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Lost in a sea of projects, formats, and debates? Look no further! These are the current hot topics, and you can find previous topics here. To begin a new topic on this page, use the "+" button at the top of the page. If logged in, you can also add this page to your watchlist to track any changes and stay on top of things! Old topics are archived to these subpages.

Moving skill statistics closer to the skill facts

One thing I've always found odd on the wiki is that skill "statistics" (cooldowns, activations, ammunition count, initative/energy cost) are shown all the way to the right side of the page, far away from the skill facts. I think it would make more sense to group them together to be more similar to the ingame tooltip. Grouping would also make it easier to compare skill differences between game modes. I have made an example of what it could look like in my sandbox. While it isn't the prettiest solution, it's functional and sort of replicates the ingame tooltip. Feel free to offer suggestions or improvements. --BuffsEverywhere (talk) 20:11, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

As I said on the discord, I like it, explicitly because it replicates the ingame look -- we do not need to reinvent the wheel, and consistency with the game is good. ~Sime 17:54, 29 April 2023 (UTC)

Implemented in preparation for tomorrow's balance update. --BuffsEverywhere (talk) 16:04, 1 May 2023 (UTC)

I actually thought it was a wiki bug as far as underwater icon and the target indicator moving to the left but then I tried on several browsers along with purging the page; good thing I checked here. The spacing seems sort of off since ingame it is justified formatting (and so is GW2skills). The one thing I would probably change is relocating back the underwater status and the target indicator. Cooldown and activation appear on the top left side of a tooltip so that looks fine. --Life Infusion «T» 17:22, 2 May 2023 (UTC)

Yeah I was a bit caught on the hop by this one. Looking ingame, the ground targeting indicator certainly doesn't have its own tooltip icon, so that's gotta go imo. Underwater icon is indeed on the left-hand side of the top-right of a tooltip, but perhaps we should reorder it a bit. I had a go at altering the CSS yesterday to make it prettier, but couldn't find anything that works. -Chieftain Alex 18:07, 2 May 2023 (UTC)

I've moved the underwater and targeting icons back into the infobox in my sandbox, and also made the statistics text smaller. I agree the uw icon doesn't need to be on the left because we have the intro text for that. Let me know if it looks better now. --BuffsEverywhere (talk) 18:21, 2 May 2023 (UTC)

It does indeed look better! I think ingame the underwater icon only shows in the build panel (or when swapping skills with the up arrow) with the icon on the left side if I am not mistaken. Whatever is decided I think that some spacing is required (justified text or whatnot) since a pile of 5 icons in a row seems more confusing than a column that we had before. I do not think ammo count has an icon ingame except for mantras but I am not ingame, if I remember correctly it just has a number on the skill icon.--Life Infusion «T» 18:35, 2 May 2023 (UTC)

I've updated the skill infobox with the changes. The spacing can be changed but the icons were always in a row though, never a column. Some skills such as Jaunt use the icon in its skill facts. --BuffsEverywhere (talk) 19:31, 2 May 2023 (UTC)

No offense, but how does this look visually appealing to anyone such that this got implemented in mainspace? This randomly floating left aligned icons look terrible out of position and it also introduces a weird and unnecessary line break which mismatches the position of the quoation marks with the description line start. The first time I saw this I thought this was some strange CSS error that incorrectly places the statistics div outside the infobox for whatever reason.

I'm voting to revert this to the previous format. However, if you really, really want to move the skill statistics outside of the skill infobox (in my opinion: why though?) then please properly mimic the in-game style by

• 1. Adding the skill name to the quotation block (probably increased font-size and bold).
• 2. Limiting the quotation block width (to something like 400px/30em).
• 3. Moving the icons to float on the right.

--Tolkyria (talk) 18:31, 31 May 2023 (UTC)

(Reset indent) When talking about visual stuff, probably some examples will help, let's take the skill Whirling Wrath:

Currently used variant	Mirroring in-game variant	Previously used variant
Skill statistic icons left-aligned directly above the skill description.	Skill name bold with increased font size on the right and skill statistic icons on the right. Also: increased icon number size by removing the "font-size: smaller", removed the "big" tags from fractions that always cause strange line height interactions.	Skill statistic icons placed in the infobox.
“ 0.75¾ 8 Spin in place and swing your greatsword while hurling powerful projectiles.  Damage (7x): 1,274 (3.15)?  Projectile Damage: 151 (0.375)?  Number of Impacts: 7  Number of Targets: 5  Radius: 130  Combo Finisher: Whirl  Range: 600 — In-game description	“ Whirling Wrath ¾ 8 Spin in place and swing your greatsword while hurling powerful projectiles.  Damage (7x): 1,274 (3.15)?  Projectile Damage: 151 (0.375)?  Number of Impacts: 7  Number of Targets: 5  Radius: 130  Combo Finisher: Whirl  Range: 600 — In-game description	“ Spin in place and swing your greatsword while hurling powerful projectiles.  Damage (7x): 1,274 (3.15)?  Projectile Damage: 151 (0.375)?  Number of Impacts: 7  Number of Targets: 5  Radius: 130  Combo Finisher: Whirl  Range: 600 — In-game description

It's a fair point to place the skill statistic icons closer to the in-game description, but with this comparison above, I highly doubt that the currently used variant is the best format, the visually best looking, the smoothest solution this wiki can provide. --Tolkyria (talk) 07:42, 2 June 2023 (UTC)

If we choose to do a "right align" on the statistics, what width of box would you pick? From the couple of fixed/max/min-width arrangements I tried, it quickly fouled on the longer skill fact variable text. -Chieftain Alex 17:16, 2 June 2023 (UTC)

In my browser one needs at least 46em to display all common skill facts in one line (except incredible long stability fact description). I'm not sure if you consider this as too much. Edit: Note that the max-width could also only affect the upper part, namely skill name+icons and skill description but not the skill facts. However restricting the width might not be even something bad, for example see:

• Extra long skill descriptions reaching from the left to the infobox on the right on larger monitors, those might be more readable with forced line-breaks.
• The new standard mediawiki skin vector2022.

Each solution has to make a payoff:

• The current solution has the terrible format.
• The previous solution has the inconvenience of placing the icons on the right in the infobox instead near the skill facts.
• The suggested solution with the skill name and the right-floating icons is somewhere inbetween these two plus the restriction on the description width which may cut some skills fact texts into half.

But in the end in my opinion a pleasing format is worth more than a slightly inconvenience. --Tolkyria (talk) 20:00, 2 June 2023 (UTC)

"Mirroring in-game variant" looks good. Better than what we currently have, that's for sure.

While we're at it, perhaps we could consider listing the cooldown and cast time while affected by alacrity/quickness in the infobox? But perhaps it would look too confusing for what little value it would add. Warming Hearth (talk) 21:33, 10 June 2023 (UTC)

I like the "Mirroring in-game variant" as well. ~Sime 18:54, 12 June 2023 (UTC)

I am in favor of improving the formatting by mirroring the ingame variant. --BuffsEverywhere (talk) 15:52, 13 June 2023 (UTC)

I have revised my sandbox for the mirrored the ingame variant. But instead of using a right align, I used a span with a margin of 10em separation between the statistics and the skill name. I also didn't apply Tolkyria's change to the font size and removal of the big tag. Removing the big tag would need edits to Template: 1/4, Template: 1/2, and Template: 3/4.--BuffsEverywhere (talk) 02:43, 21 June 2023 (UTC)

With your "margin-left" solution one gets weird spacing when reducing the browser window size (e.g. reduce browser window to exactly line break the statistics). Furthermore it would be user-friendlier to have a fixed skill statistics position where the wiki users have to look at rather than being dependent on the length of the skill name.

