BZPRPG News and Discussion

[Constructelf]

One thing I wanted to ask and I've never seen come up:

 

Given that Matoran and Vortixx can eat with their mouths alongside Skakdi, do Vuata Maca hold any significance? Can they still be used as a touch-based energy source in favor of physically eating food?

[25K Now!]

Obviously you suck the energy from it by touching your mouth to it.

[Razgriz]

l-lewd!


next you'll rp people

holding hands

 

[soularin]

Proposal:

What if we did both? Keep our detailed biographies, but have a subsection for streamlined bulletpoint events?

That way we have our in-depth character bios, but also a nice easy way for others to access our ongoings.

I agree with the above statment. Kughii makes a good point, HOWEVER, I don't think it's worth it to make everyone who has put hard work into their biographies scratch them altogether. I mean, seriously, I have a really hard time understanding the logic in that. I could totally understand it as an additional piece, like a summary or whatever, but please don't go deleting the elaborate bios that people HAVE worked hard to maintain. That seems like a waste to me. If some people have larger pages than others, who cares? Personally, I've really benefitted from reading through elaborate biographies, and doing so has helped me better understand things that I didn't get a chance to read here. It really beats going way back in the location topics and scouring them for certain characters you want to catch up on.

 

That's just my opinion, but I have to say I really hope this doesn't get overruled. I'd hate to see people's work get deleted unnecessarily.

[25K Now!]

l-lewd!

 

 

next you'll rp people

holding hands

 

I can't handle the lewd!

[Mel]

Where exactly are Hogo Noshima and Herupa Jiyu right now?

[Funkydude527]

A LITTLE WIKI ANNOUNCEMENT

Staff approved Maps are on the way. Please PM any custom locations to moi and I'll pass them along to Ghosty for the big map after getting them on the wiki.

-DROOLS-

 

Can I send you a portfolio of fake maps I have drawn? I mean, I want to help in any way possible?

 

EDIT FOR PRESUMPTIVENESS: Not even like big places, just like sections of rivers, or railroad maps or glacial flows or caves or just local little things. I mean, I LOVE MAPS.

Edited October 25, 2014 by Funkydude527

[AuRon the champion]

I dunno, somewhere.

[25K Now!]

We've decided on random garden.

[They]

Well, that was an astounding response!  A: I now see how uses the wiki and why.  B: you all brought up some great points.  

 

Tyler, Requiem, etc., you make a great point and as I've already stated I'm in the front row of people having to delete mounds of text if this idea flies.  The concept of making a quick event involvement section, or maybe putting the bio at the bottom, sounds like a good compromise.  Mainly, Ghosthands and I have been working to get things into a more consistent shape, but updating everything is impossible when we're still trying to add old information (i.e. Desde, etc) without much help.  I've been seeing a lot of new users, and some older users coming back to create and update pages, and that's fantastic!  However, in the end it create a lot of extra pages and the core "lore" of the major plots end up being sidelined.  The concept of reducing extra writing by having characters linked to events (rather than a specific personal bio) was mainly for the reason now x number of players involved in the event could pool their writing together instead of working individually.  Yes, we'd have more events than we do now, but that's fine and would fill out the time-line of the game over on the wiki a bit more.  

Anyways, I think you've all hit on some great points and would love to see more discussion on how to resolve the lack of updating, the need for more information, and inconsistency in formatting.

 

P.S.

@Palm: my current profile for Ishi is actually not the way it was being proposed.  However, I have to agree I thought it worked well to compartmentalize.  The only reason why it works is because I keep the page up to date and have the entire post archive back-saved into my wiki blog. 

[Nato G]

So... What I got from this is that you're ackowledging that people disagree, but going ahead with it anyway?

 

Also, I'm still caught up on the fact that apparently just two people have made this decision without properly consulting the rest of the community.

 

Sorry if I'm sounding kind of crabby here; I'm just frustrated because it feels like we're not really being given a choice in this matter...

[25K Now!]

A character's biography shouldn't boil down to dot points.

[They]

I did not say that the idea was going ahead despite disagreement.  In fact, I believe I asked for a continued discussion after explaining the reasons for how the idea had come about.  BY ALL MEANS, PLEASE keep talking about ways to increase the usability of the wiki!

 

Yes, two people made this decision to change things because (a) they're both wiki admins and (b) the wiki hasn't been up to date in, well, since its inception.  Ghosthands runs the show over on the wiki, and I can be commonly seen cleaning and updating the pages.  Since we're both the most active Lorebook members for the wiki as well, things boiled down to making a decision and seeing where it went. Apparently it's not a well liked decision, and that's something to note.  Who wants to use something they don't like? (Besides government. Let's save that for a later debate, lol.) An alternative we were also thinking of was making the lorebook -- the really important and totally up to date in a very specific format, like a book -- a separate place for resource and letting the current wiki be totally free ground to run wild, especially in character pages.  Would this work better?  The difficulty is just keeping things up to date.

