User talk:Konig Des Todes/Archives11

Sub-regions

What's the source for (a) the Maguuma Wastes, Tarnished Coast and Magus Falls (b) the Deldrimor Front, Steamspur Mountains and Far Shiverpeaks being sub-regions of the Maguuma Jungle and the Shiverpeak Mountains, respectively? They are given the same prominence on the world map, surely the text size would be a little smaller or something if they were sub-regions? --Santax (talk · contribs) 02:41, 29 October 2012 (PDT)

The former lies in GW1 lore and in an interview which tells us about the Maguuma Wastes where Jeff Grubb said that the Maguuma Wastes was the northern Maguuma Jungle (in GW1 lore, the Tarnished Coast was the Maguuma Jungle's coastline). Magus falls is merely logical deduction from that, as it is treated on the same level as the other two.

The latter lies in that the Shiverpeak Mountains was formerly divided into Northern, Southern, and when discovered, Far Shiverpeaks. They're the same mountainrange. The Steamspur Mountains is merely a renaming of the Shiverpeaks due to their defrosted form - thus are still part of the Shiverpeak Mountains; Deldrimor Front is similarly Southern Shiverpeaks under a new name - specifically, the former sub-region that was "Southern Shiverpeaks" was merely split in two - Steamspur Mountains and Deldrimor Front. Far Shiverpeaks has been known to be a sub-region - while not mechanically - since their very first introduction long ago. Konig/talk 18:00, 29 October 2012 (UTC)

So there's no actual basis in anything "mechanical" then, just GW1 lore and "logical deductions"? This creates some confusion as some zones that would, according to this definition, belong in the Shiverpeak Mountains (being, in lore, located in the Steamspur Mountains), are considered part of the Maguuma due to the achievement, for example Sparkfly Fen and Mount Maelstrom (which is the heart of the Steamspur Mountains) are actually part of the Maguuma according to the achievement. I created a discussion at Guild Wars 2 Wiki talk:Location formatting#Definition of 'region', if you're interested. --Santax (talk · contribs) 12:51, 16 November 2012 (UTC)

No, it the sub-region aspect is lore-based, not mechanical. It is also distinctly different in purpose than the infobox's region parameter. Konig/talk 16:06, 16 November 2012 (UTC)

This edit

And pray, what the fuck else do you think will be scaring creatures out of the ocean, when the logo for the game has a bloody great dragon on it? --Chieftain Alex 16:16, 9 November 2012 (UTC)

I fully suspect that it is the DSD. I want it to be. However, so long as there is no proof (we never even got confirmation the DSD is in the Unending Ocean after all, merely implications of a large threat there, and that a "underwater dragon" was related to the krait being pushed out - and not the largos mind you), it is speculation. And speculation should remain off of the main article, at best retained to notes/trivia or talk pages. Konig/talk 16:17, 9 November 2012 (UTC)

hmm, krait also look a bit like tiny dragons... I also apologise that my tidal wave of image tagging probably pushed Santax's 3 day ban off recent changes, he/she can't respond to you. --Chieftain Alex 16:21, 9 November 2012 (UTC)

No, but Santax can see it, and can respond to it later. Plus, I use My Watchlist (which has 1k+ pages on it), not recent changes. Konig/talk 16:22, 9 November 2012 (UTC)

Species

Do have a list or similar tracking which enemies count for which slayer achievements/daily kill variety? (that's assuming the lore/type categorization of species is mixed together)--Relyk 01:07, 14 November 2012 (UTC)

I'm presuming the missing noun in your sentence would be "you" and placed after "do." In which case, no I don't - though when it occurs to me, I do denote them in the species marker for NPC pages.

Something to note: slayer does NOT count the creature type (or whatever term you may prefer). They count the affiliation. It just so happens that the affiliation for most are the same, name-wise, as creature type. How I figured this out was how dungeon creatures are treated - all for the same slayer, but count for different kill variety. Konig/talk 01:21, 14 November 2012 (UTC)

I would like your input...

... on tis topic: Talk:Sea_of_Sorrows#Kryta and the Sea of Sorrows. You have always a good thought on these kind of things. So what do you think about my suggestion? - Yandere 08:14, 16 November 2012 (UTC)

Glad you liked my in-game map for SoS. Is the line-drawn map still available somewhere? I thought it made an interesting comparison. Gold Recluse 08:13, 19 November 2012 (UTC)

Still at [[:File:Sea of Sorrows on world map.gif|the old place]], but I tagged it for deletion - it's also a cropping of this map. Konig/talk 08:30, 19 November 2012 (UTC)

Removing edits

If you are going to remove edits because they are simply in the wrong place, you had best add them to the CORRECT place and not just delete someone else's effort. Please put the NPC entries for Southsun cove where they belong. Thanks! It would also help if you would let the person who made the edit know the correct place for them. -- Wyn talk 22:08, 17 November 2012 (UTC)

Issue is I don't know which areas those NPCs are in. So I couldn't add them. The NPCs are still in the history, so it's easy to nab them for copy/paste when said area is figured out. Konig/talk 22:43, 17 November 2012 (UTC)

See, the way I see it is on days like today when we have all this new content in the game, you really need to lighten up on the whole "what's proper" thing.. I mean, wouldn't it have been better to just leave them there until the area pages were available and them move them accordingly? I mean, you snabbed them off of there almost as fast as I put them on. You get way too obsessive about "proper" sometimes... I'm just trying to get info on for players to use. There are going to be lots and lots of people putting things in the wrong places today.... give them a break, don't delete their edits until they can be moved to the "right" place. It makes them feel bad and will stop them from trying again. (In my case, it just makes me mad) -- Wyn talk 22:52, 17 November 2012 (UTC)

I didn't even pay attention to when they were added, so how could I know they were taken down almost as fast as when they were added? If the articles for areas existed at the time and/or I knew where the NPCs were, I would have moved them. As I do for other stuff. I only remove when their proper article location doesn't exist and is too bothersome to create - why? Because history still exists, so going to the history and copy/pasting when said proper article is around or less bothersome at the time (e.g., less time constraints on myself), I add them if I wasn't beaten to the punch.

So sorry for wanting to keep order to things. Coming from GWW and seeing the outcome of GuildWiki, I know for a fact that if information is put up wrong, it will remain that way for a damn long time just because it's information that's not wrong. So, I greatly apologize for preferring order over "let's document all the things" mentality when the information is still on the wiki database in some form. Konig/talk 01:47, 18 November 2012 (UTC)

If someone else knew where the NPCs were, they could have moved it; now they have no idea what the problem was. And I hope your joking about looking in history.--Relyk 02:29, 18 November 2012 (UTC)

If they knew it existed, why couldn't someone fetch old text from history? I do it all the time, after all. But I guess I'm just weird. A freak. A monster. ~But it's all good~ Konig/talk 02:55, 18 November 2012 (UTC)

Ok guys... chill. I'm not trying to cause issues, but seriously, we were only able to access that area as of noon pacific today, so you had to know those were very recent additions. I do have a problem with your attitude that you only remove when their proper article location doesn't exist and is too bothersome to create. If you aren't going to take the time to correct it properly, leave it be for someone who IS. I'm not exactly sure what you mean by your references to gww and guildwiki, both of them are fine wikis. BTW, I have created the location pages and moved the NPC entries to those pages, and I trust others will go in and fill in more details etc. That's how a wiki works. -- Wyn talk 03:53, 18 November 2012 (UTC)

Question about dialogue formats

I notice that you changed the format for dialogue for the NPCs yesterday, and I would like to do it correctly. Perhaps there is a discussion page I should be following that I have missed. Is there a perfect dialogue page that can be used as a good example that I can follow? There are a lot of pages that were done the other way, those likely need to be fixed if the dialogue is different now. I also find that lining up the dialogues looks awkward sometimes, so I would like to be sure it is done correctly. Surriela 04:27, 20 November 2012 (UTC)

Hmmm, there was a discussion between a few long long ago during the BWEs, but no other that I know of. I'm just following that discussion with however modifications since that make sense. The one supplied to the format template was discussed - like most of the original formatting templates, it was just made and altered by others initially, more or less. So I'm simply going with the older format which I believe is better (for starters, there's a distinction between NPC and Object text, where NPCs get quotation marks and Objects don't; then there's one less colon to worry about as well, and it's easier to differenciate the lines between bold and unbold fonts).

