Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Video games/Bethesda/Archive 2

Request For Independent Review On Shadowkey Page

Just FYI, but since I own and have played thru Shadowkey before, I took the liberty of fleshing out the wiki page there as well as adding connections to other Elder Scroll related topics that Shadowkey covers. Please feel free to let me know what you think of it. Aspect Of Shadows 02:32, 26 January 2007 (UTC)

Gruntyking117 and myself have been making changes and updates to the page. I'd like to request independent review for recommendation of page grade upgrade. Aspect Of Shadows 06:08, 27 January 2007 (UTC)

List of Elder Scrolls potion ingredients

What do you think about List of The Elder Scrolls potion ingredients? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Jackson070792 (talk • contribs) 22:41, 10 December 2006 (UTC).

That article covers the subjects, but lists are rarely accepted on Wikipedia, except for when they are lists of subjects notable alone. I suggest to put it on http://uesp.net , as it will be deleted eventually. CP/M ^comm |Wikipedia Neutrality Project| 15:44, 23 December 2006 (UTC)

GA

Hey, I nominated The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind for GA. It passed. Yay! --PresN 05:07, 18 December 2006 (UTC)

Whoa... I was not expecting that at all. You go away for a few days and suddenly something like this crops up... Yay! Thanks, PresN, and good work. Geuiwogbil 05:44, 18 December 2006 (UTC)

To commemorate this momentous occasion, I have added an "Achievements" section to the project page, listing our two Good Articles. Geuiwogbil 06:15, 18 December 2006 (UTC)

Good work! Smomo 12:15, 18 February 2007 (UTC)

Request for Comment

Feel free to comment following the particular sections and points your comments concern, as one would on a FAC. It makes it easier to keep track of any given area.

Black Marsh

I've looked on Black Marsh every now and again for the past few months now, and I'm wondering what you fellows thought might be recommended moving forward. I was about to put it up on PR, but I'm not sure how helpful that would be, in light of my temperament. Any comments would be helpful. I was cautious about sending it to FAC, even if it were to be improved to FA quality, but then I saw Torchic on the frontpage and felt better about myself. Someone commented some time ago that the article was nowhere near that point, though it could be, and I'm wondering what should be done about that.

I think the article lacks, first of all, ease of reading. Not that it's really problematic, but resembles a technical article. More narrow subsections, more paragraphs, introductions would help.

The rest is pretty good, although some images, maybe some sources outside of TIL would help. In general, the only issue to improve is readability, the info and sourcing are good. CP/M ^comm |Wikipedia Neutrality Project| 05:14, 24 December 2006 (UTC)

• I'm looking at the article and finding that a lot of the history can't be fitted into any particular scheme. Putting a heading like: "Second and Third Eras" over a paragraph talking about slavery seems inappropriate, as does putting a section called "Slavery" under a history section. But I don't feel that the issue can be appropriately discussed without talking about slavery and how Bethesda worked it out.Geuiwogbil 06:14, 24 December 2006 (UTC)
  • Okay, I lied. I'll put the material under Argonian and keep the rest without the frivolous context. Geuiwogbil 06:47, 24 December 2006 (UTC)

• It's not that context is excessive, no at all. It needs only streamlining, some more sequence, that's all. Mostly it's fine by now, though. CP/M ^comm |Wikipedia Neutrality Project| 07:19, 24 December 2006 (UTC)

• I think what I removed was excessive. It was essentially three paragraphs on the PGE completely without connexion to Black Marsh. Context is good, but it should be said as concisely, usefully and densely as possible, with much relevant wikilinking. Thank you very much for what you've given me so far. Any more particular comments on structure? Geuiwogbil 08:09, 24 December 2006 (UTC)

• I did some subsectioning, and some paragraphing. Where in the article would I go about adding introductions? Is there anything wrong with the prose, or is it just formatting? Geuiwogbil 06:14, 24 December 2006 (UTC)
• The Pocket Guide to The Empire section is unnecessary and discursive, though. Can I create a Pocket Guide to The Empire page? Or a Literature of The Elder Scrolls page? Geuiwogbil 06:14, 24 December 2006 (UTC)
  • Hmmm...There isn't much. Maybe it could be a subsection of the main Elder Scrolls page, talking about the game setting and literature and whatnot. There aren't many (Read:"there are no") sources talking about the Elder Scrolls' books as books...TIL analyses them individually, but never provides anything that recognizes the body of literature in the series as a whole, so making an article out of the stuff seems unlikely. I guess I don't know where to put this stub. Geuiwogbil 06:44, 24 December 2006 (UTC)

I'll put the offending material here for the moment, so I can keep track of it. Geuiwogbil 06:14, 24 December 2006 (UTC)

Morrowind developer Gary Noonan cautions against using any source too exclusively, and emphasizes the dynamic nature of the series' lore. "Remember! The PGE was written in a 'tourists' view. Much like reading a diary. You cannot expect the 'fictional' author of the writing to be right about everything. By putting something in concrete, you limit yourself downplay suspense and originality for further developments and such. Not everything we say is always true. Sometimes, even we developers speak out of personal beliefs and idealisms about certain aspects of TES. And it is NOT always correct.... many times, it is INcorrect purposely...Not to be cruel, but its keeps everything very dynamic and ever evolving. Just because we tell you a red stick is white, it doesn't mean it isn't really green."

