UESPWiki:Community Portal/Archive 43

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.

Another thumbnail error

I know admins were discussing this - found another error on Arniel's Endeavor. Also, error seems to be randomly effecting userbox icons as well. Mine were showing errors, I went in to see what the issue was, and when I cancelled out of the edit, they fixed themselves.--Beezer1029 (talk) 15:23, 1 April 2014 (GMT)

Fixed er. --AN|L (talk) 15:29, 1 April 2014 (GMT)

One more: Honorhall Orphanage. Is there a central place we should list these as we find them?--Beezer1029 (talk) 18:28, 4 April 2014 (GMT)

Fixed. There isn't really a central place to report them, but the Administrator Noticeboard seems to be the best and/or most common place. Another alternative is to just fix it yourself and continue about your business. You can fix this by clicking 'Edit' at the top of the page and clicking 'Save' without doing anything else to the page. This is called a 'null edit' and clears the page's cache. It also happens to fix whatever is broken here. •WoahBro^►talk 18:32, 4 April 2014 (GMT)

Ah - good to know there isn't some sort of clandestine process needed to fix them. Should we be collecting data on them, or just fixing as they come up?--Beezer1029 (talk) 18:36, 4 April 2014 (GMT)

Nah, just fix them. They're probably just leftovers. --AN|L (talk) 19:06, 4 April 2014 (GMT)

The other thing that often works is a page purge. (Sometimes a purge will work when a null edit won't and vice versa. Purging is more reliable in my experience.) There's a setting in your preferences that adds a "Purge" tab to the top of your edit window. One click and it's done. You can also edit a page, and in the URL, replace the word "edit" with "purge", which is more annoying but accomplishes the same thing. Lest you worry about messing something up, purging is harmless - generally if you wait long enough (a few hours usually does it), the page will eventually be purged automatically, but purging manually forces it to happen right away. — TheRealLurlock (talk) 20:08, 4 April 2014 (GMT)

Similarly, the UTC clock has a hidden purge functionality. Just click on the clock and the page will be purged. – Robin Hood  ^(talk) 20:59, 4 April 2014 (GMT)

Ooh, that's a new tool! I like that better actually. I never liked how the other gadget grouped all the admin options into a dropdown box as well. Now I can turn that one off, since the Purge feature was the only reason I was using it. — TheRealLurlock (talk) 21:23, 4 April 2014 (GMT)

Page purging has worked every time for me. Biffa (talk) 10:56, 7 April 2014 (GMT)

If purging the page works the first time, every time, then that suggests to me that these are leftover issues from some temporary glitch. If it were something specific to one of our servers, I would expect that it would randomly not work, depending which server the user happened to get. Similarly, if it were a misconfiguration of our mobile or regular servers, I would expect everyone who was using mobile/regular would be reporting issues. Since that seems not to be the case here, I suspect whatever the problem was has been resolved. I could force the server to invalidate our image cache for everything before a given date, but that would place a fairly heavy load on our servers for the first few days as every thumbnail or alternate-sized image anyone looked at on the site would need to be re-generated. Understandably, especially right now with ESO's recent release, I think we should avoid that given that this seems to be a non-critical issue that's fairly easily resolved. – Robin Hood  ^(talk) 17:42, 7 April 2014 (GMT)

There's one case I've found where purging does not work but a null edit does. If you have #saved variables on a redirect page, hitting purge on the page will purge the redirect target instead of the redirect itself. This is the only situation I've found where a simple purge doesn't work. Honestly, I think pages should automatically purge after every edit, at least if they have any #saved variables on them. This would save a lot of trouble and confusion on pages with saved variables on them. Currently, every time somebody makes even a minor edit like punctuation/spelling to a page with #saved variables, any other page that #loads data from that page will have errors unless you purge afterwards or wait several hours for it to auto-purge. Most people will not know to do this, so errors like this will be fairly common. — TheRealLurlock (talk) 17:53, 7 April 2014 (GMT)

(←) Yeah, that's a completely different issue that we're aware of, and want to fix, but haven't figured out how yet. I'm not terribly skilled with PHP, but it's on my "to do" list to look at it. Alfwyn's better with PHP than I am, and I seem to recall he took a look at it but didn't find anything. It may be that it'll need a significant re-write, or for Nephele to come back and take a look at it, since it's her code. – Robin Hood  ^(talk) 18:25, 7 April 2014 (GMT)

I believe the issue is still going on or else has restarted. I created Online:Kothringi after the errors started happening and it originally was fine, but I had to fix it today. --AN|L (talk) 00:55, 8 April 2014 (GMT)

Would you be terribly upset if I told you I don't like you anymore? ;) Honestly, I'm at a loss. I'll go over our server configuration and double-check everything tomorrow. If I don't find anything, I'll poke Dave again. – Robin Hood  ^(talk) 02:58, 8 April 2014 (GMT)

Pre-Release tags

Is it time to start getting rid of these? It's technically no longer pre-release, and I don't think too much has changed since the last beta. Should we still be putting these tags on new pages? Or removing those that exist? (Might be a bot-job at this point.) — TheRealLurlock (talk) 14:03, 3 April 2014 (GMT)

Given that the official release is tomorrow, with the early releases already done, I'd agree that it's time...at least as much as I can without having the actual game. With over 3000 uses, I'd say it's definitely a bot job...unless Jeancey really wants to raise his edit count some more. :) – Robin Hood  ^(talk) 14:12, 3 April 2014 (GMT)

I would love to :) But, I actually DO think that we should do this by hand. Release happening doesn't change the fact that this is still pre-release information and it should ALL be checked. Thus, I actually propose we change the template upon release, to read that the information was added pre-release, asking people to check the information, and once that is done, to remove the tag. That way, the information gets checked and the tags get removed. When someone fills out an NPC page, they remove both the pre-release and empty tags, when they read a book, they check the book info, remove the tag, etc. That make sense? Jeancey (talk) 14:30, 3 April 2014 (GMT)

But...but...that was the easiest template replacement I've ever written! The main replacement is a single line. You're no fun at all. :Þ

Seriously, though, you might have a point. My one concern with this is that people may feel reluctant to remove the tag, even though all the information is up to date, because no one person can verify every last thing on the page. Perhaps we should set a date at which point the Pre-Release tags are assumed to be no longer relevant? In any event, if we do change the template, just to put a concrete message out there, I'm going to suggest: "Some or all of the information on this page was created prior to the official release. Please verify that the information is current, then remove the {{Pre-Release}} tag." – Robin Hood  ^(talk) 14:44, 3 April 2014 (GMT)

In that case, should we maybe have a notice somewhere notifying users to do fill and remove these tags? It's probably better to have it explicitly written somewhere so we're not assuming users (anonymous and registered) will know what to do. •WoahBro^►talk 14:46, 3 April 2014 (GMT)

RH:That seems fine. WB:The message would be IN the prerelease template. We would change it. Jeancey (talk) 15:10, 3 April 2014 (GMT)

We should at least have a bot remove the tag from pages marked empty, like a number of NPC pages. Vely^►t►e 15:11, 3 April 2014 (GMT)

How about May 15 as the final date? I figure some people may not want to spend time editing if they're trying to cram in as much ESO time as possible before the subscription sets in. This would give such people about two weeks to check info here and remove tags before we get rid of them altogether. Minor Edits^{Threats•Evidence} 16:07, 3 April 2014 (GMT)

Sounds good to me. I don't think there will be many changes considering how recent the last beta was, but it's definitely prudent to verify information no matter what. I am curious if they will patch any typos in books.... -- Hargrimm^(T) 16:51, 3 April 2014 (GMT)

(←) I changed the text based on my suggestion, above. This, of course, changes it across the board in all namespaces, but I checked, and every last use is ESO-related at the moment. Obviously, we'll want to change the text back for whatever game is next. – Robin Hood  ^(talk) 17:45, 7 April 2014 (GMT)

Well, if you want to get the bot started removing these tags, I think it's probably safe to do so now. — TheRealLurlock (talk) 18:13, 15 April 2014 (GMT)

Vote on ESO as the shorthand name

Sorry to beat a dead horse, but editors still seem uncertain about what to use for the shorthand name, which is necessary for short-term editing, and I want people to edit with confidence. So let's set aside the other naming issues for the moment and have a straight vote on this one, as based on the comments above, there's substantial agreement on this point already.

Proposal: ESO should be the shorthand name. This is the name that will appear in summary boxes, non-book notes, see also sections, and in text after the first use, as well as any other scenarios I'm forgetting where, based on past practice, the shorthand name for the game would be appropriate.

Clarifying Remarks: Okay, so at the risk of playing along with some kind of practical joke, I'm going to do my best to explain in detail the situation we find ourselves in.

We use different terms for the same game depending on context. We have a proper name, a shorthand name, and the name of the namespace for the game (historically, the same as the shorthand name, though it doesn't have to be), as well as a namespace abbreviation for use on files. Each of these things are used in different contexts.

TES I: Arena - Arena - AR

TES II: Daggerfall - Daggerfall - DF

TES III: Morrowind - Morrowind - MW

TES IV: Oblivion - Oblivion - OB

TES V: Skyrim - Skyrim - SR

TES Travels: Shadowkey - Shadowkey - SK

TES Travels: Stormhold - Stormhold - SH

TES Travels: Dawnstar - Dawnstar - DS

An Elder Scrolls Legend: Battlespire - Battlespire - BS

To reiterate, the proper name? Irrelevant here. Some people want "Elder Scrolls Online". Others want "The Elder Scrolls Online". My personal preference is "TES Online". We can cross that bridge later, and there's little reason why our shorthand name should influence that decision. So just forget about the proper name for now.

The namespace we have gone with has been "Online". This is not set in stone, but neither is it something we can apparently deal with at the moment for technical reasons. Perhaps the reason people are confused is because I'm not suggesting the namespace name and the shorthand name have to match. We could still have them match, in the end, but I'm just saying that there's nothing dictating that they must be the same. So just forget about the namespace name for now.

The namespace abbreviation is used for file names, info box parameters, etc. Obviously, it relates to the namespace name. So just forget about this even harder than the other names for now.

This is, apparently, a confusing issue, and people are not entirely in alignment on these issues. People who agree on ESO for the shorthand name don't necessarily agree with each other on what the proper name should be. Because of these differences, the simplest way to handle them is one at a time. People need to know the shorthand just to get small edits done, and even though I thought we were previously in agreement on "ESO" for the shorthand, I noticed at least one editor still expressing confusion.

So, here we are. All we are talking about is the shorthand name. This is the name in summary boxes. Look at Lore:The Waters of Oblivion, and note how incongruous it is to have Battlespire, Morrowind, Oblivion, and Skyrim, followed by "The Elder Scrolls Online". We have thrown in a proper name where the shorthand name should be. This is also the name used in non-book notes; see From the Memory Stone of Makela Leki. It is also the name used in text after the first use. See Lore:Sentinel#Notes. This is because the grammatically correct practice is to provide the full name for a noun when it is first mentioned, with shortened names only being appropriate after this. The shorthand name is also used when providing references in the lore section, simply for the sake of brevity. "Events of Daggerfall", "Events of Skyrim", etc.

Three patterns to note about the shorthand names we have used before now:

1. They're the unique part of the proper name.

2. They're all very descriptive, distinctive terms.

3. They're the names used by the fanbase to refer to the games.

But now, with ESO, we're left with a situation where we can't continue all three patterns. We're being forced to pick which patterns to follow, and this will determine whether we use "Online" or "ESO". By using "Online" (a name we picked initially in a rush, without much thought), we are following #1 at the expense of #2 and #3. I respectfully submit that rigidly adhering to pattern #1 is a mistake. #1 is actually the least important pattern, and by following it, we're confusing correlation with causation. Just because all the shorthand names in the past have been the unique part of the proper name, that doesn't mean that's why we used them. We used them because they were logical choice, and they were the logical choice because they were the terms our readers were using. #2 is important, but #3 is really the most important one for us to follow. We should use the name most fans are using. And that name is ESO. Thank you for your time, and I certainly hope I don't have to extend this dissertation any further.