As for a format, this is how I've been keeping it and, hopefully, it'll eventually catch on:

NPCs:

==Dialogue==
:''"<text goes here>"''
:'''{{dialogue icon|<icon>}} <PC response here>'''
::''"<text goes here>"''
::'''{{dialogue icon|<icon>}} <PC response here>'''
:'''{{dialogue icon|<icon>}} <PC response here>'''

Objects:

==Text==
:''<text goes here>''
:'''{{dialogue icon|<icon>}} <PC response here>'''
::''<text goes here>''
::'''{{dialogue icon|<icon>}} <PC response here>'''
:'''{{dialogue icon|<icon>}} <PC response here>'''

Edit: And now I think I had been messing up on the colons. It's hard to keep track 8D Konig/talk 05:21, 20 November 2012 (UTC)

I can see how the NPC response is clearly differentiated from the choices for the player. So that makes sense to me too. I do think it is a lot of quotation marks. Is that really needed - just asking - in a section labelled dialogue? Objects looks the same I think - but one line has quotes and the second does not.... is that a mistype? Surriela 22:03, 20 November 2012 (UTC)

The difference between object and npc is the former don't have quotation marks (that was a mistype, fixed now ty); the reason why quotation marks are used is to show that it's speech - one may find that it's obvious, but it really isn't always, and it's proper grammar anyways. Konig/talk 22:39, 20 November 2012 (UTC)

I thought that was a mistype on the objects. I am okay with the quotations, just raising the question. thanks. Have a question about quotes too - should they be surrounded by quotations as well? And I would suggest bulleted lists instead of : lists? That way, each quote shows as a separate entity, and it fits with the idea of bulleted lists being better. What are your thoughts? Surriela 22:46, 20 November 2012 (UTC)

Quotes sections depends on how it's done. There's typically two means of doing it, depending on if it is a monologue or a dialogue.

For monologues, it's set up as such:

* ''"<text>"''
* ''"<text>"''
* ''"<text>"''

For dialogues, it's:

: '''<Speaker>:''' ''"<text>"''
: '''<Speaker>:''' ''"<text>"''
: '''<Speaker>:''' ''"<text>"''

If there's an action that should be denoted, you add this line between the speech bubble placements:

: *<action that's done>*

Konig/talk 23:07, 20 November 2012 (UTC)

Ok -monologues are very clear to me. They are bulleted lists of quotes with the same dialogue format as usual ie with italic quotes. For the dialogues between two NPCs - I am assuming that the same dialogue goes onto each NPC page, if they are different names for the NPCS? But if they have the same name ie- Noble - how do we differentiate that? Noble 1 and Noble 2 ??? By the way, this is very helpful to me, sorry to have so many questions. Surriela 23:25, 20 November 2012 (UTC)

I should correct myself on the monologue bits - bulleted lists were previously used for one-line quotes. I'm not entirely sure how GW2W would handle multi-line monologues, but I'd presume the same or similar way. It's fairly undiscussed - it could go as the dialogue, I suppose. Main point however is this: Bullet lists is meant for a list of quotes, not a conversation (irregardless of the number of speakers), though if there's one speaker than showing the speaker's name is irrelevant.

For dialogues, yes it goes on both NPC pages (or, alternatively, just goes in the location article). If its related to events, then they go on the event article. Typically on GWW when shared NPC names were, it was indeed Noble 1 and Noble 2. Konig/talk 00:17, 21 November 2012 (UTC)

I hate text with multiple lines, including the mail, quotations, and the lost shores special event. Bulleted lists do not like.--Relyk 00:20, 21 November 2012 (UTC)

That's why I was correcting myself that bullet points should be used as a list of unrelated lines, which is fairly rare in GW2 I believe.

Bypassing redirects in articles

First of all, I want to just say that I'm not contending the point here; I can understand bypassing redirects, especially when you know they exist and that they aren't likely to change. What I did want to put, though, is that there currently isn't any information/guidelines that specifically say that you should bypass redirects. There's a section in GW2W:FORMAT for linking, but there isn't anything with guidelines for how to choose links (such as with this). Is there another article with this information that we should incorporate/merge into this page, with those kinds of guidelines, or should we/you/I go and write that into the page? Jyavoc 18:33, 22 November 2012 (UTC)

Thank you kindly. I think that was necessary to have on that article. --Jyavoc 19:06, 22 November 2012 (UTC)

My habit of bypassing redirect comes from GWW, where it was a "preferred for cleaner page loading, but not mandatory" situation. Most of the GWW formatting and guidelines are around in the GW2W username as an "unwritten preference unless otherwise written" (e.g., the no double revert).Konig/talk 19:37, 22 November 2012 (UTC)

GWW had the guideline for bypassing redirects because of a perception that it mattered in terms of wiki performance. It turns out that it doesn't matter, so bypassing redirects by using [[Non-player character|NPC]] instead of [[NPC]] simply makes it harder for people to edit: it's harder to proofread and it's harder to fix. It's fine to promote GWW practices when there's a good reason for them, but that isn't the case for bypassing redirects here. 75.36.180.174

I find it annoying to see the "redirected from" bit beneath the title. --Chieftain Alex 20:22, 22 November 2012 (UTC)

I disagree upon any of those notions of making things harder, and furthermore it is helpful to bypass redirect for any abbreviation as people can simply hover the link to see the abbreviation's full form if the redirect was bypassed. Also, it allows a cleaner and fuller list in the What Links Here special page, both in more links directly to the actual article, and in maintaining links for when redirect change (e.g., how asuran was a language article, moved to another article, then redirected to asura, if the redirecting links were kept, changing them would have been needed). If we, for instance, find a better use for Orrian than redirecting to Ruins of Orr, meaning something other than the nation or inhabitants, e.g., an NPC named just "Orrian," which is something we cannot predict, because we use the redirect, it would require altering a lot of pages. The example given is unlikely to occur, but not impossible. Konig/talk 20:25, 22 November 2012 (UTC)

Like I said, I wasn't contending the point, because I could see how it could occur, and it was enough of a nuisance changing "Pass Oola's lab tutorial" to Oola (for discussion elsewhere, if that must occur), so I'm in favor of Konig's method of going about it. My only contention with the whole system would be that, in the articles themselves, for redirects that are actually unique (ie, Great Tsunami and Rising of Orr, as opposed to Asura or Asuran), we bold the first instance of it, to make it visually appear as the article title does. That is what wikipedia does, to my knowledge, and I think it looks nice and is easier to read, and when you're redirected to a page, you can easily find out why you were redirected there/what the redirect means (in the case of Giant Tsunami, not having it bold currently makes one wonder "Why am I here" until they read the entire page, which, who reads entire pages on the internet anyways?). --Jyavoc 21:24, 22 November 2012 (UTC)

On the holding bit, I disagree. Bolding should be refrained solely for the article's name or alternative names introduced in the first sentence. Your particular example can be reworded to fit that situation, but as is, it looks weird as hell to bold in the middle of a paragraph. Also, we are not Wikipedia, so we don't have to do as they do.Konig/talk 21:38, 22 November 2012 (UTC)

I didn't say we were Wikipedia. But I did pull an example of another MediaWiki project that is dramatically more successful than we are. Bolding there can occur anywhere within the introductory paragraph/before the first section header. —Jyavoc 21:44, 22 November 2012 (UTC)

Wikipedia being more successful is both irrelevant and obvious, but it is documenting a different kind of topic. We're documenting a game; events, locations, figures, and mechanics of the game. It's far different and far smaller. Most lore articles or lore parts of articles don't have more than one section, unlike e.g., lore. So the rule of bolding in first section doesn't really fit. Most alternative naming is within the first sentence. I don't think that needs changing, though the article in question could be reworded to put Great Tsunami first - or even turn it into its own article since its about the wave(s) itself, or even move the article since "rising of Orr" is wiki made. Konig/talk 02:24, 23 November 2012 (UTC)

Oola

To prevent the revert war that is already brewing, I contend that we should format Oola as an NPC, at least until we find a better naming convention for skill challenges. What would you have this skill challenge be named, then? Where would you put that page? The state of disorder that skill challenges is in on this wiki is absolutely appalling. I'm trying to put some semblance of uniformity for the pages, and that involves a bit of give and take. This page was "Pass Oola's lab tutorial" before, which had absolutely no bearing on what was canon in-game–there was no mention once in the entire skill challenge of the string "Pass Oola's lab tutorial," or anything even remotely like it. The only thing that I could think of as an alternative for a name for this skill challenge would be "Oola (skill challenge)." Furthermore, this character–as well as all characters that present a skill challenge–currently exist only to do their skill challenge. There are currently no NPCs who are both merchants and skill challenge providers, or skill challenge providers and Trahearne. If Oola exists only as a skill challenge provider, and the skill challenge is named Oola, then the skill challenge information would be on the Oola page, even if you formatted it as an NPC. I don't care if you want to discuss what we should do for skill challenges–in fact, I would love to have some feedback or input on the formatting, since so far, I'm working entirely alone and would like at least someone to tell me I'm doing a good job, or correct the mistakes I'm making. And so we can change the formatting for all skill challenges, but for now, until some better system is proposed, at least someone has to step in and try to take hold of the skill challenges. Which is what I'm trying to do here. –Jyavoc 21:36, 22 November 2012 (UTC)

See Deputy Crackshot. NPC and skill challenge should be on one page, just as object/items should, instead of making a non-existing event (the old version) and, imo, that skill challenge individual is 100% unnecessary as all skill challenges are either represented via events, NPCs, Objects, or Items. See also Guild Wars 2 Wiki talk:Community portal's current section at the bottom (its a pain on phone so I'll edit the link to the section later) which is about this situation - to remove the non-existing events and whatnot that the wiki is making for skill challenges. Konig/talk 21:44, 22 November 2012 (UTC)

