UESPWiki:Community Portal/Archive 31

This is an archive of past UESPWiki:Community Portal discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page, except for maintenance such as updating links.

Effect Icons

Just to let everyone know, there was a minor issue with a template change that I just made that has caused all the Morrowind effect icons to disappear. While in truth, I wasn't expecting this to happen, I'm going to take advantage of this to put some changes into place that rpeh and I discussed two years ago. I could just revert, but rather than bog down the server with reverting it now, then unreverting it again later, I figure the Morrowind users can probably live without effect icons for a short time. I'm hoping to address the issue tonight, but if not, then at the latest, I'll have them back up tomorrow. Oblivion and Skyrim space should be unaffected, since they never had the icons in the first place, though per the discussion, I may well end up adding icons for Oblivion and Skyrim in harmonizing our approach. – Robin Hood↝talk 04:41, 15 April 2012 (UTC)

Okay, for those who are following along ;), the bot is just going through and making the necessary changes to the various ingredients pages in all namespaces. You should slowly see icons appearing on Morrowind:Ingredients as it does each page. In theory, you shouldn't see any visible changes to any other pages. If you do, or if the bot appears to have badly goofed, please let me know. – Robin Hood↝talk 07:01, 15 April 2012 (UTC)

While we're on the subject, some icons on effect pages in Morrowind space (e.g., Morrowind:Almsivi Intervention) had custom names for the hover text but most didn't. For consistency within Morrowind space and with other gamespaces, I've opted to remove them all (about a dozen, I think). They will now just show the file name like everything else already does.

Also, as a result of this change, once the bot's done and I've made a few more template changes, we should have effect icons showing up on ingredient pages in Oblivion and Skyrim space, not just Morrowind space any more (e.g., Ingredients). – Robin Hood↝talk 04:29, 17 April 2012 (UTC)

(←) Okay, at the risk of talking to myself some more ;), the updates went reasonably well and we now have icons on pages like Oblivion:Ingredients and Skyrim:Ingredients. What I was forgetting was that GIFs don't scale well on the wiki. Unless somebody has some urge to recapture all those icons at a decent colour-depth, I'll look into mass converting the existing ones to PNGs using .NET. (And if anyone has suggestions for good software to do that, I'm all ears. I've never done any programmatic graphic processing, though I'm sure Google will suggest something. Turns out it's stupidly simple...it's built into .NET and properly supports transparency.)

In the mean time, I need community opinion: should I leave the rather funky-looking GIF icons up, or should I remove any that are GIFs and only display JPGs/PNGs? – Robin Hood↝talk 05:46, 17 April 2012 (UTC)

For now, I think leaving the 'funky' GIF icons up is better, but that's just my opinion. ABCface^◥ 05:48, 17 April 2012 (UTC)

Okay, that turned out to be far easier than I expected. I'm just uploading PNG versions of the images now, though I won't be able to actually put them in place till tomorrow...it's too late and my brain is fried from programming most of the night. Just for reference, here's the difference between the two after resizing from 64px down to 16px: File:O-charm.gif|16px – Robin Hood↝talk 07:57, 17 April 2012 (UTC)

Final update: All the images are now in place. I'll go over the original GIFs in a day or two and propose them for deletion if they're as unused as I hope they'll be. – Robin Hood↝talk 08:11, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

Talk/Discussion Page Abuse

Throughout my adventures in the Skyrim section of the wiki, I have taken notice of the vast ocean of discussions about the game that, whilst in accordance with article theme, lack any relevance to the structure or content of the corresponding article. Game discussion is appropriate when the user is suggesting the the discussion topic be used for article development, but otherwise general discussion should be limited to the forums: http://forums.uesp.net/ The shining example of this type of abuse for me is any request for help with a feature of a game; all game-related questions can be asked in the associated forum, all article-related questions can be asked on talk pages.

Currently at the top of edit pages is a box with the text,

Please remember that talk pages are meant for discussing the contents of the article, or for asking specific questions. If you want to chat with other users about ______, please consider using the UESP forums instead.

I propose that this text be altered to read something like,

Please remember that talk pages are meant for discussion of the articles themselves, and the inclusion, exclusion, or alteration of article content. For general discussion of games, media, et cetera, including related questions, please use the UESP forums instead.

http://forums.uesp.net/

that this text also be written in bold, and that the fill color for the text box be a little more intense than its current coral pink.
— 174.124.140.241 08:14, 16 April 2012 (UTC)

I really don't think that's necessary. Also, please don't remove other user's comments from talk pages. ThuumofReason 10:35, 16 April 2012 (UTC)

I thought I was following already established guidelines. I'll won't touch anything else. —174.124.140.241 11:01, 16 April 2012 (UTC)

The IP editor is correct that we should be removing content that's clearly forum-like. Strangely enough, while there have been numerous discussions about the issue, I can't find anything where we've ever turned this idea into policy other than the fact that we have this message available.

As to the specifics of 174.*'s activity, the Ringmaker removal was understandable. The only reason I didn't remove it, which you'll see in a moment, is that that sort of information is probably something we should be adding to the Notes section of the page, albeit more succinctly. So in a very tangential way, it helped us improve the page. In a similar way, the edit to the Followers talk page can potentially be helpful to the page. The user is discussing a bug they've experienced. If it's a one-off bug that only that user is experiencing, then there'll never be any follow-up and the post is unnotable. We probably have thousands of such posts littering gamespace talk pages. On the other hand, if several users chime in and say "me too", then we know it's a common bug. In these cases, we can add {{Bug}} reports to the page, which people like Kivan, one of the creators of the Unofficial Oblivion and Skyrim Patches, can use to implement fixes. – Robin Hood↝talk 14:53, 16 April 2012 (UTC)

The Blog

The blog has been dead for a while. I wish to to attempt to revive it. What needs to be done to start getting the blog updated again? --AKB ^{Talk Cont Mail} 19:15, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

Wasn't rpeh in charge of it? You'd have to find someone new to do it if that's the case. ThuumofReason 19:39, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

He wasn't in charge of it, he just had (has?) permissions on the blog. Daveh, Krusty, and Nephele also had the same rights as him, judging from a previous discussion. However, you do need to be a "blogger" to write new blog entries and the like. I've already made an account under the name "akb", so that part's done. This information was extremely hard to find, actually. We do need some kind of page on the site that thoroughly explains what the blog is, how you can become a blogger on it, etc. etc. --AKB ^{Talk Cont Mail} 19:52, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

The main thing needed on the blog is just people who want to write posts.

AKB, I've added your blog account to the admin group and given you level-10 access -- so you should now have all the same abilities as me on the blog, including the ability to give extra perms to anyone else who wants to use the blog. And you now also have as much of an introduction to how the blog works as I was ever given ;) Yes, more info on how things work would be good, including who to contact to be given permission to post blogs, etc. Which again means having people who want to write up that how-to info.... --Nephele^Talk 21:39, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

My Data works thanks to this site

Thanks all for this site, i got my data to work thanks all. Off to play Oblivion till infinity. — Unsigned comment by JoelTh3Great (talk • contribs) at 02:56 on 19 April 2012

Lore on Drugs and other Illegal Substances

What do you think about compiling lore on all the drugs like balmora blue and moonsugar? I know there isn't much to begin with but wouldn't it be fun? For instance I was disappointed when I searched for sujamma and was redirected to sujamma as a potion, I was looking for more worldly information like who sold it and who drank it. I know I'm not alone --J'ZhirrthePriest 09:23, 23 April 2012 (UTC)

I think it would be an interesting article, although as you said there aren't many resources. We already have Lore:Skooma, but if you can find enough information for the other drugs then I support consolidating it all into a single article, such as Lore:Drugs. Write up the page in a sandbox (you could use User:J'zhirrthePriest/Sandbox) and then we'll see about making a proper article out of it. • JA^Talk 18:43, 23 April 2012 (UTC)

HTML comment removal, and proliferation of "Notes"

Lately, editors have been removing the HTML comments in each page prototype section. These tell what kinds of things are expected in the section.

A concomitant issue is that after removal, editors began moving descriptive content out of the article body into lists in Notes sections.

Personally, I have found nicely written narrative "How you meet this follower, how to equip the follower, what's special about their house" all useful information in the article body. It seems annoying to see them shortened into a stub description next to a table, with a proliferation of "Notes" bullets (often less descriptive) at the bottom.

I'd like to put them (especially the HTML comments) back. What say you all?
--DayDreamer 13:10, 29 April 2012 (UTC)

Have you got an example of this? I don't think I've seen this happening often, so I don't really think there's a need. Vely^{►Talk►Email} 15:21, 29 April 2012 (UTC)

If you mean the HTML comments the bots added - they were put there to be removed at a later date. Thats expected to happen. As for the rest i've never seen this happen at all. --kiz ^talk_email 15:23, 29 April 2012 (UTC)

I've been removing them as I go if the section they apply to is reasonably well developed. I haven't seen much of the kind of over-summarizing the OP is describing, but if it's only happening occasionally, then it can be brought to the article's talk page and resolved from there. If it's happening a lot and we think the notes are still serving a purpose, it's not too difficult to have the bot re-add (or change) the notes as needed, but it's enough of an effort—due to the possibility the notes have been reformatted, removed, altered, etc.—that there'd have to be clear consensus to re-add them before I'd undertake that kind of project. Also, there's the load on the wiki to consider as well, since this would affect a very large number of pages. – Robin Hood↝talk 20:11, 29 April 2012 (UTC)

Today Faendal. I wasn't suggesting a bot run. Just fixing where we notice changes that misused the sections, or at least not how the HTML comments had originally stated. Let's leave the HTML comments in place forever, as that will inform future editors about the earlier organizational intent.
--DayDreamer 21:18, 29 April 2012 (UTC)

If we are putting HTML tags back into every article in Skyrim, we may as well do it to every content article on-site. That is just impractical. Just like with all the other articles, once they are already pretty filled with content, it would become obvious what was being used where. While the tags are useful on a completely empty page, they are just useless, extra data on the filled ones. It just seems to me like it would be far too impractical to re-add every tag to every page. ES^{Question?•Email•Contribs} 21:27, 29 April 2012 (UTC)

As I stated, I'm not suggesting a bot run. And they aren't useless data, they aren't seen by anybody but editors.
--DayDreamer 21:36, 29 April 2012 (UTC)

So what your asking is that, for example, under the Notes header we add the message that 'Notes go here'. The Silencer has spoken^Talk 21:38, 29 April 2012 (UTC)

No, I'm suggesting that

Only information that does not belong anywhere else on the page should be included here. In general the information in this section is information not relevant to gameplay....

--DayDreamer 02:53, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

(←) There's typically not a lot of this going on, and those that do not follow those guidelines could be directed here (the chart at the top right has layouts). As for the hidden text, it's not always easy to tell what fits under miscellaneous information; the thing that Alphabetface added to Notes on that page could be perceived as miscellaneous by some; newer members or IP address users might not understand what the wiki counts as misc info anyway, so it wouldn't make a big difference. Vely^{►Talk►Email} 21:44, 29 April 2012 (UTC)

Looking at Faendal, I tend to agree with Alphabetface's edit, though I can certainly see both sides. Amusingly, Faendal never had the HTML comments to begin with because the page already existed when the bot ran, but looking at the notes from another page, the way I read it, the narrative description was only intended to mean that you should include what their equipment is—whether or not it should include notes on how the NPC chooses equipment is more debatable. Given that it's the same for all NPCs (at least as far as I know), it should probably go into the Notes section, but I can see how it could easily be missed either way, depending on whether you tend to look primarily at the narrative or, like me, just glance at the notes and bugs to see if there's anything important there. – Robin Hood↝talk 22:21, 29 April 2012 (UTC)

Actually, the HTML comments were always meant to be removed after a while. They were there for the initial setup of a page so newer users can understand what goes there. The edits after Skyrim's release were patrolled automatically by the patrollers (essentially) because we just tried to get as much info on the pages as possible. Now, however, each addition is checked for it's accuracy and grammar based on normal standards. Having the notes is pointless at this point. elliot (talk) 22:32, 29 April 2012 (UTC)

The HTML notes were always intended to be temporary -- to provide guidance when adding information to an empty page, and especially to help with Skyrim content during the first couple months when we had no time to help new editors and very few examples for editors to see what was expected.

