Talk: Criteria for deletion

Delete vs Keep

Moved from Talk:Refund point

I hope I'm not implying any bias by being the article's creator, but this reason for deletion ("We track the game as it is, not as it was") seems a little silly. If items or skills began disappearing and were accordingly removed from the wiki, new players using the wiki might not know or believe that the items/skills ever existed. I checked the policies and I don't believe this is listed as a reason for deletion anywhere; moreover, is Guildwiki not meant to be a repository of knowledge for all things Guild Wars? Pardon the clichéd term, but to say that something doesn't belong in the wiki just because it is no longer in the game but once was seems almost a little Orwellian to me.

P.S. If this is an acceptable reason for deletion, then the Denravi Sword article should be reviewed as well. 404notfound 19:38, 13 August 2006 (CDT)

the denravi sword still exists in the game, my monk has one. no one has any refund points. this point has been argued quite a bit. i, personally, agree that we should track the historics, but with a historic tag like the unfavored tags, but the community doesn't agree. --Honorable Sarah 19:41, 13 August 2006 (CDT)

Items and skills have disappeared from the game and they have been removed from the wiki, hasn't seemed to cause much confusion. --Rainith 19:45, 13 August 2006 (CDT)

None of which changes the fact that the very narrow criteria in GuildWiki:criteria for deletion do not include one word about things no longer in the game. If the admins want a different deletion policy, they can either discuss it among themselves or allow a public vote, and then update GuildWiki:criteria for deletion to conform to the new criteria. -- Gordon Ecker 00:47, 14 August 2006 (CDT)

See Talk:Frozen Chest and Template talk:Legacy. --Rainith 02:09, 14 August 2006 (CDT)

I do agree that if we are going to say "historical content should not be kept" then it should be codified in GW:DEL. However, I do not feel as strongly now as I once did about deleting historical data. I do wonder if it makes sense, in some cases, to keep certain information. Let me clarify my point:

• I do not believe we should include information in skill articles about how a skill used to work. This applies to articles on items or missions or anything else in the game.
• I'm not certain whether we should keep articles that explain a term that may be available on the internet that relates to Guild Wars but is no longer in use. For example, if Kurzick/Luxon faction was removed then I'm not necessarily opposed to the article Kurzick Faction or Luxon Faction remaining.

<LordBiro>/<Talk> 03:54, 14 August 2006 (CDT)

I'd also throw in an exception to the updated policy for any obsolete information that has relevance with regards to plot, lore or backstory such as removed quests, the Luxon and Kurzick settlements and various holiday events. -- Gordon Ecker 06:20, 14 August 2006 (CDT)

Couldn't hurt, could it? Guild Wars has its own lore with Stuff That Used To Be. Might be interesting, just give it a bit tag screaming "This article refers to items/events/NPCs that have since been removed from the game; this information is no longer accurate, and only serves for posterity" or something like that. Got your bases covered that way. Of course, I'm contradicting my own "just because it's interesting doesn't mean it's relevant"-theory there, but I forgive me. --Black Ark 06:39, 14 August 2006 (CDT)

Backing up indent because narrow columns are hard to read ...

This subject has been debated many times; this isn't the first, and certainly won't be the last. To help reduce the frequency of these debates - or to at least contain them at one location, I do feel that the documented policies should be updated to better document the defacto policies of past practices.

My view on keeping articles vs. deletion is that we're a game guide and fansite - but I don't recall the site ever claiming itself to be a "repository of knowledge for all things Guild Wars". As such, here's my take on what to keep and delete:

• Articles that describe game mechanics, quests, missions, skills, weapons, armor, etc - anything that can be utilized currently - should only contain information relevant to the current state of the game.
• Keep Articles that describe special events and the related items and NPCs - documenting the event to which they were related (if an item or NPC becomes a regular component later, just document the current state, don't mention 'introduced in' such and such event - also, do not add in NPCs retroactively, only NPCs that were adequately documented during the event should be kept).
• Keep Articles describing weapons that have been fully removed from the game, mentioning that they are no longer available (items still remaining should not be documented as 'changed' or 'nerfed' as of such and such date - just their current stats should be shown).
• Delete Articles describing game mechanics that no longer exist (such as Refund Points, etc).
• Delete Articles describing no longer relevant strategies (such as Book Trick, etc).

To me, it's more important and informative to document what's relevant to current players - strategies and game mechanics that are no longer relevant to the game do not serve any value to newer players except to confuse them with no longer relevant trivia. --- Barek (talk • contribs) - 11:21, 14 August 2006 (CDT)

I moved this here since it is more to do with general policy on deletion than it is to do with refund points specifically. <LordBiro>/<Talk> 11:34, 14 August 2006 (CDT)

I agree that articles describing game mechanics should only contain information regarding the current state of the game. I agree with every point you make Barek, except that I do not agree that having an article on refund points that is clearly marked as historical will confuse readers.

As I said above, if ANet were to remove something that plays an important part in the game at present I no longer think I can justify omitting that from the wiki completely. The reason for this is that so much documentation outside of the GuildWiki exists that is not as well maintained as our documentation. I would rather a reader came here and found out that refund points no longer exist than they came here and thought we did not bother writing about refund points. <LordBiro>/<Talk> 11:42, 14 August 2006 (CDT)

What if a user has heard mention of such things as Refund Points or the Book Trick, and comes to Guildwiki for answers? You'd expect us to know these things. And we do. Or... we did. --Black Ark 12:10, 14 August 2006 (CDT)

I agree with Barek in most points, but I also think that we should keep articles which some players might search for. Especially new players might be interested in the removed chests or book trick as they are mentioned in numerous other fansites. We can easily delete such articles as the useless NPC near Fisherman's Haven who was removed from the game as no one will probably search for him anyway. -- (talk) 12:38, 14 August 2006 (CDT)

You'd better not be talking about Crafter, that guy is awesome! A lot of people are interested in the mystery of Gwen or whatever, I have to be honest, my care factor for her it pretty low. But Crafter, now that's a real mystery, this guy in the middle of nowhere selling armor, but not all armor, only certain types for certain professions. Why is that? How did he decide whom he'll craft armor for, why is he standing just there, wouldn't he get more business in town? I think that was one of the first articles I ever edited, it was and still is the primary reason for my continued existence here! If he did pack up and leave that would only serve to further his mystery, we should really have a category for Crafter lore but there wouldn't be enough articles to put in it, indeed that's how mysterious he is!