The Pocket Guide to the Empire remains a key in-game source for the descriptions of the various regions of Tamriel left undeveloped within the games themselves, and the lynchpin which holds most narrative schemes together. Though, in the words of Gary Noonan, it is "not a TES Bible", the guide was part of an extensive expansion of the series lore that took place during the development of Redguard, the game with which it was eventually shipped. Morrowind Project Leader Todd Howard describes it as "a point in time when we said ... 'we need a guide for all the new stuff..make it more unique', and the PGE was born..."

Within the game world, the Pocket Guide was commissioned by the Emperor Tiber Septim for the purposes of promoting Imperial interests across Tamriel, a potentially uniting piece of propaganda providing Tamriel with an oficially acceptable Imperial-driven history.

• Are there other sources? All I can think of is game dialogue, but I haven't played any of the games in some time, and I can't think of any time they spoke of Black Marsh.

• Not sure. Just if there are; I meant other sites, primarily. CP/M ^comm |Wikipedia Neutrality Project| 07:19, 24 December 2006 (UTC)

300px|thumb|The mighty and ferocious Argonian eyes its prey

• I'm still open to screenshots like I posted above, but would they improve the article? Plantations in Morrowind, Argonians in Morrowind, Argonians and Oblivion? My version of Morrowind's all modded up, right down to the textures, so I don't think I could help. Know where I can get some good screenshots? Geuiwogbil 06:14, 24 December 2006 (UTC)

• Probably a "clean copy" could do it (my version is modded as well, though I could help). What specifically - just how Argonians appear in the consequent games. Also, about the screenshots - probably would benefit from some slight gamma correction, and would be better packed in high-quality JPEG. BTW, thinking about it - a paragraph about representation in mods could help. CP/M ^comm |Wikipedia Neutrality Project| 07:19, 24 December 2006 (UTC)

• Do you have a copy of Daggerfall or Arena handy? I could probably get Morrowind and Oblivion screenshots, because I didn't modify the bodies beyond Better Bodies. Arena and Daggerfall are beyond me, as the former doesn't work on my compy and I have absolutely no idea how to get the latter. The Argonian Compendium has nice screenshots from the early games. Would it be fair to borrow their fair use images? I'll get started on the Oblivion screenshots. I'll work on representation in mods later. Geuiwogbil 08:09, 24 December 2006 (UTC)

• Here's some sort of screenshot. Do we want body or face shots? Geuiwogbil 10:54, 24 December 2006 (UTC)

• Unfortunately, I don't have Daggerfall or Arena playable. I have Daggerfall, but making it playable under modern OS is quite hard; maybe I'll dig up a moderately old laptop later. For shots, I think both; however, that's more for Argonian article. CP/M ^comm |Wikipedia Neutrality Project| 15:41, 24 December 2006 (UTC)
• 300px|thumb|Screenshot of an Argonian from Oblivion

I made this pic for the Aragonian article. I think it's pritty good. It shows of the Aragonian better than the one above so I will put it up on the Species page. NobleWarrior 22:07, 28 December 2006 (UTC)

Thanks, NobleWarrior. Geuiwogbil 04:29, 29 December 2006 (UTC)

Argonian

Also, I've been working on the Argonian page. Comments for that would be helpful too.

The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind

I've also been wondering what everyone thinks of The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind, and what could be done to improve it. Here are some particular questions.