One concern about keeping the notes permanently on the pages is that guidelines for page content can change over time. Trying to keep notes that are hidden on hundreds of pages up-to-date is not practical. UESPWiki:Style Guide and its subpages are the best places long-term for providing information about recommended page content. --Nephele^Talk 00:31, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

OK, I'd found the HTML comments really useful as I started editing. But you are correct that maintaining them for changes would be hard. I had no idea they might change! We really need something pointing at the style guide instead. Could we add a pointer? Perhaps in the edit page CSS?
--DayDreamer 02:53, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

Bot run purging

And maybe normal edits, too.... Anyway, I just noticed that viewing not logged-in had old data in NPC tables that had been recently changed by NepheleBot. A page refresh fixed it. Then, I went through my contributions list, and noticed A LOT of non-fresh pages. I'm not maintaining a local cache, so that's not the problem. I remember we sometimes had this problem with older versions of MediaWiki. Note there's a Purge requests page (listed at the top of this page). But it might be better to simply fix the job that auto-purges the cache after edits. I know it doesn't function well on what we on the wikitech list call MJ or Michael Jackson events, but that's not likely to be a problem here.
--DayDreamer 21:33, 29 April 2012 (UTC)

A lot of pages show up as a couple weeks to a month out of date if you're not logged in, and they do fix with a hard refresh. I don't think a solution's been found yet. Vely^{►Talk►Email} 21:44, 29 April 2012 (UTC)

As far as I know, if a page has recently been saved and still didn't update for logged out users, a purge won't change that. I'm not 100% certain it's the same process, but I believe saving automatically performs a purge or something like it. As Velyanthe said, this is a known problem for our site, but logging in fixes it. – Robin Hood↝talk 22:06, 29 April 2012 (UTC)

Yes, log-in will always "fix" this problem, because that doesn't hit the cache. But Google is indexing the cached data, not logged-in. Saving is supposed to perform a purge of the local cache automatically. Something's wrong. Are you using an external Squid or Varnish?
--DayDreamer 02:39, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

Wanted: Legate Rikke images - please help!

Hey everybody! As part of my extensive page on Rikke (can be seen here), I’ll need several images to avoid the wall-of-text syndrome. Since she is related to so many quests, I’m having a hard time finding someone with all the saves at hand, so I thought I’d try and make this a community effort. I really hope the image providers of the site will help me out.

• An image of Rikke battling it out against Ulfric during Battle for Windhelm
• An image of Rikke during the Season Unending peace treaty
• An image of Rikke losing her battle against either Galmer or Ulfric during Battle for Solitude
• An image of Rikke in Sovngarde.

All images should be 4:3 and in the Skyrim-NPC Story images category. Fingers crossed that some of you have the appropriate saves, so I can get this giant page launched. Thanks in advance! --Krusty 22:23, 29 April 2012 (UTC)

Protecting/Warning on Official Pre-release Images

I'm thinking after one of the pre-release images was uploaded over today it might make sense to protect those pages, or at least place a warning template of some kind telling people to leave them alone. It's kind of a big task (over 100 images for just Skyrim, more if you include other games), so I thought I'd post the idea here to see how the community feels about it. Should be a fairly simple job for a bot (though it'd have to be one with admin access if we go with the protect route). There shouldn't be any need for anyone to change any of those images, so I don't see a problem with having them protected, but if there are objections, a warning template will suffice. Not a huge priority, as I don't think this happens that often, but might make sense to preemptively do something about it. --TheRealLurlock ^Talk 02:32, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

I think this one was uploaded over because the image was being used on an article page for the creature. That will obviously create some problems when users have "better" images. I wouldn't be against protecting the files, but I'm not too sure if it's necessary. It might be better to try to take them off any articles. elliot (talk) 02:36, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

I think the issue has largely been dealt with at this stage. It might have been a good idea to protect them earlier, but I agree with Elliot that the main priority should be actually removing them from articles. --Legoless 23:13, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

Image Standards for Items

So, I was consulting Help:Images to look at what the appropriate sizes for item images to be, since the aspect ratios for them are all over the place, and I noticed that we haven't got a written standard for items. So, I was wondering two things. First, what is the standard? And, secondly, if no standard exists, can we propose one and put it up for a vote so that we can have an official standard?

Oh, and one last request: Can an administrator please archive this page? At approximately 330 kilobytes, it is ridiculously long, and I notice that many subjects here have been closed for over a month. ES^{Question?•Email•Contribs} 08:06, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

I'm surprised this wasn't already covered at some point before, but you're right--Help:Images doesn't appear to cover item images at all. I personally prefer 4:3 for these, if only because that seems to be largely what people are going with and I think it looks nice.

Eh...then again, 1:1 looks good on Skyrim:Artifacts. What do other people think? eshe^talk 01:18, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

When would a 4:3 image be beneficial? Eshe's right, 1:1 looks good on Skyrim:Artifacts, so I'm leaning towards adopting 1:1 as the standard for items of images. • JA^Talk 02:26, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

Compare Category:Skyrim-Item_Images to Category:Morrowind-Item Images, Category:Oblivion-Item Images, Category:Shivering-Item Images, Category:Tribunal-Item Images, and Category:Bloodmoon-Item Images, of the six, the only one to closely follow any kind of ratio standard are the Skyrim images at 1:1. Instead of requiring image alterations for six namespaces (I don't see why we should count Arena and Daggerfall images due to the differences and limitations those games bring), it would be easier to only require five to be cleaned up. Though, making exceptions for group shots at 4:3 or ever 16:9 is probably a necessity. --AKB ^{Talk Cont Mail} 02:41, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

I've never been fully on-board with rigid AR standards. I understand why vertically oriented images are a problem, because the wiki software determines thumbnail size based solely on width, so portrait images end up very large. And I can see using a standard on things that are on uniformly formatted pages (e.g. Ingredient pages, NPC/creature pages, etc.) But in general, I don't think there's a serious problem with allowing wider than 4:3 in some landscape-format shots. (Especially since the majority of visitors probably have widescreen monitors now - see [1].) But I've had this discussion before, so whatever. --TheRealLurlock ^Talk 03:34, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

For item images, I think the best thing right now is to focus on the Skyrim namespace and ignore the others for a while (after all, we can do what we want within each namespace). Looking at the SR Category, it seems quite clear that 1:1 is the best choice for images, so that format gets my vote. --Krusty 07:50, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

Edit Links for Lead Section

For those of you who are using the gadget "Add an [edit] link for the lead section of a page", when you're looking at a protected document or a featured article, where do you want the edit link vs. the icons? Do you want it to look like the first or second of the following options?

Fake Top Section 1	[edit]
Fake Top Section 2	[edit]

A little background: I've just implemented a feature that'll let us easily add as many page icons as we'd like without any of them overlapping, but for the moment, I've also slightly broken our current Edit Top gadget in that it won't display properly on pages with page icons (e.g., protected pages, feature articles, and some user pages). This is readily fixable by an Admin, but before I ask them to do this, I need to know which approach to take. Personally, I'd prefer the style of Fake Section 1, and it has the added bonus that I don't have to hack through code that I'm unfamiliar with...I can just tell an Admin what changes to make and we're off to the races. However, the version we were previously using was the second style. I can make it look like that if we need to, but I'll need to do some research unless someone else out there is skilled with DOM and Javascript and can help me out.

Preferences? Or am I just being anal and really, nobody cares? ;) – Robin Hood↝talk 00:17, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

I don't use the gadget, but I think having [edit] on the very right looks best. • JA^Talk 00:27, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

I prefer the second style, and I do use the gadget. But I won't be upset if it ends up being the first style, especially since it's easier to code. Vely^{►Talk►Email} 00:32, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

Edit on the inside looks best. ES^{Question?•Email•Contribs} 00:44, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

Either fix is good for me - when I tried using that gadget, the Edit link ended up being hidden underneath the icon. If I had to choose, I'd say Edit link on the inside, but I'm cool either way. Also affected by this are all of the official plug-in pages - you should make sure to check those as well when testing this. --TheRealLurlock ^Talk 03:26, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

(←) Okay, that turned out to be easier than expected once I stopped and thought about what I was doing. I've also updated the code with the latest from Wikipedia, give or take some fudging for features we don't have available in 1.14. I'll post another update later on once we're moved over. For now, can I ask an admin to move the Javascript...

From: my sandbox (edit it, then copy all but the first and last lines with the <pre> tags on them—shouldn't hurt if you copy them, but they're not needed)

To: MediaWiki:Gadget-EditTop.js

If there are any troubles, let me know, but I believe that should do it. Don't forget to do a hard refresh or you won't notice a difference. – Robin Hood↝talk 04:09, 4 May 2012 (UTC)

In case anybody's thinking of doing this, hold off a sec...I just found a minor bug that's easily fixable, but needs to be dealt with. I'll post back in a minute when it's okay to go ahead again. All fixed! – Robin Hood↝talk 04:56, 4 May 2012 (UTC)

Yikes, okay, I'll do it. The script from your sandbox completely replaces everything on the MediaWiki page, correct? eshe^talk 13:57, 4 May 2012 (UTC)

Yes. Everything there should be wiped out in favour of the new version. I'm about to go have lunch, but I'll be around again, here and on IRC, in about an hour should anything go horrendously wrong. – Robin Hood↝talk 20:17, 4 May 2012 (UTC)

Okay, thanks! I've done it now, and I kept the <pre> tags, since without them the little "box" at the top went all wonky (you can tell I'm really into accurate technical jargon). If I've broken everything, slap me in the head and I'll undo it ASAP. eshe^talk 23:48, 4 May 2012 (UTC)

The Pre tags need to have the // in front of them still, or the code won't work (or at least it seems not to be). – Robin Hood↝talk 00:10, 5 May 2012 (UTC)

Okay, trying again...how's that? eshe^talk 00:43, 5 May 2012 (UTC)

(←) That's got it, thanks! – Robin Hood↝talk 00:44, 5 May 2012 (UTC)

Lore Alchemy

Okay, reviving this topic now that the work in my sandbox is complete. Only thing missing from these pages now is descriptions. (I have examples on the D page, but the rest still need adding. That task I think I'll open up to the community, as it may require knowledge of games I haven't played.) Also potentially missing are items from Oblivion and Skyrim which are like ingredients from other games, but not treated as ingredients in those games. (Things like food and animal pelts mainly.) I added those where I saw them, probably missed some. And I'm missing info from Daggerfall and the mobile games in some places - I could only go by what we have on the site for that. Otherwise, I think these pages are ready for migration to the Lore space if nobody disapproves. Should be as simple as moving the pages and updating any cross-links between them to the new locations. --TheRealLurlock ^Talk 12:55, 4 May 2012 (UTC)

I'm all for this. I don't feel like the previous argument was settled - it just sat for a while and collected dust. Here are my thoughts (read: counterarguments) on the subject.

• A lot of the hard work is done, which IMO was what people were having reservations with.
• The other reservation people had was with the duplication of content. Look at Artifacts. The difference between the lore page and the various game articles is that the lore provides a more historical context on them, thus one could argue that it's not duplicating information. We also include the various, game-specific enchantments on the Lore page, because A) It's central to the item being an artifact, and B) It's interesting to see the progression of enchantments as the focus of the games changed from one to the next. These are the same reasons we want to have the various effects of the ingredients on the Alchemy pages.

