Sundering

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August 2009

Item Lists

I added two additional templates, {{Item Table Three}} and {{Item Table Two}} that are the same as {{Item Table}} only instead of four items wide they are three and two items wide respectively. This provides more flexibility if you need to put an item list alongside something else (such as in a quest writeup when there's little info before the items section, like Defeating Vaeshok) or when it improves the layout (such as when sets of items are grouped in 3s, like Asheron's_Departure#Items).

As a side note, normally I'd just add a parameter to specify the width and make it one template however because the table formatting changes completely and you have up to 32 items it made it too unwieldy for a single template. --Tlosk  talk  contr 12:45, 28 August 2009 (UTC)

Creature Template

I have created a possible new look for the Creature Template. It is based upon the cleaner looking NPC Template. You can view it here: User:An Adventurer/Sandbox 3

Notes:

  • I have kept all the variables from the current {{Creature}} wiki template, in order for it to be compatible with all creatures currently using the template.
  • I have moved Trophies, Weaknesses, Common Attacks, Melee Defense, Melee Attack, Missile Defense, Missile Attack, Magic Defense, & Magic Attack from within the "Assessment Panel" area to the side, where the TOC was displayed on the NPC template.
  • the notes section has not changed at all.

My idea is that, if possible, the information on the side for attack/defense skills will only be displayed if there is information entered into the template. If no defense or attack skills are listed (which is pretty common), none of those bullet points will be displayed.

If however, no information is entered for the Weaknesses, Attacks, or Trophies variables, I think it would be more useful for "Unknown" to be displayed. If one wants to specifically state that a creature has no weaknesses or trophies, "None" will have to be entered.

Thoughts?

--An Adventurer 18:48, 24 August 2009 (UTC)

I know you've mentioned previously that your browser is full screen on a wide screen display. A fair number of people, including myself, have AC open in a window and the browser open to the side. The third panel isn't visible at all at that size unfortunately (or for people on a 15" display or many laptops).

Also I think the spaces are a nice prompt for the info, indicating it needs to be added still.--Tlosk  talk  contr 01:15, 25 August 2009 (UTC)

I initially wanted to move the trophies, weaknesses, attacks/defenses, etc into the notes section, but I was not sure if that would be possible to have the {{Creature}} template place its variables in the notes section, without that section being a part of the template. And I wanted to avoid having all creatures having two notes sections if possible.

What are your thoughts on changing the template at all? The creature template has more or less stayed the same since page templates were created. I feel it would look better to have it more closely resemble the in game appraisal panel, just like what we have done for items and NPCs.

--An Adventurer 01:41, 25 August 2009 (UTC)

Unfortunately neither is possible, the content of a template can't span more than a single section.

Part of the reason for updating the NPC template was frequently there wasn't much information which caused a large gap when put alongside the image and showing the stats allowed getting rid of the gap.

I suppose part of the problem is that there's a lot of info that isn't readily visible with an ID panel that's still important.--Tlosk  talk  contr 14:28, 25 August 2009 (UTC)

I see. I have altered the new look example in my sandbox once more. Let me know if you think this style could work. User:An Adventurer/Sandbox 3 --An Adventurer 15:24, 25 August 2009 (UTC)

That looks really good, I'll get a mockup in Template:Sandbox later today and the we can test it with a few pages and see if it needs any more tweaks.--Tlosk  talk  contr 16:33, 25 August 2009 (UTC)

There were some tricky bits but I have a working example now in Template:Sandbox with three usage examples at User:Tlosk/Test. Because of the implicit tree arrangement I moved all the attack values underneath common attacks and the three defensive values underneath weaknesses.

I removed the beveled border so the lower panel better integrates with the block and added a subtemplate {{Creature Trophy List}} that can handle displaying icons. Plain text or plain links can continue to be used in the trophy parameter which avoids breaking anything currently in use.

Try it out with a couple creatures (remember to use Sandbox instead of Creature for the template) and see if anything can be improved. --Tlosk  talk  contr 15:34, 26 August 2009 (UTC)

They look good. Some observations:

  • I made the tables below the stats/pic section 620px wide because of the beveled border. Now with the bevel removed the table is wider than the stats and image. It is especially noticable on the Obsidian Golem.
  • The border color on the boxes is pretty light with no bevel border. I think it should be changed to match the color of the border on the into box.
  • I think it looks good without the bevel, but we should probably update the NPC template to the same style.

--An Adventurer 22:13, 26 August 2009 (UTC)

The borders have been darkened. I'd reduced the width some, but it was still off 2 or 3 pixels, it lines up correctly now when using a standard size image (300x400) however the size renders differently when the image has to be resized. This is parser engine behavior which we don't have direct control over. I might be able to workaround by using nested tables, I'll try some things out. --Tlosk  talk  contr 23:30, 26 August 2009 (UTC)

Looks better with the darker border. I hate to suggest this since it adds another level of templates, but perhaps we should make general ACCW Table style template, like how we have a {{Creature Stat Table Format}} template. There are a LOT of our templates with tables that use a single style (border color, width, and bg color), but now this creature template uses a new one. I think it would make sense for all the light grey, outlined in darker grey tables to use the same shades, and it would certainly be a time saver if we had a single template that controlled that. What do you think? --An Adventurer 00:29, 27 August 2009 (UTC)

I added a {{format}} template that can store as many specific formats as we use (instead of a template for each format, you just pass the name as the parameter). That'll make it easier, to have them all in one place, if you can't remember the name of the one you want to use. --Tlosk  talk  contr 20:10, 27 August 2009 (UTC)

The nesting worked and the panels square up consistently now regardless of the image used. Well at least for Firefox anyways, I'm looking into IE (along with some other issues with the most recent version of IE 8 that aren't rendering right on other parts of the site) and I hope to get workarounds for them soon.

Also because the structure is more rigid, a vertical layout option is no longer available. Templates currently set to vertical will still display ok, just with a smaller image to the right. --Tlosk  talk  contr 19:31, 29 August 2009 (UTC)

Asheron's Call on other wikis

There are pages on Asheron's Call on various other wikis. I was thinking that it would be good to list these somewhere, but I'm not sure where. I don't want to clutter up the top of the Related Links page with all these links, but maybe that would be best. Here are the links:

Wilderness/Generic Merchants

I have noticed during my explorations that there are really only a few types of generic merchants, and these types are all identical. For example, while there are varying types of generic Peddlers, all the Female Sho Peddlers are exactly the same (see Peddler (42.4N, 32.2E) & Peddler (27.8S, 68.3E)). I propose that instead of creating a unique page for every generic merchant, we instead create one page per specific type, and on that page list the locations where they are found. I would suggest naming them in this fashion: Peddler (Female Sho), Healer (Male Aluvian), etc. Gender may not be needed - I'd have to scout out what all the types are before doing any changes.

