Suggestion: Version Numbers for Steam Workshop

[RicoDevega]

This has been posted before, it'll be posted again. There are 822 five-star mods for Stellaris. A majority of these are not compatible with the current version of stellaris. The .mod files can already have 'supported version' added to them. This is a game that lauds its ability to play the version you want to play. Don't like a change? Pick from anything all the way back to release, and play with the mods that worked during that time.

So why is there no option to select version when you browse the steam workshop? You don't even need to take the messy approach of adding all the version numbers to the list like what Rimworld does. Divinity Original Sin 2 uses categories of mods, including whether you're using the Difinitive edition or not.

Some modders (I found 2) use a version tag for their mods, but without it being an officially supported category, there's zero incentive for modders to pick up on this behaviour.

Again, over 800 mods that are considered 5 star, and most of them unusable in whatever version of stellaris you happen to play (including live). This will get worse the longer stellaris is supported, as many modders create a new mod when a new version is released, changing the old mod to a legacy version.


So please, give us version tags, preferably in a separate category so it doesn't clutter things but I'll take what I can get at this point.

 

[delta180]

if your taking issue with something on the steam workshop, I think you should talk to valve not paradox, as far as I know the workshop is part of steam so it the restore to previous version is just using the opt into beta function to host files from previous versions, so this really is not a problem paradox can solve

 

[RicoDevega]

While the steamworks documentation is a hassle to navigate, what little I was able to read implies very strongly that once you decide to include a workshop for your product (in this case, Stellaris), you have total control over exactly how that workshop is handled. Valve barely operates steam yet alone the 1163 workshops on its system. I find it very hard to believe they take the initiative every time Rimworld got an update to add new tags, nor would I expect it to be popular tag based given Kerbal Space Program has its "Getting Started" tag with 2 mods, and "Craft" with 38 046 mods.

So no, I'd be inclined to believe this is 100% a Paradox problem. If you can find somewhere in the steamworks documentation (https://partner.steamgames.com/doc/home) that proves otherwise that'd be amazingly helpful, but I couldn't.

 

[delta180]

what you were talking about with linking the workshop to the version is not possible, in the steamworks documentation it says "As soon as a tester or customer has selected the branch, the Steam client will start downloading the branch, replacing their currently installed branch." in the branches and beta pages, so the customer has to choose the version, paradox cannot automatically pick a version for you

 

[RicoDevega]

Ah, you've misunderstood my request. It's easier if I show a couple of different workshops.
Here's the rimworld workshop. See how it has multiple different versions listed as tags along the side, going all the way back to 0.14. https://steamcommunity.com/app/294100/workshop/

Here's another workshop, this one for Divinity: Original Sin 2. Note its categories of tags (Game Mode, Version and everything else). It even has a dropdown box, isn't that neat? https://steamcommunity.com/app/435150/workshop/

What I'm asking is simply a combination of these things. A 'version' category of tags, ideally with the version 'name' as the tag, as it's displayed in the list of versions in the client.. So on Stellaris right now, this would give us:
Launch
Clarke
Asimov
Heinlein
Kennedy
Banks
Adams
Capek
Boulle
Cherryh
Niven
Le Guin
Wolfe
Lee
Shelley

Or, using just the numbers:
1.0
1.1
1.2
1.3
1.4
1.5
1.6
1.8
1.9
2.0
2.1
2.2
2.3
2.4
2.5

I'm not asking for it to automatically detected, I'm just asking for version based tags to be officially added to the workshop page. You can set them as tags right now, but without them being listed on the workshop page there's not much point.

 

[delta180]

ah, sorry I misunderstood you. That does sound very reasonable

 

[lConst]

Hi, I just came here to make this exact suggestion after coming back to Stellaris after a while of playing Project Zomboid, which does the same thing in its workshop. Mod creators would have to manually add and update the tags on their mods (like any other tag), but for Paradox it would be the work of about 5 minutes to change the workshop settings.

Filters like these could make modding much easier. Please don't let this suggestion die in the pipe.

 

[Foxosaur]

Great idea. It’s frustrating to navigate as it is atm.