About Legal stuff for Event Submissions...

[SmutForger]

Hey there!

[Obligatory introductory... intro]

As a long term fan (and lurker) of the smut you guys bring, I have long been pondering about creating some event submissions myself to finally start contributing for all the free content I have been so generously given.

[Required explanation of topic]

Having read the Legal Stuff topic there are some concerns regarding some of the rules (However few it may seem). I can understand the need for the set-in-stone rules, lest it becomes an argument in the community rivaling a Treated Myr orgy on New Texas.

However, it does seem harsh when put that way. I.e. Anyone could make a shy human female, it'd get integrated in the game, and by these legal rules, the next week Fen could say "Sorry dude, we changed her to a male leithan with eyes for balls and balls for eyes.".

[Concluding to a point]

So what I am wondering is, how extreme are these rules enforced? Are the original content creators asked to make the scenes themselves or improve their scenes? Are other content creators really allowed to, say, do the example above regardless of any objection of the original content creator?

What would you consider reasonable for added content made by other people? Total identity change is not okay but giving someone a dick or a vagina by default is fine? Where is this line drawn? Have you elaborated on these on other posts? (I tried searching for terms with "legal" in it to no accurate results)

I'd really simply like to know how all this works before I consider investing serious time into writing some smut. My sincere apologies if this comes across as nagging, and I'm sure other people have asked before as well, my search just came up empty.

[Obligatory outro]

Thanks for your time and I'm looking forward to a reply!

 

[Woider]

However, it does seem harsh when put that way. I.e. Anyone could make a shy human female, it'd get integrated in the game, and by these legal rules, the next week Fen could say "Sorry dude, we changed her to a male leithan with eyes for balls and balls for eyes.".

By that point, it's not really the same character though, is it? There has, to my knowledge, never been a situation where a character has been radically overhauled, in any way. Closest thing that has happened is Fen and Co. making expansions for characters originally created by guest writers, that have since left. (Yammi being a good example of this.)

Are other content creators really allowed to, say, do the example above regardless of any objection of the original content creator?

Generally, creators will add onto their own work. Other people can obviously submit additions, but I do not believe the chances of them getting accepted are high. It's been Fen and Co. that have added to guest-written characters.

What would you consider reasonable for added content made by other people? Total identity change is not okay but giving someone a dick or a vagina by default is fine? Where is this line drawn? Have you elaborated on these on other posts? (I tried searching for terms with "legal" in it to no accurate results)

Fen will most likely consult the original creator before adding anything, and especially if it was written by a third party. It's not like there are some strict guidelines other than certains kinks being banned, and it must meet certain writing standards.

Fen himself can obviously give a much better explanation.

 

[HugsAlright]

Anyone could make a shy human female, it'd get integrated in the game, and by these legal rules, the next week Fen could say "Sorry dude, we changed her to a male leithan with eyes for balls and balls for eyes.".

By all means, anyone could write an entire quest to give Syri a vag, but the chances of such a scene actually getting in or being positively received is pretty much zero.

So what I am wondering is, how extreme are these rules enforced?

Generally, they don't need to be. Most current/aspiring authors are pretty adamant about going to the character's original author before making anything for them.

Are the original content creators asked to make the scenes themselves or improve their scenes?

No~

If someone in this game wants something, they need to write it themselves/commission it. Authors are never forced to write something, cept' Savin maybe.

Are other content creators really allowed to, say, do the example above regardless of any objection of the original content creator?

Yes, but something like that is highly regarded as being a "dick move" and the chances of people receiving something like that well/getting in game is very low.

What would you consider reasonable for added content made by other people?

Sex scenes that fit the character, mainly. Unless the original author gives the go-ahead to/asks/commissions someone to write some good-ass expansions a la Sera.

Total identity change is not okay but giving someone a dick or a vagina by default is fine?

Well, sometimes the characters genitals are important to that characters, i.e. Syri.

Big idea being: the part of this community that has the ability to write generally won't do something like go against a fellow author's wishes and write something crazy.

 

[SmutForger]

By that point, it's not really the same character though, is it? There has, to my knowledge, never been a situation where a character has been radically overhauled, in any way. Closest thing that has happened is Fen and Co. making expansions for characters originally created by guest writers, that have since left. (Yammi being a good example of this.)

Very true, I probably should have put up a way less extreme example.

Generally, creators will add onto their own work. Other people can obviously submit additions, but I do not believe the chances of them getting accepted are high.

This is good to hear and also logical; although from a creator's standpoint I can also understand the point of expanding upon an existing character being easier than creating an entirely new one for just a few new scenes.