What about something like the following instead (feel free to adjust the widths), in my tests it looks quite promising even for extremely long skill names and/or smaller browser window sizes:

<div style="max-width: 30em;">
<div class="statistics" style="float: right; margin-left: 2em;"><!-- STATISTICS --></div>
<div style="min-width: 8em; font-weight:bold; font-size:115%;"><!-- NAME --></div>
</div>

--Tolkyria (talk) 16:12, 21 June 2023 (UTC)

Okay, let's use that. I've copied your code into my sandbox above. --BuffsEverywhere (talk) 16:39, 21 June 2023 (UTC)

Maybe a box outline would impove the visual grouping (instead of the quotes?). —Kvothe (talk) 21:47, 21 June 2023 (UTC)

I've updated skill infobox but I am still not satisfied with how much empty space there is between the skill name and recharge, for example on Alliance Tactics. --BuffsEverywhere (talk) 00:27, 29 June 2023 (UTC)

(Reset indent) Am I the only one who thinks that inserting the name in the description looks out of place? It's already in the page title which is right above it which looks very odd. I If the intent is to keep the name regardless, I strongly echo Kvothe's suggestion to put the whole thing in a box outline (and add a background) so it actually looks like the tooltips from ingame, similar to Template:Mail. --ItVictor (talk) 07:30, 29 June 2023 (UTC)

Okay, another change, I think it won't get better by stacking up different format changes (on live wiki every month), honestly keeping it simple might be the best solution. For example a box somehow needs a fixed width for the skill description which gets awkward for long skill facts like stability, furthermore it introduces even more tooltip inconsistencies between different infoboxes (e.g. skill vs. item infoboxes). Overall, I think it has good reason why we kept the skill statistics icons in the infobox for more than ten years, it's visually just the cleanest and least disturbing format.

I brought up the "mirroring in-game variant" to give a somehow constructive alternative to the "left aligned icon variant". The "left aligned icon variant" was live on the wiki for the last two month and as I initially said for me it looks even more out of place than the current one. Sure, the redundancy of the skill name (1x in the browser tab, 1x on the top of the page, 1x in the infobox header, 1x in the skill tooltip) is a thing, but that's the price that has to be paid for right aligned icons.

For me the initial design was the simplest, so, if there's still the option to revert to the "put the icons back in the infobox" variant, I'm still voting for that one. --Tolkyria (talk) 09:11, 29 June 2023 (UTC)

How to display a single Dye color?

How might I display a single dye color by name without having to find / lookup the associated color code? Had looked Template:Dye palette color but couldn't get it to work without the color code. Lady Elyssa.2469 11:01, 30 April 2023 (UTC)

Assuming its for your userspace, make a new userspace subpage to use as a template, and then copy the important bit from Template:Dye palette. I've created User:Lady Elyssa/Templates/Template:Dye color for you. -Chieftain Alex 11:34, 30 April 2023 (UTC)

That is amazing, thank you, that is exactly what I needed Lady Elyssa.2469 14:17, 30 April 2023 (UTC)

Suggestion: Add gw2fortune.com to list of fansites

Hey guys, making a request to add https://www.gw2fortune.com to the list of fansites page. What would it take to get this accomplished? Reborngeek (talk) 00:04, 3 May 2023 (UTC)

The criteria can be found here, which is also where you ask for being included (on the talk page). ~Sime 13:06, 4 May 2023 (UTC)

New Template:Mastery icon needed

think we need a mastery equivalent of Template:Achievement icon for use on pages which refer to a specific required mastery in the text. Genie (talk) 13:24, 10 June 2023 (UTC)

I guess nobody stops me from using Template:Map icon for this. Genie (talk) 00:43, 21 June 2023 (UTC)

I am not that knowledgeable in creating custom templates like this and not really sure either how much this would be needed/necessary, but yeah I think the Map icon template should be good enough. Though if someone were to create it I would not be opposed, especially if it makes linking masteries easier when required. ~Sime 01:08, 21 June 2023 (UTC)

Strike Mission table overhaul

Heya, I have finished (hopefully) the overhaul of the Strike Mission table: it can be found here. The differences between what's there currently and the proposed version:

• The unlocking conditions are directly under the strike's name, so easier to spot.
• Currencies are formatted similarly to the Raid page.
• Reinstated unique drops, so players can at glance see what unique items can drop there (there was no reason to remove them in the first place, imho).
• Moved the release dates under Notes, it took a lot of space and is not particularly useful by itself, especially since many strikes do not have any notes at all.

I think the revised table offers more information than before. I am open for suggestions/tweaks. Thanks! ~Sime 15:47, 5 August 2023 (UTC)

I vote for the revised table. As a nice byproduct of adding release to the Notes, headers take comparatively less space than the content. Adeira Tasharo (talk)

Looks good. Only potential issue is possible information overload but better too much info than not enough given common comments about the wiki on reddit, etc. Konig (talk) 21:59, 5 August 2023 (UTC)

I get the worry about info overload but I do not think that's a big issue here. I was indeed working with some feedback from reddit which is why the unique drops and release dates are included, as people often wonder what cool stuff you can get from the strikes and when was the last release. It is an overview, so a lot of info is to be expected: still, I think what's included is iseful for the table. ~Sime 12:53, 6 August 2023 (UTC)

Looks good to me; it provides clear detail and is nicely divided into sections. As expected of the Mother of Choya! One slight tweak I would recommend is regarding the access mention about Old Lion's Court. Some players might get confused by the "Doesn't require any expansion to enter." note as it would imply that Arborstone is accessible to everyone too when it requires the End of Dragons expansion. I think that some sort of reference to the fact that only LA access to the strike is available to all players should appear somewhere to avoid potential confusion. --Kossage (talk) 13:53, 7 August 2023 (UTC)

Thank you all for the suggestions (even to those folks on discord who did not participate here), I implemented some slight tweaks based on the feedback. It's been over a week now so I updated the Strike page.~Sime 11:58, 13 August 2023 (UTC)

Vista pages

→ moved from Talk:Lake Lutgardis Vista

Sime claims "Vistas do not get their own pages", and yet the question comes up, what's the point in cluttering other pages with instructions on how to reach a vista? The majority of reasons for going to a region's page are for finding other information about that region. What if that information could instead be self-contained on a page exclusively for that vista? Not all vistas need pages, certainly, but some of the more difficult to reach ones would be well served with having their own page, especially given that Points of Interest already get their own pages even when the lore and difficulty in access don't justify it. Arkevorkhat (talk) 21:17, 15 August 2023 (UTC)

I agree with Sime and our 10+ years of handling it this way. My reasoning is: Why create inconstistency in how we handle vistas if it is only for a minor few. Readers should be somewhat aware at this point that vistas don't have their own page - not much information one can put there anyway. And by not having separate pages sometimes - it is clear that one goes to the zone or area page related to said vista and looks for information there. Sime added your map and a getting there explaination to Lake Lutgardis. In my opinion this is handles adequately. —Kvothe (talk) 09:27, 17 August 2023 (UTC)

By that metric then, why have POIs been getting pages for so long? The vast majority of POI pages have either zero content or minimal content. "<Name> is a Point of Interest located in <Location>. EOF" isn't much of a page. Are we going to just keep a decade of bloat because "we've always done it this way"? Arkevorkhat (talk) 21:22, 18 August 2023 (UTC)

Actually, No. It's fine. It's clear that more of my time here is going to be spent arguing with you over things that you guys only do because of nothing more than tradition, so it's better for me to simply not contribute anymore. Good luck, do what you want, but do it without me. Arkevorkhat (talk) 21:25, 18 August 2023 (UTC)

Vistas don't even have names. At least with PoIs you can add some text about their significance or their lore. Look at waypoints too, those do have names but what even would be the point of making pages for them when you can just redirect to the area page (which we already do Temple of Kormir Waypoint). The way I see it, PoIs are lucky they have their own pages, and vistas shouldn't even dream of getting a page for each of them.