That's lovely and would have been a wonderful thing to discuss here, especially any of the times that I had to bump the discussion when it went dead and I was asking for input in making the formatting guidelines. But that said, your proposal has every skill challenge page looking different; ie, a skill challenge page for a discussion/quiz (eg Oola) will look different than a skill challenge page for a communing skill challenge (eg Hidden Falls). My proposal at least has every skill challenge page appearing the same, so we have some semblance of uniformity within the wiki project. Which we need. —Jyavoc 21:50, 22 November 2012 (UTC)

If you want to have information regarding the NPC for a skill challenge on the page, I think that's a wonderful idea. I was considering having the consumable on the same page as a skill challenge, since they literally only exist for the purpose of that skill challenge. The same with objects. So modifications can be made. But considering they are all geared around skill challenges, and how Deputy Crackshot even has a page concerning how to get the skill challenge, it makes total sense to have the page be formatted as a skill challenge with the addition of NPC information, instead of an NPC page with the addition (read: override) of skill challenge information. Uniformity along like articles. —Jyavoc 21:57, 22 November 2012 (UTC)

There really isn't any overriding reason to have 100% conformation between different types of skill challenges. Communing challenges are the simplest, there's not much at all to document there; consumable challenges will require a short description of the item; battle challenges will require documentation of the foes you fight; qui challenges will require a lot of dialogue. I don't see how we can unify all of those into a single standard. —Dr Ishmael 00:51, 23 November 2012 (UTC)

I mean, I realize that we can't have the same exact page for every type of skill challenge, because they're all going to be different by virtue. However, I don't believe that we should go so far as to use the {{NPC infobox}} infobox. I wrote the guidelines for formatting skill challenges so that each type would have its own information. But I do think that there should be base uniformity. As in, the same infobox. Things like that. I fully agree that for skill challenges when an NPC is involved, such as battling, we should document that. But I think that whatever is the "largest" or "root tree" of the whole thing should take naming precedence. That is, for the skill challenge we are arguing, if the game world shows "Oola [Skill Challenge]," then the skill challenge should be the Oola article, with the NPC spawned, that (literally, in canon) exists only to facilitate the skill challenge, shouldn't dictate how the article is formatted. Include the information, yes, but I don't know how exactly. I just think that, even if in cases of this, if we were to copy the formatting for NPCs in this case, we should recognize that as a subtype of formatting skill challenges, not as a formatting of NPCs. —Jyavoc 02:27, 23 November 2012 (UTC)

(Edit conflict) First, what Ishy said. Second, existing items, objects, and NPCs hold precedence over non-existing "events" (e.g., "pass Oola's quiz"), and there is no need to make skill challenge when they are nothing but events, items, objects, and NPCs. In other words, they are a secondary feature to the fact they provide skill points. There is no need to conform the pages, because they are not all the same thing or structure mechanically.

Also, if you give NPC articles this truth be told unneeded skill challenge infobox, then you're removing the consistency you're claiming to want to keep. If you make an article for the skill challenge and one for the NPC, then you have a duplicate and therefore redundant article. Konig/talk 02:34, 23 November 2012 (UTC)

So, you're basically saying that skill challenges should just sort of... exist... within the wiki. Also, that they're not mechanically the same, even though we've been able to create a list of the most dominant types of skill challenges, creating a list of three.

Concerning all of this, if we're going to go all the way through and say that skill challenges in this regard are just a facet of the NPCs, and that NPCs take priority, then we need to make this an overriding feature of how we document the wiki. If NPCs are of the utmost importance, and we should document the NPCs first—because they're NPCs—and then have the skill challenge be additional information therein, then we should have a page for Villager, [[Rescued Villager]], Wounded Seraph Soldier, and every other NPC who is present in Defending Shaemoor, to pull out one example. Because if we remove the skill challenge functions from the NPC "Oola [Skill Challenge]," we're left with an NPC who has as much functionality as all of these NPCs, and so if we document "Oola [Skill Challenge" as an NPC, we should do the aforementioned NPCs as well. —Jyavoc 02:44, 23 November 2012 (UTC)

(Reset indent) Firstly, yes those NPCs should have articles. And will. Secondly, Oola shall retain its skill challenge information. We can create lists of skill challenges via the category. Truth be told, documenting skill challenge info on the article of the "thing" (NPC, Objects, items, events) is no different than documenting them inversely with only a change of infobox and format. Same thing in the end, just looks differently. And I don't mean NPCs take precedence over everything. I said they take precedence over non-existing aspects. The NPC is the skill challenge. They are one and the same. Just as those horde fight skill challenges are the same as the ev3nt they triggered. That is, from the player's and therefore documentation perspective.Konig/talk 03:26, 23 November 2012 (UTC)

I am okay with this. But there still needs to be an appropriate format or guideline for this all. Because there currently is none, and so I've pretty much taken this under my wing to do. If we're doing it this way, the guidelines would/should wind up being by type, with a template for each type of skill challenge. I'm still not necessarily sure that we should be doing away/ignoring {{skill challenge infobox}}, because it has information that we don't have stored elsewhere. I'm hesitant, but I'm willing to discuss a change. —Jyavoc 04:06, 23 November 2012 (UTC)

I am working on producing a new set of formats for each type of skill challenge. I'll post here when I have them finished, for review and editing. And to preempt any questioning, I'm basing the new formats off of the {{npc infobox}} and {{object infobox}} :) —Jyavoc 04:13, 23 November 2012 (UTC)

The initial versions are up here. They obviously need more work, and there will need to be some modifications, but let me know what you think of the initials. —Jyavoc 04:49, 23 November 2012 (UTC)

On the battles. No. Just no. Unlike the otherwise they have events, so it should be the events that hold the skill challenge information first and foremost. Why would you ever consider giving an event an NPC set up? Secondly, consumables are items, not objects. Thirdly, not all communing are the same dialogue. I'm sorry, but there is no conforming possible because ANet didn't make them all the same!

If I weren't on my phone, I'd edit that formatting guide for how they should be, but truth be told, that's an unnecessary formatting guide. Konig/talk 20:11, 23 November 2012 (UTC)

Events aren't all the same, either. There are very common types of events, but across the board, there is more than one type of event in the game. Skill challenges are the same. There are some unique events. There are some unique skill challenges. You don't see anyone getting in the way of event formatting, saying "oh, ANet didn't make them all the same, we can't possibly conform all of the events here." What I'm trying to do now on that page is to provide guidelines and layouts for how the pages should look. They're guidelines. Hence why I use that word. Guidelines. I have been doing my damn well best to put together some coherent documentation for all of this. I'm not assuming that the only people who are going to edit the wiki are going to be the hegemonic elite of the wiki, who have been here since the very beginning and have been versed in everything. Some people who have the desire and willingness to contribute to the wiki but don't have the prior knowledge for what the wiki has thus decided on. If they want to contribute skill challenges to the wiki—which we need, desperately—they're going to look for information on a page that, oh, I'm not sure, has something to do with skill challenges. If they've just gotten here, they're not going to look for skill challenge documentation on the NPC page. So saying that this is an unnecessary formatting guide is a load of crap. If people are having this problem—and don't act like they aren't, or like I'm the only one being tripped up by the lack of information on skill challenges, because I can name at least two other users who you've had direct arguments with this over in the past two days—then it'd be swell if you'd be swell if you'd be more receptive to people trying to help out. —Jyavoc 00:18, 25 November 2012 (UTC)

If your comment about being receptive is due to my bepow comment, excuse me for being aggrivated by having to repeat myself on the same page. Secondly, technically all events are structured the same, including skill challenge events. they all have triggers, be it time, an action, or a previous event, and they all have a set kind of objective. Skill challenges don't all have triggers, they don't all have events, so they do not conform. I never disagreed with adding skill challenge events in the events section; I merely stated that they should be in the locations sections - e.g., locations or locations and events. For guidelines, see below - tomorrow afternoon I shall be back . No, folks who havent been around since the beginning (these folks would, as it may surprise you, does include me) are expected to edit too. Onto guidelines, I don't disagree with them or anything, I merely stated that they're often outdated due to new discussions on a weekly basis - it's hard to keep them up to date! Konig/talk 02:23, 25 November 2012 (UTC)

But, EVERY skill challenge HAS a trigger---------it might be "commune", "fight", "take and eat", "take a test", but it IS a trigger. I'm a newby, but I do look to try and identify just what each Skill Challenge is, and what it requires. It may well affect my "choice" of arms and/or skills. Will there be a "fight" before, during or after the challenge? I have to agree with Jyavoc, Skill Challenges DO need their own page, and not be "lumped" into an NPC, or an 'event' page where they can't easily be found.Undouble 03:34, 25 December 2012 (UTC)