On a related topic: Crafters and collectors. The same is true of them - there are a handful of varying types. We saw this was taken advantage of in the Assassin's Roost Quest where we had to bring items to a specific type of collector - an Aluvian Collector, a Gharu'ndim Stone Collector, and a Sho Wing Collector. I would suggest that we break the various collectors up in a similar way as I propose we do to generic merchants.

--An Adventurer 15:52, 10 August 2009 (UTC)

Good idea. --Tlosk  talk  contr 16:26, 10 August 2009 (UTC)

AC2

See Talk:Asheron's Call 2 --An Adventurer 16:52, 6 August 2009 (UTC)

Wiki project pages

Would it be possible or useful to move the various pages on the wiki about the wiki to wiki project pages? For example, moving Naming Conventions to Asheron's Call Community Wiki:Naming Conventions. Or moving the various pages under Help:Contents to be under the [[Help:<Page>]] name. Basically, I'm suggesting we separate pages about the wiki and its use from pages actually about the game. --An Adventurer 16:36, 6 August 2009 (UTC)

It's possible yes, but for a couple of reasons would not be a good idea for this particular wiki I believe.

  • By default searches only include the main name space. The concept of name spaces isn't something commonly understood outside the programming community which means neophytes trying to find information have a high probability of being unable to find them if they are outside the Main name space.
  • The primary reason for namespaces is to avoid naming conflicts. For a project like Wikipedia that covers essentially everything this is vital. For our wiki this need is almost nonexistant.
  • Naming issues, articles outside the main space have (especially in our case with our long site name) an awkward prefix which can also make it harder to find a known article by simply typing the name of the article into the search box.

For these reasons moving articles to other name spaces solves no problems (article name conflicts) and creates problems that don't now exist (search difficulties and lengthening article names). Keeping as much as possible in the main name space is ideal for specialized wikis. --Tlosk  talk  contr 19:50, 10 August 2009 (UTC)

Disambiguation

I recently changed the Lady Aerfalle entry to reflect the discussion here in July 2009 > creature/NPC pages and lore. Each creature and NPC version of Aerfalle, along with the lore character, now have individual pages. The way I disambiguated the creatures was to add (<level> Creature) at the end. The NPCs were both the same level, so I included the quest name in the page title.

I believe we need to update the Naming Conventions page to reflect this change. But before we do, I wanted to discuss the way we should go about naming disambiguation pages, and the possibility of extending this beyond the Creature/NPC/Character category.

On how to name the pages: I am open for suggestions. I named the Aerfalle pages the in the first way I could come up with that allowed for unique pages. But certainly adding (<level> Creature) to the end of creatures that require disambiguation won't always work. I do not believe there will be one single page naming system that will work for all the Creature/NPC/Character disambiguation situations that will come up in AC. However, I think we could come up with a list of acceptable suffixes that editors should try to use first.

On extending disambiguation: I was thinking we may want to extend this to items, and possibly other page types as well. My reason for items is because of categories and spell enchantments. The Sword of Lost Light, for example, has many different versions. These have varying spells and special properties. If you are looking through the retired category, Sword of Lost Light is listed there, even though only the original version is retired. If you are looking at what links to Blood Drinker VI, the Sword of Lost Light will be listed, even though 2 versions do not have the spell.

Another reason for disambiguating weapons/armors with multiple versions is to get a more accurate count on the category pages. For example, all 3 versions of the Crest of Kings can exist in game, but they are counting only as 1 shield in the category.

Thoughts?

--An Adventurer 16:30, 6 August 2009 (UTC)

Kill Tasks & Titles

A while ago we discussed titles at Talk:Quests. It was decided that, whenever possible, a title should redirect to the quest it is from. While most have not been doing this for quests (since we never added it to the page template or anywhere else), I have been doing it and still think it is a good idea.

This brings me to kill tasks. I think that we should consider naming kill tasks by their titles. I thought about this when I saw the Hunter Quest (Elementals) page. This is not a very good name as turbine could add more elemental tasks at any time.

While the titles themselves may not always be very descriptive (for example, tumerok gladiator task title is Dryreach Militia), it would give killtasks a unique name. To help with locating kill tasks, I would suggest that we create redirect pages tagged as kill tasks. For example, The page Dryreach Militia would be the guide, and the pages Hunter Quest (Tumerok Gladiator) and Tumerok Gladiator Kill Task would redirect to it.

For the few kill tasks without titles (paradox olthoi nypmphs/grubs, possibly others) we would use <Creature/Group of Creatures> Kill Task as the name. Same for kill tasks with multiple title rewards, like the coral golem and caul rift tasks. The multiple titles would then redirect to the guide.

For kill tasks with multiple creatures, I would suggest creating Hunter Quest (<Creature>) and <Creature> Kill Task pages for every creature on the list that redirect to the guide. This would be useful in the Elemental Eradicator guide and the 3 tasks from Belinda du Loc. The reason for creating a redirect page for each creature on the list is that if you are flagged for the task but do not remember it, it only tells you, for example "You have killed 3 Caustics! You must kill 25 to complete your task". This can be confusing when trying to look up the task, since there is no Caustic Kill Task.

--An Adventurer 16:30, 6 August 2009 (UTC)

July 2009

Thug Events

Please see Talk:Old Ghosts --An Adventurer 23:42, 17 July 2009 (UTC)

Spells

To: Tlosk
Nice work with the spells and the new design. Some questions about it:

I noticed all spells are being created as links. But if the previous spell system is going to be used, all of those links will just be redirects to the main spell page. Do you have plans to bring back individual spell pages, and merely place a link to the main spell page on individual spells?

Foci components are not listed, and old comps are only base comps with none of the tapers (even non-personal) included. I understand that due to page width only so much info can be displayed, but I do think this info should still be available somewhere.

One major thing I noticed is that there is no learnable/not learnable column. I think this is very important to have.

My overall suggestions would be:

  • Replace "Base Components" with "Learnable"
  • Eventually, create individual pages for all spells, where full comp listings and correct spell words can be listed for non-standard spells.

--An Adventurer 15:56, 17 July 2009 (UTC)

To: An Adventurer
This is the first of three stages, where I get the bulk of the data in place using tools. The second will be editing individual spell pages, most will be redirects categorized as creature spell, unlearnable spell, etc. Some will have their own page when they have additional information that's important (related quests, etc). Ones with their own page will have a prominent link to the list page for stacking info. Also in the second stage I'll be deleting the generic Cantrip pages (all spells of a given effect are now listed on the same list page, and the individual spell redirects will be themselves categorized at cantrip, this way they will show up individually by name on the category page).

After initially including tapers, I discovered that there are discrepancies in game and in fact there aren't nonpersonal tapers (colors in the supposedly fixed taper position that differ from those given in the portal.dat info). Those can be added if anyone wants to though (the {{Spell Formula}} template allows you to just insert tapers or empty spaces as desired). Since it's no longer possible to enter component information to learn a new spell though it's not something that I'll be doing myself.