Ok think hard, how are you going to tie this in with the actual issue being discussed here...!?...Well firstly I think that the Book Trick is incredibly well known in the game, I think the GuildWiki would be poorer for not documenting it. (Just keep watching this space, I'll somehow tie Crafter in.) I mean people still say Tombs occasionally and our article documents it previous incarnation. Just because something has been removed from the game doesn't mean that people don't still refer to it.

Either way I know where I'm going to when I get home from work tonight, to Stingray Strand and see if Crafter is still there. Even if he has gone I won't be disappointed, the mystery and his mystique only grows and his memory will live on in the hearts and minds of those he has crafted for and of course his legend will be documented on the GuildWiki, as it should be. This would have to be the best thing I've ever written on a discussion page, I'm taking my pants off right now! --Xasxas256 21:14, 14 August 2006 (CDT)

Not Crafter, the NPC found between Fisherman's Haven and Sanctum Cay that never even had dialogue. Though, suprisingly, there are more of those NPCs out there, one I ran into the other day in Twin Serpent Lakes. Another was in Talmark Wilderness. Anyways, I've always been a "knowledge is power...and interesting" guy, so I support legacy and I think I did in the last discussion we had about it. -Gares 22:17, 14 August 2006 (CDT)

So you're telling me I wrote all that crap for nothing? /shakesfist. Seriously that's all I've got, that and perhaps /bangsfistondesk and /putsfistthroughmonitor. Although if I did that it might become a removed item, I wonder if they'd document that here at work. I forgot about the interest factor, I also think that it's interesting to see what was. --Xasxas256 22:30, 14 August 2006 (CDT)

Barek's proposal is very well thought out, and I strongly support this becoming policy. I would support an outdated information article that briefly summarizes popularily-referenced, yet non-existant information in the game, like the book trick and refund points. The articles deleted due to the push to document only the current state of the game could simply redirect to that single outdated info article.

Justification: if the wiki only documents the current state of the game, "refund point" and "book trick" no longer exist in-game, and thus should not exist on the wiki. However, no matter how the game is updated, outdated information does truly exist in-game, and thus should exist in the wiki as well.

—Tanaric 23:29, 14 August 2006 (CDT)

I think it's a good written description of our current, slightly unofficial, policy and I also agree with it. But I personally would prefer a template which includes a banner and category. If you search for Book Trick it shouldn't the 10th link on a page called "outdated information" I reckon, it should be on an article called Book Trick which clearly states that this game tactic is no longer valid and is kept for historical purposes. --Xasxas256 23:40, 14 August 2006 (CDT)

As outlined by Tanaric, the search wouldn't bury the item because an article under the original name would still exist as a redirect to the central article - the redirecting page would show prominently in the search. The bigger problem to me is that the central article would either be too vague to give any meaningful information about the subject, or would grow excessively large if subject sections were added within the article for each subject removed from the game - so I really wouldn't want to see that method.

I must admit that , while I'm not convinced to change my opinion on this, I can see some merit in the argument to change towards keeping some legacy articles. But I wanted to spell out a bit more my reasoning for being against it. For me to change my opinion, these issues would need to be overcome.

One of the bigger problems that I see with keeping legacy articles is how to handle false rumors of items, NPCs, game mechanics, or strategies that supposedly were once in the game but were removed - as we can no longer confirm/verify info on removed items, how do we prevent the buildup of well written fiction posing as legacy facts? I see these periodically already - a legacy tag just makes them harder to fight. Do we go from memory? Have a disclaimer in the banner? Have a discussion to try to reach concensus on if it being a real legacy subject? A well written fake could draw on enough pieces that were real to make someone question their memory; or even be originated in other forums - resulting in a large population who would claim that they heard that such-and-such was once true so they would argue to keep it, making it harder to fight the fluff.

The other problems that I see are how to maintain the quality of articles after it has been created and tagged as legacy. Again, false rumors would result in periodic changes. Over time, as old-time players drop out, this becomes harder to patrol and keep clean. Then there's just the style and formatting questions: how much is adequate to keep - all the detail or a summary? Do we try to recreate articles for subjects that were previously removed before allowing for legacy tracking? If so, how far back - to initial release, or even items that were in beta weekend events but were released prior to actual release?

Some of these are higher concerns than others; but to me they all would need to be resolved. --- Barek (talk • contribs) - 01:24, 15 August 2006 (CDT)

Start now. Keep writing the articles. Should Anet implement changes that render the articles out-dated - or as it were, candidates for a legacy-tag - then tag `em, protect `em and put them in the archives for those interested. With articles that date too far back (Wossname the Meek, Signet Rings) stuff that's too fuzzy; stuff that was too experimental; stuff that had no real merit to begin with when it was even in the game - keep them under the blanket. Things that did have an impact (removed quests and events, Book Trick, Refund Points et cetera - stuff that's still in people's memory); rewrite those articles. Tag `em, protect `em. Sounds good, right? I know. And still people think I'm just a pretty font. --Black Ark 01:35, 15 August 2006 (CDT)

Personally I think that we should not have one large article, as it could get out of hand. I will outline the process that I would like to see occur should an element be removed from the game.

• Refund points are removed from the game.
• The refund points article is altered to reflect this.
• Articles pointing to refund point are altered.
• Refund point is marked as legacy/historical.
• After a short defined period the article is locked to prevent future changes, including S&F changes.