Old discussion is old and consensus (not just me!) agrees with NOT making pages for non-existent things. Yes, every skill challenge has a trigger, but not every skill challenge has something that's part of it other than a trigger (e.g., an event). In the cases where there is a "something else," that "something" is more important than the trigger - e.g., Defeat Captain Mattox and his Ethereal Vanguard is more important than Ethereal Vanguard Monument; however, there is no equivilent to "Defeat Captain Mattox and his Ethereal Vanguard" for Temple of the Ages (object) or Oola. And to make a page for such is to make a page for something that does not exist. Which is then turning the wiki from documenting the wiki to documenting fanon, and that's not what the wiki should or does do. Konig/talk 04:31, 25 December 2012 (UTC)

Skill challenge guidelines

(Reset indent) I never intended that the guidelines—especially those that I have on that page right now, or the other guidelines I've edited—be finalized versions. I have at the top of all of them that they're drafts/proposals, because I realize that they need to be vetted by the community, to tweak them. That's exactly why I put them up there, though, was to at least get something in the way of a working draft going. It's easier for people to edit existing content when they see something wrong than to write out new content entirely. I don't have all of the answers, and I realize this, but even the incorrect formatting that I created in the intermediate was better than the spotty, few-worded skill challenges that existed before. I want feedback on the whole issue—if you've noticed, over the course of our various conversations, I've completely overhauled the page's contents two or three times. All I'm looking for is constructive feedback. The types of skill challenges vary more than events do, but I didn't necessarily believe that even though skill challenges were different, that they couldn't be conformed into the same type. Whether or not that would be how the community would go, the infobox was created because there would be ways that all skill challenge pages could be handled in roughly the same manner. We don't have to go that route, but all I was looking for was an explanation of your point of view. I obviously hadn't had a chance to read/participate in the conversations that you had, and so I wasn't aware of these decisions. But at the same time, there were other conversations that I did take part in—such as the conversation earlier this month regarding what should be used for the creation of the skill challenge infobox—that I did, that you didn't. I realize that the wiki is in a state of disarray, and that was/is why I'm trying to step in to help it; to fix these problems, including the lack of documentation on guidelines, policies, and formatting that there are on the wiki.

As for locations, I don't believe I ever commented on the locations/locations+events topic. Also, due to the below discussion, I forgot to check on this discussion, and so didn't notice you had posted here. That is my fault. —Jyavoc 03:47, 25 November 2012 (UTC)

First, please link the discussion on the skill challenge infobox.

Second, you mentioned events and the skill ch!lenge events being listed with the other events, so I assumed you continued the discussion on that which was above.

Third, may I ask, again, and please answer this time: why do skill challenge articles need special treatment (inbox and format) than event, object, NPC, or item articles? As I said before on this page, skill challenges are an addendum to what the activity is - a dialogue sequence, an event, or the consumption of an item. Skill challenges are quite literally nothing unique except that you recieve a skill point - and to denote this, we have categories and that little skill challenge icon in all existing infoboxes.

So unless you can explain it to me, I see no need for either the skill challenge infobox, or the skill challenge formatting guideline. They can all use the pre-existing infoboxes and guidelines of whatever they are other than skill challenges - this way all of those pages are conformed with what their type of article is.

Easy to understand, conformed, and makes sense. Win win win. Or does that not work? Konig/talk 04:53, 25 November 2012 (UTC)

Guild Wars 2 Wiki talk:Practices and processes#Skill_challenges

And that works as well, as much as I might not want to agree with you. They are, in base, other types of things. Though even if that be the case, I still think that Guild Wars 2 Wiki:Skill challenge formatting should exist, and should be populated with information on how to choose what the skill challenge name should be, how to know what the page format should be, and can/should have preformatted wikicode for common pieces of information on that type of article, like I had with the communing skill challenge dialogue. In its own section, naturally, since we would do away with the example template formatted articles section. My reasoning behind this is that even if not all communing skill challenge have the same dialogue options/setup, for example, the majority do, and having snippets of reusable code (be it in prepared wikicode, or an inclusive template of its own, though the former makes more sense to me logistically) allows for less mistakes to be made in transcription, and can give new editors an example of how the wikicode should be formatted to be "proper."

These are some ideas, which I'm willing to work on implementing, if we're willing to discuss them. —Jyavoc 05:08, 25 November 2012 (UTC)

If you wish to retain a formatting guideline for skill challenges be my guest, but the infobox is completely unneeded. And the guidelines would effectively act no different from the jumping puzzle guideline - a copy paste shortcut for dummies (get reference?). Anyways, I'm dropping this until tomorrow afternoon when I can get access to a computer, when I shall give my full input on the matter - it's highly irritable to read and write walls of text on a phone. Konig/talk 05:31, 25 November 2012 (UTC)

Against better judgment, I'm going to assume good nature with the reference there. In the meanwhile, I will likely work on prototype guidelines based on the discourses we've had thus far. —Jyavoc 06:00, 25 November 2012 (UTC)

Due to my aggravation at the time, the comparison was not really in good nature. I have provided more direct feedback on the formatting guideline talk page. And I have read through said link, and have explained my reasons in concision on [[Template talk:Skill challenge infobox]] and tagged said infobox for deletion. Konig/talk 03:32, 26 November 2012 (UTC)

It would be nice, in the future, to keep these things to yourself, then. Unless I've misunderstood the community here, this isn't a place for aggravated verbal assault, regardless the reason for it. Further because you pin some/much of your irritation/aggravation on something entirely out of my control. But like I said, name calling and insulting accomplishes nothing other than to turn people away from both you and the wiki. —Jyavoc 03:42, 26 November 2012 (UTC)

I was merely presenting my opinion on the jumping puzzle format guide section, but it's an irrelevant thing. And I was merely stating - though admittedly in a bad moment of personal emotions which slipped through - that I felt the skill challenge formatting guide was rather unnecessary. I explained simply to be honest, no other reason. Aggravation lowered now, thanks to not being on a bloody phone and seeing a sentence being the size of a paragraph anymore. Konig/talk 03:51, 26 November 2012 (UTC)

Until every person who comes to the wiki knows automatically how to format a skill challenge to be to what we've decided they should be, I don't see any logical reason not to have a page that details, however "redundantly" you may believe it to be, how to format skill challenges. I mean, mw:Help:Talk details how to sign comments, but we still put that here on GW2W:PP. That isn't redundant, even though there is the same information. Besides, having this means all information is in one place, and—I mean, this is just documentation. So naturally a skill challenge formatting guidelines page should exist. I don't quite even begin to understand why there shouldn't be...

As for the jumping puzzle format guide section, that most certainly wasn't "presenting your opinion," but I think it better to just drop the entire discussion. —Jyavoc 03:59, 26 November 2012 (UTC)

With the exception of a few parameters on the infobox, the skill challenge articles would, theoretically at least, be no different from any other object and so forth article. Only special notes like quiz answers really need to be differenciated, but that's little different from how the quiz events are different, or any object/event/NPC's special notes. But I'm not contesting the existence of the article, so I don't see why your up in arms about it. Konig/talk 04:08, 26 November 2012 (UTC)

(Reset indent) But everything you're saying seems entirely like you're contesting the existence of the article. Saying that "[you're] not sure why it even exists" pretty much means that. And I am not entirely sure you understand the concept of true documentation; documentation isn't just putting only certain things up. I think that GWW did a wonderful job. Every major issue, topic, concept, or otherwise has information on how they are expecting it. Things such as naming have their own detailed articles as well. There's obviously going to be a lot of overlapping, but if you're going to hold a group of people to a specific standard, we should present that information that we're holding them against to them in the simplest way possible. So if that means that we put pages with multiple copies of "the same information" here, then I don't see what the problem with that is. The wiki is in such a state of disarray and incompletion because there's no single, established guideline in one place. —Jyavoc 04:34, 26 November 2012 (UTC)

Let me rephrase. I am stating that I disagree with it. However, I am not contesting its existence in regards to tagging it for deletion.

"The wiki is in such a state of disarray and incompletion because there's no single, established guideline in one place." So wouldn't multiple guidelines cause confusion when they don't match up? :p Konig/talk 04:38, 26 November 2012 (UTC)

Naturally, it would cause confusion if/when they don't match up. But then someone would post, or make a mistake and wind up explaining where they came by that information, and we would fix it. But to not create guidelines because what if they don't match up is a moot idea. Which you aren't proposing, I know.

