Just going by these notes, but I'd like to voice this:

Players would rather see new content than see us polish the old.

A lot of people who followed this mod for years believe it dead, and understandably: the released map has hardly changed in years.

Feedback on TR as a whole, including the old stuff, is almost universally positive (with the exception of comparisons, IE: "I thought everything looked good until I saw OE, then I realized how much better it could be" etc.

We will get more bang for our buck moving forward, rather than back. 

Some important points about the re-do's

- it'll never be perfect. 
- standards are always changing
- There is not a clear line where "standards" end and "modder preference" begins.
- There's a real danger that a "re-do culture" can form, and we'll have an endless amount of "just a few more small changes" to old stuff, slowing progress moving forward.
- danger of splitting team focus between new content and re-do content.

And what's the benefit of re-doing the old?

- we could make it look better, sure. But at the cost of slowing new releases, which is what the players are all waiting for. Plus the other cons listed above.

At this stage of the journey, let's move forward, not back.

Cicero

Aren't you guys working on Firewatch and Helnim interiors?

And?

Sure, I claimed the FW lighthouse. Its a new unique structure that looks neat. Working on this interior however does not change my view that these 're-do' projects are a slippery slope that will bog down the releases.

I'll also remind you that this lighthouse was neither my first, nor second choice for which interior to work on right now while I have a bit of time.  It being a unique landmark was really the only thing that tempted me to take it, after my other two choices fell through.

ITO has been described on discord as "surgical" "precise" "targeted" etc. Hopefully that's all true. Tani seems to be doing well enough of taking care of the exteriors in a timely matter. 

I also hope we're not needlessly and inefficiently throwing out too much interior,NPC,quest stuff along with the proverbial bath water, but this isn't my project, so we'll see what the scope turns out to be.

My point stands: the player base would be a lot more excited to see a new release, rather than hearing that we've polished up the old content.

All the best.

Cicero

You found the lighthouse neat to work on so you took it. 

Perhaps the same can be said about others wanting to work on older exteriors?

Perhaps? No Cicero, of course that can be said. This is a volunteer project. For fun. People can work on whatever they want.

I hope ITO is a success, and turns out the way it's been marketed.

That being said however, my points above still stand. And the released map has barely changed in many years. TR progress comes at a snail's pace at the best of times.

We have to also remember who this mod is for: the players. Do they want to see new content, or see the same chunk of eastern morrowind they've seen for nearly two decades "fixed up" ?

I'd also not say this is entirely for the players. It is made by us because we are really enthusiatic about Morrowind. And we are not selling it as a product so it cannot be positioned as a "we need to get this out to the players".

DoD is a big release. It is like 10% of the mainland. 

Any old content we touch is done in specific ways. Sundered Scar for example is easy as there is a shack village there, and next to no quests. The two things that made it special, the fort in the swamp and the durzog,were both taken out, so now there is literally nothing to see there except laggy bitter coast. Making that good is good for the players as well as the people that want to work on it. ITO is good for people as they are getting a better expereince in those settlements, and Charger is very passionate about handling that project. 

Some devs are only here because they want to work on older content. They don;t really want to contribute to the new stuff. What to do with those people.

I feel like this conversation is turning a bit sour. So in hopes that I might resolve some of the issues, here's my opinion on the current status of TR, and our plans for the future.

tl;dr Quests are not affected by redos. Interiors and exteriors might actually be boosted by redos. Top-level planning is somewhat affected. None of the people involved in these areas are slowed down by redos. However, asset development is hard, and I need further information from others to decide how to best go forward there.

1) Quests. They are the single biggest task when preparing a release. DOD is turning out to be a monster with 139 quests currently planned, and some more on the way which might get included (Foul Murder). This is because of Andothren's status as a major quest hub, and some ambitious dev-driven projects involving the Vampire clans and Imperial factions. We currently have 16 people actively working on quests, 9 of them being directly involved with DOD. The rest are working on Mainland additions to OE and AT, or early TV quests. This division of labor (2/3 working on a release, 1/3 on Mainland) has been the intended goal of TR for years, starting with the (failed) quest pack release. Nowadays, we're occasionally putting up quest ideas for Mainland areas to bring quest density in line with post-Sacred East releases, provide some connections between old and new areas that direct players to spend more time in our lands, or just implement unfinished content. Most of the time, these quests are simple, and are usually finished as showcases, frequently drawing in new developers.
While redo proposals might theoretically hinder questing progress, they rarely do so because of the previously mentioned priorities. Defining a minimum viable product (MVP) for OE, AT, and DOD helped focus our development pipeline and give quest devs a sense of our priorities.