I think it's important to lock the article because, as you point out Barek, changes could be made to the article in the future and we would not be able to substantiate any claims regarding the removed entity. i.e. someone could now claim that if you type /refund you would get a refund point. We have no means to disprove this.

New historical articles are a different matter. I'm not sure how they should be treated. <LordBiro>/<Talk> 01:39, 15 August 2006 (CDT)

P.S. Just had an edit conflict with Black Ark, I pretty much agree :) <LordBiro>/<Talk> 01:39, 15 August 2006 (CDT)

Just a quick short note that I generally favor keeping articles of things that have been removed from the game, as long as they are clearly marked as such and all links to it are updated. The article doesn't take much space on the server, nor does it use much bandwidth, so keeping it doesn't hurt much, even if it's for reference / historical documentation only. -- 04:39, 15 August 2006 (CDT)

Same here. I'm in favor of keeping pretty much everything except out of date skill information, because anyone looking for information on previous versions of skills can check the edit history on the skill pages. -- Gordon Ecker 04:49, 15 August 2006 (CDT)

Thanks for the note Lord Biro, been slacking on my wiki time lately. Getting too hard to keep up with things here. :(

As far as this issue, I am against it. (Big surprise, I know) :) There are several categories of "obsolete" information in the game:

• Items: Items that have been removed from the game or nerfed permanently.
• Game mechanics: Skills, attribute points, limits on attack speed, ....
• PvE storyline/locale: There didn't used to be a Sorrow's Furnace, there was that Meek guy by the water near Sanctum.
• Player culture: Tactics/expressions that have gone obsolete. e.f. Book tanking, UW 55 soloing, Air Spike with Chain Lightning.

To me, none of these types of information is useful one month after the fact. On the flip side, it is information that is very hard to maintain. Locking up articles (a solution too many have been throwing around lately) is simply a solution I refuse to adapt for anything but the most dire situations. Locking an article simply because a user edited it and we no longer have the means to verify the edit flies against everything page protection is for. Since when is Page protection meant as a "we don;t nee dmore info, thank you" tool?

What if we had it wrong to start with? Someone edits What's His Name The Meek's legacy article to say that he was level 10, not 15, and he was right. How do we know? someone edits the Nerfed Super Axe article to indicate that it was extremely useful in farming Griffons in the Desert. This is not incorrect information. Why remove it?

I think we adopt a common sense apporach, If users create articles for an item over and over, then that's an indication that maybe we should leave a note that says the item is a farce or is no longer there (like we do with Silver Armor or like we should do with Terror Shield). But I don' think we should make it policy to record the game as it was (opening a whole can of worms) just to please a few curious readers.

I am, however, too tired with this system of re-hashing debates over and over and over and over. So, I am done. Do as you all wish. --Karlos 05:28, 15 August 2006 (CDT)

The wiki has a whole lot of weird quick references and such which only a few persons use. I don't think that keeping or deleting a page should be decided by the amount of users searching for the info. If even a few people are looking for the info, we should have it. There is no harm in having the articles, but there might be some benefit to someone. Why not do it? I'm personally against protecting the pages thou. I don't think that people will go adding false information. -- (talk) 05:47, 15 August 2006 (CDT)

And now refund point has been deleted out of process despite the general concensus despite the general concensus here that the page should not be deleted until after the deletion policy is formally revised. -- Gordon Ecker 04:58, 23 August 2006 (CDT)

The good thing about being away is that answering to debates is so much easier: Most of what you want to say is already said hehe. My point of view is that old content should be kept with the legacy tag. That way there is no possible confusion about what currently is implemented in the game, but people searching for it find the information. Btw, in 10 years time, you will all be very happy to review the book trick page and say "ahhh the good old times". Or look at the dragon festival missions again and laugh while thinking about the fun you had playing dodge ball. The objection "we dont have a way of proving stuff is correct" is not irrelevant, but I doubt it will ever become a problem. In general we should stop editing once an article becomes legacy, but even if someone comes along and changes lvl 15 to 10 (and I doubt many will), would it really matter? --Xeeron 06:38, 23 August 2006 (CDT)

if we are going to even entertain the idea of preserving historical content, could one of you admins restore Template:Legacy? if this is not possible, i can create a new one. --Honorable Sarah 11:13, 23 August 2006 (CDT)

I still disagree with this in concept - but if its going to be done, a legacy tag is a must. I'll go ahead and restore the tag. If the discussion continues and it is decided to remove it again, that can be done later. --- Barek (talk • contribs) - 11:18, 23 August 2006 (CDT)

If we are going to keep historical stuff, then restoring Frozen Chest and some other old friends might be wise. Are we going to keep it all, or just those things that we think might be searched for later? One more thing: We want all Legacy articles to be removed from other categories and added to Category:Legacy. -- (talk) 14:02, 23 August 2006 (CDT)

I personally don't think we should go to too much effort to resurrect old articles. I purely believe it is a case of reducing the number of deletes brought about by game updates. <LordBiro>/<Talk> 14:22, 23 August 2006 (CDT)

i'd like to see those pages back, if someone can fondly remember it, then that's fine, but i don't think admin's need to go digging in delete logs for stuff. this should not be a dumping ground either. those pages will have to be rewritten to show their historical status. --Honorable Sarah 14:28, 23 August 2006 (CDT)

Some, such as Frozen Chest and Lost Strongbox, it's nothing but pressing two buttons to restore the information. That only works, however, if the name is the same as the original article's name. -Gares 14:42, 23 August 2006 (CDT)

Personally I think everyone is jumping the gun. This has not met the criteria laid forth in GuildWiki:Policy to change the policy. That states that a concensus must be reached that the policy should be changed. According to the American Heritage Dictionary, a consensus is: An opinion or position reached by a group as a whole. And the whole group does not agree that this policy should be changed. --Rainith 16:04, 23 August 2006 (CDT)

are you sugguesting awaiting a response from every registered user, including the inactive majority? how far do you intend to define consensus? --Honorable Sarah 16:26, 23 August 2006 (CDT)