There are a multitude of topics that we really need to have policies and formatting guides for that we don't, but I don't want to create more until the ones that we have are under way. But the ones that I do have up, such as skill challenges, are proposals. Everything within them is likely to change/will change right now, because it's all volatile. So I'm not directly arguing for the information that's on that page so much as I am that the page itself needs to exist. —Jyavoc 04:43, 26 November 2012 (UTC)

Plains of Ashford reversion

Hi, you reverted my changes to some of the skill points in this area, I had changed the names to that which you see approaching the "trigger" rather than the event you generate when you have activated it. Can't see how your reversion makes things any clearer, maybe if you could explain, thanks. I couldn't see any policy written on it. My first inclination was to undo your changes but I really don't want to get into that kind of silliness. I can see your point regarding jumping puzzle separation but I guess that's just a matter of opinion. I thought it would be helpful to have an idea of where it would be. Bernardus 03:13, 24 November 2012 (UTC)

They should link to that which gives the skill point, not the trigger. Events, when they exist, rewards the skill point. Not the trigger. For the jumping puzzle event, there is no real qualifications or, well, anything that separates it from standard events. Konig/talk 04:08, 24 November 2012 (UTC)

Oh, and you were linking to events as well on occasion, changing the appearance of the link to match the others - that would just make people confused being led to an event when clicking a figure's name. Konig/talk

My point is that if an object in the world is called "The Mighty Trigger" and the player sees the object called "The Mighty Trigger" then they may reasonably expect to see an entry so named. I guess it would be better to list the object and have the event link off that again. If you want to list the events as such, would it not be more consistent to list them in the Events' list? You say "They should link to that which gives the skill point, not the trigger", I'm just trying to get a feel for how the wiki is structured and reversions like yours make me curious as to if it's your personal preference or there's some "master plan". Saying "They should…" doesn't show the basis for what you say. If there is such a plan, could you please point me towards it. I am really not trying to be difficult, I would like to see some logic rather than "It should". Thanks Bernardus 04:28, 24 November 2012 (UTC)

Originally, the wiki's set up was the events, but people began creating non-existing events for communing and so forth skill challenges. In other words, since the beginning it has always been what gives the skill point. Recently, we've been removing said non-existing events, leaving some links to be NPCs/Objects, which are both trigger and what gives the skill point. Konig/talk 16:34, 24 November 2012 (UTC)

You do realize that there is no documentation anywhere (or, no documentation anywhere that people are likely to find if they go searching in the places they would expect to find it logically) to this effect, and so attempts to do anything in this regard are thwarted. I've tried doing that with skill challenges, proving some naming format, which I'll now go back and rectify. But if we could move whatever compendium we're suppose to be working off of to a visible location so that we can all know this stuff, that'd be helpful. —Jyavoc 17:04, 24 November 2012 (UTC)

There is no documentation because 1) its still a work in progress, but that doesn't mean things should just be changed arbitrarily, and 2) the removal of the non-existent event articles that provided a more obvious consistency was a very recent act (early this week) and shortly thereafter, I for one had to go out of town. I only got access to my phone for internet, which has limited and otherwise slow capabilities (why others haven't added these to the formatting guides which become outdated on a nigh weekly basis is unknown to me).

Anyways, discussion on how zone articles should treat skill challenges was discussed at Guild Wars 2 Wiki talk:Projects/Cartography and that's is a place "people are likely to find if they go searching in the places they would expect to find it logically" Konig/talk 20:37, 24 November 2012 (UTC)

If you're talking about that wall of text that you think every person who is going to edit skill challenges is going to read before doing anything, I don't think you understand proper documentation. If people reach a consensus in a discussion, putting that somewhere with an appropriately named page—not a discussion post on a project page—is the next step in that whole process. You shouldn't expect public discussions to be a form of documenting guidelines. —Jyavoc 23:02, 24 November 2012 (UTC)

Did you not read what I wrote? I outright said there was no documentation and stated why. I said it was discussed and agreed upon. I never said the later was the former. Please, read fully next time.Konig/talk 23:23, 24 November 2012 (UTC)

I did read fully. What I said is that if you agree upon something, it'd be swell if you put that in a place that is easily accessible to those who weren't part of that discussion, and to not expect every person who follows you to read through every discussion you've made to figure out what is agreed upon and what isn't. I thought that was made clear. —Jyavoc 23:30, 24 November 2012 (UTC)

Yes, that too was clear, but was written in the style of an addendum. But that too was addressed at the very beginning and, in fact, earlier in this section and the section above titled #Oola. As I said, it was recently agreed upon and I could not, without a lot of time spent (more than the annoying large amount of time I am putting in these responses), alter the format guides - the most logical place to go for formatting guidelines - because I went out of town. Why others haven't, I can't say. Said discussion, as I pointed out in the section above as well, is also under further discussion solely for a hope of more people, on Guild Wars 2 Wiki talk:Community portal, though such continuation, which includes a summary of the other semi-linked discussion on the project talk page, did not have much flesh blood.

Now, anything else? Is there anything else I must explain for the third time? Konig/talk 23:44, 24 November 2012 (UTC)

Now you're seeming to be irritated. If you make statements that do not seem logical to others, then why are you surprised by them asking for clarification? I found the area on Project Cartography, Oola and links from there. It's a wall of text that argues not only about skill points' handling but drifts into many things. And, having plodded through that wall twice, my conclusion is that there is no consensus on how skill points should be handled. You have your views, others have theirs. So, you telling me "They should…" really means "I think…" and you're assuming an authority which doesn't seem to have a basis. If you don't have time to discuss a problem with the contributor but just arbitrarily revert their changes, you're virtually certain to get into an editing war with some of them and that could waste more of your time than taking the trouble to explain yourself.

OTOH, if there's an inner circle who decide such things in private or 'hidden by obscurity' conversations then maybe you shouldn't be surprised if people don't know what these decisions are. If they are not published separately from the wall of text i.e. in a reasonably accessible and readable form, then they're not "official" policies. Bear in mind that there are so many pages/discussions, sometimes in obvious locations but other times not so obvious, that it can be impossible for people to find what they want to know. I see pages that purport to be authoritative that are not. If I see multiple discussions with no consensus then why should I follow one system when the other seems more logical. If they're about to become "official" then why not say so? I am, unlike some who publish here, utterly at peace with the concept that others may have different ideas from mine and that those ideas may prevail.

I am new to this wiki, those who grew up with it do have an intimate knowledge of its unwritten conventions. The fact that newbs like me don't have an instinctive feel for the subtle arcana means that those who do should exercise some patience with those of us who are not blessed with this inner knowledge. The few people I have interacted with on the wiki so far have been kind enough to explain not only that I was wrong but why and how I was wrong. As for my mistakes, I have copied these "mistakes" from other areas on the wiki where they have been present for some while, so you see my confusion.

Anyway, I'm going to take a step back from this conversation. I look forward to some definitive "rules" in the fullness of time. Bernardus 05:25, 25 November 2012 (UTC)

(Reset indent) Yes, I was irritable when writing that last comment. Phone "keyboards" mixing with walls of text, family for Thanksgiving, and having to repeat myself does this. As said above, I won't continue (as such haven't read your post fully) until I get computer access tomorrow after a nice several hour drive. But to end things off:
Consensus is a bit of a moot point, really. It rarely exists in the truest sense, so we discuss then go with the majority - usually majority by a big enough gap (e.g., 5 to 6 won't do). You see, democracy on the wiki leads to a standstill, where nothing gets done. So a line must be drawn. And usually that line is drawn from the majority of a discussion and "being bold" as its said. There was no "consensus" to the truest extent, but the discussion died and if we waited for such before doing anything, the wiki would be barren. Konig/talk 05:42, 25 November 2012 (UTC)

First of all, I agree entirely with what Bernardus said, though I think he succinctly worded everything that I would be saying/have said, and so restating all of that would be just, restating. I do have two qualms, however, about your last response. First being that you seem to be angry both here and in #Oola about the fact that you have been forced to read walls of text. This is the exact feeling that, if I may speak for Bernardus, we feel when we are linked to previous conversations which require three to five indent resets, and are told that the answer to a mistake we've made against the community is somewhere within here. Therefore, it doesn't seem just to me that you would expect us to read through walls of posts but then be angry when forced to do the same. Secondly, I do want to say that while continuing to work on the wiki when all you have access to is a phone is highly commendable, it isn't something that I control nor something that I'm inflicting upon you, and so while I sympathize with what you're having to deal with in terms of hardware limitations, I would appreciate if you wouldn't take this out on Bernardus or I. —Jyavoc 06:06, 25 November 2012 (UTC)

I really have no intention to put down, in any way, those who put a huge amount of time and effort into this wiki. I am thankful that people have done so. In my rather OCD way, I enjoy filling in the gaps of which I think I have found many, it's fun. I know wikis are democracies and, as Churchill said, "No one pretends that democracy is perfect or all-wise. Indeed, it has been said that democracy is the worst form of government except all those other forms that have been tried from time to time". I know that some leaders have to make a way forward or we would never get anywhere. No problem at all with that. But tell us, please. Put the information in an easily accessible place, lock it if you can to prevent silly edits. Thanks. Bernardus 08:47, 25 November 2012 (UTC)

Now that I am at a computer and the paragraphs don't look like humongous walls of text, allow me to read... Okay.

Firstly, the discussion on the Project Cartography denotes something very important - two things in fact: 1) Everyone was in agreement not to have articles for non-existing events/activities (e.g., "Commune with Ancient Energy Source" and like articles), this was attempted to be more spread in discussion at Guild_Wars_2_Wiki_talk:Community_portal#Skill_challenge_documentation. 2) Everyone was in agreement on how to format zone articles in relation to the skill challenges - that is, to use what gives the skill challenge (e.g., the object for communing) rather than said soon-to-be-deleted articles on non-existing things. What is a wall of pointless text would be, as Dr. Ishmael worded it "mostly one person hung up on insisting that every single instance of a god statue should have its own page" (e.g., it carried on so damn long because one person didn't want Statue of Melandru and "Statue of Melandru (Cursed Shore)" to be merged - since its one person against, there's no real issue with merging, though I tagged for the sake of giving others the chance).