I don't like revisiting old arguments, but in this case (unless everyone who objected has changed their mind/doesn't care) it's necessary. On a side note, I don't have anything going on today, so I'll write some in-depth descriptions for the ingredients. • JA^Talk 18:23, 4 May 2012 (UTC)

Since the work has been done, I don't see the harm in adding it to lorespace. I'd like to suggest General as another option for where to put it, as I still feel it's far too game-specific. Just as a note to Jak, the Lore:Artifacts page is a poor example, as I'm currently in the process of converting it to the usual alphabetised list format with separate articles for each artifact. --Legoless 19:05, 4 May 2012 (UTC)

Well this I don't agree with. General namespace is for things that have nothing to do with the games at all - articles about the developers mostly. Not at all appropriate for game-related topics. If anything, General is even less game-specific than Lore. Really, Lore is the only place that makes sense. I was thinking Lore:Alchemy. Doesn't exist yet, and I can't think of a better place for it. I think it'll feel more Lore-like when descriptions are added, particularly for those ingredients that appear in more than one game. It could maybe be added to the Appendices if it doesn't feel right on the main page, though I'd prefer not to bury it too deeply. (I suspect that many of those Appendix pages get fairly few views due to the way they're nested away from the main page, but whatever.) --TheRealLurlock ^Talk 03:07, 5 May 2012 (UTC)

I'm still really against this project, mainly because I think it is organized fairly poorly. But, I believe General or Mainspace would be more appropriate. And consider your note on General, I am fairly certain Mainspace is the best way to go. I think most people have forgotten that we have it, and considering we want to cover game specific info for 4+ games, it makes the most sense. elliot (talk) 04:42, 5 May 2012 (UTC)

Skyrim character page design

Go to any character page and there might be listings like "Follower: Yes", "Marry: Yes", "Essential: Yes" etc. There's never one that says "Follower: No" or such. Since there are lots of NPCs without these traits, and therefore these rows in their summary panels, couldn't all these be condensed into one row?

"Interactions: Follower, Marriage partner, Essential, Respawns, etc"?

Just a thought. NFITC1 18:51, 4 May 2012 (UTC)

Those Character templates follow a specific table. Generally we'd only list the information provided, along with a yes if they are a follower. It typically means that if the character page doesn't have anything for the character being a follower, then they are not. Helenaannevalentine 22:54, 4 May 2012 (UTC)

We use a template for that information, and information is basically implied to be "no" if it is not mentioned. Listing such info should be avoided. elliot (talk) 04:46, 5 May 2012 (UTC)

I think what he's saying is instead of having separate boxes for "Follower", "Marriage", "Essential", "Respawns", etc., we could have a single box for "Interactions" in which we listed if they were a follower, could be married, etc. • JA^Talk 05:03, 5 May 2012 (UTC)

Hmmm, that could possibly work. I've always wondered about a way we could fix that information up. I thought about having them in one section like that before, but I wasn't completely convinced by it. I might work up an example on it here within the next day so we can have a visual to compare the two styles with. elliot (talk) 05:07, 5 May 2012 (UTC)

One major reason why they're not merged right now is because any of the entries can be more than just "Yes". Most essential NPCs are only NPC until a given quest is completed, in which case the infobox should specify which quest. Followers may only be followers during a single quest. The current layout allows the flexibility to add any such extra information as necessary. --Nephele^Talk 21:54, 6 May 2012 (UTC)

Puzzle Symbols

There are about 20 different descriptions around the wiki for the symbols found on Dragon Claw doors, and the spinning symbols. There are three books that I can find that descibe them, the first The Dragon War lists nine that can be found, while the other two, Notes on Yngol Barrow and Of Fjori and Holgier, have clues that agree with a few symbols. All nine are listed in my sandbox with pictures for them(thanks to Xyzzy). The Hawk and the Eagle do not corrospond, the hawk is in Dragon War, but the eagle is in Notes on Yngol Barrow, but all others seem to match.

I am asking that these be the correct definitions of these symbols, to avoid confusion, and also, where should this be posted. It could be part of a separate Puzzles page, or just a subpage to have the pictures together and not clutter the Traps page. I know the pictures aren't great but Xyzzy's working on it. The Silencer has spoken^Talk 21:50, 4 May 2012 (UTC)

An update on why this needs resolved.

The Jagged Crown (Stormcloaks); Fox, Butterfly, Dragon.

The Jagged Crown (Imperial); fox, moth, dragon)

Korvanjund (The location of both quests); wolf, butterfly, dragon.

The Silencer has spoken^Talk 14:39, 5 May 2012 (UTC)

I say yes, they should be renamed to the names that you've found. I have no opinions on the separate puzzle page, though.

What would also be nice would be a format to how to list the animals. I've seen italics (fox, butterfly, dragon), bolded (fox, butterfly, dragon), dashes (fox—butterfly—dragon), capitalized and not capitalized, etc. Vely^{►Talk►Email} 14:53, 5 May 2012 (UTC)

My favourite format seen so far is Fox—Moth—Dragon. But also need to decide if the Hawk is also the Eagle. The Eagle is the symbol as confirmed by in-game books, yet it is not mentioned in the Dragon War. The Silencer has spoken^Talk 15:00, 5 May 2012 (UTC)

If there's no other bird of prey to be found, I would go with the hawk being the eagle. I don't think there is another. Vely^{►Talk►Email} 15:13, 5 May 2012 (UTC)

If there are no objections then I will get onto this soon. The Silencer has spoken^Talk 12:56, 6 May 2012 (UTC)

Elder Scrolls Online

Given the latest news, it probably wouldn't hurt to start planning the namespace and all that jazz. There are a number of images floating around that are legit (though I'm slightly dubious on their source since GI doesn'tappear to have released them online yet...), and the GI article has a fair amount of detail in it, so we do have some content to work with. Any thoughts? Dlarsh^(T,C) 01:24, 5 May 2012 (UTC)

The quicker we create a namespace, the better. I've uploaded all of the leaked screenshots/concept art, as well as the single image GI released today. You can bet Wikia and every gaming news site is going to be using them, so we might as well go along with it – this isn't like the potential copyright problems we had with the Skyrim magazine scans. --Legoless 01:34, 5 May 2012 (UTC)

I think we should name the namespace Online (as on Online:Main_Page) and the abbreviation should be eo:Main_Page. Legoless already uploaded the images under EO, it seems. Right now, the main page should probably have some basic info (which is all we have) and a gallery of all of the leaked screenshots/concept art. • JA^Talk 01:44, 5 May 2012 (UTC)

I agree with Online:Online, but I think the abbreviation should be ON:Online. elliot (talk) 04:48, 5 May 2012 (UTC)

I actually agree with Elliot here. The abbreviation should be ON:Online as it would be more easier to recognize and is a more appropriate abbreviation in my eyes. Helenaannevalentine 04:52, 5 May 2012 (UTC)

Fine by me. All of the categories created for the images so far have had the prefix ESOnline. Should I change this to Online? I used ESOnline because we already have OBMobile. • JA^Talk 04:58, 5 May 2012 (UTC)

ESOnline seems to be redundant, considering we only work with Elder Scrolls games on the wiki. elliot (talk) 05:00, 5 May 2012 (UTC)

(←) We need to consider any future online games, ie sequels, that will also have Online in their name. I know Elder Scrolls Online is all we have, but where would Elder Scrolls Online 2 go, though I think this is only a working title at the minute. The Silencer has spoken^Talk 07:09, 5 May 2012 (UTC)

Yeah, I wasn't sure if that was the actual name of the game or just a trademark they're using to refer to what may become a series of games. I think until it's actually more officially announced, this discussion is somewhat moot. All we know is that there will be an ES MMO of some sort, which may be called "Elder Scrolls Online", or may have some other name and just be billed under that umbrella somehow. Also, it should be pointed out that namespace changes are not impossible, in fact we've done it twice so far (Tamriel -> Lore, and Image -> File). Sure, it was a bit of work making those changes (mostly done by bots), but the option exists, so we don't have to treat any such decision as cast in stone for all eternity, especially since the number of articles in this new namespace will probably be fairly small until the game is actually released, by which point we'll hopefully know for sure what it's actually named. --TheRealLurlock ^Talk 11:50, 5 May 2012 (UTC)

A cover story and month-long coverage by Game Informer and the release of the first trailer isn't an official announcement? It's no different than when Skyrim was first announced. If the name is changed to something else later on then by all means change the formatting here too, but waiting indefinitely for such a change (which may or may not happen) before adding ESO info here is highly impractical. People like me are looking for ESO info now, and instead of finding it here we're going to the Wikia site and finding it there. I can't imagine that's a situation UESP would be content with. 108.59.252.58 18:27, 5 May 2012 (UTC)

Anonymous user, there's an image or two out, plus a very vague trailer. We've certainly got plenty of time to decide on a name.

For those looking for this trailer, it's on this page. I'm unsure if that page should be put in a news story, here, or anywhere else. Maybe on the ON main page? If ON's what we're going with, that is. ESO, EO, and ON all sound fine to me. Vely^{►Talk►Email} 20:27, 5 May 2012 (UTC)

There's [[:Category:ESOnline-Images|more than an image or two]] floating around. If the title is changed, we can move the namespace; for now, we need to put the information somewhere, and people seem to be agreed on Online/ON. Sequels etc can be dealt with as they occur.--Legoless 21:36, 5 May 2012 (UTC)

@The anonymous user who said there was only two images and a vague trailer in response to my first comment - Scans of the Game Informer issue can be found here: http://imgur.com/a/fO9Ty#0 I even bought a copy at my store yesterday, its all there. The Wikia site has the highlights of this posted in their ESO article. In Response 00:56, 6 May 2012 (UTC)

(←) I think Online and ON work fine, I don't see anything to suggest that "Elder Scrolls: Online" isn't actually the name. Delaying covering the game in anything but news stories due to lack of information doesn't make much sense, we have an adequate amount of information to at least start the basics. Though, the namespace should be locked, with page creation handled through UESPWiki:New Page Requests. However, just waiting until an undetermined date in the future when we have a bit more information won't accomplish anything at all, besides earning us many messages asking when we're going to be covering the game. --AKB ^{Talk Cont Mail} 04:20, 6 May 2012 (UTC)

If the Lurlock is right and sections can be moved, then the page needs started now, before we fall any further behind our rivals. Even if isn't the final name, it's the name released and what people will be looking for. That's a sensible idea to lock page creation until it's clearer that this is the final name, and not a new series Eg. TESOISkyrim (The Elder Scrolls Online 1). The Silencer has spoken^Talk 12:54, 6 May 2012 (UTC)

I've begun work on the pages here. --Legoless 13:01, 6 May 2012 (UTC)

Making changes like that is easy for a bot, and I've already got code that would take only moments to adapt to such a change, if we needed to make it. The obvious issue is the number of pages and how much load that would create on our servers. Given that we're unlikely to have a large number of pages in the namespace until closer to the game's release (by which time I would hope we'll have all the info we need about its name), I see no issues creating a namespace under a best-guess name, then we can change the name later on if we need to. – Robin Hood↝talk 21:05, 6 May 2012 (UTC)

If the immediate need is just to create two or three articles, they can be created in the Main namespace, and then moved later (any new game will end up having a redirect or disambig page long-term in the Main namespace). There's no reason to rush creating a namespace if we're not even sure of the name of the game yet. We probably also want to create a couple redirects based on different presumed names. --Nephele^Talk 21:50, 6 May 2012 (UTC)

The name is concrete; there's no reason it would change. There are more than a few articles in my sandbox, but they're all stubs. We could condense them into a single page if necessary. However, I think starting the articles early is best. Like has been said above, in the event that the namespace needs to be moved, it can be easily done. --Legoless 22:13, 6 May 2012 (UTC)

(←) Yes, I see no evidence that "The Elder Scrolls Online" isn't the actual name. In fact, all signs currently point to it being the name of the game when you take into consideration the name of the official website, the twitter account, the Facebook group or whatever they call things on Facebook, the banner they released with the announcement, the name of the official forum, the fact that I can't find any examples of it being called anything else... I see no evidence to suggest that this isn't the actual name. If it wasn't, this would be a pretty dumb advertising move on ZO's part by having all of these things released under a different name just a year before the planned release of the game. And if I'm wrong and this isn't the actual name, we can still change it after the fact. Unless there is some reason I'm missing, is there any reason not to create it now? I would do it myself, but besides finding the MediaWiki Page that controls what namespaces we have, I'm not sure what else is needed to create a new namespace (if anything). --AKB ^{Talk Cont Mail} 23:19, 7 May 2012 (UTC)

As far as creating articles goes you don't need to do anything (I once created an article in the "Skryim" namespace, derp). • JA^Talk 23:31, 7 May 2012 (UTC)

Edit Break: Elder Scrolls Online

Okay, we need to be consistent with the abbreviations for categorization and whatnot. If we are going to use Online:Online as the main page, then the category should be Category:Online. I am not sure where [[:Category:ESOnline]] came from. The same goes for images (e.g. File:ON-concept... etc.). elliot (talk) 02:08, 9 May 2012 (UTC)

I renamed the "Edit Break" header so people know which Edit Break from the RC page. Always annoyed me when there were several discussions with identical "Edit Break" headers and you couldn't tell what people were talking about.

