Zwiebelchen

Are games downloaded and maintained via steam actually moddable? Is there some kind of hashing to prevent modifying the game base? That imho would make the decision for me; I want a game that allows me to mod it.

Small nitpick on this point: Unity does not allow the mixing of content produced with its free version with content produced with a licensed professional version - which Obsidian undoubtedly used. From their software license agreement: "You may not combine or integrate Licensee Content that you develop with Unity Personal simultaneously with any Licensee Content that you develop with Unity Pro or any Unity Pro Add-On Products. Licensee Content developed with Unity Personal will be tagged with an identifier that is used to enforce this restriction." Since when do private persons care about legalities? And besides; as fanmods and user-created contents are usually non-profit, this point is moot. It's perfectly legal to use Unity Personal for non-profit content.

I don't think that it's a bad thing if you go by tropes. In a way, you can't avoid touching several tropes in any story. This is because there exists a trope for almost anything: http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/HomePage But tropes aren't a bad thing. In fact, tropes are helpful tools to tailor your story. The trick is to mix your tropes up with less popular tropes or unexpected twists. This is what makes a memorable story. And there are always tropes that are completely under-used and interesting. Just a quick example: how much RPGs have you played where the protagonist is a mother? Heck, even for party members it's rare to find a woman who has kids. One would assume that in a world where everyone should have had a mother at some point that you would at least find one character who has children? The oddest thing about this is, that the premise alone spawns numerous of interesting plot possibilities that almost never get explored in any triple-A game yet. It seems that in RPGs, any real-world struggles are completely out of question. That being said, some games surprised me with how they played with tropes and expectations and twisted them around for memorable moments. The earliest example I ever played was Lufia II for the SNES back in the glorious 16-bit era. When the game starts, you are immediately presented with the typical childhood-friend girl-next-door. Absolutely the "the first girl wins" trope. It's getting hinted over and over again that there will be a romance plot at some point. And then I was amazed to find out that the protagonist is just one of those douchebags that completely forgets about her as soon as a hotter girl shows up. Unexpected and awesome with a touch of realism!

If PoE is a success and up to our expectations, I'm not against the idea at all. Imho, possible revenue from direct sales to non-backers should benefit addons for PoE, not necessarily the next game in the pipeline. I believe in the crowdfunding model. The direct interaction between backers and developers is imho what made PoE turn out so promising. Without this interaction, I'm perfectly sure we would get a much less polished game. Just remember all the valuable feedback threads on the BB and how they helped to improve the game. Just remember how scientifically and acribic some people pointed out major flaws in game design that got completely overlooked by the devs (I still wonder why they haven't hired Sensuki yet). Without a crowdfunding campaign for the sequel, we would experience a disconnect between the devs and the community. And while this has advantages for the developers, it doesn't necessarily lead to a better game. I'm btw aware of the irony that I'm saying this while not being a backer. I believe in the crowdfunding model, but I myself never invest into a product before it is finished, simply because I never know if my interest in the product is still the same when it's done. I'm just that kind of guy. But I respect everyone who does support developers via kickstarter and I see how it benefits everyone, including non-backers like me, in the long run.

I think the problem isn't really the long downtime between attacks. It's the animations themselves that are too static and not dynamic enough. The problem is, imho, that the animators didn't account for the top-down perspective of the game. Proportions and animations are usually exaggerated in strategy games. This not only goes for attack swings, but also the idle animations inbetween weapon swings. Here are some examples from popular strategy games: http://classic.battle.net/war3/images/orc/units/animations/blademaster.gif http://classic.battle.net/war3/images/human/units/animations/spellbreaker.gif http://www.succubus.net/wiki/images/8/8e/Succubusw3.gif http://www.abload.de/img/worgendkt10special1h.g017z.gif Look how over-the-top these animations are. Wide swings, long arches backwards and forward, often even exaggerated by motion blur. There's also a lot you can learn from fighting games when it comes to Idle animations between weapon swings: http://fc04.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2013/309/4/f/league_of_legends_fighting_game_by_iurypadilha-d6t5nrm.jpg Just look at the posture of Katarina. It just screams "I'm gonna punch you in the face at any moment!" even if she is just standing there. She looks like she is actually taking cover when not attacking. PoE's animations lack this. If you have a game from isometric view, you need to exaggerate animations to give them enough weight and impact. And while I understand that these games can hardly be compared, I think there's a lot to learn from this video; imho, it's a perfect analysis about what are the key features of well done animations: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=coCsLWqT3v0

I guess it wasn't about the point of that answer, but the indirect implications that can be associated with it. You know ... women are expensive and stuff.