The learnable information will be added in the third stage (this data is metadata so will have to be done by hand for each spell), I'm toying with the idea of linking to scrolls (with the respective icon) for those, and making special icons for monster only, item only, or quest learned that would each link to something appropriate for that particular spell.

There's about 5000 spells so I should be done in another day or two. The tables and rows are templates to make adjustments as painless as possible so if you think of any more suggestions let me know. --Tlosk 15:15, 17 July 2009 (UTC)

Also we'll need to overhaul the Spells page once this is all done and I was thinking of making a prominent section there about focii and prismatic formulas instead of repeating them on every single spell. --Tlosk 15:18, 17 July 2009 (UTC)
I should add that I have no objection to having individual pages for each spell, but at least for the interim we'll have all spells link to something that gives a description. I primarily made them links to aid in making the redirects, so there are links to spells that do have pages, and because I thought it looked nicer. --Tlosk 15:37, 17 July 2009 (UTC)

To: Tlosk
I have a suggestion, although it would not need to be done right now. Part of the reason I added (Spell) to every spell listing was because there were also cantrips to list on a different page. Now that cantrips and spells are listing on the same page, that distinction is no longer needed. Now - there are still cases where we need some form of disambiguation, for Example strength is a spell and an attribute. I would suggest that, for every spell, we replace (Spell) with Spells or Spell Category. So Strength (Spell) becomes Strength Spells or Strength Spell Category.

Another idea would be to keep (Spell) only on pages that require the disambiguation (like attribs), and drop it from every other one. Sword Mastery, for example, does not need the (Spell) since it already has the Mastery word to distinguish itself from the skill and the weapons. --An Adventurer 15:56, 17 July 2009 (UTC)

I like Spells for a suffix, makes it more general and reflective of the diverse spells in some categories. And gets away from the title ending with parentheses issues. Although having the parenthetical suffix does make it come up first in the autosuggest drop down when searching. I'd be fine with either. If we decide to change them I can move the pages one by one while doing the redirects/categorizations. --Tlosk 16:02, 17 July 2009 (UTC)

Another suggestion. On each page there is currently the following code used to display the TOC and an image: 

 {|cellpadding=5
 |-valign=top
 |
 __ToC__
 | [[File:0x0600115D.png]]
 |}

I would suggest that we convert this into a wiki template, and create one template for each school. Each school would use a different image. Along with the image and TOC, the template could contain a [[Category:Spell]] and [[Category:<School> Spell]] so that all spells will be categorized. EDIT: Templates named {{Creature Enchantment Spell}}, {{Item Enchantment Spell}}, {{Life Magic Spell}}, and {{War Magic Spell}}.

I'd suggest the following images:

Creature - Item - Life - War

--An Adventurer 00:26, 18 July 2009 (UTC)

To: An Adventurer
That's a good idea, I made a single template with a school switch, {{Spell List Header}}. Edit: I added icons to indicate whether the spell is learnable, creature only, item only, or retired also. Willpower (Spell) and Feeblemind (Spell) show the changes. --Tlosk 16:10, 18 July 2009 (UTC)

New Version of Wiki Swiss Tool

Version 1.05 is now available for download of the Wiki Swiss Tool. Although it was mostly finished back in January I was waiting until we'd finished updating the templates to release it. It also now has the ability to easily update templates to the current versions on the wiki anytime by copying the text at Wiki Swiss Tool/Page Templates and using the update button on the tools tab.

If anything doesn't work as you expect it to, or you think of something else you'd like to see it able to do, just post here or on the talk page. --Tlosk 17:59, 11 July 2009 (UTC)

creature/NPC pages and lore

I've been wondering if we should handle pages for lore and in-game information differently. Currently the rule is that if for example an NPC/Monster is also a notable lore character, the lore character description would go on the same page as the in-game stats. I think this might be better if the main page is a disambiguation.

For Example, the Lady Aerfalle would look like this:

See:

There would be similar pages for other notable characters like Asheron, Borelean, Elysa, Nummy, Rytheran, etc.

I also think it could be useful to split creature class pages up into stats and lore. While some creatures may not have a lot of lore, others like Shadow, Virindi, Tumerok, Lugian, Burun, and Undead have tons of information, and certainly deserve their own "Heritage" page, like those I've been working on for Isparians and Empyeans (see: Sho and Falatacot)

As for how to split up creature class pages, I would suggest leaving the current ones in place as the stat page since they are linked to the most, and the first place someone would search for when looking for stats. On those pages we would place a link to the lore page. It could be something simple like Drudge Lore or Drudge Bestiary Entry.

Thoughts?

--An Adventurer 16:21, 10 July 2009 (UTC)

I agree that'd be a good way to handle creatures with multiple versions. For the creature class pages, I'd suggest that since an abundance of lore is the exception, we keep the layout as is, however for those few types with more than 2 or 3 paragraphs of lore, to have 2-3 paragraphs of abbreviated lore on the class page with a link to an additional page where the lore is expanded as you suggest. My preference would be with [[<Creature Class> Lore]]. Besides the frequency issue (maybe 10 of the 70+ classes have lots of lore available) it's also because of layout concerns, the ToC and image would cramp the table without the text there. --Tlosk 17:59, 11 July 2009 (UTC)

I've completed the Aerfalle changes. Please see Lady Aerfalle. Feedback anyone? --An Adventurer 20:49, 5 August 2009 (UTC)

June 2009

Template Subcategories

The number of templates has increased to the point where making subcategories in the near future will be helpful. Discussion here.

Containers/Chests

I would like to look into the Container Template, but to me it is still unclear how to make the subcategories. At the moment, both the Packs (i.e. those containers that toons can hold in their inventory), and the lootable chests (for quest items, and/or randomly spawning loot chests) are categorized under "Container". However, a (lootable) chest would, imho, require a different template than a Pack. Also, there is a (sub) category "Chest", and a (Sub)category "Pack". Personally, I'd prefer to have lootable Quest Chests rather as a subcategory under "Object", since many do have fixed locations. For now, I'm gonna put a few proposals in the Discussion of Containers to see what you think of it --Sanddh 16:46, 21 June 2009 (CET)

Subcategorization isn't exclusive, it can be a sub of both. Though on the List of Categories it probably only needs to be listed under the most logical one. --Tlosk 19:00, 23 June 2009 (UTC)

Quest Item Category

To: An Adventurer
it sure would be nice to just have a 'Quest Item' category instead of just dumping them all into 'Item' - what do you think? --RyanR 22:22, 15 June 2009 (UTC)

I think it could be useful, if for nothing else than to have a category to put all those items in besides item. One issue though would be what exactly would qualify as a quest item. I would suggest that for an item to be tagged as category:Quest Item, it would need to only be used in a quest. Any item that has the ability to serve any other purpose, even if it is only really used in one quest, would not be tagged as category:Quest Item.