I think there's a difference between just putting an article in what looks like a namespace vs. an actual namespace. (In other words, you did not create a "Skryim:" namespace with that typo, it just looked like you did.) We had problems during the Tamriel->Lore move where pre-existing articles with the "Lore:" prefix would be lost when the actual namespace was created. So please DON'T go creating articles with an "Online:" prefix until the namespace is officially created, which I'm pretty sure has to be done by Nephele or Daveh at this point. You can make articles in the mainspace for now and we'll move them later. That said, though, I agree that we should go ahead and make the namespace so there won't be too much confusion finding the articles that need to be moved later. Worst case is they change the name and we have to move all the Online: articles to whatever, but at least we'd know which ones to move, since they wouldn't be mixed in with mainspace articles. (Not that there are very many articles currently in mainspace, but still.) --TheRealLurlock ^Talk 11:43, 9 May 2012 (UTC)

Okay, that's good to know. I changed over all of the categories and images to use the Online- and ON- prefixes, respectively. • JA^Talk 16:14, 9 May 2012 (UTC)

After looking into it, that does seem to cause problems with searching and linking to articles as they'd all be in the main-namespace. So we definitely can't do that. --AKB ^{Talk Cont Mail} 16:21, 9 May 2012 (UTC)

What do you mean? • JA^Talk 16:25, 9 May 2012 (UTC)

(←) As they would all be in a main-space, every single link that links to another article on the game would break once they were moved. Worse yet, that would mean that there would be superfluous wanted pages if we miss any of the red links, likely leading to redundant articles. That's also why it's not a good idea in general to create articles on the game until it has its own namespace, as it will be harder to move after we get a few articles on it. --AKB ^{Talk Cont Mail} 16:32, 9 May 2012 (UTC)

In terms of creating articles in Main space and then moving them, it's incredibly easy for a bot to go through and update all the links. We can avoid even that necessity if we use a template similar to the {{SR}} template for all the links and are religious about ensuring that that template always gets used for links until a namespace is created. Once that's done and it's been added to the Uespnamespacelist, my bot will automatically pick up on the new entry and convert those links to hard links, just like it would for any of the other namespace templates.

As far as Lurlock's point goes, while there are two ways I'm aware of to get rid of the conflicting pseudo-namespace vs. real-namespace issue, they're both pains in the butt, so definitely not a good idea to "fake it" using links like [[Online:Online]]. (And for the curious, the two ways I know of are for Neph/Dave to run the namespaceDupes.php maintenance script, or for my bot to catalogue and move the pages by ID# instead of by name, suppressing redirects so nothing gets left behind.)

Another way of faking a namespace that doesn't cause too many problems is to use main space with subpages. For example, use [[Online/Online]], [[Online/Quests]], etc. Then when the namespace is actually created, the conversion is simply a matter of changing the first "/" in any link to a ":". Still, I think a template, or perhaps a template combined with this naming scheme, is the best way to go.

Of course, the real question is: what's the harm in creating a namespace now if the name is unlikely to change? – Robin Hood↝talk 22:01, 9 May 2012 (UTC)

The doubt about creating the namespace seems to be based around uncertainty about the name, which I think has been addressed well enough to go ahead. Besides discussing what we need to write for the new namespace, the general consensus is strongly in favor of creating it. I'll ask Dave to create it. --AKB ^{Talk Cont Mail} 01:32, 10 May 2012 (UTC)

Also, one final note on the name. See The Origins of the Elder Scrolls Online, in which Matt Firor explains the choice for why they named it "The Elder Scrolls Online", and not something like "The Elder Scrolls: Tamriel". Unless they change the name between now and then, this is absolutely the name of the game. --AKB ^{Talk Cont Mail} 04:57, 10 May 2012 (UTC)

(←) Daveh has created the namespace, so I've gone ahead and moved the main page to Online:Online, as well as created the dozen or so new stubs as planned. --Legoless 22:54, 10 May 2012 (UTC)

Don’t create too many pages – you will drown. --Krusty 23:08, 10 May 2012 (UTC)

Okay, I'm experimenting with the stub's image for Online. Which of the below three looks best?

This Online-related article is a stub. You can help by expanding it.

This Online-related article is a stub. You can help by expanding it.

File:ON-Icon-Test Logo 01.png

This Online-related article is a stub. You can help by expanding it.

I know the last two look almost identical. The full-size images have a minor difference, but when they are scaled down this much you can't tell the difference. • JA^Talk 00:32, 11 May 2012 (UTC)

I would say the second one. The full-size image for the third one looks almost awkward with those spaces, and I feel like there's not enough contrast between the logo and a black background for the first one. Vely^{►Talk►Email} 00:38, 11 May 2012 (UTC)

^Agreed. The second one looks best. ABCface^◥ 01:43, 11 May 2012 (UTC)

(←) Ditto. – Robin Hood↝talk 03:24, 11 May 2012 (UTC)

I also agree. Image changed over. • JA^Talk 04:17, 11 May 2012 (UTC)

New User Group For Maintenance Edits

After recently clogging the RecentChanges with category edits, I decided to propose this idea that I've been mulling over for some time. What it would be is a new check box displayed when editing, which would say "This is a maintenance edit". This checkbox would only be available to people part of a user group. What it would do is tag the edit as a bot edit, effectively hiding the edit (as well as the many other accompanying edits) so people who are trying to patrol the RC don't have to deal with the huge number of edits clogging it. I don't know how difficult this would be to implement, but I think that it would be a very useful feature. Plus, we are upgrading the wiki, so we might as well do it all at once. Thoughts? • JA^Talk 06:45, 5 May 2012 (UTC)

I'm not too sure about this. Even maintenance edits need to be patrolled, and that goes for all users. If you are worried about the physical aspect of patrolling, most users who do different types of maintenance edit are already patrolled. elliot (talk) 06:52, 5 May 2012 (UTC)

I'm not talking about patrolling maintenance edits, I'm talking about trying to patrol non-maintenance edits. Anyone whose ever tried to patrol the RC while someone is doing maintenance edits knows how annoying it is having five thousand Category edits pushing the unpatrolled edits off of the RC within a minute. • JA^Talk 07:05, 5 May 2012 (UTC)

Isn't that what the different filters are for? elliot (talk) 07:07, 5 May 2012 (UTC)

I don't see what niche this is filling when you take the ability to hide unpatrolled edits, only see edits from specific namepsaces, and the ability to mark an edit as minor. --AKB ^{Talk Cont Mail} 07:09, 5 May 2012 (UTC)

I like to be able to read the RC and see what other editors are doing. For example, if I do that then I won't read someone's huge revamp of a page, or any edit in namespaces that receive few edits (basically, any namespace other than Oblivion and Skyrim). Currently the RC has an option for hiding a single namespace, but maintenance edits can be in any namespace (usually adding categories). • JA^Talk 07:13, 5 May 2012 (UTC)

Edit: A large number of minor edits are not maintenance edits, I don't like to mangle my casual patrolling/browsing by hiding entire namespaces, and I have a link in my toolbox that hides unpatrolled edits. That way, if I want to just see what's going on with the website then I can check the RC, and if I want to just patrol then I have a link for that as well. • JA^Talk 07:17, 5 May 2012 (UTC)

...And this discussion died. What do other people think? Do you want this group to be added? Do you think the site would benefit from this? And to the administrators: what are the technical aspects of this? Would this be a fairly simple addition, or very difficult? I hate having discussions die before a conclusion (or at least a stopping point) is reached. • JA^Talk 04:38, 8 May 2012 (UTC)

(←) I support the idea. If it's another checkbox that just adds a tag to the edit (like marking an edit as minor does), then it's an excellent idea. Of course only some people should have the choice for it (based on activities and/or status on the wiki), but it would realy make checking the RC a lot easier. Vely^{►Talk►Email} 19:24, 8 May 2012 (UTC)

I don't have an answer regarding the technical aspect of adding a group like this, and I don't feel particularly strongly either way about the group, but I suppose I can comment anyway :). I can see where having the ability to further customize the way you look at the Recent Changes could be nice for some people, though I personally wouldn't use the feature. (I use my browser search function to highlight certain things to help me find what I'm looking for, when filters aren't sufficient.) However, if access to the flag is restricted to certain users, how do you decide who gets access and who doesn't? Are we going to have another nomination process, or is it only for people whose edits are already autopatrolled?

Further, I know I for one am particularly good at ignoring the "This is a minor edit" box when I edit. It's marked as minor by default (because I consider the large majority of my edits to be minor), and I almost always forget to uncheck it when I'm making a bigger change. I won't be the only one who's unreliable with the flags. So, what if people forget to check it, or check it when they shouldn't? Are you okay with that, or will it defeat the purpose of the group for you? eshe^talk 19:39, 8 May 2012 (UTC)

I'm thinking that it would be a checkbox just like the checkbox for checking minor edits. I understand that a lot of maintenance edits are going to slip through the cracks - I'm expecting that to happen - but for those users who would use it it would be useful. I'm not sure about deciding who has access to the checkbox. I'm thinking either we have a separate nomination process (which I think is overkill) or we have it bundled in with all of the other perks of being an Autopatrolled User, Patroller, and Administrator. Anybody we elect to these positions can be trusted to use this box appropriately. If we decide that at the coding level the edits are technically marked as a bot edit, then the already existing feature of showing bot edits in the Recent Changes would be used to show or hide these maintenance edits.• JA^Talk 23:09, 8 May 2012 (UTC)

I think limiting this to the three groups you listed would be best, rather than having a nomination process. And I can definitely see this being a helpful change, for the same reasons that you brought it up in the first place. While I do have special links for viewing pages with filters which aren't available, this would make it even easier to view the Recent Changes page much of the time. As for users forgetting to check the box, well, that's bound to happen. I imagine enough people will remember to use it that it would be worth it, though. ABCface^◥ 23:16, 8 May 2012 (UTC)

I think that those three groups, plus a few other individuals (The Silencer comes to mind, with his recent additions of towns and houses to NPC pages, though I don't know how often he does things like that) would be good for it. I think that general guidelines for adding the "maintenance" tag to edits could be to only tag an edit as such if you're making a large amount of edits in a short amount of time all pertaining to the same very minor change. Vely^{►Talk►Email} 23:27, 8 May 2012 (UTC)

That's a good guideline. I also think that the majority of category edits (creating categories, adding/changing/removing categories on pages, etc.) can be tagged as maintenance. However, sometimes it makes sense to display these types of changes, such as creating categories so other people know to use them rather than create new ones. As for other users getting the perk, I could see doing that in exceptional cases, but for the most part I think we should restrict who has access to it. Besides, we already created the Autopatrolled Users user group for these types of situations. • JA^Talk 23:42, 8 May 2012 (UTC)

I still don't like this. The main issue you have for suggesting this is to make the Recent Changes more appealing looking. Considering all of the technical changes that would need to be made to implement this, it's just too much for something so trivial and cosmetic. As I previously mentioned, you can hide all of the patrolled edits if you wanted to get around a bunch of consecutive edits. We shouldn't change something just because it inconveniences some users part of the time. elliot (talk) 01:59, 9 May 2012 (UTC)

(←) That's fair. I know that a lot of our editors rely on the Recent Changes, whether to patrol or just browse what's going on around the site. I know I do. I have a link in my toolbox to patrol unpatrolled edits, but most of the time I just want to be able to read the Recent Changes without 400 Category edits or link repairs clogging it up. As far as how much work it would take, I'm not sure. I'm thinking that it'll just tag the edits as bot edits, which saves a whole lot of overhead and reuses a bunch of pre-existing (and working) code. As for adding the actual checkbox, I don't know, but I don't think it would be impossible. • JA^Talk 02:41, 9 May 2012 (UTC)

Well, how would we qualify such edits? And how will such labels be enforced? And what stops people from abusing it? If you answer the last question with "people will still look at those edits", then doesn't that take away from your initial argument? elliot (talk) 02:48, 9 May 2012 (UTC)

I think it's up to the judgement of the person making the edit, just as it's at the admin's discretion whether to warn a user a second time or block them. If we want a guideline, though, then I propose that adding/changing/deleting categories, unless in some way provocative, would be considered maintenance edits. Creating categories is at the discretion of the creator - if it's a category that other people should see, then don't mark it, but if it's something like a basic Faction category then it should be marked as maintenance. Fixing links that were broken by a recent change or changing links to link past disambiguations would count as maintenance. Updating parameters to NPC and Place Summaries is a bit iffy, but if it's something that's already been decided through consensus then it counts as maintenance.

