Yes, they do have to do extra now. If they were to stop making videos daily, that 1.1 million fanbase would simply stop visiting the channel, and they would cease to have pushing power. "Already" having an audience, as you put it, doesn't mean jack shit if the audience isn't paying attention, so they must continue to generate daily content to engage the audience and have the pushing power. As for what their 50% cut is paying for, simply put,
It doesn't fucking matter. You give 50% away and more than double your sales, you come out on top. That's what matters. The notion that we should only give a percentage to an organization to help them is bogus, man. There are plenty of reasons to give a percentage away, and making more money is right up at the top of that list for me personally. It doesn't really matter if they contribute to the creation of the item or not.
Now I am fully aware of the shitty quality tournament items, both past and present, but that is a separate issue, and that is a valve issue.
When i speak of the push, I am referring to actual sales, not getting an item into the game. It didn't matter how big DC was, that lifestealer set wasn't gonna happen for example.
Where we are in agreement is that a lot of shitty stuff is getting into the game, and this is where valve needs to focus its attention. As I said before, this is a sympton of valve's poor quality control and artists pumping out lower quality stuff and bundling it to get it in if they think it wouldn't get accepted otherwise.
Because they have 1.1 Million followers. Don't tell me you think that shit just happened...
Of course becoming a powerful YouTube channel didn't happen overnight. They worked hard for it, as did you and as did every artist here. Becoming an artist and making good quality items doesn't happen over night either.
Working hard is not an excuse for "pushing items in and reducing the chance of other artists getting their stuff in", while they can make money from their YouTube channel, website(advertising, selling stuff), sponsors and what not.
It doesn't fucking matter. You give 50% away and more than double your sales, you come out on top. That's what matters.
That could only be true if every artist had the chance of being offered something like that. When only a few are being offered every time, then what is happening happens.
P.S.1 I knew this situation with workshop would happen, because it can generate a lot of money and whenever something generates a lot of money, well you know the rest. Personally if there are no special treatments (such as getting items in without even publicizing it :poly121:, or having direct contact to check the concepts and items and get straight feedback on how to improve the items :poly141: ) then there is not much problem in my opinion.
P.S.2 I have nothing against DC, they were nice to promote us couple of times already,but I think they are just like every other organization but they are getting a special treatment that most teams and tournaments or even YouTube channels with similar level of attention don't have. This is simply unfair and coming and saying to please not mix us with other organizations, they are bad, we are good is just simply ... Well I don't know what word to chose that can describe it.
P.S.3 Nothing against you, I admire your art more than I can express, but these arguments are in my opinion, invalid.
It doesn't fucking matter. You give 50% away and more than double your sales, you come out on top. That's what matters. The notion that we should only give a percentage to an organization to help them is bogus, man. There are plenty of reasons to give a percentage away, and making more money is right up at the top of that list for me personally. It doesn't really matter if they contribute to the creation of the item or not.
Whether an artist decides to give 50% or 75% to an organization is up to the artist himself. If 50% is imposed by the organization, then its a different matter. Its pressure on the artist to comply rather than good will.
Judging from you've said, you don't mind giving a large percentage solely for advertisement (which is fine, everybody has different reasons for doing different things). I'm not condemning you for doing that, its your choice. All I want is that items be judged based on quality rather than favortism.
The workshop today makes it easier for 3rd parties to take advantage as artists since 3rd parties will have an easier time selling to their followers.
Of course these are valid arguments. The dc stuff that got in would've gotten in anyways, with or without the involvement of DC. So it hasn't reduced the chances of other artists getting stuff in. I also don't know why you quoted that, I don't recall saying they reduced the chances of other artists getting in.
My comments regarding the % were perfectly relevant, because they were as a response to a question of the percentages validity. Furthermore, other artists not being offered a deal with DC is not part of the problem, its part of the solution. The problem is low quality items getting churned out left and right by tournaments, which is PRECISELY because these kinds of offers are in fact being offered to pretty much anyone, regardless of skill level. DC not offering a deal to just anyone only further serves the first point:
Its not reducing anyone's chances, because they only use artists who would get in anyways.
The workshop today makes it easier for 3rd parties to take advantage as artists since 3rd parties will have an easier time selling to their followers.
This is the one bit of truth I've really seen. Nothing that organizations are doing is particularly wrong right now. There are only two real problems.
1: Valve's quality control is painfully inconsistent and sometimes apparently non existent
2: They aren't shipping many sets other than bundles. It used to be a weekly or bi-weekly thing where we would get like 7-14 new sets in the store. Now every month or so we get a chest with questionable quality in a system that really fucks over the higher quality work.
The expand on that last point, take this most recent chest. Some sets are good, some are adequate, and that's fine. Being in a chest spreads the money across a few artists evenly- MOSTLY, more on that later- which encourages, or at the very least, allows artists to make sets for less popular heroes (and prevents us from having a million pudge sets) and still make a decent amount of money. The problem is how valve handles the very rare. Whoever made that Tiny set got fucked. Hard. The other 5 artists in that chest will get money from the chest according to their portion (1/7 i think) in addition to 25% of the total sales for their set in the store. However, the guy who did the tiny set, which is the very rare, only gets from the chest. He will actually make less money than all of the other artists in the chest, even tho valve is using the RNG chest drop to sell more chests USING THE TINY SET as motivation. How fucked is that?
To make matters worse, if memory serves that tiny set was for empire. Which means even without the in store purchase, that guy is making less than every other person in the chest. This is also an issue. Buying into the idea of an organziation "collaboration," we as artists can try to manage how much we give in rev split relative to how much we think they can boost sales. This is advantageous to all parties when done right. More gets sold, valve gets more, artists get more, team gets a cut. Often times the cut given is worth the return, but thats another point. Assuming it did actually work, valve fucks it up when they throw one of those in a chest. Empire fans are far less likely to roll the die repeatedly hoping for that tiny set when they have the chance of getting one of 5 other (some mediocre) sets instead. But lets assume for a moment that empire DID in fact manage to use their power to push more sales on that chest....EVERYONE in the chest benefits from this push, but only the tiny guy (who is already fucked over) has to pay the price.
This just straight up blows. Valve had it right before, TWO chests released simultaneously featuring the same very rare. 8 artists were able to get items in for a variety of heroes, and one guy who did a really standout job got double. Having one chest with all sets available in the store except the very rare is better than the previous setup where it was one chest with like...one set for a very rare and a ward (just like the people wanted!) but now the unlucky soul who did work good enough for valve to deem it as highly valuable....well sucks to be that guy.
These are the real issues we face. The organization witch hunt is a bit damaging in my opinion, as all the commotion about it may steer valve in the wrong direction when the actual problems are quite a bit simpler.
Put in more non organized sets, fix the chest system, stop accepting crap sets.
To make matters worse, if memory serves that tiny set was for empire. Which means even without the in store purchase, that guy is making less than every other person in the chest. This is also an issue. Buying into the idea of an organziation "collaboration," we as artists can try to manage how much we give in rev split relative to how much we think they can boost sales. This is advantageous to all parties when done right. More gets sold, valve gets more, artists get more, team gets a cut. Often times the cut given is worth the return, but thats another point. Assuming it did actually work, valve fucks it up when they throw one of those in a chest. Empire fans are far less likely to roll the die repeatedly hoping for that tiny set when they have the chance of getting one of 5 other (some mediocre) sets instead. But lets assume for a moment that empire DID in fact manage to use their power to push more sales on that chest....EVERYONE in the chest benefits from this push, but only the tiny guy (who is already fucked over) has to pay the price.
Yeah I have never understood the recent trend of adding pro player/team sets as one of the 5-6 drops available in a chest. The whole incentive of those sets is to buy because of your support of a specific player or team.
Personally I think pro team or player sets should show a clear means of collaboration between the third party and the artist. Sets like SingSing's Kunkka set work well in this regard. If you want to support SingSing you can buy his set from the store and he can benefit directly from those sales. Having them randomly drop from chests from teams or pro players you might not of heard of just seems odd.
Of course these are valid arguments. The dc stuff that got in would've gotten in anyways, with or without the involvement of DC.
Judging by so many good quality items that are not getting in and probably won't and judging from some of the items that got in through DC, I must say that I seriously doubt that.
I don't recall saying they reduced the chances of other artists getting in.
I'm sorry I thought I can use "" to emphasize as well. My bad
The problem is low quality items getting churned out left and right by tournaments,
It's not only this, bad quality items always get in (with or without 3rd party).
The bigger issue is 3rd party organizations dominating the workshop and destroying the initial point of the workshop which was supposed to support the artists, make items for their favorite game and make money out of the sales (not out of a contract like an actual job).
Furthermore, other artists not being offered a deal with DC is not part of the problem, its part of the solution.
DC aside, generally speaking, This means that any talented artist who doesn't have connections has to leave = against what workshop supposed to be.
The sad point is that this is not the survival of fittest, it is the survival of the one with more connections in his/her add list.
BTW, your silence about them receiving special treatments and breaking the rules, leads me to believe that I mention the right point.
You know all the things that I'm saying is to support this community from a logical point of view. At the end of the day I personally don't mind them doing what they are doing, they were smart(or whatever) enough to do whatever they are doing, so be it! But then coming here and saying "don't mix us up with other organizations, we don't do wrong (lol) and etc" and then worse than that an inspiring artist like you coming and defend them with arguments that was mentioned, just destroys my day.
The other 5 artists in that chest will get money from the chest according to their portion (1/7 i think) in addition to 25% of the total sales for their set in the store. However, the guy who did the tiny set, which is the very rare, only gets from the chest. He will actually make less money than all of the other artists in the chest, even tho valve is using the RNG chest drop to sell more chests USING THE TINY SET as motivation. How fucked is that?
I have been wondering about that too. Are we absolutely sure that the creators of such very rare items only get 1/7th ? I would assume that Valve would, somehow, attempt to balance this out ...
It would also be nice if there was more consistency regarding off-chest availability of sets. Some can be purchased directly from the store and the pre-game menu, some can't .
As for dealing with third parties (branded items and/or ticket bundles), I expressed my opinion on this before but I'll sum it up as follows : Such collaborations can be very interesting, and very good things can come out of them. But I think there is fundamental problem with the idea of a cut being taken from the artists' share. I wish that such third parties would be more proactive at talking to Valve about adding them to the contributors list, so that they could get their fair cut without chipping away at the share of the content creators.
If the cut pays off, then I could care less. I just don't see how a standard of 50% CAN pay off for most deals. Of course, determining percentages should be handled on a case by case basis, but it's also good to just talk about this - it's raising awareness for artists about what the standards are and how they can best protect themselves and their interests.
About the point that "DC gets rejected items too!": The level of communication Valve has with tournaments and organizations exceeds the level that they communicate with the artists. They were told that single items weren't going to be accepted for tournaments going forward.They were also told that items for Slardar would not be accepted. They get feedback on their sets, and know if it's rejected or if needs revisions. This is just more tournament/organization favoritism. How many posts here in this thread have asked for more valve communication? How many people have mentioned wanting more feedback on their items? How many people have mentioned learning about unspoken workshop changes from tournament organizers? This is another point of contention that goes beyond "quality of sets" or "expedited admissions" to the game, and it's strange to be so close to the creation process and yet so distant from information regarding changes to it.
