HammerWiki talk:Article retention

From HammerWiki

Looks good. Though I think it can be made into two simple sections, "What we retain" and "What we do not retain", as there is little in the policy now. --Deadpool 17:19, 25 February 2008 (UTC)

I do not feel this article can adequately replace HammerWiki:Original content and HammerWiki:No guild pages, as proposed. These articles include more specific examples, background and necessary arguments. If they are to be replaced, much--if not all--of their content needs to be included in the replacement. » Bishop · talk « 14:45, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Current Relevance Discussion

This has become an issue lately with the influx of new editors. I've said it multiple times, and we've had (long) discussions about what does and does not belong. I admire both camps for their commitment to making this wiki the best it can be - either by trimming the fat, or by working to make sure it's as complete as it can be. Earlier, I laid out some very basic guidelines on Talk:Vardek Crom that are as follows:

• Is it related to WAR?
• If it's not, how important is it to Warhammer lore?
• If it's not important, then the article shouldn't be more than a small blurb.

Frankly, these are the principles I've been working under. When I stray from them Pen usually reigns me in. But the main problem I have with all of this is the work that has been put into the game. Essentially, (and I know you guys have heard me say it a hundred times,) but we are - at this point - the best place to get WHFB info on the net. The only other WHFB wikis out there, Lexicanum and Warhammer Wiki are both skimpy and seem to be dead. Hammer wiki, when you type "WAR Wiki" into Google, is the third hit (behind only Wikipedia's article on War, and it's article on the Vietnam War.) We're the fifth hit when you type in "Warhammer Wiki", and we beat all the other WHFB wikis in every conceivable way. I seriously think we should consider expanding to a full WHFB lore database as well as a WAR database - much in the same way as WOWWiki is the database of Warcraft lore on the net.

So, then, we need to hash this out. Pros and cons? We need to present a unified front on this issue, and we need to update our procedures. We're bigger than just a WAR wiki now. --Mikeblack 01:47, 6 May 2008 (UTC)

Not too much time right now, but here's a few thoughts: Ideally, this discussion should result in a re-write and updating of HammerWiki:Article retention. See also some of the other policies and suggested policies for other relevant bits, such as HammerWiki:Original content.

Currently, my personal feelings on the issue remain as they were when I originally volounteered to be a part of leading this project, which is that this is a wiki dedicated to documenting Warhammer Online. However, that does not mean that I want to block or prevent others from turning HammerWiki into something more. I'm simply aware that turning HammerWiki into a resource for the entire Warhammer universe requires quite a bit of effort. Not just in writing articles, mind you, but in organisation, segmentation and policy revision. Effort that I am not currently in a position to provide in the same abundance as I was when setting up HammerWiki.

However, there's a few options I see for how to proceed. One would be to start (or, more likely, invade and assimilate) a sister-wiki such as, for example, this one -- a completely empty shell of a wikia WHF-wiki. I would also name the previously mentioned Warhammer Wiki as an option, but it has been so completely vandalised by spam bots as to be utterly devastated. Of course, this option requires something of a community split and I'm not sure that's such a great idea.

Another option would be to allow a greater influx of lore, WHFB-related and background material into HammerWiki, selecting either a tagging, categorising or sectioning (or a combination) strategy for keeping the content somewhat structured. Tagging and sectioning is largely what WoWWiki is doing with their expanded universe content and it is my impression that it works, to some extent. The only issues are see are dilution of purpose and potential information overload. My worry is that the wider we reach, the less specific information and the more contradictory information we will accumulate. WoWWiki does not have these issues to a very large extent, but remember that it was already huge before deciding to allow anything except the most directly WoW-related information inside, iirc.

