Talk:Psychatog

GA Failed

Two immediate problems leap out upon reading this article: It is impenetrable to a reader who (like me) has no knowledge of Magic: The Gathering, and it has external links sprinkled throughout the text. Assume the reader has never heard of Magic: The Gathering, much less an understanding of the game mechanics.

• The external links should be changed to internal wikilinks if the subject is notable enough, or plain text if not.

  Most of them probably aren't notable, but surely just giving the card's name with no further information would be unhelpful? --Ptcamn (talk) 10:33, 12 May 2008 (UTC)

Then include the necessary basic information somewhere in this article, or perhaps use footnotes. Oldelpaso (talk) 19:40, 12 May 2008 (UTC)

• Examples of terms I do not understand or that need explanation from the lead alone:
  • What is a "creature card"?
  • What is the the "uncommon" level of rarity
  • What on earth is a five-card cycle of multi-colored atogs?
• The lead should stand alone from the rest of the article, see WP:LEAD.
• I do not think the fair-use "Upheaval" image should be present. Non-free content should be kept to a minumum, and the Upheaval card is not the subject of this article. Oldelpaso (talk) 09:42, 12 May 2008 (UTC)

I don't think it's reasonable to demand that the article be targetted at people who have never heard of Magic the Gathering, any more than simple group can be targetted at people who don't know what a group is, or SL-1 to people who don't know what a nuclear power plant is. You're demanding that Wikipedia repeat large quantities of text about the basics of the game on dozens of articles, and make those articles unreadable to anyone who know about the game but wants to know about Psychatog.--Prosfilaes (talk) 01:05, 18 May 2008 (UTC)

One problem is that, in other areas, you can usually link to a more specific article on a technical topic. The article on Ruy Lopez for example links to articles like Castling, Fork (chess) and Pin (chess), instead of explaining those terms. But there are no articles like Creature (Magic: The Gathering) to link to yet. The closest thing is the short (and unreferenced) section Magic: The Gathering rules#Creatures. --Ptcamn (talk) 15:05, 18 May 2008 (UTC)

But those articles should be created and the information added there. I don't know what to do about the editors who will delete them, though. Don't worry; they'll try and delete this article soon.--Prosfilaes (talk) 15:35, 18 May 2008 (UTC)

And not to be snide, but the uncommon level of rarity is the fact that it's rarer than common cards, and more common than rare cards. Belaboring stuff like that in any way would take away from the point of the article.--Prosfilaes (talk) 14:07, 18 May 2008 (UTC)

Well, it's more than just that. I wrote at the "uncommon" level of rarity rather than just an uncommon card because "uncommon" isn't just a loose description, but a standardized rarity: you get exactly three uncommon cards in a booster pack. --Ptcamn (talk) 15:05, 18 May 2008 (UTC)

Well, you young whippersnappers may assume that, but in my day... Ahem. The number of uncommons in a pack has varied over the years (see for example Fallen Empires), and it's just not relevant here. The basic meaning is clear.--Prosfilaes (talk) 15:35, 18 May 2008 (UTC)