UPDATED 14/06/18 - *** Rules for User Made Mods and Edits of PDS games ***

  • We have updated our Community Code of Conduct. Please read through the new rules for the forum that are an integral part of Paradox Interactive’s User Agreement.
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Castellon

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This is the discussion thread for the User Modding Rules of PDS Games. Please note that other games published by Paradox Interactive may be subject to other rules. For example the game Pillars of Eternity is owned by Obsidian Entertainment and you will need to contact Obsidian if you wish to mod that particular game.

If you want to read more about what can be done/not done with Paradox games as a whole, please visit our legal page: https://legal.paradoxplaza.com/terms-of-use

First, We at Paradox love User modding and mods for our games and want to encourage you to do so, we see benefits for everyone involved.
In the past there has been some confusion about the rules concerning user mods, in an effort to provide a clear understanding, the rules are formalized here.
These may be updated as needs and circumstances arise and through exchanges and dialog with you, our valued modders.

Below are the rules you must follow if you want to Mention/Discuss/Plan or otherwise Market your User mod on our forums and or list it in the steam Workshop.

1) Although we will no longer absolutely forbid having an external forum for the mod that is open to the general public (You have always been allowed a private one for the internal modding team), we strongly encourage you to keep your feedback discussions here to both benefit our members and to benefit from them. If you choose to have an external forum you can still use ours but normal rules against posting/direct linking/ or writing out external links without approval still apply.
2) User Mod files should be hosted on a file share site designed for use by the public (if they know the specific address) and or Steam Workshop.
3) The User Mod will not distribute the EXE file.
4) The User Mod may not include ANY kind of license or claim of copyright distributed with the mod (You may have a Credits section).
5) The User Mod should respect the work of other modders and not include any work without the consent of that modder.
6) The User Mod should not include 3rd party copyright material, without permission of the copyright holder.
7) Mods created with content owned by Paradox Interactive must be made so that they will only be usable by players who have the corresponding game or DLC installed. If this requirement is beyond the technical ability of the particular mod maker (or it is impossible due to the nature of said mod) then they cannot be used.
8) You may not charge to buy the mod or charge fees of any kind.
9) The Mod should be exclusive to the members of this forum and or Steam workshop.

Violations: If you feel that a user mod is violating one of these rules, please alert a Moderator and never bring it up publicly, leave that to the staff. Starting an argument or confronting the mod creator directly can result in unfriendly behavior and may result in both parties being warned or infracted, we do not want members getting into arguments about it Especially for Rule 5.

Once your User Mod has grown to the point where you feel you need more than one thread to discuss it, you can ask a Moderator that your main thread be stuck to the top of the forum and can use the first post of that thread to act as an index to the other related threads of your Mod.
Once you feel You have too many threads and posts to manage in that way, you can ask a Moderator to sponsor your mod and they can apply to an Administrator for your own sub forum.

It is important to note that we support modders and want you to succeed, follow the rules as outlined above and we will support you as fully as we are able.

SNEAKY EDIT:
Removed the following line: You may not solicit directly or indirectly donation in any form.
Our terms of use has been updated and you are allowed to include a link to Patreon (for example). If someone wants to donate for the time you've invested in creating your mod, that's fine, but make sure it follows rule 8 above.
 
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Yup I left it open for Discussion.
Using Steam workshop is new for us and so some issue may arise or rules added/changed as a result.
 
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I dont quite understand this:

"1) The mod may not have an external public forum, they can have one for their internal development use but not disclosed to the general membership here, nor allowing them to join."

So lets say there is a non-English community forum, does that mean i cant post my mod there?

As I mentioned in responce to your PM, Yes that is correct, if you are making a Non English based mod this is probably not the best place to market it anyway.
Except, French/German/Spanish/Swedish/ can do so in the other language forums on this site.
 
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You cannot claim any kind of license. If someone requires you to post a license then you should not use it, as then it would be third party copyright.
99% of the time I am sure there would be no issue, but it is the one percent that is the problem.
 
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Paradox IP is not "Valve Game IP"
To be clear we can remove mods from Steam workshop.
 
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Wait so with #6 we can't have mods that are made based on other games IE: Elder Scrolls Mod, Fallout Mod, Bioshock etc at all?!?!
Technically No, you cannot include material specifically trademarked, but most stuff is not, Copyright is tricky, I do not think most people would go after you for it if they see it a benefiting them and their brand in someway, or they just do not care enough one way or the other, but we need this rule in place to cover ourselves if they do.
I cannot really elaborate, as it is A) not my place, and B) I am not an International Copyright lawyer, to know what I can and cannot say regarding it.
Hey one company even went after youtube videos of their games that were like a decade old, you just never know.
 