This said, I am not meaning "I think" instead of "should be."

For published separately - I already explained this. And I think it was either you or Jyavoc that agreed that the wiki is rather chaotic so sometimes, just sometimes, discussion outcomes won't make it to formatting guidelines immediately.

And please do not become another one who believes that I am intent to make my way the way - there's enough of those folks. Not saying you are, but you got close.

@Jyavoc: I was not angry at you nor Bernardus, nor intending to take such out on either of you (there has been but three folks who have annoyed me personally to such a point I do that, and the annoyance they bring is lightyears beyond either of you, considering you are both at 0). I was not angry at having to read walls of text (and for the record, a single paragraph like that you just wrote looked half a page long when viewing on a phone - the wall of text I linked to would have been more like a mountain of text, hence why I didn't do direct links (besides multiple windows being a pain in the arse on my phone)). My issue was repeating myself, while reading walls of text, while writing walls of text, while on a phone which doesn't have a full keyboard's capabilities and are naturally slower because I can only use thumb (and that's ignoring the external situations). In short, I wasn't angry at either of you, but sometimes my writing shows my emotions (actually, make that all the time).

Nor was I expecting you to read through walls of text. Rather, I provided those as a source. Little different than how wikipedia provides articles, and those articles provides sources. Few people are expected to look at those sources, but they are there for those who may feel so inclined. My intention was little different, though the situation is more than so.

@Bernardus again: I'm just your run of the mill user. No abilities to lock here. Konig/talk 03:48, 26 November 2012 (UTC)

Recent discussions

I don't want to get too much into it because there's been a lot of discussion and I haven't read it all, but based on what I have seen so far, here's some advice:

Keep your emotions in control. You've acknowledged some slips because of your wikiing via mobile, but it's still coming through, and it makes you seem annoyed, or too... attached, in a way that's off-putting. Snarky comments also aren't helpful: "I "like" how you prolong a topic wanted to be dropped" [1], "Oh, and I didn't tell you guys to drop the subject - unless by the subject, you mean the off-topic annoyances" [2].

Pick your battles. You don't have to object to, or revert, everything you disagree with - especially when you're disagreeing with the same two or three people all the time. You also don't need to write mini-walls of text for every detail. In just a few days, there's been a boatload of discussion to trawl through, for relatively minor things like whether a template should be used. pling 20:48, 26 November 2012 (UTC)

Vendor lists for location

Regarding your recent change in Straits of Devastation (http://wiki.guildwars2.com/index.php?title=Straits_of_Devastation&curid=47948&diff=450570&oldid=450359), as you probably know, there are some special merchants tied to events that are available only at certain times. Karma venrods have their dedicated lists like List of hearts in Queensdale, but if we remove vendor lists from location articles, i don't know of any place where that information could be searched (or placed).

If there is template like heart list, can you please point me to it? I am also aware that there are efforts ongoing with semantic media wiki which will make articles like dedicated page for heart list obsolete, if that's what you had in mind when removing vendor section?--Leriel 13:31, 3 December 2012 (UTC)

I don't think there's such a template or intended article, I was merely making the zone articles consistent with each other and that section was listing more than just the Orr-unique karma vendors, but rather attempting to list all vendors. Konig/talk 15:11, 3 December 2012 (UTC)

Agent Raia and Tactician Lystratia even though are coin merchants, are unique to the zone and items offered by them are available only in this zone and only from them. With that in mind, would you agree for me to restore the list?--Leriel 18:15, 3 December 2012 (UTC)

Agent Raia and Lystratia are no different than any other NPC that becomes a merchant in every other kind of zone. We do not list all those hundreds of other NPCs on their zone articles (but do on their area articles), so there is no reason to list those two there. Similarly, we do not list heart NPCs on zone articles (just the hearts - and the karma event vendors which are replacing heart NPCs in Orr can/could/should (you chose) be gotten to from their respective meta event as all such NPCs are a part of a meta event).

Seeing how I do not think that a list of 20-50 (on a rough guess purely from memory) NPC vendors on a zone article is really helpful or desired, no, I would not agree to restore the list because I would want consistency. Konig/talk 18:19, 3 December 2012 (UTC)

The 20-50 range is accurate and i agree that this is too long of a list for the zone article. Can you tell me how does the flow look currently for looking up all karma merchants in a zone? Are tables like queensdale heart list above or [[List of hearts in the Maguuma Jungle]] thing of the past, or are they current standard? Would it be okay with you if for example - Brisban Wildlands had link on the bottom to [[List_of_hearts_in_the_Maguuma_Jungle#Brisban_Wildlands]] ?

Sorry for 10 questions at one time - what i'm trying to say is that i am missing a link between being in a zone article and having a list of karma/non karma vendors specific to the zone - that's where the link suggestion is from but i may not be aware of some other way and that's where previous questions are from. Thanks for understanding--Leriel 21:56, 3 December 2012 (UTC)

An answer to all your questions: As far as I know, it's all still in discussion. One that hasn't had fresh word in a while, last I saw. Some people want to keep the lists, others believe that the lists-per-zone (and even certain lists, e.g., the List of vistas) are pointless and can be deleted. I do know there was mention at one point or another about a list of vendors in a zone, but it never really went anywhere. Most discussions I know of on this are at Guild Wars 2 Wiki talk:Projects/Cartography and its archives.

Linking to the lists from the zone articles are more or less pointless since the main contents/objective of the lists are already listed on the articles.

But as things stand, lists of karma vendors are non-existent (and that'd be pretty damn hard to fill out anyways) nor are there definite plans for such to exist. Konig/talk 22:05, 3 December 2012 (UTC)

I actually am not a fan of list of hearts :) I only gave them as an example of easy finding lists of karma merchants for zones. I don't like heart tables, since some areas like Orr don't have hearts. As it stands now, like in discussion you linked, if someone wants to locate karma vendor item, he has to either go through all of them ingame, go to dulfy (http://dulfy.net/2012/08/26/queensdale-karma-vendor-list/) or vaporial list. While both of those lists are fine, i believe wiki could be used for case like this as well (and please correct me if i'm wrong).

Anyway, making list like that is a problem, because once we remove heart-related data from such table, what is there left? Pretty much what Category: page has already. Making one big list of vendors+items for area/zone (like dulfy) would be lovely, but then the vendor page becomes duplicate of what is already on the list.. just thinking out loud, but do you agree with me on the use case? How would you see karma vendor list?--Leriel 23:30, 3 December 2012 (UTC)

delete tagging

When you tag a page for deletion, would you mind putting something in the edit summary as well? That would make them obvious on RC and someone could take a look at them immediately, instead of letting them languish for a month or two. —Dr Ishmael 05:28, 4 December 2012 (UTC)

I'll try to keep that in mind. Guess I'm just too much in the habit of checking the deletion/merge/split/move candidates lists. Konig/talk 16:10, 4 December 2012 (UTC)

Double Linking

I thought double linking here only referred to double links in each section... at least that seems to be the way it's done on most other pages. — Rappy 02:33, 9 December 2012 (UTC)

How I've always seen it is multiple links to the same article so long as the article doesn't scroll too much are wanted to be avoided, with the exception of lists. Konig/talk 02:35, 9 December 2012 (UTC)

Honestly, when I visit a page like Diessa Plateau, I click the ToC for the section I want only (in this case, where are the pets). It's helpful if I don't have to scour the whole page to find a link to Arcovian Foothills (which is well above this section on the page) in order to find out where that is in the area. — Rappy 02:39, 9 December 2012 (UTC)

I guess, in short, I am curious why it was delinked there (when the need was greater) and not delinked here when it's horribly abused. — Rappy 02:42, 9 December 2012 (UTC)

It's not really a hard and fast rule, but more of a "does it look stupid" thing. Having one repeat link per new section header is the general guideline if you want to use them, but if the headers are very small/close together, it looks silly to have 5x links to Steal, for example. The idea behind having multiple links is for the convenience of readers and editors, so they don't need to scroll up/down to find a previous link in a different section. Naturally, monitor sizes and resolutions differ a lot, and there are even some crazy people who browse the wiki from phones...so it's something you learn to eyeball.

Remember the cardinal rule of wiki editing (and web design in general): usability comes first. If the information is not easy to access, then there's a problem to be fixed, no matter what the formatting guidelines or standard practices are. Vili 点 02:44, 9 December 2012 (UTC)

Please look at the page in question. All the PoI links are in a huge (2x page at 1080px) table above the section in question. I'm fine with the Waypoints not being linked... I didn't realize we didn't make pages on them... but the PoIs are obscured in a huge table and no where else on the page. — Rappy 02:48, 9 December 2012 (UTC)

@Rappy: Because I wasn't paying attention to that section. As Vili said, it's more or less a personal opinion case, and to me I don't think that page is really long enough, especially when things like highlight->ctrl+F options are available. But again, opinion. Personally, I don't think the pet section is low enough to merit such.