I think the overall low quality of tournament and organization bundles is a symptom of this. Artists can see its a raw deal, so the ones that really don't need any help in getting things in pass on any deal and the lower quality stuff gets in. Now that's on artists. If you feel like you are getting a raw deal with a tournament, don't take the deal. If you are compelled to do it because you are worried about not getting accepted otherwise, then its on you to put more time into making your set worth getting accepted.
This is what it sounds like you're saying:
Problem: Tournaments get held to a lower standard for their affiliated items.
Solution: Artists should make higher quality items.
Shouldn't the solution be: Tournaments should be held to the same standard as independent artists for their items.
I have been wondering about that too. Are we absolutely sure that the creators of such very rare items only get 1/7th ? I would assume that Valve would, somehow, attempt to balance this out.
It would also be nice if there was more consistency regarding off-chest availability of sets. Some can be purchased from the store, some can't ...
I could've sworn I read something on Valve's faq before that said that artists get paid based on what valve determines their contribution to be. @.@ But I can't find it anymore. I'm under the impression that the rare items in the chests get paid out a higher percentage than the rest, but I don't have any facts to back that up.
BTW, your silence about them receiving special treatments and breaking the rules, leads me to believe that I mention the right point.
Cheers :thumbup:
I feel like I have to continually say the same shit over and over again. I have already addressed this. They didn't break the rules, Valve did. Valve does it all the time. They make the rules they do whatever the fuck they want with them. The workshop bypass thing was because of some huge fuckup in communication that necessitated such a bypass due to time constraints.
As for all your other counter points....
There are for sure some DC sets that I think are questionable, but are still better than half the crap that gets pushed through, tourney based or otherwise. They would've gotten in eventually.
The rest of your points I have already addressed. Multiple times in some cases, but I will address one of these again
This means that any talented artist who doesn't have connections has to leave = against what workshop supposed to be.
The sad point is that this is not the survival of fittest, it is the survival of the one with more connections in his/her add list
No it doesn't. Getting those connections is crazy easy. In fact, there is a thread on here devoted specifically to that. Anybody who has ever posted a tourny bundle has their contact information on the submission page. Just click on their name on the workshop, and send them a message. Its not hard. ANYONE can try. If you are good, you will probably get a shot. Hell even if you straight suck you will probably get a shot. There are at this point as many organizations as there are actual talented artists, but it brings me back to a previous point. Most of them aren't worth it, and you need a level of desperation to work with many of them, which means you aren't confident that you would get in on your own. If afterwards someone elects to stop, or can't get things in anymore....that is fucking survival of the fittest.
I get that you want to support the community, but your "logical point of view" is only partially informed and suffers from terrible tunnel vision. Have you considered that valve making tons of fucking money is good for the community? Have you considered how that money, going into events like the international, increases the size and collective income of the community at an absurd rate? Capital builds business, valve having more of it is better for the community.
Sorry that this ruined your day, the truth tends to suck.
I just don't see how a standard of 50% CAN pay off for most deals
As I have said, MULTIPLE times, it usually doesn't.
Where the issue comes up is when an organization thinks they are anywhere near that level and demand 50% as well and don't do jack shit to promote it. Many organizations aren't worth their salt,
Most of them aren't worth it
Not likely on a ticket tho, as tickets are still bullshit all around until valve takes the time to ensure that the rev split goes in favor of the artist after the tournament is over
Not sure How i can get much more clear on that. Organizations are generally not worth it.
This is what it sounds like you're saying:
Problem: Tournaments get held to a lower standard for their affiliated items.
Solution: Artists should make higher quality items.
Shouldn't the solution be: Tournaments should be held to the same standard as independent artists for their items.
No, that's definitely not what I am saying. What I said was,
Where the issue comes up is when an organization thinks they are anywhere near that level and demand 50% as well and don't do jack shit to promote it.(this is what I state is a problem) Many organizations aren't worth their salt, and I feel that when speaking of the majority of artists' collective dissent to the bullshit going on with organizations and the workshop, DC gets lumped in with others than genuinely deserve a raised eyebrow, even if they don't (and they don't) deserve it themselves. I think the overall low quality of tournament and organization bundles is a symptom of this.(this is, at the risk of being terribly redundant, where I explain a symptom of this problem) Artists can see its a raw deal, so the ones that really don't need any help in getting things in pass on any deal and the lower quality stuff gets in. Now that's on artists. If you feel like you are getting a raw deal with a tournament, don't take the deal. If you are compelled to do it because you are worried about not getting accepted otherwise, then its on you to put more time into making your set worth getting accepted(this is not a solution to low quality items getting in, this is a solution to not gettin taken advantage of by organizations).
That is very different. There are multiple problems, are you have mismatched one potential solution to a very different problem is your summation of what you think i said.
So it's basically arbitrary. The other artists in the chest may not be receiving a 1/7 split of the revenue either.
No, thats not what that says. What that says is the rev split is variable from game to game, not the rev split is variable between artists contributing to the same game. Very very different things.
So unless valve says otherwise, i would say yes it is in fact a 1/7th rev split and I think it deserves their attention, and some alterations if they are going to continue with chests like this.
I feel like I have to continually say the same shit over and over again. I have already addressed this. They didn't break the rules, Valve did. Valve does it all the time. They make the rules they do whatever the fuck they want with them. The workshop bypass thing was because of some huge fuckup in communication that necessitated such a bypass due to time constraints.
You might be right. There are other more likely possibilities that I won't bother mentioning cause DC ppl are such good boys and I shouldn't mix them up with other greedy organizations. lol
I won't discuss this further with you since you are clearly angry and I have respect for you and don't want our first interaction to be so aggressive.
As for the last paragraph, by community I meant artist community. Also it wasn't the so called "truth" that ruined my day, it was people trying to twist the crystal clear "truth".
You might be right. There are other more likely possibilities that I won't bother mentioning cause DC ppl are such good boys and I shouldn't mix them up with other greedy organizations. lol
I won't discuss this further with you since you are clearly angry and I have respect for you and don't want our first interaction to be so aggressive.
As for the last paragraph, by community I meant artist community. Also it wasn't the so called "truth" that ruined my day, it was people trying to twist the crystal clear "truth".
Take it easy man :thumbup:
I'm actually not angry at all. I'm just very blunt and prone to profanity.
I do however take some offense by your statement about twisting "crystal clear truth." Thats a lofty accusation, especially since the truth in anything regarding the workshop is never crystal clear.
Holy shit dude, I was agreeing with you that saying that it'll generally suck. Calm the fuck down.
(this is not a solution to low quality items getting in, this is a solution to not gettin taken advantage of by organizations).
So. Your solution is "don't work with the organizations, and work harder." That's a given. The solution to the wider problem is that tournaments should be held to the same standard as independent artists for their items.
So unless valve says otherwise, i would say yes it is in fact a 1/7th rev split and I think it deserves their attention, and some alterations if they are going to continue with chests like this.
Unless valve says otherwise, I say it is not a 1/7th revenue split. See how that works? But sure, if it's an issue, it should be addressed too.
Holy shit dude, I was agreeing with you that saying that it'll generally suck. Calm the fuck down.
So. Your solution is "don't work with the organizations, and work harder." That's a given. The solution to the wider problem is that tournaments should be held to the same standard as independent artists for their items.
Unless valve says otherwise, I say it is not a 1/7th revenue split. See how that works? But sure, if it's an issue, it should be addressed too.
Was calm, still am.
As I said, that is one possible solution to a VERY specific problem many have complained about, which is being taken advantage of by organizations.
The wider problems as I said earlier are:
1: Valve's quality control is painfully inconsistent and sometimes apparently non existent
2: They aren't shipping many sets other than bundles. It used to be a weekly or bi-weekly thing where we would get like 7-14 new sets in the store. Now every month or so we get a chest with questionable quality in a system that really fucks over the higher quality work.
and the simple solution is:
Put in more non organized sets, fix the chest system, stop accepting crap sets.
And finally...
Unless valve says otherwise, I say it is not a 1/7th revenue split. See how that works? But sure, if it's an issue, it should be addressed too.
Yes, I see how that works. Not very well in your case, as you are basing your assumption off of an incorrect reading of valves rev split agreement, whereas I am basing my assumption off of how they have split the revenue for the three chests I have been in. Either way, it needs to be addressed. Either explained to show that Tiny dude isn't getting fucked over, or changed so that those in that position in the future don't.
Their rev split agreement works within the context of a single game. "Your split is determined by game developer (Valve)". The fact that they never specifically address chests doesn't help your argument any more than it hurts mine.
Katze did a ton of work on the tiny set to cover all of his ult forms, and it would be a shame if he was shafted.
I do however take some offense by your statement about twisting "crystal clear truth." Thats a lofty accusation, especially since the truth in anything regarding the workshop is never crystal clear.
Well don't get offended, cause I wasn't talking about you. You were just arguing your point and as I said I thought (and think) that the argument was invalid.
The one acting like he hasn't done anything wrong was the one twisting the "truth", and he shouldn't get offended too, cause there is no offense here.
Chillax
Their rev split agreement works within the context of a single game. "Your split is determined by game developer (Valve)". The fact that they never specifically address chests doesn't help your argument any more than it hurts mine.
Katze did a ton of work on the tiny set to cover all of his ult forms, and it would be a shame if he was shafted.
Again, that is referring to the set rate at with you split revenue with VALVE, not the other artists. You are assuming they are going to alter the way chest rev is split among artists (which, again, is not what the article you linked, the entire basis of your assumption, is referring to). You are giving the benefit of the doubt to valve that they wouldn't shaft Katze in a thread about the various ways in which workshoppers feel shafted by valve.Even tho all previous chests indicate this is not how it works, and the volume of work for a set has never had any bearing on its price.
Well don't get offended, cause I wasn't talking about you. You were just arguing your point and as I said I thought (and think) that the argument was invalid.
The one acting like he hasn't done anything wrong was the one twisting the "truth", and he shouldn't get offended too, cause there is no offense here.
Chillax
Ok, all good. Still don't know what you are talking about but its fine. And still, I am calm.
Twitch is definitely more appealing to watch than dota TV. Anyways the problem is that tourneys are on a different level than items are, always will be. Even the super tiny baby ones.
The point of contention comes from items associated with tickets, so I get that. Right now the current system of having the set sold seperately on store totally fixes that issue I think, it's a win win. You want the set, you buy set, you want ticket, you buy ticket.
The second issue with communication: It's intergral to who valve is as a company. Valve has always lacked a strong communication channel with pretty much everything. This exists in licensing the Source Engine, it existed when modding was huge like xbox, it was an issue with outside companies DIRECTLY WORKING with valve, and it continues to exist now thru the TF2 workshop, and the present day ones.