The wiki is very democratic. You proposed something, it didn't receive any support. Accept the truth, no need to get angry. Warming Hearth (talk) 10:30, 19 August 2023 (UTC)

"The wiki is very democratic" Really? 2, *maybe* 3 people constitutes democracy? Sounds more like plutocracy to me. This is the exact kind of problem with wiki culture I'm talking about. Y'all have dozens or maybe hundreds (hard to say, since nothing is documented) of editing standards that new editors are expected to already know by the time they make their first edit, and the response is immediate hostility when one of those unwritten rules is broken. How do you expect to grow the wiki when this is how you treat new editors? As for "vistas don't have names," that's BS and you know it, the wiki has been assigning names to vistas for as long as they've supposedly been prohibited from receiving pages according to Kvothe. TL;DR, if you want people to edit the wiki, don't be such a bitch about them breaking one of the rules you never told them about.

not having a name is a major stumbling block to creating a page. -31.94.0.14 12:55, 19 August 2023 (UTC)

I fail to see hostility in being told that "It's usually not being done that way, and here's why." ? Inni (talk) 10:24, 22 August 2023 (UTC)

Just want to add on about the "Y'all have dozens or maybe hundreds (hard to say, since nothing is documented) of editing standards that new editors are expected to already know" part. We do have documentation, see pages like Help:Editing and the Help:Contents section. You can also always see other pages as examples or even ask if you have questions. At the end of the day though it's not a big deal to edit and fix things after the fact and then you know for next time too. Also all the templates have info on them and examples, and we post about changes and suggestions. Lots to look at though so it's not really expected that you memorize it all. But it is there. --Dak393 (talk) 10:33, 22 August 2023 (UTC)

Points of Interests used to contain npcs and dialogue but iirc since there is no boundaries to them it might be hard to decide what actually belongs in it or not + it was a repeat of the area, so it was decided to not have it there. All PoI pages though should have lore -- the fact that they do not is an entirely different matter. Walkthrougs and pics for vistas on the area pages is nothing new and no one had a problem with it so far as far as I am aware. I would not be against vistas having their own page per se but I do not think it is worth, and definitely not only for some of them. Also very nice of you to come the wiki, something does not go your way and you immediately throw a tantrum when a discussion starts and then you start insulting editors, a really friendly attitude. ~Sime 11:58, 22 August 2023 (UTC)

Just my two cents, but if anything there have been complaints that the info on the wiki requires too many clicks to get anywhere. The area page is a suitable place to have this information and makes for an easier user experience. Myriada (talk) 12:23, 22 August 2023 (UTC)

Relics - what template to use

Been some comments on this, so thought I'd ask the community formally.

Do we want to consider Relics...

1. as their own standalone thing (like back items which have their own Template:Back item infobox),
2. as trinkets (like amulets which use Template:Trinket infobox), or
3. as upgrade components (like runes which use Template:Upgrade component infobox).

Currently I've gone with "Trinket infobox" (the actual changes to get the infobox to work were small), but I did have to apply a bit of a kludge to get them to work, and you need to use uslot=no.

I'd be open to the idea of a separate infobox, but there's a fair bit of similarity with other infoboxes we already have.

I've noted there is a request on the wiki discord to add an effects parameter which is easy enough, I just want to finalise the decision on what infobox we're using first. -Chieftain Alex 19:27, 24 August 2023 (UTC)

I'm open to options but still leaning towards having it's own template that we can work with and change. Being able to to set things like properties for them can help a lot in filtering and finding them too. Right now a lot of them cause a skill to happen and I think it would be nice to actually have those details set and not just on another hidden page like we did with runes. But flexible on options and we could just modify current templates to fit. --Dak393 (talk) 02:17, 25 August 2023 (UTC)

I am for them having their own template too, especially if it makes working with them easier. ~Sime 18:00, 25 August 2023 (UTC)

Samarog identified?

In the mission Tower of Secrets, there's a statue of Samarog next to a statue of Deimos. We know Deimos is a Kryptis, but the statue's placement next to Deimos and message seem to imply some sort of relation. "Samarog was not our destiny to correct, but that of another. We must keep our eyes on the Obscure. The rest...will correct itself. -Isgarren". How do others read this? That Samarog was also a Kryptis or that he was just another kind of mist demon?

I read it as neither. We know that the Wizard's Court refuses to deal with internal threats to the world of Tyria unless absolutely necessary (like they mentioned they almost intervened with Soo-Won) and they have been relying on the Commander for a while now, as they protect the world from external, Mists threats. It also doesn't read to me that Deimos and Samarog are exactly related nor it confirms that Samarog is a demon either, just that the two were in the same prison (for different reasons). ~Sime 15:15, 7 September 2023 (UTC)

How to get Related Skill / Skill List by Specialisation for User Page

I have been trying to look up which skills, traits, etc, grant a given effect, for example: Might on Warrior and which Weapon Skills, Heal, Utility, Elite might do that.

I have cobbled this together so far with a copy on my Sandbox 7 page

Skill List

No good, shows All Professions by default

•   "Save Yourselves!" — Shout
•   Overwhelming Celerity — Final Charge
•   Potent Haste — Mantra
•   Facet of Strength — Legendary Dragon Stance, Facet
•   Nomad's Advance — Legendary Alliance Stance, Luxon
•   Banner of Strength — Banner
•   "For Great Justice!" — Shout
•   Signet of Might — Signet
•   Frenzy — Stance
•   Elixir B — Elixir
•   Blast Gyro — Well
•   "Guard!" — Command
•   Sun Spirit — Spirit
•   Griffon Stance — Stance
•   Vulture Stance — Stance
•   Exploding Spores — Cantrip
•   Well of Bounty — Well
•   Cleansing Fire — Cantrip
•   "Feel the Burn!" — Shout
•   Unravel — Stance
•   Mantra of Pain — Mantra
•   Signet of Inspiration — Signet
•   Psychic Force — Psionic
•   Blood Is Power — Corruption
•   Well of Power — Well
•   "You Are All Weaklings!" — Shout
•   Desiccate — Punishment
•   Elixir of Risk — Elixir

In order to display this without the optional filter options, does this require a new Widget to do this or a modified Widget:Filter table with an option to exclude showing the optional filter options? Also, how would I manually pass the chosen profession / specialisation to it? Lady Elyssa.2469 16:39, 7 October 2023 (UTC)

• You want Template:Skill list by property, just using the correct query:

  {{skill list by property|utility|[[Is for profession::Warrior]][[Has subobject.Has fact::Might]]}}

• This outputs the requested list:
• •   Banner of Strength — Banner
  •   "For Great Justice!" — Shout
  •   Signet of Might — Signet
  •   Frenzy — Stance
• DJemba (talk) 13:21, 8 October 2023 (UTC)

Thank you so much for the response DJemba and this works perfectly for Might but notice that when I use this for Fury it shows Core Warrior along with Berserker and Bladesworn. Is there anyway to limit this to a specific Specialization.

•   Banner of Discipline — Banner
•   "For Great Justice!" — Shout
•   Wild Blow — Rage
•   Flow Stabilizer — Armament

{{skill list by property|utility|[[Is for specialization::Berserker]][[Has subobject.Has fact::Fury]]}}

seems this only works for Elite Specs and not the Core Specs. I did stumble upon Property:Has specialization type and when including this in with the existing query like so

{{skill list by property|utility|[[Is for specialization::Berserker]][[Has specialization type::Core]][[Has subobject.Has fact::Fury]]}}

Found that it generates a warning informing me that the query condition could not be considered due to this wiki's restrictions on query size or depth. Lady Elyssa.2469 14:20, 8 October 2023 (UTC)

Is there perhaps a way of looping through the results provided by the skill list by property and then filtering out just was is needed.? Lady Elyssa.2469 09:47, 9 October 2023 (UTC)

Am still fumbling around in the dark here but was able to cobble this together and as its related to this existing question and does allow for a larger, more focused query, thought it best to include it here and sorry for the long post.

{{#ask: [[Has fact::Fury]] [[Has fact type::Boon]] [[Is for skill.Is for profession::Warrior]] [[is for skill.Has skill context::Utility]] [[Is for skill.Has specialization sort order::0]]}}

Banner of Discipline#fact2, Banner of Discipline#fact3, "For Great Justice!"#fact1, "For Great Justice!"#fact2

No idea how to turn this in to a list or how to remove the duplicates Lady Elyssa.2469 20:49, 9 October 2023 (UTC)

Unable to use parameters passed to User Template and use them with a Query

The user template is at: User:Lady Elyssa/Templates/Template:Skill fact query and can be called with

{{User:Lady Elyssa/Templates/Template:Skill fact query|Warrior|Utility|Fury}}

If the Query is hardcoded, like so:

{{#vardefine: QUERY | {{#ask: [[Category:Warrior skills]] [[Has skill context::Utility]] [[Has subobject.Has fact::Fury]]}}
}}

Then it correctly displays these results:

• Banner of Discipline
• "For Great Justice!"

When trying to read in any parameters passed to it, it fails

{{#vardefine: QUERY | {{#ask: [[Category:{{{1}}} skills]] [[Has skill context::{{{2}}}]] [[Has subobject.Has fact::{{{3}}}]]}}
}}

{{#vardefine: QUERY | {{#ask: [[Category:{{{1}}} skills]] [[Has skill context::{{{2}}}]] [[Has subobject.Has fact::{{{3}}}]]}}
}}
{{#arraymap: {{#var: QUERY}}
|,       <!-- Seperate our Data by the (,) Delimeter -->
|@@@     <!-- temporary string variable -->
|* @@@   <!-- Cycle through each piece of data stored in variable -->
|\n      <!-- Add newline to end of data segment -->
}}

Lady Elyssa.2469 18:52, 10 October 2023 (UTC)

Notes and Trivia sections

We currently have a bit of a disjointed mess at the end of many articles, were "facts" are arbitrarily added into Notes and Trivia. Some of these practically replace the article's intro and body. They also often contain really valuable information, sometimes the reason why people go to these wiki articles in the first place.

