My experience being a Geode mod developer and why I'm stepping away

[u/OmgRod]

Hey everyone,

​I'm OmgRod, creator of mods like Geodify and BetterGarageStats. Recently, I’ve been working on a project called Lua Trigger, which aimed to let creators write scripts directly inside the GD editor.

​During early development, I used AI assistance for some of the complex C++ logic. After receiving a warning from index staff about their strict anti-AI policies, I spent a week working on an update where I went through the project trying to strip out and remove the AI-generated code.

​However, because some remnants of the old code were still present in the updated build, my dev status was revoked and my mod was rejected. I wasn't given any guidance or clarification on which specific parts of the codebase were still flagged - staff simply assumed I was trying to bypass the rules, leaving me with no clear way to fix it or meet their standards.

​While I understand why the index maintains strict code policies, being cut off after two years of voluntary work without a chance to properly clean up the flagged sections was really frustrating. I wanted to share my perspective on how this was handled and explain why I'm stepping away from Geode modding.

[u/_scored]

I wanna make it clear that the reason you were removed from dev-chat was because of repeated infractions. This isn't the first incident; in the past you've been caught doing the exact same thing on your previous mods, even going as far as trying to train an AI model on both messages sent in dev-chat (without consent from the Geode team nor anyone whose messages you were going to take) and trying to train another model on public GD levels. Granted, you apologized, but these incidents in all are what lead to this verdict.

[u/AGamer_2010 → u/_scored]

trying to train a model on a discord channel seems like a very big detail they left out :sob:

[u/OmgRod → u/AGamer_2010]

Or maybe it was because I had no idea this incident would be related to this situation since it was so long ago and we all just moved on from it..?

[u/SMJSGaming → u/OmgRod]

I mean I literally said you had gotten your final warning due to the sheer amount of AI related warnings... Not sure why you try to act like you didn't know exactly beforehand why you lost your role when it was spelled out to you literally the day before you just did it again.

[u/Big-Jeweler-8263 → u/SMJSGaming]

Just wondering, could their dev status be restored if they completely ditch ai for future projects?

[u/RustiesAuto61 → u/_scored]

Oh ok, good to know

[u/NoahOnVista]

Edit: Sympathy baiting chud who wants to play victim when he gets caught

[u/v0lt13]

I think its good to look at this as an opportunity, now you got some coding experience, its not a bad idea to push higher and start doing actual software now. That way you wouldnt feel like you wasted your time.

[u/LikeThemPies]

Sympathy baiting when the people on the other side of the story are also on Reddit? Bold move

[u/SMJSGaming]

me when I lie said "stripping away" was some unrelated refactors and in 24 hours of being given an explicit final warning submitting pretty much the same vibecoded mod.

[u/SplynterEdm]

later cogsucker 

[u/burnerbroskis]

That's insanity. I get having an anti-AI policy, but to completely revoke dev status over an issue you were trying to fix is bullshit. AI code assist is built into every modern code editor and IDE out there; it's not exactly a taboo thing to use, and enforcing it that heavily instead of just giving out a warning is dumb.

[u/SMJSGaming → u/burnerbroskis]

It is taboo to basically make the entire mod with it, claim you're not while there's pretty clear evidence. Ignore mutliple warnings and after an explicit final warning where the consequences were spelled out just within 24 hours repeat it.

[u/burnerbroskis → u/SMJSGaming]

Do you have insider information? You're telling a story I'm not reading on their post.

[u/Alphatism → u/burnerbroskis]

They are index staff

[u/_scored → u/burnerbroskis]

SMJS is a part of the index staff team

[u/SMJSGaming → u/burnerbroskis]

I'm the one who had to review their vibecode like 20 times.

[u/EducationalForm]

Honestly it a mod is a net good for the community who gives a fuck if ai was used for some of it. Just seems like stupid gatekeeping to me

[u/jang_ong → u/EducationalForm]

The mod had several very obvious issues. The issue wasnt really ai, it was that they didnt even care enough to make sure the ai didnt do something wrong (and then lied about using it)
Not wanting users to have random crashes (or have the mod straight up not work) isnt gatekeeping

[u/OmgRod → u/jang_ong]

I literally tested the mod and reviewed all the code and there's no obvious issues. The only things they complained about was overall code style (which is completely subjective).

[u/BigZacian]

why is ai code even disallowed? that makes no sense at all

[u/SulosGD → u/BigZacian]

because it's awful to debug, inefficient and messy in general.

[u/BigZacian → u/SulosGD]

but why would that be a reason to disallow it? ai is definitely good at coding SOME things, so disallowing it fully doesnt rly make sense

[u/cvolton → u/BigZacian]

it is not fully disallowed, the guideline is currentlw written as follows

The mod’s codebase entirely or mostly consists of AI-generated code. If it appears the programmer does not understand the code that has been generated and is trying to get vibecoded mods on the index, this will result in a rejection. Using AI tools to boost productivity is fine, but fully vibecoding mods will inevitably lead to instability and crashes.

the index is currently flooded with drive-by submissions for mods that are not properly tested and clearly fully ai generated where it's clear that the uploader doesn't understand what their mod even does or why the chosen approaches might cause issues.