It would be enforced just like any other user group, such as Patrollers. If they commit a minor infraction, then they are reprimanded, but if they make many such infractions or a gross abuse of power then they simply lose their privileges. If we had a separate user group, then removing their privileges would be easy, but if they have such gross misconduct then they probably will lose their title as Administrator/Patroller/Autopatrolled User anyways.

As far as protecting against abuse, we already have high standards set for Autopatrolled Users, Patrollers, and Administrators, but if those aren't enough then a separate nomination process could be used. (I think this would be overkill, but if that's what the community decides then so be it.) Perhaps an option to only display bot edits could be added to the Recent Changes, but I don't know how difficult that would be to implement. • JA^Talk 05:29, 9 May 2012 (UTC)

I really think we are getting away from editing the wiki. It seems, at least with this discussion, that we are talking about editing the wiki more than actually editing. This discussion has us debating the trivial points of what such a proposition would entail. I think that just proves how overkill and how unnecessary this is. elliot (talk) 06:23, 9 May 2012 (UTC)

Edit Break: New User Group For Maintenance Edits

(←) Wait, so first you bring up some specific points, and then when I answer them you claim that we're "debating the trivial points of what such a proposition would entail", and that it proves how pointless this user group is? How does that make any sense? If they are so trivial, then why did you bring them up in the first place? • JA^Talk 17:15, 9 May 2012 (UTC)

I have to agree with elliot here, there's really no point in taking the trouble. I think we all need to stop worrying about maintenance vs. content edits, both are equally important to the site. Also, I really don't think we need any more user groups than we already have. If a user is making a bunch of really good edits consistently, put in a nomination for patroller. We shouldn't be making user group membership a reward for anything, we should just let that user's contributions speak for themselves-trust me, they always do. ThuumofReason 18:21, 9 May 2012 (UTC)

Personally, I think the group is a good idea. Look at the recent changes--maybe half of the past 500 were made by ABCface or Jak, and they would be classified as maintenance edits. Hiding those would be pretty nice. And when an admin goes through and deletes a ton of things at once, it really makes it hard to see any edits in between. Just hiding patrolled edits doesn't work out for me, either--I prefer to double-check some patrolled edits or to view the conversations on some pages. It's like trying to find something in a pile of clutter, but you can't put the clutter off to the side.

Now, if it's difficult or very time-consuming, or nobody really wants to write the code for it, I don't think it's absolutely necessary. Elliot, it would definitely be nice to have and would clean up the RC page a lot for those who wish to use it, and Jak covered how abuse could be handled. On the other hand, you're right on one thing: If it's a ton of work, it's probably not worth it.

Jak, it looks like you're suggesting marking such edits as bot edits rather than a new category of edits. I disagree with that, if that is what you're saying. I always hide bot edits, but I would have a different way of dealing with maintenance edits. Vely^{►Talk►Email} 18:24, 9 May 2012 (UTC)

Thuum: I think you're missing the point. I'm suggesting that we have a new tag for editswhich would tag them as "maintenance" edits, just like how we can tag edits as minor edits. This allows users to hide the maintenance edits from the Recent Changes, so for those of us who like to be able to check the RC and patrol/just see what's going on can do so without five thousand category edits and link fixes getting in the way. Also, only Administators, Patrollers, and Autopatrolled Users (who are users that we already recognize their excellent contributions) would have access to the button. If you weren't part of any of those groups, then you wouldn't have the ability to tag an edit as maintenance.

Velyanthe: I suggested this because it would make everything at the coding level that much easier. However, I don't know the technical implications of this, or how much work would be necessary to implement it, but if it wasn't too difficult then I think it would be a useful addition to the site, especially as it grows, which it will with the impending release of the MMO and Skyrim DLC.

Okay then, this is a question to Nephele, Daveh, or whoever else would implement this: How difficult would this be? Is it a matter of just copy-pasting existing code and tweaking a few variables, or would this require a huge system rewrite? • JA^Talk 18:38, 9 May 2012 (UTC)

I don't think there really is a consensus on whether or not this should be implemented. I'd consider ABCface's edits to be content, because she is adding content to the articles. The definitions are too vague, there is no clear support for the proposal, and we aren't even sure if this can be easily implemented. I probably won't comment on this again because I've made my opposition pretty clear. elliot (talk) 01:45, 10 May 2012 (UTC)

People Pages

Quick question that I'd like a little community input on: on the various People pages (e.g., Whiterun People), we're currently using a mixed bag of {{TrainerIcon}} and {{Service Icon}} templates (used to be {{Navimg}}s until a few minutes ago) for the various trainers. I think both for consistency and because it's a more specialized template, it's best to harmonize those ones to use Service Icon. Currently, though, the Services Icons point generically to Skyrim:Trainers when clicked where the TrainerIcons point to the individual skill pages. Either is easy, but which do people prefer? – Robin Hood↝talk 22:09, 5 May 2012 (UTC)

{{Service Icon}} is more powerful and more widely used, so I updated it and it now has all of the functionality of {{TrainerIcon}}. I also changed {{NPC Summary}} a little. Now, rather than using the pre-formatted text as the train parameter, it uses text in the format of <skill trained>, <training level>. Now NPC Summary handles the formatting, so that way if we want to go back and change everything again we only need to go to one place. I'll go through and get rid of the stragglers, and we can go ahead and delete TrainerIcon and be done with this! • JA^Talk 06:10, 10 May 2012 (UTC)

Okay, that's the last of them! • JA^Talk 06:29, 10 May 2012 (UTC)

Unmarked locations

It was suggested that I bring up a question here. Is there any consensus on where to list information about unmarked map locations? I have noticed that other editors tend to list them on the article for the nearest marked location, so I have started doing the same. Is this how we want to do this? It seems a bit haphazard. --Xyzzy 17:53, 6 May 2012 (UTC)

I think it's best to keep it similar to Oblivion (see Oblivion:Unmarked Places). elliot (talk) 17:56, 6 May 2012 (UTC)

Sounds good to me. I keep coming across these, and would like to start cataloging them somewhere in preparation for them being collected on a single page. Any suggestions? --Xyzzy 18:20, 6 May 2012 (UTC)

I would have to agree with Elliot, now that I've seen the Oblivion link he provided. If you are going to start collecting images/information, it would be a good idea to create a new Sandbox page, such as User:Xyzzy/Sandbox (click the red link to create it there). You can also add a notice box to the top of the page if you are willing to allow edits from other users. ABCface^◥ 18:31, 6 May 2012 (UTC)

It looks like The Silencer may have something in the works that may include Unmarked Locations: User:The_Silencer/Sandbox3. --Xyzzy 18:47, 6 May 2012 (UTC)

Try the Whiterun Hold. It only shows the unmarked locations for that hold, and I would support a separate page for all of them. The Silencer has spoken^Talk 18:50, 6 May 2012 (UTC)

(←) In my travels for the section below I documented as many unmarked locations as I could. They are now in User:The_Silencer/Sandbox2, which someone may care to make into a sensible page. The Silencer has spoken^Talk 19:21, 9 May 2012 (UTC)

Pronunciations

Should we be recording these? For instance, on a recent playthrough I realized for the first time that Aela is pronounced "I-ela" instead of "A-la". This isn't the only instance (try saying Arnbjorn ten times fast). Wikipedia already has a system for recording pronunciations, and although we don't necessarily have to adopt theirs, including how to pronounce each character's name would add a lot to the completeness of this wiki. It would definitely be a useful (if often overlooked) addition to the site. We wouldn't have to do it for simple last names (such as Snow-Shod or Gray-Mane). What does everyone else think? • JA^Talk 16:20, 7 May 2012 (UTC)

I feel certain i've read this before, and that it was said that we did used to include them. I think it became a bit of a PITA presumably from peoples differing opinions on how they should be pronounced... and then on which pronunciation system to use. I can't find the old discussion, i'll have a bit more of a dig! --kiz ^talk_email 16:26, 7 May 2012 (UTC)

I'm thinking that we only note the pronunciation on people whose names are said in-game, and the rest of them we either can come up with one through consensus or just leave blank. Using basic Wikipedia research, I see two distinct possibilities as far as which system to use. One of them uses the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA) and the other is phonemic spelling. Copied directly from the first linked article,

As an example, the last name of actor Jake Gyllenhaal, written ˈdʒɪlənhɔːl in the IPA, might be written jĭl′·ən·hôl or jil-ən-hawl in a phonemic system, and Jill-in-hall in a non-phonemic system.

I think that a phonemic pronunciation system is best, because just by looking at it you can tell how it's supposed to be pronounced, whereas you really need to decipher the IPA version for it to make sense (in this case, you need to already know how "Gyllenhaal" is pronounced to even figure it out). We could come up with an official pronunciation respelling guide, like what Wikipedia has. Whatever system we choose, though, I think we should definitely do this. • JA^Talk 16:52, 7 May 2012 (UTC)

I agree, either use a phonemic system or a plain lettering system. The IPA is far too complex for most casual gamers to bother deciphering, I think. (I know I can't, and I like studying linguistic things!) Also, in regards to this discussion happening before, you're right, it did. It may have even happened more than once. The one I know of is this one. – Robin Hood↝talk 01:31, 8 May 2012 (UTC)

I put up {{pronunciation}} a while ago, and you can see it on Lore:Dwemer (/dweɪ.mɚ/ dway-mer or /dwiː.mɚ/ dwee-mer). I think, compared to IPA, it is a much better option and pretty straightforward. E.g. el-ee-it, ey-ee-la etc. elliot (talk) 02:01, 8 May 2012 (UTC)

In this particular case, I'm not sure either pronunciation is correct - I always thought it was dweh-mer. Maybe I've been wrong this whole time though? Come to think of it I'm not even sure I've heard it pronounced before... --TheRealLurlock ^Talk 02:58, 8 May 2012 (UTC)

Not that it is relevant here, but you can listen to Azura say it. elliot (talk) 03:09, 8 May 2012 (UTC)

Shadowmarks as notes

I noticed that the place articles that have Thieves Guild shadowmarks now have a place in the place summary for them. They all also appear to have a bulleted note saying what kind of shadowmark the place has. This seems redundant to me. Should we keep the shadowmark info in both locations on the page, or remove the notes? --Xyzzy 05:11, 8 May 2012 (UTC)

Although the Place Summary includes what shadowmark the place has, it doesn't indicate where. The note mentioning this solves that issue. elliot (talk) 05:24, 8 May 2012 (UTC)

Good point. I hadn't noticed that. --Xyzzy 05:43, 8 May 2012 (UTC)

To be honest, I can understand why the information seems redundant. I have thought about ways to solve it just a bit more elegant, but with the exception of some crazy idea about ‘roll over the mark in the summary to see location’, or even handle them the same way we do achievements, I came up with nothing. Maybe in time, we can change the wording of the notes to just include the location of the info instead of the repeated line ‘There’s a [] shadowmark next to the front door’ to ‘The Shadowmark is located next to the front door’. In any case, it’s not overly important, just my two cents. --Krusty 08:01, 8 May 2012 (UTC)

There should also be more information added in the notes as to why the place is dangerous, safe, etc., and what loot there may be, but nobody's done it yet. Vely^{►Talk►Email} 19:27, 8 May 2012 (UTC)

What is the total number of locations

After seeing that no-one anywhere has a definitive answer, and my updates to the Hold pages, I thought it was high time this question was answered.