I didn't think this meant changing the policy since these "legacy" articles are not specifically under the criteria for deletion. Some would say they match up with the not marked for delete statement of "The page's content is unique or useful". However, it's how a user perceives the statements. The policy is fine, though somewhat vague. It was my understanding this was about perserving historical references of in-game world of Guild Wars. -Gares 17:07, 23 August 2006 (CDT)

Unless there's a reference in an existing policy someplace, I think this is another instance of needing a policy. Past practice, which has been the defacto policy since before I started contributing to the wiki, was that the site documented the game as-is, not as-was. However, entries related to special events have been allowed to remain regardless. The outline that I provided several posts up was what I believe should be documented policy based on this past practice - changes, if any, should be made from that point. --- Barek (talk • contribs) - 17:20, 23 August 2006 (CDT)

I believe no one is disputing what our policy IS and that there is a request to change the policy. As such, I agree with Rainith that people are jumping the gun. Gares, we have erased "was" content before, a LOT. Sarah, Consensus is defined as the overall proponents in the dispute reaching a middle ground and moving forward. It is not defined by a set number of people. I believe the champions of the "legacy" tag should first exert effort in convincing those who are still stuck at "we don't record legacy" that we will. Once we agree that we will, then coming up with a template or undeleting one is really a trivial task. I think it's more important to mark that as it stands now, recording the game as it was is STILL not acceptable content with the exception of the special events (which I personally would not mind seeing gone). --Karlos 21:51, 23 August 2006 (CDT)

I think we should have a vote on what to do with each of the roughly half dozen categories of historical information (game mechanics, strategy, items, events, NPCs, monsters, quests and anything I'm missing). I'm in favour of zapping obsolete strategy and game mechanics and keeping everything else. -- Gordon Ecker 22:25, 23 August 2006 (CDT)

I would like the following things to stay:

• Special event stuff: These are allready kept. The articles wouldn't be useful to create for a few days only and they really are interesting to read later.
• Removed in game stuff like the chests, NPCs and such: These might be refered to in other fansites. Some of them have been a big part of the game earlier, like the removed chests.
• Removed game mechanics: Refund points and others might still be refered to on other fansites. I don't feel so strongly about this stuff, but if verythign else is kept, why not keep it all?

I'm not sure if I forgot anything, but generelly I think (at this time) that everything should be kept as I cant come up with anything that shouldn't be. I would also be happy if only those things with significance are kept, like the refund points and the frozen chests. -- (talk) 23:58, 23 August 2006 (CDT)

gem brings up a point i'd not considered. is the absense of something relavant to the game? not everyone comes to the wiki without preconceptions. they might believe that this chest exists or +15% always or whatever. --Honorable Sarah 00:04, 24 August 2006 (CDT)

Exaclty my point. And has been for the whole time. Good that someone noticed it. :) -- (talk) 00:07, 24 August 2006 (CDT)

Regardless of which decision we eventually come to, I think most of us can agree that the policy needs to be more clearly defined. -- Gordon Ecker 00:36, 24 August 2006 (CDT)

I can actually get on Wiki now ;). In response to Karlos' "we have erased "was" content before, a LOT", that is a practice, probably due to someone first deleting one article, then snowballed with others following. That is usually how these practices first start. Just as if someone took initiative and began running with this and it snowballed, a new practice would be born. As this discussion lingers on, I find myself more neutral to the subject. I still think this has potential, but I doubt there will be a compromise, and as the past has shown, nothing will change. -Gares 07:49, 25 August 2006 (CDT)

Past practices (that have been running for in excess of a year now) established a defacto policy of deleting as-was content, regardless of it being recorded. By the admission of all those who want to change that practice, it has been the established practice in the past. Any attempt to change would require an agreement, just as changing a properly documented policy would require. --- Barek (talk • contribs) - 12:23, 25 August 2006 (CDT)

That sounds like a really bad way of making decisions. As for past practices, Mad King Thorn, Wintersday, Day of the Tengu, Game updates/2005 May haven't been deleted, that's 14 months of precedent. -- Gordon Ecker 18:52, 25 August 2006 (CDT)

Most of the items you mentioned were special-event specific articles, which have always been kept; if I recall correctly, the argument that won over keeping them at the time was that it would save us the effort of re-creating a large batch of articles should they be restored one year later. As for the news article, that's a factual press release - unless ArenaNet modified their past press release, it's still an accurate reprint of the news that still exists at guildwars.com. Past practice as I have seen it is what I outlined far above:

• Articles that describe game mechanics, quests, missions, skills, weapons, armor, etc - anything that can be utilized currently - should only contain information relevant to the current state of the game.
• Keep Articles that describe special events and the related items and NPCs - documenting the event to which they were related (if an item or NPC becomes a regular component later, just document the current state, don't mention 'introduced in' such and such event - also, do not add in NPCs retroactively, only NPCs that were adequately documented during the event should be kept).
• Keep Articles describing weapons that have been fully removed from the game, mentioning that they are no longer available (items still remaining should not be documented as 'changed' or 'nerfed' as of such and such date - just their current stats should be shown).
• Delete Articles describing game mechanics that no longer exist (such as Refund Points, etc).
• Delete Articles describing no longer relevant strategies (such as Book Trick, etc).