So here we have it, a comment from someone who was probably never active in any modding community. Let's just ignore the fact that Unity itself is free: You can get a 3DS max licence for free if you are a student. GMAX, a dated 3DS max version is also completely free. GIMP, a professional 2D graphic software is completely free aswell. Blender is another modelling software which is free. The "certain level of technical competence/expertise" of modding communities led to mods that surpassed their original platforms in success and popularity multiple times. DOTA, League of Legends, Counterstrike, Team Fortress; all those games had their origin in mods. There are incredible talents to be found across amateur artists. Just check out some random 3D models on DeviantArt. You'll be amazed what amateur artists are capable of. Modders turned Warcraft III, a game that looked like this: http://www.buffed.de/screenshots/original/2012/03/Warcraft_3_Frozen_Throne.jpg into this: http://www.hiveworkshop.com/forums/attachments/terrain-board-267/143562d1424528811-bits-hope-bits_hope.png http://www.hiveworkshop.com/forums/attachments/terrain-board-267/136678d1404476007-nature-tower.png http://www.hiveworkshop.com/forums/attachments/terrain-board-267/143003d1422394247-my-fantasia-fireflies2.png http://www.hiveworkshop.com/forums/attachments/terrain-board-267/140642d1415046365-honey-i-blew-up-planet-hibuap2.png http://www.hiveworkshop.com/forums/attachments/terrain-board-267/140775d1415306098-starscape-stars.png http://www.hiveworkshop.com/forums/attachments/terrain-board-267/140688d1415141864-all-alone-lone-loney.png EDIT: Some more impressive works... http://www.hiveworkshop.com/forums/pastebin_data/zem6lh/Castle.jpg http://www.hiveworkshop.com/forums/pastebin_data/zem6lh/Twostepsfromhell.jpg http://www.hiveworkshop.com/forums/pastebin_data/zem6lh/Fatelesstemple.jpg http://www.hiveworkshop.com/forums/pastebin_data/zem6lh/Shade.jpg All the models you see in the above screenshots are custom made by the community. There's a database of literally thousands of models (across all types like environmental, special effects and full fledged animated unit models) made by the community.

AngryJoe has always been a supporter of vintage game ideas. Check out for example his review of XCOM: Enemy Unknown. I'm not surprised that he likes where PoE is heading. I've always been a fan of his reviews and the dedication he is putting into making them. Lots of material, good discussions, great production (check for example the intro song for his review of South Park: Stick of Truth). I'm curious to see what Yahtzee from ZeroPunctuation thinks of PoE, though he usually only reviews console games, so I don't have high hopes that he will actually notice it.

It's not like there's hundreds of different armor models... I expect a range of roughly 30-40 models. Not an amount that couldn't be handled one by one, imho. But yeah, since we have body scaling for different races, I expect animations to be externalized with just the bones being part of the actual model. Which doesn't make it harder nor easier, tbh.. They could have also went for an effective mixture of interchangable textures with interchangable base models. In this approach, they would only design 3-4 armor models and then just interchange the textures layered on top of them. This would make custom designs even easier, as now a poor-man's approach would be to just exchange the textures. This is basicly how World of Warcraft does it.

Judging from the videos, it seems that PoE uses the "classic" method of interchangable body models with attached static models. I don't see any complicated stuff here. So basicly, when you equip a new armor, what happens is that the entire body model will be exchanged. Heads, Cloaks/capes, weapons and helmets are most likely static models that get attached directly to bones. This becomes quite obvious when you watch some youtube videos on the early backer betas, when some of the models didn't load in perfectly. The only "variable" here is if the animations are baked directly into the body models (which would mean that every body model has all sequences copy&pasted in) or if the animations are externalized and the body models are static (they'd still have bones in that case). But no matter if they are externalized or not: it would be easy to just use an existing body model as a basis and then modify the UVW mapping or vertices to get new designs. This has been done before in thousands of games. I don't see why PoE should be much different here. One of the first mods of almost any game is a "nude armor"...