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That would most likely be my thought, but again I am no expert.
 
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Correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe Castellon means this specific sub-forum, ie the EUIV User modifications forum. Rather, you should use one of the "other language" forums available on this same site.

I had a question of my own: would we be allowed to post mod files generated by the CK2-EUIV converter? I asked BjornB for permission to start this thread, which he thought was an excellent idea and gave me the go-ahead to start it, but I only asked about posting the actual CK2 save file, not the converted .mod file. The thread would probably get more traffic if the mod files were allowed, but since they require a DLC to generate I wasn't sure if that is allowed.


Doesn't matter to me either way; I'm happy with just posting save files, but if mod files are allowed then I think the thread would be a lot more useful. Thanks in advance!

I asked Bjorn to take a look, as you were already discussing with him and I do not want to just get in the middle.
 
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Isn't that going to kill any modding community that isn't English/French/German/Spanish/Swedish? There is a small but thriving modding community in Italy, for example - if you forbid them from distributing mods, they are gone. Poof. Vanished. Or at least completely excised from the main public, other Italians that come here but not in other forums included.

Let me make it clear, in no way do we wish to stop distribution of mods in other languages.
My comment was that since everyone in this Sub forum speaks English (By definition, since it is the only language allowed for posting) it is not the best place to talk about a mod made (using the example you gave) in Italian. That only seams logical to me. Other language mods if they want can still use this sub forum as long as they follow the rules outlined and all post would need to be in English (see why it would not be the best place), and if they use an Italian site to mod they can still post it on Steam to distribute. Send me a PM when you get going and let me know how we can help.
 
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China too and shutting down a community that is growing rapidly and in a country where income is rising rapidly (10% a year) is maybe not the most desirable thing.
See my post above.
 
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Lets not get into a legal debate on the internet as they tend to be unproductive (And we are not going to pay our legal department to come and represent our side :) )
 
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I hate being that person, bringing up stuff discussed ad nauseam, but wheeeee, here we go.



Mods are not persons¹ and as such cannot "have" (own, host, control, whatever) a forum. If by "mod" you mean what a "project" would be in the free software world, then you should define it as such. But there are other problems with that too.

A forum dedicated to a mod can exist without the knowledge or involvement of the people authoring or distributing that mod (which is technically equivalent to them being involved and/or in the know about it as long as they deny that). If some 3rd party would create such a forum, there's not much you or the modders can do. There are countless forums out there where EU4 and other Paradox games are being discussed, and such discussions can and do often center around certain mods.

Also, the wording "not disclosed to the general membership here, nor allowing them to join" is ambiguous too, since it seems to indicate that the rule is only there to keep readers of the (non-public) EU4 User Mod subforum from getting to external private forums... and that the hosters of these external private forums should bar the readers from here from joining there, for which they'd need information only you guys have. Fun with words.

Since it wouldn't be the first time for a collision of different goals to create a legalistic work of art of that kind, could you perhaps elaborate on the reasoning behind this rule? Personally I don't mind arbitrary rules as long as they are paired with benign neglect and/or a sufficiently civilized community, which is both the case here. But I'd like to know more about the direction this community might take in the future. Take your time though. It's cool.



I guess that means that you don't want to pay for possible traffic it could produce on one hand and that it should not be behind a pay wall or similar systems (as indicated by 8) and 9)) on the other. You should say so more clearly. Or was that an oversight and things should move towards what rule 10) implies?



The only .exe that was distributed with my copy of EU4 is eu4_launch.exe, and since it uses Windows Forms it is not even executable for me in any way... contrary to a file "eu4" which works. ;) (And thanks by the way, for it works splendidly.)

Oh, and you also do not want the dll/dylib/so files to be distributed by anyone without your explicit permission. (Or is that okay?)



If someone agrees to me distributing their creations under the conditions of a specific license, e.g. the WTFPL, then what is your reasoning for prohibiting that? Also, in most of the all too generic parts of the civilized world, something you create that can be considered to be above the magical threshold of creation (which is usually quite low to begin with) has a copyright held by you - you cannot simply waive that except by being dead for long enough... which is not sensible in any way since we'd be around Europa Universalis XVII then.

Of course people shalt not claim copyright when they don't possess it, but that's not what "ANY [...] of any kind" means.

If you just want to be sure that it is not distributed under a license that would allow distributors to circumvent the other rules, please say so instead. (Or additionally.)