2) Interiors. TR has been in a perpetual shortage of available interiors for years. This is due to the relentless work of old and current int devs in interiorizing lands as far north as Kogotel. Most of the fresh claims are either put up for new exteriors, or revoked from inactive int devs. Currently, TR quest devs often wander off to work on P:C and SHOTN, just to be able to work on something interesting that is not some random cave.
Potential solutions to this include...
...putting up refurbishment claims for existing interiors (we already do this sometimes, but these are technically redos so we want to limit them as much as possible)
...putting up more interior claims to existing areas (not a good idea - we already have too many).
...finishing more exteriors, which is another problem that I'll talk about later
DOD is pretty much interior-complete. Significant parts of the TV, SH, and Kartur releases are also interior-complete. Here, redos actually give us some momentum because it makes stuff available for quest devs to work on.

3) Exteriors. Here, the problems of quest and interior development come together: there's both a shortage of available claims, and a lack of manpower. We have about 10 active ext devs shared between PT and TR, most of them juggling multiple claims at the same time to avoid burnout. Putting up more claims would allow us to do recruitement more efficiently, simply because there's work for both new people and existing devs to get excited about. However, putting up claims requires new assets and top-level planning to various degrees, depending on the method.
For new lands, we need a lot of new assets and a lot of planning. For section work, we usually don't need any new assets, and some planning. For redos, there's some need for new assets, and the required planning is sort-of inbetween new lands and section work. This is why most exterior progress at TR is being done on section files like the Roth-Roryn and Armun Ashlands redos, Nemon's Velothi mountains work, Coda's OE mountain range work, or the recently proposed harmonization of LA-TV exteriors with neighbouring sections. Again, redos might actually help TR and PT in the long run, because if we don't have enough assets to open up new lands, we can keep existing devs busy with redos, or entice new people to join the project.

4) Top-level planning. Since I've already touched on a lot of related topics, I'll just focus on the effect of redos here. When planning something like the Sundered Scar redo, we need 3 meetings: coming to an agreement to do it, figuring out the region during a template meeting, then finally setting up claims for developers to take. The reason why we're having these meetings now, is that we've used up most of the available meeting topics where relevant people could be present. It's summertime, so it's a lot harder to get a T_D or faction coordination meeting going. However, only 3-4 people are needed for a template meeting, and they are all available for the next weeks. And eventually we have to do these meetings anyway, because we can't build province-spanning faction questlines without having a clear vision of older regions.
When it comes to scheduling releases, Mainland redos should not affect those signficantly, as they are being worked on in separate section files (such as ITO). We can merge them whenever we want to.

5) Now we get to the hardest bit: asset development. The effect of redos is the biggest in this area. We actually have to deal with both the prioritization and distribution of the workload. So I understand where you're coming from, MwGek. Ideally, finishing up OW assets would allow us to extand ext and int development to a huge part of the landmass. We even have a list of the remaining assets to be finished. But it's still going to take us a lot of time. Compared to that, Clambering Moor and Sundered Scar assets are readily available, with only some minor additions needed to start ext work in the regions.
Unfortunately, I don't have a good overview of our asset development pipeline, so I'd like to ask Cicero to expand a little on our current priorities in a comment, if he has the time.

Overall, TR is a hobby project. We can't really stop people from working on things that are interesting to them. There's always been a building pressure to start working on older areas, and the task of the lead team is to direct this enthusiasm in a way that doesn't impact the release process. We try our best to maintain this. The way I see it, none of the departments (except assets) will see negative consequences with regards to DOD/TV release progress. Feel free to disagree on this, I'm open to having a conversation. Also, for the record, I agree that if we wanted to set priorities in assets, OW should come first.

re: my stance on redos

I was at the meeting for 2 hours or so, but for the duration of the Kartur (1), Ascadian Bluffs (2) and Andothren (3) talk.