Creating own areas is possible, but it is quite difficult task, because creating area is not easy task if you want keep visual quality that original areas have and scripting and 'hacking' in those self made areas also demand coding+unity expertise that most people don't have. So to make new areas you (or your modding team) need to excel in 3d area design and have good knowledge about coding and unity, but it is possible, but same time I would not predict lots of new area mods. I think this all depends on how robust the modding sites for this game will be. It's not like you have to be directly involved in any modding projects to create new art assets for the game. Some people just make them for the sake of it. I personally wouldn't mind creating empty 3D landscapes and uploading them for public use in other mods. I know some programming, but I don't have the time or dedication to code in unity, so I rather just spend my time making new "raw files" that can be used for zones or new armor/weapon models, then upload them to a community that might have a use for them.

I don't really agree with this. From what we know, there's definitely 5 maps for each background (and one optional I just assume is there, even though I haven't found any information on that yet): - The basic texture layer; a bitmap, containing all the classic background information - the depth map, containing height information of the background (so that occlusion appears properly) - the normal map, containing facing information of the background (so that they get lit properly) - the lighting map, containing areas that emit light and will not get covered by shadows (this one is probably greyscale but might have colored information) - the pathing map, containing gameplay data on where characters can walk (this one is probably binary) - a specular map, which contains information about the surface type of materials (reflective surfaces like metal, non-reflectives like wood) From these 5 maps, the first 3 can be rendered directly from a 3D landscape in any modelling software like 3dsmax, Gmax or blender (of which two of them are free!), given the crucial information on viewing angle, ambient light coordinates and camera distance. The lighting map can basicly be hand-painted from the original texture bitmap; just color everything that doesn't emit lights black and open windows white. The pathing map is even easier: just take the bitmap and color everything walkable white, everything non-walkable black. This is, if the pathing is binary, but I don't see a reason why it should not. A specular map (if it's even there ... still not sure on that) is more or less only about defining reflective surfaces. Just color metal faces in the reflective color and use the diffuse color on all other surfaces and you're done. While it's possible to make this very sophisticated, a simple two-color scheme is already enough visual fidelity for most applications. I don't see how this should be a huge problem. It all boils down to getting a renderer that allows to create the normal and depth maps from a 3D scene. The reason why almost nobody made custom maps for the IE games is that when 3D modelling became accessable for amateurs (and commercial hardware became strong enough to support millions of polys in a scene) the IE modding scene has shrunk to just a handful of people. I'm really really trying hard to this. I am trying to get at least the normal map, the specularity map and possibly the occlusion map done properly. As I said: most modern tools already support this by default. The only real problem is the camera data. creating a normal map: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=66ulKGSkJVo creating a height map: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V5QD6D9pYfE

I don't really agree with this. From what we know, there's definitely 5 maps for each background (and one optional I just assume is there, even though I haven't found any information on that yet): - The basic texture layer; a bitmap, containing all the classic background information - the depth map, containing height information of the background (so that occlusion appears properly) - the normal map, containing facing information of the background (so that they get lit properly) - the lighting map, containing areas that emit light (this one is probably greyscale but might have colored information) - the pathing map, containing gameplay data on where characters can walk (this one is probably binary) - a specular map, which contains information about the surface type of materials (reflective surfaces like metal, non-reflectives like wood) From these maps, the first 3 can be rendered directly from a 3D landscape in any modelling software like 3dsmax, Gmax or blender (of which two of them are free!), given the crucial information on viewing angle, ambient light coordinates and camera distance. The lighting map can basicly be hand-painted from the original texture bitmap; just color everything that doesn't emit lights black and open windows white. The pathing map is even easier: just take the bitmap and color everything walkable white, everything non-walkable black. This is, if the pathing is binary, but I don't see a reason why it should not. A specular map (if it's even there ... still not sure on that) is more or less only about defining reflective surfaces. Just color metal faces in the reflective color and use the diffuse color on all other surfaces and you're done. While it's possible to make this very sophisticated, a simple two-color scheme is already enough visual fidelity for most applications. I don't see how this should be a huge problem. It all boils down to getting a renderer that allows to create the normal and depth maps from a 3D scene. The reason why almost nobody made custom maps for the IE games is that when 3D modelling became accessable for amateurs (and commercial hardware became strong enough to support millions of polys in a scene) the IE modding scene was already in decline.