Votes

• Support Minor Edits^{Threats•Evidence} 15:23, 3 April 2014 (GMT)
• Oppose Personally, Online still seems like a better option to me. Jeancey (talk) 16:16, 3 April 2014 (GMT)
• Oppose: (In favor of Online) I have been somewhat ambivalent on this, as there are certainly good arguments for using ESO. But I just can't stop feeling that the use of an acronym is glaringly out-of-place compared to every other standard shorthand we use everywhere else. While the word is somewhat generic, in the context of the wiki and the places where it will be used (see also, references, etc) I just don't see a real potential for confusion. -- Hargrimm^(T) 16:49, 3 April 2014 (GMT)
• Support: I don't know why we're voting on this, as far as I'm concerned it was agreed upon to use "ESO" weeks ago. —Legoless (talk) 17:52, 3 April 2014 (GMT)
• Support: It's just the name the people out there use. --Alfwyn (talk) 17:54, 3 April 2014 (GMT)

*Oppose: We use the unique identifier of each title in every other instance, why change it up for here? -damon  ^{talk ♥ contribs} 18:16, 3 April 2014 (GMT)

• Support: I was also of the opinion that it had already been decided on. I also think ESO, a "name", makes more syntactical and logical sense in general usage than Online, a "descriptor". --Enodoc (talk) 18:56, 3 April 2014 (GMT)
• Support: I too believe this was already agreed upon. • JA^T 20:40, 3 April 2014 (GMT)
• Support: "ESO" seems best. --Xyzzy ^Talk 20:44, 3 April 2014 (GMT)
• Support: People already use it and it's identifiable. No reason not to use it; it's the best option. Vely^►t►e 00:03, 4 April 2014 (GMT)
• Support: Alfwyn summed up my reasons precisely: it's the name people use, simple as that. – Robin Hood  ^(talk) 00:12, 4 April 2014 (GMT)
• Comment: Just so everyone is clear, this is only for text after the first usage. The first usage will still be Elder Scrolls Online, not ESO. Jeancey (talk) 00:15, 4 April 2014 (GMT)

• Question: I'm starting to be lost, and I'm not entirely clear anymore what's going on, though I think I have an idea. May it be made a little more clear to me (and whoever else might be lost like me), in what circumstances are Online, ESO, Elder Scrolls Online, et al going to be used during, and how is it determined with use is most appropriate? Kinda hard to accurately and fairly vote when you're thoughts are disconnected from the others. -damon  ^{talk ♥ contribs} 00:30, 4 April 2014 (GMT)
• Question: I'm lost too. So, because the most immediate impact a name change would have (er, maybe?) on my editing would be the filenames of the images I upload, I need to ask now. ON-type-name, as it has been? ESO-type-name? I thought I saw that links would redirect automatically, so unless I am totally blind I won't worry about those. But files? What's up with that? likelolwhat ^{talk lulzy to me} 00:43, 4 April 2014 (GMT)
• Comment: (edit conflict) And this is exactly what I was trying to avoid. In reply to Jeancey, yes, if it's in text, the proper name should be used first. E.g.: Note 1: "In TES II: Daggerfall, [blah blah blah]." Subsequent notes: "In Daggerfall, [yadda yadda yadda]". But what the proper name will be for ESO is a separate issue. I'm fine with Elder Scrolls Online, personally, but if anyone out there takes exception to that, they can support ESO for the shorthand now and advocate for their preferred proper name separately. And, again, sorry for beating this dead horse, but I felt that enough dissent for ESO had been expressed in the previous conversation that a more formal vote was prudent.

As for files, stick with ON for now. We can always have a bot change them later if needed. Any possible namespace name change will have to wait anyways. All this vote is about is the shorthand name for the game. It will not impact the proper name choice, the namespace choice, or the choice for the namespace abbreviation to be used on files. This is a very simple, limited vote. Minor Edits^{Threats•Evidence} 00:49, 4 April 2014 (GMT)

• Comment: I think concrete examples would help resolve the confusion here. Perhaps just a couple of links, like: "See the banner/non-book note/whatever on [[this page]]: I'm proposing that it would read 'blah blah ESO blah blah'". – Robin Hood  ^(talk) 15:21, 4 April 2014 (GMT)

• Comment: Off the top of my head, Lore:Sentinel and Lore:Malabal Tor should provide good examples of how I think names should appear. Lore:From The Memory Stone of Makela Leki provides a non-book note mentioning ESO, though the infobox still says "Elder Scrolls Online", which, if this successful, should be changed to display "ESO" instead. Minor Edits^{Threats•Evidence} 15:38, 4 April 2014 (GMT)

• Support: ESO seems more straightforward than ON, for example. Also, I have a feeling that ON and OB could potentially be mixed up. Also, since ESO isn't exactly a chapter in the series of TES, I don't think it needs to follow exactly the form the other games follow. (I hope this actually makes sense and that I seem like I know what's going on) •WoahBro^►talk 15:48, 4 April 2014 (GMT)

• Comment: I'm withdrawing from the vote itself simply because for my own sanity, since I'm still on the fence with my understanding of what's happening. Personally, to use ME's examples, however, I actually don't like where it just says "ESO" in the description box. Can the description box or the very first example in the article spell out the name in its entirety "(the) Elder Scrolls Online", with the "the" included when it makes grammatical sense to include it (as in, not the infobox, which ought to just be "Elder Scrolls Online"? Then, we can abbreviate ESO in redundant instances? That's how I think it would look visually appealing. Creating a hybrid of "From The Memory..." and the place pages. -damon  ^{talk ♥ contribs} 18:11, 4 April 2014 (GMT)

• Comment: The problem with the full name in the info box is that, on smaller screens, it's broken up into two or three lines. Regardless of what shorthand name we use, it will ultimately be what we should use in summary boxes. Minor Edits^{Threats•Evidence} 18:18, 4 April 2014 (GMT)

• Comment: I just checked on an iPhone 4 and on the full site, "Elder Scrolls Online" is only two lines, which I don't think looks bad (also note that it says "The Elder Scrolls Online". If we omit "the", I think it can fit on one line). More importantly, it is a complete non-issue on the mobile site because the "Seen In" box takes up the width of the page. Since UESP is heavily promoting the mobile site (with the page header and everything), I think that we shouldn't be worried about small screens because we are expecting them to use the mobile version. Given this, I would be opposed to "ESO" in favor of "Elder Scrolls Online" for things like the "Seen In" box. Is that an option for this vote? -Thunderforge (talk) 01:22, 5 April 2014 (GMT)

• Comment: I, for one, never use the mobile site. Never. Many small-screened devices don't default to the mobile site, and many people, myself included, dislike using mobile sites for a wide variety of reasons. And we use the names in infoboxes in a vast array of situations. Often, there's very limited space available to display the name in an aesthetically pleasing manner. So while "The Elder Scrolls Online" might look tolerable in some circumstances, that won't be the case for all. Just off the top of my head, there are the book lists. Books O, for instance. We're talking about significant clutter here. Anyways, aesthetics are something we should always worry about. It's an ancillary issue, sure, but not a non-existent one. This is just an up or down vote on ESO for the shorthand. More comments pending to address your request below. Minor Edits^{Threats•Evidence} 03:10, 5 April 2014 (GMT)

• Comment: I too am confused as to what we are voting on. Are we voting on putting it in "See In" boxes? In article text? In footnotes? The namespace? When would we use the shortened form and when would we use the long form? I think linking to articles, which could change while we are discussing this, isn't the best way to clarify it and I don't think we can have a good, binding decision without some concrete examples right here in the proposal. Also I'm not sure about why we are wanting to change. You mentioned later on that there was an issue with small screens, but I'm still unclear about any other reasons. Could you please amend this proposal to explicitly state what's changing and give examples of when we would and would not use the shortened form? -Thunderforge (talk) 00:54, 5 April 2014 (GMT)
• Oppose (in favor of Online): Honestly, I'm fine with ESO in notes and such, but in the "Seen In" box, it looks downright ugly to have an abbreviation alongside full words. I also question whether or not we really need a shorthand abbreviation for the "Seen In" box. -Thunderforge (talk) 20:44, 6 April 2014 (GMT)
• Support: ESO seems like the best option to me because of all the reasons stated, but mainly to capture newbies to TES searches, etc and I thought it had already been agreed. Biffa (talk) 10:55, 7 April 2014 (GMT)
• Comment: Here's my opinion. "Online" as the namespace. "Elder Scrolls Online" or "Online" for the first instance of the name being used on a page (Online is for the harder to find/less interesting pages that you clearly already know the location). "ESO" for secondary mentions such as there are. ON as the shorthand for technical things. If "The Elder Scrolls Online" is too long for infoboxes then "Online", otherwise leave it as the full. "ESO" for see also links. Online for "Events of ...". Online is a noun in relation to the game, therefore it is grammatically sound. Silence is Golden^{Break the Silence} 14:43, 7 April 2014 (GMT)

Recent wave of spammers

Browsing through the Block log, I noticed that a lot of spammers have been trickling through. I could only find one edit whose history remained, where the spammer blanked a short page and replaced it with -, so I altered one of our abuse filters to check for whether or not a page is shrunk to less than 20 characters, which should catch this and similar edits. If the other spammers that broke through followed a different pattern, please send me the before and after text on the edit before reverting it. I'm confident our abuse filters can be configured to catch any and all spammers, but we might want to also block off all API access for non-users. For those of you that don't know, the site API is a neat way for bots to get information from the wiki (everything from category members to page text) without loading the entire webpage (which takes a lot of extra time and bandwidth). Unfortunately, this is how many spammers access the site as well. I can't imagine any reason we'd want non-users to access our API (or at least be able to edit through our API), so it might be a good idea to simply disable this for all non-autoconfirmed users. • JA^T 09:46, 7 April 2014 (GMT)

I blocked write API access a while back only to discover that it broke the Watch/Unwatch feature which, for some inexplicable reason, uses the API. A workaround was implemented for MW 1.20, but it means that when you watch or unwatch a page, it'll take you to a separate message page rather than popping the message up at the top without leaving the current page. So, if we want to remove API access, we should consider whether that's a big deal for people or not. A possible intermediate solution would be to open the API to all autoconfirmed users, so only newbies and IPs would see the Watch message on a separate page. In any event, this is something that we can't really implement until we upgrade, or we'll break the Watch feature for everyone who doesn't have API access. – Robin Hood  ^(talk) 17:31, 7 April 2014 (GMT)

Actually, we can block access to just the 'edit' action within the API, since that's the only section we really need to block off. Here's an example of that, but in our case we'd replace 'sysop' with 'autoconfirmed'. • JA^T 18:38, 7 April 2014 (GMT)

Good point. That would do the trick. If it's just the one module, I think I'd limit it to just the bots, actually, rather than autoconfirmed. Or do we have other scripts that make use of the API? I checked our gadgets and the ones in Project:Javascript and none of them use the edit API, so we're good to go there. It could be more of an issue if there are other user scripts that use it, though. – Robin Hood  ^(talk) 20:12, 7 April 2014 (GMT)

Just as a heads up, the same exact spam is still getting through. •WoahBro^►talk 00:46, 8 April 2014 (GMT)

ESO Map Icons - accuracy vs. utility

So, as it turns out, many of the Crafting Sites in ESO, particularly the higher-level ones, use the Point of Interest icon instead of the standard Crafting icon . This is the case in the game - whether because they wanted to make it ever-so-slightly harder to find the higher level ones or whether it was simply an oversight, we'll likely never know. But on the in-game map, they look just like every other not-so-interesting Point of Interest. The question is whether we should follow that lead, and make our map as close to exactly the same as theirs as possible, or in the interests of providing more information for our users, use the Crafting icon for all Crafting sites, regardless of whether that's what's actually seen in-game. My vote is to use the Crafting icon. Sure, it could be seen as a minor spoiler, but then that's what the site is for. If you wanted to see the map exactly how it appears in the game, well, you'd just play the game and open the map screen. If someone goes to the map looking for the crafting sites right now, they'll have a hard time because they look just like any other PoI. Likewise, if we were to follow this rule for the pages themselves, the lists of locations on the zone pages would make no distinction between them, and you'd have to visit every link to figure out which ones were the crafting sites and which were just PoIs. We could add a note on each of the affected pages stating that the in-game map uses a different icon in case people get confused by it. But I think it's more valuable to provide that information quickly and efficiently than it is to slavishly copy things exactly as they are in the game. I do believe in keeping things as close to the original as possible, but not when it obscures information and hides it from the user. — TheRealLurlock (talk) 15:39, 7 April 2014 (GMT)

I concur to that effect. Utility is more useful than accuracy in this instance. I would also suggest reporting it as a /bug in-game, even if it's not actually one, since, as you say, that leads to confusion in-game as well. --Enodoc (talk) 16:21, 7 April 2014 (GMT)

I'd support using the crafting icon for now, until it becomes clear whether it is a bug or a deliberate attempt to mislead (as it were). Then again, our maps do not need to follow the games map exactly, otherwise Morrowind's would be entirely unusable/pointless. Silence is Golden^{Break the Silence} 17:55, 7 April 2014 (GMT)