• Gameplay: How long should this section be, and what details should it focus on? I've made a subarticle, Gameplay of The Elder Scrolls series, and cut out some previous information that was called "too lengthy" on the article talk page. (Any contributions to the subarticle, by the way, comparing Morrowind's gameplay to Oblivion's in a non-trivial fashion, (or Arena's or Daggerfall's) would be much appreciated.) I was wondering how much should be let back in, if any at all?
• Plot: Should this be called "Plot and Setting", or just "Plot"?
  • Setting: Can someone else write this? I'm not sure how to write a section that is supposed to be both in-universe and out-universe at the same time. FF7 has a hefty hunk devoted to this type of material, written with the conceit that the material is real-world, but the thing feels contrary to WP:WAF.
  • Story: How long should this be, and what should citations look like?
    • Length: The story sections on other media articles are inordinately long. I don't even know if I can write that much. Given that the bulk of the game deals with sidequests, should I write about those at all? On TIL's History of Tamriel, it considers some side quests notable enough to be mentioned in its few paragraphs on Oblivion: the Arena line of quests, the Mage's Guild line of quests, the Dark Brotherhood line of quests. Is the same true for Morrowind? I'd be much obliged if someone else wrote this section for me as well.
    • Citations: The FF series quotes game dialogue, but I'm not sure how well that would fit in with Morrowind's semirandom dialogue spoken by multiple persons. Do we quote "Telvanni Faction Character in Ald'Ruhn", or the name of an arbitrary character him/herself? We have the rather helpful walkthroughs by TIL, which I've cited, but I'm not sure if I should be using them. Should I cite UESP? It's not an WP:RS, and it can't be, right? It's what I did on Oblivion, being all too lazy to fish up quotes for anything. It's implied that all material is directly from the media: that's why we don't cite films or novels in their respective articles. But having the UESP cites makes the whole thing rather more useful. I'm confused.
  • Characters: Anyone know what, if anything, should go here, in this place where a section is curiously absent? The link is to "Characters of Morrowind", but the section deals entirely with storyline. Who's notable? Uriel, who lives far-off and doesn't much deal with us? Dagoth Ur, who makes us dream surreal dreams and who we know mainly from centuries-old tales? Caius Cosades, who gives us quests and then hurries off to do something on the mainland? The characters are developed in a quite different way from the way they are in most team-based, plot-driven RPGs. How can this proposed section reflect that? Should this section be here at all?
• Reception: What does everyone feel are the most important subjects mentioned by the reviewers, or notable subjects only mentioned by few reviewers? What awards are notable? What portion of the material should be quotes?
  • Focus: In the Gameplay material I chucked out of the article, I devoted a comment or two to how the reviewers felt about every little thing, and I'll probably continue to do so on the subarticle, but the Gameplay sections of other articles placed all reviewer comments in the reception section. I'd be uncomfortable writing the section without creating a mirror image of the article: How the reviewers felt about the Gameplay; How the reviewers felt about the Combat; How the reviewers felt about the Setting; etc. To put it briefly, I lack perspective. There's probably nothing anyone else can do about that, however. Maybe I should just regurgitate everything they say, make a kind of "Concordance" for the reviews of the game, and someone with a clearer head can subarticle out the mass and fillet out the most informative nuggets.
  • Awards: Review awards aren't notable, are they? They just indicate the game scored a such-and-such, right? Any notable awards the article is missing?
  • Quotes: Balance is hard to reach. Too many quotes makes it feel like a "Concordance", too few quotes makes it seem weaselish. "May reviewers felt..." Does anyone like the balance as it stands?
• Modification: Is this OR? Can anyone cite this? Are there guides to the mod community as a whole? I have some dev interviews talking about the TESCS in its development and origins; does anyone have any talking about "modification" or "modifications"? The Game Press often gurgles and gushes whenever a game is seen as "highly moddable", but it barely speaks a useful word on the subject afterwards. I've seen some good articles listing off top 10 mods and such for Oblivion. Does anyone remember any for Morrowind?
• Expansions: How much to say, and how much to leave on their respective articles?
• Overall: I'm unsure about my prose in places. Any comments there?

Sorry to make you read all that. Looking over that, I can't tell whether I've said enough or if anything I said made any sense. I'm exhausted. Any comments are welcome. Thanks all. Geuiwogbil 04:14, 24 December 2006 (UTC)

you CANNOT combine everyothere game and oblivion together there SO different. though im just saying we do have a separate article for different games.1337 H4XZ0R 12:48, 1 April 2007 (UTC)

What? Geuiwogbil 22:15, 1 April 2007 (UTC)

Anime and manga articles by quality and importance
Quality	Importance
	Top	High	Mid	Low	NA	Total
FA		2	6	4		12
FL				68		68
GA	7	25	82	277		391
B	6	22	45	289		362
C	13	70	237	1,663		1,983
Start	13	79	293	7,357		7,742
Stub	2	13	79	5,118		5,212
List		5	9	1,916	3	1,933
Category					2,653	2,653
Disambig					44	44
File					6,883	6,883
Portal					9	9
Project					282	282
Redirect			6	619	11,943	12,568
Template					894	894
NA					8	8
Other					70	70
Assessed	41	216	757	17,311	22,789	41,114
Total	41	216	757	17,311	22,789	41,114
WikiWork factors (?)		ω = 79,782			Ω = 5.08