GW2Wiki is obviously a completely independent wiki project with its own rules, but I still would urge everyone to read the w:Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Trivia sections (it's pretty short). Key highlights:

• Lists of miscellaneous information can be useful for developing a new article, as they represent an easy way for novice contributors to add information without having to keep in mind article organization or presentation: they can just add a new fact to the list.
• As articles grow, however, editors encountering such lists may feel encouraged to add to them indiscriminately, and these lists may then end up becoming trivia magnets which are increasingly disorganized, unwieldy, and difficult to read. A better way to organize an article is to provide a logical grouping and ordering of facts that gives an integrated presentation, providing context and smooth transitions, whether in text, a list, or a table.

Common objections I've seen:

It's just a note, it doesn't deserve a section.

That's the problem: any single piece of information can be considered a note. Try to reverse how you think about them: any note can and should be placed in an appropriate section. Yes, even if its just one sentence. It stops Notes from growing uncontrollably and directs future editors to the relevant sections.

It is consistent with other articles.

Don't continue making a mistake just because you spent a lot of time making it – create a new consistent approach. E.g., we have wonderful standardized "Version history" sections for skills and traits, who says we can't have a "Development history" section for any game mechanic? Currency#Trivia looks like such a section, why not just rename it and prevent it from becoming a mess in the future? Another example: Fractals of the Mists#Trivia.

Some examples and suggestions on how to deal with Notes:

• A fact explaining how an item/skill/mechanic works — "Mechanics" section.
• A fact explaining how an item/skill/mechanic doesn't work — "Mechanics" → "Limitations"/"Restrictions" sub-section.
• A very specific or advanced calculation about the mechanic — "Mechanics" → "Advanced"/"Formula"/"Calculation" etc.
• A fact about a very obscure one-off interaction — "Mechanics" → "Special cases/interactions" etc.
• Bug/anomaly — put these to the section where they are relevant to avoid these.
• Walkthrough/guide/tips — "Walkthrough"
• An update changed a game mechanic — "Development history" (placeholder name, open to suggestions)
• A reference to a movie — "Cultural references" (who am I kidding, this stays in "Trivia")
• Etc. etc.

Practice lesson: Raid#Notes – reorganize this using the guidelines above. :D

Let me know what you think in the comments down below Please feel free to suggest what you think makes sense (if any of this does). --Genie (talk) 12:30, 19 October 2023 (UTC)

I've thought this before and honestly, sounds like you just want Notes section with extra steps. One major point of specific contention I have is this:

"Yes, even if its just one sentence."

No. It would be cleaner, easier to read, and shorter page length to have 3 unrelated bullet points in one section, then as sentences under three separate sections. If a notes section is "growing uncontrollably" (and I barely see this in the edits you've made that I've caught), then I can see the merit of making a section for those if there's enough info to merit a section. But very rarely do I see such where division is cleaner. Also, "Walkthrough/guide/tips" usually are already in a Walkthrough section, unless you're suggesting having walkthroughs for items or something... Which sounds like a logical fallacy to me.

And Trivia section should not be touched, imo. Trivia is such because it's trivial, because it's an easter egg, a fun fact, or a "hey did you know". Those do not deserve their own section and if they did, it'd be stuff like "Pop Culture References", "Development", etc. with one line each - to which I say, see above. We do not need multiple tiny sections when it can be one medium sized section. And to your "practice lesson" - the only one that wouldn't be a one or two liner, and thus rather ugly imo, would be the LFG. But that's still technically one note. Konig (talk) 16:41, 19 October 2023 (UTC)

Let me start saying that what I said on your talk page before, Genie, is still 100% true -- I absolutely agree that crucial information should not be hidden at the bottom under Notes. However, I share Konig's sentiment that oftentimes it feels like you are just switching the Notes section to Mechanics but it's...still Notes but a different name. Also, not all Notes content is Mechanics, it just doesn't fit on all pages universally, unlike Notes, which is why that section exists on all formatting guidelines. As Konig says, section should not be just one sentence unless absolutely necessary (so, like Acqusition, for example), however, for pages where the formatting guidelines do not exist or are not as strict (as they are for example for Item guidelines), let's say the Raid page you mentioned, it's 100% possible and often being done to create a section once it's warranted by the size of the section or importance. The Raid page could easily have an Abbreviation section with a link to the Abbrev page but listing the most common ones as they are under Notes right now.

Bugs are often under the relevant section (so for example, Items offered on vendor pages), usually they are under Notes if there is a large number of them on the page for easier overview. Not sure why you linked the Peaches in Bulk as an example since the relevant pages, due to their confusing nature, had the relevant information literally at the top of the page as a massive Notice and yet people still ignored it. Walkthrough/guide/tips are already categorized under Walkthrough for relevant pages. I have mentioned multiple times a Version section history for non-skill pages (in a non-official manner, though), and was told no unless I can keep them updated (I wanted to list patch notes changes for anything from the game updates, so slightly different from what you are mentioning here), but for most pages it's just literally a note or two that I do not feel it needs a special section on all pages. On Trivia I once again agree with Konig, there are so many possibilites that can go under it and you could have for some pages literally dozens of sections with oneliners, from dev comments, to name meaning, to what the npc is wearing etc.

To summarize my opinion, Notes and Trivia sections exist for a reason and it's just not possible and imho shouldn't be done to replace them all and everywhere, though I am not against new sections on pages where the formatting guidelines do not mention them, as the guidelines for this wiki are a mix of descriptive and prescriptive approach, but just trying to get rid of Notes is honestly a moot attempt in my opinion.~Sime 15:38, 20 October 2023

I think Konig summed it up best as "sounds like you just want Notes section with extra steps". Mechanics might not be a bad idea on skill pages, since skills can have mechanics, but I also do not pay attention to skill things at all, you'd have to define what would go under that over on the Guild Wars 2 Wiki:Skill formatting talk page. Beyond that, I'd leave things as they are, as other than the above comments, it's just easier for casual editors/IPs to add a notes/trivia section versus wondering where in the world their info is supposed to go due to having way too many rules of what is where. - Do_odleplex 16:02, 20 October 2023 (UTC)

Thank you everyone for the feedback, I agree with a large portion of it. I never really tried to render Notes section as some absolute evil, more like urging other editors to pay more attention to them and adopt a different approach to future-proof the articles.

My main gripe remains that often important or semi-important info is getting shoved at the end of the page where some readers might not even see it. Sure, let's not visually overcomplicate the page with seven different one-sentence sections – but then let's just put this info into the intro. The only reason many notes sections exist is because people don't see where they can fit this information into, but everyone knows that, when in doubt, "Notes" is the way to go. A quick way to add information to the page without much thinking. Meanwhile, intro is technically a mini-article in itself, acting as a summary and providing context for the page (at least in Wikipedia rules it is). It should make it easy for new/anonymous editors to add info there. So, by creating more intro sections we will automatically avoid a lot of random Notes (here's how I sneakily added a "note" about stacking by creating an intro). Obviously, its not a mandatory or universal rule, but just another way to address this.

Also I hope we all agree that if a "Notes" section is 3/4ths of the page, basically making it the article, it should be addressed? It doesn't make sense to have more notes to the content that the content itself.

About Notes->Mechanics edits in skills and traits. I would argue that in practical sense any information about functionality of a skill or trait fits "Mechanics". If it's still a section with one sentence, might as well name it correctly? And, again: a) Notes are simply often overlooked by readers b) It avoids a potential future problem where a crucially important fact will be shoved into the "Notes" because the "Mechanics" section doesn't exist. Also, I don't see why not have "Mechanics" or some version of "Walkthrough" for items where it makes sense, like Levvi's Device, for example.