We don't have to use the same icons for our online map. But for wiki pages, we really should use the symbols used in the game. We document the game, not how we think the game should be. For one, using the in-game symbol makes recognizing the location on the in-game map easier. And the point of interest locations seem to be tied to the "discover locales" achievement of a zone, so it might not be an over-sight at all. --Alfwyn (talk) 09:51, 8 April 2014 (GMT)

I agree with Alfwyn - the map is meant to go beyond the in-game map to aid exploration, but the wiki is for documenting what's actually in the game. However, it might be worthwhile to note this discrepancy somewhere on the wiki page, so people don't think our map is incorrect. • JA^T 10:03, 8 April 2014 (GMT)

Alfwyn – your point about the Discover Locales achievement leads me to believe it is more likely to be an oversight, as the sites in question are not required for that achievement despite using the icon. I would suggest putting in the bugs section of the crafting sites page "This location uses the Area of Interest icon instead of the Crafting icon." or words to that effect, while the page itself would use the Crafting icon because we assume that is "correct". --Enodoc (talk) 10:44, 8 April 2014 (GMT)

Well, exactly which places are we talking about? --Alfwyn (talk) 10:52, 8 April 2014 (GMT)

For example (Lurlock will have to confirm whether these are all accurate): Chancel of Divine Entreaty, Matthild's Last Venture and Sleepy Senche Overlook in Malabal Tor; Silaseli Ruins, Wether's Cleft, and Viridian Hideaway in Bangkorai; Crimson Kada's Crafting Cavern, Hammerhome, and Tinkerer Tobin's Workshop in Eastmarch; Eldbjorg's Hideaway, Smokefrost Vigil, and Trollslayer's Gully in The Rift. --Enodoc (talk) 11:24, 8 April 2014 (GMT)

The problem with using the in-game icon on the page is that this icon is loaded by the Place Link template, and thus will also appear on list pages, e.g. ON:Bangkorai. Since we've already grouped the crafting sites in with the PoIs, there would then be no way to distinguish them on those lists. I still say we should stick with the crafting icon in every case, both the map and the wiki page, but add a note at the bottom stating that a different icon is used in the game. This makes it clear that we're making a conscious decision to provide more information and that yes, we know the in-game icon is different. — TheRealLurlock (talk) 14:46, 8 April 2014 (GMT)

(←) Further to this, I think we should do the same to distinguish between what the devs call "Delves" and what the game calls "Public Dungeons". (I mentioned this before at Online talk:Fungal Grotto I, but have investigated further since then.) While they are both 'public' in the MMO sense, their gameplay style is totally different. The game tells you when you're approaching a Public Dungeon with a popup saying "Public Dungeon" that does not occur when you approach a "Delve". Public Dungeons have Group Challenge achievements, while Delves have Exploration achievements. A support article on public dungeons on the ESO website says (paraphrased) solo [public dungeons] will be marked as a single flaming torch icon and group [public dungeons] will be marked as double flaming torches . This iconography was supposed to "indicate when an area requires more than just one player", but the Public Dungeons are using the same single torch icon as the Delves; I think this is another oversight, and we should endeavour to preempt the correction of this as well. (Note this is similar-but-different to Instanced Dungeons, where the small-group instances use and the large-group raids (eg Craglorn Trials) are expected to use .)
TL DR: use for "Delve" public dungeons and for "Public Dungeons" with Group Challenges. --Enodoc (talk) 11:12, 9 April 2014 (GMT)

Yeah, I was thinking about that too - I did distinguish them on Public Dungeons by putting them in italics, but I can see where further distinction is needed. (Mind you, in the beta I did one of these delves - Bad Man's Hollow - completely solo, but I was probably much higher level than the place was designed for by then.) Another difference Achievement-wise is that the "Delve"s are not counted towards the <Zone> Cave Explorer achievements. I'm not sure how many areas will qualify for , though. Is there really much difference in-game? — TheRealLurlock (talk) 14:40, 9 April 2014 (GMT)

Minor point; it's the "Delves" that do count towards the Cave Explorer, and the "Public Dungeons" (like Bad Man's Hallows) that don't. Here's the breakdown:

Delves, 6 per zone (18 in Cyrodiil) [for solo/duo]

Public Dungeons, 1 per zone (none in Cyrodiil) [for public group]

Group Dungeons, 1 per zone (none in Cyrodiil) [for 4-man group]

Trials, coming with Craglorn [for 12-man group]

Enodoc (talk) 15:41, 9 April 2014 (GMT)

Ah, okay. So there aren't any Trials yet - that's going to be in an expansion. I can see breaking up the "Public Dungeons" page to split the "Delves" onto their own page. It is kind of a long page, though Delves would only be slightly shorter, losing just one entry per zone. I'm also debating whether to have a separate page for "Veteran Dungeons", which are just advanced versions of some of the Group Dungeons, but with different enemies and different bosses. Also might break that table up into Place Links like all the others - it's not really necessary to have the "Bosses" and "Level" columns there, so long as they're listed on the individual pages. — TheRealLurlock (talk) 15:57, 9 April 2014 (GMT)

The Towers

So, my attempt at making a lore article for the Towers is about as complete as I can make it (I figure some ESO details I'm not totally familiar with yet can be added later). See here.

I want to get feedback on how I went about it before putting it up on wiki for a few reasons. First, I saw that Lore:Towers was made in 2008 and then deleted shortly thereafter. I'm not aware of the reason for this, but remaking a deleted page is generally a touchy subject. Second, there's obviously a ton of OOG information.

I wouldn't have pursued this if I didn't think a page was necessary. There is an abundance of references to the Tower(s) in official material. Further, I believe the page's reliance on OOG is still relatively conservative (I decided to remain silent on Akatosh's spaceship). I think, as called for by the guidelines, I only included OOG to the extent that it would help explain official content. I would've liked to move them lower on the page, but it just wasn't feasible. Anyways, if we can accept the premise that a lore article is necessary, well, Michael Kirkbride's words, official or not, are bound to be more reliable than my own.

I decided to merge the Tower and the Towers into one page, and distinguish the metaphysical Tower from the constellation right off the bat, so as to avoid using {{About}} templates or clumsy parenthetical clarifications in page names.

I thought about transcluding lore pages for each Tower subsection, but it quickly proved untenable. The page is coming at them from an entirely different perspective, and as I tried to emphasize in the article, each Tower is far more than just its "physical echo".

Any issues with the formatting? Any complaints or suggestions regarding my word choices, and the unsourced tidbits I threw in here and there? Long story short, if anyone has any problems with this, specifically or just in principle, let's address them up front. Minor Edits^{Threats•Evidence} 15:50, 8 April 2014 (GMT)

I'm no lore-expert, but I'm not sure about the use of the ESO map to represent "Mundus". I know it's called that in-game, but really, it just shows Tamriel (not even all of Nirn) and Coldharbour, which is just one of many planes of Oblivion - it just happens to be the one you can visit in ESO, but on a lore page, it's not nearly sufficient. — TheRealLurlock (talk) 16:37, 8 April 2014 (GMT)

Since it included the constellations around the central sphere (which could be viewed as a two-dimensional representation of Nirn), I figured it could be interpreted as a sort of abstract representation of the cosmos. But your point is valid; I'll remove it. Minor Edits^{Threats•Evidence} 16:47, 8 April 2014 (GMT)

It may have been changed. But that map is not called "Mundus", but "Oblivion" in the map section of the game. --Alfwyn (talk) 17:23, 8 April 2014 (GMT)

Nice one ME, you've made a good shot at an abstract concept. Looks ready to go to me. --Enodoc (talk) 17:32, 8 April 2014 (GMT)

I've been feverishly following your sandbox progress, and overall I think there isn't anything that stands out as too problematic. I do find it odd that the metaphysical Tower/Wheel/Hub stuff is on the same page as The Towers themselves - especially since they both separate and very different things. My concern is it might confuse and already confusing subject. I get your reasoning and that you have distinguished it in the lead, but I'm not sure it is clear. I think people might come away thinking these two concepts are somehow related. Or they might not.

Onto the Towers themselves - much like I said with your CHIM page, these topics are so heavily reliant/based on OOG, that scaling back on certain texts only half explains the subject, which does it a disservice. I don't think that's a problem here. I'm glad you have used Nu-Mantia Intercept, as I don't think the page would have worked otherwise. I'm also surprised you have used the MK chat logs where he mentions the Person, Sword, Fruit and Cave Stones (not that I have issue with it!) as they are on the far end of acceptable OOG scale, but they certainly provide a rounder background to the article and have been embraced by most people into the subject.

You said possibly other Towers should be included? - the only other "known" tower is the Khajiit Tower, with the Mane as its Stone - But this is just a commonly accepted fan theory, with some backing from MK. There aren't even any supporting OOG texts I don't believe, so I don't think it can qualify.

• One issues is the veracity of "Skeleton Man's Interview" source - going by the note, I suspect it's an official Bethesda text, but can you confirm? TIL has shown time and time again to mix head-canon with established lore.
• The map of Mundus. I'm not sure that its entirely representative, as it is only Tamriel and Coldharbour. I understand that's how it appears in ESO, but it's not really the whole picture.
• I interpreted the term "Red-Heart" as the Heart of Lorkhan, not Red Mountain ("...the Chimer following Red-Heart"). The Prophecy of the Dragonborn establishes it as Red Tower, so that would be my preferred heading for that section.
• On the Crystal-Like-Law section. I'm not entirely sure about your translation of Dracochrysalis: "the Tower was formed to keep their world in stasis, free of decay." Are you meaning Dracochrysalis = Dragon-Cocoon? Time-Cocoon? How does that relate to the Aldmer's goal of accession? I think its somewhat open to speculation.
• Wasn't White-Gold built by the Aldmer and later occupied by the Ayleids? (Before the Ages of Man) - Although Nu-Mantia says otherwise.
• Not sure if it's worth noting that Nu Manita calls the Stone of Ada-Mantia the Convention itself, whereas ESO seems to refer to it as more of a physical object within the Foundation Vault?

--Jimeee (talk) 17:37, 8 April 2014 (GMT)

Beyond an aversion to relying on MK for anything, this subject should have a page, whether we have the sources or not to fill it out. Its a very important aspect to the Elder Scrolls lore, and one reason for a lot of conflict. Silence is Golden^{Break the Silence} 17:44, 8 April 2014 (GMT)

(edit conflict) Aurbic Enigma directly attributes the construction of White-Gold to the Ayleids, and Ayleid Cities of Valenwood agrees that the Tower was built during Ayleid rule of the area. I do agree with your point on Red-Heart. ME: Just to be completely pedantic, is there any reason you went with 'Anumidium' for Walk-Brass, instead of just 'Numidium'? As far as I know, the latter is by far the more commonly-used name. Nothing important, just something that stuck out to me on a read-through. -- Hargrimm^(T) 17:48, 8 April 2014 (GMT)

(edit conflict) At least four or five pages on the UESP already cited to the Skeleton Man interview, so I figured it was fair game. I thought I'd seen it referred to as marketing material from Bethesda, though I can't say where at the moment.

OOG has also mentioned the Prolix Tower, and then there's the Ceporah Tower, though I'm not sure if either could actually be considered one of "the Towers" within the meaning of the page. And Kirkbride's comments on the Stones seems to suggest that Falinesti is a Tower, as well (though it was a fan who first offered this assertion, and he may have simply neglected to correct due to his whole "open source lore" stance). More than anything, I just wanted to clarify that the list is not necessarily comprehensive.

I went with Red-Heart to best match the titular name of the other Towers, though I'd be fine with changing it.

I was really stretching for sources on Crystal-Like-Law; some of it is based on info from the Crystal Tower page, which cites Arena, and I haven't corroborated it. The bit about dracochrysalis is described in Nu-Mantia as "keeping elder magic bound before it could change into something lesser". Much like the Psijic Order's (initial) goal, I interpreted this to mean that they sought to keep their world as unchanging as possible. This also seemed to match the general Altmeri worldview. Anyways, I can just remove my paraphrasing and leave it to readers to interpret.

The precise meaning of "Aldmer" is open to interpretation in many contexts. Delineating where the Aldmer ended and the various elven races began often seems impossible, and the term could still be used to refer to elves in general even after distinct races emerged. That's why I consciously tried to remain vague in some places, such as by referring to the "elves of Summerset" instead of the Altmeri or Aldmeri in the Crystal-Like-Law section. Anyways, as I noted in the intro to The Towers section, the terms here are more metaphysical designations than they are racial.