Anyway, out of time for now. But there's some things to think about. » Bishop · talk « 13:02, 6 May 2008 (UTC)

My first and major concern, obviously, is the integrity of the wiki, Bishop. I completely agree. I think that tagging, like WoWWiki has done, would be the best way to go. But I do worry about things like space (as in - does Wikia begin to charge you at a certain point?) One of the major issues I see with splitting the wiki is splitting the community, which you've acknowledged isn't really something we want to do. I believe that, to best serve the community, the best method would be to allow lore articles for the whole of WHFB in addition to WAR except for game rules. This is to best avoid stepping on GW's toes and keep the necessary lore articles. I just believe that we currently have too much info to ignore the rest of the lore out there (I'm relatively sure we're sitting on around 75%+ of the WHFB lore available in print.)--Mikeblack 13:19, 6 May 2008 (UTC)

Storage, space and such will never be a problem. In that respect, I'm confident we can consider Wikia a limitless resource. » Bishop · talk « 14:06, 6 May 2008 (UTC)

I'd be against any widening of the scope of HammerWiki to cover other Warhammer games. This wiki will always be about Warhammer Online first, unless some very drastic changes are made, which I don't think are feasable and will only serve to reduce the quality of the content. Considering that any attempt to cover aspects of Warhammer that lie outside WAR will be second-rate compared to our coverage of WAR, I don't think it's worth taking that step, not here at least.

I'm as big a fan of Warhammer as anyone, but there's just too many inconsistencies in the background for a single resource to cover everything properly. This is a problem that other big gaming wikis don't have - things like WoW, Halo and Star Wars have all been developed in a mostly linear way, with the IP progressing from one stage to the next, building on everything that's gone before. That makes documenting the whole thing a relatively straightforward affair. Warhammer, on the other hand, has been developed in a much more haphazard process, borrowing ideas from all over the place, with the focus of the IP jumping around depending on what game or theme is flavour of the month. Games Workshop's designers have admitted that there is no such thing as a single WH canon: "Keep in mind Warhammer and Warhammer 40,000 are worlds where half truths, lies, propaganda, politics, legends and myths exist. The absolute truth which is implied when you talk about "canonical background" will never be known because of this. Everything we know about these worlds is from the viewpoints of people in them which are as a result incomplete and even sometimes incorrect. The truth is mutable, debatable and lost as the victors write the history ... ". Trying to document the entirety of the Warhammer games and background with this in mind would be a logistical nightmare. Think about how you would put together an article on Chaos Warriors that covers the NPCs in WAR, the unit in WFB, the character in Warhammer Quest, the players in Blood Bowl, the warband in Mordheim, as well as their depiction in WFRP and their general background from the various works of fiction published by the Black Library. Once you start looking at Warhammer as a whole, you're going to have all kinds of inconsistencies which will probably take a great deal of effort to sort out into some kind of useful structure.

Also, I think you're underestimating the amount of stuff there is to cover in WFB. It's a game that has been around for 25 years covering 7 editions. The german version of Lexicanum has 5,500 articles, and they're still missing stuff. On top of that, you've got Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay, Warhammer Quest, Warmaster, Mordheim, Man'o'War, Mighty Empires, Blood Bowl, and all the various mini games and specials that have been in White Dwarf over the years.

I think wikia needs a WFB wiki, and so do we. There's already a WFRP wiki. A group of Warhammer-related wikis - separate but built along similar lines - would be ideal, because then we wouldn't have to deal with any ambiguity in the articles, everyone would know where they stand. You could have an article on Witch Elves here, and an article on Witch Elves on the other wikis as well, and they could each cover the subject properly without needing to compromise the article content in any way. And I don't feel as though this would split the community, because there has never been a 'Warhammer' community in that sense, in the same way that WFB players don't share a community with WFRP players.

Warhammer Online. That's the main concern of this wiki, that's what we're all about. Losing sight of our focus right now would be a mistake, IMHO. As far as relevancy goes, if it's in the game, it should be in HammerWki. Even if it's not in the game, if it's Warhammer-related and it doesn't contradict anything that's in the game, then there's nothing wrong with having it in the wiki. Unfortunately, right now we don't know exactly what kind of angle WAR is taking with regards to Warhammer background - we still haven't had a conclusive answer about how they're treating Storm of Chaos, for example. So there's still a lot of 'wait and see' going on. Once people start playing and start getting stuck into the Tome of Knowledge, we'll have a much better idea of where exactly WAR sits in relation to the rest of Warhammer. - Pendrako talk 22:25, 6 May 2008 (UTC)

Your last paragraph, Pen, is exactly what I'm saying, though. I don't think that we should be covering things like Army lists, banner templates, and spell lists - but I think that we should allow any WHFB lore to be included. Not to say we should strive to include all the information on the various game manuals, and I think I've been misunderstood on this point - I just don't think we should discourage inclusion of the information based on it not being relevant to WAR. Should we curb, and avoid adding too much info? Yeah. That Grimgor Ironhide article is way too big for someone who probably won't be in the game. But I don't think it should be a candidate for deletion, because it helps to paint the tapestry of the Warhammer World.