It's a flat structure issue, 10/10. But tangent aside there, okay, let's say that valve gets serious about communication with artists. A couple of problems crop up there. You'll start seeing this large disparity in artists that get feedback, and ones that don't. When a service like that becomes available, just try and imagine the amount of artists emailing valve asking PLS GIF FEEDBACK. There also becomes this issue of expectancy. "Me getting feedback equals my set having a stronger chance going into the game" It creates a strange atmosphere. This large rift grows between artists that are good, and artists that are not.
Going back to what I said about tickets and stuff; they're on a different level because it's a complete and total separate aspect to the lifeblood of dota. Cosmetics are being sold because they make money, but aren't necessary. Growing the competitive scene probably brings more players overall to the game itself, because these events have further reaching impacts than cosmetics do. There are probably other factors to consider, but valve providing feedback to ticket organizers isn't really as unfair as it sounds.
That being all said though, I do think there's a possibility for valve to provide a level of feedback to all artists, but would probably have to be something super minor, and less personal than private emailing. It would have to be something on a workshop level, which technically is already what dev comments are for.
I know I didn't fully explain the process the chest went through to get to release before, but it's not as simple and forced as maybe it seemed from my earlier post. Or desperate, for that matter.
There were a number of artists approached about this, and all of the work submitted for evaluation was work that was popular and well-received in the workshop. BTS didn't choose what sets went into the chest, they chose the artists they wanted to work with, and Valve had the final say in everything from a large spread of sets. I believe they might even have made suggestions of their own. At an early point there was talk about possibly having two chests because of the amount of possible content, but this obviously didn't happen. Cuts were made by Valve as expected, and some artists were excluded in the end.
Valve doesn't accept anything and everything that's put in front of them, and to say that a lot of what makes it into the game these days, either with regular chests, or with tournament bundles, is "crap" is extremely insulting to a lot of the artists here. I've heard rejection stories from organizers going through Valve's quality control process all the time.
In the end, yes, tournament organizers are the only ones with the ability to put something in front of Valve and ask "Can you put this in the game?" They can't, however, force anything to happen, and oftentimes, they end up in a desperate situation without anything to bundle at the last minute because of numerous rejections.
It's fine if you have a problem with Valve's quality control, I don't always agree with it either, but to blame it on the artists, the organizers, and the people who vote for and want to see these sets in the game, is a bit much.
Personally speaking, my decision to accept BTS's offer wasn't out of fear that my sets wouldn't meet Valve's quality standards, it was because Valve was showing less and less interest in accepting any community content at all, and instead, choosing to push a lot of Arcana releases in place of regular chests. I know I don't exactly represent the most popular opinion here, but I don't regret my decision at all, in fact it's worked out well for me.
When a service like that becomes available, just try and imagine the amount of artists emailing valve asking PLS GIF FEEDBACK. There also becomes this issue of expectancy. "Me getting feedback equals my set having a stronger chance going into the game" It creates a strange atmosphere. This large rift grows between artists that are good, and artists that are not.
Sure - but 'more communication' doesn't necessarily mean 'more communication with individuals'. I think most of us would be happy with just a few more posts on the Dota blog along the lines of the New Bloom call to arms, for instance.
After all, artistic feedback is fully covered by the pdf art guides already available.
10 days since last DC's workshop weekly top 5. You guys just proved a point right here.
I don't get it. Why is this part of the issue?
SUNSfan is somewhat right in that we sorta lump DC together with the rest of the organisations, but that is for good reason - the issue is not about DC doing what they do. Nor is it really about organisations scamming artists (though that's bad too and is addressed in Drywall's post). The issue is that the system empowers organisations in such a way that they can step in as middlemen holding all the power resulting in situations that we have now. This is what enables community powerhouses like DC to hold all the sway, and lets tournament organisers negotiate favourably with inexperienced artists who don't know better. And the system does not need to be that way.
So with that in mind, where does DC delaying its workshop top 5 (for any amount of reasons I might add, like being busy with the XMG CD tourney) fit into the proving of a point?
Let's not miss the forest for the trees and unnecessarily dramatize this.
Pior is also right in that a small amount of communication from Valve might help. It would not need to be case-by-case critiques of every item, but feedback on their state of mind that will help stabilise the guidelines for item acceptance. Less uncertainty over what would help an item get into Dota 2 would enable artists to be more confident in their work and less reliant on finding round-the-back methods of getting in like tournament tickets.
The guidelines might have been set in the early stages of the workshop via the pdf guides, however the guidelines seem to have evolved and this hasn't been communicated clearly. The only hints we have are looking at what does get into the game, and by observing those results in a black box it appears that many of the guidelines outlined in the pdfs are regularly flouted. This uncertainty with the "normal" process, combined with how tournament tickets and organisation chests appear to force communication from Valve means that partnering with an organisation seems more appealing to those not in the know. So it's no surprise that even if some artists stop partnering with organisations there will always be others who would.
It's just like what I used to hear about the state of the freelance CG industry a few years ago where experienced artists were constantly feeling like they were being priced out of a job by less experienced artists who forced market rates to plunge because they didn't understand the value of their own work. Even if all the polycounters woke up tomorrow and decided to boycott every organisation it wouldn't solve anything. There would be other workshoppers waiting for the opportunity to get their own stuff into the game. I suppose it's quite fitting that this somewhat mirrors the discussion about tournament oversaturation that has been going on with pro players and communities like reddit.
Personally speaking, my decision to accept BTS's offer wasn't out of fear that my sets wouldn't meet Valve's quality standards, it was because Valve was showing less and less interest in accepting any community content at all, and instead, choosing to push a lot of Arcana releases in place of regular chests. I know I don't exactly represent the most popular opinion here, but I don't regret my decision at all, in fact it's worked out well for me.
The problems was that you felt like you needed to give your set to BTS. Partnering up with an organization meant having an easier time getting an item into the game. Even with Valve's stricter policy for 3rd party things. As you said, that you accepted BTS's offer because Valve didn't really release any community chests.
Sure - but 'more communication' doesn't necessarily mean 'more communication with individuals'. I think most of us would be happy with just a few more posts on the Dota blog along the lines of the New Bloom call to arms, for instance.
After all, artistic feedback is fully covered by the pdf art guides already available.
100% agree
That would've actually been nice to have a page of things not to do with the new bloom stuff (with some examples), And as teabuscuit point out
About the point that "DC gets rejected items too!": The level of communication Valve has with tournaments and organizations exceeds the level that they communicate with the artists. They were told that single items weren't going to be accepted for tournaments going forward. They were also told that items for Slardar would not be accepted. They get feedback on their sets, and know if it's rejected or if needs revisions. This is just more tournament/organization favoritism.
Valve could have easily said that in a blog post....
I just wish player sets got in more frequently. If they can live off doing their thing, and not off prize money, then tournaments wouldn't need to do hats to increase ticket sales to fund prize pools and all that.
But larger prize pools entice viewers, so it's kinda a pie in the sky hope.
As for tournaments and hats, I have been against the idea since I did a tourney ticket back in 2013. I changed my stance to player hats being a larger priority.
In the end the hats is the seller. How the hat is marketed in the store is another huge seller.
SUNSfan is somewhat right in that we sorta lump DC together with the rest of the organizations, but that is for good reason - the issue is not about DC doing what they do. Nor is it really about organizations scamming artists (though that's bad too and is addressed in Drywall's post). The issue is that the system empowers organizations in such a way that they can step in as middlemen holding all the power resulting in situations that we have now. This is what enables community powerhouses like DC to hold all the sway, and lets tournament organizers negotiate favorably with inexperienced artists who don't know better. And the system does not need to be that way.
So with that in mind, where does DC delaying its workshop top 5 (for any amount of reasons I might add, like being busy with the XMG CD tourney) fit into the proving of a point?
Let's not miss the forest for the trees and unnecessarily dramatize this.
They had time to analyze the new patch and upload 3 videos about it. Not sure how an easier weekly workshop video would be an issue. You must be naive to not see it. The moment this blew up here from the "vocal minority", chances are they decided to not do it. I could be wrong, but the shadow of pulling power moves like these are always present. I can't what they can pull off if someone pissed them off on a submission scale! Imagine when going to organizations is the way to go. Such power is scary and will alienate a lot of artists.
You made me spell this out for you despite it being so obvious. I don't care if you state otherwise. Stop putting roses around a clear and immediate concern.
You know what would be rather nice. Is an Artist appreciation month. We seem to have seasonal/festival, 3rd party months, but not one that says "we appreciate workshop artists"
Add 2 chests, one that contains only veterans work, and another that's just for people new to the workshop (with zero accepted sets). Good way for newbies to break in and also for the community to thank the vet's for their continual work output.
And while they are at it, post on the blog an encouragement for fan's to favortite/follow artists ( as well as put a follow button on the collections page!!!). The more they encourage fans to like/follow artists work, the better chance they will buy sets, and make more money for both valve and the artist.
i think what toasty said is a good point, but actualy its not only about volvo. its also about us. i mean we are the polycount community, a community of the greatest and hardest working people out there why are we self unable to do a "polcycount content chest" from time to time and promote it propper? for example andrew and those redmoon guys did it alot this year. they even invited other artists into it and had great output.
i am 99% sure that if we would offer volvo such things, they would take it - the fucking same way they are taking the dc chest.
Yay! Polycount chests!...notice the "s"......chests........
In all seriousness however, we can look back at valves history as a company and the way they prefer to interact with their gaming community. It's always been a fairly hands off, keep in the background work method. They create options and avernues for players and communities to interact with their products and services (mods, workshop, filmaker). They know as a company the best way to keep customers is to allow them become engaged and interact with the products.
Valve is not going step in and dramatically change anything on the workshop. Valve is waiting for the customers to become creative, engage and build things for themselves . If we ask valve to create/change anything to favor artists, there is a very good chance it will be ignored. The Tournament groups/Youtube channels are a good example of this in action. They have been proactive and have created something that builds engagement with Valves. Because of this Valve speaks to them and assists where they reasonably can.
If we create Polycount chests ("s") ourselves as a community and present them they have a good chance of being accepted.
Perhaps a new big polycount comp is in order? Vets vs Newbies. Top 6-7 on each side are submitted with the 2 chests to valve.
They had time to analyze the new patch and upload 3 videos about it. Not sure how an easier weekly workshop video would be an issue. You must be naive to not see it. The moment this blew up here from the "vocal minority", chances are they decided to not do it. I could be wrong, but the shadow of pulling power moves like these are always present. I can't what they can pull off if someone pissed them off on a submission scale! Imagine when going to organizations is the way to go. Such power is scary and will alienate a lot of artists.
You made me spell this out for you despite it being so obvious. I don't care if you state otherwise. Stop putting roses around a clear and immediate concern.
On the contrary I was completely aware of the insinuations you were making with your post. I'll try to be clearer - I believe that not only are such accusations unfounded, they also don't help. I'd have hoped that my post would express that.