I understand Convention as occurring outside known time. In other words, it's still happening. Much like how the Last Dragonborn entered Azura's Star, Convention may very well be happening within the Zero Stone. In which case, they could be one and the same. The Stone is Convention is the physical stone within Direnni Tower. But that's the kind of thing I thought better left to the forums. I could expand on this a bit, though, without drawing conclusions; let me track down the Nu-Mantia language you're referring to.

The Skeleton Man interview used Anumidium, as did Baladas in Morrowind when referring to Divine Metaphysics, and they were both unambiguously referring to the "god", rather than the physical golem. Since it was the name the "authorities" were using, it struck me as most likely being the proper name. Minor Edits^{Threats•Evidence} 18:09, 8 April 2014 (GMT)

I think the Falinesti-is-a-tower thing stems from the idea that Falinesti and Green-Sap were one and the same. Although new info from ESO now suggests this is not the case. (Or, that Falinesti is another representation of Green-Sap.) --Enodoc (talk) 18:31, 8 April 2014 (GMT)

(←) Jimeee, in regards to Convention-as-Stone, I assume you're referring to this: Our forebears saw the erection of Ada-mantia, Ur-Tower, and the Zero Stone. Let the Elders acknowledge this truth: every Tower bears its Stone. The impossipoint of the Convention was the first, though another bears the true title of First Stone. I don't construe this as saying that Convention is the Stone, but that the Stone was used at Convention; that it in essence belonged to Convention. The rest of Nu-Mantia seems to support that understanding, particularly Letter #5.

And if anyone can corroborate or debunk the Crystal Tower info from Arena, that'd be great. If not, I'll just keep digging.

Anyways, hope I'm not failing to address a concern above ... shout it out again if I have. Minor Edits^{Threats•Evidence} 21:21, 8 April 2014 (GMT)

I sent off an inquiry at TIL regarding the Skeleton Man interview, and I'm just polishing a couple things right now. If there's nothing further, I'll set up the lore page once I've gotten clarification on that. Minor Edits^{Threats•Evidence} 00:29, 9 April 2014 (GMT)

Idea about the UESP Main Page, and what UESP is

Hello everyone! Avron here again. I want to first congratulate all of the wiki contributors for doing such a great job with TESO (which is how the rest of the world says it - that's my two cents on that old issue ;) ). I wanted to alert your attention to a forum post I wrote over at the forums. I think it is a bit long to reduplicate and clutter on the CP, but of course I want to share the idea with the wiki folks who do not necessarily read the forums and really would like to know your thoughts. It has to do with UESP as a site, future growth, and of course a proposal for a new main page space. You can find it here.

And, of course, a shameless plug to remind you that the SMPs are available to highlight new pages you've been working hard on with the community, and are always looking for suggestions or folks to help out! Feel free to contact me anytime, anyway! Damon just got involved with the Twitter, and it's already near doubled its fellowship, not to mention we've surpassed 1,000 followers on Facebook and the other pages are doing great!

Thank you kindly! -- Avron the S'wit (talk) 19:59, 8 April 2014 (GMT)

So the new sections would be completely replace the featured article, image, and did you know sections? Jeancey (talk) 20:06, 8 April 2014 (GMT)

(edit conflict) Nearly doubled is a bit of an exaggeration, but it is growing. A 33% increase is more accurate, but it's still growing :p

Jeancey: It wouldn't replace the wiki page, it wouldn't be part of the wiki as far as I can tell. It's a central hub page on the main uesp.net address that links around to everything (wiki, blog, fora, SMP), and it puts them all in the spotlight. I imagine FA/FI would remain on the wiki page :) -damon  ^{talk ♥ contribs} 20:08, 8 April 2014 (GMT)

Nothing wrong with making the main page more of a hub for all parts of the site and less detached from being wiki-only usage. All it ever gets is news available elsewhere and our featured stuff. The Did you Know's can be dropped if needed for space imo. Silence is Golden^{Break the Silence} 20:48, 8 April 2014 (GMT)

People come here because for the wiki first and foremost, cluttering the main page with community focused assets just looks bad. Furthermore, a huge part of the appeal to the site is our dedication to our usual theme, and the always awesome MonoBook look. Our front page is a selling point to visitors, the community assets are there to convince them to stay. If it were to be added, it should be added to the bottom. --AKB ^{Talk Cont Mail} 20:52, 8 April 2014 (GMT)

I think it's worth discussing, AKB, and I think highlighting other areas helps attract the social community you want. They aren't necessarily coming right now, and this was my thoughts on why. I still think it is a cool idea and would serve nicely to the whole community! Besides, with people not knowing about other areas of the site, it's hard to say that folks wouldn't come for the wiki and stay for other things, if they also knew they were there. ;)

And oops, sorry Damon. I got excited, but you've done such a great job already! --Avron the S'wit (talk) 20:54, 8 April 2014 (GMT)

(edit conflict) AKB, what's the incentive to stay, if not for the community, though? For all the good UESP is for content, I'm sure a lot of the users (definitely myself included), wouldn't be around if there was no community to speak of. All business, while fun for some, simply isn't going to do all the work and keep it all good and happy here. The whole point of the forum, the blog, and social media project, etc is to have a community and communication. How would we make it clear that we are fun people and not boring bad admins who like reverting stuff and being bossy about rules?

I simply don't like the idea of not mentioning anything about our community side (or mentioning it in small lines that nobody reads). Besides, with a little creative CSS and HTML work, the main page could look like it has always belonged. -damon  ^{talk ♥ contribs} 20:59, 8 April 2014 (GMT)

(←) I believe you are seriously misjudging our audience. Most visitors stay here for about seven minutes if I recall Daveh's post on the subject, because they needed to look up something really quick. Advertising the forums, blog, and social pages will not encourage these people, who will only be upset by us changing our layout, to visit them more. Furthermore, it's not like we're keeping these things a secret, they're on the sidebar for goodness sake. They get traffic, clearly, and they are growing at a steady pace. As I have already said, I would be alright allowing it onto the front page, below the primary site content, but it's not going to be the front page. --AKB ^{Talk Cont Mail} 21:03, 8 April 2014 (GMT)

Well, that's the point of the discussion - for everyone to give feedback and ideas. I'd still like thoughts on other things brought up there, since it's not up to one person to say "No" and end the discussion. This is a community, like it or not, and I think it's fine to say why you don't like it. Saying "it's not going to be" is not up to you, AKB, and I think you should try to think about being more constructive in your criticisms so as to not discourage discussions on simple ideas with a bang of your judge's gavel. In any case, I'd love to hear folks ideas for or against it, or other suggestions. These are just my version of ideas, but it's also based on feedback with our fans outside of editors and admins and registered users across several sites and the SMPs, and I'd love to hear the goods and bads and thoughts. But I think it's too early to end the conversation completely, with all respect. Perhaps something can evolve out of the idea, plus I'd love to see what other folks think as well! --Avron the S'wit (talk) 21:13, 8 April 2014 (GMT)

Please don't put words in my mouth, I never said the conversation was over. Furthermore, please focus the discussion on the topic, and not on specific users in it. I said what I would be alright with. I am not alright throwing away the main page for something the majority of users do not care for. I am alright giving it some space, as I have now said several times. It's called the middle ground, destroying one of the site's major selling points for things that our audience has been time and time again shown to be at most ambivalent about, even by our long time users, is not going to do us any favors. --AKB ^{Talk Cont Mail} 21:25, 8 April 2014 (GMT)

I just wanna second Silencer; the Did You Know page could be abandoned entirely. I think it was started as a space-filler, but we clearly have better things to do with that space now. Minor Edits^{Threats•Evidence} 21:26, 8 April 2014 (GMT)

(edit conflict) ...but catching up on what happened while I was editing, let me just add that I think the last line of AKB's post came out wrong, perhaps, so let's just let that go and not get into some big drama-filled debate over a few words. Now, on to what I originally had typed:

Despite appearances to the contrary, I'm not actually a very social person. This is why I have a grand total of three posts on the forum in the past five years, and why my attendance in IRC is sporadic. As for other things, like Tumblr and our blog, I'm barely aware they exist. (The fact that I hide them from my sidebar probably doesn't help with that.)

Now, where am I going with this? Well, despite what I said above, I wouldn't mind becoming at least a bit more involved in our forums, at the very least. I don't visit the main page all that often, but I'd guess I probably see it for one reason or another at least once a month, maybe more. If there were other info on it such as top recent forum posts or the subject of the latest blog post, that would probably get me to visit them at least a little more often. I wouldn't be surprised if other users are in this same boat. In other words, show us what we're missing! So, in that light, I would agree with the idea in principle. I have to disagree with AKB's suggestion of putting it at the bottom, though. Doing that is like shuffling it off to the middle of nowhere that no one's going to see unless they're looking for it. That runs counter to the point of making this a larger community than just the wiki. And as I recall, developing the larger community was something that was highlighted as highly desirable in the responses to the questionnaire a while back. – Robin Hood  ^(talk) 21:54, 8 April 2014 (GMT)

A small aside about the Did You Know thing, before I forget it - those pages could be preserved as Tweets, since Twitter followers always request random page links and love, love, love lore and trivia. That way, if folks wanted to toy with removing that space for other things, the material that was gathered there can still be shared in other ways! --Avron the S'wit (talk) 22:05, 8 April 2014 (GMT)

(edit conflict) Social media links could be easily incorporated into the dead space in the current header. That would make them prominent, yet easy for uninterested people to ignore. If we cut the Latest News section down to 2-3 posts instead of four, that would leave plenty of space to show blog post(s) just below. Which makes sense to me, because while we've had several blog posts recently, we're displaying "news" from February on the main page. And if we got rid of "Did you know?" (or transitioned it into a social media thing like Avron was saying), that would leave plenty of room for a forum-related section. Minor Edits^{Threats•Evidence} 22:10, 8 April 2014 (GMT)

(←) I think AKB honestly has a major point (which I may be slightly misinterpreting but oh well): People come for the information and stay for the community. I happen to be one of those people. I think that the community features could be featured slightly more prominently, but not by a whole lot. The "Did You Know" stuff I kinda like, but the problem is that it never changes/gets updated. If it were to stay (which I kinda hope it does, maybe make it less prominent), I think it should have some fresh trivia every once and awhile. •WoahBro^►talk 22:14, 8 April 2014 (GMT)

That's what I mean WoahBro. I believe that replacing the Did You Know? section with automatically updating lists of community stuff would be the best option here. --AKB ^{Talk Cont Mail} 22:16, 8 April 2014 (GMT)

That sounds like it could make everyone happy, and I'm all for that. Aka I support it. •WoahBro^►talk 22:22, 8 April 2014 (GMT)

(edit conflict) While I think it is nice to have a community behind the wiki, I wholeheartedly agree with AKB – there is a clear reason why people are attracted to the UESP, and that is because we have this cool no-bull philosophy, our main page is not overly cluttered with social media and ads, and there is an overall feel of seriousness about the entire thing. If I need a walkthrough for a game, I automatically seek out the most serious page around, not the page with an attractive community. In fact, I’m not even here for the community (although I have made, and lost, quite a few friends over time), I’m here to maintain the coolest gaming site on the www. All in all, and once again, if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it. Feel free to call me an old geezer, but I have seen my share of popular sites crash and burn in an attempt to attract everybody. Come for the info, stay for the community – well put, WoahBro! --Krusty (talk) 22:24, 8 April 2014 (GMT)

I agree with Krusty's sentiment. The UESP is primarily a wiki, and our main page should reflect that. The site's social network is secondary to that. —Legoless (talk) 22:32, 8 April 2014 (GMT)

I'm all for it. What I was going to say in response to Damon's blog post (but didn't, as I accidentally deleted it before I could post it) is that I think we need to be willing to be flexible and change in order to keep up with other wikis. Particularly on the subject of ESO, which is a type of game that we have never documented before here, and has a theme and a community more in common with World of Warcraft than with Skyrim. That doesn't mean we need to rip everything out and go in a completely different direction, but I'm of the opinion that change, when it is properly thought out, is good. And I do not understand some of the opposition to this. How would it hurt to have a more prominent social media and forums? Who is it going to turn off? We aren't deleting or even changing the wiki portion, we are simply elevating the social media to the same prominence. It has chance to attract a different group of people without losing any. I think we are foolish if we think that the wiki does not need to change, or that social media is not important. --AN|L (talk) 22:37, 8 April 2014 (GMT)

What's important here is to gauge what the overall readerships is interested in. Thankfully the UESP survey from the end of 2012 gives some great insight and really should be the cornerstone of any discussion that takes place about this. When asked "Rate how much you would like to see the following features on the UESP", the results revealed less than 20% wanted more social media integration and about 20% wanted better forum, chat and blog integration. Over 25% simply did not desire anything to do with social media and if we read the associated comments, we can see many people are just not interested. This is absolutely vital.