 

Thoughts?

[Nato G]

Ah, my apologies, I misread part of that last post.

 

I can see there are a lot of wiki pages that require updating; I really think everyone who's made pages has an obligation to upkeep and maintain them, for everyone's sake. I just don't know how that could be enforced.

 

I've been doing my best just to keep my own pages up to date, and making mention of any characters I cross paths with, just so that there is some kind of record of what's occuring.

 

It's obvious that there's a problem, but I don't think condensing everyone's biographies into dull, uninteresting dot points is the way to solve it. That said, I can't think of any goods ideas myself. Any suggestions from anyone else?

Edited October 25, 2014 by NatoGreavesy

[Visaru]

We dont have the manpower to run both; The Wiki is already supposed to work as a sort of Lorebook and look how outdated that is. I think it is fine to let people use the Wiki as a place to create longer more elaborate profiles as well as make it an organized reference place. No need to be strict about the format when we can just have both elaborate and easy to reference brief versions exist side by side.

[Not Quite Dead]

l-lewd!

 

 

next you'll rp people

holding hands

 

 

REPORTED, HlDDEN, CALLED THE COPS

[25K Now!]

That reminds me, I need to make wiki pages for my other thirty characters.

[Voxumo]

To be honest. I am perfectly fine with doing what Kughii proposed, as long we can also keep the more extended biography section. I mean I feel that would be a proper compromise between the two points. And everyone, i'm assuming, would be satisfied with the decision. 

 

Though question Kughii, what if an event that took place is not listed on the main category page for events? Like if it was small enough to go under the radar, but big enough for your character that it is an important part of it? Would creating a list point for it be allowable, or are we limited to events that are officially recognized on the event category page?

[Toatapio Nuva]

I disagree 100% about removing proper full-text biographies. As someone who consistently updates his wiki pages, I would hate to see all that work going to waste, and I see I'm not alone. I think the focus should be on updating outdated pages, not changing those that already are up to date.

 

Yet I agree that the wiki needs to go through a serious overhaul of some kind. I've done my best to bring old pages up to standard, like the Turaga articles, but a major problem for people is that they don't have enough knowledge of the lore to make edits.

[Nato G]

I think I agree with absolutely every point Toatapio Nuva has made there. The people with the knowledge and understanding should be fixing up the out of date articles.

 

That should take precedence over making everyone else change their own articles that ARE up to date.

[Ghosthands]

 

Ok, WOAH, WOAH, EVERYBODY SLOW DOWN.

 

This is not what I wanted to wake up to. Commence cleanup operation...

A LITTLE WIKI ANNOUNCEMENT

 

<snip>

 

 

I don't want to humiliate Kughii here (God knows, he's worked far more faithfully on the Wiki than I have) but this announcement jumped the gun. It was based on a conversation Kughs and I had in (for me) the late evening, with my understanding being that we would work on the idea further once I'd slept on it and had a chance to think about it with a fresh mind. I didn't write any part of that announcement, nor did I see or approve it prior to its posting.

 

That said, yes, this is basically my fault because I proposed the idea of condensing character bios into shorter, more readable 'timelines'. A lot of what Kughii said above is absolutely right, but 'scrapping all character biographies' is much more extreme than what I'd intended.

 

With these things in mind, plus the excellent points brought up by Tyler et al., (and now that I've had a good night's sleep) allow me to re-explain, reform and repackage the idea thus:

 

• One of the main problems with the Wiki is that information there is often heavily out-of-date, particularly on character pages. This can make the pages misleading or frustrating to the reader. It also feeds a bit of a vicious cycle for the writer (not in all cases, but definitely in my own): your character's bio is out-of-date, which is demoralising, which erodes your will to work on it, which makes it more out of date, etc etc etc.
• The idea I proposed last night was to stop focusing on lengthy biographies for characters, and instead focus on pages for the events themselves, particularly those that involve many PCs. These pages could then be linked to from a much-more-concise timeline on the individual character's page.
• My reasoning behind this idea was that unlike, say, Biosector, we don't have a large and highly-active editor-base. Most people focus on just chronicling their own characters, which obviously makes the content rather unbalanced: you get reams of text about a few people's PCs, and a couple of meagre sentences (or in many cases, no page at all) about high-profile ones. We needed a solution that would not require vast amounts of time spent writing (which is not a luxury I can afford) but would still remedy the balancing problem and make pages (and the Wiki as a whole) more useful.