For one, I should think that DC wouldnt even have time to go about making petty political power plays. As you mentioned they just did several patch analysis videos and on the day they were due to release a workshop weekly they were also about to launch their next major tournament. I'm very much inclined to think that they are very busy with everything. However if you have evidence to support your accusations I could be convinced otherwise.
The other point I'd wanted to make was even if someone did do something to address the issue of DC holding their workshop weekly hostage it would merely be fixing a symptom instead of looking for a cure. It'd make you and me and them feel like shit because of all the negativity, and lets say they commit to doing a workshop weekly on time every week from now till eternity - it still doesnt matter. There will be someone else who can come along and pull off something similar. That would just be a whole new drama and we start from square one.
I say fix the system that gives rise to such situations. This is not rosey at all - I'm accusing Valve (a company I hugely admire, respect, and want to work for) of having let us down. I'm not trying to sweeten anything - i'm trying to be focused on what the real issue is here. Cut through the drama and get to the root of the issue. DC does appear to be a juicy, convenient target for criticism. I suggest we don't get distracted by that and focus on the real issues at hand.
i imagine a new patch is infinitely more interesting to most players than the weekly hat parade
hey BOY! Wanna play homework game? Start by checking how many times they skipped weekly workshop top 5.
Then come here flex all you please.
@Snowstorm: Well, I am bringing about a serious issue, it has been proven in the past how DC plays favorites. They do pull power plays and will continue to do so if Valve doesn't downplay organizations role in this workshop. You might think I am taking the focus away from the main issue but the truth is, it is the very same you are concerned about, just from a different angle.
Oh come on, don't make me play Grandpa now..well.. even though I could very well be one of the oldest here...
Don't make me go get my stick!, you people's play nice, and remember life isn't worth getting this serious about. oh wait... maybe it was the other way about.. anywho's fuk it, either way it's not worth it. I'm losing track in my old age.. now where did I leave my cuppa tea...anyone else suddenly feel like cake? mmm delicious cake.
They had time to analyze the new patch and upload 3 videos about it. Not sure how an easier weekly workshop video would be an issue. You must be naive to not see it. The moment this blew up here from the "vocal minority", chances are they decided to not do it. I could be wrong, but the shadow of pulling power moves like these are always present. I can't what they can pull off if someone pissed them off on a submission scale! Imagine when going to organizations is the way to go. Such power is scary and will alienate a lot of artists.
You made me spell this out for you despite it being so obvious. I don't care if you state otherwise. Stop putting roses around a clear and immediate concern.
I told myself I'd never come here again but this was sent to me and I HAD to respond. Holy wow talk about paranoia. FYI the workshop weekly, A-Z, and Fails were not posted this week. We will ALWAYS prioritize current patch videos over series shows. Why? Because they are current and relevant to what the dota community want to see at the moment. And if that means pushing our regular shows til the next week then so be it. Second, Neil is traveling home for the holidays. He is our video editor and couldn't get them ready before he left for home. And third, we have the semi-finals and grand finals of our tournament. If you check out our youtube channel, we've been posting videos about that. We can only post so much video content before it creates "spam" on people's feed. We don't like that.
We'd never stoop so low as to hold or cancel a show we enjoy just because some people here have issues they feel we're responsible for. I don't know how many times I, SUNSfan, or others have to reiterate over and over. It saddens me that I came here thinking that this would be a great place to learn and socialize but instead I felt ostracized. I'm not the only one either. What kind of community do you have that you create an environment that grows paranoia, greed, bitterness and jealousy? Clearly, a not very good one.
I told myself I'd never come here again but this was sent to me and I HAD to respond. Holy wow talk about paranoia. FYI the workshop weekly, A-Z, and Fails were not posted this week. We will ALWAYS prioritize current patch videos over series shows. Why? Because they are current and relevant to what the dota community want to see at the moment. And if that means pushing our regular shows til the next week then so be it. Second, Neil is traveling home for the holidays. He is our video editor and couldn't get them ready before he left for home. And third, we have the semi-finals and grand finals of our tournament. If you check out our youtube channel, we've been posting videos about that. We can only post so much video content before it creates "spam" on people's feed. We don't like that.
We'd never stoop so low as to hold or cancel a show we enjoy just because some people here have issues they feel we're responsible for. I don't know how many times I, SUNSfan, or others have to reiterate over and over. It saddens me that I came here thinking that this would be a great place to learn and socialize but instead I felt ostracized. I'm not the only one either. What kind of community do you have that you create an environment that grows paranoia, greed, bitterness and jealousy? Clearly, a not very good one.
Well... I got guts to say I am sorry
Maybe I am directing my frustration at current workshop status to some big beacon!
All this thread is one big bullshit. People are people and they will do what they want and collab with whoever they want to. Any regulations will only resault in some shady way to bypass them. Worth noteing is that even many artists here use 3rd party names to their advantage. Like recently uploaded ward chest to workshop that is supposed to be made by polycount community. Sorry but there was no thread about it here so how is it suppose to be Polycount Community Chest?!
What I could suggest is that workshop should have check-box that artist could state that uploaded set can be used in tournaments. Than depending on prize pool and other factors tournament hosts could request from Valve set or bundle for their event. Set would be choosen by Valve alone from workshop like every other sets are right now. Strict splits should be than aplied to revenue split.
However still that would not solve issue of pro player sets that are also some kind of bypass of standard acceptance process. Also one could argue that situation where only most popular players get their sets is also unfair.
Terracotta said that his sets would be accepted anyway. I dont doubt that because his work is top notch but that could be otherwise in many situations I saw.
@Konras: I dont think all this thread is one big bullshit. In fact I believe it has some valid points that stand and need adressing in one way or another. It also has some good ideas in it aswell.
Concerning all the organizer workshop paranoia, calm the fuck down everybody. no need to just throw rude accusations around. we all know there are shady working ppl out there, just by blaming them nothin' changes.
I repeat myself when I say: Every artist has a choice, either to give into doubt and fear and desperation or to fuckin' stand by his art and believe in the quality of his own product and thus not selling out.
My personal opinion on content creation based on other ppls original content in the context of youtube money and marketing. welp, its just the fucked up internet that could come up with such shit.
Concerning Ike_Ike: everybody knows he is a donger raising hoodlum from down under, nuff said :P
i think that creative and constructive positive thinking for a solution is more useful in our situation.
thats why i took a bit time to go more into detail about my idea:
the current Polycount Monthly Community Competition:
over the last months more and more people have been unhappy with the polycount contest.
reasons for that have been:
- the not anymore existing single item chests!
- leck of communication and criticism during the running months
- last day submissions
- delayed price judging
- ...
allover that contest doesnt seem to fit anymore into the current situation.
my idea would be to rebuild the contest to fit into the current workshop situation:
the NEW Polycount Community Chest Series #1:
(or any other possible name, i know there have been a polycount chest before)
the goal would be to have a chest with 10 sets inside (maybe +1 2 more so valve can choose if they dont like something) and 2 specials (rare drop - very rare drop) that could be either set, ward or courier.
the period of former one month is not enough time for many of us to create something big like a set. and it is also not needed to use such a hard deadline. i could imagine we could try it with quarters (3 months per chest / 4x chests a year). so we could even use season themed stuff: spring-, summer-, autumn- and winterchest. ofc its not a must, i could also think of actual changing themes. we can be creative here. i mean we are the fucking artists^^ if we can not come up with great and unique ideas... who can?
ive thought long about the next point:
the pool of artists inside a chest should be mixed. in my first idea there were 2 chests, like one chest made from veterans, and another from newcomers, but i think that would create more borders then helping anyone.
first of all because the veteran chest would be mostlikly the "good" one that people would want to buy and the newcomer chest would end up unused.
by mixing, the lead (theme, chest artwork, common layouts, deadlines,..) could be taken by veterans. its also alot easier for someone new to get into something like that if u do not have think about everything but can just focus on the own part. so at the end/start of each quarter there could be created a new thread with a list and people could sign in if they like to take part. they should write what they can deliver like *concept artist* *modeler* *animation*... and build teams (either the teams are build by the veterans who lead the project, or the teams are build by the signing people itself). and then the work starts. people use the thread the next 3months to give each other feedback and at the end of the quater the whole polycount community can vote for which submissions they want to see in the chest (or some polycount guys like thiago, anuxi,... choose it). ofc it should be a combination of veteran submissions as well as newcommer submissions.
finally when the quarter is over and the chest is chosen, it should be submitted to the workshop and promoted by polycount and also on reddit and other social media. so the whole thing becomes a real public event, and less something that happens behind closed doors (like the current competition, nearly nobody of the dota community even knows about it).
and the cycle starts again.
lets be a real community and work together instead of against.
The ORIGINAL problem here is that the workshop was created to attract artists to make content for Valve's games. TF2 Workshop worked perfectly well in that manner and the main contributors were, as it should be, artists. However, since TF2 doesn't have a competitive scene as Dota2 there were no tickets, as far as I know. Dota2 is competitive, there should be tickets for tournaments, that's normal. The problem starts when organizations/tournaments have the upper hand in content acceptance that is AGAIN created by the artists. Of course, all is done to maximize profit. That's why tournament bundles came. Of course tickets will sell more when there are cosmetics attached to them. It's logical. But the problem is that tournaments/organizations abuse their popularity and force artists to work for them at unfair rates. You forget that without the artist your chest/ticket bundle would be non-existent. And why does Valve prioritize organization/tournament bundles? It's not because they value artists more. It's because they profit more. The concept of the workshop was for ARTISTS to create content. Not for ORGANIZATIONS/TOURNAMENTS to have priority. Because the ONLY providers of content are Valve and the workshop ARTISTS. However, Valve cannot compete with the amount of work artists are uploading each month on the workshop. That's why they made the workshop. It's not normal that people agree to work with tournaments/organizations in order to INCREASE the chances of their items getting accepted. It's not normal. The adequate situation would be artists to have priority. Because they are the provider of content. Without artists there would be no chests, no sets, no TOURNAMENT bundles, no ORGANIZATION bundles. Don't abuse the artists.
There are a ton of good points raised across the length of this thread, and possible initiatives to combat the current state of things. I think a lot of them are becoming overshadowed by negativity and angry venting.
Since I joined this forum back in March, I've seen a lot of positive thinking and interactions, but also huge spikes of hostility and finger-pointing brought on by Valve's silence, questionable decisions, and the state of the workshop. I know Polycount can be a really positive, constructive community, but at its worst, in times like these, it pushes a lot of people away, and paints the community as a whole in a really negative light.
I think when someone like Shock brings up a constructive idea, it warrants serious discussion, and I hope everyone can take some time to either add to it or come up with some of their own solutions.