(1) The exterior of Kartur, IMO, is fine. Like it's fine. It's okay. I do however think that the town is a little too large, and I'm also glad that it's getting moved closer to the Rift Pass. A smaller town will be much easier to NPC and moving it further away from the Hlaalu-Redoran border means that in the future it won't mess with the current dynamic of the lands east of Pryai River.

(2) I've never had a problem with the Ascadian Bluffs being green. I dont think I'll have a problem with it being brown, either. My input in the Ascadian Bluffs discussion was mainly "okay, fine, okay, fine, I'm tired, just do it if it bothers you". Vern made a good point in favor of changing AB to RR by saying that the area will be the first things some players will see in TR and that making the RR will offer them something new to see rather than more of the Ascadian Isles. Changing the visuals of the region won't be a huge undertaking, I reckon it'll postpone the release of DoD by two to three days.

(3) The Dwemer ruin cliffs are the biggest issue with Andothren and moving it to the south is good. I have always disliked how it's like 15 meters from Vvardenfell. I will support any and all redos that make the Inner Sea bigger.

Regarding the other things discussed in the meeting; I wasn't there. I maintain that TV needs no significant exterior redos. I also think that the Roryn's Bluff visual overhaul is largely unnecessary and that the regions was mostly fine as it was. The big wheel's already turning on that one so I just want it to be done and dealt with so we can move on. When ITO first started, it felt like an ambush and I wasnt very thrilled with it. I've since changed my mind due to how well Charger has coordinated the whole operation. Atm, I've no opinion regarding the Indoril heartland regions: they've always bored me immensely.

Final thing I'd like to say that redos definitely hinder quests, at least for me. It's a pain to come up with quest ideas or to make quests for an area that's constantly being changed, though there are no techinical limitations causing it. Could be a me-thing.

Oh, another final thing: voiced meetings have been much more enjoyable than text meetings; very cordial and even fun

Third final thing: I think we're all at least a little guilty of treating TR as a personal vanity project every once in a while. Well, I know I am :P

So, I just checked the asset browser. And honestly, it's a bit of a mess. Thomas already started categorizing various assets that didn't have region/faction/race information, but the priorities are all over the place. I talked with Gnomey and Rats, and we think it might be a good idea to have a meeting after the SS template on long-term planning for TR (15 August). This would include drafting a proper prioritization system for the asset browser, and figuring out what needs to be done on the next few releases. Like, if TV is the next release, but people say the section needs ext work to finish the riverbed, or replace cliff meshes to improve performance, then we should prioritize this so we can start NPCing and making quests for the section right after DOD. Or, if SH needs interior assets to open more claims, then we should do that. Or, we can open 21 ext claims if we had OW assets, let's prioritize those then, etc.

The idea is to figure out how to keep the pipeline as smooth as possible (assets->exts->ints->npcing->quests) for future releases, so we can avoid the mess that DOD has become. It was kind of unavoidable due to us postponing Andothren work since pre-OE times, but we can actually avoid it in the future. Also, TR has 4 avenues for expansion now: TV->SH->OW, Kartur->Kogotel->Baan Malur, the Deshaan, and Indoril redos. With clever prioritiziation, we can use this to our advantage to keep project momentum high.

I'm very frustrated with this conversation. I guess I'll respond point by point.

Redo's are still planned after the new areas are complete right? Even tho ITO is nice to have (And a cool small release) is does push back our regular release of DoD. I rather see more new area's instead of overhauled old ones. Focusing on these indoril lands with some new regions will drain manpower from creating the much needed stuff for OW. 

You guys probably spend multiple hours discussing this and that time could have been used by 10+ developers to get DoD out of the door. In other words it is a waste of time.

Sorry, but this is nonsense. Nothing I have done with ITO has delayed DoD in the slightest. Rats, Cicero, Mark, Dillon etc are all focused on DoD work, with occasional ITO contributions along the way, and while I am very focused on ITO work, I've personally done a great deal to drag DoD along further, from touching up half the ints in Andothren, NPCing and writing dialogue for the city, and working on the MG questline. Should we being doing more? Come on.