Yes, the forum, chat and blog are the least used - why this is, is up for debate. They are certainly there in the side bar, but not everyone knows about them. However, promoting parts of the site that large numbers of the readership have shown to be uninterested/indifferent to is very risky and can backfire. Trying to make the UESP a catch all for all the social aspects of Elder Scrolls can't be forced, it really has to happen naturally. People like to use different sites for different things - reddit, the official forums, gamefaqs etc.

My personal thoughts on this is that UESP is a wiki I use to gain information, period. I rarely get involved in the community stuff unless it's wiki related. If I want to discuss the games/lore, its usually on reddit where I am most comfortable. I don't see myself switching. That's just me. In addition, I suggest treading very carefully in changing the main page. I originally come from the wikia, and Avron the S'wit paint mockup brought back some bad memories from there. Not that I am trying to compare the two or say that what didn't work there can't work here, but there wikia overlords were (and still are) pushing heavy for social integration, including videos, twitter and all that jazz. I honestly didn't think it was effective overall. The focus shifted from the wiki to the community stuff, which it turns out was what many people there were more interested in (Again, i'm certainly not saying that would happen here!). Also, blogs and forum posts on the main page can give an unprofessional aura, most of the time. The UESP front page is great the way it is. A fear of being left behind in the social media rush is unfounded. The quality of this site speaks for itself and it is serving its purpose masterfully. --Jimeee (talk) 22:39, 8 April 2014 (GMT)

(←) Wow, I completely forgot about user survey. Now that it's been brought up, I think that since honestly a lot has changed in the world and it may reflect on the feelings of users. That being said, it could be a good idea to have another user survey before long. Maybe late summer/early fall? That way probably most of ESO will be covered and surge traffic should have die down by then. Then any new users since late 2012 (which that's probably what? half of our current user, maybe?) can say how they feel. I'm done rambling, let me know if I made no sense with my ramblings. •WoahBro^►talk 22:48, 8 April 2014 (GMT)

Just today alone, both Avron and I saw fit to create both forum and CP topics for the issue we wanted to address because the wiki editors and forum posters are very distinct groups. We should really try to find a way to address that issue, because it's pretty inefficient and impractical. Important things said in one convo might get missed by people who are only viewing the other convo. We can't force them to become the same group, obviously, but we should try to find a way to make sure info is being disseminated properly. Minor Edits^{Threats•Evidence} 22:52, 8 April 2014 (GMT)

(edit conflict) I like ME's suggestion of incorporating links into the header, as well as the idea of replacing the Did You Know section. A lot of people try chatting on talk pages about the topic, or don't know that there is somewhere to talk about these things (forums). If we could replace the DYK section with 4-5 "most recent topics" from the forums--possibly placing it above the FI and FA--that would provide them with a nice spot to go. We certainly have space under the news, and could feature the start of a recent blog post, or another social media post (though the blog is more thorough). Even with percentages, we're talking about thousands of people being interested in social media. Blog posts get 1000+ views in a day. Facebook has 1000+ followers, and with more activity, the Twitter page has done better. The Tumblr has over 400 followers, and that increases whenever I post FIs or detailed posts. The main page has just under 4000 google+ recommendations. We've got people who love our social media. Vely^►t►e 22:57, 8 April 2014 (GMT)

For a site that had 23 million unique visitors and 530 million page views last year, those are all just drops in the water pail. While I support the improvement and further use of the social media services we have, it should not take precedence over the main focus of the site, if for no other reason than it is what is pulling in traffic. Turning over the main page is still a bad idea, and the more I discuss it, the less I want to give up any space. If we do anything, I think we'd just be replacing the DYK section with something that is (hopefully) more regularly updated.

Another really good point that's been brought up, besides the survey results (I mentioned them from memory, but didn't think to link it), we are also really busy right now. We've created several thousand pages over the last few days, making this doubly inconvenient for us. The summer will be a really better time for any kind of redesign stuff of this matter, as the site workload will be much less by then, hopefully. Additionally, it would give the social media pages a chance to prove their usefulness and value to the overall site. --AKB ^{Talk Cont Mail} 23:10, 8 April 2014 (GMT)

(edit conflict) I just want to clarify something here, because I think people are getting confused, and understandably so. Damon tried to say this at the beginning, but many people seem to have missed it or misunderstood. There are, in fact, two different "main pages" being discussed here. There's the wiki's Main Page and there's the page that you land on when you type "http://www.uesp.net" into your address bar. At the moment, if you type in "www.uesp.net", you land on the wiki's main page, but nothing says that's what has to happen. What Avron is proposing is changing it so that instead of landing on the wiki's main page, you land on an aggregate page that includes links to and/or snippets from all the different components of the site. The wiki's Main Page does not need to be altered in any way. – Robin Hood  ^(talk) 23:18, 8 April 2014 (GMT)

It is changing it since you are moving the address of the page, still. And I find that to be the least ideal option. I believe the wiki should be the main page as it is the focus and center of the site. Changing that for the benefit of the other parts of the site can only be seen at harming the majority of our user's experiences for the benefit of a minority of users. I recall a discussion about the sidebar, where it was widely agreed that making someone have to go through more than one link to get to any major page is a waste of their time, and could drive them away. Now imagine that, but applied to the entirety of the site. I certainly care about the other parts of the site, but that's going a bit too far to help them, when it is still unclear if it would help them even. Let's not destroy what we do have to attain what we might be able to get. --AKB ^{Talk Cont Mail} 23:35, 8 April 2014 (GMT)

(←) The address of the Main Page is, and presumably always will be, http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Main_Page or simply Main Page if you're already on the wiki. What changes is whether or not you get redirected to that page when you just type www.uesp.net. Up to now, the two have been one, but in reality, they're not. All this talk of removing or adding things to the wiki's Main Page to make space for other things is what I'm trying to address. Nothing needs to be added or removed from the wiki's Main Page, we don't need to change it's name, nor do we need to change its URL. If I took a screenshot of Main Page today, made the change Avron is proposing, and took a screen shot of Main Page tomorrow, nothing would have changed. If I took a screenshot of http://www.uesp.net today, made the change, and took a screenshot of it again tomorrow, that would be different. You'd no longer be sitting on http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Main_Page, you'd be sitting on http://www.uesp.net, because that would now be a page in its own right rather than a redirect. That's all I'm trying to clarify. – Robin Hood  ^(talk) 23:52, 8 April 2014 (GMT)

Thank you for the clarification, I understand that. I still think that http://www.uesp.net should just redirect to http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Main_Page. For the immediate future, I would support adding content below (see Wikipedia's Main Page, specifically the "Other Areas of Wikipedia" or "Sister Projects" section, I would love to add that into there), or if it could be tastefully done, change DYK to be social media stuff. Beyond that, I am opposed to any changes, but would be more open to further talk in a few months. --AKB ^{Talk Cont Mail} 00:01, 9 April 2014 (GMT)

I've got to agree with AKB here (not that it pains me to do so). I don't think separate pages is necessary, and if we did separate them, there would be a significant degree of overlap. I'd imagine that advocates for the main page might not like it getting "boxed out" by having a social media at uesp.net. The Main Page is just that - the head honcho, the foundation and top of the pyramid, the alpha and the omega. Ultimately, I'd agree with what others have said - we're a wiki first. It would seem more appropriate to me to have a supplemental "social media" page, if anything, rather than to subordinate the Main Page in that fashion, if we're insistent on separating the two in the first place. But like I've been saying, though, I think a compromise can eventually be reached on changing the Main Page to better complement the emerging features of the site.

I can't say I'm a fan of dragging our feet, though. Things move fast with MMOs (or so I've been led to believe). We're going to get a lot of traffic in the next few months, and I'd see this as a reason to act now rather than delay. Minor Edits^{Threats•Evidence} 00:13, 9 April 2014 (GMT)

Definitely to clarify that RH is right, and the suggestion was that uesp.net not redirect automatically to the wiki but a "main page" for the site. I think it's very hard to discuss what to do with UESP as a site (not as a wiki) because you get very different opinions depending on where you go. From what I've seen so far, I see that folks that use UESP as a site, including the wiki and the forums (and the blog and what have you) tend to be supportive of something, whatever the "something" is to be decided by everyone, to support all aspects of UESP. Those who primarily use the wiki sans forums usually like to leave it alone and don't usually show much interest in forum involvement (which is fine, as it is an unknown for many who don't use it). When talking to strangers (non-registered users) about UESP, the vast majority don't know it exists beyond a wiki, and it's hard to say if it's because they don't generate interest or they're just unknowns because they aren't equally featured. I like having subforums with threads and wiki pages with things like even the Social Media Pages, but if folks can't find them easily or don't know they're there, it's hard to drum up interest. The problem is with how to say "Hey, we can compete with these other fan sites because we do have it all!" without erasing that the UESP wiki is strong, which I don't think anyone disputes.

None of the thoughts were to take away from the weight of the wiki or to fundamentally change the wiki, but rather to question the direction UESP wants to go from the folks who use it. The difficulty here I'd like to really point out is the great divide depending on where folks lay, which isn't made easier by the fact we cannot have a conversation together since it's either wiki or forums with no in between, and it's hard to relay how the people who do use the site and contribute to the site and equally run the site feel and want to take it, since we can't all talk together and spend a lot of time running back and forth. Since I'm primarily from the forums, I can say that people who use the forums and wiki equally are more aware of the "artificial divide" between UESP as a wiki and UESP as a site that does a lot of stuff. If nothing else, something to amend this would be great. Plus, it wouldn't hurt to share things like the blog, which someone commented they didn't even know existed and they were a hardcore site user. (Posts get auto shared on Twitter, which helps somewhat, and hopefully fixing the reCAPTCHA issue I pointed out to AKB earlier and he will look into will help with the lack of comments posts receive.)

I guess, primarily, it's an issue complicated by the weight of opinions on either side of the forums/wiki divide, made complicated by a cohesive way for the entire community to communicate, in addition to figuring out if anything like this is beneficial to our public non-registered users, which was my primary idea for the suggestion. (And hey! I spent time on that Paint doodle! A whole 20 seconds! ;) ) In the very least, I would be happy if we could find a smooth way for the community to come together, because half of the members do want it, and I think it would benefit the wiki by introducing you to forum users who have time to contribute to wiki projects as well, and vice versa and et cetera. In a world where, realistically, we all won't be involved in every area of the site, it would at least be encouraging to have an easy way for us to all talk together to share ideas and growth. --Avron the S'wit (talk) 01:18, 9 April 2014 (GMT)

I'll re-post this here as well as the forum thread.

After reading the comments here, I have to say that the statistics given don't point to a necessary change. 23 million unique visitors in a year and only 20% of them want more social media content does not give me confidence that the UESP is where they want to go for latest news or social interaction.

I think replacing the Did You Know section with more prominent links to the social media pages, blog and forum would be a good first step, and one that we should take and be happy with, then revisit the topic after a few months to see what impact it has had. -- Musicman247 ^(talk) 15:53, 9 April 2014 (GMT)

(←) Something Thelastdovah said in the forum topic got me thinking: is there any point in having separate IRCs for the forum and the wiki? Minor Edits^{Threats•Evidence} 18:22, 9 April 2014 (GMT)

The only reason I could see is different communities, but I wouldn't be against our chats going Captain Planet (combining). -- Musicman247 ^(talk) 19:41, 9 April 2014 (GMT)

The forums and the wiki clearly appeal to different people, and the communities that have developed are quite separate from one another. While the wiki is the main selling point of the site, we do have these different outlets under the UESP banner. We opened up the IRC and picked up a few new people by having the chat tab at the top of every page, so more visibility does lead to more usage. Elder Scrolls forums are quite large and active, but we do a disservice to our own by consigning it to a few semi-random links here and there. I think there's a fear that promoting our forums and other social media might lead to more forum-type discussions on the wiki, but I don't think that would be the case.

I don't think there should be anything between the front page of the UESP and the wiki, as the wiki is the biggest draw and the main part of the site. What we should do is give the other parts of the site some proper display on the front page, otherwise they may as well be some other site not linked to the UESP. This includes the forum, the blog, and the social media, as each caters to a different audience, and the IRC could be thrown into the mix as its an outlet for wiki editors (i.e. the wiki community). To me the sidebar is not a valid form of representation, its a collection of links. This leads me to another point I want to make concerning the social media; as I've said they cater to different audiences, but we try to have the same content on all three, which doesn't do anything to show our creativity. I would like them each to be given over to someone who has an interest in that media form, and allowed to make posts that their audience show an interest in.

