then there is no good reason not to get involved.

PJ  

[dunniteowl]

There definitely is a shortage of both player reviews and awards reviewers for NWN2 modules. Folks, the Community needs you to participate. I know, as Arkalezth stated, that there are plenty of module playing Community members out there. Hey! It's not all one sided here. Those of you who play many modules are in a unique position to "give back" in the form of reviews as well as module nominations for differing segments of the Community's module releases over time.

Who knows, you may not think you're any good at reviews or giving recommendations, however I'm betting that this just isn't so. I didn't think I could be a good interviewer of module makers, custom content creators and whatnot, but whoa, there I was doing it and getting all sorts of compliments on my "skill" as an interviewer (and I am not the sort that takes compliments all that well, because I, too, didn't really think it was something I was good at.)

You could be the next Siskel or Ebert of NWN2 Modules. Go on, give it a whirl. As Andarian said, the commitment is simple, "What you can, when you can." How tricky is that?

dno

Сообщение изменено: dunniteowl, 03 Ноябрь 2011 - 02:02 .

[Arkalezth]

To add (I'm pretty sure all this has been said before, but just in case): the current awards are for 2009 and 2010 content. Since I joined in June, I've played very few modules and only one from that period, but I've been able to vote in nearly every category just with what I had played on my own, at my desired time, before joining the AME. So if you have been playing modules in the past two years, you should be able to vote or nominate somewhere.

And as has also been said, you can always go and take a look (better to send a PM to Andarian for that as there are some private forums you'd need access to), see how things are done, and leave if you feel it's not for you.