@Vili: "there are even some crazy people who browse the wiki from phones" *raises hand guiltly* Konig/talk 02:54, 9 December 2012 (UTC)

So I'm confused. It sounds like the general thought is OK for that section? Or no? As a ranger, when I am looking for pets, it's quite nice to have the link right there (same with the diving locations) regardless of whether it is above or not. — Rappy 03:02, 9 December 2012 (UTC)

I can't answer that question nor do I know how you got that possibility. But as for diving locations, I believe those may end up being sorted akin to jumping puzzles and mini-dungeons in the future. Who knows, maybe even boss achievements will be sorted into the zone locations table as well. I don't see a need for a section that's one line long personally. Konig/talk 03:38, 9 December 2012 (UTC)

(Reset indent) "How I've always seen it is multiple links to the same article so long as the article doesn't scroll too much are wanted to be avoided" I guess it depends on your definition of too much. I have a 1920x1080 screen and I have to scroll close to 2 pages to get from one link to the other. — Rappy 03:54, 9 December 2012 (UTC)

I don't see a problem with the wiki links. It's a list of area articles, not in prose. My phone is retarded, so it takes me about 15 seconds to scroll back up to the area. More than enough merit on a page that serves as navigation for the zone.--Relyk 04:43, 9 December 2012 (UTC)

Well it don't matter much to me. In the past however I've always seen folks removing the area links from that section and thus followed through with it. Konig/talk 04:51, 9 December 2012 (UTC)

It looks good compared to plaintext anyways, just like any other page that lists articles (i.e. the list of areas on pet pages)--Relyk 05:08, 9 December 2012 (UTC)

Crow's Nest Tavern

Good fix. I added the description for the video added by the IP.. turns out its a confusing route for the Lost Grotto instead. --Chieftain Alex 08:36, 11 December 2012 (UTC)

Area infobox extension for landmarks

Hi, User:Relyk has directed me to you for the issue of landmarks and their area infobox treatment. Could you extend that infobox so that articles with type Landmark are automatically put into Category:Landmarks? Or who could do that? Roland of Gilead talk 03:47, 18 December 2012 (UTC)

Actually, I went ahead and did that as you were posting this. Konig, if there's a problem with that, feel free to change or revert what I did. —Jyavoc 03:50, 18 December 2012 (UTC)

Landmarks are located in zones, categorizing it into landmarks isn't necessary.--Relyk 04:02, 18 December 2012 (UTC)

Hmmm. I mean, I can't think of any necessary reason why we'd want to have a Category:Landmarks, but at the same time, I can't think of any reason why we wouldn't want one. I suppose clutter. In any event, I'll revert the change for now, and we can add it back in if this discussion goes that direction. —Jyavoc 04:18, 18 December 2012 (UTC)

Konig hates clutter with a vengeance. We can generate a list of landmarks with dpl or smw eventually.--Relyk 04:21, 18 December 2012 (UTC)

Haha, I can understand that. Still, this wasn't my idea, nor am I saying this as advocation, but just in general, whenever I get to the bottom of a page, I always feel like the sole category that article is in could use a friend XP. Regardless, you're absolutely right. Do we want to go about making a List of landmarks right now, or put that off? Either way, I'll let someone else handle that page. —Jyavoc 04:50, 18 December 2012 (UTC)

I'm sorry, but why is Category:Landmarks necessary? We had agreed upon no category for Points of Interests or Areas, so why do so for Landmarks? Because they don't have a marker? No, I'm sorry, but that's not enough qualifications if you ask me. They can and should be added to the zone category (e.g., Category:Queensdale which may eventually get renamed to Category:Queensdale locations), just as PoI are.

As for a List of landmarks, I don't see such as necessary either - eventually, when we get around to landmarks (as most location documentation is focused on the things that are mechanically denoted in the game - e.g., PoI/Areas) they will get added to zone and area articles just as PoI are, utilizing as their icon. 04:59, 18 December 2012 (UTC)

Ancient Lore of the Norn

You know a lot about the lore pages, so I'm hoping you can answer my question. I was in Hoelbrak yesterday, and a Jotun Storyteller walked into the Great Lodge. When I interacted with him, I could ask him to tell me stories about the history of the Jotun and Norn. He claimed that the Jotun and the Norn both ruled Tyria together with an unimaginable magic from the gods. Then gods then stripped the Norn and the Jotun of the magic because the gods feared and envied them. The gods then turned their attention to their favorite young races, and abandoned the Norn and Jotun. The Norn turned to their spirits for consolation and guidance, and the Jotun fell into savagery. He also has an option for a story about the time of the dragons. Anyway, I noticed that the main article on the Norn doesn't mention anything about this, and it says "little is known of the history of the Norn before they were first encountered in EotN". Is that because it's not actual history, or because it's mentioned somewhere else? If it's more of a legend, maybe the main race articles should have a myth/legend portion too. I don't want to make any changes to the article that are redundant or unnecessary. —CrazyRabidSquirrel 17:52, 18 December 2012 (UTC)

Thruln the Lost's dialogue is a bit debated. He outright contradicts some known things, but there are other parts of what he says which is possible to hold truth. Most of the older lore frequenters like myself or draxynnic believe that Thruln was twisting the tale about the norn's heritage in order to suit the audience - given he learned this all from oral tradition, it's likely false in places and can be changed to suit the speaker's needs (this is why the krait priesthood's so corrupt).

The idea about the jotun revering the Six Gods is unfounded and contradicts the known jotun persona of pride, and the notion that jotun society fell because magic was removed by the gods is equally unlikely (it might be due to magic being removed by the seers though when the Bloodstone was made) and all other evidence points to infighting causing the loss of magic among jotuns (this being told before we learn of the Bloodstone including jotun magic though). Given Thruln's statements on humanity and the gods' view on them being known to be false, at least objectively, other parts of his dialogue come into question - the only truth we know for certain among his dialogue is what he claims the time when the Elder Dragons were last around was like (though it's a fairly generic description), so the entire state of the Age of Giants - and thus norn history - is under debate of whether Thruln is truthful or not.

My belief is that the Elder Dragons' last rise was in approximately 2,000 BE (by "approximately" I mean "over the coarse of a few hundred years - in the same concept at the modern rise would be 1,000 AE, though I think they woke up a bit early this time around, perhaps thanks to an abundance of magical activity (Exodus, Jade Wind, Searing, Cataclysm, Nightfall) and they wake every ~4,000 years - meaning to known history, they have four awakenings at 10,000 BE, 6,000 BE, and 2,000 BE. The Gigatnicus Lupicus are said to have last walked on continental Tyria in 10,000 BE (note: extinction never mentioned in the timelines, as pointed out to me); thus I believe that during that ED rise they were survivors but forced out and eventually died out in 2,000 BE (the Durmand Priory claims that the G-Lupe, as some NPCs shorten them as, died out during the last ED rise; Sieran says that dwarven civilization began "over two thousand years ago" which would be far off for the previously assumed 10,000 BE, and it would also mean the old line of the Forgotten arriving in Tyria in 1,768 BE is not necessarily false). Given the jotun hold knowledge of multiple ED risings, this would make sense rather than their rising being every 11,000 years and would indicate that the jotun were around since ~6,000 BE - thus the Age of Giants, if it truly existed, I'd say ended in ~2,000 BE - if not sooner, with only jotun society surviving (it could be that the Age of Giants, perhaps including the G-Lupe, Jotun, and Ogres, ended in 6,000 BE's ED rise, but the races survived, with only jotun holding onto as a powerful society, and in their minds it lasted until 2,000 BE when their own race fell to infighting due to the seers taking magic).

But this is all speculation. Point being: Thruln the Losts' dialogues hold too many inconsistencies to take the uncontradicted-but-unfounded lines like the jotun and norn holding shared history. Konig/talk 01:41, 19 December 2012 (UTC)

So Thrulun and his dialogues could be compared to Homer and the Iliad and the Odyssey. I'm intrigued by the history of the Norn because it's so mysterious. Thrulun must be more like an orator who tells the stories with a specific twist to make them more romantic, heroic, or interesting based off who he is performing for. I wonder if the current situation with the gods had any impact on how he told the story of the ancient Jotun when I talked to him in Hoelbrak. It kind of reminds me of when the Valar abandoned Middle Earth after the men had rebelled in the Silmarillion. I wonder if the team drew any inspiration from the Silmarillion. Anyway, thanks for answering my question! —CrazyRabidSquirrel 18:38, 19 December 2012 (UTC)

Isn't it more likely that someone (either the Arah explorable writers or the Thrulun writers) made a mistake, or they never got around to updating one or the other than purposefully having a prominent NPC provide lore that contradicts other lore? Conflicting messages seems like it would just be confusing, especially in an MMO, and ANet has certainly built quite a few inconsistencies, retcons, vagueness, and abandoned threads as it is. Manifold 19:13, 19 December 2012 (UTC)

It's possible, Manifold, but not more likely. GW's lore is based on the foundation of subjective truths - meaning that any one source will always have flaws in it. They've used this to retcon old things (like the seers being the ones who made the bloodstones, or how Glint wasn't made by the gods, even that Abaddon existed). Which means if you take all sources of the same topic, there will always be inconsistencies regardless of the topic or the number of sources. To determine the truth you need to follow the more credible and, more importantly, numerable sources. An expert on seer lore be more credible as a source than a jotun storyteller of oral tradition when it comes to why magic disappeared.