So to roundup, 'come for the wiki stay for the community' doesn't really work if we don't inform people where the community can be found. Silence is Golden^{Break the Silence} 20:14, 9 April 2014 (GMT)

I put out an open request to Tweet in requests for content, and I will do so periodically, enabling me to tailor the UESP Twitter experience to what the community wants, and that's led to sharp increase in follower activity on Twitter in the last two days, as well as communication between the UESP Twitter and its followers. So, why not follow a similar trend with the other pages? Sure, post FAs, FIs, major TES news, but also encourage interaction between the community and make them feel involved by allowing them to influence the content seen, and then do posts that they want to see, and take an extra few minutes to individually reply to comments, even if they are redundant? It certainly appears to help them feel involved. -damon  ^{talk ♥ contribs} 20:23, 9 April 2014 (GMT)

I've made a few posts askin' folks what they want to see, but they're usually indecisive (except for that glorious Twitter audience!). The real content changer is in the interaction aspect, since the communities interact in different ways. I do a lot of FAQ on Facebook with messages and wall posts, and G+ has a pretty active comment audience who asks questions, but they comment on completely different things. And no one really cares about the MMO right now, except to let you know they're dying for a list of craft material locations. ;) Some things you should share across all audiences, and we can cater if we could figure out what to cater too. However, if anyone wants to help do some research there and get involved, that'd be pretty super. I spend a lot of time asking for suggestions and don't usually get them, and as much as I wish I had the time to sort through our millions of pages and forum topics and figure out what's most interesting...well, you know, I don't, and I'm sure it's not a secret I am not in the best health to do so at the moment. So don't be afraid about suggestions or to ask to become involved. Or screenshots. Please send me your screenies, people eat those up!

I like the idea of giving the other areas some representation on the front page, but I know from previous discussions we're just undecided about where other than the (I agree, inadequate) side bar. I think if we could come together to get creative about that in some light, it might help people feel involved. Maybe some tiiiiny tweaks to the (wiki) main page? I think the hard part is forum folk use the wiki and want to bounce ideas with you nice wiki folks, but there just isn't a real way to do that or get to know each other, and, at least forum side, it's really wanted! Merging chats might introduce us all to some cool people with great ideas, and it would also help spread the word about projects that do need help, like finding content for the SMPs? --Avron the S'wit (talk) 21:13, 9 April 2014 (GMT)

NPC Sliders

I would just like to know if we could do that kind of page on this wiki. It would help provide info for what sliders NPCs use (e.g., face, mouth, hair etc). Place your thoughts, ideas, and opinions below. DG^{Any Questions?} 17:17, 10 April 2014 (GMT)

I do not believe this information is necessary or beneficial to the wiki. Not to mention I have no idea how we would collect that information? --Nocte|Chat|Look 17:29, 10 April 2014 (GMT)

Collecting the info might work if it's Skyrim on PC, but for other things it wouldn't. But that's besides the point. Why do we need such a thing? A high-quality picture fills any need I can think of. likelolwhat ^{talk lulzy to me} 18:15, 10 April 2014 (GMT)

With as many combinations as there are for each race in each game, do we even need that much? That's dozens of pictures to show off just one single slider. That would be the Gallery from Hell to showcase every single difference for each combination. I find slider information to be about the most unhelpful thing that could be thought of. That's a lot of work for practically zero gain in return. -damon  ^{talk ♥ contribs} 18:19, 10 April 2014 (GMT)

There's a website called Truancy Factory with Skyrim sliders. Unfortunately, the founder is too busy to add more. That's where my suggestion came from. DG^{Any Questions?} 18:35, 10 April 2014 (GMT)

For those who don't want to Google, the idea behind Truancy Factory (aka Famous Faces of Skyrim) is that by setting your character's sliders to the same values, you can get your character to be the twin, or a very close approximation, of a specific NPC. While it's an interesting idea, it's really not something I think UESP is geared towards, and it would be a lot of work. Something like that would be better off in CSList, but it's not there currently, and I doubt if anybody wants to work on adding information that's that trivial, all the more so with all the work going on for ESO right now. – Robin Hood  ^(talk) 18:42, 10 April 2014 (GMT)

Knowing how the busy founder of that other site can't just "hand over" founder priviliges (i.e., adding sliders) to someone, I figured we could build a slider database here instead.

Thoughts? DG^{Any Questions?} 19:05, 10 April 2014 (GMT)

There's no real value to having that kind of information here. It would be a huge amount of images of a subjective result that I can't fathom why anyone would want to accomplish. It's completely out of our scope of useful information. -- Hargrimm^(T) 19:21, 10 April 2014 (GMT)

Firstly, let's see some admins provide input on this.

(←) I'm not sure who this "we" is... It seems to me that everyone else has said no, you are the only one who is saying yes. This is clearly a no. Admins have no more weight in consensus than anyone else. It's a no. Jeancey (talk) 19:50, 10 April 2014 (GMT)

This "we" is us — the community of the UESP Wiki.

I know how you're saying the admins don't have anymore weight in consensus, but at least we can see what they have to say first. DG^{Any Questions?} 20:23, 10 April 2014 (GMT)

I don't know how you cannot see that everyone who has responded (that is we, yes?) has said no. No, admins don't have any more say in this than anyone else, but as a point of fact, two admins (one albeit temporary) have chimed in and both have said no. Add this as another 'no', because I don't see the point in these sliders. •WoahBro^►talk 20:26, 10 April 2014 (GMT)

Let's try to keep this discussion constructive. I'm normally a big proponent of "full documentation" of the games on our pages, but this goes beyond that even for me. Assuming it would involve taking and uploading images of each combination of appearance options for each race, the resulting page size staggers the imagination, all just to document one small aspect of the game. I vote no on this. --Xyzzy ^Talk 20:49, 10 April 2014 (GMT)

It is impractical to the extreme for us to do this. Jeancey (talk) 20:50, 10 April 2014 (GMT)

If you could entirely automate the process, and include it in such a way that such a hefty data dump wouldn't interfere with the rest of the page's content, then I would be fine with this being done. In any other circumstance, I do not think it would be that valuable to the UESP to have this added. --AKB ^{Talk Cont Mail} 21:10, 10 April 2014 (GMT)

If we wanted to use dynamic sliders, that would be a massive undertaking not only to create an interactive 3D tool and embed it in a webpage, but also to re-render each and every customization option. If we wanted to use static images, according to the ESO stats there are 5.0952187 * 10^58 possible character combinations. If each image took up 1kb (which is nowhere near how much it'd actually take), it'd use up 5.09 * 10^61 bytes, which is 5 billion billion billion trillion times larger than all hard drive space on the planet. So no, I don't think this is a feasible idea. • JA^T 23:13, 10 April 2014 (GMT)

(←) I've not played ESO, but how many of those sliders don't make a cosmetic change? Omitting those ones would cut a large number out of the grand total, but at the end of the day, it's still just unfeasible to accomplish something like that. -damon  ^{talk ♥ contribs} 23:18, 10 April 2014 (GMT)

I'm usually a proponent of adding more stuff to the wiki, but in this case it's just completely unrealistic. Even if it could be automated, it's still a huge upload and I can't think many people are going to be interested in that. --AN|L (talk) 23:25, 10 April 2014 (GMT)

Pros: Gives info on NPC Sliders

Cons: Unrealistic. Page wouldn't load properly. Too long. DG^{Any Questions?} 07:05, 11 April 2014 (GMT)

This will just be for Skyrim. What do you think of just having NPC sliders for Skyrim NPCs, and not Online, or Oblivion? DG^{Any Questions?} 15:35, 11 April 2014 (GMT)

The reason beyond discussing this was because TruancyFactory.com is not active anymore, so there will be no more sliders on there. The founder couldn't just "hand over" ownership, so I thought I could discuss it on here because the slider requesters on that website aren't getting their requests fulfilled. DG^{Any Questions?} 17:06, 11 April 2014 (GMT)

(←) Well, it's been discussed, and it's near unanimously (with you the only one who wants it) against the inclusion of this, because of how much work it would take for a novelty item. And, what's the point doing it for one game, but not all the other games even if we did do it? That doesn't make sense to me at all. -damon  ^{talk ♥ contribs} 17:44, 11 April 2014 (GMT)

I brought up a similar suggestion a few years back: listing NPC ages based on the age slider in Oblivion. As far as I recall it was shot down. —Legoless (talk) 23:24, 11 April 2014 (GMT)

I took a look over at Skyrim Sliders, which seems to be part of a larger project called famous faces of Skyrim, and it seems to me that there is some misunderstanding about how it works. It doesn't display screenshots of characters with slider values you put in. Rather, the author opened up the Creation Kit entries for various NPCs and recorded the values of each slider (i.e. how many notches they are from the far left). For instance, they opened up the entry for Hroki and wrote down the slider values that made up her face. They also created a screenshot and save files for beginning PCs that were constructed in this way. In all, there are a little over 100 NPCs represented. The author did also try playing with slider values to create faces of recognizable people from real life or other media (e.g. Gandalf), but that was unrelated to this.

Assuming that I'm understanding the project correctly, I'll risk the wrath of the other users and support doing what the author did: opening up the Creation Kit for existing NPCs and recording the values of the sliders that make up their faces here on UESP (there's only, what, 1000 or so?). I don't know if we can automate the process to pull the values from the creation kit like we do with other aspects of the game, but if so, then it wouldn't be that hard to do. I don't think we'd add any more screenshots; just creating a table or two that has numerical values. That said, I do realize that knowing the numerical value for Ulfric's nose height is pretty niche, so I would not be heartbroken if others felt it was too specific to put on this wiki. -Thunderforge (talk) 04:05, 12 April 2014 (GMT)

Thanks for the clarification. However, even doing it like that, which is absolutely doable, I still don't find any encyclopaedic value to any of that information. It's an interesting novelty, but it's not something UESP needs to host, IMO. -damon  ^{talk ♥ contribs} 04:50, 12 April 2014 (GMT)

I still don't see any value in this for our wiki. •WoahBro^►talk 05:59, 12 April 2014 (GMT)

Perhaps it would be helpful to describe why you and others don't see it as having any value for the wiki. Is there something about it that makes it inappropriate for the wiki? Is it too niche? Is there something else? -Thunderforge (talk) 06:09, 12 April 2014 (GMT)

(←) For how I feel, like you said, it's too niche. That information just wouldn't be of much use to people. Useful to individuals perhaps (for instance, I was overjoyed when I saw Astrid's setup), but to the general community and the average viewer, I just don't know how worthwhile that information could be, because not very many people (that I know of) get on the internet and think to themselves "I wonder which chin setting Balgruuf has underneath that hideous facial hair?". There's just not very much reward to cosmetic appearance, as opposed to what items he could potentially drop upon death, where he hangs out, his quests, etc. That's how I feel anyway. -damon  ^{talk ♥ contribs}

Taking into consideration the clarification from Thunderforge, this information is still not necessarily beneficial to the wiki but now I will concede that it MIGHT have a place in the CSList. --Nocte|Chat|Look 07:32, 12 April 2014 (GMT)

By the way, Nocte, why do you think it would have place in CSList and not on the wiki?

If it were on the wiki, I would suggest the pagename would be the NPC followed by a forward slash then Sliders (e.g., Skyrim:Siddgeir/Sliders). I have a few NPC sliders written down already (Siddgeir included).. DG^{Any Questions?} 09:23, 12 April 2014 (GMT)

I say I don't see any value for this site because these sliders can be classified as a part of roleplaying, which this site has been trying to minimize. These sliders just aren't wiki-like information. •WoahBro^►talk 15:06, 12 April 2014 (GMT)

Why are we still talking about this? 99% of people have said no. This isn't going to happen. Jeancey (talk) 15:07, 12 April 2014 (GMT)

I am still waiting for Nocte's reply; that is why I am still talking about it. DG^{Any Questions?} 15:34, 12 April 2014 (GMT)

My understanding was the same as what Thunderforge described. That was why I suggested that the CSList would be the better place for it, since it's a lot of data to add to each NPC (at least nineteen different stats in all, possibly a couple of others that are non-obvious). About the only purpose for doing this is so that you can make your PC look like a specific NPC, which might be an amusing roleplay for some users, but is otherwise useless info.