Assessment Paraphernalia

Anyone know how to get one of those FA-class, GA-class, A-class, B-class, etc., infobox jobbies on the front page? I checked around on other Wikprojects's, but they were a great mass of categories within categories upon categories in project space out of project space and what have you. I couldn't make sense of one lick of it. I think it'd look cool having one up on the front page. If anyone thinks differently, I'm still fine without it. Geuiwogbil 04:51, 24 December 2006 (UTC)

You mean having a full list? Not exactly sure of the implementation now - which Wikiprojects do you mean? CP/M ^comm |Wikipedia Neutrality Project| 05:08, 24 December 2006 (UTC)

Yes, a full list, like Wikiproject India, or Wikiproject Anime. Like this: Geuiwogbil 05:21, 24 December 2006 (UTC)

I think we don't need such statistics. After all, they have thousands of articles, we have less. The stats are bot-generated. CP/M ^comm |Wikipedia Neutrality Project| 05:25, 24 December 2006 (UTC)

You're probably right.Geuiwogbil 05:33, 24 December 2006 (UTC)

Cyrodiil Cities

I refer to the following: {{Cyrodiil}} I feel that most of these little articles, with the possible exception of the Imperial City, are good candidates for a general merge into a Locations in Cyrodiil article. If any gets large enough, it can be broken off into its subarticle once more. Comments welcome. Geuiwogbil 04:57, 24 December 2006 (UTC)

I think they can all be merged into such an article, even IC. --PresN 20:12, 24 December 2006 (UTC)

Done. What can I do about the infobox, made useless from the merge? Geuiwogbil 20:48, 25 December 2006 (UTC)

Nominate it for TfD, I suppose. -> Wikipedia:Templates for deletion --PresN 21:06, 25 December 2006 (UTC)

Once it's orphaned, as we all agree with merge, just speedy will do. I'll tag it now. CP/M ^comm |Wikipedia Neutrality Project| 22:47, 28 December 2006 (UTC)

Wikipedia Day Awards

Hello, all. It was initially my hope to try to have this done as part of Esperanza's proposal for an appreciation week to end on Wikipedia Day, January 15. However, several people have once again proposed the entirety of Esperanza for deletion, so that might not work. It was the intention of the Appreciation Week proposal to set aside a given time when the various individuals who have made significant, valuable contributions to the encyclopedia would be recognized and honored. I believe that, with some effort, this could still be done. My proposal is to, with luck, try to organize the various WikiProjects and other entities of wikipedia to take part in a larger celebrartion of its contributors to take place in January, probably beginning January 15, 2007. I have created yet another new subpage for myself (a weakness of mine, I'm afraid) at User talk:Badbilltucker/Appreciation Week where I would greatly appreciate any indications from the members of this project as to whether and how they might be willing and/or able to assist in recognizing the contributions of our editors. Thank you for your attention. Badbilltucker 17:04, 29 December 2006 (UTC)

Up for deletion

My good friends, it seems we one of our articles is up for deletion. Behold: Architecture of The Elder Scrolls, nominated by one Nifboy, brought to us with the comment "Recipe for WP:OR: One part primary source, one part fan-derived source, mix well." Geuiwogbil 05:10, 29 January 2007 (UTC)

There was, apparently, some relevant discussion on the CVG talk page.

A quotation from the CVG

I was doing some assessing when I came across this article: Architecture of The Elder Scrolls. That title, to me, screams original research. The page lists many references, but upon inspection they are all from the same site, http://til.gamingsource.net/, not exactly something I would call a reliable source. I'm not very familiar with The Elder Scrolls series so I wanted to get a 2nd opinion before I prod or AFD it. —Mitaphane _?|! 23:42, 28 January 2007 (UTC)

It freely mixes fan-guides and primary sources (which are reposted at the fansite) in its sources, so yeah, I think it ought to go. Nifboy 01:15, 29 January 2007 (UTC)

I second (or third) that. I forgot it even existed. I would have done something about it a long time ago if I did. ♣ Klptyzm ^{Chat wit me § Contributions} ♣ 01:32, 29 January 2007 (UTC)

Also, about that site, yes, most of the information is OR and fan fiction, though some info about the story and events is true. Anything that comes from that site that is not about the story is total fan fiction. ♣ Klptyzm ^{Chat wit me § Contributions} ♣ 01:36, 29 January 2007 (UTC)

I've prodded the article. Curiously, it's a year and a half old. Strange. Nifboy 01:51, 29 January 2007 (UTC)

Should we let the article be deleted? Is there a place we feel it should be merged? Or should I instead argue that the existence of notable, reliable, third party sources published by an entity separate from its authors, inflammatory comments of "fan-derived" notwithstanding, make this subject notable, and further allows the citation of ingame documentation? That is, should I go to the effort of purging all that which cannot be cited to one of these sources, or is my belief that these are reliable sources false, as the above fellows would seem to believe? Fancruft seems to be one of the great dæmons of this quarter of the Wiki these days, and perhaps these would-be witch-hunters marching under the banner of that nameless essay should have their day and kill it.