For example - the olthoi soldier pincer would get tagged as category:Quest Item. It only has one use, and that is in the pincer quest. A wood golem heart, although used in multiple quests, has the basic use as a trophy, and would not be tagged as category:Quest Item. A piece of wieldable equipment (example:Lou Ka's Yaoji), even if only used in one quest, would not be tagged as category:Quest Item. A text used as part of a quest would not be tagged as category:Quest Item.

--An Adventurer 02:06, 16 June 2009 (UTC)

If you look at what's actually in the Item category (and not in a subcategory), almost all of the items could be described as quest items of one sort or another. Another way of looking at it is to say that the Item category already is the category for quest items (currently lots of items are double classified as a subcategory and as an item, but this will be cleaned up as we slowly convert existing entries to use current page templates).--Tlosk 16:12, 16 June 2009 (UTC)

Template Revision Progress

General Issues:

  • Updating all templates for next release of Wiki Swiss Tool.
  • Moving from format heavy page templates to variable based page templates (will aid data entry speed and provide flexibility in updating formatting in the future).
  • Live images fixed to not overlap in small browser windows and not appear at all if no image specified.
  • Move template links listed below up the chain as progress is made.

NPC Template

Revised and Reviewed: (final inclusion candidates)

Under Review: (Updated and needs improvement feedback, sign the end of each template once you have reviewed it and have no further suggestions.)

Under Revision: (Currently being updated.)

Needs Revision: (Not currently being worked on.)

Needs Creation: (Does not exist in any form yet.)

Instead of making a unique template for rares, I added an optional line to the {{Intro}} template. Adding Rare Number = makes a link displaying the rare number on the far right. For example, Mirrored Justice.

I was able to construct the Armor Template so that it can handle all the different types of armor, so the clothing, robe, masks & guises, and shields have all been folded into a single template. --Tlosk 11:26, 19 February 2009 (CST)

I'd like to bring spell templates back into discussion. Currently we have some copy/paste tables that I put together, but no wiki templates. And the tables were pretty much just my work without much input from others.

The current copy/paste table template is here: Standard Spell Template with examples here: Armor (Spell) and here: Blood Drinker (Spell)

One important thing is recently someone (I am blanking on who it was) harvested all the spell data from the .dat files which gives us categories and spell difficulty and other information we may not have had. I think some of this could be added to the templates. I think difficulty would be a great addition. So I think there is still room for improvement on both the Standard Spell Template and the Cantrip Template before we possibly turn them in to wiki templates. --An Adventurer 11:11, 12 May 2009 (CDT)

Yeah that list is really cool, especially with all the creature only spells. But the stacking info is invaluable, that stuff was a major pain to track down and test in game for all the combinations. I've got a few ideas I'm working on and will post them as soon as I'm done.

May 2009

Server Pages & server specific info

This is sort of related to the discussion of general vs personal pages below, but I thought it should have its own discussion.

when I first put up some guidelines for restricting personal pages, I did so because someone had created a page for their allegiance. My reasoning for this was because 1) I thought allegiance pages were mostly irrelevant as general info, 2) I didn't want allegiances from different servers with the same name competing for a common name (like Defenders of Light or some other generic high fantasy sounding guild) and 3) I didn't want actual in-game factions, existing or in the future, to have to compete for the same name as a guild.

Now more recently, there was a discussion on personal vs general pages, started because of Connor the Craftmaster's posting of his adventures as their own page. That discussion so far has concluded that personal pages for entertainment, such as connor's adventures or my fan-fiction, should be placed on the author's user page, under the format User:User Name/Article (example: User:An Adventurer/Character Back-stories).

This gave me the idea that we could do the same thing for server pages. For example: the page Leafcull would be a general description page of the server. The page Leafcull/Allegiances would be a listing of allegiances on LC. the page Leafcull/Allegiances/The Trues would be a guild specific page for my current allegiance, The Trues.

I think this would be a good solution for resolving possible name conflicts. I have no opinion on whether or not the info would be useful though. What does everyone else think? Would allegiance pages be good information to have up?

--An Adventurer 18:54, 24 May 2009 (UTC)

I think it's a good idea. I think the wiki is served by recording not just objects but to record history of the players and allegiances also. --Tlosk 18:57, 24 May 2009 (UTC)

General versus Personal Pages

Discussion here: Asheron's Call Community Wiki talk:Policy

Mediawiki 1.14 Update completed

A list of changes and new help pages is in progress here: Mediawiki 1.14 Changes. Please post there if you find any bugs or glitches (for anything serious please post on my talk page. --Tlosk 14:28, 13 May 2009 (UTC)

Filtered Whatlinkshere Results

For a while now I've been trying to figure out a way to get more specific Whatlinkshere results, ideally we could filter results by category however I've been unable to discover any way of doing that currently. I have however come up with a partial solution for at least some types of items that would be easy to implement and could be changed if needed without lots of cleanup edits.

I realized that it's possible to make invisible links on pages (a link that isn't actually displayed, but will cause the page to show up in the whatlinkshere list) and that you can also have a whatlinkshere link to a nonexistent page, which allows us to specify a page for a specific type of links we want to filter for (just Shopkeepers, just Creatures, just Locations, etc).

These special links can automatically be included in component templates. For example, to get a list of just shopkeepers that sell a particular item, we can place this: [[{{PAGENAME}}/Sold By|<nowiki></nowiki>]] inside the {{Inventory Item}} template since it is only used on Shopkeeper pages. This would automatically create a link to each item for that shopkeeper of the format Item/Sold By which would then be used in the {{Sold By}} template which would be modified from a straight whatlinkshere link to [[:Special:Whatlinkshere/{{PAGENAME}}/Sold By]]. So instead of including all links (like recipes and patch pages etc, it would only list shopkeepers.

I was trying to think what else we could use this for and so far I've come up with:

  • Items included in recipes.
  • Creature locations (I will need to make a component template for creature lists that will be closer to item lists). (I'm leaning towards being able to specify the type of location as well, so we could get separate lists for dungeons and landscape locations).
  • Trophies (may not be possible without changing the template in a significant way).

Are there any other ones that would be good to include? Also input on whether to include this for just item types that generate big lists and skip smaller ones that could be ready through quickly, or to do this for them all.--Tlosk 11:17, 10 May 2009 (CDT)

That's a very clever solution. I was going to suggest looking at the Semantic MediaWiki extension, but it appears that it doesn't support to-many relationships (like the shopkeeper selling multiple items). --Widgeon 17:29, 11 May 2009 (CDT)

I'm not sure I understand exactly how this will work, but if you say we can just modify the templates and it will work, then it sounds good to me. I agree with the things you listed. I would divide creatures into 3 types instead of 2: Dungeons, POIs, and general landscape - the listings found in Geographic Area and Town pages. --An Adventurer 18:10, 11 May 2009 (CDT)

Yeah it's kind of convoluted, but thankfully the implementation is transparent and a poster doesn't have to do anything different. However once implemented it will break existing vendor/recipe links so I'm going to wait until we finish updating existing entries with the new templates to turn the key so to speak (in the meantime we'll just get the full list of links like normal).