That's pretty much the way it supposed to be done for now (as you already found out from Mod Support thread in Beta section :D). Giving the fact that PoE's Beta being modded even before full game is out, I wouldn't worry about post-release modability at all. Well then, I'm there to create and share 3D art assets such as landscapes and armors. What I can't do, however, is writing some neat Javascript tools to convert my photoshop or 3dsmax files into scenes... I hope Sensuki and Besker will step in on that and provide us with tools along the road...

I would probably stay away from modding classes or anything gameplay related too much until several months in. Chances are that we will get balancing patches post-release, so it would probably be a waste of effort.

Afaik, legal issues is not the problem here, lack of resources is. Modability never was a selling point of PoE and was brought during Kickstarter campaign by community, not by developers. When the question appeared, devs answered like "Uh, okay, we'll do what we can to support modders as long as it won't require us to go out of our way too far", which is perfectly reasonable for game of this type and budget by me. Now, developing dedicated modding tools definitely looks like going out of the way too far, so... externalizing certain game files is going to be about all in terms of modability. It's not about developing modding tools. I'm not asking for a world editor. I'm asking about getting full access to all assets in the game via a nicely done file structure. Let's take for example the scene files, which supposedly contain all the area layers and the object data like items, npcs, dialogues, etc. If the folder that contains these scene files is accessable, all we need is a code injection that loads a custom scene when the game starts (or even better: the game supports that by giving us the option to load a custom scene directly from the main menu - like a "start custom campaign" button) and the specs on how the scene file is structured internally. It's then basicly up to the modding community to use the structure and the critical intel to create executables and tools that allow to convert and merge typical file formats like tga into a game-readable scene file. This is no rocket science and has been done before for hundreds of games. It would be cool if in the end it becomes as easy as creating 5 TGA files (containing all the background layers of the game) via photoshop or 3dsmax/blender, some XML sheets for NPC or mob data and text files for the dialogues and events and then merge them into a new scene via the pressing of a button to throw into the scenes folder.

Great collection of info! The fact that there is an empty folder for scenes makes me feel optimistic that they will be externalized eventually. This is when the party starts. Let's hope we get this sooner, not later... Can't wait to build custom landscapes in 3ds max (I have quite the model library available already on my HDD ...; also, I'm willing to write tutorials on how to use 3ds max to create custom maps given the tools to convert my max files into game assets)

If legal issues are the reason we won't get certain tools, there is always certain "unofficial" ways of getting tools to the masses. Leak the internal specs of the game to private persons to help them build custom converter tools in Java or C. From almost 15 years of modding experience, I can tell you that there is always a handful of guys in every community that can write 3rd party tools for almost anything, from simple converters to full-blown editors. However, this requires to know what you are looking for. It isn't that hard for private modders to gain access to certain unity tools in the anonymity of the internet. What we need, however, is intel on how it all comes together in the end.

I haven't been around here for a while, so I probably missed a lot of updates... Is there anything new to know in terms of modding? In PoE, I don't think it will take long until the first simple mods that affect some gameplay elements appear. However, I am more talking about content mods, like NPCs, new zones and new items. I understand that modability isn't the main focus of the project. However, with possible expansions in mind, what are the plans of Obsidian to support the modding community? Remember that modding is what kept Half Life, Warcraft III, Baldurs Gate and Neverwinter Nights alive even a decade after the initial release... New zones are particulary interesting: Theoretically, creating simple static backgrounds for zones would be as simple as designing a landscape in 3dsmax (remember that there are thousands of free art assets like trees, buildings, etc. available on the web), then running a converter maxscript that turns your 3D landscape into a bitmap and a bump/normal map. However, we would still need a tool to modify the gameplay elements for such maps: placing 3D objects and light sources, adding a pathing map, converting and merging all maps into the appropriate game-files. Also, judging from the Neverwinter Nights 2 community, 3D moddeling of new armor/weapons is popular. Will there be a quick & dirty converter tool to turn milkshape/3dsmax models into the appropriate game files? Also, a spec sheet for how the game handles animations would be useful aswell, so that we don't have to reverse-engineer the game engine to find out how everything works. Due to it's 2D isometric perspective, PoE offers incredible potential for the modding scene. The amount of detail on the 3D models allows amateur 3D artists to create art assets that are of comparable quality as the original models. The reason why there are thousands of models available for Warcraft 3, but not even a fraction of that for Starcraft 2 is, that the artistic complexity of the models increased enormously; however, in terms of graphical fidelity, PoE hits the perfect middleground between simplicity and complexity. Please do not miss that opportunity to get the 2D/3D artists on board! Supporting them with instructions and tools to convert and implement their creations into game-readable file formats! Who wouldn't want to explore user-made dungeons or sidequests? Or even a full-fledged campaign?