First of all, i really dont think this is a valid comparison, between these 2 sets, the es set, while only has 4 slots, has very decent textures and a huge job on the particles part ( which i think is the main reason for that price at that time). The pudge set has 7 slots and 5 alternate styles, however, has kinda blurred textures and inverted normal map, and the particles work is limited, which left me thinking that (just my assumption) it was hasted, carelessly made and the reason it has that price is the huge amount of items the set ships and a tiny bit of particles work. ( not to add while pudge is, if not the most popular hero in the game, es isnt)
The volume of work for each hero set has never been fair since the beginning, and it's clearly not us artist's fault, why pudge doesnt have only 4 slots instead of 7, why es doesn have 6-7 slots instead of 4? No one said you have to make a huge ass, complex as hell hat instead of a simple one as long as it fit with other items in a set and the original idea/concept.
Back to the main reason of this thread, you guys have already said all the thing i wanted to say, but the thing is, while this thread is meant to be deliverred to valve, so they might consider to do sth ( or nothing at all) about this workshop situation, i dont see many focus on discussing what should we do about this ( maybe here, or in a new thread), because clearly it's our problem as well - not just valve's.
I personally do like the idea of a big contest just like the one polycount and valve did years ago, everyone has a shot, and the best sets come out, guarenteed to get in.
By making this a yearly thing ( or half a year or any reasonable amount of time) we should get a strong communication, feedbacks and comments on our work by valve, and on their current state of the workshop/what they want, what they dont. It should push the quality bar and get rid of the low quality sets, and raise the awareness of ppl/players/organizations that we are deserved more attention/benefit ( same case happened with the big guys of the workshop in the early state by that big contest i assume).
Of course this alone will not solve all of the problems that the workshop is having right now, and of course Valve have to agree with this idea, but i really think the chances are high and i personally dont see why valve wouldnt do this. Just my 2 cents.
It saddens me that I came here thinking that this would be a great place to learn and socialize but instead I felt ostracized. I'm not the only one either. What kind of community do you have that you create an environment that grows paranoia, greed, bitterness and jealousy? Clearly, a not very good one.
If you came here to learn and to improve your skills in art, and to socialize ONLY on this dota2 subforum of polycount then, wow, you're missing out A LOT. And the environment you're talking about is in a subforum, where most of the people competing each other day by day so that at the end of the day, their work could be appreciated and they could get some money for that, so what do you really expect ? And your assumption on this particular part over the whole community of polycount is, i must say, inappropriate.
edit: writing the comment before shock's above comment, would very much like this to happen too if valve would not like to back the contest.
The main things I would like to see change is for Valve to judge the Third party affiliated stuff just as harshly as independent sets. In my opinion it seems they are getting a bit harsher already with alot of sets that would of been bundled previously being rejected. This would let us base involvement with collaborations purely on the merits that they can bring us. Rather than viewing it as a more guaranteed chance of getting items in game, albeit with a docked percentage.
For instance how many would work with third party's if they knew that their set would be added eventually anyway? This happened with one of my sets, after being approved for Dota cinemas chest as a replacement for the lifestealer Valve let us know it was already approved for 'regular' submission and in the end we decided to not team up. Although I will say that it was not an easy decision as I think DC are one of the better 'value for money' thirdpartys. As Terracota mentioned earlier, maybe it was a mistake and I could of gotten more sales even with the cut, through access to DCs huge fan base and promotional content.
Another thing that would be great is if the Dota 2 team let everybody know about their shifting guidelines in the announcement section of the workshop(something the CS:GO team do). For instance, dont make sets for Slardar or Void, some better guidelines on Chinese censorship and maybe even post suggestions for heroes that we should work on that they feel are currently lacking quality content on the workshop. That would help alleviate feelings of favoritism, as at the moment it feels like we have to constantly hunt for scraps of information that trickle down through people who have direct contact with Valve. Usually from other artists who are working with third partys, which get to email directly to the Dota team etc.
I was thinking it might be nice to make a thread where, if we get feedback from Valve on items or learn of something Valve are or are not looking for through a third party etc we can post a summary of what it was. That way we could get a better overall picture of things they are and arent looking for.
hey guys, there's a lot of great discussion here but let's do our best to chill on the assumptions, finger pointing, and name calling if possible.
I'd love to see more posts like Shocks that, instead of just blaming and venting, offer possible solutions that we can all agree on going forward. There has been a great handful of posts contributing this kind of stuff already, which is awesome. I just don't want us to continue down a darker road with no real benefit to any of us.
As a note, there have been talks of another polycount event/contest. Seeing as New Bloom is here right now, perhaps we can make it something that flanks the other end of the year, this taking up dec-jan time, a polycount thing can maybe be either right before or right after TI, that way each half of the year has a 'big event' we can take part of. Is this something people would be interested in?
As a note, there have been talks of another polycount event/contest. Seeing as New Bloom is here right now, perhaps we can make it something that flanks the other end of the year, this taking up dec-jan time, a polycount thing can maybe be either right before or right after TI, that way each half of the year has a 'big event' we can take part of. Is this something people would be interested in?
This will definitely be something a lot of artists will be interested in. Can you make it happen? Considering that Valve needs around 1-2 months for the submissions to be uploaded on the workshop before the actual update it could be for example Sept-Oct event? I feel like October to be the perfect time.
So I think this would be a good time to bring up taking this beyond Polycount, tourney bundles, and Organization Illuminati Volvo conspiracies. Back in the TF2 days there was a time when there was an update that was made by the community for the game. How fucking awesome would it be to have Polycount work with organizations like Dota Cinema and BTS or whoever else, and Valve and put together a community made Dota update. I'm talking full comic blog post, amazing lore tie in story cinematic, that could be made with our friends at DC, and turbo hat update including x amount of community made sets, and x amount of single hats being added. If Valve wants feedback and listens, and you guys want to band together as the kick ass community we are and maybe do something really killer, lets use all the resources we can to show how much we care about dota and its fans and its communities. :poly136:
While there are dozens of ways we could improve the workshop experience, to try and keep everyone on track, I'd like to try and condense this into what I believe is the core issue everyone can agree on is the primary concern right now:
Affiliating your work with an organization or player should have no impact on the acceptance or rejection of the work.
If becoming affiliated had no bearing on acceptance rates, then the only reasons to do so would be because you want to, or because they can bring something else to the table such as advertising. There's many ways this could be done. One could even make an argument that organizations shouldn't become attached to an item at all until after valve has approved it for the game. Since that would stop 99% of the shenanigans dead in its tracks.
Upload to workshop -> Some sets are accepted -> Accepted sets can add affiliation afterwards if they so choose.
Heck, if valve put up a list of accepted sets ahead of time there could even be a "market" of sorts where organizations could contact the artists of accepted sets and offer deals such as XX% for advertising on their website with X number of visitors per month, whatever. This is assuming that organizations in the future have more to offer the artist, because right now very few have anything to offer.
I do have to address another facet of this thread though, a rather ugly one. With a rather difficult, soul-searching type question. Especially to everyone in here that is upset with the way things are currently working.
Let's say Valve significantly increases the number of accepted unaffiliated sets over the next year, say quintuples what they've accepted in the previous year.
...but none of those items accepted are your own.
Would the animosity in here really die down? Would you be ok with that? Or would we still have a thread filled with finger-pointing and cries of bias and unfairness?
I realize this is an incredibly uncomfortable question, but it's something everyone here (including myself) should take a minute to really ask themselves. How much of the frustration is from pouring hundreds of hours into work that is not used and you don't get paid for, and how much is from the system being (in your view) rigged? If the system was rigged, but all of your own work was accepted, would you be as upset? Or even upset at all?
No matter how fair the system becomes some people are going to get screwed. It's the nature of the workshop: extremely high risk for potentially high reward. There will always be people that don't make it and it really sucks but that's the nature of the beast.
While there's plenty of ways the workshop can be improved I'm worried there will always be an angry thread like this on polycount and that makes me sad.
to be honest i didn't read the whole thread,i can't atm but the main thing i want to say is that dc is also a comunity,a comunity of non artist that gathered artist to make sets for them...and they made so much advertising that the chest is now in game.Think a bit on polycount ,a comunity of ARTISTS .technically speaking there are a lot of insane sets here ,our problem is that we not work toghether like a comunity .it seems to me that people are afraid to like other peoples work because it will get in game and their work not. dc comunity don't got this fear and they all focus all their votes on same works .think a bit on what chest polycount could make ,how many small teams are already here with ,studios.i rly belive that polycount got a sick potential if the small studios with even the new artist work toghether not against each other
it seems to me that people are afraid to like other peoples work because it will get in game and their work not
I sincerely hope that no one is actually thinking that way ! One vote not being cast doesn't make much of an difference anyways, therefore I don't see any good reason to *not* vote for something cool. And not voting for a cool item doesn't turn the bad items into good ones either ...
Replies
Yes, they do have to do extra now. If they were to stop making videos daily, that 1.1 million fanbase would simply stop visiting the channel, and they would cease to have pushing power. "Already" having an audience, as you put it, doesn't mean jack shit if the audience isn't paying attention, so they must continue to generate daily content to engage the audience and have the pushing power. As for what their 50% cut is paying for, simply put,
It doesn't fucking matter. You give 50% away and more than double your sales, you come out on top. That's what matters. The notion that we should only give a percentage to an organization to help them is bogus, man. There are plenty of reasons to give a percentage away, and making more money is right up at the top of that list for me personally. It doesn't really matter if they contribute to the creation of the item or not.
Now I am fully aware of the shitty quality tournament items, both past and present, but that is a separate issue, and that is a valve issue.
When i speak of the push, I am referring to actual sales, not getting an item into the game. It didn't matter how big DC was, that lifestealer set wasn't gonna happen for example.
Where we are in agreement is that a lot of shitty stuff is getting into the game, and this is where valve needs to focus its attention. As I said before, this is a sympton of valve's poor quality control and artists pumping out lower quality stuff and bundling it to get it in if they think it wouldn't get accepted otherwise.
Of course becoming a powerful YouTube channel didn't happen overnight. They worked hard for it, as did you and as did every artist here. Becoming an artist and making good quality items doesn't happen over night either.
Working hard is not an excuse for "pushing items in and reducing the chance of other artists getting their stuff in", while they can make money from their YouTube channel, website(advertising, selling stuff), sponsors and what not.
That could only be true if every artist had the chance of being offered something like that. When only a few are being offered every time, then what is happening happens.
P.S.1 I knew this situation with workshop would happen, because it can generate a lot of money and whenever something generates a lot of money, well you know the rest. Personally if there are no special treatments (such as getting items in without even publicizing it :poly121:, or having direct contact to check the concepts and items and get straight feedback on how to improve the items :poly141: ) then there is not much problem in my opinion.
P.S.2 I have nothing against DC, they were nice to promote us couple of times already,but I think they are just like every other organization but they are getting a special treatment that most teams and tournaments or even YouTube channels with similar level of attention don't have. This is simply unfair
P.S.3 Nothing against you, I admire your art more than I can express, but these arguments are in my opinion, invalid.
Respect :thumbup:
Whether an artist decides to give 50% or 75% to an organization is up to the artist himself. If 50% is imposed by the organization, then its a different matter. Its pressure on the artist to comply rather than good will.