For Sime – "Development history" or "Update history" sounds less strict than "Version history", so I think we can totally have such sections even if they are incomplete and not always up-to-date. It's valuable information for continuity purposes and deserves a standard section. Let's just settle on the name. --Genie (talk) 17:42, 20 October 2023 (UTC)

Widget Request

→ moved from Guild Wars 2 Wiki:Admin noticeboard#Widget Request

Could you add widget "Linkedin Profile" to this wiki? For use in ArenaNet

Ref. https://www.mediawikiwidgets.org/LinkedIn_Profile

E.g. {{#widget:LinkedIn Profile |profile=http://www.linkedin.com/in/sergeychernyshev |name=Sergey Chernyshev |norelated }} -Aefjl (talk)

Per our formatting guidelines, Linkedin profiles of ArenaNet staff are not considered to be relevant to the game and shouldn't be included in their articles. - Felix Omni 12:46, 9 November 2023 (UTC)

I wanted to use it for easier maintenance of current role and to see if they are current or former employees. I understand that prior history is not relevant, and would exclude that if the widget allows it. Linkedin has a setting where the users themselves decide if info is public, so there are no relevant privacy concerns. -Aefjl (talk)

Thank you, but no, we have reached a unanimous admin decision with respect to documenting linkedin profiles of employees. -Chieftain Alex 18:22, 10 November 2023 (UTC)

Ok, then I assume manual edits are ok for roles and employment status based on various sources? How should that page be effectively kept up to date, and avoid disagreements on changes? Also, I'm brand new to contributing here, and don't understand how "potentially libelous information" is a valid comment for deleting all my edits on Arenanet. I simply added forum (account) id of anet employees as they are listed by the dev tracker in the official forum, as well as making some corrections along the way to two or three employees that no longer work there. The intent was to follow it up with improvement of the formatting in the page. I judged the forum (account) id to be very relvant to that page. I'm now asking for help in undoing the deletions since I dont know how to, or even if I have rights to undo deletions: https://wiki.guildwars2.com/index.php?title=Special:Log&page=ArenaNet

After the comment here above this by Omni I was made aware of the formatting guideline which allows for further improvements to be made to the template. -Aefjl (talk) 23:39, 10 November 2023 (UTC)

I don't agree with Doodle's edit summary on hiding the edit history - this was probably overkill, the forum id isn't hidden - its shown on the dropdown when hovering over the "157 members" text on the dev tracker. It probably does make it slightly easier to target them on the forum, however it is unlikely that they would reply anyway - and who really uses the forums?

This might be better documented on their individual pages (e.g. Chris Cleary would have | forum id = Chris Cleary.8017). I'm going to restore visibility of the hidden edits, but I'm going to suggest their forum account ids don't belong on the ArenaNet page. -Chieftain Alex 15:01, 11 November 2023 (UTC)

Also I can see why Doodle used that oddly specific reason, its the default dropdown option when changing revision visibility lol. -Chieftain Alex 15:05, 11 November 2023 (UTC)

I've dumped the account ids to the sandbox. -Chieftain Alex 15:11, 11 November 2023 (UTC)

Also, if you would like these ids from the sandbox to be added to the individual pages, I can do it with a bot. Stick a request on GW2W:BOTS if so. -Chieftain Alex 16:02, 11 November 2023 (UTC)

(Reset indent) I want to jump into this discussion as the ArenaNet Wiki Liaison. Linking to LinkedIn profiles of employees is totally not ok, and I think in general it's the same for all social media accounts (note that linking to individual posts to support a statement that documents the game is fine, assuming the information is public and not gated by particular mechanisms). While ArenaNet employee engage in the public space, it doesn't mean that the wiki has to facilitate this communication. Copying information that is relevant to the wiki (like employment status) from these sites is totally ok.

Regarding Forum IDs, imo (but this can be debated) it's also not relevant. What employees say is. I understand the doing it for convenience but this is where it feels like getting beyond the role of the wiki, which is to document the game. We cross a line when we point to a person (I don't think employee articles do it). I can also see ways for someone malicious to abuse this.

This is a wiki policy matter. And I'm open to everyone's opinion, in particular the wiki admins (some already commented above). --Stephane Lo Presti talk 15:39, 13 November 2023 (UTC)

Thanks for the clarification! The only followup question I have for this approach is how to document a valid/correct change without a typical "References" part at the bottom of the page, if we don't link directly to info sources? E.g. how can others see that edits I made are correct info. --Aefjl (talk) 20:08, 15 November 2023 (UTC)

Support for automatic category for second type per object

→ moved from Guild Wars 2 Wiki:Admin noticeboard#Support for automatic category for second type per object

Hi, is it possible to automatically add a page to category also for the second type (etc.) from Object infobox? E.g. Endless Striped Silk Clothing Tonic where I added the Gizmo category manually at the end of the wikitext.

Is it also possible to allow secondary types inside the Item infobox? For example the following book & gizmo: The Great Joko, Hero of Tyria. --Aefjl (talk) 19:59, 15 November 2023 (UTC)

The first thing is already possible. However, the item you linked has in the infobox categorize = n, which prevents it from being automatically added to the category (since it is already in the Clothing tonics category, which is a sub for Gizmos, thus it would lead to double-categorization for the same thing.) ~Sime 20:02, 15 November 2023 (UTC)

Ok, thanks I didnt know categorize = n did that. I misunderstood category structure, believing that all gizmos would be listed directly under "Pages in category 'Gizmos'" on https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Category:Gizmos. Is it then correct that they are only supposed to be listed under the Gizmo category when it does not have a subcategory under Gizmos? I'll revert those changes of mine, assuming this is true. This does however not seem consistent with how other pages are categorized, e.g. Endless Beetle Tonic, which has "Gizmos", "Endless Tonics" and "Endless Costume Brawl tonics" categories (the two latter are subcategories). And can an item have multiple categories under items? Ref. https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Special:CategoryTree?target=Category%3AItems&mode=categories&namespaces=&title=Special%3ACategoryTree Such as discontinued and gizmo, e.g. Adept's Training Manual. Maybe we should move discontinued and historical as subcategories to a new category "Availability" for a few items so that there is no overlap.

For the second question, it appears possible as shown in Bench of the Final Judge for "Gizmo, Novelty" but did not work with "Gizmo, Book". --Aefjl (talk) 21:03, 15 November 2023 (UTC)

I suggest that perhaps we could add to "type = novelty" with a "novelty type = <tonic/chair/whatever>" parameter. We will likely have things more consistent that way. - Do_odleplex 21:21, 15 November 2023 (UTC)

Extra Life animals and formatting guidelines

There have been various discussions about how to approach the Extra Life animals on the wiki. However, most of it happened on Discord, so I am gonna summarize the most important stuff here to give chance anyone else who isn't on Discord a chance to participate and respond. So, tl:dr is that we agreed on standardizing the formatting for all the various Extra Life pets, which includes a new 'Extra Life animal" banner at the top of the page and a special, mechanical-only race for those pets, called 'Extra Life animal' so that the standard NPC racial categories wouldn't be filled with dozens and dozens new pets every year (if, of course, they continue adding more). I took it into my hands to prepare the formatting guidelines based on these agreements and on what's the current most common formatting style these pets use: Extra Life animals formatting guide. As I said, the guidelines are based on what we already use, but obviously feedback is welcome. Some editors have raised concerns about these pages, and so we all want to make sure that wiki standards are upheld on them despite them being somewhat special considering the nature of their origin and the potential they might have to entice "ownership" of those pages, which is why we need precise guidelines. ~Sime 22:35, 17 November 2023 (UTC)

Looks good to me. I'm glad to see the caution on RL images for users that may not be aware of licensing implications. Would there be benefit in adding to the notes in the Trivia section to remind editors that although they may have requested the animal, this is a public wiki and a shared game? Adeira Tasharo (talk) 00:05, 18 November 2023 (UTC)

Looks okay to me. I would probably not link the "cat/dog/rabbit" whatever bit in the lead paragraph. Do we want to agree a naming convention for the "real life" photos? -Chieftain Alex 12:54, 18 November 2023 (UTC)

To add to the unlinking suggested by Alex: I'd remove the fragment from the notice template as well. Maybe even turn it from a date parameter to a year parameter, allowing for specifiying the Extra Life event year and letting a switch determine the patch date, too; though i suppose this may be difficult in case the animals were to ever be released in batches at some point in the future.

