Paid Mods? - Whats the story on this?

Conan Exiles General Discussion
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Not sure if this is the forum section to put this question, but I was curious. What are the rules in paid mods in the game? Are they allowed? Encouraged? Frowned upon? Illegal?

I remember a year ago I had stumbled across a few and thought it was normal. Looking for them now I did not find any.

What is the story on all this?

To be honest I am thinking of making a mod, and how far I will go into making it a full fleshed out mod to the extent I want to will be determined by if we are allowed to have monetized mods that we make. Otherwise, I guess I’ll make a really lite version of what I initially thought of for free.

Truth be said, making the mod to the extent I initially “dreamed” of will take time away from actual work. So, that puts me in a very awkward situation and was curious.

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I am not a moder, but here is a suggestion where you could get many (if not all) answers:
discord: https://discord.gg/66jB9dN

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Not allowed. You can set up a patreon, and its a grey area to do a commission (only because Funcom doesn’t come down with a hammer about it). But trying to straight up sell mods using Funcom’s code is very much not going to go over well.

And to be very, very clear. You are not going to find financial success making mods. You just aren’t. You either do it for the learning experience, or for fun. But if you want to make actual money, you should look at something like making marketplace assets for UE4 or Unity.

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So the answer is no. Thnx :slightly_smiling_face:
Yes I was curious because, depending on the mod, its not funcoms code you are selling, but visual content. Same as say a DLC from funcom that adds buildings and armours, and historically this is not in actual violation of the work a company made legally but it all depends on the company itself as they have the last say and right to claim what is ok and what is not. For quite some time there have been plenty mods with payment for different games, and there were a few about a year back for Conan Exiles too… I was curious if it was even allowed. Maybe the waters were unclear at the time, and since the the issue has been directed thoroughly.

Again thnx :slight_smile:

As for financial success, hehe, no that was never the intent. It was simply that “weighing” of hours spent towards some revenue return to take time off from other work. If the issue wasn’t as such, then I would of never of even wanted to do it for anything other than just fun :slight_smile: This was always the primary concern, do something I enjoyed. The “budget” on other work is what creates the restriction of how much free time I have on the side to be doing something like this instead of directing said creativity to my own actual work :smiley:

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You are still using Funcom’s assets (code) to add those art objects into the game. Technically it’s even in their EULA that to even host a mod on Steam you must put a legal notice on the workshop.

Legal
This mod contains assets (art, music, code, items, systems and/or designs) that are the intellectual property of Funcom Oslo AS or their licensors

Which is accurate. You cannot create a placeable, working armor piece, weapon, or building without using Funcom’s blueprints.

If you want to sell the art without actually adding them as a mod you could via 3rd party 3D art selling stations. But the moment you use Funcom’s code to implement your stuff, whether that’s buildings or armor, that option goes out the window.

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Wait a second, since I havent used the dev kit yet, what do you mean by this? That you are for example making say an axe, model, maps, everything, and importing it through the Unreal Engine Dev Kit, that it still needs to for example to be placed under the Axe template so the game can see it as such and for you add values?

Hmmm. If so that makes sense.

Yeah thats why I said, it all comes down to how the developers themselves deem content made for their game. Again I was mostly curious as all this started also with a UI mod that I want that used to be for money and now I can’t find it at all :stuck_out_tongue: Got me thinking what the deal is altogether with all of this.

I think not being able to monetize even assets that are created to be imported into the game is ok, again and up to them, as it is in fact the very game and its dev kit that allow you to do it in the first place.

So again, I would have to default to making something if and when i have some free time just for the fun of it :slight_smile:

However, there is some worrisome wording I saw in that last part,

I will have to check to see what this actually means (the depth of it) when the time comes.

For example, if I am using assets that I created all on my own, and the only part of the mod is the “blueprint” as you call it for them to work in the game (and thus totally ok not to monetize it as by their rules) does this by extension make those assets themselves intellectual property of Funcom?

I will I guess look into it in more detail (and privately as suggested) with Funcom. Since, if this means by extension, that I cannot use my own asset work after that in whatever I so please, then that would indeed be a problem. And although I am cool with everything else, this part, if this is what it means, although it is up to them to dictate and chose how it goes down, I am not cool with and find myself very unwilling to make a mod that will contain assets that I myself created and not have any right to those base assets after that because I pretty much signed it over to Funcom :confused:

Anyway… Working atm so gonna have to look into it when I get around to having the time to do a mod for the game, in which case I will see what the details are then.

Thnx for all the info.

p.s, chances are I will want to see this in the game so much anyway, that I might even forfeit rights to said assets if I ever get around to it… lol… But, I’ll see how it goes when the time comes.

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Probably your best route ya.

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Yes this was my initial understanding. But we are living in dark times :stuck_out_tongue: And although Funcom is not Blizzard in such practices by any stretch of the imagination, that WarCraft 3 refunded… I mean reforged, fiasco with their new modding regulations has me now always looking over my shoulder. lol.

btw, I can’t 100% blame Blizz for being salty either for missing out on one of the most popular titles with Dota, but to go to the other end of the spectrum and make such license agreements is a little too much.

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No, as I explained several times the reasoning to why this is not possible. I also epxlained its not for profit, but to not make it feel like a complete waste taking time/budget hrs that could be spent on work, so a Patreon is also not an option. Its not what I do. There is no cart or horse, if it sells zero I still don’t care, its a peace of mind.

Sorry for answering a little abrupt but if you read the conversation above I go into these details and explain it already and I am currently working and kinda in a hurry with regards to giving a more thorough “civil” response.

Thank you for the suggestion.

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Something else to add :slight_smile:
If I was to go “full out” on this and think of profit, then the first question would again be “how is it legal to monetise”… its not a horse before the cart situation because I didnt spawn into modding and creating assets and 3D work just now and thinking about picking it up. Been learning since even before 2005 and doing this since 2010 :rofl: So again, IF I was to do this for profits (which it isnt) I would need to know if it is viable. At my point of the “journey” there is no just have fun with it and learn. Its all about making results now and taking it to the next level. Ive done that first part long enough :stuck_out_tongue:

I mean, if someone is thinking of profits, the first thing they research is if it is even possible to get profits in the first place. If = yes, then they move on to the rest :wink:

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Every time a hotfix comes out, mods need to be adjusted. This means x amount of hours, per mod, x times per year in relative perpetuity. A mod expert could look at this action and make predictions about how much income is available at each of these points: a) consulting, b) maintenance, c) mod rework. Consider a scenario: you know the wholesale going rate for desk work in IT goes for about $35-$45 an hour. If you serve three mod-makers per month, five hours each at a minimum of $40, you can bank $600 from your desk.

IN the above example, if you expanded your plans to “packages,” including amounts of a, b and c in varying amounts, you could offer mod-makers a monthly service, or a one-time subscription. And finally, to put the icing on the cake, you could offer private server admin services. All of this would be run from a central hub, a web page with paid advertising, including ad spots for private server realms. Slay, live, love and profit, Exile!!

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you could really go all out then.
it is for sure interesting to look into, personally im too tied up in other work to be able to go in that direction. however at least there is some margin of viability to it if you also go “pro” on it so to speak.

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I think so. And with your creativity and work ethic, you could dial up a more fungible/modular plan than the one I just conjured. It is interesting to think how supporting a game could become an organic entity, so at the very least I appreciate your patience with my thought experiment. :brain:

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