To start with I now have 333 locations discovered. Now for the missing;

• These ones can only be discovered through other places (2)
  • Hag's End
  • Ruins of Rkund
• These ones need quests to unlock (11)
  • Japhet's Folly
  • Wreck of the Icerunner
  • The Katariah
  • Hjaalmarch Imperial Camp
  • Reach Imperial Camp
  • Rift Stormcloak Camp
  • Whiterun Imperial Camp
  • Winterhold Stormcloak Camp
  • Pale Stormcloak Camp
  • Windhelm Military Camp†
  • Solitude Military Camp†
• I am unsure why these did not appear. I assume they must be traveled through first (3)
  • Great Lift at Alftland
  • Great Lift at Mzinchaleft
  • Great Lift at Raldbathat
• These ones I do not believe actually appear at any point (2)
  • Markarth Military Camp
  • Riften Military Camp

This makes a total of 351 locations, of which 5 possibly do not appear. If someone confirms the lifts, that makes 349 total locations. Of the two marked camps, only one can be located, while joining a side and Season Unending makes all others available. Which makes a grand total of 348 locations discoverable in one playthrough. The Silencer has spoken^Talk 17:07, 9 May 2012 (UTC)

For the record, I do care, but it takes a while to look into this kind of thing. --AKB ^{Talk Cont Mail} 19:16, 9 May 2012 (UTC)

I didn't want it getting lost in the middle of the debate going on above. No offense intended to anyone. The Silencer has spoken^Talk 19:25, 9 May 2012 (UTC)

Looking in the CK, I see 381 in Tamriel, 15 elsewhere, and 1 in a test cell. Don't take those numbers as definitive, so much as numbers that it's highly unlikely we can exceed. The reason I say that is that it's entirely possible that some of these map markers have conditions attached to them that mean they'll never be enabled, others may be quest-related (as you mentioned above) and therefore not accessible if you've failed the quest or are doing mutually exclusive quests, and there may be some where there are alternate entrances to the same location that count as two markers on your map, but are only one location in reality (I seem to recall a couple, but I can't bring a specific example to mind). I'm not about to go through the 381, but the 15 non-Tamriel ones are:

• Hag's End (Deepwood Redoubt)
• Giant's Grove (Fallowstone Cave)
• Japhet's Folly (Japhet's Folly)
• Sky Haven Temple (Karthspire Redoubt)
• Markarth (Markarth)
• Understone Keep (Markarth)
• Mistveil Keep (Riften)
• Thieves Guild (Riften)
• Riften (Riften)
• Blue Palace (Solitude)
• Solitude (Solitude)
• Whiterun (Whiterun)
• Dragonsreach (Whiterun)
• Windhelm (Windhelm)
• Palace of the Kings (Windhelm)

I'm not sure why only the above cities are listed as not being in Tamriel, yet others are. The only thing I can think of is that perhaps for those cities, the "found <location>" event only occurs after you've entered the city and not when you've entered the general area. <shrugs> I don't have time right now to look into the ones you've mentioned, but I'll try to do that later tonight or tomorrow. And if there's anything else that needs specific research, let me know and I can look into it. – Robin Hood↝talk 01:44, 10 May 2012 (UTC)

The Great Lift at Alftland and The Great Lift at Raldbthar (at least, that's what I assume you meant, the location you asked me to check doesn't seem to exist) don't give you map markers if you go through the ruins. I couldn't test the Great Lift at Mzinchaleft, but since it has an article unlike the other two I would assume it actually gives you a location on your map if you go to it. --AKB ^{Talk Cont Mail} 01:56, 10 May 2012 (UTC)

I can confirm I have all 15 listed except the two mentioned and agree with the params needed. Spelling mistakes show that Great Lift at Alftand and the Great Lift at Raldbthar have pages, and Raldbthar says it appears. I used the UESP map to check every location was accounted for, but I know that Sky Haven Temple doesn't appear because of bad map co-ordinates. I don't think I missed any others, using the updated Hold pages, but the only others would need to be only accessed first through other places, ie. the ones above, and not appear on the UESP map. The Silencer has spoken^Talk 02:18, 10 May 2012 (UTC)

You have to actually take the lifts for them to be added to your map, or at least that's what I remember. You might have to specifically take them from Blackreach to the surface, but I'm not sure about that. • JA^Talk 03:41, 10 May 2012 (UTC)

(←) First, the biggest question to sort out is what exactly are we trying to count? I'm assuming that this thread is specifically trying to address the "Locations Discovered" statistic -- which in turn I'm assuming is controlled by finding map markers and making them appear on your in-game map as discovered locations. However, I think any discussion of "number of locations" needs to start by clearly stating how locations are being defined -- for example, there's also the Dungeons Cleared statistic, there's a count of all named locations in the game (at least a thousand), etc.

Of the 397 map markers mentioned by Robin Hood, 35 of them are in fact located in test areas (such as "Warehouse Map Markers"). So only 362 map markers were added to the UESP map (of which, 2 are disabled because of strange coordinates, namely Sky Haven Temple and Japhet's Folly -- so anyone who wants to actually count markers on the map should find 360).

Of the 362 map markers, the ones that are most likely to be problematic are the various camps: Military Camps, Imperial Camps, and Stormcloak Camps.

• Each of the 5 Military Camps (the 4 listed by The Silencer, plus Whiterun Military Camp) have two different identically-named map markers, one using the Stormcloak icon and one using the Imperial icon. The two markers are fairly close to each other (but not identically located) on the map; at maximum zoom on the UESP map you can see both markers. All ten of these markers are originally disabled; presumably at most one of each pair of markers is actually enabled in any given playthrough (and their appearance depends upon what you do in the civil war -- even the number that appear could be affected by Season Unending).
• There are then 8 Imperial Camps and 8 Stormcloak Camps (basically one of each in each hold -- exceptions being no Stormcloak Camp in Eastmarch, and no Imperial Camp in Haafingar). Half of these are disabled at the start of the game (not directly in their REFR record, but indirectly through a parent item that controls when they get enabled). The disabled ones are:
  • Falkreath Imperial Camp
  • Falkreath Stormcloak Camp
  • Hjaaalmarch Imperial Camp
  • Pale Stormcloak Camp
  • Reach Imperial Camp
  • Rift Stormcloak Camp
  • Whiterun Imperial Camp
  • Winterhold Stormcloak Camp

The two Falkreath camps are highlighted because they're not in The Silencer's list. It would be good to confirm whether all of these originall-disabled camps are always enabled regardless of your choices in the civil war / Season Unending.

The other non-Camp map markers that start the game disabled (and therefore clearly can not be discovered until quests are completed) are:

• Dark Brotherhood Sanctuary
• Great Lift at Alftand
• Great Lift at Mzinchaleft
• Great Lift at Raldbthar (and, yes, all three of the great lifts -- as well as Tower of Mzark IIRC -- only appear on your map after you use the lift in Blackreach)
• The Katariah (disabled via its parent KatariahEnableMarker)
• Thieves Guild
• Tower of Mzark
• Western Watchtower
• Wreck of the Icerunner

The ones in bold are ones that don't appear in The Silencer's list -- so I don't know whether they're all included in the count of 351 places. (Japhet's Folly isn't here because it is enabled from the start of the game but just inaccessible).

Two other random questions are:

• Does Helgen count as a discovered location? (Given that you're placed there at the start of the game),
• Did the game originally double-count discovered locations? We know that the number of standing stones was originally incremented every time you re-visited a standing stone -- so my current save game lists 47 under "Standing Stones Found". That issue has since been fixed by a patch -- but did anyone test whether the same issue affect all discovered locations before getting patched? In particular I've wondered about this given one claim of getting up to 441

So bottom line is from the CK side there are 357 uniquely-named map markers (362 - 5 duplicate Military Camps). 335 of the markers are enabled from the start of the game. Discrepancies in maximum numbers are most likely to be caused by the 22 markers that are originally disabled. --Nephele^Talk 04:53, 11 May 2012 (UTC)

I've created a Category:Skyrim-Places-Discoverable category that lists all 357 uniquely-named map markers -- and I've double-checked that the places listed exactly match a list generated from the CK's map markers. Which then just leaves the questions of whether all 357 can be found in game, and whether they can all be found in the same playthrough. If some of those locations actually never appear in game, then we need to fix their wiki pages accordingly. --Nephele^Talk 16:59, 11 May 2012 (UTC)

I was so sure I got them all, apologies to all. The two aims where the total number of discoverable locations and the most discoverable in one playthrough going by Map Markers. My count is on a playthrough started after 1.4, I can say that my Location Count did not go up when travelling to previously found places, though my Standing Stones count did.I can confirm the ones missing from my count are Falkreath Imperial Camp, Whiterun Military Camp and Tower of Mzark, I have all the others except the ones already stated. The faction camps are still there after the Hold changes side, but as the military camps appear only for the capture of that city (afaik), I don't think Markarth's or Riften's appear. A new game shows that Helgen does not "count" and I can't see any other discrepancies, giving me a new total total of 355, which all tells me that I can accept the CK is more likely right and I have missed another two places. The other thing to determine is how many can appear in one playthrough, but also that we decide if 357 Map Markers is accurate enough to state it as fact, and be the first site to do so. The Silencer has spoken^Talk 21:15, 11 May 2012 (UTC)

Actually it's a bit soon for that. Any ideas on how to see if the two military camps appear. The Silencer has spoken^Talk 21:31, 11 May 2012 (UTC)

Templated NPCs / NPCs with multiple IDs

In response to concerns raised about the latest Featured Article nomination, I've been trying to work on adding the rest of the Forsworn NPC data to the Forsworn page. Trouble is, each of the types of Forsworn appear to have multiple versions (using different templates, if I recall correctly), and I can't come up with a good solution for it. I've been combing through a few pages looking for a way to handle NPCs with multiple IDs or templates, and I can't find any discussion to help me out. This kind of question has been raised in a few other places too (this one and this one come to mind).

So, how should we handle this kind of thing? I don't think it's right to include only one version of an NPC (as on Forsworn Briarheart), but sticking multiple NPC Summaries on a page doesn't work well either (see here and here). Should we use the most commonly-used version in the NPC Summary, then include the other variations in a table? Or is there some reasonable way to combine all the information into one summary, maybe? eshe^talk 17:24, 10 May 2012 (UTC)

On the Alduin page, he has varying RefIDs, so it's marked "Varying". We could add a hidden table for the complete information with all the possible variants, or have them show up on mouseover. Vely^{►Talk►Email} 17:51, 10 May 2012 (UTC)

There's also {{Showhide}}. However, we should also indicate which RefID is used when (so people trying to summon Alduin to kill him don't summon one of his many invincible forms, for example). What about we have all of the RefIDs separated by commas, and have them also use {{hover}} so that way you can mouse over it and see more info on it? I created an example at Skyrim:Forsworn Briarheart/Test. And yes, I know those are not valid RefIDs. • JA^Talk 18:54, 10 May 2012 (UTC)

That's not a bad start, Jak (and I like the on-mouseover idea too), but if you look just at the Briarhearts, it's more than just a case of multiple refIDs and classes--the Briarheart (and all the others too, so far as I can tell) use a whole list of different templates, and they all have different stats and such. So how do we fit all that on a page in some non-horrifying way? I think consensus was to put all of the Forsworn in a table on the Forsworn page—and that'll be much easier than trying to squeeze it into a summary—but what about Adventurer and the like? eshe^talk 14:10, 11 May 2012 (UTC)

I think a regular wiki-table should be used for cases such as this. Or provide a link in the table such as See below, where it links to a place where you can list it in the notes. elliot (talk) 21:53, 11 May 2012 (UTC)

Linked Icons

Just so everyone knows, I've just finished converting the last of the various linked icons we use (e.g., the icons in Skyrim's skill perk trees, the various icons on ingredient effects, etc.) to use the proper syntax for 1.19. This will ever so slightly break icons where they have both a link and hover text until we upgrade to 1.19 in that the hover text will show the file name instead of the hover text it's supposed to. If I'd waited and done it the other way around, there would have been massive breakage and any pages that used those icons would look..."special"...so I figured this was the better way to go.