The primary planning of these things is costing lead/senior developers a lot of hours. These are exactly the developers working on the major quest hurdles for DoD right know. I know it is fun and sometimes easier to work on something else for a while, like a redo area. All the talk time on discord about redoing stuff is better used for group development streaming, showcasing or some other stuff that keep developers motivated and enjoying the progress. So let's not say that this is not going to slow down our main releases.

The major quest hurdles for DoD are being handled be me, Rats, Mark, Why, and Dillon. Rats has done a bit of asset work for ITO, and Mark has one (1) int claim. Dillon and Why haven't done any ITO stuff. These devs are in no way being meaningfully "delayed" by ITO, and I hope I've demonstrated in my previous reply how I too am personally doing a great deal to get DoD questing done.

I also hope we're not needlessly and inefficiently throwing out too much interior,NPC,quest stuff along with the proverbial bath water, but this isn't my project, so we'll see what the scope turns out to be.

If anyone cared to actually look at it, the scope spreadsheet has been publicly posted with every iteration of the ITO sectionfile, and I've repeatedly posted in #questers-campfire about updates to quests. It should be more than clear by now that I'm "cutting" basically nothing, and retaining/improving almost everything.

So if I'm not on the discord I can't voice an opinion. Seems weird since the post specifically asked to give your thought now before it was to late that was exactly what I did. If I can't I'm quite done with this project.

You're being asked for your opinion now! We wouldn't be having this conversation if we didn't care about your opinion. Please don't leave the project over a misunderstanding like that.

A lot of people who followed this mod for years believe it dead, and understandably: the released map has hardly changed in years.

Dude, what? We've literally released half of TR's playable content in the past three years. Let me say that again: half of all the quests in TR were released since 2018. Those releases included a playable area on the map twice as large as Bloodmoon. So, yeah, no, you're saying nonsense.

Also want to voice that these redos do draw manpower from NPC/Questing teammembers (populating towns/reimplementing quest/on the go adding some new content because we are at it now) and those are just the people needed to finish the new releases. 

For the quest hurdle my point still stands. For example Cicero is asking loudly for this redo, and I guess he spend time in the meeting and thinking what it should become. He has a quest badge so theoretically could speed up DoD. There are probably more people that talked hours in that meeting where that time could be be used to work on claim. Since it is a volunteer project everyone can do what they want, but don;t say it doesn't water down the primary release speed.

I'm going to say this as diplomatically as I can. I don't think it's particularly generous to speak on the time commitments of other devs. I have put - at least - over a hundred hours of work into DoD, between int touchups, NPCing in Andothren/Ishanuran, writing dialogue, and quest content. The other seniors and leads who have worked on ITO - Cicero included - have done as much or more than that for DoD. ITO has not taken devs from DoD in any way, shape or form. If devs don't want to work on a DoD thing, removing a redo alternative doesn't force those devs to work on DoD; it just means those devs will do nothing instead.

At this stage of the journey, let's move forward, not back.

This is going to be my last post about this subject. I voiced my concerns about redo's and my opinion about focusing on a new area for real with a group of developers. If we do that I might even be charmed back into using Discord if it actually complement my development speed and joy of creating something together.

My point stands: the player base would be a lot more excited to see a new release, rather than hearing that we've polished up the old content.

For crying out loud, yall. We literally do not have to choose. We can improve our old content while we expand to new areas. ITO has been modeling exactly how to accomplish this for seven months now. It's very straightforward, and can even motivate progress if we do it in an organized fashion. You are the only people claiming this is a binary choice, that our options our stagnation or progress. It's just not the case, and I hope I've clearly laid out why above.

So again let's not do this for old stuff, but let's go foward first and pick up the pace.

As I said above, we do not have to choose between new release areas and old area touchups. And we won't get far pressuring devs to "pick up the pace". People will just burn out.

I don't understand how having more options for assets to make could delay assets work. It's not like OW progress was going strong before this redo talk started.