I don't want you guys to think that I'm pushing for HammerWiki to be a WHF wiki. I'm not. It is, and always will be a WAR wiki. I just think that (lore wise) we should not dissuade anyone from including any lore article they think would help paint a full picture of what Warhammer is. I'm not just looking at this from a completionist standpoint. I'm looking at this as someone who's seen how MMO's evolve. The RPG servers will need definite background on everything they can find (our articles like Language and Calendar are perfect examples,) in order to totally immerse themselves. Yeah, the Tome goes a long way towards helping to realize that. But I think it's our obligation to continue with that supplemental information. --Mikeblack 23:47, 6 May 2008 (UTC)

OK, so we're generally in agreement. I just thought I'd better make my position as clear as I could, because I can see this issue coming up again and again. Then again, it's always good to re-visit discussions like these, because nothing on the wiki should ever be completely set in stone. One of the reasons for using the delete template instead of simply deleting an article straight away is so that we can explore exactly why the article should be deleted, which can help us set precedents to base our policies around. When it comes to Grimgor, he's a notable character, but only in relation to the events of the Storm of Chaos. The WAR devs, in their wisdom, have chosen to disregard this piece of Warhammer history. Including articles on specific characters like Grimgor, Atchaon and Vardek Crom won't help anyone looking to immerse themselves in WAR, because they are inconsistent with the world as it's presented in WAR. I agree that Grimgor is one of the most characterful and evocative Greenskin characters that GW have ever come up with, but his story directly contradicts the established history of WAR, and on that criteria he shouldn't be given a page in this wiki. - Pendrako talk 12:40, 7 May 2008 (UTC)

I'm responsible for most of the Grimgor article, and I agree I did overdo it.. But I'd hate to see so much work just deleted so how about just putting up some banner saying "This character is part of of GW's WHF world, but is not canon in the story of WAR" or something like that? Anyway I do understand that this should be a wiki on WAR not WHF and that WHF is not as linear as other fantasy worlds, but I'm a huge fan of WHF and I know a lot about the lore but what I know about WAR is all from this wiki or the main site, making most things I can contribute with largely unneeded. -Rovdyr 13:10, 7 May 2008 (UTC)

This highlights another question. Should we just "clear the air" with a single Storm of Chaos article, and in huge letters at the top state "STORM OF CHAOS IS EXPLICITLY DISCLUDED FROM WARHAMMER ONLINE."? That way we can take the Crom The Conquerer, Grimgor, Archaon, etc articles and redirect them to Storm of Chaos to A.)Avoid having too many pages on SoC, and B.)Really hit home the "It's not included in WAR, so we're not touching it" point. So, instead of having a search place-holder page that might entice someone to create a new page on the article they see, right off the bat, it's not allowed.--Mikeblack 14:03, 7 May 2008 (UTC)

I'd be happy with that. If we can collate all the Storm of Chaos stuff in one place with a summary explaining what SoC was all about and why it isn't considered canon in WAR, with sub-pages like Storm of Chaos/Archaon, Storm of Chaos/Timeline, etc. I still think Storm of Chaos articles would be better placed in a dedicated WFB wiki, but I'd rather keep it here in the mean time instead of deleting it.

Generally speaking, I'd try to avoid deleting articles unless absolutely necessary. But that relies on us putting our heads together to come up with a workable solution. - Pendrako talk 15:00, 7 May 2008 (UTC)

I'd rather keep the pages, but just throw up some banner saying that at the start of them.. and maybe we should put up some notice on the main page recommending that people try to avoid adding articles not part of lore? -Rovdyr 15:14, 7 May 2008 (UTC)

I think leaving the articles up might encourage people to keep adding them. I know where you're coming from Rovdyr, I've been through this before. But I think the best way to ensure the integrity of the wiki would be to do one SoC article and have all of the possible SoC pages redirect back to it. I'll get to work on this when I get back from getting smokes. --Mikeblack 16:20, 7 May 2008 (UTC)