Judging from you've said, you don't mind giving a large percentage solely for advertisement (which is fine, everybody has different reasons for doing different things). I'm not condemning you for doing that, its your choice. All I want is that items be judged based on quality rather than favortism.
The workshop today makes it easier for 3rd parties to take advantage as artists since 3rd parties will have an easier time selling to their followers.
My comments regarding the % were perfectly relevant, because they were as a response to a question of the percentages validity. Furthermore, other artists not being offered a deal with DC is not part of the problem, its part of the solution. The problem is low quality items getting churned out left and right by tournaments, which is PRECISELY because these kinds of offers are in fact being offered to pretty much anyone, regardless of skill level. DC not offering a deal to just anyone only further serves the first point:
Its not reducing anyone's chances, because they only use artists who would get in anyways.
Also, I appreciate the kind words.
This is the one bit of truth I've really seen. Nothing that organizations are doing is particularly wrong right now. There are only two real problems.
1: Valve's quality control is painfully inconsistent and sometimes apparently non existent
2: They aren't shipping many sets other than bundles. It used to be a weekly or bi-weekly thing where we would get like 7-14 new sets in the store. Now every month or so we get a chest with questionable quality in a system that really fucks over the higher quality work.
The expand on that last point, take this most recent chest. Some sets are good, some are adequate, and that's fine. Being in a chest spreads the money across a few artists evenly- MOSTLY, more on that later- which encourages, or at the very least, allows artists to make sets for less popular heroes (and prevents us from having a million pudge sets) and still make a decent amount of money. The problem is how valve handles the very rare. Whoever made that Tiny set got fucked. Hard. The other 5 artists in that chest will get money from the chest according to their portion (1/7 i think) in addition to 25% of the total sales for their set in the store. However, the guy who did the tiny set, which is the very rare, only gets from the chest. He will actually make less money than all of the other artists in the chest, even tho valve is using the RNG chest drop to sell more chests USING THE TINY SET as motivation. How fucked is that?
To make matters worse, if memory serves that tiny set was for empire. Which means even without the in store purchase, that guy is making less than every other person in the chest. This is also an issue. Buying into the idea of an organziation "collaboration," we as artists can try to manage how much we give in rev split relative to how much we think they can boost sales. This is advantageous to all parties when done right. More gets sold, valve gets more, artists get more, team gets a cut. Often times the cut given is worth the return, but thats another point. Assuming it did actually work, valve fucks it up when they throw one of those in a chest. Empire fans are far less likely to roll the die repeatedly hoping for that tiny set when they have the chance of getting one of 5 other (some mediocre) sets instead. But lets assume for a moment that empire DID in fact manage to use their power to push more sales on that chest....EVERYONE in the chest benefits from this push, but only the tiny guy (who is already fucked over) has to pay the price.
This just straight up blows. Valve had it right before, TWO chests released simultaneously featuring the same very rare. 8 artists were able to get items in for a variety of heroes, and one guy who did a really standout job got double. Having one chest with all sets available in the store except the very rare is better than the previous setup where it was one chest with like...one set for a very rare and a ward (just like the people wanted!) but now the unlucky soul who did work good enough for valve to deem it as highly valuable....well sucks to be that guy.
These are the real issues we face. The organization witch hunt is a bit damaging in my opinion, as all the commotion about it may steer valve in the wrong direction when the actual problems are quite a bit simpler.
Put in more non organized sets, fix the chest system, stop accepting crap sets.
Yeah I have never understood the recent trend of adding pro player/team sets as one of the 5-6 drops available in a chest. The whole incentive of those sets is to buy because of your support of a specific player or team.
Personally I think pro team or player sets should show a clear means of collaboration between the third party and the artist. Sets like SingSing's Kunkka set work well in this regard. If you want to support SingSing you can buy his set from the store and he can benefit directly from those sales. Having them randomly drop from chests from teams or pro players you might not of heard of just seems odd.
Judging by so many good quality items that are not getting in and probably won't and judging from some of the items that got in through DC, I must say that I seriously doubt that.
I'm sorry I thought I can use "" to emphasize as well. My bad
It's not only this, bad quality items always get in (with or without 3rd party).
The bigger issue is 3rd party organizations dominating the workshop and destroying the initial point of the workshop which was supposed to support the artists, make items for their favorite game and make money out of the sales (not out of a contract like an actual job).
DC aside, generally speaking, This means that any talented artist who doesn't have connections has to leave = against what workshop supposed to be.
The sad point is that this is not the survival of fittest, it is the survival of the one with more connections in his/her add list.
BTW, your silence about them receiving special treatments and breaking the rules, leads me to believe that I mention the right point.
You know all the things that I'm saying is to support this community from a logical point of view. At the end of the day I personally don't mind them doing what they are doing, they were smart(or whatever) enough to do whatever they are doing, so be it! But then coming here and saying "don't mix us up with other organizations, we don't do wrong (lol) and etc" and then worse than that an inspiring artist like you coming and defend them with arguments that was mentioned, just destroys my day.
Cheers :thumbup:
I have been wondering about that too. Are we absolutely sure that the creators of such very rare items only get 1/7th ? I would assume that Valve would, somehow, attempt to balance this out ...
It would also be nice if there was more consistency regarding off-chest availability of sets. Some can be purchased directly from the store and the pre-game menu, some can't .
As for dealing with third parties (branded items and/or ticket bundles), I expressed my opinion on this before but I'll sum it up as follows : Such collaborations can be very interesting, and very good things can come out of them. But I think there is fundamental problem with the idea of a cut being taken from the artists' share. I wish that such third parties would be more proactive at talking to Valve about adding them to the contributors list, so that they could get their fair cut without chipping away at the share of the content creators.
About the point that "DC gets rejected items too!": The level of communication Valve has with tournaments and organizations exceeds the level that they communicate with the artists. They were told that single items weren't going to be accepted for tournaments going forward. They were also told that items for Slardar would not be accepted. They get feedback on their sets, and know if it's rejected or if needs revisions. This is just more tournament/organization favoritism. How many posts here in this thread have asked for more valve communication? How many people have mentioned wanting more feedback on their items? How many people have mentioned learning about unspoken workshop changes from tournament organizers? This is another point of contention that goes beyond "quality of sets" or "expedited admissions" to the game, and it's strange to be so close to the creation process and yet so distant from information regarding changes to it.
This is what it sounds like you're saying:
Problem: Tournaments get held to a lower standard for their affiliated items.
Solution: Artists should make higher quality items.
Shouldn't the solution be: Tournaments should be held to the same standard as independent artists for their items.
+1 to Reza's post.
I could've sworn I read something on Valve's faq before that said that artists get paid based on what valve determines their contribution to be. @.@ But I can't find it anymore. I'm under the impression that the rare items in the chests get paid out a higher percentage than the rest, but I don't have any facts to back that up.
WAIT, I FOUND IT: The percentage of Adjusted Gross Revenue that you are entitled to receive will be determined by the developer/publisher of the Application associated with the Workshop to which you have submitted your Contribution
So it's basically arbitrary. The other artists in the chest may not be receiving a 1/7 split of the revenue either.
I feel like I have to continually say the same shit over and over again. I have already addressed this. They didn't break the rules, Valve did. Valve does it all the time. They make the rules they do whatever the fuck they want with them. The workshop bypass thing was because of some huge fuckup in communication that necessitated such a bypass due to time constraints.
As for all your other counter points....
There are for sure some DC sets that I think are questionable, but are still better than half the crap that gets pushed through, tourney based or otherwise. They would've gotten in eventually.
The rest of your points I have already addressed. Multiple times in some cases, but I will address one of these again
No it doesn't. Getting those connections is crazy easy. In fact, there is a thread on here devoted specifically to that. Anybody who has ever posted a tourny bundle has their contact information on the submission page. Just click on their name on the workshop, and send them a message. Its not hard. ANYONE can try. If you are good, you will probably get a shot. Hell even if you straight suck you will probably get a shot. There are at this point as many organizations as there are actual talented artists, but it brings me back to a previous point. Most of them aren't worth it, and you need a level of desperation to work with many of them, which means you aren't confident that you would get in on your own. If afterwards someone elects to stop, or can't get things in anymore....that is fucking survival of the fittest.
I get that you want to support the community, but your "logical point of view" is only partially informed and suffers from terrible tunnel vision. Have you considered that valve making tons of fucking money is good for the community? Have you considered how that money, going into events like the international, increases the size and collective income of the community at an absurd rate? Capital builds business, valve having more of it is better for the community.
Sorry that this ruined your day, the truth tends to suck.
As I have said, MULTIPLE times, it usually doesn't.
Not sure How i can get much more clear on that. Organizations are generally not worth it.
No, that's definitely not what I am saying. What I said was,
That is very different. There are multiple problems, are you have mismatched one potential solution to a very different problem is your summation of what you think i said.
No, thats not what that says. What that says is the rev split is variable from game to game, not the rev split is variable between artists contributing to the same game. Very very different things.
So unless valve says otherwise, i would say yes it is in fact a 1/7th rev split and I think it deserves their attention, and some alterations if they are going to continue with chests like this.
You might be right. There are other more likely possibilities that I won't bother mentioning cause DC ppl are such good boys and I shouldn't mix them up with other greedy organizations. lol
I won't discuss this further with you since you are clearly angry and I have respect for you and don't want our first interaction to be so aggressive.
As for the last paragraph, by community I meant artist community. Also it wasn't the so called "truth" that ruined my day, it was people trying to twist the crystal clear "truth".
Take it easy man :thumbup:
I'm actually not angry at all. I'm just very blunt and prone to profanity.
I do however take some offense by your statement about twisting "crystal clear truth." Thats a lofty accusation, especially since the truth in anything regarding the workshop is never crystal clear.
So. Your solution is "don't work with the organizations, and work harder." That's a given. The solution to the wider problem is that tournaments should be held to the same standard as independent artists for their items.
Unless valve says otherwise, I say it is not a 1/7th revenue split. See how that works? But sure, if it's an issue, it should be addressed too.
Was calm, still am.
As I said, that is one possible solution to a VERY specific problem many have complained about, which is being taken advantage of by organizations.
The wider problems as I said earlier are:
and the simple solution is:
And finally...
Yes, I see how that works. Not very well in your case, as you are basing your assumption off of an incorrect reading of valves rev split agreement, whereas I am basing my assumption off of how they have split the revenue for the three chests I have been in. Either way, it needs to be addressed. Either explained to show that Tiny dude isn't getting fucked over, or changed so that those in that position in the future don't.
Katze did a ton of work on the tiny set to cover all of his ult forms, and it would be a shame if he was shafted.
Well don't get offended, cause I wasn't talking about you. You were just arguing your point and as I said I thought (and think) that the argument was invalid.
The one acting like he hasn't done anything wrong was the one twisting the "truth", and he shouldn't get offended too, cause there is no offense here.