Sorry if my bringing this before you bothers you. I'd like to thank you all so much for your help in the past, with Black Marsh and Argonian. A bleated and off-topic thanks to CP/M for that barnstar I received. I'd just like the community's consensus on what should be done, so that I don't do something totally out of line, or something that you all wouldn't support. I don't know what to do right now. I don't want to be angry, because this wasn't something I was really involved with, but I am angry. What would you do? Geuiwogbil 05:37, 29 January 2007 (UTC)

This is me clearing my head: Any proper deletion argument is not an argument as to the worth of an article at any given moment in time. That is the subject for cleanup, or POV check, or Request for Comment. They are, as the deletion policy calls them, problem articles, but not necessarily deletion-worthy articles. Any deletion argument is an argument as to the encyclopedic worth of the topic in question. Any subject, for example, that has no verifiable third-party sources, for example, is probably lacking in what is called Notability. Any synthetic judgements made on such topics are called Original Research. That is the particular argument noted above, [[and on the page. OR is a tangent of the highest-level Wiki policy, Verifiability, which seeks to create a guideline through which pages may be created by conforming to previously published sources. In the vernacular, these are called Reliable Sources, with capital letters. Now, the cornerstone of the argument is that The Imperial Library is not a Reliable Source. (An sub-argument, noted by Nifboy, is that Primary and Secondary ("Fan-derived") sources are freely mixed, but I don't think that anyone else really cared, once the taint of "Fan" was already there.) As per the RS policy, there are no hard and fast rules regarding Reliable Sources, only general guidelines which can build to a conclusion. The upper level Verifiability policy has laws, but they are few, and only serve as the reddest of red flags. "Anyone can create a website or pay to have a book published, then claim to be an expert in a certain field. For that reason, self-published books, personal websites, and blogs are largely not acceptable as sources." TIL passes this hurdle, but further down, in RS, there is a grand proliferation of clauses.

• Attributability
• Expertise
• Bias
• Editorial oversight
• Replicability
• Declaration of sources
• Confidentiality
• Corroboration
• Recognition by other reliable sources
• Age of the source and rate of change of the subject
• Persistence

Does anyone think it's worthy to make an argument for TIL as a RS? Does the title "fan-made" automatically mean "irrelevant"? Are Gamespy, IGN, and Gamespot to be the ultimate and only arbiters of fact? (Am I taking this too seriously, too personally?) I think it passes the most relevant of these. It's also the repository of most synthetic propositions that can be made regarding the actual substance of the games. If there's ever to be an argument regarding its worth, it should be made here and now. I feel I might be acting too agressive or unreasonable. I'm sorry if I am, and please tell me if there are any specific character flaws you'd like to see addressed. Thanks again, Geuiwogbil 06:14, 29 January 2007 (UTC)

Well, there's several problems really. I had typed up a nice long summary of them but of course Wikipedia went down for a minute or two just as I was submitting it. I'll try to sum it up:

1. Secondary sources are risky at best. There are some that are good observations without jumping to conclusions, but they're in the minority. Because of this, we've kind of got to be leery about them. The right kind might make good support to other sources, but they don't work alone.
2. All the sources stemmed from the same secondary source. Even if it weren't a secondary source, you never want to have only one base source for your writing, it doesn't work. This applies to all types of source as well.
3. The title is a bit misleading. It should probably be "building styles" or somesuch, not architecture. Using the word architecture suggests that the article is discussing the mathematic and geomaetry undertones to the buildings, not just their asthetic styles.
4. It is a tiny bit OR. We need to strip the article to the bones, and make it so that all information is that which is obvious in the game, so that the reply to anyone objecting to the information is "Look for yourself, it's right there in the game, see?"