When you get right down to it, I believe there are a grand total of four people on the site with the knowledge and permission to either update CSList or extract the information from the game files and then get a bot to upload them to the wiki. So far, not one of them has stepped forward to say "Hey, sounds like a great idea, I'm willing to put in a couple of days' work, just so you can make Joe Blow look like Siddgeir." The amount of effort is rather large when compared to the trivial reward here. Those that have an interest in this sort of thing can either use the CK to get the info themselves or ask a PC user (whose friendship they don't mind losing :D) to copy those 19 stats for them. – Robin Hood  ^(talk) 15:56, 12 April 2014 (GMT)

I agree that CSList would be an appropriate place for this information if nowhere else. However you're right that if the small number of people who have access to it don't wish to add it, then there really isn't anything we can do about it. Since there is some vocal resistance against adding it to UESP at this time, perhaps it's something that Dragon Guard or others could put on a user namespace article. Heck, most of the legwork has already been done from the Skyrim Sliders website, so wouldn't be too tough to create. Since one of the biggest reasons against adding it is the amount of work involved, perhaps the community might reconsider in the future if the work was already done. But for now it seems that the community is feeling that it's not something they'd like to invest the time to add to the wiki. -Thunderforge (talk) 03:56, 13 April 2014 (GMT)

(←) Seriously this needs to stop. We CAN'T take the work that Skyrim Sliders has done in any way shape or form. That's illegal and has no place on the wiki. Feel free to do all the legwork yourself, but this is something that requires an immense amount of work for extremely little gain. I was mildly opposed to it when this started, but the more it gets talked about the more vehemently I oppose it. Seriously, this needs to stop, the answer has been an overwhelming no. Jeancey (talk) 04:01, 13 April 2014 (GMT)

I guess I should have added that any information taken from Skyrim Sliders would of course need to be with the permission of the author, but anyone could also duplicate the work by opening up the Creation Kit (as Robin Hood said, you can always ask a PC user whose friendship you don't mind losing). At any rate, if others do want to take it up on a smaller scale (either by adding it to CSList or creating it on a user page), I think that they certainly have a right to do so. -Thunderforge (talk) 04:26, 13 April 2014 (GMT)

I'll concede that it's a random user's prerogative to make a table and document all these slider notes within their own userspace, however nobody is wanting to host the information within the gamespace, and that's highly unlikely to change. I hate being a guy to suggest shutting off a topic, and I don't find doing such a thing to be my place, but this really needs to stop, as this conversation can not (and hasn't for a while) continue in a productive way. -damon  ^{talk ♥ contribs}c

Maybe it could go in the CSList. I know Daveh, Alfwyn, and Nephele (who's inactive) can add to the CSList.

And the fourth person? DG^{Any Questions?} 09:28, 13 April 2014 (GMT)

It doesn't matter at this point. Like Jeancey said, this is long over. This conversation has gotten nowhere and continues to be dragged out with no progress. (Isn't there a DiscussionClosed template or something? I think it'd be good to use here) •WoahBro^►talk 15:20, 13 April 2014 (GMT)

Only this. —Legoless (talk) 15:26, 13 April 2014 (GMT)

No Not Done. Jeancey (talk) 18:54, 13 April 2014 (GMT)

Order of zones on ESO articles

I'm trying to decide if we should change the default order in which zones are listed on pages that list thing found in them. Right now what we have is first splitting them by Alliance, and then just sorting them alphabetically. But they do have a set order, based on the order you're likely to encounter them, and the level of difficulty in each zone. This would be ordered like so:

Dominion	Covenant	Pact
Khenarthi's Roost Auridon Grahtwood Greenshade Malabal Tor Reaper's March	Stros M'Kai Betnikh Glenumbra Stormhaven Rivenspire Alik'r Desert Bangkorai	Bleakrock Isle Bal Foyen Stonefalls Deshaan Shadowfen Eastmarch The Rift

(It just so happens that for the Dominion, the alphabetical order is the same as level order except for Khenarthi's Roost, but for the others it's very different.) I'm not sure if this would just be confusing though. And then there's the issue of where to put Coldharbour and Cyrodiil. Based on level, Coldharbour would be after all of the other PvE zones, and Cyrodiil - bleh? Kind of its own thing. On some articles, we have Coldharbour and Cyrodiil listed alphabetically, after Aldmeri Dominion and before Daggerfall Covenant. On others, we have the three Alliances first, followed by Cyrodiil and then Coldharbour. I do at least prefer the orderings where Coldharbour and Cyrodiil are listed after the Alliances rather than in between, but that's just my opinion. And in pretty much every arrangement, we do have the Alliances themselves in alphabetical order - which means Aldmeri/Daggerfall/Ebonheart, though it could just as easily be Covenant/Dominion/Pact (sorry, Ebonheart Pact ends up last either way.) I mean, it might be construed as a bias towards Aldmeri or Covenant if we go either way, but come on, somebody has to go first, and the alphabet seems to be the fairest way of doing that. I'm not sure which ordering is best, but I do think we should at least try to be consistent. Any thoughts on this? — TheRealLurlock (talk) 15:06, 11 April 2014 (GMT)

I think this seems logical. I'm for this at the moment, we'll see if someone comes along and changes my mind. (Also, are you sure that Bal Foyen comes before Stonefalls? I've played in Stonefalls but not Bal Foyen, albeit it was the last beta so they could've changed it.) •WoahBro^►talk 15:12, 11 April 2014 (GMT)

Bal Foyen is arguably part of Stonefalls. It's where you land immediately after leaving Bleakrock. It's a very small zone, so you might've not realized it was separate. — TheRealLurlock (talk) 16:35, 11 April 2014 (GMT)

This would make sense to me as well. On a couple of pages where that order is more relevant, I think I may already have done this, and it's also the order I've been working on those pages in (to get the earlier ones done first). I also agree with Cyrodiil and Coldharbour being at the end, with Cyrodiil before Coldharbour. (And yes, Bal Foyen comes before Stonefalls storywise [even if the quest levels don't quite match up], and may also be considered separate politically [Stonefalls is Dunmer, Bal Foyen is arguably Argonian].) --Enodoc (talk) 17:06, 11 April 2014 (GMT)

I think alphabetical is just the simplest and easiest rule to follow. Dungeons in other games have a minimum level but we only split them by county (which were listed alphabetically too). Introducing rules that aren't that immediately apparent only ever leads to confusion. Silence is Golden^{Break the Silence} 17:49, 11 April 2014 (GMT)

I'm okay with that as well, just wanted to see if that was how most people felt about it - though I still think Cyrodiil and Coldharbour should be moved to the bottom, as they are definitely different from the main Alliance zones. — TheRealLurlock (talk) 19:25, 11 April 2014 (GMT)

I'd rather that all zones be alphabetized within factions, especially since the starting islands are no longer mandatory and the player can go anywhere they want to. -Thunderforge (talk) 22:58, 11 April 2014 (GMT)

"Most likely" isn't good enough. If all players were bound to experience the zones in the same order, it would make sense to list them in that order. But if that's not the case, alphabetical is the way to go. Insignificant Revisions^{Threats•Evidence} 01:40, 12 April 2014 (GMT)

(←) I'd rather sort them alphabetically as well, though with the level range of quests or enemies (like 5-11 or something) listed beside the zones, if/when applicable. Can't players visit them at level 50+/50++ or something anyway, making level sort of useless there? I also think Cyrodiil and Coldharbour should be their own separate section ("Unaligned" maybe). As for Aldmeri vs. Covenant, I'd put Aldmeri first, since that's the first part of the full name of the faction. Vely^►t►e 15:31, 12 April 2014 (GMT)

I'd generally be opposed to showing the level range of quests and enemies as it kind of breaks the flow and is subject to change (the starter islands now have higher levels than during the beta since they were changed to no longer be mandatory starting points). Regarding the order of factions, we should alphabetize them as well. If we say "Aldmeri Dominion" and "Daggerfall Covenant", Aldmeri Dominion should be first because A comes before D. If we say "Dominion and "Covenant", Covenant should be first since C comes before D. That said, I'm fine having Cyrodiil and Coldharbour come later, especially if they are under some sort of "Unaligned" or "Other" header. -Thunderforge (talk) 03:39, 13 April 2014 (GMT)

I want to point out that some in-game lists use the "level of the zone" order rather than alphabetical for zones, which means that there is a canonical order, even though players can visit zones in a different order. But the game uses alphabetical too, and sometimes inconsistently does both. For instance, looking at the Exploration achievements for any given alliance, before you earn any of them, the more general achievements are alphabetical at the top, but then the rest are in order of the level of the zone in which they occur. (Which I guess means that the developers never agreed upon a consistent ordering scheme, but that doesn't mean we can't.) Quantheory (talk) 07:21, 14 April 2014 (GMT)

Sorting by title

TRL is in the process of sorting everyone by their name, removing the title from the equation. In this case, it's Captain, Acolyte, Priest, etc. I honestly, don't think that there is a good reason to sort like this, as someone looking for Acolyte Krem, for instance, in the category, would look under A, not K. Across the wiki, we don't do this. Not in any of the namespaces. We do remove royal titles, on occasion, but that's it. Never titles such as Acolyte, Priest, etc. I think that a discussion should happen before we change the sorting of a couple hundred pages across games, so I'm opening this so the communities consensus can be reached. This also applies to Fort and Castle for place names. Jeancey (talk) 05:58, 15 April 2014 (GMT)

Have you ever looked at a phone book? Sorting by name is the proper thing to do. I'm not going to go so far as to say we should sort by last name (especially since many NPCs don't have them), but having all the "Captains" listed next to eachother is just wrong. They're often referred to in dialog without their title. And a person's title or rank can change (and in a few cases does so), while their name is permanent. Anyone who's searching the categories by title is confused already - we have a search bar prominently displayed on the side for exactly that reason, which will find things regardless of their sorting. I think if we remove "King" and "Queen", we should be consistent and remove all titles from the sortkey. That's just the way names should be sorted. — TheRealLurlock (talk) 06:06, 15 April 2014 (GMT)

For articles, we can always have a redirect for any alternate names (such as "Krem" for Acolyte Krem), but for lists we should list them exactly as they appear in game, because as Jeancey said that is the name people will search for. For instance, on Skyrim:Military Forts, we don't say Fellhammer (Fort), we say Fort Fellhammer. Even though most of the entries begin with "Fort", we still list the full name, because that is what's in the game. If you were to search for "Fellhammer", the correct page is the first result, so users shouldn't have any problems finding the info they need. For a comprehensive list of NPCs, the same applies - we list by exactly what's in the game, and if they can't find what they're looking for right away, they can search and find it right away. Expecting users to browse a list of improper names and search for the full name if they can't find it is counter-intuitive. • JA^T 08:17, 15 April 2014 (GMT)

I agree, we should sort by the full name listing as they are referred to ingame, that applies to NPC's, place and anything else, that's what someone who is looking for help is going to search for. Having redirects for things with multiple names or where the titles change is perfect and what the redirect should be used for. For instance Captain Lonely-Gale in Windhelm, he's never referred to as anything else, so what would be gained by sorting him or creating his page as just Lonely-Gale or Mr Lonely-Gale or anything else? That applies even more to places, if it's known in game as Fort Hardrock, no one is going to search for Hardock or any other format. We've always gone by ingame data and if the place is referred to as anything else it going in as a redirect. The only example I can think of is Secunda's Kiss which has a redirect of Secunda's Shelf. Finally even when a game mis-spells something we still use the incorrect spelling and add a redirect of the correct spelling, I don't have an example, but that just my brain not working. Biffa (talk) 12:11, 15 April 2014 (GMT)

For the record, we do ignore titles when alphabetizing the multitopic lore pages. However, we do so by the character's first name, so it's not entirely the same as the phone book. Insignificant Revisions^{Threats•Evidence} 12:19, 15 April 2014 (GMT)

I'm not talking about list articles. I'm talking about Categories. Lists can be formatted however we deem best in a situation (often by location or importance). Categories are automatically created and should be sorted by a person's proper name. If a character's rank changes from Captain to Major, you'd expect both those entries to be next to eachother, not one under 'C' and the other under 'M'. Names are immutable, titles and ranks are not. I still say that's the only proper way to sort names. — TheRealLurlock (talk) 15:11, 15 April 2014 (GMT)

Could an explanatory note on the category pages resolve your concern? I imagine that would be easier than removing titles from the sorting process. Insignificant Revisions^{Threats•Evidence} 15:06, 17 April 2014 (GMT)

Abandoned Sandboxes

The recent bot run to fix up a few remaining {{ID}} templates that were deliberately skipped the first time around has reminded me of an issue that I've wanted to bring up for some time now: sandboxes whose owners are no longer active on the wiki. Generally speaking, they're harmless, but they present a bit of an issue when we do things like changing templates. We're left in a position of either allowing the sandbox to slowly degrade in appearance if the templates are no longer compatible or links are deleted, or we have to make edits to a page to make those templates work or add {{Deleted}} tags as needed, when those edits will probably never serve a purpose.

