I agree it should be treated as an exemption due to the debate around its taxonomy and how unique it is compared to the others, and other animals can also be discussed for a similar exception if people think of any
Preparing for PZ2 metawishlist
- Thread starter Stygi
- Start date
Dingo gets exemption but we can't vote for brown bears or tigers, wow that's going to upset a lot of people.
but there is no debate about them being separate species (that I am aware of) where as there is for the Dingo additionally it has a very unique range when comparing the different subspecies of bear
I could probably just write Dingo/Domestic Dog on the list.
I guess one solution could be that people choose their preferred subspecies when voting and if @SuzieSky is still against the proposed method of including subspecies in brackets then the subspecies could be ignored on the main meta wishlist and someone else who particularly cares about subspecies can independently go through and use that information to make an independent document showing subspecies preference, I guess the one issue with this idea would be double voting, for example if someone wants 2 tigers how would we manage that?
I would be extremely irritated, probably enough to quit if people encouraged this in any way. This rewards people who don't follow directions.
Well if you are against then we won't encourage it, I think the idea of grouping the Dingo with the domestic dog is a good solution
Wait so when we would vote for a brown bear you write brown bear? It would be more logical to put the sub species because I don't think anyone wants more than 2 species of them. Or we end up with EBB and HBB.
If the rules ever allowed it, I wouldn't hesitate to vote for a north American grizzly and Eurasian brown bear.
Frontier almost certainly knows by now that people would have preferred those two. I was initially going to try to work takin subspecies into the code, but it ended up being a nightmare. I was very happy when they added it and saved me the trouble. I will happily redirect people to another thread to discuss which if any species should be broken into subspecies, but if we start going down that road, I think more people are going to try to put subspecies for other species. It is simpler to manage and keep track of brown bear.
Its the kind of thing that might need adjusting when the game actually comes out, at the moment we don't have enough info
I think frontier will most likely pick bengal again, but I'd love to have Amur and Malayan/Sumatran.
Animals like Takin, Dik-Dik, All bears besides Brown and Black, Tree Kangaroos, and much more should be the generic route while giraffes, zebras, brown bears, wolves, and your more iconic varied subspecies should all be seperate.
Animals like Takin, Dik-Dik, All bears besides Brown and Black, Tree Kangaroos, and much more should be the generic route while giraffes, zebras, brown bears, wolves, and your more iconic varied subspecies should all be seperate.
I feel like we keep going in circles about the subject of subspecies. We need consistent and explicit voting criteria to get the clearest data possible. No exceptions whatsoever.
And just to put this out there, you’ll avoid most of this is you just made the wishlist on new species and completely ignore already existing species.
And just to put this out there, you’ll avoid most of this is you just made the wishlist on new species and completely ignore already existing species.
I think by the time planet zoo 2 is announced, we may have come to an agreement on subspecies.
Again I'd be surprised if the next metawishlist lasts beyond PZ2 launch.
It would make most sense to start a new one from scratch where these things are taken into account.
As I said I'd be happy to coordinate with @SuzieSky and company (and hopefully save them some labor) to start a separate thread for subspecies and domestic breeds specifically if people are that fussed about them (TBF I am myself for domestic breeds).
It could use a template to choose for the subspecies/breeds that most people can be picky about. For instance (though this can be discussed):
1. Tiger subspecies
2. Leopard subspecies
3. Lion subspecies
4. Brown bear subspecies
5. Takin subspecies
6. Giraffe subspecies
7. Plains zebra subspecies
8. Chicken breed
9. Donkey breed
10. Horse breed
11. Cattle breed
12. Sheep breed
13. Goat breed
14. Pig breed
15. Wolf subspecies
...
I would add the African buffalo, as the red forest buffalo is quite popular and distinct-looking. Other than that, I think the idea is solid.
So since Frontier may already be working on plans for PZ2, I want to try and help guide the potential aquatic roster while it's still possible. If I were to make a PZ2 base game aquatic meta-list soon, one that's not in any way intended to supplant the larger meta-list, is that something that you all would be okay with? Do you think it would get enough participation to be worth it?
