Lately I've been seeing a trend on several articles to just put a link to a related codex entry in the Background section rather than writing out an actual background. See Blades of Hessarian, Tusket, etc. I think we can do better than that. We should take the Background section as an opportunity to make use of multiple resources (where available) and rewrite the subject's background in our own words. This eliminates the sometimes subjective POV's that occur in some codex entries and also gives us the opportunity to be creative. It also defeats the purpose of having the codex entry in the See Also section.
It's my understanding that codex excerpts should really only include small excerpts of the codex if relevent, rather than the entire codex entry. That's why there is an |excerpt field on the codex articles. I think we should not turn this into the norm on the wiki and work towards eliminating this trend as much as possible. --♫ Kelcat Talk 03:35, April 26, 2015 (UTC)
- I partially agree. I would support retaining this style of codex excerpt for smaller articles, such as creature and demon types, since we often lack substantive information for background sections outside of the codex. Some groups also suffer from this problem, such as the Blades of Hessarian or Order of fiery promise, but I would definitely not want to apply this further to location, character or organization articles where we have a larger supply of information.
Basically I think whether we employ this style or not should be based on the amount of information available for the subject, rather than the adherence of article formatting.
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HD3 (Talk) 03:46, April 26, 2015 (UTC)
- That is done so that readers can draw their own conclusions from the text and then see the actions of the entity within the games. The gaming experience is inherently subjective.--FossilLord 03:45, April 26, 2015 (UTC)
- We may lack substantive information, but I still think we can do better than just regurgitating the codex entry in its entirety. By rewriting, we take out the superfluous filler in the codex entries and just present the necessary information. Again, people will still have access to the codex entries as they are always listed on the article. Why have it twice? The wiki shouldn't be subjective, and it usually isn't. We should, and do, instead strive to be objective and provide necessary and useful information. --♫ Kelcat Talk 03:59, April 26, 2015 (UTC)
- I think it could be a good idea. Something along the lines of:
- "Whenever possible, try not to use a codex entry excerpt link in place of an actual background. If a codex entry is the only source, try rephrasing the information to focus on the specific subject and maintain neutrality."
- Putting the "possible" would concede that there are always exceptions, or we could word it differently of course. The many creature articles we have are what brought this to my attention, so I'm at some point at least going to try and flesh those out, whether or not we decide to add a guideline. --♫ Kelcat Talk 05:38, May 18, 2015 (UTC)
If there's no futher input or objections to the proposed addition to the guidelines, I will get them updated in the next couple of days. --♫ Kelcat Talk 02:49, June 12, 2015 (UTC)