It's been Fen and Co. that have added to guest-written characters.

I wonder if I can engage into a small discussion with them directly about this sort of thing. I understand that from the community's point of view, I'm very new and have yet to prove myself of creating any content of any quality. If I do kick this off and create content that people actually like and would see in the game (And Fen and Co do eventually add it in), I'd love for them (And the community) to come to me and ask me to put in a scene for fetish X or expand more on backstory or what have you. I'd rather have that than find out later that some things have changed already (Perhaps even something that I was already working on that I'd feel pushed to scrap altogether because something similar has already been added.).

So I guess the "TL;DR" question in this case is: How likely are Fen & Co to add in scenes themselves without asking the creator if they'd be interested in doing it instead? Of course only they can answer that question, fingers crossed!

Fen will most likely consult the original creator before adding anything, and especially if it was written by a third party. It's not like there are some strict guidelines other than certains kinks being banned, and it must meet certain writing standards.

Yes, I am well aware of these standards, and even if these standards are met, it isn't any guarantee that it'll be added. I find that acceptable; Although I'd really like to hear Fen & Co's opinion on why this is the case so I can either alter the scenes/character or keep it in mind for my next attempt. (Well explained in the Submission guide too, so I will take that to heart.)


Thanks a lot for taking your time to be so thorough in answering my questions!

By all means, anyone could write an entire quest to give Syri a vag, but the chances of such a scene actually getting in or being positively received is pretty much zero.

Unless Savin/FireDrops change their mind on the matter I suppose? Or does this also not work because Syri is how she is now and considered canon, and alterations like that would break canon even if made by their original creators, and therefore perhaps not meet the standards?

Generally, they don't need to be. Most current/aspiring authors are pretty adamant about going to the character's original author before making anything for them.

This is really great to hear, I have been part of communities before that are, shall we say, less respectful of their original content creators. (Skyrim/FO4). So this is a concern off my shoulder!

No~

If someone in this game wants something, they need to write it themselves/commission it. Authors are never forced to write something, cept' Savin maybe.

Savin never gets a break.

Thanks for all the answers so far, you people probably have answered these concerns from other people a hundred times. I appreciate the time spent to explain it to me. Peace.


Guess I should get started on writing some Smut.

 

[Woider]

Savin never gets a break.

He's an employee, not an independant writer.

 

[Flash Dingo]

Fen will most likely consult the original creator before adding anything, and especially if it was written by a third party. It's not like there are some strict guidelines other than certains kinks being banned, and it must meet certain writing standards.

That's generally supposed to happen, but it doesn't mean it will. I think I remember something about Fen doing a thing with getting content written for Briha, without consulting with JimT, which almost resulted in Briha getting hate-rape content.

I don't for the life of me remember where I saw it, so don't quote me.

 

[Woider]

Hence the "most likely".

 

[SmutForger]

That's generally supposed to happen, but it doesn't mean it will. I think I remember something about Fen doing a thing with getting content written for Briha, without consulting with JimT, which almost resulted in Briha getting hate-rape content.

That sounds awful.

 

[Magic Ted]

Once you submit content to the game you more or less absolve all rights to it. Unless agreed to before hand you ain't getting paid, you don't have authority over the submission or content directly related over it and you become just another fan again. However, that's only the flat reality of it all and it doesn't really happen like that; in practice, you're still the author of it and, while you have no outright say over game design choices further more, you might be consulted at the very least to keep your artistic vision in chance.

What are the chances of someone else writing your work? Incredibly slim, although possible. Are their examples of this in however many years of TiTs' development? Not really, no. Yanmi was a cited example, but she was actually an ancient backer-goal crewmember... thing. The powers that be have other projects that need doin' and strike their fancy, no one really likes to try and write with someone else's mouth.

So; sure! Your character could be turned into a squid or something. They won't, tho.

 

[Nonesuch]

That sounds awful.

And is also completely untrue.

 

[Noob Salad]

Fen will sell your characters on the space slave market.

Do you have anything specific you're worried about happening?

 

[SmutForger]

Fen will sell your characters on the space slave market.

Do you have anything specific you're worried about happening?

Hey! No, just things like severe alterations like the example I put up above, but those have been washed away by the replies.

Working hard on making a character to get proofread and submit; then see how well it is received. I'm learning heavily from the submission guide by Zeikfried and sticking with the KISS (Keep It Simple, Stupid) method. As in, I want to make sure that people like what they're reading, that I'm not messing up early on; then proceed to make those mistakes for the rest of the week and be very sad about it. So that means that it will be a very minimalistic entry at first and if people like what they read (And criticism isn't off the charts (Can only blame myself for that if that happens...)), I will expand upon the initial draft - and then have that proofread as well - before turning it in as a real Submission asking for Fen & Co's attention. Especially because it will be my first entry and all that, better to be safe than sorry.