Of course this article seems a bit like ones that belongs in a specific TES wiki, so maybe that's what should happen. --Niroht | Smoke signals 20:11, 29 January 2007 (UTC)

Mmmkay. Thanks Niroht, you've been a good counterpoint to my insanity. What you've said sounds quite reasonable.There's nothing substantial enough here for a page. If any of this is worth keeping, it should be as a subsection of the Morrowind page. I'll ask the UESP if they want the article, and I won't foolishly contest the deletion. I won't work on the article either, though, because it will probably just be deleted anyways. Thanks again, Niroht, for stopping me from doing something stupid. ^_^ Geuiwogbil 20:56, 29 January 2007 (UTC)

Sadly, the UESP can't pick it up do to copyright infringement (Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 2.5 License on the UESP and GFDL on Wikipedia). However, I would comment that TIL is generally regarded as a good source by its peers in the TES ring. --Ratwar 18:30, 30 January 2007 (UTC)

Now it's an AFD. Just a note. Geuiwogbil 00:02, 31 January 2007 (UTC)

First, some architecture was discussed in TES books, so it isn't pure OR; just to mention. TIL is a source reporting directly from the game and from interviews with the game developers. Second, I suggest projectification so it can be rewritten. The article will be moved to WP:TES subpage. Other sites may rewrite it if they are CC, or copy if GFDL. If you support this, please vote or change the vote to Projectify. CP/M ^comm |Wikipedia Neutrality Project| 17:58, 1 February 2007 (UTC)

Daedra Spheres, Aliases, ect

Was there really a need to delete them? They did add information about the Daedra Lords, such as what they command over so shouldn't they be put back? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by TheUltimate3 (talk • contribs) 00:44, 14 February 2007 (UTC).

No, as it's incredibly trivial, non-notable information. Fortunately, there's the UESP wiki- look it up on google. --PresN 06:31, 14 February 2007 (UTC)

Daedric Princes

Does anyone feel like going through the Daedric princes article and sorting out what information there is actually from the games, and what is speculation/original research? I would, but I might accidently remove something that was stated in Arena or Daggerfall... I'm only passingly familiar with the first two TES games. VoidTalker 02:57, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

I will be glad to help, but because my DP knowledge is limited to that of only one game (Morrowind), I can't make somewhat major changes. ♣ Klptyzm ^{Chat wit' me § Contributions} ♣ 16:22, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

In-Universe bias of articles

While skimming through many Elder Scrolls articles, I've noticed they contained a large amount of in-universe writing and POV-ed writing, and I must say it is quite ridiculous; probably 14 articles I've seen that could have been AfD'd based on that, and they probably would have been deleted in the process, mainly due to lack of attention, rather than content. I've done a large deal to fix this, but my knowledge is limited to that of TES: Morrowind, so I can't fix all of the articles effectively. Someone needs to get on this. ♣ Klptyzm ^{Chat wit' me § Contributions} ♣ 05:24, 11 March 2007 (UTC)

If you could make a list of the articles you are referring to I'm sure someone would be happy to neutralize them. Smomo 11:45, 11 March 2007 (UTC)

Here goes a few:

• • Mankar Camoran
  • Numidium
  • King of Worms
  • Cyrodiil
  • Uriel Septim VII - needs only a bit of help in the "in-universe department"
  • The Third Era of Tamriel
  • Major regions of The Elder Scrolls - needs a bit of help in referencing department, as well
  • Dremora - has it real bad

I will, of course, add to this list. ♣ Klptyzm ^{Chat wit' me § Contributions} ♣ 16:42, 11 March 2007 (UTC)

I'm not a terribly good judge of in-universe writing yet. How are Kwama, Ashblight, and Camonna Tong? --Niroht | Smoke signals 17:46, 11 March 2007 (UTC)

Those 3 are fine; they speak of their subjects as if it were part of a piece of fiction rather than, say, the Numidium article: its article states that "Numidium is a 1000 ft golem," speaking in such a sense as if it were real, making no statements about it being a fictional element. My experience has shown me that to prevent an article from sounding too in-universe, a good way to start is to clarify in the introduction, and other necessary parts, that the article's subject is fictional; in some cases, a simple word rearranging or rewording can fix some cases of in-universe speaking. ♣ Klptyzm ^{Chat wit' me § Contributions} ♣ 19:19, 11 March 2007 (UTC)

WP:WAF's section about in-universe writing can help a bit too. ♣ Klptyzm ^{Chat wit' me § Contributions} ♣ 19:20, 11 March 2007 (UTC)

I've made a few changes to Numidium, I think the first part is worded better now. Smomo 19:43, 11 March 2007 (UTC)

Yes; I also made a few more changes to it. ♣ Klptyzm ^{Chat wit' me § Contributions} ♣ 19:57, 11 March 2007 (UTC)

C'mon, guys, these articles need work; some of them I can't fix, due to other issues and just plain lack of knowledge. ♣ Klptyzm ^{Chat wit' me § Contributions} ♣ 00:13, 29 March 2007 (UTC)

Is anybody even gonna try to fix these or am I just talking to a brick wall? If you have fixed one, please say so in this discussion. ♣ Klptyzm ^{Chat wit' me § Contributions} ♣ 23:12, 1 April 2007 (UTC)

