How to make your campaign mainline

Discussion and development of scenarios and campaigns for the game.

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Aldarisvet
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How to make your campaign mainline

Post by Aldarisvet »

Hi everyone.

I have some question that is in the topic, may be its quite ambitious question, but thats is. May be it is not a new question, so forgive me.

The question is: how to make your campaign mainline (included in source by default)?

The fact is that im going to make a campaign and i dont want my creation to be buried somewere in add-ons server. I just want to take an ultimate goal and go to it, and not to do things that is useless for achieving goal.

FIrst of all, i dont want to create campaign just for amusing myself and my fantasy and ability to create artwork. I want to create campaign that would be largely and permanently played. Also i dont have much graphics skills anycase, i dont want to create new races, new units (except some heroes). Definetely campaign with some non-default races would be hard to accept as mainline, and Burning Suns is just an exception.

I think that the core sets of units/races have much unrealized potential. I mean tactics, also including tactics on using default special abilities. I want to create campaign in which players have to THINK how to most effectively use special abilities of some little group of heroes. I want players have to GUESS something in each level, not just about taking villages and producing army - thats really boring. I have to say that in mainline campaigns u almost have no need to think. Even in Hard levels of campaigns for experienced players. For example - in Burning Suns i had only one moment in which i faced real difficulty (in hardest level of difficulty)- in level underground in which u have to choose between helping dwarves and helping trolls. If u choose dwarves it besomes really hot vs LOT of level 2 regenerating trolls. So helped one idea - using cheap elf slowers at front to slow masses of trolls attacking (with healers at their back), and attack with level3 units from flanks... So i want to create campaign for good players.

About storyline - of course it must be, and must be cool and must be interlaced with Wesnoth history. But first is tactical idea of each level, then means to realize idea (concrete units with concrete abilities for this purpuse), then map of the level, then storyline. Music is first, not the lyrics (its opposite of what is written in 'How to create campaign' btw).

Enough, for beginning )
So if someone can answer to subj question, plz do it.
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Re: How to make your campaign mainline

Post by Dugi »

Your plans are grandiose, but the point is, only good and proven by time campaigns become mainline. There is no way to tell that your campaign will be good. You can't tell it neither, no matter what you think. You're telling how good it shall be, but I think that it's just your humongous ego.

If you want to create a campaign, create it, post it to the add-ons server and time will show if it's good enough to be mainlined. If it will be buried there, most likely it isn't good. It can shine even on the add-ons server if it's good. When it gets polished and very well balanced, it may be one day mainlined.

I've seen more people than you thinking about making new campaigns to be mainline. Do you know how many campaigns they wrote? Zero.
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Re: How to make your campaign mainline

Post by zookeeper »

Indeed the only way is to make the campaign first, and to make it very good. After that someone (which of course can be you) still needs to do the actual work of 1) integrating it into mainline and then 2) maintain it forever.

If someone makes an excellent campaign which fits mainline in tone and content and whatnot and they or someone else is willing to commit to the job of maintaining it, then sure, there's a good chance of it happening. No one can promise that beforehand, though.
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Re: How to make your campaign mainline

Post by Aldarisvet »

2 Dugi

Hi. Thx for the answer. I know its look like grandiose, and such reaction about 'ego' is predictable in any community for newcomer. Still, may be the problem is that i harmed u ego by my previous post? )

But look, those who dont make goal, never achieve it.
What if, i say, i want to become a president of my country? And ask of advices about it? U will say im crazy and never achieve it, or u can find at least some good advices?
Your plans are grandiose, but the point is, only good and proven by time campaigns become mainline. There is no way to tell that your campaign will be good.
Nope, i disagree. There is obviously things that can make u campaign definetely to be rejected. Such creating new races with bad graphics and balance for example. I saw quite a bit of such in add-ons server.

So i just ask, what things that i shoudnt do for achieving my goal? Dont do this, dont do that, ok? Dont make Dave angry for example )
Last edited by Aldarisvet on February 25th, 2015, 1:33 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: How to make your campaign mainline

Post by Aldarisvet »

I want to specify what i mean by creating levels which demand THINKING.