I was going to put my 2 cents in now, but got distracted. Basically, I agree that losing our focus could damage the wiki at this point. But seeing as all pages have been archived (it is a wiki, after all) - would it not be prudent to, in the future, review our article retention policy and add some more non-WAR related stuff. Not game rules per se. But Lore Characters which don't appear in WAR, and the like. I hate to see that amount of work wasted. Like others have suggested we could use WoW-wiki's idea of putting small tags at the top of pages. Certainly keep the Storm of Chaos article though - we definately need an overview of the campaign to provide relevance to the people new to Warhammer who don't understand the difference between the Age of Reckoning and standard Warhammer lore. So not, now, but sometime in the future i'd like to see extra information like that added - stopping short of actual game rules as mike said because that would just attract the attention of GW's legal ninjas. ~ Revoran 02:54, 8 May 2008 (UTC)

Personally, I abhor discarding people's work. I am currently in favor of a policy that A) discourages but does not prohibit non-WAR related Warhammer lore and background and B) mandates tagging of such content with a template designed for the purpose. I will happily support revision of what may be superfluous information from some of the non-related background articles, but I cannot support wholesale deletions, out of respect for the editors who have contributed their time and efforts. There is an example of what I mean by tagging at {{ebc}} » Bishop · talk « 09:28, 8 May 2008 (UTC)

As a first draft, that looks pretty good to me.

So in terms of policy, we can accept expanded background content, as long as it's clearly tagged as such. This doesn't apply to general background lore that is consistent with WAR's background, or at least doesn't explicitly contradict it. I'd also suggest that EBC articles should be based around a single page, with related articles added as sub-pages. Expanded Background Content includes things like the summer WFB campaigns (Dark Shadows, Storm of Chaos, Lustria, Nemesis Crown), other Warhammer games (Warhammer Fantasy Battle, Mordheim, Man'o'War etc), and other Warhammer articles that come from official sources. What it doesn't cover is fan-created material... we still need to sort out how to handle things like Druhir, which isn't official Warhammer background as far as I can tell. - Pendrako talk 11:00, 8 May 2008 (UTC)

I am cool with this. Nice job on the tag, guys. As for Druhir, I'm fine with removing it if we decide to. My original intent was to further flesh out all of those articles, but when it became apparent that I wasn't going to be able to build this for each of the languages, I held off. My only real point for keeping the Drukh-Eltharin section of Druhir is that it might help out the RP'rs. Other than that, I'm fine with removing it. --Mikeblack 13:59, 8 May 2008 (UTC)

A humble proposal: In terms of a division of labor, why not either outside link to or merge with the Lexicanum? (http://whfb.lexicanum.com/wiki/Main_Page) They seem to be the most advanced WFB wiki, with support from the tabletop gaming community. That way, anything that's too much a table-top issue or that refers to non-Age of Reckoning events can be dealt with, without large-scale delections. --User:Vikingkingq

The part of Druhir that I wrote: the short blurb was basically original research. The dictionary section however was taken from a forum, and I know at least some of the words in it are from DE army books - I have the 6th edition book here with me and it lists some words relating to weapons. And Nauglir and Maibd are official. The main reason those language articles are there is to help roleplayers - and mike's section on Drukh Eltharin is great but if any of those articles need revision you think... or if we need to cut back on fan created stuff to prevent an influx of original lore... then feel free? I know I tend to blab on a bit when it comes to lore. But then I guess that's a discussion for those talk pages.

The tag is nice, very in-your-face, but then, I suppose that's the point. If we could manage a smooth join with Lexicanum, that would be cool. And prevent shamelessly stealing their content (I know, I know, but I tagged them and it's on my to-do list to re-write them). ~ Revoran 17:33, 8 May 2008 (UTC)

Don't get me wrong. I'm all for lore posts and whatnot. I was thinking more in terms of Storm of Chaos stuff. User:Vikingkingq

I swear, Rev, you and are going to be known as the guys who scream "But what about the role players?!" I would hold off on merging with Lexicanum since they're all about TT, while we're WAR-centric. Technically, not the same wiki, and I don't think those are grounds to merge. --Mikeblack 22:23, 8 May 2008 (UTC)