Talk: Guides

We should find some links to this category, it seems pretty lost in terms of being linked to. Not sure whether it deserves a main page link already, but at least some pages should link here. --Xeeron 18:56, 23 March 2006 (CST)

Bump. --Xeeron 22:00, 30 March 2006 (CST)

Please add Mo/any_Spirit_Bonder_Guide --84.173.122.39 16:48, 30 September 2006 (CDT)

Do you think it would be acceptable to make a chest running guide? -71.104.139.76 02:36, 21 February 2007 (CST)

I've always wanted to see a guide to get to Defender of Ascolon.

Yea i think it would be a good idea to add a chest running guide and to add a defender of Ascalon cuz we dont have many title guides only 2 so far Icebreaker 06:47, 9 July 2007 (CDT) Icebreaker

I think it might be helpful to have a guide to successful hard mode

Hero Battle Guide

You think we could make a guide on hero battles? Because I really like them but I suck at em lol Shogankiller 13:33, 19 November 2007 (UTC)

I think so too, hero battles is great fun, but it's so difficult for new players.

link to magni bison guide

/yesplz68.36.202.128 19:42, 10 February 2008 (UTC)

Category:Strategy guides --- -- (s)talkpage 19:46, 10 February 2008 (UTC)

Proposed categorization of unclassified guides

To make it more likely that ppl can find guides serendipitously, I propose that we take the current unclassified guides and put them into new or existing categories. Here's a first pass at the categorization. (Categories in red have not yet been created.) The aim is to consolidate as many guides as possible into as few categories as possible, making exceptions when the category probably requires expansion.

proposal

v1.1. strikeouts indicate already recatted

Category:Strategy guides

• Caravan vanquishing
• Guide to Trapping in Fort Aspenwood
• Death-leveling animal companions
• Guide to evolving a Dire Pet

Category:Lists these feel more like lists rather than guides; they feel more like lists of collectors, artisans/crafters, etc

• Collecting for fun and profit
• Supplies collectors ← Nothing links here; propose renaming to something like, Bargain Hunting: A Guide to Getting Good Loot for Cheap and/or merging w/the fun & profit article.

Category:Software Guides

• How to report ← propose rename to How to Report Bugs
• Repairing data archive ← not sure where this belongs, but probably not in Guides which is gameplay oriented

Category:Character development guides

• Attribute point spending
• Roleplaying character creation
• Profession changer differences
• Category:Profession guides (subcat of char develop)

Moves & Merges

(merges require both articles getting stamped and adding a note that indicates the completion criteria)

• Skill prefixes and suffixes → category:game mechanics
• Maps → tbd (need to look at them; maybe there's a need for category:maps)
• Prophecies Ascension guide proposed merge with proph mission overview (requires carefully editing both/either)
• Guild → tbd (p'haps not in guides at all)

Category:Getting Started Guides

• Pre-Searing guide (this could be considered a subordinate article to Getting started in prophecies; maybe should be merged)
• PvP character creation
• When to join a guild

Proposed redirect to PvX

• Guide for making your own solo dervish

continued discussion of proposal

(separated from proposal above to make both easier to find/edit)

It'd be easier to reply if you had listed the problems you see instead fo proposing a solution. Here's my comments:

• your Move to Help? section should be calles "Software guides", and that category also be placed in Category:Software.
• subcatting Farming Guides under strategy is not good, it won't be findable
• making a category for 3 articles or less is pointless; categories are best created when you have a bunch (half a dozen?) of articles that you can put in there.
• if you want to convey better what the guide is about, consider renaming it (instead of creating a category)
• Maps can not go into Locations, because it isn't one; you can link to it from that category's text, though. (Why can't these maps be uploaded here?)
• I've put PvP character creation into "getting started", and pre-searing could well be there as well.
• Maybe some more of your proposed "Character development guides" could go into "getting started" as well? I've changed that category's definition to be more inclusive for this. ;)
• Skill prefixes and suffixes isn't a guide at all, I've recatted it into "game mechanics" and linked it from Skill
• Ascension is a short and focused article (which doesn't really have a good category, should it also be in "game mechanics?), so it'd be bad to put teh guide in there; and while marking teh missions needed for ascension in the proph overview (and maybe adding a short section of notes about that), the guide should not be deleted until that has been satisafctorily done. Maybe a merge tag can be placed on that guide now (merge with proph overview) if you don't want to do teh edit yourself?

Hmm, I got distracted by hamsters, better save now before this edit box gathers cobwebs... --◄mendel► 11:41, 7 April 2009 (UTC)

re: unclear reasons for recat — Gah! I did let that, um, small detail escape, didn't I? So, biggest issues IMO with Cats for Guides (as I found them):

• articles that can't be found b/c they don't belong to a cat (that is/could be used to link related articles)
• uncategorized articles (making them hard-to-find)
• articles that overlap in purpose (making them hard-to-keep-current, relevant)
• general clutter, which makes it hard to see what we might be missing or when articles might be combined
• unfocused articles (those that serve two masters poorly instead of doing well in a more focused topic)

re: your comment on my first draft — that looks good to me, as it moves the wiki forward in resolving all of above. I'll review, make updates as proposed, and then re-publish the cats here (so that others can follow in footsteps or amend as needed).

This is (obviously) a general maintenance issue; there will always be a need to keep updating/modifying cats to align the current wiki needs with existing/proposed articles.   — Tennessee Ernie Ford (TEF) 18:57, 12 April 2009 (UTC)

Hmm, articles that can't be found can be put into Category:Guides as a first step, and somebody else can then work on the clutter. :) That needs to be done from time to time, of course. The situation in Category:Templates is much worse, both in regard to uncategorized templates and missing or badly chosen groups.

Having too many small categories usually means that articles are hard to find as well.

Choosing good article titles is a skill. ;)

Anyway, as usual you're too generous to disagree. ;-) Go right ahead to actually implement any changes that you feel are in line with my comments; I did some, but not all; that should shorten your list of proposed changes. :) --◄mendel► 20:18, 12 April 2009 (UTC)

So, v1.1 of proposed moves (sort of a to-do list and a chance to review before taking further action) Also, I accept your implied gauntlet of reviewing the template categories. I'll do the same thing -> propose steps (and only act on obvious stuff first). Might be awhile...

And, I'm not as generous as you think. (See, already disagreeing ;-) I do, however, try to bow to superior logic or ideas (although I hates it when they weren't mine.)

Speaking of disagreement: I generally support the idea that it's bad to add new cats for < many items. However, when the proposed cat should include many articles, I think it would be smart to proactively add the category (so that it's likely that the putative articles end up getting well-sorted rather than badly or un-sorted). (On reflection, I'm not sure that applied to my v1.0 proposal.)

FWIW: I also prefer not to have anything at the top level of super category like Category:Guides when there's already more than many cats within the supercat. (It has the appearance of growth by accretion rather than by design; I think this wiki is mature enough to encourage ppl to fill in missing articles rather than wait to see what's written.)   — Tennessee Ernie Ford (TEF) 19:18, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

No, the template thing wasn't meant as a challenge; please don't burn yourself out on that unless you feel you profit from it in some way. It is a horrible task with many unused and ill-written templates.

Proactively adding categories doesn't make articles appear. Just don't.

Other than that, I am still not totally satisified with the "character development" section, but to my tired eyes, the rest looks fine. --◄mendel► 23:02, 15 April 2009 (UTC)