Also, there's no easy way to be 100% certain that that was actually all of them, so if you start seeing {{#icon:...}} anywhere after the conversion, please respond to this thread and I or one of the other templaters on the site will take care of it. – Robin Hood↝talk 08:34, 12 May 2012 (UTC)

Okay, these have all been put back to their 1.14 versions for now (with a few fixes besides), pending further updates on 1.19. I haven't actually restored the category; I'll just keep a list of what needs changed back in one of my myriad sandboxes. – Robin Hood↝talk 23:56, 12 May 2012 (UTC)

Bot Requests

Just to let everyone know, I've just created a Bot Requests page that you can add any future bot job requests to. This will make it much easier for the bot owners to field requests and decide who's going to take on any new jobs without users having to go to their individual pages or wonder who's best to approach. For now, I've only added a link to the page from the Bots page itself, but I'm thinking either here or the Admin Noticeboard would probably also be a good place to link to it from too. I'll let the community decide what works best for them in that regard, though...after all, it's you guys making the requests, not us! :) – Robin Hood↝talk 03:18, 15 May 2012 (UTC)

NPCs with random RefIDs

I recently found out that the RefIDs I was entering into some of the NPC pages (like the Scavenger) are randomly generated each time the NPC is encountered. My edits were rightfully reverted, and I was educated about them. That being said, something needs to be done with those blank spaces for RefID in the summary. My thoughts were to either put "Random" in the space (first choice), or alter the template for those NPCs and eliminate the space for RefID. Any thoughts? --Xyzzy 02:27, 24 May 2012 (UTC)

What about putting "Random" in the summary and including a {{Hover}} list of possible is (if the number is reasonable) or list them in a note (if not reasonable)? eshe^talk 17:10, 24 May 2012 (UTC)

1,000,000 Edits

Moved from Administrator Noticeboard – Robin Hood↝talk 22:32, 26 May 2012 (UTC)

It is nearing the moment of the one-millionth edit since UESP was set up. I, personally, believe that this memorable event deserves some recognition; perhaps a news segment would do, but something should be done. I apologize if this is not the right page to post this on. MethodicMockingbird 22:27, 26 May 2012 (UTC)

We had a news story for the 500,000th edit, so this milestone is almost surely worth mentioning. Not much else to say on the matter, though. --AKB ^{Talk Cont Mail} 23:01, 26 May 2012 (UTC)

100,000 articles is coming up too. Though that'll take longer I think (hope). (Currently we don't need that many new articles - maybe when Dawnguard comes out, or possibly it'll have to wait for ESOnline.) --TheRealLurlock ^Talk 02:23, 27 May 2012 (UTC)

Requesting Images

I think we need a page to request images, which would be monitered by those who take the images. This would be handy for us consolers who cannot take large or clear enough images and for image takers so they aren't burdened by constant requests. I know their is a category for pages missing images and needs image, but sifting through it can be an adventure, plus sometimes an image may be requested that is more for page filling and adding something to the page that doesn't fall under the usual paramaters for the templates. The Silencer has spoken^Talk 01:29, 29 May 2012 (UTC)

I agree. I rather enjoy taking images, whether for my own use or for others. I'd be happy to take requests. --Xyzzy 05:00, 29 May 2012 (UTC)

Sounds like a really good idea. We don’t have any project pages yet (so we can’t create a page like this), so I’ll have a word with the other admins so we can figure out the best place to put it. --Krusty 05:51, 29 May 2012 (UTC)

I'd also suggest that we redo the "Other pages" section at the top of this page so that it stands out more and highlights the other pages in bold, maybe. Then we can add both the Image Requests and Bot Requests pages along with what's already there. – Robin Hood↝talk 18:03, 29 May 2012 (UTC)

I think this is a really good idea, particularly for those pages which already have one image, but need more to break up long walls of text and make pages more appealing. Do we need more of a consensus to create such a page? I can draft something up if this is wanted by the community. Also, I think RH's idea of adding it to the top of this page would make sense, probably putting it in the same line that mentions New Page Requests. ABCface^◥ 14:31, 2 June 2012 (UTC)

(←) I've gone ahead and made the changes RH suggested to the top of this page. Hopefully that's what ya meant, RH. Feel free to tweak it if not. :) Also, I'm going to start a draft on the Image Requests page in a sandbox, assuming we're going ahead with it. I'll wait for more feedback before creating the actual page, though. ABCface^◥ 15:13, 2 June 2012 (UTC)

Okay, I've made a draft of the page with help from a few other editors. It seems that it will get some use from at least the several editors who already make/take image requests, and no one has expressed an issue with creating the page, so I'm going to go ahead and launch the page in a few minutes. You will be able to find it at UESPWiki:Image_Requests. Any ongoing discussion should occur on the talk page there. ABCface^◥ 21:21, 6 June 2012 (UTC)

Unneeded info on NPC follower pages

Hey people! On the NPC pages for followers, we have an awful lot of tips and tricks on how to change their weapons and armor. Since it goes for all followers (except for the bugged ones), I suggest that we remove that info and just add it to the Skyrim:Followers page. Snowmane has volunteered to go through all follower pages and get rid of the info – and if no one objects, he will start tomorrow. --Krusty 20:59, 30 May 2012 (UTC)

It's done. Eric Snowmane (talk | Contribs | Block) 07:00, 31 May 2012 (UTC)

Image categories

In relation to the proposed needed image page, I would like to address something that I would like to see standardized. As I upload images, I try to give them a descriptive category (ingredient, npc, place) as per the Help:Images page. Unfortunately, that page only lists a few categories. Should we consider expanding it somewhat? I want to upload some images of activity-related items (grindstone, smelter), but I don't want to use the generic "place" or "item" tag. Does it really matter what is used to anyone besides me? If not, I will happily bumble along uploading to my heart's content --Xyzzy 05:58, 2 June 2012 (UTC)

The tanning rack image is currently using the Item category, but you're right that it doesn't really fit since it's not actually an item. "Activity" would work as well, but I'm not sure if there are enough images that would fit into that category to make it necessary. I can think of about ten off the top of my head, is that enough for a separate grouping? I think it's enough, but I don't feel particularly strongly about it. What do others think? ABCface^◥ 14:36, 2 June 2012 (UTC)

"miscellaneous"? Though in other namespaces we've used that to refer to miscellaneous items. Possibly "crafting" would work. Or maybe just "general" for any images that don't fit any other category. We'd have to figure out just how many of those there are... --TheRealLurlock ^Talk 15:43, 2 June 2012 (UTC)

I've had the same issue when uploading/categorizing things before. Kind of comforting to know I'm not the only one who's bothered by these things ;). Anyway, I think Skyrim-Activity Images would be best. If no one else particularly cares, I'll set it up later today. eshe^talk 13:54, 11 June 2012 (UTC)

"Activity" sounds good to me. I had already uploaded "SR-activity-Arcane Enchanter.jpg" in anticipation of this. --Xyzzy 02:17, 12 June 2012 (UTC)

(←) Along this same vein, I think we should rename the images for the ore veins (see what I did there?). I was thinking about adding them to the "activity" category, but noticed that plants have a "flora" category. I think both should be renamed to "activity", but could see keeping the same theme and renaming the ore veins with "mineral" category. Any thoughts? --Xyzzy 22:13, 20 June 2012 (UTC)

I had this problem when i was going to do images for all the veins. I uploaded moonstone as SR-vein-Moonstone.jpg but i think that should be changed to something better ... well I also wasent sure what size it was supose to be so i put it as 1:1 ... in the end I just gave up doing the rest D: — Kimi the Elf ^{(talk | contribs)} 22:22, 20 June 2012 (UTC)

Yeah, it's a bit of a puzzler. We don't want to have 100 different categories, but we also don't want 1 category becoming the de facto "miscellaneous" one, like "item" has become. --Xyzzy 22:25, 20 June 2012 (UTC)

The Skyrim Quest Redesign Project

Hey everybody! It is finally time to reveal the details of the Skyrim Quest Redesign Project and ask the community for opinions. To save discussion time, and to be able to give everybody an example, we decided to do the bulk of the work in advance - we justified that decision from the fact that this project resemble every other cleanup project we’ve had in the past like the OPRP and OBNPCRP, with a few Skyrim-related exceptions. All quest pages now have the SRQRP tag attached, the categories has been created and guidelines has been written based on the Style Guide, but tweaked for the SR namespace:

Skyrim Quest Redesign Project

First of all, this is an attempt to organize the quest pages, and an attempt to organize our own work. Therefore, we have the trademark writtenby/checkedby process, this time for the quest walkthroughs. The difference here is that these two stages will require an in-game effort, both for checking and writing. Additionally, an extra Creation Kit section was added to the project, because there’s still a lot of work to do. This involves CK checks of the data added by the bots back in November. People familiar with the ‘projects of the past’ should recognize the categories and the entire workflow.

The biggest concern is probably the Bugs sections – and for now, we chose to ignore them because they are so complex that we can’t really add any guidelines. The project page includes a bit of guidance on how to format the Bugs, but that’s it. Remember that we can always add more cleanup-categories to the project in the future, but for now, there’s tons of stuff to do. I will not explain any further, and will instead invite everyone to dig in and comment on what’s on the project page. Any concerns, suggestions and whatever is appreciated asap, so we can get to work as quickly as possible. Thanks.

--Krusty 14:36, 2 June 2012 (UTC)

Hello people! A quick update on the introductory work related to the in-game part of the SRQRP. Right now, I’m reading through all 350+ quests in an attempt to sort out the articles that needs to be written, rewritten – and what they’re lacking. The quests I leave behind as “Not written” is in serious need of a rewrite, because they lack the most basic stuff – so please, until I’m finished, don’t update that part of the tag as it will mess up the category I use for preference. I’ll post an update as soon as I’m finished. --Krusty 22:32, 3 June 2012 (UTC)

Okay, as of now, I’ve read through every single quest page in the SR namespace – and it is important to mention that ALL quests I left behind as “unwritten” needs to be REWRITTEN. Therefore, do NOT just add “Multiple” as writer – and do NOT mark the walkthrough as “checked” afterwards. I will revert all of these edits within minutes. Basic rule of this project is: One editor writes the walkthrough then another editor checks it. If in doubt what needs to be done on a page, please contact me on my talk page. Also worthy of note is that pages marked as “written” is not necessarily complete – or even good. Please read through the guidelines for the project and think twice before you add it is “written”. I’ll see if I can write some more detailed guidelines later on. --Krusty 20:04, 4 June 2012 (UTC)

A graphical bugfix without a context

When I first played Skyrim, I had troubles with my graphics. Most objects were badly distorted - as if one of the points in a polygon (object) was taken to infinity. This resulted in horizontal long-stretching bars that were purely visual. Did not affect collision, but made playing impossible. This is a W7 64bit and for some reason the official drivers for the graphics chip are from a few years back, wtf. All other specs are ok. So, what one had to do was to download an unofficial driver for the graphics. (I need to check my boot for links & stuff.) Now: where should I place this piece of information so that the user experiencing the same difficulties would find it? --88.113.200.229 15:00, 3 June 2012 (UTC)

It's already on this page, in a blue box under the section Unofficial Video Chipsets Specifications: "If you're experiencing problems even though your computer passes the recommended system requirements, download the latest drivers to your computer." Vely^{►Talk►Email} 15:24, 3 June 2012 (UTC)

Dafuq, will continue conversation on appropriate talk page. --88.113.200.229 15:31, 3 June 2012 (UTC)

CSList Template

For those of you who regularly link to the CSList, I've created a new {{CSList}} template to make linking hopefully a little less of a mess and to allow us to quickly re-target it should we ever change where it's located. Just click on the template link to see the documentation. For now, it's fairly basic, but if you'd like to see more functionality, just ask. – Robin Hood↝talk 21:56, 7 June 2012 (UTC)

Proposed Lore Policy Change

A small policy change proposal for UESPWiki:Lore. There was some minor controversy over at Lore talk:Soul Cairn concerning the addition of Dawnguard content to lorespace. We've currently been following the same "policy" that we had before Skyrim's release, i.e. completely ignore everything until release. This is both to avoid false info (such as the Jills, the black dragons that were talked about before Skyrim's release but were left out of the game) and to maintain the quality of lore articles - as you know, updating it is slow, and the editors need to fully understand the subject before making large changes, which is obviously impossible when the content isn't even out yet.