Another thing that I would like to do, is to create a discussion thread where we can try to coordinate which aquatic species we vote for on the larger list. For example, I think some sort of trevally would be a must-have eventually if PZ2 gets large bony fish. If others feel the same way, we could try to reach a consensus on a trevally species to push for, in order to increase the chances of getting one over if we had all voted for separate species.
Another thing that I would like to do, is to create a discussion thread where we can try to coordinate which aquatic species we vote for on the larger list. For example, I think some sort of trevally would be a must-have eventually if PZ2 gets large bony fish. If others feel the same way, we could try to reach a consensus on a trevally species to push for, in order to increase the chances of getting one over if we had all voted for separate species.
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Apologies for the delay on replying, this week was midterms for me (I'm in grad school). Still more than happy to help with the PZ2 meta-list and have some additional thoughts on it too. First I'll respond to your questions though:
- Microsoft Forms would, imo, be an ideal way to collect data from voters, as it could sort votes pretty easily for us, allows for up to 200 questions/"fill-ins" to be asked, allows us to gather email addresses of participants (this would allow us to send mass email updates on things to all participants and might help deter people from "double-voting"), and Microsoft Forms was designed with the intentions of allowing for easy, self-automated transferring of data between it and Microsoft Excel.
I really do think something like this is our best option for a long-standing meta-list for many reasons. It would take most, if not all, of the "grunt" work out of things for those of us who are managing the meta-list. Everything could more-or-less be self populating and Forms allows for real-time updating of a linked Excel file. Additionally, I think our odds are much higher of a bigger community turn-out/participation if we keep submissions all done through a survey. No one has to have an active Frontier forums account and has to publicly upload a list to a specific thread in these forums. Instead, a voter just has to have an active email account and a link to the survey (ideally the link would be shared throughout all of PZ's communities - Reddit, Discord, Twitter, etc.).
We could still have a thread dedicated to the PZ2 species meta-list on Frontier's official forums, where we upload visuals of data, a link to the larger external excel file, and allow for forum users to discuss the survey's continually-updating results.
- While we are on the topic of the meta-list's actual creation process, I also think the survey's/list's results should not be publicly available/viewable until after a decent amount of voters have participated. Group-think is a common reoccurring issue with surveys that allow voters to see other's responses in real-time. It can lead to a skewing of data and "species campaigns". Additionally, this likely happened with all the meta-lists in the past. Users would look at what everyone else was voting for/was near the mid or top points of a meta-list, and partial if not entirely, base what they vote for around what other users have already been submitting. We really should strive to remove as many opportunities for bias as we can.
- Which leads me to the point of subspecies vs. species. After reading through everyones' comments on this it really highlighted all the biases that can occur around categories that operate on anything smaller than the species-level. The divisions between what counts as breeds, ecotypes, populations, and subspecies is in far more fluctuation than what is happening with animals at the species-level. Thus after further thought, it probably would be best to keep all votes at the species taxonomic level. This alleviates a lot of the bias-related issues that were brought up and would make things easier on the meta-list managers, a win-win.
There really is no need for the meta-list to be anymore sub-specific than an overarching PZ2 community wishlist. The game isn't even official confirmed or announced yet, and until then there is no reason to start dividing what people want from PZ2 DLCs vs the base game. Plus it wouldn't really matter if we even did divide things up into DLC or base game lists; Frontier is going to save some, if not most, of the top-voted-for new species for future DLCs regardless. Not all the communities top wants are going to appear in base game PZ2.
I also think that time is very much of the essence if we hope to still get a larger sample size of voters involved in this meta-list. The hype of the new (and likely final) DLC will start to drop pretty quickly, and with it, so too will community engagement. To me, it sounds like we are about at the point to finally get this thing up and going.
Threw this together a little bit ago now that I finally have some free-time again. (The design is pretty much a one-to-one of what Frontier did with PC2's logo haha)
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