In fact, I think I will put up the draft that doesn't even qualify for a Submission first (Not enough scenes), just to see if I handle the parser text and such correctly, so that I can use the feedback right away. Got a couple of neat ideas but I'm definitely not going for anything snowflake-y for my first entry!


And damn those curly quotes! Ah well, I'll just suck it up.

 

[Magic Ted]

Headtilt.

If you're writing it in googledocs, which you ought to be by all rights, you can turn off curly/smart quotes under tools, preferences.

 

[Gedan]

Hey there!

[Obligatory introductory... intro]

As a long term fan (and lurker) of the smut you guys bring, I have long been pondering about creating some event submissions myself to finally start contributing for all the free content I have been so generously given.

[Required explanation of topic]

Having read the Legal Stuff topic there are some concerns regarding some of the rules (However few it may seem). I can understand the need for the set-in-stone rules, lest it becomes an argument in the community rivaling a Treated Myr orgy on New Texas.

However, it does seem harsh when put that way. I.e. Anyone could make a shy human female, it'd get integrated in the game, and by these legal rules, the next week Fen could say "Sorry dude, we changed her to a male leithan with eyes for balls and balls for eyes.".

[Concluding to a point]

So what I am wondering is, how extreme are these rules enforced? Are the original content creators asked to make the scenes themselves or improve their scenes? Are other content creators really allowed to, say, do the example above regardless of any objection of the original content creator?

What would you consider reasonable for added content made by other people? Total identity change is not okay but giving someone a dick or a vagina by default is fine? Where is this line drawn? Have you elaborated on these on other posts? (I tried searching for terms with "legal" in it to no accurate results)

I'd really simply like to know how all this works before I consider investing serious time into writing some smut. My sincere apologies if this comes across as nagging, and I'm sure other people have asked before as well, my search just came up empty.

[Obligatory outro]

Thanks for your time and I'm looking forward to a reply!

Generally speaking, we fully respect the wishes of the original author of content. If you submit something that makes it into the game and are generally a) contactable b) around and c) cognizant, then we pretty much fully defer to the original creator of a character and their wishes. Unless said wishes are "Please remove this character from the game entirely" or "I'm aware you need to make a lot of changes because of feature X but I have no desire to put more work in at all, not even to review or okay things", which is why we basically reserve the right to do whatever.

In 99.9% of cases it will never come up, but in the 0.1% where it does, we need to ensure we can do whatever we need to keep moving forward.

In JimT-content cases, our position is basically "it has to fit the character and the existing writing, and if you can do that go hog wild." If JimT was still around, then we'd also be asking for his input on things like that, but seeing as he's not, we've essentially stepped into his shoes when it comes to policing the kinds of things that'll be added to his content.

The wording of the agreement sounds draconian and overbearing because it is. It has to account for the worst-case scenarios that may crop up. Whilst we may never need to invoke the full power of essentially what we've asked for, if we do need to, we need to.

 

[SmutForger]

Headtilt.

If you're writing it in googledocs, which you ought to be by all rights, you can turn off curly/smart quotes under tools, preferences.

Of course, it is just something I have to get used to and the rules that surround it (Such as normal quotes inside curly quotes). It's just something that I have to keep reminding myself because of how used I am to using normal quotes, and I'll likely notice this error quite often in proof-reads afterwards until I am used to it.

Generally speaking, we fully respect the wishes of the original author of content. If you submit something that makes it into the game and are generally a) contactable b) around and c) cognizant, then we pretty much fully defer to the original creator of a character and their wishes. Unless said wishes are "Please remove this character from the game entirely" or "I'm aware you need to make a lot of changes because of feature X but I have no desire to put more work in at all, not even to review or okay things", which is why we basically reserve the right to do whatever.

In 99.9% of cases it will never come up, but in the 0.1% where it does, we need to ensure we can do whatever we need to keep moving forward.

The Gedan himself! I understand the rules sound harsh that way because it is as you said; you need to be able to protect the integrity of features (npcs, mobs, anything) in the game. I wanted to know as to what extend and such this has been in the past and how much say creators and such get on their submissions.

I am really glad to hear that there's good communication between the original authors and staff regarding these things. I'm glad to see the rules are there as a last resort, like you said.



Quite frankly, I did not expect this many people to respond to my questions and it is bewildering, in a positive way. A lot more helpful than, well, pretty much any other forum. Thanks!