I think it's time to bump this back into consideration. There have been some great suggestions in this thread and I don't want them to be forgotten!

Regarding the UI: I wonder why nobody ever thought of just adapting the WC3 UI for an RPG. It's intuitive, convenient, functional and looks great! http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-gZQ4tQ5pTD4/TfTH8ZGlwbI/AAAAAAAABMo/ocmMFg-f3-Y/s1600/Warcraft-3-Frozen-Throne-The-Tales-of-Raviganion_1.jpg http://www.gamesurge.com/pc/war3/nightelf.jpg So what do we have here? - We obviously have a minimap that could be replaced by the combat log, simply because this is an RPG and we don't need a minimap here. - We have a portrait of the currently selected character - When drag-selecting multiple units, we have a sub-selection menu in the center panel, that allows us to change the command card on the bottom right to the actions and abilities available to the sub-selection unit (highlighted in the center panel) and only this unit will use those abilities, but other orders like move or attack orders get applied to all units selected - When only selecting one unit, we see details about this unit instead of the sub-selection control panel at the center (second image) that displays all kinds of stats, buffs, debuffs, etc. ... in PoE, this could be used for combat information like an action queue - We have a mini-inventory between the command card and center panel for consumables The WC3 UI basicly has all functionality an RPG needs and is optimized to allow heavily micro-intense fast-reaction gameplay. If this works well for even a fast paced real-time strategy game without pause function, imagine how intuitive it is for an rtwp RPG? Imho, a party-based RPG has a lot more in common with RTS games than with MMORPGs. And yet a lot of game developers seem to adapt the design of MMORPG huds for RPGs instead of checking out RTS games. Soom food for thought on the whole UI thing.

Stronghold quests are basicly minor follow-up quests from the big quest chains. They won't "exist" at the same time as the major quest chain leading to the stronghold. I was more speaking about how much quests you could have at the same time. Because things only get confusing if you have too many quests at the same time, not in general. Most of the secret dungeons like the mind-flayers in the sewers or the mercenaries in the bridge district do not have a quest attached to them, so they are not really adding to the confusion of chapter 2. You more or less stumble upon them by chance (and most likely not at your first playthrough).

Thanks for the correction on Hold Person. However, Hold Monster not affecting friendlies was exactly what I wrote above? Maybe you misread something here.

I'm not sure if I agree with chapter 2 having to many quests. In fact, there aren't that many quests when you really think about it. The thing about chapter 2 wasn't the amount of quests, but the quality and size of the quests. But just to go sure, let's just make a list of all quests in chapter 2, sorted by area (I exclude the mini quests and puzzles here like getting the swords and beer for the youngsters in Umar Hills, creating Lilarcor or the child murderer in the bridge district, because they don't qualify as real quests imho). I also don't list quests twice that take place in multiple areas and only list them in the area they are most prominent. Also, character specific quests like Edwin's nether scroll or Korgan's Book of Kazaa are excluded, as they depend on what characters you take. Waukeens promenade: - Circus quest Slums: - Slavers in Copper Coronet - Planar Sphere Graveyard District: - Story-Quest to proceed to chapter 3 for vampires Temple District: - Unseeing Eye - Helm/Lathander/Talos quest depending on alignment Bridge District: - Skinner, part I - Paladins - Theater Docks: - Story-Quest to proceed to chapter 3 for shadowthieves - Mae'var - Harpers - Kangaxx Government District: - Art quest De'Arnise Hold: - Troll invasion Umar Hills: - Shadow Lord - Mimic Blood Trademeet: - Animal attacks - Skinner, part II WIndspear Hills: - Firkraag - Dryads As you can see, every area has more or less only 2-3 major quests. You can add 5 quests for character specific quests at average. Imho, that's not that much. It only appears to be a lot due to how huge the quests are.