Regarding the note in the trivia section as suggested by Adeira: I'd hazard a guess that having a message as the one suggested (though i'm not even sure if what was used above is the exact wording that will be used), similar to the first point under the text edit area (Refer to there for the text. (Or alternatively to MediaWiki:Edittools.)), in there wouldn't hurt, as redundant as it may end up being, depending on at least the actual wording and whether we want to care about not being redundant there or not.

As for something else: Wouldn't it make more sense to not allow any indication as to who may or may not has requested a specific animal considering any such claims seem non verifiable (By virtue of e.g. the descriptions of the animals not being publicly viewable - as far as i can tell at least - and it thus not being possible to tell whether any indication as to e.g. who may or may not has requested a specific animal and which real life animal may or may not be the reference for a specific animal that anyone may add holds true.)? Medyro (talk) 02:03, 19 November 2023 (UTC)

I'd like to apologize for not addressing this sooner, but real life happened and I kinda forgot about this...sorry. I am fine with removing the animal type in the lead and just leave "animal" there. About photos, maybe <NPC name> photo.jpg?

Not sure about the specific wording of the Note, maybe it could be a part of the Extra Life banner as well?

Well, you have a point, Medyro, that we cannot easily verify this info, but then I guess it could possibly lead to, if there were two or more people claiming ownership or clashing information, that the burden of proof would be on them to try and provide proof. ~Sime 17:24, 17 February 2024 (UTC)

As do you, Sime. I suppose that could be prevented from occuring by not allowing people to add any information that would require such proving if challenged onto the pages in the first place. Medyro (talk) 23:32, 11 October 2024 (UTC)

Skill lists, elite spec weapons and Weaponmaster Training

Back when HoT was being released we've decided to leave out skills specific to an elite specialization, including the new weapons skills, from the generic skill lists such as List of guardian skills to make it easier to read, and just link to those specs at the top instead. However, now with Weaponmaster Training those weapons can potentially be used outside of those specs. As such we should probably start listing them on the generic lists once again, with a note about their requirements, at least the non-spec-specific versions of their skills. Especially when new weapons will be added to the core professions soon as well, which we'll also want to list there.

The main question remains what to do on the elite spec pages. The weapons are still tied to the specs if you don't have the training unlocked, so they should probably stay there as well. But we'll need to list and ideally in some way highlight the skills which have changed from the generic variant. Or should we keep these weapons on the generic skill lists only, link to them from the elite specs and only list the skills which are different there? Or does anyone have any other idea how to handle this properly? 15:44, 19 November 2023 (UTC)

Following up on this, I'd like to thank User:TBTerra and User:Yimo for adding the elite spec and expanded weapon proficiency weapons to the skills tables. --BuffsEverywhere (talk) 08:18, 21 August 2024 (UTC)

UTC-0 vs Pacific (UTC-8) for game update pages

Moving this from discord for a more permanent place to discuss.

There is no "official" standard on whether the game update pages should should be treated as UTC or UTC-8 for the purpose of dates (i.e. page titles). Currently, we use UTC (as is done for most other areas of the wiki), but the only mention of this is an edit by TxonAtana in March 2022 on the game updates overview page. Searching in the discord sees several instances of people saying that we use UTC, but again, this is not documented anywhere on the wiki itself.

Dak suggests we switch to using UTC-8 as that is how ArenaNet lists their patch notes (as well as all other official announcements/posts) on the forums and blog and that we should always use the official source, being ArenaNet themselves (who are located in UTC-8).

The purpose of this topic is to decide on a time zone to be used for game update pages, move older game update pages to the proper date, and possibly create a formatting guidelines overview for game update pages to resolve any potential confusion in the future.

--ItVictor (talk) 04:07, 1 February 2024 (UTC)

Since I was mentioned here I just want to point the discussion that led me to make that mentioned edit. ----Txonä Atan - (talk) 04:15, 1 February 2024 (UTC)

I'd also just mention that Anet uses UTC-8 in their notes themselves and lists the date relative to them, something that we should be matching with the headers (and by extension imo the pages). Any place we list an actual time should be just using UTC time stamps when we can (or converting with stuff like {{datetime}} being set to pacific, for example like on the HoT page). We already do that in many places across the wiki and that shouldn't change.

When Anet does use dates in posts it's always their time zone, and when they use times it's their time with a mention just like the January 30, 2024 update notes "noon Pacific Time (UTC-8)". Really this mainly comes up with the late notes due to the release times, but I'd hope we wouldn't have a release post at 5pm Anet time saying one date and we'd place it at a different date due to UTC date change. Maybe there are some technical limitations I'm not aware of? But at I feel like with page names and headers we really should match the Anet posts and references. -- Dak393 (talk) 06:34, 1 February 2024 (UTC)

Also really quick add on but we use start and end dates in other places (like say Special event? If Anet posts that something is "November 29 – December 5" our text should match that) based off Anet listed dates and not UTC. If we want to add actual UTC time stamps to posts that would be great and fine, but for plain text and the page locations we might want to stick to Anet time no? --Dak393 (talk) 06:40, 1 February 2024 (UTC)

I'm going to vote for Anet's time. I had no idea about UTC, and it's a lot easier for me to convert to their time. For what's it's worth, all of the Spanish patch note update pages I've made on the ES wiki, I used PST for. I suspect the German and French wiki also use Anet's time, so interwiki consistency would be nifty. - Do_odleplex 22:49, 7 February 2024 (UTC)

Use Pacific time. Generally ArenaNet is likely to be posting the updates at midday their time so it should be pretty clear cut which date the update is stored against.

Going forwards, if there are existing pages for which this affects which page the update has previously been recorded on, I'd suggest leave it as it already is, and just use this advice for all future updates. -Chieftain Alex 05:37, 21 August 2024 (UTC)

I'm partial to UTC+00:00. Medyro (talk) 23:32, 11 October 2024 (UTC)

Help needed on Combat arenas article

I made an article last year, Combat arenas, to collect info on all the places players can fight each other outside of WvW or sPvP, but it could some info I can't get myself, like notes on the maximum number of players who can fight in each one and probably some things I don't even know about since I'm not much of a PvPer (I only discovered by chance that it's possible to fight anywhere in Armistice Bastion). It might even be missing entire entries. Normally for a wiki page I'd just wait for interested people to add to it, but this one hasn't had much activity from anyone else so I thought asking directly might be a good idea. Danikat (talk) 20:31, 17 February 2024 (UTC)

Classifying Items That Are One-Time Only Or Limited

I think it would make sense to label limited-availability items for those that want to hold onto otherwise irreplaceable keepsakes. The Wintersday ornaments, the expansion Act Mastery rewards like the Mordrem Loop, and so on. A simple warning that says "if you get rid of this, you can't get it again." Perhaps a tag could be added in the infobox saying "Limited Availability"? I don't know the best way to add this information. --Lost in Hyrule (talk) 20:08, 14 March 2024 (UTC)

You can put it into the notes section of the item, but generally it's implied if the acquisition is not repeatable like an achievement. --BuffsEverywhere (talk) 08:06, 21 August 2024 (UTC)

Extension Request: Dark Mode

Can we add https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Extension:DarkMode to the wiki? Thank you.

--77.46.204.56 14:05, 28 March 2024 (UTC)Sienna

Create an account and then change your user preference to Vector. We use that as the dark theme round here. -Chieftain Alex 20:52, 28 March 2024 (UTC)

Based on the rules I can see that it applies, you could alternatively create an account and then visit Special:MyPage/common.css to adjust your own stylesheet.

Also since I just looked at the extension now, its a beta release extension so we probably wouldn't want that. We could request the Gadgets extension which does have a few neat tricks, including dark-mode-toggle (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Gadgets#gadget-dark-mode-toggle-pagestyles).

-Chieftain Alex 11:20, 29 March 2024 (UTC)

Having another table or information list for Cosmetic infusion or Cosmetic Aura based on cosmetic application method.

Having another table or information list for Cosmetic infusion or Cosmetic Aura based on cosmetic application method. These are currently organised based on acquisition methods, but as "Fashion Wars 2" players, we'd want to sort these based on application methods (because we'd want to experiment cosmetics on how these will look like on mixing, but we don't know which one does which well.)

