Paid mods is still a thing for Valve. BUT...

[DesoPL]

Seems that even Valve learned lession from years ago, about paid mods.

Gabe said, that paid mods is still a thing because modders working hard on thier stuff and they deserve reward for it. That's i understand... The thing however is, that making paid mods in Skyrim which is huge modders community, was an huge mistake and they will not do it again.

Well that's something i guess?

[Rucati]

I think they got it right with DotA 2 custom games. Give free versions of the mods, but allow people to pay or donate if they want to for extra features or something. That way everyone wins. Everyone gets the mods for free, the developers still have a chance to earn some money, and the community won't lose its shit.

Seems like an easy solution for everyone. Perhaps too easy.

[Dezerte]

I don't think paid mods are ever going to work as Valve envisioned it.

Skins for e.g. CS:Go work because they are not incompatible with each other, and official game updates rarely break them and ultimately Valve is responsible for making sure the skins work as intended.

[Deleted]

Paid mods is really really complicated to pull off without fucking everybody involved (mod creators, game devs, consumers, distributors) over. It should probably only be done by mod creators themselves. distributors, especially steam, should not expect a direct kickback from it. Game devs getting a kickback sounds decent to me but if they want money i think they should also offer tech support for mod creators.

ofcourse the absolute biggest problem in general is the huge risk of just crippling the entire modding scene if people start to want money for minor mods or if there are no free/trial versions of big mods. and for big games like skyrim with thousands of mods of various scopes if probably a bad idea all around, even if implemented on launch.

honestly donations or other payment models sounds like a better idea. patreon or twitch subscriptions or w/e sound like the way to go to me. it's never going to be a goldmine anyways. maybe some hybrid models where the game dev curates mods and split the proceeds with modders can work, especially if it's art/skins related mods.

[Collegeguy]

I would like something similar to youtube. Have people watch a 2min ad before downloading the mod.

Yes, everyone hates ads, but if it could bring far better mods because people are getting rich off it, I think it would be worth it.

[Aeula]

I'm not about to pay for something that gets broken every patch and can be abandoned whenever the modder feels like doing something else.

Exceptional mods I'll donate a few £ to, but there's no way I'd pay for the 100's of mods across all my games.

[Cosmic Janitor]

I would like something similar to youtube. Have people watch a 2min ad before downloading the mod.

Yes, everyone hates ads, but if it could bring far better mods because people are getting rich off it, I think it would be worth it.

How would that work.. the numbers are vastly different and it already doesn't work for most web based program hosting services as the adds can barely cover hosting. Best model I've seen is probably patreon support for some minecraft mods. Continues support gets you more supporters and so on, but I guess that doesn't work as well for modding in games like skyrim which were made and have barely been touched by Bethesda since the last DLC (not counting re-re-re-re-re-re-releases).

[Glorious Leader]

I'm not about to pay for something that gets broken every patch and can be abandoned whenever the modder feels like doing something else.

Exceptional mods I'll donate a few £ to, but there's no way I'd pay for the 100's of mods across all my games.

Thats the thing about mods theirs very little consumer protection. Valve ends up having to step in and arbitrate. Its a bit of a reslonsibility on their part not sure its wise for them to assume this burden.

[Dys]

Then Valve should pay them. They don't understand why there was backlash at all. It wasn't because they tried to include Skyrim. What a pompous jackass.

Mods have always been free, and the creators make them and support them under that notion from the very beginning for their love of the game. Allowing people to donate through Steam if they choose to would be a good step. But, they should never be treated as fan created paid DLC. That spits in the face of the entire modding community and goes against everything they've been doing from the start.

[Ninjavitis]

The main reason I can't support paid mods is that there really is no Obligation on the modder's end to make sure their mod works with other mods and if they do, for them to remain that way. When, for example, Bethesda makes dlc for a game they design that dlc to work with all parts of the released game and future DLC, and if not they fix it. Unless there is some sort of guarantee for mods that they will work with all other mods released, theres no way I could justify paying.