As I said, I needed some time to think the idea over, and now that I've been able to do so, this is what I'm proposing going forward:

• As many people have said, it would be far better to add the bulleted timelines while still letting people keep the long-format biographies, with the proviso that the timeline should take priority and be kept up-to-date, for ease of reference. A timeline is much easier to maintain than a prose biography, making it easier for the writer as well.
• Again, as has been said (and thank you for reminding me—my evening-befuddled brain had completely forgotten this), the Wiki is ideal for dumping bio detail that can't fit on the profile pages.
• By shifting the focus to concise timelines, however, we'll make things a lot easier for everyone. There will be no obligation to write paragraph after paragraph just to maintain a page. That way, we can focus our time and energy for writing on the actual game, while still making the Wiki more complete. For those of us who are limited in that time and energy (I am certainly one of them) less is more, but that doesn't mean previous hard work should just be thrown out.
• There's a lot of characters whose players don't use the Wiki, and with the current system, they don't get much love. With a timeline system, it'll be a heck of a lot easier for other players to write their pages.
• Also, please bear in mind that this only applies to biographies, i.e. the character's history. Sections such as appearance and traits are unaffected.

I apologise for the confusion that's been caused here. If anybody has any feedback (positive or negative) on what I've said, please do share it.

[25K Now!]

Well that explains things.

[Nato G]

Still... I'm not overly fond of this idea. What about interactions that aren't really events? Are we really going to write up a wiki page for every petty argument or impromptu barfight or street scuffle, especially those that only involve one or two characters?

 

I still think the focus should be on updating plot-important character and events pages before anything else.

[Ghosthands]

Still... I'm not overly fond of this idea. What about interactions that aren't really events? Are we really going to write up a wiki page for every petty argument or impromptu barfight or street scuffle, especially those that only involve one or two characters?

 

I still think the focus should be on updating plot-important character and events pages before anything else.

 

You're missing the point. Interactions that don't merit a full event page can easily be summed up in a bullet-point without any need for a link.

 

The timeline thing is intended to help update plot-important character pages. Instead of having to write a full biography, editors can now sum up a character's history in a series of concise bullet-points.

[Toatapio Nuva]

While having both a biography and timeline sounds better than deleting the biography altogether, I'm still iffy about the idea. Since everyone doesn't even use the wiki, it makes more sense to me to let players decide what their character pages look like. Even if the rules change, it'll still be the same people, the ones keeping their pages up to date and neat already, who contribute to the wiki.

 

The real problem is the major pages that are out of date. Event and location pages, as well as important characters. One thing I've been doing with my pages is adding links to important posts in the game. Maybe something like that should serve as references? Also, I think a common timeline per arc would be helpful. Anyone could add points to them, as long as their events are at least somewhat relevant.

 

To organize the events, I think it would be smart to call the story arcs seasons rather than "staff plot year 2012 arc" or so. Especially since the plots don't follow the years logically, it makes little sense to refer to them. Thus, season 1 and season 2 would be more logical, and also sound more cool and episodic.

 

Just my thoughts.

[Nato G]

Once again, I completely agree with pretty much everything Toatapio Nuva has said above, particularly the part about letting players choose what they want their character pages to look like.

Edited October 25, 2014 by NatoGreavesy

[25K Now!]

I don't even know what anything after "Arc 1" is anymore.

[Nato G]

Yeah. According to the wiki we're still in the 2013 arc.

[shadow pridak money gang]

aaron's said multiple times to totally disregard years at this point. we're in arc 2. it just so happened to start in 2013, and it'll carry us through to 2015.

 

when we're in arc 3, you'll know.

 

-Tyler

[25K Now!]

Fun times.

[Toatapio Nuva]

aaron's said multiple times to totally disregard years at this point. we're in arc 2. it just so happened to start in 2013, and it'll carry us through to 2015.

 

when we're in arc 3, you'll know.

 

-Tyler

 

And yet the wiki still refers to the current arc as the 2013 staff plot.

[25K Now!]

Yeah the wiki's outta date.

[Ghosthands]

While having both a biography and timeline sounds better than deleting the biography altogether, I'm still iffy about the idea. Since everyone doesn't even use the wiki, it makes more sense to me to let players decide what their character pages look like.

 

No, it doesn't. A certain amount of standardisation is necessary to make the Wiki a useful resource. Too much stylistic freedom and you get things like this.