Here is a tactical idea i just get in.
There is a silver mage (villages teleporting) unit in the game, that no one use. I never seen it, at least.

So u can create level the only way to win it is to use that special ability.
For exapmple, u forces is devided in 2 parts. One part can recruite (among other level 2 units) level 2 red mages. Other part in real grave danger (and dont have ability to recruit, but control some villages). So u have to guess to upgrade u red mages by fight to silver mages, and THEN teleport them to other side which badly needs support. So one by one u teleport help and u resist on second part for 30 turns, for example.

I think the idea need to be polished, but it definetely WORTH a level.
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Re: How to make your campaign mainline

Post by gnombat »

Personally, I kind of doubt that there are going to be any more campaigns added to the mainline. I'm not a developer and I can't speak for the development team, but it just seems to me unlikely to happen after observing the general trends over the past few years:
  1. There were no new mainline campaigns added in the latest version (1.12);
  2. AFAIK there are no plans to add any new mainline campaigns in the next version (1.13/1.14);
  3. There are 16 campaigns in mainline already, and the game is a fairly large download (300 MB+) so adding more mainline campaigns at this point may just be considered unnecessary bloat.
That having been said ... if you're really aiming to make a campaign which has a possibility of being mainlined, your best choice would be to make a campaign where you play Drakes or Khalifate - simply because there isn't one of those in mainline yet.
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Re: How to make your campaign mainline

Post by zookeeper »

gnombat wrote:That having been said ... if you're really aiming to make a campaign which has a possibility of being mainlined, your best choice would be to make a campaign where you play Drakes or Khalifate - simply because there isn't one of those in mainline yet.
Oh yes, that too. No more elf/human-centric campaigns, please (unless they're really really really good).
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Re: How to make your campaign mainline

Post by Aldarisvet »

2 gnombat, zookeeper

Many thanks, thats really good advice that can affect my view.
However, i was not going to make campaign 'of' some race. Heroes that destiny bring together may be from different races.
The idea is that small group of heroes using "quality not quantity".
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Re: How to make your campaign mainline

Post by Lord-Knightmare »

Hey, what about Wings of Victory? It was the campaign that was supposed to be mainlined in 1.13.
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Re: How to make your campaign mainline

Post by Dugi »

Aldarisvet wrote:Still, may be the problem is that i harmed u ego by my previous post?
Maybe you did. Some of your claims could be interpreted that you can do something better than all add-on authors, without even trying.
Aldarisvet wrote:But look, those who dont make goal, never achieve it.
It's good to have a goal, but it should not be absurdly high. It's better to try to try to become your hometown's mayor than to aim for presidency. Unless you know that you are powerful enough.

Also, the fact that you're neglecting spelling and writing 'u' instead of 'you' or even 'your' (not even bothering that it's usually contracted to 'ur'), don't capitalise the word 'I', misspelled even an emoticon and other issues show me that you aren't that kind of guy who tries hard.
Aldarisvet wrote:Such creating new races with bad graphics and balance for example.
If you mean stuff like Count Kromire or Panther Lord, keep on mind that their author did not want them to become mainline. The new races were intended to let you give a break from the usual units.
Aldarisvet wrote:Dont make Dave angry for example )
That would not have much effect, capaigns aren't smitten for having bad authors, argument ad hominem isn't quite the way to deal with ideas in rational societies. But if you show people that you are a neglecter (congrats, you've already done this one), expect them to expect your work to be neglected.
Aldarisvet wrote:So u have to guess to upgrade u red mages by fight to silver mages, and THEN teleport them to other side which badly needs support.
So the other group will stay in that grave danger that can be solved by two better units for long enough to let two red mages kill numerous units so that they could advance, right?
Do you expect every player to figure it out and not to complain that it's unbalanced or bugged?
Aldarisvet wrote:I think that the core sets of units/races have much unrealized potential.
Potential in a direction that this game is not focusing in. Wesnoth is not an adventure game where the silver mage example belongs to. If you make an adventure campaign, expect it not to be mainlined.
Aldarisvet wrote:Heroes that destiny bring together may be from different races.
The idea is that small group of heroes using "quality not quantity".
Small group. Okay, it will be either short or you'll end up with max level units wasting exp just to heal. Or you will add something allowing them to advance further. Pushing you further from the usual game and reducing your chance to have it mainlined.
Aldarisvet wrote:So i just ask, what things that i shoudnt do for achieving my goal?
Don't try to revolutionise the game. It increases the level of awesomeness you'll have to reach.
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Re: How to make your campaign mainline