Furthermore, Thruln the Lost holds things that contradict lore that hasn't changed, and is the sole source of such claims - mainly how the humans were when they arrived on continental Tyria, particularly how the Six Gods treated them (Thruln claims that the Six didn't pay humans any heed until humanity built kingdoms - however, we know that the Six Gods brought humanity to the world and that they helped humanity build their kingdoms - both facts are stated prior to and after Thruln the Lost).

In the Guild Wars series, you cannot take any one source as absolute truth - but if there's nothing to contradict that source, then it's a case of "truth until proven otherwise." Konig/talk 01:33, 20 December 2012 (UTC)

So is it possible that the Norn descend from a mix of Jotun, Giganticus Lupicus, or Orgre? If that were the case, it would explain the lack of their established history. It would also help explain why they always seemed more of a nomadic/hunter-gatherer society. Perhaps it's because they lack history and identity that they constantly seek to be renown and own a legend of their own. Perhaps the void of their established history helps to explain why they adore the myths and storytellers so much. I completely love how the game is full of subtle historical references, I believe it adds an amazing amount of depth to the game that is usually lacking. -CrazyRabidSquirrel 04:25, 22 December 2012 (UTC)

They're as likely to descend from Giganticus Lupicus as they are from charr - that is to say, the chance is so miniscule it's not really worthwhile to consider (G-Lupes are ~40 foot tall bipedal canines, basically). Its possible norn descended from jotun (I wouldn't really place any money on ogres given physical differences), but I find it more likely the jotun and ogres are relatives and the norn are an evolutionary step from humans.

I don't think its so much a case of they have no established history, but rather that it just isn't relevant to be brought up - yet. I bet we'll get the answers to who the norn were before Eye of the North when we go face Jormag and reclaim the Far Shiverpeaks.

For my view on the matter: Take note on something Thurln says: "At first, they kept to the shores, but then they spread across the land and into our mountains." There's never been any known human settlements in the Shiverpeaks, let alone the Far Shiverpeaks where jotun are most common. However, there are statues of Grenth in the Far Shiverpeaks, and there's the norn physic - and we have a history of nomadic and distanced humans too. I wouldn't doubt that norn were like the Druids in that they went into the wilderness and they in time adapted to the coldness by growing larger over the generations, as well as adapting new faiths (just as Canthans revere ancestors alongside the gods). Luxon culture also has several similarities to the norn - they hold no formal government, instead having several small groups (where norn have hunting parties, luxons have crews) that band under similar ideals (given the names of Serpent, Crab, and Turtle clans) which in turn hold a leadership determined through strength (clan captains and champions) or wisdom (clan elders). And even though Luxons have Cavalon, they seldom remain there - just as though norn have Hoelbrak, they seldom remain there. Luxons are more social than norn and there's still a lot of differences, but there's a huge number of similarities to make me think the norn hold ancestorial roots that are shared with Luxons. Even the Great Hunt is similar to the gw1:Convocation, a competition where a great hunter (or hunters) is determined to face a giant beast. And in a magical world, especially if aided by the Spirits of the Wild, then 1,500 years is more than enough time for an evolutionary change to such caliber. Konig/talk 04:38, 22 December 2012 (UTC)

I hadn't ever thought of the Norn as descending from ancient humans, but it makes a lot of sense considering their shared attributes. I hope you're right and we get some more back-story when we get to take on Jormag. In EotN, the story made it seem like the shape-shifting ability of the Norn was more commonplace and natural for them. For example, all Norn had Bear Form, and they always used it first in combat. Also, the only form they could assume was bear. Obviously they've adapted since then by being able to take up the other forms. It also seems like shape-shifting isn't necessarily as common in GW2, in fact, only the shamans appear to use the shape-shifting ability (or at least they're the only ones I've ever seen actually use it). Perhaps, as they progressed, the Norn started moving away from utilizing the forms as often since they were seen as more primitive. On the other hand, not many NPCs have elite skills, so that might better explain it. But EotN did make it seem like the bear form was bound within the Norn themselves, being a part of them, which (I thought) was part of what happened to Svanir. Even GW2's Icebrood Norn don't seem to revert to the Bear appearance (or any appearance), and that makes me think that it isn't as much a part of them as it was in EotN. Of course, this may have to do more with the fact that it seems like many contemporary Norn are moving away from the Spirits of the Wild, and so they wouldn't rely on the forms as much in combat. Even in the Biography choices, "Protecting the Spirits" is only one out of three options. Perhaps serving the spirits is more of a hobby now for them compared to how it seemed to dominate their lifestyle in EotN. Maybe I'm reading too much into this, I'm sure you're right and many of my questions will be answered in future content. —CrazyRabidSquirrel 06:42, 24 December 2012 (UTC)

Erm, lore-wise, the norn have always been able to take on more animal forms than just Bear Form - it's just that because EN was so resource-limited that they were only given Bear Form. But they could always use other forms, lore-wise. It's unknown if they can use Wurm/Owl/etc. forms, though. Several Vigil norn use bear form as well in GW2, and others using other forms too. I think you are reading too much into it, as the norn never "served" the spirits, they look to them for guidance - and they still do to equal shares. Protecting the Spirits is just an ideal of how to build one's legends - whereas the others is focused on strength (Defeating Ancient Foes) or Instinct (Defend the Mists). Konig/talk 07:07, 24 December 2012 (UTC)

I hadn't realized that they could always assume the form of the other spirits. Now that I think of it, it actually makes sense since we had all those quests related to Wolf, Bear, and Raven, and of course we could get those Norn transformations. Thanks for answering my questions and presumptions. I'll try to stop thinking so hard about it and just try figure out what I can as more content is released. Thanks! —CrazyRabidSquirrel 21:06, 24 December 2012 (UTC)

Krewes

I can't recall what krewes exist in GW2, but I swear there some around beyond the one introduced in Wintersday.--Relyk 06:12, 23 December 2012 (UTC)

There are tons of "smaller" krewes, it looks like, but I've browsed a number of resources on the wiki, and I'm not seeing too many krewes worthy enough of having their own page (wouldn't have enough information). I guess the one that I found that does look promising is Dessa's krewe, however. If we can find the official name. Which should be buried... somewhere. —Jyavoc 07:14, 23 December 2012 (UTC)

There are named krewes all over Metrica Province, among elsewhere, but making articles for them is like making an article for each charr warband, so better to make a list of them on the krewe article, same with warbands. Dessa's doesn't have a name iirc.Konig/talk 07:44, 23 December 2012 (UTC)

Relyk was asking because I made a page for the Funwerks Krewe, given the fact that it was a developed krewe with a decent amount of information (ie, it wasn't just a throwaway krewe). I believe he was asking if you knew of any other krewes that were as thoroughly developed. —Jyavoc 07:46, 23 December 2012 (UTC)

Area format

Hi, I saw you reverse the Ascalon Settlement area page. No wrong in doing that, I just want to know how we should edit Area pages so they all look the same. I have read the How-to-help for that and furthermore the talk for that. The subject I will refer is Update Template by Anzenketh. Quetzal_Bay is the standard for areas it sais. But when looking at the template itself, it doesn't reflect that. Pointing at Event section and the name for Locations and objectives. I really like to help out but need to know the correct format. I disagree with your change, that Event being part of the Locations. You don't need to do events to complete the map itself. By the look, I much more enjoy having Events as a separate section. Can you or someone check out the template? --Hencovic 12:54, 24 December 2012 (UTC)

Didn't realize I did any reverting, but no, Quetzal Bay isn't the standard for areas (I've never seen it used as a standard, in fact). Formatting guidelines go out of date quickly and I'm not sure what template you refer to, but this one looks up to date. Ah, except the meta events bit - they share their section with events. *goes to update, and fix Ascalon Settlement now that I think of it* Konig/talk 20:28, 24 December 2012 (UTC)

Ok, did a major job now adding area format to Gendarran Fields areas. But used sections named Locations and another one Events. Realizing this was the wrong format, we need to get it back to just Locations and objectives. But.. still I don't like it. Reason - event has no common icon that we can used to display it right? It's the text event now. The different events has their own icons but not events as a whole. Look at Guild_Wars_2_Wiki_talk:Location_formatting#Update_Template. Ok, I can see that you have edit the Quetzal_Bay now. By objectives I can agree that it is Renown hearts. But events is for me something else. --Hencovic 21:17, 24 December 2012 (UTC)

Events isn't the only header that's only text. It's just the most common. Konig/talk 23:43, 24 December 2012 (UTC)