--- Barek (talk • contribs) - 19:25, 25 August 2006 (CDT)

Re-reading the suggestion from User:Tanaric from above, if the legacy items were changed to a redirect to an article that simply mentions that the item referenced is no longer in the game; or the article was reduced to a one liner followed by a template boiler plate disclaimer mentioning it was no longer in the game - no mention of quantity data (ie: no mention of NPC level, NPC profession, XP costs such as used in refund point, etc - the items that are most difficult to keep accurate); both solutions would alleviate my concerns and objections to maintaining the old articles. --- Barek (talk • contribs) - 19:42, 25 August 2006 (CDT)

That's what I was pointing out, that our current de facto policy is more complicated than an unconditional "delete all historical content". -- Gordon Ecker 21:20, 25 August 2006 (CDT)

so what was the final disposition? keeping legacy or not? we've a category and tag set up. --Honorable Sarah 12:13, 25 August 2006 (CDT)

I believe the tag and category should be deleted until this is resolved. --- Barek (talk • contribs) - 12:23, 25 August 2006 (CDT)

so we are 12 days in and no forseeable agreement. lovely --Honorable Sarah 12:37, 25 August 2006 (CDT)

Nightfall isn't going to be released for another two months. I'm not going to propose a vote myself because I think we've still got a lot of time to resolve this issue, but if someone were to propose that we move this on to the voting phase more quickly, I wouldn't object. -- Gordon Ecker 18:52, 25 August 2006 (CDT)

The discussion isn't progressing as no one has anything new to say. I still think that we should keep everything that might hold interest for someone. Especially stuff which they might find on other fansites and then come looking here for it. They should be able to find an article telling that this thing has been removed from the game. Unless anyone has anything new to say, why not make a vote just to see more clearly what people think and maby rediscuss after the vote. -- (talk) 19:30, 25 August 2006 (CDT)

I might also be happy if all of these articles would just be redirects to one single page stating: "You were trying to find information about something which has been removed from the game. If you read about it on another fansite, their information is outdated. If you want to find more specific historical information, you could ask for it on fansite forums or other Guild Wars communities." -- (talk) 19:51, 25 August 2006 (CDT)

First I want to apologize for not participating more in this discussion, I've been swamped at work and had a lot going on in my personal life the last couple weeks.

Barek has pretty much summed up the unwritten policy as it has been here. That is the current policy. It has never been written down before, but until a few months ago we never had an Image use policy in a written form, we still had a policy about it though. That said, my suggestion for things like "refund point" and the "locked strongbox" is to make the page a redirect to the update page that shows their removal. i.e. refund point would point to Game updates/20050907 or put something like "Please see Game updates/20050907#Attribute Points." as redirects cannot be made to point to subheadings in pages. --Rainith 20:23, 25 August 2006 (CDT)

I think that's a fair compromise. While I would like to see certain articles remain I can't codify which articles I would like and which I wouldn't. If the user was simply told that the thing in question was no longer in the game then I think we would be fulfilling our role by pointing out that, yes, we know it used to be there, but we also know it isn't there now. <LordBiro>/<Talk> 03:51, 26 August 2006 (CDT)

I want to note the inherent contradiction between keeping an article for an item removed from the game, yet not keeping historical info about an item IN the game. I think items removed should not be documented unless they affect the game today (i.e. scam items like the terror shield). --Karlos 04:04, 26 August 2006 (CDT)

Karlos: Didn't you notice the proposal that these articles could be kept as redirects to a generic page stating that the thing was removed from the game? The main reason for not keeping the articles seems to be that the information can't be verified later. If we don't keep nay specific information, we should atleast tell someone searching for the info that it isn't in the game anymore. I would like to keep everything, but I'm okay with the redirect solution if need to be. -- (talk) 04:08, 26 August 2006 (CDT)

I'm not sure what your point there is really Karlos. Have I missed something? Has someone suggested we delete articles on items that currently exist IN the game?

To repeat my point, I don't really think we should keep items that have been removed from the game entirely. My main concern is that someone will read about refund points, which were a significant part of the game mechanic, as you could not reassign attribute points without spending refund points, and come to the wiki looking for info and not be able to find out that refund points were removed from the game. <LordBiro>/<Talk> 04:36, 26 August 2006 (CDT)

My note was pertinent to Barek's summary up above. The third point says keep articles on deleted items, but do NOT keep history of existing items. Seems contradictory to me. --Karlos 04:45, 26 August 2006 (CDT)

Ah yeah Karlos, I had missed that. It does seem contradictory. I certainly agree that any item that still exists in the game should be documented. I wonder if what Barek actually meant was that the way in which an item used to work should not be documented? In this case I see his point. <LordBiro>/<Talk> 04:48, 26 August 2006 (CDT)

Yes, I was specifically thinking of items like Drago's Flatbow and The Rockmolder. Document how they now work, but it's not relevant how they used to work. The only items fully removed that I can think of at the moment (haven't had breakfast yet) are special-event items, which would be addressed by the second row. --- Barek (talk • contribs) - 11:05, 26 August 2006 (CDT)

Keep vs Delete vs Redirect - subheader to avoid a lot of scroll work

So do we have concensus to create a central target page to use for redirection? Or do we target the redirect to the update notice where it was removed (not as self-evident why you land at the target article in my opinion)? Or do we create a one liner summary that excludes quatity data (no level, XP costs, damage amount, etc) with a boilerplate mention of it being a legacy item and a link to the update notice if known? --- Barek (talk • contribs) - 12:02, 30 August 2006 (CDT)

Personally, while I do feel an article would be useful, I think that in practical terms having a legacy template that links to a specific update would be the most sensible option. <LordBiro>/<Talk> 12:16, 30 August 2006 (CDT)

I knocked up a quick example of how I think the legacy template should look. <LordBiro>/<Talk> 12:39, 30 August 2006 (CDT)

There won't always be an update we can point to. Some changes are made silently and some don't require a client update. --Fyren 12:42, 30 August 2006 (CDT)

That's true. I would have hoped a change large enough to affect the deletion of an article would be noted in an update, but this is probably a little optimistic. Let me mess around :) <LordBiro>/<Talk> 12:47, 30 August 2006 (CDT)

Sorted :) <LordBiro>/<Talk> 12:54, 30 August 2006 (CDT)

I'm happy with your suggestion. -- (talk) 15:08, 30 August 2006 (CDT)

Lord Biro, master of templates and template pictures, hehe. --Xeeron 15:16, 30 August 2006 (CDT)

Hehe, you are too kind :P Thankyou!!! <LordBiro>/<Talk> 16:59, 30 August 2006 (CDT)

