Modding Madness - Home of the Fusion Pack

Time goes by

[EDIT: this was written back in 2009. Some things have changed, especially about AAA and Canvas Knights, but I won't edit my original rant to reflect those changes]

Nothing personal

Before I get started let me set this straight: I appreciate the good work that the guys at SAS and AAA do for IL2.
AAA was the first, and it's probably still the largest one. It had some problems but it's now much better, and they still do a great job at connecting users and modders + providing a meeting point for modders to work together, they have great stuff going on (you are anxiously waiting for Canvas Knights to be released, just as I do), and I could keep going but I'll cut it short: thanks AAA for the good work.

Right now SAS is the 'leading' IL-2 modding site, and it does a great job. I do appreciate the work that Cirx and his group do for IL-2. In fact, my Fusion Pack wouldnt exist without SAS, or it would be very different. Thanks SAS for the good work.
I'll say that again: I have nothing against SAS or AAA, and nothing personal against the people who run those sites.

What I have a problem with is the "Modders Mafia" as a mindset; the idea that "modding knowledge should be kept from the masses", that's what I hate, that's what I'm trying to fight against.

Knowlege Is Power

So why am I doing this?
The short answer would be "because I'm not supposed to".
The long answer involves things like *why* I'm not supposed to, who says that I'm not, and who are they to tell me what to do anyway... but I'll try to make it as short as possible. Consider yourself lucky.

According to the most widely accepted doctrine, we'll call that the 'official truth', some things shouldn't be posted in public because that kind of knowledge would enable any idiot to make a cheat mod and use it on line.
The unofficial truth, as it often happens, is that the official truth is a load of bullshit.
Knowledge is power, and there's a buch of assholes who want to keep all the power for themselves.
That's why I'm publishing this information, as little as it is, as fragmented and incomplete as it is: to take some of the power from Modsters' Cupola and give it back to the legitimate owners: you, the wide community.

Right now the Modders' Mafia has a monopoly on IL2 modding and the only way to learn some of it for a non-coder is to be accepted in their club. The problem is that you are only accepted at the price of profused and continuous ass kissing, and that price is too high (or should I say too low).
That's pretty much it. That's why I do it. To reduce the power of Modders' Mafia, to break their monopoly on IL2 modding information, and if it works as I hope, it will bring in new modders, truly independent modders who won't kiss anyone's ass.

Why it's bullshit

As for the Modsters' official theory that this knowledge should be kept secret or cheating would be too easy, all I can say is that I don't believe it. I mean, making cheats available for download may increase cheating, not telling someone how to switch the gauges in a cockpit or how to make an AI plane use an existing cockpit (those were exactly the questions that got me in trouble with the Modders Mafia).

Telling someone how to mod is not the same as making readily usable cheat mods available for download, because in order to build a cheat mod using the information published here, one needs to actually do some work that takes a at least a medium-highish brain power, and according to my experience, the kind of people who would actually enjoy cheating at online gaming aren't smart enough to make their own cheat mods (some very smart people could (and do) use cheat mods on line, but that's mostly about testing new toys. And they know way more than I could possibly tell them, anyway)

My theory is that we are fairly safe as long as you need more work to learn how to cheat than to learn how to fly. If cheaters cheat to skip the hard work of learning how to fly, they probably wouldn't choose to cheat if cheating involves more work than learning how to fly. Makes perfect sense to me. So the trick is not "hide knowledge" but don't make it too effortless, tell them where to look, tell them what they need to work on, but don't do the work for them.

I promised you whine and rant...

I just realized that I haven't told why I stopped posting at SAS.
Well, here's the story: Some time ago I was contacted by one modding 'leader' who offered to join their group. I accepted but then it turned out that he had asked me without asking the rest of his group first, and the rest of the group didnt want me in, so I became an 'external contributor' (kinda) I was given the lowest access to 'hidden knowldge' (one 'secret' forum at SAS) so I assumed it was OK to ask how to do stuff.

I was wrong. I asked how to make an AI plane use an existing cockpit, and no one answered. I asked how to make a cockpit use a different set of gauges and I was ignored again.
In the meantime I managed to get banned for saying that there may be some free Unix tools that are capable to pack SFS files. That was just a guess of course, but Cirx (AKA "Crazy Pete") took it as if I had said "who the hell needs you losers anyway", so he banned me. He un-banned me almost right away, after someone asked him to (the same guy who originally asked me to join the group), but a trend was set: every time I said something (pretty much anything), Cirx would find the way to bash me. (I warned that I would whine, didnt I?)

Once I told a user that he wasn't supposed to use the SAS buttons file on line (there was no on-line edition back then) and also made some more considerations about the SAS buttons, and Cirx somehow managed to say the exact same thing that I said, yet making it sound as if I was lying and misleading users on purpose. Meanwhile, on another forum, I said something like "I wont ask twice" (referring to my questions being ignored) and I got an email from Crazy Pete that was like "wtf is the matter with you? cant you write one post without being an asshole?".

At that time I was alredy extremely disappointed at the so-called "nothing-like-AAA" community, when the 2 latest things happened I thought that it was enough, and decided to never post again at SAS or its sister site UP.

And no matter how much that pisses Cirx off (or maybe *because* of that), I will keep pointing out that when it comes to 'hidden knowledge' SAS is no different from AAA. The same people who never miss a chance to point out how they wouldnt ban anyone for asking questions have clearly shown, several times, that "some" questions are not tolerated. They dont ban you, alright. But they dont answer either...

[NOTE: One big difference is that, unlike AAA, SAS never claimed to own any of the work posted at their website, and probably never would.]

OK, I'm done with the rant-and-whine thing. Feel free to discuss on the forums about the points that I made.