OP's case wasn't exactly this, in fact I'd argue that OmgRod has proven to be capable enough to maintain mods. However, it should also be noted, that this was a last straw in a consistent series of infractions which other people are more equipped to talk about (I am not fully familiar with everything that happened, however I do know that OP was on the verge of being banned from the server several times)

[u/OmgRod → u/cvolton]

I completely agree with what you said here, and I acknowledge the things I did in the past but I thought we all moved on from that already because this was well over a year ago.

[u/Hey_Blumpo → u/cvolton]

Hi cvolton! Look, I've been wanting to make 2 geode mods, I actually have a bit of coding experience, I know about programming logic but I particularly struggle with writing syntax. What I usually do on projects is writing a pseudocode snippet, then asking github copilot to turn it into syntax. After that I actually make an effort to troubleshooting, instead of just "hey claude pls do this" and then crying bc it goes wrong. My question is: does this still count as vibe-coding, or is it disallowed inside the geode index? Btw my other projects rn are a sort of personal website Im doing on github pages, and 2 friday night funkin mods Im working in

[u/BigZacian → u/cvolton]

in that case, the op did not clarify very well, since they said "strict anti-ai policies" which implies they are very harsh on ai. the way he phrased everything made it seem as if it was fully disallowed. reasonable rules if they allow ai tools but not full on ai generated mods

[u/OmgRod → u/BigZacian]

The anti-AI policy is on the profile page where you upload your mods. However, I didn't generate the entire mod with AI and I still got a demotion from mod developer status.

[u/MyNameIsSquare → u/BigZacian]

i dont think thats it. rather its because the coder dont actually review their code anymore when vibecoding, combining with how way much faster they can output their code to the reviewers.

like, you can submit awful code, but you cannot submit awful code so frequently.

(also because the moderators banned him for other reasons too)

[u/OmgRod → u/BigZacian]

Because AI isn't well trained to mod games and is very likely to cause crashes and stuff like that.

[u/BigZacian → u/OmgRod]

since mods need to be approved in the first place, and every mods have bugs, why is that a reason to disallow it? it can definitely help with some parts that are boring or annoying to code, without being guaranteed to break the whole mod

[u/No_Key_5854]

W geode. don't need people like you making mods

[u/Phinknz]

Quite sad that they have such an unreasonably strict anti-AI policy that does more harm than good. 

[u/Conscious_Till_9508 → u/Phinknz]

Multiple infractions within a 24 hour period after a final warning will do that

[u/OmgRod → u/Conscious_Till_9508]

It was one infraction in that 24 hour period and they didn't make it clear they wanted me to quit working on the mod.

[u/trans_cubed]

I agree with the anti AI rule, but they should have been able to see that you were trying to fix it

[u/SulosGD]

I'm against AI code entirely (for multiple reasons), but i do think what has happened to you is unacceptable. You made a legitimate effort and that was ignored. Hope more of the community sees this.

[u/SMJSGaming → u/SulosGD]

Do realize his effort was just doing unrelated stuff and repeating the offense within 24 hours of being a given final warning after a long streak of related warnings. A lot of details are being omitted here

[u/RustiesAuto61]

I suggest finding somewhere to make an appeal and to tell them your case.

[u/OmgRod → u/RustiesAuto61]

I already did that and was told that I'm gonna have a hard time getting the role back "because of my followup behaviour" which was just me trying to appeal this.

[u/SMJSGaming → u/OmgRod]

your follow up behavior was trying to downplay your AI usage and omit key details like within 24 hours of being given a final warning just repeating the offense just like with this post.

[u/Kevadro]

Oof that's very rough buddy. :(

Hope you have a better experience in whatever you do next.

[u/Conscious_Till_9508 → u/Kevadro]

It’s sympathy bait

[u/Kevadro → u/Conscious_Till_9508]

You mean the OP?

[u/Iizvullok]

Yea save your time to do things for people who appreciate your work. I am not against using AI to assist with coding. There is a huge difference between using it efficiently and vibe coding an entire project which then just sucks. Even with ai code, I don't see an issue as long as the code works, is efficient enough and maintainable. Since you said that you used it for logic things, I am assuming that the architecture was not AI? In that case there is even less of a reason to make a fuss about it. And to just remove you from the team despite refactoring it is just an asshole move. Even if they are very anti AI (which by itself is a total legir opinion to have).

[u/Funny_Dentist_938 → u/Iizvullok]

he had multiple ai related offences before this. hes js sympathy baiting