We're just talking about stuff that would've been deleted under the current de facto policy, right? No one's suggesting that we expand the list of things that get deleted and merge recurring and one-time event stuff into one hideously bloated 2 meg page containing everything from the Dragon Festival and the refugee settlements to Rift Wardens and Evil Gwen, are they? I'm going to add a commented-out version of the current do facto policy, extrapolated from existing policies, to GuildWiki:criteria for deletion but keep it commented out, so that it can be added more easily once we come to a conclusion. -- Gordon Ecker 03:23, 31 August 2006 (CDT)

I was under the impression that nothing new is going to get deleted, and everything that would get deleted gets this template on the page instead and the other content is blanked. With this system we don't need a huge page which lists all of the deleted stuff, or even any kind of generic page at all. People can look at the history of the article to see what it was. Also: We should protect pages tagged with this template. -- (talk) 03:32, 31 August 2006 (CDT)

Gordon: I read your additions to the policy. According to this discussion it seems that we don't want to delete obsolete articles, but blank them and add the legacy tag. -- (talk) 03:57, 31 August 2006 (CDT)

The additions are a combination of Barek's description of the current de-facto policy and my observations of apparent current de-facto policy based on other pages that have been kept, as such, it completely ignores the currently unresolved discussion. They are intended to either be simply de-commented if we decide to keep and formalise the current de facto policy, or be de-commented and altered if we decide to alter the policy. Current trends in this discussion seem to be in favour of deleting obsolete builds, keeping everything that's currently kept under the de facto policy, and either merging and redirecting various other forms of legacy content that would've been deleted unter the current de facto policy, or keeping it but trimming out crunch such as levels, damage and experience. -- Gordon Ecker 04:18, 31 August 2006 (CDT)

Woops, sorry. I was hopping over the word 'de-facto' all the time. My mistake. -- (talk) 04:45, 31 August 2006 (CDT)

Gordon, I don't think anyone is suggesting we behave any different towards articles describing historical events, only features that have been removed from the game. The current suggestion that seems to have general consensus is that, while deleting the article would give the impression to the casual reader that the article had never existed, blanking the article and including a legacy tag would reassure the reader that this feature is no longer in the game, and if they want to know more they can look at the history and/or the specific game update. I included an example at User:LordBiro/LegacyTest.

I certainly agree that it would make sense Gem. Once this tag is added then I don't see any reason why it should be edited again in future. And if there is some special circumstance then we can always unprotect it then. <LordBiro>/<Talk> 04:32, 31 August 2006 (CDT)

I forgot to comment on deleting builds. I'll voice my opinnion here, but I think that the discussion should be done elsewhere. I think that builds which are poor should be deleted and builds which become poor due to skill changes should be deleted, unless they were a big part of the game, for example the 55hp or a trapper. -- (talk) 04:49, 31 August 2006 (CDT)

So what exactly is the rationale of blanking the pages that get the legacy tag? The tag is big enough that there should be no confusion with content still in the game, so all this achieves is making it more difficult to look up the actual content. --Xeeron 06:21, 31 August 2006 (CDT)

Imagine if we were to keep refund point as it is and add the legacy tag. In 6 months time someone might come along and say "actually, refund points worked like this". We have no idea whether that's correct or not.

I don't think it's our responsibility to document how the game used to be, but I do think it's our responsibility to let readers know that "refund points" are no longer part of the game. I don't think we actually need the article to let the readers know that, and we're saving ourselves from future problems by only including the tag. <LordBiro>/<Talk> 06:43, 31 August 2006 (CDT)

Just what Biro said. -- (talk) 07:20, 31 August 2006 (CDT)

The advantage of leaving the article in: We can apply the legacy tag to ALL articles about stuff no longer in GW (e.g. the whole Winterday stuff). We face the exact same problem there, but we want people to be able to read up of wintersday skills, I dont see the difference to people being able to read up on Rift wardens or refund points. --Xeeron 10:04, 31 August 2006 (CDT)

My original complaint with keeping the articles is that confirming changes becomes problematic. I have no problem doing the same for event NPCs and skills (blanking the page and attaching the tag). From what I recall, the only reason the special-event NPCs, skills, quests, etc were not deleted originally was because of the theory that they may return annually, and saving them would save effort of having to restore their articles each year. Blanking the page is still easilly reverted should they be restored annually, so blanking them and adding the tag would pull them into a consistent handling of all removed items. I would recommend keeping the categories to link common legacy items. --- Barek (talk • contribs) - 10:42, 31 August 2006 (CDT)

I agree there Barek, blanking can be reverted easily if we have made a mistake. <LordBiro>/<Talk> 13:41, 31 August 2006 (CDT)

Also, I'm not sure how I feel about blanking Wintersday but keeping the categories there Barek, but I do see where you're coming from. <LordBiro>/<Talk> 13:43, 31 August 2006 (CDT)

My take on that particular article: Wintersday itself is part of the game lore, and to me should be kept. But the quests, skills, and NPCs that were removed after the event ended are not part of the GW universe lore, and should be blanked and tagged. --- Barek (talk • contribs) - 13:48, 31 August 2006 (CDT)

Just a quick clarification: I view Wintersday as part of the lore, but not the Wintersday special event, which is part of game content. --- Barek (talk • contribs) - 14:19, 31 August 2006 (CDT)

One quick thought on the blanking of the "special event atricles" (for lack of a better term), if we do blank them, there will be a lot of images that will then become homeless and most likely be deleted (the next time Gem looks at the unused images page). I don't think that that would be a good idea. --Rainith 16:16, 31 August 2006 (CDT)

One more reason not to blank articles. And think about it: If the problem of verifying old stuff comes up (which I still doubt) you can all go to my talk page and blame me ;-) --Xeeron 16:22, 31 August 2006 (CDT)

I don't think we should be keeping articles simply to avoid having orphaned images. <LordBiro>/<Talk> 16:56, 31 August 2006 (CDT)