Either I don't understand what Josh Sawyer is talking about or you don't. Nothing about the risk/reward of the base AoE (in this example, a fireball) changes. The friendly-fire AoE of fireball will be the same size in an 18-int will be the same as a 3-int wizard. The tactical considerations are unchanged. My understanding of Sawyer's plan is to make it so that the 18-int wizard is not punished for investing in an attribute by making it more difficult for him to utilize fireball than a 3-Int wizard. Also, no offense intended, but I a lot of the reticence to this idea comes more from guttural nostalgia than from anything else. If part of your AoE only hits ennemies, you negate the usual trade off of fireballs. "if I want to hit an ennemy, I will hit my frontline too". In fact, the base AoE (wich is friendly fire) becomes irrelevant because you won't use it anymore. You will always position your spells so as to hit with the outer ring only. You don't have to take risks anymore by hitting your own troops (low risks) but you continue to deal massive damage (high reward). Beat me to it! Yeah, the idea is that if the fringe AoE is large enough, you can basically start using only the fringe AoE. This could be mitigated by making the AoE increase small. Another interesting option could be to just embrace this and roll with it as a feature. Maybe instead of increasing AoEs, the AoE stays the same (or increases less), but increasing portions of it are non-friendly fire. Representing the caster becoming better and better at controlling his/her spells to selectively avoid allies. Just an idea. Imho, non-friendly-fire zones for such AoE spells are a no-go as an intended feature, simply because of the way those AoE spells get balanced. In the IE games, AoE spells were always balanced around Risk-vs-Reward principle. "Spider's Web" (2nd level spell) has a large AoE, not to make it stronger, but to actually make it weaker. The large AoE radius prevents this spell to be used in a situation where battles are face-to-face. That's why "Hold Person", on the contrary, is a 4th level spell (3rd level for clerics): the smaller AoE radius actually makes it more useful than Spider's Web. If we proceed further to the next iteration of AoE stuns, "Hold Monster" on 5th level, we notice that, while all other aspects remain unchanged, the friendly fire aspect is gone, which, again, makes this spell more powerful than the previous iteration. On epic levels, we finally get to "Power Word: stun", which removes the randomness of stuns (either an enemy is immune or stunned without saving throw) completely, but also removes the AoE potential. On the contrary, we have "Symbol: stun", which, again, has friendly fire, but at a much lower radius than Spider's Web. As you can see at the D&D 2nd edition example, all spells are always balanced around the risk vs. reward principle. If there is low risk, there is always low reward. Only as the level requirement of the ability rises, spells get more powerful without increased risk. That's also why "Horrid Wilting" is an 8th level spell, despite not dealing a lot more damage than "Magic Skull": The removed friendly fire aspect makes this spell incredibly powerful, up to the point of being totally overpowered, despite the epic level requirement. This also shows a major balancing error of 2nd edition D&D: that Horrid Wilting as an 8th level spell is more powerful than a lot of the 9th level spell AoEs that, again, have friendly fire enabled. Almost nobody uses those spells over Horrid Wilting. This shows how easily a spell can be overpowered by just the removal of risk from the risk-vs-reward formula. As another example, just take NWN2: As friendly fire is a toggle option in NWN2, you can side-by-side compare the impact of friendly fire on the tactical fidelity of a game. Playing the game with disabled friendly fire (It's a shame that friendly fire is turned off by default) changes the whole game experience. Not only is it a huge step upwards in difficulty, but also affects your spell choice tremendously. Whereas almost all spells you'd pick as a mage in NWN2 would be AoE spells (simply because spaming fireballs is so goddamn effective without friendly fire), you suddenly start to use other spells aswell. A basic character stat that is obtainable at low levels should not reduce the friendly fire aspect of spells, as that would require a total rebalancing of all friendly-fire spells. And no matter how small the fringe radius is, you can always manage to throw a spell in a fashion that you do not hit your frontline fighter but do hit all enemies surrounding him. Especially if they are all melee. A scalable AoE size via mousehweel doesn't have this problem, hence why it is the better solution. A two-layer AoE is just a quick and lazy solution that will in the end hurt the game more than it benefits. Sorry for all the off topic about AoEs here. But it's more or less related to the stats discussion so I hope you can live with that. I really like the suggestions of the paper in this thread. I would 100% approve of the proposed change.