• As far as I know, there are 3 types: Texture, Color, and Aura. (These can mix, so 'Texture + Color' type exists)
• For texture and color, 3 types exist: Skin only, Armor only?(not sure this one), and Skin and Armor. (Let's say "Skin" / "Equipment" / "Full")

Examples:

• Festive Confetti Infusion, Aura
• Polyluminescent Undulating Infusion (Orange), Color (Full)
• Polysaturating Reverberating Infusion (Red), Color (Equipment) (This overrides color cosmetics on your armor)
• Toy-Shell Infusion, Texture (Skin)
• Celestial Infusion (Red), Texture (Skin)
• Echo of the Dragonvoid, Texture (Full)

Designing a table for this is what I am not sure yet, but also there might be something I am missing. How do you think about this? --Targal (talk) 23:57, 8 May 2024 (UTC)

This seems niche, but if you can verify what stacks with what, I suppose there's no harm in documenting it. --BuffsEverywhere (talk) 08:00, 21 August 2024 (UTC)

Delete Guildwars2 Wiki Account

How do I delete my GW2 Wiki Account?

Well the great news is you have very few edits, and have never posted anything about yourself ever, so there's basically nothing for us to delete.

You should erase all your personal information under Special:Preferences as you see fit, then save. -Chieftain Alex 18:11, 20 May 2024 (UTC)

Spoilers in mouseover tooltips

Playing through all the story content for the first time, and found that the first line in the hover tooltip (which starts with the quote from ANet on this expansion) for this article spoils a major plot point. You can mouseover for a second to view the tooltip spoiler. I was just trying to tell if the article references an achievement, a living world season name, or something else. I wish there were some things you could just unsee, but there's no going back from that one. 😔

Maybe something could be done on the wiki side so others might not get a similar accidental spoiler? Either move the quotes below the intro line, so they don't appear in hover tooltips, or exclude those quotes in general from showing in them. I know it's not the wiki's fault that ANet's website spoils the previous episodes with subsequent releases, but it would be nice that using the wiki wouldn't do so for a cautionary user.

--Talonz // 21:14, 16 June 2024 (UTC)

I agree, that's a big spoiler for people going through the story for the first time. I don't think those quotes add anything to the release tooltips and I would be in favor of preventing them from being displayed in the tooltips in Template:Release infobox. --BuffsEverywhere (talk) 07:56, 21 August 2024 (UTC)

We can either remove all the official quotes from the tooltip, or add a parameter to suppress only certain quotes from tooltips (e.g. "tooltip no quote = y"). Thoughts? -Chieftain Alex 18:35, 21 August 2024 (UTC)

I'm always up for options so having a parameter sounds good, I'm sure there might be cases where it wouldn't need to be suppressed. --Txonä Atan - (talk) 03:55, 22 August 2024 (UTC)

How to display a wikitable based on a condition / parameter

I am looking to display content on a page based on a parameter passed to the page. I have tried using ifeq to determine if the chosen parameter is correct but when trying to display a table if the match is successful find myself coming unstuck. Should I be using ifeq or something else?

I have created a sandbox page to try and better demonstrate /explain things. Lady Elyssa.2469 15:16, 5 July 2024 (UTC)

Did a quick edit on your sandbox but there are many ways to do it all better still. --Dak393 (talk) 16:11, 5 July 2024 (UTC)

Thank you sooo much, much appreciated and can't believe I had the solution right in front of me and couldn't see it for looking. How might it be done better? Lady Elyssa.2469 16:40, 5 July 2024 (UTC)

How many pages of content does this wiki have?

I was just wondering how many pages of content this wiki has that aren't user pages or templates, etc and what the average number of pages per user might work out to be... Lady Elyssa.2469 11:56, 8 July 2024 (UTC)

According to Special:Statistics, 110,563 for content pages. - Do_odleplex 13:34, 8 July 2024 (UTC)

Thank you Doodleplex! That is a whole lot of pages! Lady Elyssa.2469 16:02, 8 July 2024 (UTC)

Want to help with Corrupted Hero weapons pages

Hi, I want to help with the Corrupted Hero weapons pages (only pistol is up right now) but the coding looks a little intimidating. I have a list of skin chat codes for the weapons that I wanted to share if someone else wanted to create the pages.

Sword [&ChowAAA=]
Hammer [&CjEwAAA=]
Longbow [&CiIwAAA=]
Shortbow [&CiwwAAA=]
Axe [&CjowAAA=]
Dagger [&Cj4wAAA=]
Mace [&CiowAAA=]
Rifle [&CikwAAA=]
Scepter [&Ch0wAAA=]
Staff [&CjYwAAA=]
Focus [&CiYwAAA=]
Torch [&ChkwAAA=]
Warhorn [&CigwAAA=]
Shield [&CkAwAAA=]
Spear [&CjUwAAA=]

—The preceding unsigned comment was added by OmniaStyle (talk) at 05:12, 21 July 2024‎ (UTC).

Heya, we're all done I think, thanks for sharing the links and the prompt that we were still missing those pages. Best tool for making the skin pages is http://mymeanderingmind.com/GW2W_Easy_Mode/index.php (just type the name of the item in), after Asuaka/Victor/Sunlion created the base structure for the first weapon, we've replicated that for the others. I've moved all the icons + uploaded placeholder gallery images too. -Chieftain Alex 09:52, 21 July 2024 (UTC)

Quick overview of expansion features

I drafted up a rough table with the potential goal of adding to the Expansion page. Mainly wanted an easier way to compare the main features across all expansion content since it can get confusing with all the different release models over the years. Feel free to let me know of any comments or suggestions. - Flutte (talk) 02:53, 20 August 2024 (UTC)

I agree that it is a good idea to have a table comparison/overview, I know that it is often requested on reddit for new/returning/even veteran players to quickly compare the content. I like it! Though maybe we could work, as/if the template allows it, to separate the entries slightly more for better visibility/differentation. ~Sime 17:09, 27 August 2024 (UTC)

I think it's a good idea to have this. If I might offer critique, the "Story" column has no usage as it's green across the board. If there is a way to add vertical lines (might require not using the STDT template?) then that would be ideal as well. You've done a great job condensing and organizing so much information!--Rain Spell (talk) 17:28, 27 August 2024 (UTC)

Thanks all. Removed the "Story" column and added this to the Expansion page to replace the List of Expansions section. Will keep the original version up on my sandbox page for future reference. The table formatting stuff is beyond me so hopefully others will be able to help with that in addition to updating/correcting any info. - Flutte (talk) 06:05, 28 August 2024 (UTC)

It's a good idea and concept indeed, although I feel it needs a better formatting and layout but I can't think of anything to suggest for now. It looks too big and somewhat spread around. --Txonä Atan - (talk) 02:45, 29 August 2024 (UTC)

Suggestion: Adjust the formatting structure- List of links to related achievements shouldn't go before Notes

This is in response to my edits being corrected where I've ordered "Related achievements" to go after "Notes" as it didn't really make sense to me as a reader to see that list of links appear before, as per my justifications below, which I now realise doesn't follow the current formatting structures. As such I'd like to make this suggestion public to adjust the current format structure order.

• I see the "Related achievements" section functioning very much like a "See also"/"Related articles" list, to append links to any mentioned achievements as well as achievements that relate or could potentially be completed at the same time given the information in the article, and usually coming after sections with information more pertinent to the article.
• Explicit information about the achievements directly relevant to the article should really be in the main "Achievements" or "Walkthrough" sections, or the description, and not in "Related achievements" list.
• "Notes" section will always have information directly pertinent to the article and tends to include miscellaneous points that won't necessarily fit into or require a whole new section.
• As a reader, I usually find the information in "Notes" more valuable and relevant to the article before seeing a list of links to related achievements. In the same vein that I would expect a "See also"/"Related articles" list to go somewhere after "Notes", and not before.
• I would still put "Related achievements" before "Trivia", since the scope is still within the context of the game.

But if the current order is simply a hard and fast stuck convention then I'm also happy to just go with it and fix up any articles. I understand changing it might involve a lot of work (which I'm also happy to do). The order does bother me a little because of the above reasons, but it's nothing controversial. --Caeldom (talk) 23:03, 26 August 2024 (UTC)

Related achievements sections were initially used on jumping puzzle, npc and object pages (all added 1 August 2017 to formatting guides) to show the connection to an achievement. Initially after notes, then put even after trivia. NPC Infobox was updated in December 2017 and Location and Event in April 2020 to have the section before notes. The usage of the section evolved to be used more widespread. E.g. items to show the conncetion to a collection without being being part of the collection. The section is currently on the following formatting guides

Guild Wars 2 Wiki:Adventure formatting

Guild Wars 2 Wiki:Event formatting (only for lists, achievement walkthroughs go under the walkthrough->achievements section)

Guild Wars 2 Wiki:Location formatting

Guild Wars 2 Wiki:Item formatting

Guild Wars 2 Wiki:NPC formatting

Guild Wars 2 Wiki:Object formatting

As you correctly state the notes section is often a catch all that has not its own section. There are surely pages where the section feels like a big see also section, but then there are others were the section has one achievement linked and it is the main point of the page. To quote some discord messages the views and opinions differ:

"Notes, Trivia, See also, External links, References, -categories- Anything else, regardless of how trivial, goes above notes."