I've done some stuff with Dremora. Undoubtedly it still needs work but I don't have the resources of Oblivion to work with, so I don't know how the ranks are involved in that game. Also, I'm in college right now and busy so I may not have much time to work on these, sorry. --Niroht | Smoke signals 19:33, 2 April 2007 (UTC)

I've continued the work you did on Dremora (good work, by the way!) and condensed most of the information down into a useful table. It is much clearer now, and, as far as I can see, clear of in-universe nonsense. Smomo 22:33, 2 April 2007 (UTC)

Yay, good job, guys. Thanks for listening. ♣ Klptyzm ^{Chat wit' me § Contributions} ♣ 23:57, 3 April 2007 (UTC)

Apparent Game cruft

Some articles, such as the ones I listed above, are a bit crufty; I've just recently questioned the existence of these articles and, I must say, some of these need to be merged or maybe even deleted. Some of these are:

• Numidium
• Dremora
• Third Age of Tamriel - nothing can come from that except OR
• Septim Bloodline - maybe OR and unverifiable information
• Maybe Major regions of the Elder Scrolls

We need to discuss where which need to be deleted or merged. The list is subject to additions. ♣ Klptyzm ^{Chat wit' me § Contributions} ♣ 17:30, 1 May 2007 (UTC)

I'd think, if anything, you'd want to aim for a reduction of the province articles before that of the "Major regions" article, if in-universe reduction is what you're aiming for. I mean, even the mergist FF wikiproject believes that the Major Regions articles are, in some sense, worthy of existence. What one should be wary of is excessively detailed and fiction-focussed articles like, say, Black Marsh. A reader looking for a brief and comprehensive overview of the series would need some background knowledge of the regions of the series, without excessive detailing, while not, perhaps, wishing for the same level of detail as the province-specific articles would have. It'd be kind, though, for the rest of us, who want to keep that sort of detail, to re-write it off-wiki at UESP, where such material is wished for, rather than outright purging it.

The real counterbalance to in-universe information is not, however, mere reduction. It's the addition of out-universe material. Reviewer reception, development information, an overview, guided by reference to manuals, game material, review material, and game speech, and without verging into OR, of how the specific fictional object acts within the series games. How Oblivion (dimension) functions as a gamespace. How the Numidium functions as a plot device. How a game race came to be. That is what anti-fiction readers want, not maimed entries still filled with fictional information. I really don't think they could care less whether we have a full page of fictional material, or a mere stub. The stub, in fact, would probably be put up on the deletion list far more quickly than the full article.

I'm really confused by what you mean by "unverifiable". Nothing in

{{TES-characters}} {{TES-lore}}

is any more verifiable than anything else. The fictional information can only be verified by reference to the fiction. Now, of course, it's not a WP:V issue, it's a WP:WAF issue, it's a WP:RS issue. We're focusing too much on fiction, against WAF, and we can only use primary sources, which is a RS issue. Now, while I'd like to believe that TIL counts as a reliable source, being a well-vetted independently-hosted resource independent of the fiction that comments on its themes and subjects without indulging too far in its fictional world, material that a WAF minded article should contain, I, and you, have been advised that it isn't. Thus we are in a conundrum. We really can't have any of the above articles. Our entire project, basically, separate from the articles on the series games, is focused on fiction. You could just merge up every article under our purview into a few, limited articles. In fact, this is what policy advises us we do. Do you want this? Then, kindly, do so, but please take what you can (following copyleft concerns) and put it up on UESP. The truth is, it's all cruft. Geuiwogbil 19:13, 1 May 2007 (UTC)

What you said about most, if not all, of it being cruft has been biting me in the back of my mind for a long time, which is the main reason why I opened this discussion. I want major feedback about this so we can create a good solution to this problem. Of course, I don't want to outright obliterate all of the articles associated with the project; that's never been my plan. Man, I don't know what to do anymore. ♣ Klptyzm ^{Chat wit' me § Contributions} ♣ 19:33, 1 May 2007 (UTC)

Our third GA!

The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion was made a Good Article today, bringing us up to 3! It is still in Peer Review, and needs some work based on the suggestions there, so feel free to come by and help out. --PresN 17:39, 28 March 2007 (UTC)

Woo! Good articles are good! --Niroht | Smoke signals 19:14, 28 March 2007 (UTC)

w00t! Good work, PresN! Geuiwogbil 22:17, 1 April 2007 (UTC)

Could someone email an easier "how to" for peer reviews, I had to request that someone (thanks PresN) request the peer reviw! Stabby Joe 22:57, 7 April 2007 (UTC)

Oblivion page vandalism

With the recent blanked page of Oblivion (of which the BOT appeared to blame me for of which I did NOT do) and one suggested a negativly bias link be added, just to quickly point out that although I don't think the page should be overlly protected, it should be closely watched since there will always be those who want to vent their dislike on these wiki pages, which is not good since we just achived a good status. Stabby Joe 22:55, 7 April 2007 (UTC)

Morrowind FA push

Note: I've also gone to PR.