And it turns out that my suspicion that someone was arguing for blanking articles relating to some historical events such as Day of the Tengu that wouldn't be deleted under our current policy even though they're part of the lore / backstory was, in fact, correct. Once more, I'm in favour of tagging without blanking. -- Gordon Ecker 19:40, 31 August 2006 (CDT)

I'm not sure who you're referring to there Gordon. Barek said that he didn't want to blank articles that are part of the Lore. I don't really have any feeling on Lore articles either way. Rainith has made a point in favour of keeping them. My only point is that preventing orphan images is not a good enough reason to keep any article, regardless of whether it's lore or not. If lore articles should be kept because they are important to the current story of the game then that should be the argument put forward. <LordBiro>/<Talk> 19:55, 31 August 2006 (CDT)

I'm referring to Barek suggesting that we blank a lot of articles relating to Wintersday because he doesn't consider quests, NPCs or the event itself to technically be part of the lore. -- Gordon Ecker 20:42, 31 August 2006 (CDT)

Actually, I'm also for not blanking. Just tag them and possibly protect. Also undelete allready deleted articles. -- (talk) 23:56, 31 August 2006 (CDT)

SO Gem, does that mean that you think we should blank all articles on removed features and add the tag, apart from Lore articles or articles relating to Lore articles that you think should be tagged but not blanked? <LordBiro>/<Talk> 04:12, 1 September 2006 (CDT)

Okay, I'm on vacation, but still peeking in here from time to time ...

My original suggestion (above) was "or do we create a one liner summary that excludes quatity data (no level, XP costs, damage amount, etc) with a boilerplate mention of it being a legacy item and a link to the update notice if known?" I'm not sure where the idea of blanking crept in, but once it was mentioned, I didn't debate it and ran with it as well.

I think a variation of the idea I originally mentioned would suffice. Remove quantity info from the article (damage level/type, NPC level, costs - be they gold or xp) as that's really at the core of my issue with maintaining the old articles - the stuff that's problematic to verify. Images would remain. Then add the legacy tag to the article.

On other related issues: These historical articles WILL get modified, either by vandals or by good intending individuals who either remember it differently or who read it in some forum described differently. In these cases, verifying which is correct after the fact is the problem.

Also, I'm against protecting the pages, that goes against the basic ideas behind wikis in general. As it is, I'm seeing protection of other articles which I disagree on. To me, protection should only be used on frequently vandalised articles and even then should only be done for un-registered accounts. Even these should probably be set with a duration (from a couple weeks up to maybe 3 months or so). --- Barek (talk • contribs) - 10:55, 1 September 2006 (CDT)

Ok, I still dont understand why we kill the patent to prevent him from getting ill. So even IF some well meaning person edits the wintersday pages. They would still be much more informative than a blank page. If you are all so scared about these edits (btw: if you all think these edits happen, why has there been 0 controversy about them so far? I did not find any edits other than administrive and spelling ones on wintersday articles and I doubt there are many others), make a policy forbidding to change legacy articles. I cant believe that the some principled stance, based on a slight probability of something happening which might lead to problems will get a lot of content deleted which might very well be of interest to users of the wiki. That seems very absurd to me. --Xeeron 14:01, 1 September 2006 (CDT)

BZZT - nonsequitor - your input does not compute - I am not advocating blanking, only of removal of specific problematic data. --- Barek (talk • contribs) - 14:21, 1 September 2006 (CDT)

There seems to be a lot of fuss about deleting Wintersday... I don't advocate that at all, and I don't think anyone else has so far. If they have please correct me!

I personally advocate the blanking of pages referring to features of the game (this does not include events) that are no longer part of the game, i.e. skills, game mechanics, locations, NPCs. Having a one-line or even paragraph summary is OK by me too, I just don't think we should be including quantitive data that might be altered in the future that we would be unable to validate.

I don't have a strong opinion towards event-based articles like Wintersday or Day of the Tengu. I don't have any strong reason for deleting them. The only thing I have said against keeping them (but not necessarily in favour of deleting them) is that preventing orphaning images is a poor reason for keeping Lore articles. To reiterate (because I'm concerned no one is reading these posts properly :P) I don't care about keeping or deleting Lore articles in the slightest. They don't contain the same kind of data as a deleted feature contains. <LordBiro>/<Talk> 14:48, 1 September 2006 (CDT)

I am using Wintersday, because it is the most convinient example, but what I say goes for refund points and similar articles as well. By removing quantitive data, you are still killing the patient to prevent him from getting ill. If anything it will make people edit the articles to put the "missing" data back in. You all advocate deleting (blanking, summarizing, blanking parts, ...) of articles on the motion that perhaps, there might be something not verifiable edited in the future. I outright doubt that such a problem would ever arise, meaning the articles will be deleted for no reason at all. And even IF that problem would ever arise, it can be solved very easily by introducing a "dont change legacy articles" policy. Why is everyone so keen on deleting those articles? They created 0 problems till now. --Xeeron 15:34, 1 September 2006 (CDT)

Few problems would be the result of the existing undocumented policy of not retaining legacy material. Difficult to vandalise what doesn't exist.

As for Wintersday, it's a non-issue. Existing de facto policy is to keep them. Someone above suggested that any policy change should be consistent accross all articles, not having exceptions - okay, fine, I presented how I fealt we should handle them to get consistent handling - at which point complaints came up that the proposal to use a legacy tag is really a covert attempt to begin blanking out even more articles, which is not the case. It's a fabrication to claim that it has been advocated to do so. I am fully willing to support continuation of the existing exceptions for special event articles, and I feel from other posts that others are equally willing to support the continued exception. But to me, if kept, they should remain the exception to keeping legacy material.