But so you can see it in action, here's a hardcoded example:

Old style (all links) for Stout: This item is sold by one or more shopkeepers.

New style (just shopkeepers) for Stout: This item is sold by one or more shopkeepers.

This first one finds all pages that link to "Stout," but the second one just the pages that link to "Stout/Sold By" and that's only the pages using the new shopkeeper template.

--Tlosk 20:11, 11 May 2009 (CDT)

10th Anniversary Event Preview

I think we should create a page dedicated to information about the 10th anniversary event. It would be similar to the 100th update preview page we had.

I would want it to be more than just re-posting articles and statements from devs. For example, we have a thread about the teaser video they posted with more than 140 replies and a great deal of information posted by Sev. It'd be useful to have a few simple statements about this new two-handed weapon skill to sum up the 20+ dev posts about it.

Frelorn also hinted that there might be a special test server for this patch. More information about this, all in one place, would be helpful as it is released. In the event there is another test server I would probably want to treat it like we did for shadowfell.

Thoughts?

--An Adventurer 13:55, 6 May 2009 (CDT)

Definitely, I'm sure we'll get a ton more info as the event gets closer, and we should add a link on the main page again like we had for the 9th preview.--Tlosk 11:17, 10 May 2009 (CDT)

I'll start a page here: Asheron's Call 10th Anniversary Event Preview --An Adventurer 12:11, 12 May 2009 (CDT)

April 2009

Site Copyright Migration

When the Mediawiki software was first developed several years ago it adopted the GNU Free Documentation License and this is the license currently used by ACC Wiki. There are a number of problems with the GFDL that place limitations not intended on how wiki content can be used. The Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike license provides greater flexibility, clearer language, and fewer restrictions. A special amendment was recently added to the GFDL that enables CC-By-SA migrations between November 1, 2008 and August 1, 2009. The change was made specifically to enable Wikipedia and other projects in a similar position to make licensing changes.

Barring any objections, I propose we migrate from the GFDL to CC-By-SA on April 30th, 2009.

More details can be found here and here.

--Tlosk 18:02, 16 April 2009 (CDT)

To: Tlosk
I'm all for fewer restrictions on the information here. --An Adventurer 11:38, 17 April 2009 (CDT)

To: Tlosk
Migrating to CC-By-SA sounds good to me. --Widgeon 01:05, 21 April 2009 (CDT)

Badges

Anyone think profile badges would be a good addition? I realize its just a little extra fluff thing, but it might get more people interested in their asheron.info profile and hopefully contributing. Wikipedia has these things, they are called userboxes: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Userboxes

I was thinking we would have one for each server, so you could display what worlds you play on. There could be one for PKs, PKLs, and NPKs. One for monarchs. The ones that got me thinking about this were badges for number of contributions. For example, 50 contribs and you have one with a pyreal mote image. 100 is a pyreal sliver, 200 is a nugget, etc. This is what I was thinking would possibly motivate people to contribute some more.

Any thoughts? Would this be nice or is it a waste of time? --An Adventurer 11:03, 15 April 2009 (CDT)

I don't have any objections. --Tlosk 15:11, 20 April 2009 (CDT)

I Like it! --Immortalbob 18:54, 9 May 2009 (CDT)

NPC Table Template

I have a suggestion for a new wiki template to be used in the page templates for towns, geographic areas, POIs, dungeons, and anywhere else NPCs may be found: An NPC table template, similar to the dungeon table template. Something like this:
NPC Name Location Purpose Served
-- -- --

Geographic Area Example:

NPC Name Location Purpose Served
Adrien Swiftblade Paradox-touched Valley Tent Quest: Paradox-touched Olthoi Egg Quest
Ethan Wintermaine Paradox-touched Valley Tent Quest: Aerbax's Prodigal Olthoi
Hisham al-Evv Paradox-touched Valley Tent Vendor: Small Olthoi Venom Sac Shop

Town Example:

NPC Name Location Purpose Served
Archmage Cindrue 42.6N, 33.9E - second floor Vendor: Magical supplies
Ecutha the Tailor 42.6N, 33.5E - first floor Vendor: Clothing
Fispur Ansel the Grocer 42.2N, 22.6E Vendor: Food and cooking supplies

This looks much better than what is currently in the town template, and it would allow us to list all NPCs in one section, instead of subsections for vendors, crafters, quest npcs, misc npcs, and outskirt npcs for all those categories. By using Location instead of Coordinates the the general Purpose Served we can use the same template for NPCs in locations other than towns as well. The Template could even be used on the outdated NPCs pages.

edit:

perhaps a better table still would be this:

NPC Name Location Type Details
En al-Pisci Yaraq Quest Apple Grinder of Doom Quest
Merchant 12.3S, 12.3E - Desert Camp Vendor Basic Supplies
Town Crier Yaraq Misc Rumors

with Purpose Served divided into type and details, and with the columns sortable.

--An Adventurer 13:41, 14 April 2009 (CDT)


I've finished the template using your last example as the basis, {{NPC Table}}. Add more example types if you think of some more. We had shopkeepers and vendors called one thing some places and the other in others so when I was normalizing the template names I changed uses of Vendor to Shopkeeper to align with the category. You can integrate the template into the Town Template if there's nothing else to add to it. --Tlosk 13:24, 15 April 2009 (CDT)

Quest Pages

I have noticed that when copying and pasting links to quests that end with Quest on the official turbine forums the link breaks. For example linking to Composite Bow Quest results in http://asheron.info/~asheron/index.php/Composite_Bow_(Quest which is missing the ending ")". It can be fixed by editing the link after you post, but not everyone knows that or does that.

I have two suggestions:

  1. For every quest that ends in Quest, make the broken link page redirect to it. So Composite Bow (Quest would redirect to Composite Bow Quest.
  2. Change the naming scheme to no longer include parenthesis. The parenthesis are really there for disambiguation, so that entries that share the same official name can be distinguished. However, since quests do not actually have official names that are ever revealed in game, the disambiguation is not really needed. So Composite Bow Quest would become Composite Bow Quest.

1 will be much easier to do, but I am leaning towards 2. Unfortunately, if we go with 2 we not only have to rename the page but also fix every link to it. --An Adventurer 11:00, 9 April 2009 (CDT)

It has to do with reserved characters (internally the wiki will transform them, but on the forums it won't make that translation automatically). One way around it is to post the link as it appears in the path bar at the top when at the actual page which uses the character codes instead of the actual characters (post translation).