People distributing works should do so only if they have the necessary permissions to do so in the first place, yes.



If a content creator is cool with their work being used by other people and thus distribute it under a sufficiently permissive license (that coincidentally by virtue of its license would not infringe on any other restrictions you guys set up), why should it not be allowed? If I ask an artist friend to spend a minute to sketch me something and they are cool for me to distribute it in any way I please, are they suddenly part of The Mod even though I never mentioned said mod anywhere?

I'd say this is thus the same as 5), with the additional provision that though shalt not disobey copyright. Which is not yours to decide though, since you cannot allow it either. Although it's probably not that a bad idea to keep iterating on it, given that Swedish legal handling of copyright matters is one of the crazier variants. (It's true, the internet told me so.)



This contradicts 2) ("should be hosted on a file share site designed for use by the public").


[1] I guess if the gentle reader is not that gentle in the first place, rules 1), 3), 4), 5), 6), 7), 8) and 10) could also be applied to "mods" in the meaning of "moderators". In that case, personhood shall not be restricted, unless they are user-made.

I understand you are trying to troll me but I would not have this position if trolling worked against me. :)
These rules are for those using or advertising their mods on our site, if you cannot abide by them you cannot use our site, pretty simple.
The correct meaning of the word should be clear from the context it is used in.
FYI - You do not need to be a "person" to own something, check out corporations some time. ;)
 
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It's still a shame that paradox would even consider stripping rights from people looking to distribute their own work here. Now if I ever want to make a mod, I'm forced to distribute it outside of here and the workshop, limiting the amount of people I can reach considerably.

If you look at our terms of service this has always been the case, but hey in practice we have not "stripped" anyone of any rights, We respect peoples efforts and creativity, But we need to allow for 2 equally creative people to come up with the same idea. If you put something in your mod that we have planned for a future DLC say, we cannot have you coming back and saying you thought of it so you own it and we cannot use it. We have also never to my knowledge denied anyone the opportunity to use the work if they get offered something, for example if they find a publisher to sell their AAR. We have one of the most liberal access policies on youtube and similar chanels, were we basically give blanket rights to use our IP for lets plays and even to make money from that. (See the sticky thread in the Paradox General Discussion forum). We have also worked with Modding teams and given them full development deals, Our internal development studio PDS have also hired extensively from our Modders.
 
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Hi I already mentioned above that this is not the place for a debate about international copyright law, this is a thread discussing the rules of posting/discussing/marketing or mentioning mods on this forum.

On your other points, Java and C++ definitely come with licenses.
English Language would be considered Public Domain.

But that is offtopic for this thread as well.
 
For the CK2 flags, Kallocain would have to OK that, you can PM her. If she says yes, be sure to put it in the first post of a thread you start for the mod, that you obtained permission to use them.
That will make sure others know to do so, and avoid any issue with forum staff getting the wrong idea.
For the Wiki image, you cannot include a license so that is up to you. Not sure how they determine if the original poster of the image has the right to give the pic away (Place it under that lic) in the first place.
Chances are that if it is on Wiki then you can find a PD version somewhere without the lic, or recruit a graphics guy and make your own, lots of talent on the forums waiting to show their skills.
 
Well if you can make it yourself that is always the best idea, both from a creative standpoint, a pride of workmanship standpoint and a rights stand point.
 
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I have a question about copyright here. I got a PM from StrategyInformer :



From what i get so far , is this now allowed or not ?

Problems for me are this from the new EUIV Mod copyright:

9) You may not solicit directly or indirectly donation in any form.
10) The Mod should be exclusive to the members of this forum and or Steam workshop.


Ok, its not a donation i get, but the side is commerical and so gain provit with user made content.
Beside that its not a nice move to put up a mirror and ask later for permission :angry:


Posting links to external sites like that has always been against the rules.
And yes, you could choose to list your mods DL link with them and not here or you can list it here and not there.
 
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I've created a mod which brings all the EU3 soundtracks into EU4 directly, I'm just wondering if this is considered illegal by Paradox (Of course it is in real life, just assuming no-one takes it too seriously here as it's meant to enhance immersion). If so I'll remove it immediately, just something I forgot to think of before-hand and want to be sure on now.

As mentioned above, if you want to include PDS IP from a different game, you would need to get approval from Kallocain, you can PM her. If you do get it be sure to state that you did get permission, in the first post of any thread made about the Mod here.
 
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I didn't see my specific question earlier on, my apologies.

Could you elaborate further on this point or link to the post where you did?

Read post 11 where the question was asked, then my response in Post 14 and follow ups in 16-17
 
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