"I guess as a rule of thumb, it's fine below notes and could go higher on articles where it would make sense to do so, say because a particular achievement is practically the whole point of the thing the article's about"

I updated item formatting with the section in 2020 after the topic was brought up again and discussed on discord. Doodleplex has run multiple bot runs in the past to clean up stray sections.

I am personally in favor of keeping the current order (related achievements before notes). As for me the fixed order at the end of the page mentioned in the first quote (not my own) is more important to me. —Kvothe (talk) 20:07, 27 August 2024 (UTC)

Regarding this, since I forgot to reply, I don't really mind either way (I've mixed the sections up plenty of times myself lol) but just remember how much work it'd be to change it now; the workload of changing things like this through the over-100,000 pages the wiki has is massive, even if done by bot. Having it in one spot on one page and placed differently on another could get confusing to readers or new editors, too, if we just left it as is on older pages. I've already asked about changing the formatting for NPC infobox once this week on the discord, and had it explained to me why it's so difficult to change (workload, as mentioned above; it apparently took a year last time by bot if I'm remembering right), so I'd personally lean against the change for that reason. Sunlion (talk) 15:23, 30 August 2024 (UTC)

No bot task ever takes a year to run, but figuring out the change is not always easy considering how random our formatting can be (personally I'd get one of the other bot users to run the task).

I actually thought "Related achievements" was already used after "Notes"; I'd be amenable to updating the formatting guidelines - we don't have to implement all of the guidelines immediately if we choose to modify them. -Chieftain Alex 15:46, 30 August 2024 (UTC)

Acquisition subsections

What's the rationale of not using level 3 headers if there is only one subsection (see: Guild Wars 2 Wiki:Item formatting#Copy-paste_layouts)? This wiki overall hides too much information behind links, when it could be displayed directly on articles. I came upon this particular issue randomly on the page Dolyak Sinew. There's no indication of how you should get that item from the NPCs in question. Sunlion, care to share your thoughts? Kumiponi (talk) 14:46, 29 August 2024 (UTC)

I don't have any particular thoughts, I'm used to it being this way so I'd prefer it to stay this way. Changing it at this point would be a massive undertaking so best to keep the status quo and continue doing it the way it's done now, I think. Beyond that, I don't particularly care? If the decision is to change that, I'm alright with it, though I don't imagine anyone will be particularly enthusiastic to do a bot run to change it. Sunlion (talk) 14:52, 29 August 2024 (UTC)

OK, thanks. It's not a massive undertaking, or really an undertaking at all. Only the Item formatting page needs to be changed. There's no harm in pages remaining in the old layout. No bot needs to be involved and no one needs to do anything about it. So I'm proposing to change the policy page so that level 3 headers can always be used, so that one can see at a glance how items are really acquired. Kumiponi (talk) 14:58, 29 August 2024 (UTC)

(Edit conflict) x2 The idea is that if there is only one section it doesn't need to be split into sub sections and the formatting page shows that. We do have a lot of pages with only one source type and it's clear where it comes from. However I'd be totally fine having the extra sections if it helps readability, main downside is it makes the TOC larger. But as it is, the proper formatting is to not have the extra section so that is correct. If we want to change that I guess now is the time to discuss it. Oh and "There's no indication of how you should get that item from the NPCs in question" is not true, these are mods to kill and get drops, clicking on them would show as much. Part of this just seems to be confusion with the drop table in general.

I have no strong opinion on changing/keeping it. But proper formatting as of now would forgo the extra heading so Sunlion is correct in that regard. --Dak393 (talk) 15:01, 29 August 2024 (UTC)

My idea is precisely to increase readability. With just that one header added, you wouldn't need to click on those NPCs or otherwise figure out that this item is a drop. An alternative would be to include that information in the drops table itself, but I think the header is clearer and would simplify the layout rules. Kumiponi (talk) 15:27, 29 August 2024 (UTC)

Homestead Decorations and their page names

This discussion started in discord (roughly here). Currently all the new homestead decorations have page names like "Decoration Name (Handiwork)". There is however some discontent with that name: There is the ongoing debate of "Handiwork" vs "Handiworker", which could be solved by using the feature instead, so "Decoration Name (Homestead)". There was also a smaller discussion about using the page without any suffix for the homestead variants and instead suffix all the guild hall decorations since homesteads are the feature more players will interact with. This should be the list of current suggestions:

1. Keep everything as is
2. Keep guild hall decorations as they are but rename homestead decorations from "Decoration Name (Handiwork)" to "Decoration Name (Homestead)"
3. Move guild hall decorations to "Decoration Name (Guild Hall)" and then use homestead decorations as the main page "Decoration Name"
4. Move guild hall decorations to "Decoration Name (Guild Hall)", keep homestead decorations as "Decoration Name (Handiwork)", then add Disambiguation pages for all of them
5. Move guild hall decorations to "Decoration Name (Guild Hall)", move homestead decorations to "Decoration Name (Homestead)", then add Disambiguation pages for all of them

Discussion and/or further suggestions welcome. I'd personally vote for #3 or #5 :) Asuaka (talk) 18:24, 2 September 2024 (UTC)

I am personally for option #5, that seems the most future-proofing for me - there can be a time where we get decorations that are not crafted but a page already exists. ~Sime 18:34, 2 September 2024 (UTC)

I approve of option #5 too, seems the best choice since both subjects are equally important. I would still prefer the parenthetical to be lowercase, though, so "Decoration Name (guild hall)" and "Decoration Name (homestead)". Sunlion (talk) 18:46, 2 September 2024 (UTC)

With my crystal ball out, I can see a few of these options could be a lot of work with a bot. Fixing page links is not to be underestimated. Adjusting the new pages by comparison with renaming the guild stuff should be straightforwards. Option 2 would be my strong preference (if you really insist further down the line we could also implement #5). -Chieftain Alex 21:13, 2 September 2024 (UTC)

I personally would favor a disambiguation to refer to the crafting profession instead of the term “homestead”. For me, homestead appears to be rather specific to kodan and the current expansion. I could see a future expansion adding alternative housing options which may not be called that way then (similar to how we started with kryptis rifts and now just have rifts). poke | talk 22:47, 2 September 2024 (UTC)

(Reset indent) If we're going for "Guild Hall" we should match that with "Homestead", if we're going with "Handiwork" we should match that with "Scribe" no? Seems weird to use crafting discipline for one and location for other, should match regardless of which we pick. So option 4 is out for me as a naming mismatch. Option 1 is kind of the same but we're not changing the default pages to "guild hall", I think I'd still go for changing it to homestead. Not a fan of option 3 as it's more work without actually fixing anything and assumes homestead should replace as default. So I'd be fine with option 2 (though it does mean we should link other uses on every page for it) and fine with option 5 though that would be a lot of work fixing everything. TL;DR: If we go with the type on each it should match and I'd lean more with Guild Hall/Homestead I think, diasambig pages and changing all is a lot of work but might be the best option long term. --Dak393 (talk) 06:11, 9 October 2024 (UTC)

Version history template

Are there any templates or previous discussions related to documenting version history for things other than skills? I like how you can see how skills change over time without needing to view the wiki article history, which might not always clearly list out the differences. It can also help clean up several pages which may already list this information within the body of the article.

I've so far added this to [Group Event] Defeat Soo-Won (80) and Strike Mission: Temple of Febe but am using the templates built for skill version histories. Definitely not too feasible to add this for all events, but I can see it useful for more popular or commonly updated events/activities. - Flutte (talk) 20:29, 1 October 2024 (UTC)

I've always wanted to use the version history for every patch change, like they do on a lot of gaming wikis (example: Genshin, Warframe), but at this point it is no longer feasible. I am however for adding it for the most popular content or content that often changes/changed, like the Soo-Won event for example. ~Sime 21:41, 1 October 2024 (UTC)