Chillax
Again, that is referring to the set rate at with you split revenue with VALVE, not the other artists. You are assuming they are going to alter the way chest rev is split among artists (which, again, is not what the article you linked, the entire basis of your assumption, is referring to). You are giving the benefit of the doubt to valve that they wouldn't shaft Katze in a thread about the various ways in which workshoppers feel shafted by valve.Even tho all previous chests indicate this is not how it works, and the volume of work for a set has never had any bearing on its price.
See: 4 Piece earthshaker set with....limited work required for 2 of the four items at the same price as a 7 piece set for pudge, with 5 alternate styles. Same price.
http://www.dota2.com/store/itemdetails/20484?r=258
http://www.dota2.com/store/itemdetails/20439?r=258
Ok, all good. Still don't know what you are talking about but its fine. And still, I am calm.
The point of contention comes from items associated with tickets, so I get that. Right now the current system of having the set sold seperately on store totally fixes that issue I think, it's a win win. You want the set, you buy set, you want ticket, you buy ticket.
The second issue with communication: It's intergral to who valve is as a company. Valve has always lacked a strong communication channel with pretty much everything. This exists in licensing the Source Engine, it existed when modding was huge like xbox, it was an issue with outside companies DIRECTLY WORKING with valve, and it continues to exist now thru the TF2 workshop, and the present day ones.
It's a flat structure issue, 10/10. But tangent aside there, okay, let's say that valve gets serious about communication with artists. A couple of problems crop up there. You'll start seeing this large disparity in artists that get feedback, and ones that don't. When a service like that becomes available, just try and imagine the amount of artists emailing valve asking PLS GIF FEEDBACK. There also becomes this issue of expectancy. "Me getting feedback equals my set having a stronger chance going into the game" It creates a strange atmosphere. This large rift grows between artists that are good, and artists that are not.
Going back to what I said about tickets and stuff; they're on a different level because it's a complete and total separate aspect to the lifeblood of dota. Cosmetics are being sold because they make money, but aren't necessary. Growing the competitive scene probably brings more players overall to the game itself, because these events have further reaching impacts than cosmetics do. There are probably other factors to consider, but valve providing feedback to ticket organizers isn't really as unfair as it sounds.
That being all said though, I do think there's a possibility for valve to provide a level of feedback to all artists, but would probably have to be something super minor, and less personal than private emailing. It would have to be something on a workshop level, which technically is already what dev comments are for.
There were a number of artists approached about this, and all of the work submitted for evaluation was work that was popular and well-received in the workshop. BTS didn't choose what sets went into the chest, they chose the artists they wanted to work with, and Valve had the final say in everything from a large spread of sets. I believe they might even have made suggestions of their own. At an early point there was talk about possibly having two chests because of the amount of possible content, but this obviously didn't happen. Cuts were made by Valve as expected, and some artists were excluded in the end.
Valve doesn't accept anything and everything that's put in front of them, and to say that a lot of what makes it into the game these days, either with regular chests, or with tournament bundles, is "crap" is extremely insulting to a lot of the artists here. I've heard rejection stories from organizers going through Valve's quality control process all the time.
In the end, yes, tournament organizers are the only ones with the ability to put something in front of Valve and ask "Can you put this in the game?" They can't, however, force anything to happen, and oftentimes, they end up in a desperate situation without anything to bundle at the last minute because of numerous rejections.
It's fine if you have a problem with Valve's quality control, I don't always agree with it either, but to blame it on the artists, the organizers, and the people who vote for and want to see these sets in the game, is a bit much.
Personally speaking, my decision to accept BTS's offer wasn't out of fear that my sets wouldn't meet Valve's quality standards, it was because Valve was showing less and less interest in accepting any community content at all, and instead, choosing to push a lot of Arcana releases in place of regular chests. I know I don't exactly represent the most popular opinion here, but I don't regret my decision at all, in fact it's worked out well for me.
Sure - but 'more communication' doesn't necessarily mean 'more communication with individuals'. I think most of us would be happy with just a few more posts on the Dota blog along the lines of the New Bloom call to arms, for instance.
After all, artistic feedback is fully covered by the pdf art guides already available.
I don't get it. Why is this part of the issue?
SUNSfan is somewhat right in that we sorta lump DC together with the rest of the organisations, but that is for good reason - the issue is not about DC doing what they do. Nor is it really about organisations scamming artists (though that's bad too and is addressed in Drywall's post). The issue is that the system empowers organisations in such a way that they can step in as middlemen holding all the power resulting in situations that we have now. This is what enables community powerhouses like DC to hold all the sway, and lets tournament organisers negotiate favourably with inexperienced artists who don't know better. And the system does not need to be that way.
So with that in mind, where does DC delaying its workshop top 5 (for any amount of reasons I might add, like being busy with the XMG CD tourney) fit into the proving of a point?
Let's not miss the forest for the trees and unnecessarily dramatize this.
Pior is also right in that a small amount of communication from Valve might help. It would not need to be case-by-case critiques of every item, but feedback on their state of mind that will help stabilise the guidelines for item acceptance. Less uncertainty over what would help an item get into Dota 2 would enable artists to be more confident in their work and less reliant on finding round-the-back methods of getting in like tournament tickets.
The guidelines might have been set in the early stages of the workshop via the pdf guides, however the guidelines seem to have evolved and this hasn't been communicated clearly. The only hints we have are looking at what does get into the game, and by observing those results in a black box it appears that many of the guidelines outlined in the pdfs are regularly flouted. This uncertainty with the "normal" process, combined with how tournament tickets and organisation chests appear to force communication from Valve means that partnering with an organisation seems more appealing to those not in the know. So it's no surprise that even if some artists stop partnering with organisations there will always be others who would.
It's just like what I used to hear about the state of the freelance CG industry a few years ago where experienced artists were constantly feeling like they were being priced out of a job by less experienced artists who forced market rates to plunge because they didn't understand the value of their own work. Even if all the polycounters woke up tomorrow and decided to boycott every organisation it wouldn't solve anything. There would be other workshoppers waiting for the opportunity to get their own stuff into the game. I suppose it's quite fitting that this somewhat mirrors the discussion about tournament oversaturation that has been going on with pro players and communities like reddit.
The problems was that you felt like you needed to give your set to BTS. Partnering up with an organization meant having an easier time getting an item into the game. Even with Valve's stricter policy for 3rd party things. As you said, that you accepted BTS's offer because Valve didn't really release any community chests.
100% agree
That would've actually been nice to have a page of things not to do with the new bloom stuff (with some examples), And as teabuscuit point out
Valve could have easily said that in a blog post....
But larger prize pools entice viewers, so it's kinda a pie in the sky hope.
As for tournaments and hats, I have been against the idea since I did a tourney ticket back in 2013. I changed my stance to player hats being a larger priority.
In the end the hats is the seller. How the hat is marketed in the store is another huge seller.
They had time to analyze the new patch and upload 3 videos about it. Not sure how an easier weekly workshop video would be an issue. You must be naive to not see it. The moment this blew up here from the "vocal minority", chances are they decided to not do it. I could be wrong, but the shadow of pulling power moves like these are always present. I can't what they can pull off if someone pissed them off on a submission scale! Imagine when going to organizations is the way to go. Such power is scary and will alienate a lot of artists.
You made me spell this out for you despite it being so obvious. I don't care if you state otherwise. Stop putting roses around a clear and immediate concern.
Add 2 chests, one that contains only veterans work, and another that's just for people new to the workshop (with zero accepted sets). Good way for newbies to break in and also for the community to thank the vet's for their continual work output.
And while they are at it, post on the blog an encouragement for fan's to favortite/follow artists ( as well as put a follow button on the collections page!!!). The more they encourage fans to like/follow artists work, the better chance they will buy sets, and make more money for both valve and the artist.
ahh lovely
-Toasty
i am 99% sure that if we would offer volvo such things, they would take it - the fucking same way they are taking the dc chest.
In all seriousness however, we can look back at valves history as a company and the way they prefer to interact with their gaming community. It's always been a fairly hands off, keep in the background work method. They create options and avernues for players and communities to interact with their products and services (mods, workshop, filmaker). They know as a company the best way to keep customers is to allow them become engaged and interact with the products.
Valve is not going step in and dramatically change anything on the workshop. Valve is waiting for the customers to become creative, engage and build things for themselves . If we ask valve to create/change anything to favor artists, there is a very good chance it will be ignored. The Tournament groups/Youtube channels are a good example of this in action. They have been proactive and have created something that builds engagement with Valves. Because of this Valve speaks to them and assists where they reasonably can.
If we create Polycount chests ("s") ourselves as a community and present them they have a good chance of being accepted.
Perhaps a new big polycount comp is in order? Vets vs Newbies. Top 6-7 on each side are submitted with the 2 chests to valve.
-Toasty
On the contrary I was completely aware of the insinuations you were making with your post. I'll try to be clearer - I believe that not only are such accusations unfounded, they also don't help. I'd have hoped that my post would express that.
For one, I should think that DC wouldnt even have time to go about making petty political power plays. As you mentioned they just did several patch analysis videos and on the day they were due to release a workshop weekly they were also about to launch their next major tournament. I'm very much inclined to think that they are very busy with everything. However if you have evidence to support your accusations I could be convinced otherwise.
The other point I'd wanted to make was even if someone did do something to address the issue of DC holding their workshop weekly hostage it would merely be fixing a symptom instead of looking for a cure. It'd make you and me and them feel like shit because of all the negativity, and lets say they commit to doing a workshop weekly on time every week from now till eternity - it still doesnt matter. There will be someone else who can come along and pull off something similar. That would just be a whole new drama and we start from square one.
I say fix the system that gives rise to such situations. This is not rosey at all - I'm accusing Valve (a company I hugely admire, respect, and want to work for) of having let us down. I'm not trying to sweeten anything - i'm trying to be focused on what the real issue is here. Cut through the drama and get to the root of the issue. DC does appear to be a juicy, convenient target for criticism. I suggest we don't get distracted by that and focus on the real issues at hand.
i imagine a new patch is infinitely more interesting to most players than the weekly hat parade
hey BOY! Wanna play homework game? Start by checking how many times they skipped weekly workshop top 5.
Then come here flex all you please.
@Snowstorm: Well, I am bringing about a serious issue, it has been proven in the past how DC plays favorites. They do pull power plays and will continue to do so if Valve doesn't downplay organizations role in this workshop. You might think I am taking the focus away from the main issue but the truth is, it is the very same you are concerned about, just from a different angle.
Don't make me go get my stick!, you people's play nice, and remember life isn't worth getting this serious about. oh wait... maybe it was the other way about.. anywho's fuk it, either way it's not worth it. I'm losing track in my old age.. now where did I leave my cuppa tea...anyone else suddenly feel like cake? mmm delicious cake.
-Toasty
I told myself I'd never come here again but this was sent to me and I HAD to respond. Holy wow talk about paranoia. FYI the workshop weekly, A-Z, and Fails were not posted this week. We will ALWAYS prioritize current patch videos over series shows. Why? Because they are current and relevant to what the dota community want to see at the moment. And if that means pushing our regular shows til the next week then so be it. Second, Neil is traveling home for the holidays. He is our video editor and couldn't get them ready before he left for home. And third, we have the semi-finals and grand finals of our tournament. If you check out our youtube channel, we've been posting videos about that. We can only post so much video content before it creates "spam" on people's feed. We don't like that.
