Hey Tham, and thank you very much for your comments.
Allow me to dissect and break down your feedback into more digestible bits. If you don't agree with any of my interpretations of any of your points or you feel like I've missed some please let me know.
- It is not possible to contribute to Oldtown
- Work on Oldtown is limited to a small number of people
- The style development/testing is not a fair and open process
- There are no detailed style guides being developed
- The Oldtown document is not finished and its development is not public
- There are no means of coordination
- Feedback/concerns are not being addressed
- Expectations are not communicated efficiently enough
1. It is not possible to contribute to Oldtown
Oldtown is still in planning stages. As with any other project or server project before, the majority of the planning is limited to the project leader(s). It is their responsibility to lay out the basic rules and guidelines, as well as develop the styles of the project.
1.1 Terrain
Oldtown has come with an extensive overhaul of the entire south-western Reach, including the Honeywine river and the entire coast line between Bandallon and Cuy. I have always maintained that I do not want to start the city itself before the surroundings weren't completed.
A large part of my presence on the server in the last 3 years were spent working on this overhaul. I asked people (those that have a profound knowledge of terraforming, for obvious reasons) repeatedly for help, and did receive a fair amount of support from people like Fin, Kor, Endy, Simba, Luk and others (please forgive me if your name has escaped me right now.) But the majority of work was done by myself, and it has not been an unusual occurrence that someone would promise to pick up a task, work on it halfway through and then drop it, for me to pick it up and finish it.
1.2 Plotting/Infrastructure
A lot of work has been put into laying out the city walls, the main road network, an extensive freshwater and sewage system and the locations of major landmarks within the city. These things have mostly been done by myself, as the project leaders of other projects or server projects usually do with their projects. It's the natural approach, that the project leader(s) lay out the foundation of a project, and projects like Whiteharbor, King's Landing, Winterfell or Highgarden, just to name a few of the largest ones, have been done exactly like this.
I have indeed attempted to include various people in these steps several times. Unfortunately, especially the less enjoyable tasks, e.g. laying out and building sewer or tunnel systems, have not caused much enthusiasm. Here too I've received some help from various people, and some again have picked up a task only to drop it and disappear halfway through.
1.3 Styles
As with many server builds, community contributions are highly encouraged, and appropriate test areas are usually set up for people to free-build and share their visions. The Oldtown test area, albeit a cluttered mess, is by far the largest area dedicated to a single project in our test world, and has been open for anyone to build.
In the end however, it has always been the project leader(s) who develop and make the final decisions on the styles used in a project, as has been the case with any of our major projects that I can think of, like, again, King's Landing/the Red Keep, Whiteharbor, Highgarden, Winterfell and others.
In some cases project leaders decided to create extensive style guides that showcase the details of a certain style. I have chosen to create these style guides in situ, and this is what is currently in various spots throughout the city.
2. Work on Oldtown is limited to a small number of people
Yes, work on Oldtown is limited to a small number of people. That is because the infrastructure, the styles and many other aspects are still in development. As explained in 1.3, the project leader(s) of a project develop a style first and then it is communicated to the community when a build is started. There are Co- or Sub-Leaders already in place for some of the major landmarks of Oldtown, and others will be picked for other parts of the city later. Naturally, not everybody can become a Co-Leader of the project, and we pick those as carefully as ever - I don't believe it comes as a surprise that the project leader and co-leaders of a server project come largely from the mods and the most active builders on the server.
I am and have been making an effort to include different people in this process beyond the co-leads. I often ask publicly if someone was interested in working on a certain thing, and whenever I am approached my someone who wants to contribute something to Oldtown I go out of my way to try to find a task for them. Having just agreed to work on a model and layout for the Oldtown harbor you ought to know this.
3. The style development/testing is not a fair and open process
The style development is as open as I can make it. Anyone is welcome to test for anything they like, anyone is encouraged to pick up on elements already plotted or presented in the city area and expand on it. It is insofar not an open and fair project that I can not guarantee to use everybody's contributions and visions. I am trying to incorporate as many ideas as possible, and I try to take everyone's input seriously and give it the same amount of consideration, but in the end as a project leader I have to decide what will fit and what won't fit. I don't see anything unusual with this approach.
4. There are no detailed style guides being developed
The development of style guides is happening right now, on site, in various spots around the city. None of these are final, a lot of the stuff present right now will eventually either find other places or disappear entirely. It's a fluent process, and anyone can comment on or contribute to the stuff we're working on if they so desire.
5. The Oldtown document is not finished and its development is not public
I am not going to publish an unfinished document, period. The document's purpose is to present EStoop's and my vision of Oldtown. Once it is published there will be plenty of opportunity to comment on the ideas we present.
You can certainly relate to real life taking its toll on the time and motivation that is required to compile an extensive document on an imaginary city, and I am sure you can understand if we choose to spend more of the free time we have with something that's more fun than the document grind, especially with the additional responsibilities in the community both Stoop (Fairmarket) and I as a Mod have. We're both rather perfectionist people, too, and would rather delay the publication than produce something half-baked.
6. There are no means of coordination
Well, you've found one. On the server yesterday you have further alleged that we had closed the respective Oldtown threads and the Discord. While that is true for the Discord channel - I have opened it up again but I will close it as soon as the discussions are being derailed again - it certainly isn't for the forum threads. These have never been closed, and I have no idea how you had arrived at the conclusion that they were.
If you had looked around the Oldtown sub forum - which, admittedly, could benefit from more traffic and a regularity to updates - you'd have found that we already have a publicly visible Trello board that I maintain somewhat regularly. We also have a Mod-internal Asana board for Oldtown that you yourself set up back when you were spearheading Oldtown efforts as a Mod.
7. Feedback/concerns are not being addressed
I'd like to ask you to provide an example of me flat out ignoring feedback. I don't think it's the case that I have ever brushed aside someone's concerns without engaging in a conversation and trying to remedy the problem as soon as I was made aware of it.
In fact, I receive feedback on all sorts of aspects of the City every day, however minuscule. People will have an idea or an impression, or concerns about all sorts of things, and I have listened to it all. I can not always reply (like I didn't reply to the ideas presented in this thread in the past couple days) the way people would probably like me to, but I read and listen to anything people want to share.
8. Expectations are not communicated efficiently enough
The document lines out our vision and expectations, once completed. The style examples currently in development will explain our vision and expectations, once completed. As explained in 1-4, we're in the process of developing these things, feedback is encouraged, contributions welcome. In the end we will decide on the styles and create explanatory style guides in situ on which people will base their Oldtown builds on. There will be at least one style guide for each District, and I'm currently planning to plotting and build in parts an entire sliver of Oldtown that will showcase both fundamentals of plotting and building, with a focus on transitioning between different density zones. This guide will eventually enable others to contribute not only in building but also plotting.
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(tbc.)
imgur.com
https://imgur.com/a/LPLsvs5