I think I'm almost ready to bring Morrowind to FAC. I've worked my hardest to eke out any relevant information from all accessible sources, and present it in a somewhat appealing, or at the very least-acceptable, fashion. I've had to make some recent cuts to the Modification section, as most things in there were unciteable; but I've kept something of a mention of it, and removed some OR, by citing some tangentially relevant and borderline reliable sources. Ummm...There's still no real "Setting" section, in an in-universe style, so I'd invite anyone to write up a good summary of Morrowind's background. It just seems like a lot of work for something that most FAers couldn't care less about, and something quite difficult for me to pin down, lacking, as it does, any secondary sources to guide me through the masses of dialogue, quests, and in-game text. :P Not many (only 2) images, but I'm cool with that, since the FUers are running around with battle-axes like would-be Vikings at the moment. Anyways, I'd love some comments, copy-edits or suggestions! I've tried to give the article a few run-overs, but I'm not the best with succinctness and clarity. Thanks for whatever! Geuiwogbil 06:07, 13 May 2007 (UTC)

Article History

• Version prior to my editing of the article. (21:07, 20 September 2006)
• Changes I made to edit out the WP:NOT game-guidery, and replace it with some more palatable and citeable gameplay info. (20-25 September 2006)
• Version passed for GA. (Thanks, PresN and Chuchunezumi!) (18:21, 16 December 2006)
• Changes I made to satisfy this guy's complaints about "length" and "wordiness". Chunked out information to Gameplay of The Elder Scrolls article. (08:21-08:23, 23 December 2006)
• Version sent to Peer Review. (19:06, 21 January 2007)
• Version prior to me writing this FA push bit. (05:57, 13 May 2007)

Sorry for disappearing for that long; I was short on time and had other priorities leaving no other choice than to temporary suspend myself from WP; TBH, I won't return fully yet, but I'll be here for the time being.

Reading the article, it seems to be up to the strictest standards. The only problem could be lack of material and generally a bit overcondensed writing. Nonetheless, I think it's close to be ready for FAC. Out of small things, I'd probably rather put plot and setting as separate section, considering setting's relative independence of the plot. Still, it reads just like a FA, maybe a short one, but that can be fixed easily - so I wish it succeeds. CP/M ^comm |Wikipedia Neutrality Project| 02:14, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for the kind words, CP\M. The lack of material is a bit frustrating sometimes, so I've tried to make do by taking many small things from many different places, searching for offhand references in every video-game-related site I could think of. Your comments about the layout make sense. I'll put it below the plot in a new section. Best of luck in your other priorities! Geuiwogbil 02:32, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

Development history of The Elder Scrolls series

Hello, dear members of the Elder Scrolls WikiProject! I've been puttering around with a little article in my sandbox called the Development history of The Elder Scrolls series. I've just recently decided to move it into the mainspace. Anyone with interest may criticize, add to, trim down, or, if the mood strikes, utterly annihilate, the aforementioned page. Thanks for taking the time to read this note! Geuiwogbil 05:35, 16 June 2007 (UTC)

Hi

Hi, everybody. I'm a big fan of TES (especially Morrowind and Oblivion) but new to Wikipedia. I'd like to contribute but don't know where to start. Is there anything that needs doing?

Lots of things to be done all over the place, Ray! There's an ongoing effort to get The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion to FA. To help out with that, it'd probably be wise to first look at the Featured Article criteria and other Featured Articles on video games, and then to see where the article's lacking. There's another effort, led by Klptyzm, to cut down on "cruft" in lore (fiction)-centered articles. To help out with that, you should first check out our guidelines for fictional notability and our Manual of Style entry for writing about fiction, and then trim the articles accordingly. Then there are the earlier entries in the series, like Arena and Daggerfall, which need a good deal of content. (If you could scrounge up PC video gaming magazines from the early to mid 90s, that would be sweet.) I'm working on summaries of the series' development and gameplay. Really, though, I'm sure that anywhere you'd be willing to lend a helping hand, you'd be well-appreciated. Thanks for taking the time to offer your services, and I hope you find something you like on Wikipedia. ^_^ Geuiwogbil 05:39, 24 June 2007 (UTC)

I must apologize. I tweaked the Ghostfence article before reading the writing about fiction guide. I'm afraid I may have just added more fan cruft to the article. Ray 06:59, 24 June 2007 (UTC)

It's OK. There's always the UESP, which would gladly accept the content. Geuiwogbil 02:29, 25 June 2007 (UTC)