We'd never stoop so low as to hold or cancel a show we enjoy just because some people here have issues they feel we're responsible for. I don't know how many times I, SUNSfan, or others have to reiterate over and over. It saddens me that I came here thinking that this would be a great place to learn and socialize but instead I felt ostracized. I'm not the only one either. What kind of community do you have that you create an environment that grows paranoia, greed, bitterness and jealousy? Clearly, a not very good one.
Well... I got guts to say I am sorry
Maybe I am directing my frustration at current workshop status to some big beacon!
I still hate Ike's guts though!
What I could suggest is that workshop should have check-box that artist could state that uploaded set can be used in tournaments. Than depending on prize pool and other factors tournament hosts could request from Valve set or bundle for their event. Set would be choosen by Valve alone from workshop like every other sets are right now. Strict splits should be than aplied to revenue split.
However still that would not solve issue of pro player sets that are also some kind of bypass of standard acceptance process. Also one could argue that situation where only most popular players get their sets is also unfair.
Terracotta said that his sets would be accepted anyway. I dont doubt that because his work is top notch but that could be otherwise in many situations I saw.
@Konras: I dont think all this thread is one big bullshit. In fact I believe it has some valid points that stand and need adressing in one way or another. It also has some good ideas in it aswell.
Concerning all the organizer workshop paranoia, calm the fuck down everybody. no need to just throw rude accusations around. we all know there are shady working ppl out there, just by blaming them nothin' changes.
I repeat myself when I say: Every artist has a choice, either to give into doubt and fear and desperation or to fuckin' stand by his art and believe in the quality of his own product and thus not selling out.
My personal opinion on content creation based on other ppls original content in the context of youtube money and marketing. welp, its just the fucked up internet that could come up with such shit.
Concerning Ike_Ike: everybody knows he is a donger raising hoodlum from down under, nuff said :P
thats why i took a bit time to go more into detail about my idea:
the current Polycount Monthly Community Competition:
over the last months more and more people have been unhappy with the polycount contest.
reasons for that have been:
- the not anymore existing single item chests!
- leck of communication and criticism during the running months
- last day submissions
- delayed price judging
- ...
allover that contest doesnt seem to fit anymore into the current situation.
my idea would be to rebuild the contest to fit into the current workshop situation:
the NEW Polycount Community Chest Series #1 :
(or any other possible name, i know there have been a polycount chest before)
the goal would be to have a chest with 10 sets inside (maybe +1 2 more so valve can choose if they dont like something) and 2 specials (rare drop - very rare drop) that could be either set, ward or courier.
the period of former one month is not enough time for many of us to create something big like a set. and it is also not needed to use such a hard deadline. i could imagine we could try it with quarters (3 months per chest / 4x chests a year). so we could even use season themed stuff: spring-, summer-, autumn- and winterchest. ofc its not a must, i could also think of actual changing themes. we can be creative here. i mean we are the fucking artists^^ if we can not come up with great and unique ideas... who can?
ive thought long about the next point:
the pool of artists inside a chest should be mixed. in my first idea there were 2 chests, like one chest made from veterans, and another from newcomers, but i think that would create more borders then helping anyone.
first of all because the veteran chest would be mostlikly the "good" one that people would want to buy and the newcomer chest would end up unused.
by mixing, the lead (theme, chest artwork, common layouts, deadlines,..) could be taken by veterans. its also alot easier for someone new to get into something like that if u do not have think about everything but can just focus on the own part. so at the end/start of each quarter there could be created a new thread with a list and people could sign in if they like to take part. they should write what they can deliver like *concept artist* *modeler* *animation*... and build teams (either the teams are build by the veterans who lead the project, or the teams are build by the signing people itself). and then the work starts. people use the thread the next 3months to give each other feedback and at the end of the quater the whole polycount community can vote for which submissions they want to see in the chest (or some polycount guys like thiago, anuxi,... choose it). ofc it should be a combination of veteran submissions as well as newcommer submissions.
finally when the quarter is over and the chest is chosen, it should be submitted to the workshop and promoted by polycount and also on reddit and other social media. so the whole thing becomes a real public event, and less something that happens behind closed doors (like the current competition, nearly nobody of the dota community even knows about it).
and the cycle starts again.
lets be a real community and work together instead of against.
Since I joined this forum back in March, I've seen a lot of positive thinking and interactions, but also huge spikes of hostility and finger-pointing brought on by Valve's silence, questionable decisions, and the state of the workshop. I know Polycount can be a really positive, constructive community, but at its worst, in times like these, it pushes a lot of people away, and paints the community as a whole in a really negative light.
I think when someone like Shock brings up a constructive idea, it warrants serious discussion, and I hope everyone can take some time to either add to it or come up with some of their own solutions.
First of all, i really dont think this is a valid comparison, between these 2 sets, the es set, while only has 4 slots, has very decent textures and a huge job on the particles part ( which i think is the main reason for that price at that time). The pudge set has 7 slots and 5 alternate styles, however, has kinda blurred textures and inverted normal map, and the particles work is limited, which left me thinking that (just my assumption) it was hasted, carelessly made and the reason it has that price is the huge amount of items the set ships and a tiny bit of particles work. ( not to add while pudge is, if not the most popular hero in the game, es isnt)
The volume of work for each hero set has never been fair since the beginning, and it's clearly not us artist's fault, why pudge doesnt have only 4 slots instead of 7, why es doesn have 6-7 slots instead of 4? No one said you have to make a huge ass, complex as hell hat instead of a simple one as long as it fit with other items in a set and the original idea/concept.
Back to the main reason of this thread, you guys have already said all the thing i wanted to say, but the thing is, while this thread is meant to be deliverred to valve, so they might consider to do sth ( or nothing at all) about this workshop situation, i dont see many focus on discussing what should we do about this ( maybe here, or in a new thread), because clearly it's our problem as well - not just valve's.
I personally do like the idea of a big contest just like the one polycount and valve did years ago, everyone has a shot, and the best sets come out, guarenteed to get in.
By making this a yearly thing ( or half a year or any reasonable amount of time) we should get a strong communication, feedbacks and comments on our work by valve, and on their current state of the workshop/what they want, what they dont. It should push the quality bar and get rid of the low quality sets, and raise the awareness of ppl/players/organizations that we are deserved more attention/benefit ( same case happened with the big guys of the workshop in the early state by that big contest i assume).
Of course this alone will not solve all of the problems that the workshop is having right now, and of course Valve have to agree with this idea, but i really think the chances are high and i personally dont see why valve wouldnt do this. Just my 2 cents.
PS:
If you came here to learn and to improve your skills in art, and to socialize ONLY on this dota2 subforum of polycount then, wow, you're missing out A LOT. And the environment you're talking about is in a subforum, where most of the people competing each other day by day so that at the end of the day, their work could be appreciated and they could get some money for that, so what do you really expect ? And your assumption on this particular part over the whole community of polycount is, i must say, inappropriate.
edit: writing the comment before shock's above comment, would very much like this to happen too if valve would not like to back the contest.
For instance how many would work with third party's if they knew that their set would be added eventually anyway? This happened with one of my sets, after being approved for Dota cinemas chest as a replacement for the lifestealer Valve let us know it was already approved for 'regular' submission and in the end we decided to not team up. Although I will say that it was not an easy decision as I think DC are one of the better 'value for money' thirdpartys. As Terracota mentioned earlier, maybe it was a mistake and I could of gotten more sales even with the cut, through access to DCs huge fan base and promotional content.
Another thing that would be great is if the Dota 2 team let everybody know about their shifting guidelines in the announcement section of the workshop(something the CS:GO team do). For instance, dont make sets for Slardar or Void, some better guidelines on Chinese censorship and maybe even post suggestions for heroes that we should work on that they feel are currently lacking quality content on the workshop. That would help alleviate feelings of favoritism, as at the moment it feels like we have to constantly hunt for scraps of information that trickle down through people who have direct contact with Valve. Usually from other artists who are working with third partys, which get to email directly to the Dota team etc.
I was thinking it might be nice to make a thread where, if we get feedback from Valve on items or learn of something Valve are or are not looking for through a third party etc we can post a summary of what it was. That way we could get a better overall picture of things they are and arent looking for.
I'd love to see more posts like Shocks that, instead of just blaming and venting, offer possible solutions that we can all agree on going forward. There has been a great handful of posts contributing this kind of stuff already, which is awesome. I just don't want us to continue down a darker road with no real benefit to any of us.
As a note, there have been talks of another polycount event/contest. Seeing as New Bloom is here right now, perhaps we can make it something that flanks the other end of the year, this taking up dec-jan time, a polycount thing can maybe be either right before or right after TI, that way each half of the year has a 'big event' we can take part of. Is this something people would be interested in?
This will definitely be something a lot of artists will be interested in. Can you make it happen? Considering that Valve needs around 1-2 months for the submissions to be uploaded on the workshop before the actual update it could be for example Sept-Oct event? I feel like October to be the perfect time.
If becoming affiliated had no bearing on acceptance rates, then the only reasons to do so would be because you want to, or because they can bring something else to the table such as advertising. There's many ways this could be done. One could even make an argument that organizations shouldn't become attached to an item at all until after valve has approved it for the game. Since that would stop 99% of the shenanigans dead in its tracks.
Heck, if valve put up a list of accepted sets ahead of time there could even be a "market" of sorts where organizations could contact the artists of accepted sets and offer deals such as XX% for advertising on their website with X number of visitors per month, whatever. This is assuming that organizations in the future have more to offer the artist, because right now very few have anything to offer.
I do have to address another facet of this thread though, a rather ugly one. With a rather difficult, soul-searching type question. Especially to everyone in here that is upset with the way things are currently working.
Let's say Valve significantly increases the number of accepted unaffiliated sets over the next year, say quintuples what they've accepted in the previous year.
...but none of those items accepted are your own.
Would the animosity in here really die down? Would you be ok with that? Or would we still have a thread filled with finger-pointing and cries of bias and unfairness?
I realize this is an incredibly uncomfortable question, but it's something everyone here (including myself) should take a minute to really ask themselves. How much of the frustration is from pouring hundreds of hours into work that is not used and you don't get paid for, and how much is from the system being (in your view) rigged? If the system was rigged, but all of your own work was accepted, would you be as upset? Or even upset at all?
No matter how fair the system becomes some people are going to get screwed. It's the nature of the workshop: extremely high risk for potentially high reward. There will always be people that don't make it and it really sucks but that's the nature of the beast.
While there's plenty of ways the workshop can be improved I'm worried there will always be an angry thread like this on polycount and that makes me sad.
I sincerely hope that no one is actually thinking that way ! One vote not being cast doesn't make much of an difference anyways, therefore I don't see any good reason to *not* vote for something cool. And not voting for a cool item doesn't turn the bad items into good ones either ...