What I'd like to suggest is that sandboxes for inactive users be effectively blanked, replaced with only a generic template explaining why the previous contents have been removed and that the user is free to undo the change if they want to come back and work on the project again. That puts the onus on the user who wants to return to the project, if they ever do, rather than making everyone else do needless updates that will only increase in number over time.

If people think this is a good idea, we should also consider the question of what's an appropriate length of time for a user to be considered as having abandoned a project and/or the wiki. Also, I think if it's unclear if a user is still active, then a talk page message would be appropriate instead. Lastly, there's the question of whether we should let the bot loose on this or only do it by hand as it becomes desirable to blank an older sandbox. Anyone else have any thoughts on this? – Robin Hood  ^(talk) 01:56, 20 April 2014 (GMT)

I don't have a problem with blanking an abandoned sandbox (a year unmodified sounds good to me). But, because we'd be tweaking a user's space, every time such a change is made, that user should receive a talk page message stating such an event has happened. Such things would have to happen by hand though, because sandbox names are typically too random and unpredictable to just automate (i.e. I use the Daedric alphabet for mine - Ayem, Bedt, Cess, Doht, etc; RH does Hebrew or something for his boxes, I've seen silly nonsensical names in the past, etc). It's just hard to have a bot do that when everything is not all /Sandbox_1, /Sandbox_2, etc. -damon  ^{talk ♥ contribs} 02:05, 20 April 2014 (GMT)

That's what I was thinking too, at first, but then it occurred to me that sandboxes are almost never transcluded, which I can detect via the bot, whereas most subpages will be. It may not be perfect, but it might be possible. I'd have to actually do a test run and see what came up to have a good idea of how doable it is. There certainly are some things, like signatures and edit messages, that would need to be detected in some other way. – Robin Hood  ^(talk) 02:53, 20 April 2014 (GMT)

Have you accounted for the bit where it's unlikely that fanfiction, photography albums, chore lists, mod pages, etc are unlikely to be transcluded as well? There are tons of pages that people don't necessarily transclude. Of course, you're the bot-man, so it's your prerogative to do it that way, but it seems like a lot of work to the uneducated on this kind of stuff :p -damon  ^{talk ♥ contribs} 04:40, 20 April 2014 (GMT)

Maybe it'd be better to post to the user's talk page BEFORE any such blanking? I'd say give a week - same as we do for Proposed Deletions. That way they have time to see that it's going to happen before it does. — TheRealLurlock (talk) 05:37, 20 April 2014 (GMT)

Damon: You do have a point—I wasn't thinking of all of those possibilities. Some of those could be accounted for, but probably a good number couldn't be, so by-hand seems like it's the better way to go.

Lurlock: Yeah, I'd been thinking of that as well after I wrote my original message. It is a little impolite to just randomly blank someone's sandbox. The one exception I would suggest is that banned users' sandboxes could be blanked on sight. Of the three that came to mind who were productive for a while before being banned, only one has any significant content in sandboxes in any event. – Robin Hood  ^(talk) 06:05, 20 April 2014 (GMT)

I think its best to leave it to humans, though an initial list obtained by the bot would be a starting point it shouldn't blank them imo. Banned users sandboxes could even be deleted, and if we're making some sort of policy then appeals need to be taken into consideration so it can't be straight away. The same sort of time for that can be applied to publicly declared retired editors (though the wikidiction has proved strong here). A year seems a touch excessive, especially as in a lot of cases the sandbox hasn't been touched for a while from before that. While I'm all for letting user pages alone and asking permission/informing the user before taking drastic action, sometimes its better to just do it. I actually have a habit of looking at when a sandbox was last edited when changing such things as file names, and it can be clear that a sandbox is really doing nothing more than taking up space and forcing pointless edits (like file name updates), and if it weren't for the diligence of people who monitor the Special:Wanted pages they would be in a state of disrepair. So in short, I support the proposal, suggest 3 months from an editors ban or retirement announcement, 6 months from a users last 'serious edits' or what would be deemed active (to me this means one talk page message in 3 months doesn't count as active), though in this case a talk page message may be prudent before blanking as an answer may be more likely. Lastly the user blanking should check to see if what is being blanked has any info that could be added or is missing from the subject of the sandbox and move it over. Silence is Golden^{Break the Silence} 07:45, 20 April 2014 (GMT)

(←) I'm completely opposed to this. Why on earth are abandoned sandboxes an issue? If old templates are cluttering up the wanted pages list, I think it would be far more productive and polite to add the {{deleted}} tags. I'd like to point out that this is the epitome of a non-issue, and if updating sandboxes to fix templates is ranked so lowly on the to-do list, I can't see how setting up a policy of blanking the pages is any higher. We don't interfere with user pages; we don't archive user talk pages apart from warnings. Why are we deleting user sandboxes? It seems nonsensical to me, and annoying to boot. Personally, I have several abandoned sandboxes where I store old projects and useful info. If I came back after, say, a month of inactivity and found the pages callously and arbitrarily blanked, I'd be a bit peeved having to go restore it. I'm sure it would be even more aggravating for users with limited wiki knowledge. As far as I'm concerned, creating a policy like this is plain discourteous, under the veil of supposed 'optimisation'. Can't we do something more productive than poking at old accounts and blanking their stuff? —Legoless (talk) 15:23, 21 April 2014 (GMT)

Well if we could discount userspace from all Special wanted pages that would solve any issues I have. Many many sandboxes have had no edits beside maintenance for years, and up to 10 edits at that. They do clutter the special pages which are supposed to be kept as empty as possible because that's their purpose, to show things that are an 'issue' that needs resolved. This does not pertain to sandboxes that only hold info, but pages that use templates and are basically sandboxed copies of a page that someone had an intention of editing. The time is and issue, but it will not be one month from last editing, we don't even update active patrollers/admins etc lists that often, and though for them it is generally around 1 month non-activity before calling them inactive, that has never caused a problem. Deleting was only my proposal in regards banned editors, what reason is there to keep such pages when that user cannot maintain or work on them. Of course the talk page message after the blanking of problematic sandboxes gives those users with limited wiki-knowledge an explanation, and could even have a link to the page difference so 3 clicks (view difference, undo, save) and viola, a user has come back from the dead. In short old sandboxes do cause problems, and a solution is necessary. Silence is Golden^{Break the Silence} 15:38, 21 April 2014 (GMT)

The problem for me is how much editing they require. Looking at Mxk101's sandbox, for example, which is an older copy of Oblivion:Horses, the bot was able to update most of the {{ID}} tags appropriately, but not all of them are as they should be. When the bot did its initial run, I updated the Horses page afterwards to fix some of the problems. Now, do I also have to go through Mxk's sandbox and update those, thus doubling the work, even though his copy of the page is now out of date? That's twice the work for no substantial gain. The other alternative is that I ignore the templates and let them break. The ID template ignores User space when tagging invalid IDs, but not all templates and Special pages are (or can easily be) set to do so. As time goes on, there will be more and more sandboxes, requiring more and more of editors' time to deal with.

In a similar fashion, bots are almost always expected to stay out of Template space, largely because templates often use much more complex formatting that's not easy to deal with programmatically. User space is sometimes considered inviolate, but sometimes it's appropriate for a bot to change it, depending on the specific edits. What do we do with templates that are in User space, like my sandboxes or elliot's? How do we deal with those?

As to ease of unblanking, that's why I chose blanking rather than deletion. Unblanking is as simple as "Undo", which most people who know how to create a sandbox already know how to do. Even if they don't, as Silencer says, it shouldn't be hard to add a feature like that to the template.

Lastly, if it helps to support the idea, Wikipedia has a similar policy: "Old copies of mainspace articles should be deleted if unused." – Robin Hood  ^(talk) 16:27, 21 April 2014 (GMT)

Under our current rules, that policy is already in effect here, we just didn't know about it. Silence is Golden^{Break the Silence} 16:32, 21 April 2014 (GMT)

As long as the template has an undo button so that the editor can return to work if they genuinely desire that page, and as long as we give users 6 months to a year of inactivity before we blank their pages (and I'm pushing towards the latter), I'm still all for it. -damon  ^{talk ♥ contribs} 16:41, 21 April 2014 (GMT)

I think it's possible some of the responders are getting confused between inactive wiki'ers having their sandboxes blanked and active wiki'ers have sandboxes that haven't had activity. It's the former that this was initially aimed at. It was purposed that a talk page message be used for the latter group. Biffa (talk) 10:02, 22 April 2014 (GMT)

(←) Since I'm the one who proposed this idea, I probably shouldn't be the one to make the final call on it. Can someone else please review the discussion and figure out whether we have a consensus, and if so, what it is. I'm willing to write the policy (or we can just leave Wikipedia's in place by default), I just don't want to make the final ruling. – Robin Hood  ^(talk) 15:07, 30 April 2014 (GMT)

Health on ESO NPC pages

Do we really need to include the Health field on every NPC page? The vast majority of these pages are friendly NPCs - mostly vendors, who can never be attacked and are never in any kind of danger, so their health is completely 100% irrelevant to game-play. Having pages without this data listed just leaves a ^? on the page and automatically places it into categories for pages that are missing data, even though this data is in no way of any use to the player. For sure, this information is important for hostile NPCs and other enemies, but for the friendly ones, it just makes the page look ugly and implies that we're missing important information when that is not at all the case. I'd say make the field optional, and have it not appear if left out. It might even make sense to make the Level optional, unless that affects the quality of goods that merchants have for sale. If not, however, or the NPC is not a vendor and never involved in any kind of combat, their level is useless information and does not need to be filled in. In previous games, there was at least an excuse for having this data displayed on every page - you could kill anyone in the game, or at least attack them. In ESO, most named NPCs are not attackable, so combat-related data is just not important. — TheRealLurlock (talk) 23:21, 27 April 2014 (GMT)

I had been thinking along the same lines. Definitely support making it optional, as well as level, if it turns out to be unimportant. --AN|L (talk) 00:02, 28 April 2014 (GMT)

ESO Lorebooks Locations

I've done some research in-game, and using multiple other ESO resource sites, and it appears the Lorebooks do have static locations for each Alliance -- they've just changed from beta to full release. For example, several sites have the old location for the Thalmor Handbill in Auridon; however, I did find one that has the new location, and I matched it in-game. No less than ten other locations matched book-for-book. Given that every single one was the same, it seems to me that the lorebooks are, in fact, static. (Some can be found in all three Alliances, just in different zone tiers, but I mean within a zone and thus within an Alliance.) So, I would like to see locations listed, as lorebooks can often be hard to find. It would probably require some work, of course, as we can't just steal from other websites and run the risk of false info. That said, I'd be happy to use an alt or two to grab lorebook locations for an Alliance, if someone else would like to grab the remainder. Thoughts? likelolwhat ^{talk lulzy to me} 22:33, 29 April 2014 (GMT)

I have more than one character per alliance (specifically AD) and I have found different books at the same location. So.... I'm not really sure how you can say they have static locations. Some of them are static (notably the ones in the dungeons) but others are randomized from a list (such as an Auridon Lore book always appearing at on Auridon). Is it possible that you found Thalmor Handbill at the same location randomly? Because both in beta and in live I have found that they are randomized. Maybe it was just a fluke or something? Basically, are you SURE they are static? Jeancey (talk) 04:23, 30 April 2014 (GMT)

If you look at the log info for Ayleid Inscriptions Translated, for instance, it has 3 separate locations in the Aldmeri Dominion for where it is found, and keep in mind, this data is ALL from the live game, not from the beta at all. So I really don't think that they have static locations, otherwise you wouldn't find 3 locations for a single book. Jeancey (talk) 04:33, 30 April 2014 (GMT)

Huh. I hadn't considered that it could just be dumb luck (I'm never that lucky!). All right. likelolwhat ^{talk lulzy to me} 18:59, 30 April 2014 (GMT)

The books themselves might not be static, but are the locations consistent? They should definitely be added to our maps. —Legoless (talk) 19:09, 30 April 2014 (GMT)

The locations are 100% static. Dave and I have been adding them whenever we find them. All of AD is pretty much done (I may have missed one or two in obscure locations?), and I think DC is fairly complete. We don't have much on EP yet though. Jeancey (talk) 19:20, 30 April 2014 (GMT)

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