Some complained about deletion using the argument that we should contain data as people may hear about the item / game mechanics / strategy elsewhere, and our lack of an article may cause them to believe that GuildWiki is incomplete. Okay, good argument. But, a statement that the item / game mechanics / strategy no longer exists or is no longer part of the game does adequately address this issue. I honestly do not understand this demand that we keep non-relevant material in complete detail, especially as a statement that it's no longer part of the game is, really, all that needs to be said. If desired, I see no issue keeping images and partial descriptions to put it in context instead of relying on the history tab - but specific quantity data serves no benefit. --- Barek (talk • contribs) - 17:14, 1 September 2006 (CDT)

I don't think your analogy about killing a patient to prevent him from getting ill is a very good one. This is a patient that we can raise from the dead should the need arise.

I can see your point of view here Xeeron because I started arguing from a similar viewpoint, but I do think that by allowing the documentation of historical data we are opening a pandoras box that we will have trouble shutting. To use another medical analogy, prevention is better than the cure.

It is current policy to delete any articles on features removed from the game. I think that blanking and adding a legacy tag is a step in the right direction, allowing readers to find out that the feature has been removed, and allowing them to view the history if they want more information. The advantage of this method is that it's very clear to the casual reader that this information will not concern their current gaming experience.

And I think that's the important point here: articles on features removed from the game bear no relevance to the game in its present state, so we should not put readers in a situation where there is any chance of them misunderstanding this, or put contributors in a situation where they feel they have to ammend historical data. <LordBiro>/<Talk> 18:16, 1 September 2006 (CDT)

Well, I was hoping that the legacy tag would be big and clear enough to not let that happen. But if I absolutely cant convince you, go ahead and blank the pages, before this discussion gets to the 100k mark. --Xeeron 19:05, 1 September 2006 (CDT)

What if we add a line to the the legacy tag saying that legacy information is generally unverifiable? Reverting vandalism and maintaining accuracy can be handled by people who care about legacy information. People who don't care about legacy information probably wouldn't be affected by any inaccuracies in legacy articles. If someone's really picky about accuracy, they can settle an argument with a screenshot. -- Gordon Ecker 21:02, 1 September 2006 (CDT)

After reading all of the above again, I think that we should add the legacy template at the top and leave the rest of the article as is. Remove the article from most categories (ofcourse categories like the wintersday and halloween categories should remain) Add a note to the legacy template that this info might not be detailed or correct. A policy to prevent editing the articles content would be ok too, but keep the pages open to layout and other similiar changes. -- (talk) 14:58, 2 September 2006 (CDT)

I made an article called article retention that may be a better place to discuss this. I've proposed the initial policy to be as close to the developing consensus as possible. —Tanaric 16:04, 3 September 2006 (CDT)

theoretical builds debate

See GuildWiki talk:Style and formatting/Builds#theoretical builds

signing delete tags

does anyone actually sign delete tags in main namespace articles? could this policy be changed to reflect? --Honorable Sarah 11:53, 25 August 2006 (CDT)

I don't know enough about template scripting (have learned from trial and error), but is it possible to insert ~~~ (three tildas) and have them automatically convert to the user's name? I'm not sure if the substitution of the user's name will actually function from a template, so it would require some testing. As it is, I frequently double check history on many delete requests. --- Barek (talk • contribs) - 12:05, 25 August 2006 (CDT)

none of the existing delete tags, no any of the deleted delete tags, have signatures. since signing edits to articles is not accepted beheviour, why should a delete tag be different? this policy should change to reflect the current process --Honorable Sarah 12:20, 25 August 2006 (CDT)

That's right. All you have to do is check the page history to see who places a delete tag. Is there a reason why a signature is needed? -Gares 12:18, 25 August 2006 (CDT)

I can just as easilly continue checking the history tab, so I'm more or less indifferent on changing the policy. But, if it could be added to the delete tag, then I would support that as it saves a step for me and any other admin that checks for some deleted. --- Barek (talk • contribs) - 12:31, 25 August 2006 (CDT)

Do not forget, it is courtesy to allow a time frame for users to oppose, so if a signature was added to the tag, the timestamp would also be a nice addition. -Gares 13:36, 25 August 2006 (CDT)

You're right. If it can be done, that'll help even more that just the signature. --- Barek (talk • contribs) - 13:44, 25 August 2006 (CDT)

I don't think that a delete tag should be added with a signature. I think it makes more sense to say "this article is a candidate for deletion because reason" and then to say why on the talk page. I don't think you should be putting peoples names in articles under any circumstances. <LordBiro>/<Talk> 14:07, 25 August 2006 (CDT)

I was indifferent on signatures - while handy, I wouldn't be opposed to changing the policy to remove mention of signing them. But I love the idea of including a date stamp. If it works (ie: will the system recognize and replace the tildas from a template?), then I would love to see ~~~~~ (five tildas) added to the template. The only problem is that I suspect it won't work. If someone who is better at the code wants to give it a try, feel free to see what you can accomplish on this. --- Barek (talk • contribs) - 14:12, 25 August 2006 (CDT)

if you restore the legacy template again, we can copy stabbers date/time shorthand out and use that code. --Honorable Sarah 14:36, 25 August 2006 (CDT)

That code required the user posting the tag to manually insert the date. Here's the instructions for using it:

To mark an article as a legacy feature, add the following to the top of its page: {{legacy|{{subst:CURRENTDAY}} {{subst:CURRENTMONTHNAME}} {{subst:CURRENTYEAR}}, {{subst:CURRENTTIME}}''

--- Barek (talk • contribs) - 14:46, 25 August 2006 (CDT)

Three edit conflicts all with Barek... STOP FUCKING TYPING :P

Despite not doing what we'd like the code would look something like this: {{subst:CURRENTYEAR}}-{{subst:CURRENTMONTH}}-{{subst:CURRENTDAY}} {{subst:CURRENTTIME}}. This would produce 2006-08-25 19:50, which matches the ISO standard for time. But as Barek says this would have to be manually entered. <LordBiro>/<Talk> 14:50, 25 August 2006 (CDT)

<insert 97 tabs> Template:timestamp? {{delete|real article is [["Move Zig!"]]|{{subst:timestamp}}}} that would only work if there is a <substitute> tag that works like