Post by Aldarisvet »

2 Dugi

Oh, u kinda conflicting one)
Some of your claims could be interpreted that you can do something better than all add-on authors, without even trying.
Thats not worth discussing in such manner. It is your intepretation and i said from beginning that my subj looks quite ambitious. You know, 'that soldier is bad, who dont dream to become a general'. I have my right to that dream, especially, if it is about such non-important thing in real life as just computer game. If u have children u could understand, i just said some time ago to my 7-year son who is totally crazy of Wesnoth that i will try to create company with him and bring it to mainline) And u better 'kill ur self-importance feeling'. Read Kastaneda if u dont. Precisely, if u have 3600+ posts in this forum and some created things for Wesnoth, that is really nothing. Its a pity if u taking it too seriously. Many things in life not worth taking it too seriously.

I just asked for advices for not making obviously wrong things. Nothing bad with it.
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Re: How to make your campaign mainline

Post by Ravana »

such non-important thing in real life as just computer game
That would be just the thing to say if you want to be ignored from mainline. This shows you dont (I do not use ' symbol unless situation requires me to, but still capitalize I) care about this game and so are not going to maintain campaign, even if you somehow manage to finish it.

Download size effect would be small, currently core music has larger size than all core campaigns together.

My view is that mainline has to give decent first impression so that user has time to learn to appreciate addons.

However is being in mainline that good thing? I guess that depends on your target group really, but if you aim for people who know some nonstandard strategy then addons server would be better.
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Re: How to make your campaign mainline

Post by Aldarisvet »

2 Ravana
It is too early to speak about maintain. However, i understood that the author of mainline must be trustworthy enough and this is earned with time only. I just wanted to say that some things dont worth conflicting.
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Re: How to make your campaign mainline

Post by iceiceice »

Aldarisvet wrote:It is too early to speak about maintain
:hmm: That's exactly what being mainlined means though. It means that the dev team / someone on the dev team takes responsibility to test that it works in future releases of wesnoth and fix any problems.

Maintaining a campaign takes a fairly small amount of time, but regularly over years -- there's only so much time and interest people have for it.

There's surely a significant political component to getting a campaign mainlined, but that's the practical barrier.

I think it's a little silly to take the point of view "I'm going to make a mainline-quality campaign, but maintanence... is an afterthought." If *you* aren't interested in maintaining it, and planning to do so, or to find someone to do so, that more or less means its not mainline quality, afaict.
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Re: How to make your campaign mainline

Post by Dugi »

Precisely, if u have 3600+ posts in this forum and some created things for Wesnoth, that is really nothing.
I explicitly avoided saying that it's my interpretation, because it is not. To be honest, I was amused. I was wondering what kind of person you are, so I wrote the that you could have insulted something, to see how will you react. Whether you will flame or apologise somebody you could have insulted. You chose flame. You told I have a big ego? Kill yourself with your big ego, you &#@^~! I will not bring this ego matter again to avoid more forum rage.

If it matters, it's not that I tried to submit my campaign to mainline and I failed. I never tried and I don't want to try in the future. Fear of failure is not the reason. As far as I know, nobody submitted any campaign to become mainline for years. Why? Add-on campaigns usually take a somewhat experimental approach to things and unusual stuff is not good for newcomers, it would just confuse them. Add-ons that are not experimental in any way are usually too similar to other mainline campaigns and not needed as additional mainline campaigns. Exceptions exist, Under the Burning Suns is mainline and has a lot of unusual stuff, a drake campaign is thought to become mainline once because there is no real drake campaign there, but those are... exceptions.

And I have written some advice about things you should avoid if you want your work to become mainline. You completely forgot about it in your rage. If you ask for replies and don't react to replies, please understand that it decreases the motivation to reply to you.
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