For example http://asheron.info/~asheron/index.php/Composite_Bow_%28Quest%29 will give the correct link when posted.

I'd favor #2 as well, we could just leave most individual pages for now since they will redirect with the move, and when I'm updating the old items with scripts I can add a filter that will catch quest names and change them. --Tlosk 14:56, 9 April 2009 (CDT)

March 2009

Zone Articles / Beta

Zone Articles:
As we update old patches with Zone articles such as teasers and build notes, should we delete the older archive we have? For example, we have a single page archive of the 1999/12/16 build notes here, and they are also archived under the Sudden Season patch announcements. For newer patches, we only archive articles on the announcement page, so I would think the older single page archives are not needed.

Beta and beta events:
There has been some work put into three beta event pages: Call to Arms, Wardiel's Campaign, and Fire in the Sky. Now, I did not play beta or even early release, but from what I can tell, it looks like Call to Arms and Wardiel's Campaign are at best live events in today's terms, while Fire in the Sky was an actual patch that updated the game files. I believe the only reason all three are getting a separate event page is because other fan sites (maggies for one) list them as such.

I would like to suggest that all information on the wiki relating to the beta be placed on a single page: Asheron's Call Beta. My reasoning for this is:

  • As stated above, 2 of the major beta "events" are nothing more than large scale live events, and I do not think they deserve a full patch page.
  • Most information we have or will have on beta will be in the form of archived Zone/Zogblaster/Microsoft Insider articles, and I think it would be most convenient to have all beta related articles on a single page.
  • Some beta information may not fit into any of the 3 "events". For example, there was a major update with build notes on 9/21/99 (link: [1]) that would not go into either Wardiel's Campaign or Fire in the Sky.

Edit: To clarify, what I am suggesting for the beta page is this: Asheron's Call Beta contains links to the various beta articles, similar to the Turbine Announcements sections of current patches. Announcements - Asheron's Call Beta will contain the archives of the articles. Dev Chats and non-event related lore would still be archived on separate pages, and would be linked to on the beta page.

--An Adventurer 15:55, 19 March 2009 (CDT)

That sounds excellent, and yeah I agree we should move the single articles into announcement pages and remove the originals, we just need to make sure to check for any links to them and update them (not many but a few here and there). Their rationale for being stand alone is no longer applicable. --Tlosk 08:00, 20 March 2009 (CDT)

I started the work on the beta page. You can see it here: Asheron's Call Beta & here: Announcements - Asheron's Call Beta. EDIT: Problem fixed. All <font>s needed a closing </font>. --An Adventurer 13:58, 25 March 2009 (CDT)

Reference Footnotes

To: Tlosk
Hey, I have a request for a wiki template. I'd like a simple template that I can use for the footnotes I made for lore articles. I just added my initial footnotes to the Timeline of Auberean I'm working on, and it was a +3,123 edit. I am using the following code to make footnotes (You'll have to edit to see it): 

[1]

I'd like to just have something simple like: 

{{Footnote|1}} or {{FN|1}} or {{Ref|1}}

Do you think you could put this together? --An Adventurer 13:48, 6 March 2009 (CST)

To: An Adventurer
You can now use wikipedia style footnotes by enclosing the link or reference in ref tags, then placing <references/> where you want the footnotes to appear. Clicking on any footnote number will automatically take you to that reference and highlight it. Numbering is automatic so inserting additional footnotes will automatically renumber any existing footnotes given the order they appear on the page. If a footnote is referenced more than once, add a name parameter the first time it's used (for example <ref name=loot>[[Loot]]</ref>), then each time you use it again use <ref name=loot/>. All such uses will link to the same footnote number, and the footnote itself will link back to all uses (names have to be a single word with no spaces).

For example: 

...Deru Trees.<ref name=Knight>2008/08 [[Ancient Powers]] - [[The Blessed Trees]]</ref>
...sun and stars.<ref>1999/11 [[Release]] - [[Microsoft Zone Archive/Asheron's Lore/The Mysterious Portals Archive/The Advocate Towers|The Advocate Towers]]</ref>
...across the world.<ref>2008/08 [[Ancient Powers]] - [[The Blessed Trees]]</ref>
...Deru Trees.<ref name=Knight/>

----

<references/>

will display as:

The Falatacot diverge into two branches: the Dark Falatacot, dealing in the power of undeath and corruption in service to the Old Ones; and the Light Falatacot, working to protect what they consider to be worshipful spirits - the Deru Trees.[1]

Primordial gods struggle with evil shadow creatures. After a long contest that exhausted their powers, the gods banish the shadows into the earth by creating the sun and stars.[2]

The Deru Trees are created by the Light and they drive the Living Dark below, allowing life to spread across the world.[3]

The Falatacot diverge into two branches: the Dark Falatacot, dealing in the power of undeath and corruption in service to the Old Ones; and the Light Falatacot, working to protect what they consider to be worshipful spirits - the Deru Trees.[1]

  1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 2008/08 Ancient Powers - Knight Test
  2. ↑ 1999/11 Release - The Advocate Towers
  3. ↑ 2008/08 Ancient Powers - The Blessed Trees

Home Page Redesign

I think that ACC Wiki Home could use a redesign. I think it would be nice to have it laid out more like other wikis, like the wikipedia main page. What I am referring to are the sections wikipedia has labeled "Today's featured article", "Did you know...", "In the news" and such. Having our AC news and Wiki news tucked away as links on the side bar makes them less noticeable, and I admit I don't even update them much, but I probably would if they displayed on the front page.

One other thought I had. With the wiki software we have, are drop down menus possible? Like the ones on WoWWiki or the LotRO Lorebook?

--An Adventurer 14:50, 16 March 2009 (CDT)

I'm worried they would compete with navigational aspects. Ideally you can reach any content in the wiki in 3-4 clicks from the main page and the size of our wiki makes it possible (unlike Wikipedia where there's so much content that it's assumed people will just use the search box to get where they want to go) so more of the main page can be devoted to interest grabbing material.