However, to my knowledge we have no written policy for this. This will be a problem, as information from TESO and future Skyrim DLC is going to keep coming, and lorespace will likely be the only place with the relevant articles. I'd like to propose that we keep all unreleased information out of the main text of lore articles and off lists such as Lore:Bestiary. However, once pages are created in separate namespaces (e.g., Skyrim:Soul Cairn), links should be added in the Notes/See Also sections as per usual, so editors unaccustomed to lorespace don't get lost and can navigate to the correct article. If no one has any problems, I'll add this to the lore guidelines. —Legoless 19:14, 9 June 2012 (UTC)

That all seems fair. The only point would be when it can be added. I say when it is confirmed, by a reliable and trusted source, with just a note saying it appears and nothing else. When it is released seems a tad harsh as it can be confirmed beforehand. Additionally two links is too much, so can we decide if they go in Notes or a See Also section. The Silencer speaks^Talk 19:26, 9 June 2012 (UTC)

The problem with the two sections is that they're rather redundant. Notes only links to the game, while See Also's purpose is to provide relevant pages. It was discussed before if both were necessary, but the layout was left as-is. To remain consistent, two links would be necessary. —Legoless 19:34, 9 June 2012 (UTC)

Long story short: I support revising the guidelines to make this long-standing ban explicitly apply to the lorespace. I interpret "accurate and verifiable information" to fundamentally exclude pre-release information. It may be traceable to a published and allegedly reputable source, like a gaming magazine, but we all know that the information the writer is relying upon was garnered from an unpublished work in progress. I don't believe that a pre-released version made playable or viewable to some game journalists counts as "officially approved TES media" within the meaning of the lore guidelines.

I think it's best to assume nothing in the lorespace until a product has been delivered by the developers. It's not like it's a really big hassle, since people can create drafts of articles in the userspace, then just basically copy and paste when the big day comes (incorporating any improvements that were made in the interim, of course). The worst thing this wiki can do in terms of quality control is perpetuate popular misconceptions, and that will inevitably happen when you're relying on pre-release information.

Even discussing integral concepts or characters which are highly unlikely to be changed, like prominent settings and people from an official trailer, would invite people to add details which are more dubious. Deciding which facts are worth mentioning and which are not would quickly turn into a gong show, so it's best to have a bright-line rule.

I'm not a fan of relying on notices that something is pre-release, either, for a variety of reasons. Properly creating, implementing, maintaining, and eventually removing such a notice would eat up a lot of several editors' time which would be better spent collaborating and working on the aforementioned drafts of post-release articles. And I'm of the personal opinion that notices are kind of tacky and should be kept to a minimum.

Anyways, if we do start adding pre-release info/links into the notes or see also sections, I would only really be comfortable if it was an established and regular editor who made the addition. I wouldn't trust an anonymous or new user to maintain his or her contribution by promptly updating it after the game was released to take into account any changes, new information, or simply remove any applicable notice. Minor Edits^{Threats•Evidence} 22:32, 10 June 2012 (UTC)

If it's in writing I'll support it. The Silencer speaks^Talk 22:41, 10 June 2012 (UTC)

I've added the new policy. —Legoless 18:59, 13 June 2012 (UTC)

Lycanthropy Redirect

We are currently in a small dispute about rather to keep a redirection for Lycanthropy or delete the page. I would love to hear other opinions about this matter than just two or three people so we can come to a decision.--Cole1 03:12, 11 June 2012 (UTC)

Of course we should keep a redirect. Lycanthropy is the condition; werewolf is the creature. I find that I try to link to Skyrim:Lycanthropy more often than I link to Skyrim:Werewolf. As for the information on the perk tree, it belongs on Skyrim:Werewolf, or perhaps on Skyrim:Werewolf (perk tree); I'm not sure which. • JA^Talk 03:40, 11 June 2012 (UTC)

Proposed Deletion of the TES4:Wrye Bash pages?

While I was shuffling through the random pages button looking for something to do, I can across this page along with all of the subpages being proposed for deletion on the argument that they are "outdated". Now, admittedly, I don't use Wrye Bash, in fact, I haven't even booted Oblivion in ages, but just because it is outdated doesn't necessarily demand that the pages be deleted, does it? On the logic that it may be a version or so behind means we could do away with the TES4 and TES3 namespaces in their entirety. I am quiet sure there may be users still using whatever version of Wrye Bash this is, so by deleting the pages, we are depriving them of the resource. Maybe we could replace all those prod tags with a cleanup tag saying that the pages need to be updated to represent the newest of information? Hell, I'll download the mod and its documentation and bring every page up to date if I need to. I don't, and probably will never use, Wrye Bash, but I feel that it's an important enough program to not be deleted from the site. Opinions? ES^{(talk•email)} 09:26, 19 June 2012 (UTC)

I don't like modspace in general, so I would support its deletion immediately. User WrinklyNInja (who added the prod tags) says that the mod is being documented and maintained elsewhere, so it seems like a bad idea to keep our outdated pages around. Without the support of the developer(s?), the mod's future on the wiki is pretty hopeless. Maybe keeping a minimalistic page at Tes4Mod:Wrye Bash would be a good idea, but the full documentation seems like overkill. If you oppose the deletion, we could always start up a Deletion Review - haven't had a good one in a while. —Legoless 12:57, 19 June 2012 (UTC)

My understanding is that the documentation is the usual PDFs and whatnot that go with the mod or something. I glanced at it briefly. I would understand if it got deleted since Wrye and whoever else was involved are inactive, so if the consensus is against me, then I will just step aside and no longer contest the deletion. Unless you badly want a good deletion review :p ES^{(talk•email)} 13:06, 19 June 2012 (UTC)

One more little tidbit to add to this discussion: I e-mailed Wrye right after the Prod was added and he said he's fine with it. If he ever feels the pages should be re-instated/updated, he is an Admin, so he can always undelete them himself. – Robin Hood↝talk 22:36, 19 June 2012 (UTC)

TesMMod namespace?

As some of you are aware, I've been working on the Spin-off Series Completion Project, and recently I've been working on Stormhold. Notice the name of the project is "Completion", not "Redesign" or "Improvement". The goal of this project is pretty much to completely finish all documentation of these older games, so that we don't have to worry about them pretty much ever again. One of the characteristics of our other gamespaces is that we also have documentation on the game files. I've been going through the game files (that's my job for this project) and feel that for the sake of completion, we should record them. The question is, do they deserve their own namespace? I'm considering lumping together the data for Stormhold, Dawnstar, Shadowkey, and Oblivion Mobile into a single "Tes Mobile Mod", or "TesMMod" namespace.

Thoughts? I know that creating a new namespace might be somewhat drastic, considering the extremely low popularity of the mobile games, but having a dedicated namespace would only add to the credibility of this website, plus it would make for easier organization and a more clear-cut separation between the game info and the game data. • JA^Talk 23:04, 19 June 2012 (UTC)

It seems like a good idea to me, if you think there's enough info to be worth documenting. One slight thing: the capitalisation should probably be "TesmMod", even though it looks a bit silly. —Legoless 23:30, 19 June 2012 (UTC)

Gaston Bellefort page

A page was created for an Oblivion NPC named Gaston Bellefort. I'm can't find any evidence this NPC even exists in Oblivion, beyond authoring a book. Should this page remain (with ALOT of work), or be deleted? --Xyzzy 04:01, 21 June 2012 (UTC)

yea i flagged that for deletion already, might have been from a mod but it doesnt belong there anyway. — Kimi the Elf ^{(talk | contribs)} 03:56, 21 June 2012 (UTC)

Certain Pages Not Loading Properly?

http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Lore:Main_Page http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Skyrim:Thalmor_Dossier:_Ulfric_Stormcloak

I'm not sure if this is just me or what, but the pages are loading incorrectly with just a white background and no formats. -- Unsigned by 173.2.205.225, 23:52, 21 June 2012

Try again and force a reload on those pages. The logged in pages are fine but the anonymous versions were "bad" as you mentioned until I reloaded. I think I might know what caused the issue and will look into it...Thanks! -- Daveh 23:58, 21 June 2012 (UTC)

Do you have Danwguard? Please sign!!!

This is a simple, but important question – please sign this thread if you have Dawnguard in your possession. Then all (non-Xbox) admins and patrollers knows who to ‘trust’ and ask for advice until the DLC gets released on all platforms. --Krusty 02:35, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

I am a patroller, but I'll sign anyway. I've got it, and will start playing when the baby goes to sleep! ABCface^◥ 02:38, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

Minor Edits^{Threats•Evidence} 20:44, 2 July 2012 (UTC)

• JA^Talk 21:18, 2 July 2012 (UTC)

Umm not sure if I am allowed to sign (never been to this area before) but I have it --SPMcKinney 21:38, 2 July 2012 (UTC)

Vos 23:19, 2 July 2012 (UTC)

Babette 15:38, 6 July 2012 (UTC)

--SlyKhajiit 15:42, 6 July 2012 (UTC)

Header formatting inconsistency

Something's been bothering me about the various header formats since I came back to the site. Take a look:

Current <h1>Header 1</h1> <h2>Header 2</h2> <h3>Header 3</h3> <h4>Header 4</h4> <h5>Header 5</h5>

Proposed <h1>Header 1</h1> <h2>'''Header 2'''</h2> <h3>Header 3</h3> <h4>Header 4</h4> <h5>Header 5</h5>

What I'm seeing right now:

Notice anything out of place? Header 3 seems to be way more stressed than Header 2. I think Header 2 should be bold like the rest of them. Even 4 and 5 seem like they're more stressed due to the boldface. Is there a reason we changed that? --TheRealLurlock ^Talk 14:06, 30 June 2012 (UTC)

I just added an example of what I think it should look like for comparison. Anyone have any opinions? --TheRealLurlock ^Talk 16:01, 1 July 2012 (UTC)

As a personal preference, I prefer Header 2 without the bold. —Legoless 16:06, 1 July 2012 (UTC)

I also prefer it unbolded, but if you like it bolded, you can customize your monobook.css file by adding h2 { font-weight:bold; }, so it'll appear bolded for you but not for anyone else. – Robin Hood↝talk 17:11, 1 July 2012 (UTC)

I think having the Header 2 bold makes it look more stressed than Header 1, personally. It's possible your browser or computer display settings are different than my own though, and that's why we see it differently? Either way, I'd prefer leaving it the way it is. ABCface^◥ 17:50, 1 July 2012 (UTC)

Okay, maybe it's just me - I'm posting a screenshot of this page for comparison above. Do the actual headers look the same as my screenshot for everyone? Just want to be sure we're on the same wavelength here, because that H2 looks way under-stressed compared to all the others for me. --TheRealLurlock ^Talk 01:03, 2 July 2012 (UTC)

Your screenshot looks very different to what I'm seeing. The Silencer speaks^Talk 01:10, 2 July 2012 (UTC)

To be clear - does everybody else's "Current" column (in the table) look like my "Proposed" column (in the screenshot)? If that's the case I need to figure out why my .css is so messed up... --TheRealLurlock ^Talk 02:57, 2 July 2012 (UTC)

(←) What you're seeing is completely different that what I'm seeing. You'd be right that the header2 is way understressed in that one, but that's not how any of the headers on the site look to me. ABCface^◥ 03:23, 2 July 2012 (UTC)

Same for me, TRL. Your entire proposed list (that you see) is essentially what I have always seen (if that makes sense). --Xyzzy 03:51, 2 July 2012 (UTC)

Taking a second look, have you tried using the 'zoom in' feature in your browser (Ctrl+)? All the headers for what you see are slightly smaller than what I see. (And when I zoom out in my browser, I see what you're seeing in the current heading). ABCface^◥ 04:16, 2 July 2012 (UTC)

Hmm, zooming in does fix it, but it makes everything else uncomfortably large. Incidentally, the screenshot I took was at default zoom level (the one you get when you hit "Reset" in the zoom menu.) I had to zoom in twice to make the problem go away. I don't understand why zooming would affect the bold/not bold state of text though - as both the larger text (in H1) and the smaller text (in H3-5) remain bold at all zoom levels. Only H2 is affected by zooming in and out. I'm using the default monobook.css, not a custom one. Firefox 3.6.8, Windows XP on this machine. (I'll have to check if it does the same on my Windows 7 laptop.) --TheRealLurlock ^Talk 11:34, 2 July 2012 (UTC)

Firefox + Windows XP unbolds Watchlist items with zoom as well. Vely^{►Talk►Email} 12:26, 2 July 2012 (UTC)

I think it's just the font. The fontsize for that particular font just changes the look of the text to make it look bolded/unbolded at a certain size. ABCface^◥ 13:26, 2 July 2012 (UTC)

Note: Since the fake headers were causing issues with the TOC, I've used <Pre> tags to fix them now that the discussion seems to have wrapped up. – Robin Hood↝talk 20:44, 4 July 2012 (UTC)

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