 

 

Even if the rules change, it'll still be the same people, the ones keeping their pages up to date and neat already, who contribute to the wiki.

 

 

Again, I disagree. If we improve the overall quality of the Wiki, there's every chance it could motivate more people to come and contribute.

 

 

The real problem is the major pages that are out of date. Event and location pages, as well as important characters. 

 

 

This is the purpose of the Lorebook project. It stalled over the summer because I was extremely busy helping my parents with work, but now that I'm back at Uni, we're hoping to get things rolling again in the near future.

 

 

Also, I think a common timeline per arc would be helpful. Anyone could add points to them, as long as their events are at least somewhat relevant.

 

To organize the events, I think it would be smart to call the story arcs seasons rather than "staff plot year 2012 arc" or so. Especially since the plots don't follow the years logically, it makes little sense to refer to them. Thus, season 1 and season 2 would be more logical, and also sound more cool and episodic.

 

 

On these points, however, I agree with you. I'll make a note of the 'arc timeline' idea, and we can rename the 'Staff Plot 2012 Arc' to 'Staff Plot Arc 1' etc.

 

And yeah, a lot of stuff is out of date. If we can get the Lorebook initiative going, it should fix most (if not all) of the problems.

[25K Now!]

Oh yeah, the old Yumiwa wiki page.

[Toatapio Nuva]

While having both a biography and timeline sounds better than deleting the biography altogether, I'm still iffy about the idea. Since everyone doesn't even use the wiki, it makes more sense to me to let players decide what their character pages look like.

 

No, it doesn't. A certain amount of standardisation is necessary to make the Wiki a useful resource. Too much stylistic freedom and you get things like this.

 

I think it might help to allow other players to edit others' wiki pages with regards to the format but not content-wise. There has been interest in updating the Akiri and Piraka pages for example, but the response was that only the players themselves would be allowed to do that. Some things like deleting empty headings and clearing up infoboxes should be allowed, in my opinion.

 

But yeah, that Yumiwa page is horrible... some level of standardisation clearly is necessary. There are some instructions in the characters category, but perhaps it should be made clearer? Many wiki pages look bad simply because people don't know much about wiki formatting, so maybe updating the template with a ready infobox and sections would make things clearer? 

 

 

Even if the rules change, it'll still be the same people, the ones keeping their pages up to date and neat already, who contribute to the wiki.

 

Again, I disagree. If we improve the overall quality of the Wiki, there's every chance it could motivate more people to come and contribute.

 

It's certainly a desired outcome. It will take the efforts of the current active wiki editors to achieve that though, so I think we should consider that as a starting point.

 

I really like the lorebook idea, since it's designed to fix the problems we've been debating about here. What about pulling that project through first and then reconsider the biography-timeline question?

[Ghosthands]

I think it might help to allow other players to edit others' wiki pages with regards to the format but not content-wise. There has been interest in updating the Akiri and Piraka pages for example, but the response was that only the players themselves would be allowed to do that. Some things like deleting empty headings and clearing up infoboxes should be allowed, in my opinion.

Really? I wasn't aware of that.

 

 

But yeah, that Yumiwa page is horrible... some level of standardisation clearly is necessary. There are some instructions in the characters category, but perhaps it should be made clearer? Many wiki pages look bad simply because people don't know much about wiki formatting, so maybe updating the template with a ready infobox and sections would make things clearer? 

 

 

One of the things I was intending to do alongside Lorebook was make things easier for editors: for example, by creating some simple guides on how to make a character page, how to add an infobox, etc. I intend to get on that once Lorebook is up and running again.

 

 

I really like the lorebook idea, since it's designed to fix the problems we've been debating about here. What about pulling that project through first and then reconsider the biography-timeline question?

 

 

 

Lorebook is the priority. The timeline idea is intended to help both the Lorebook and the wider Wiki, by making it easier to create complete pages for relevant characters.

[silo]

Yeah, I still don't get how to insert an infobox...probably just me being stupid

[25K Now!]

I copy-and-pasted mine from BS01 and edited the fields back in the day.

[Daniel the Finlander]

Yeah, I still don't get how to insert an infobox...probably just me being stupid

Just edit a page with an exsisting infobox and copy-paste it, then cancel the edit. That's how I did it.

 

Otherwise, here's an example of an infobox:

 

{{Infobox

|Box Title = Example

|Row 1 title = Example

|Row 1 info = Example

}}

[Toatapio Nuva]

The infobox system we're using is pretty simple, but there is yet a simpler format for it, making inserting information really easy and, most importantly, uniform and consisten between pages. I would love to adopt that system for the wiki, if only I'm allowed to.