It's possible to do drop down menus yes, they can be integrated into skins I know, and I assume something could also be done with the default monobook, I'll try to get something working. --Tlosk 17:28, 16 March 2009 (CDT)

I have a drop down navigation menu working now, it works on IE7+ and FF. If you want to tweak the menu items or add new sections, edit the MediaWiki:Sitenotice and the linked templates. For new sections a new template must be created (just a bulleted list, see the templates used list at the bottom when editing Sitenotice for examples). --Tlosk 13:01, 17 March 2009 (CDT)

Nice work. One thing I have noticed - the page title does not display correctly with the drop down menu on some pages. It is only pages with short names or a short word at the the beginning of its name, like Forum and ACC Wiki Home. The short word is being placed right of the menu, and then continues where the title is supposed to be. This is only happening on higher resolutions/wider windows. It does not occur on my laptop (1440x900), but does on my desktop (1680x1050). Both are using Firefox, laptop is running Mac OS X, desktop is running Windows XP. --An Adventurer 13:11, 17 March 2009 (CDT)

Correction. It is occuring on my laptop as well. Could this possibly be fixed by placing the menus on the left side, right above the page title? --An Adventurer 18:40, 17 March 2009 (CDT)

Just double checking that this works now for you? Having them on the left makes the menus pop up in an annoying way anytime you go to use the edit etc tabs but having it all the way to the right makes the drop down menu bleed off the page for the right most menu item so I originally used a width fix to have them go not all the way over but we had the title wrap error you noticed. I found that using the margin instead of width fixed it. But the behavior depends on css and that is cached so it may continue until the cache is cleared normally or forced (hold shift while clicking the refresh button in the browser). Also I found a way to add menus to the sidebar so after the upgrade I can set up some examples and see what you think. --Tlosk 07:57, 20 March 2009 (CDT)

Weapon & Armor Collection categories/templates

I would like to propose we create 2 new categories & templates called "Weapon Collection" and "Armor Collection" to classify "groups" of related weapons & armor. This would be used to A.) group similar weapons/armor together, like we have already done in many places, and B.) to group together various sets/upgrades that, while they may various quests, are related to one another.

Examples of possible Weapon Collections:

etc...

Examples of possible Armor Collections:

  • Shadow Armor => Regular Shadow Armor, Prismatic Shadow Armor, Sharded Shadow Armor, etc...
    Noble Armor => Contains Empowered Noble Armor (or whatever it will be called).
    Relic Armor => Contains Noble Relic, Ancient Relic, Relic Alduressa
    Hieromancer's Armor => Thaurugmatic Plate, Exarch Plate, Auroric Exarch Armor

Just throwing it out there. Since we already have several "groups" of weapons that are currently classified incorrectly as "Weapon", it might be a good way to properly classify this stuff. What do you guys think? --Atarax 00:58, 12 March 2009 (CDT)

Since there aren't a ton of them I might suggest having a "Collection" category and add it to the list pages (and keep the weapon, armor etc). But I'd be fine either way. Your call. --Tlosk 06:01, 12 March 2009 (CDT)

To: Tlosk
Well, I thought more about it last night, and I think afterall, it would be good to keep each group of weapons/armor separate, like Princely Runed Weapons vs Royal Runed Weapons. Then in the template, just have "related articles", which link to the others. I still think having a more specific category called "Weapon Collection" would be more appropriate than listing it under Weapon & Collection, since its not a weapon, its just a group of weapons. What do you think? --Atarax 10:38, 12 March 2009 (CDT)

I agree that a general collection would be better than specific weapon and armor. First, Tlosk is right - there are not many sets out there. Second, there are some possible collections that could contain both weapons and armor, and even jewelry. For example, the various renegade tumerok and lugian weapons, armor, clothes, and jewelry could be listed on a "Renegade Equipment" page. All the olthoi armor and weapons could be on another page. --An Adventurer 14:14, 13 March 2009 (CDT)

Honestly, I do not think we need to have many collection pages. For the most part, collections or sets come from the same quest, and all the items belonging to that set would be listed on the quest page anyway. I'm not saying we don't need collection pages at all, just that they should only be used when the entire set cannot be found on a single quest guide already. --An Adventurer 14:14, 13 March 2009 (CDT)

To: An Adventurer
I see your point. Lets take Weeping Weapons for an example, where would you propose that these be listed, if not on their own page? --Atarax 15:28, 13 March 2009 (CDT)

To: Atarax
Weeping Weapons would be listed on the Heart of Innocence Quest item listing. Elemental Weeping Weapons would be listed where they already are, on the Elemental Weeping Weapons guide item listing. The heart of Innocence would have Isparian Weapons Quest and Elemental Weeping Weapons listed as related quests.

Isparian Weapons would have the following quests listed as related: Shadowfire Stone Quest, Heart of Innocence Quest, Major Atlan Stones, Major Prismatic Stone Quest. --An Adventurer 16:01, 13 March 2009 (CDT)

To: An Adventurer
Fair enough, I like that Idea. I'll start purging those "collection pages" and redirecting them to the quest that yields them. --Atarax 18:26, 13 March 2009 (CDT)

Spell Table

I've created an archive of files generated from the spell table of the client_portal.dat file. It contains information for the last six patches. Each patch has two files. The first has most of the data about each spell, including its name, description, icon, components, school, duration, caster effect, target effect, and target mask. A few of the fields don't seem to have much meaning, such as range/level, dura2, and the one labeled "2*lev". The other file shows the groups of spells that stack, with each spell sorted by difficulty within the group (the number on the left). This is useful for finding bugs with spell stacking.

You can compare the files to see what has changed in each patch. For this patch, I've summarized some of the changes on Talk:Who Watches the Virindi?. --Widgeon 02:31, 12 March 2009 (CDT)

Awesome, thanks, that will be a huge help. --Tlosk 06:03, 12 March 2009 (CDT)

Feb 2009

AC:DM CD lore documents classification

The AC:DM cd included several lore articles in the form of word documents. I want to add them to the lore section, but I'd like some input on how to classify them. There are two categories I am considering using: Internet Lore Article & Printed Material. They don't really belong in either category though. And there are only 12 of them, so I don't think they deserve a new category.

I was thinking printed materials because, while not printed, they were included as extras with the AC:DM product, similar to the manuals that I tagged as printed materials. I was thinking internet lore article because, while perhaps never appearing on the web, they fit in with the style of the internet lore articles, and if someone was looking for them without remembering their source was the CD, they might check the internet lore articles.

So what do you think? Tag them as printed, internet, both, neither?

--An Adventurer 13:51, 24 February 2009 (CST)

Since they came on the CD, it classify them as printed. Hey, you have to print a CD ;) --Atarax 13:55, 24 February 2009 (CST)

Mediawiki 1.14 Released

The 1.14 version was released on Sunday, I'm currently testing the upgrade on a test machine and in the next week I'll be upgrading the wiki. This will be a significant move as we are currently running version 1.10 (May 2007). Some preparation can be done ahead of time, however during the final backup and upgrade the wiki will be placed into a read only mode to avoid database conflicts, I'll give at least a 2 day warning before this happens. Help pages will be changed to reflect the changes once the upgrade is complete. Some special pages will appear different and quite a few new options will be available. --Tlosk 10:13, 23 February 2009 (CST)

Here are the 1.11, 1.12, 1.13, and 1.14 changes that will likely be meaningful to our specific wiki:

Images:

  • The Image namespace has been subsumed by the File namespace, while [[File:Name.jpg]] will still work, the standard is now [[File:Name.jpg]] to display an inline image. [[Media:Name.jpg]] will still create a text link directly to the image and [[:File:Name.jpg]] will link to the image description page.
  • A new tag allows a single image to link to many pages instead of just a single page as was previously the case with a redirect on the image's description page. Add the parameter link=page name where the image is used. The image will act as a hypertext link to the specified page. The page name must not be enclosed in square brackets, and it is always interpreted as an internal link. For example, [[File:Pyreal Mote Icon.png|link=Atlan Weapons]] would link to Atlan Weapons when the image is clicked. In most cases we will continue using redirects to avoid having to duplicate the link each time the image is used.
  • Setting a caption for an image will display the caption explicitly if the image uses a frame and will display a popup caption if the mouse hovers over the image even if there is no frame. Now this popup can differ from the caption by adding the parameter alt=alt text. For example, [[File:Image.jpg|frame|alt=Asheron|Asheron in his tower on the island off the coast of Eastham.]] would display the full caption, but display "Asheron" if hovered.
  • The <gallery> tag accepts image names without an Image: prefix (just give name and caption).
  • New file cache for the parser that improves page rendering time on pages with several uses of the same image.
  • Image moving is now enabled for sysops by default. (2009-03-18 Disabled due to reports of data corruption/loss in some moves.[2])
  • Image redirects are now cached (nonlogged in users will view the normal page cache instead of forcing a page rendering).
  • A warning is shown when hash identical files exist.
  • Better proportional view of upright images related to landscape images on a page without nailing the width of upright images to a fixed value.
  • New 'border' and 'frameless' keywords added to the [[File:]] syntax.
  • Removed hardcoded minimum image name length of three characters.
  • Allow HTML attributes on <gallery>.

New Syntax:

  • {{PAGESINCATEGORY:Category Name}} - For example {{PAGESINCATEGORY:Creature}} would display as 1,824.
  • Able to make arbitrary rows of sortable tables sticky (stick to top of table, not sort): |- class="unsortable"
  • Added magic word __STATICREDIRECT__ to suppress the redirect fixer.
  • Added magic word __HIDDENCAT__, when placed on a category page causes the category to be hidden on article pages.
  • New PAGESIZE parser function that returns the size of a page.

Search:

  • "Did you mean" search feature made more noticeable.
  • Drop-down AJAX search suggestions added.
  • More relevant search snippets are highlighted.
  • Drop-down selection of major search engines (Google, Yahoo, Windows Live, etc).

Special Pages:

Miscellaneous:

  • Configurable per-namespace and per-page notices for the edit form.
  • Search matches are now bold only, not red as well.
  • When a page doesn't exist, the tab will say "create", not "edit".
  • Users moving a page can now move all subpages automatically as well.
  • The User class now contains a public function called isActiveEditor. Figures out if a user is active based on at least $wgActiveUserEditCount number of edits in the last $wgActiveUserDays days.
  • Duplicate section anchors with differing case are now disambiguated.
  • White space differences not shown in diffs.
  • Add feed links for the site to all pages.
  • Allow bots to specify whether an edit should be marked as a bot edit, via the parameter 'bot'.
  • Allow HTML attributes on <math>.
  • Improved file history presentation.
  • Show edit count in user preferences.

I've successfully upgraded a test server and will be doing a full backup early Saturday morning on the 14th. The wiki will be read-only during this period. This will give us several days to get the bulk of the content up for the new patch before then. After verifying the backup I hope to complete the upgrade of the site Sunday or Monday following. If you find any unexpected behavior or errors, contact me via email. Also the template revisions and swiss tool update will be done by then so once the upgrade is live I'll start aggressively updating existing articles with the new template formats using the new tools that will be available to us. --Tlosk 17:12, 9 March 2009 (CDT)

Further testing revealed a few issues that I'm tracking down now, so it may be a few more days.

2nd Quest Template Revision Complete

I finished a first go at the various templates for the Quest Guide Template based on what you'd both come up with and posted the results on the Test Quest Page. The wikicode is at the bottom of the page. There's a special map links template now that links to the dungeon page and both the wiki and acmaps.com maps if extant, or another site if there's one. I abandoned my tile based mapping program development and am finishing automating as much as I can of a new workflow that produces a complete map in 10-15 minutes instead of several hours like it took before so it's going to be feasible to create our own maps for most dungeons. I'll start with unmapped dungeons then move to popular quest dungeons.

The experience and title table templates are flexible in the number of items and whether to include repeat info columns.

As suggested below, I added a link bar that mimics the link bar for special pages like Image file pages. Any of the items can be turned off by erasing the True values in the template.

After any initial feedback is incorporated we should probably use it on a few quest pages to see if anything unexpected turns up. --Tlosk 15:02, 15 February 2009 (CST)

Can we have a small link to Level Costs at the bottom of the Quest Experience Table? This would make it easier to figure out how much xp you'll get for levels below the xp cap. --Widgeon 00:43, 21 February 2009 (CST)

Sure, I added it in. --Tlosk 05:57, 21 February 2009 (CST)

Image Galleries

For aesthetic reasons I changed the backgrounds of the gallery thumbnails from light gray to black for higher contrast. Also to adjust the thumbnail sizes both the widths and heights parameters need to be specified. See How To Use Images#Image Gallery for more info. --Tlosk 16:59, 14 February 2009 (CST)

Show/Hide ability

I'd like to request the ability to create the show/hide function. Looking on wikipedia for examples, I was able to find two templates that we may be able to copy

Looks like these will provide the ability to make show/hide areas.

I would like this ability for the new quest guide template, currently being worked on in An Adventurer's Sandbox. I was thinking the ability to hide/show the Quest Summary, Rewards Summary, and Related Articles would be nice - but the feature may also be useful on other pages such as patches. --An Adventurer 14:50, 12 February 2009 (CST)

After an initial attempt I couldn't get it working, I need to track down all the dependencies and I may get it working, or it may have a dependency that is version related and it will have to wait for the upgrade.

It will integrate into the template itself so we can move ahead and it can be added when I get it working without having to change anything on the pages themselves. --Tlosk 16:51, 14 February 2009 (CST)

Kill Tasks Naming

Atarax and myself think we should come up with a new naming system for kill tasks. The current system is Hunter Quest (Creature Name). Some ideas:

  1. <Reward Title>, <Reward Title> Task, <Reward Title> Quest
    Example: Arctic Mattekar Annihilator, Arctic Mattekar Annihilator Task, Arctic Mattekar Annihilator Quest
    • Pros: Searching for a title would direct you to the quest, each kill task has a unique title.
    • Cons: Some titles may not be very descriptive of the task, a small number of kill tasks have multiple titles
  2. <NPC Task Giver>'s Task
    Example: Enzo Ilario's Task
    • Pros: Would provide unique names for every task
    • Cons: Not descriptive of task, a few NPCs give out multiple tasks (may not be an issue), some kill tasks may not have npcs (unsure).
  3. <Creature Name> Task, <Creature Name> Kill Task
    Example: Arctic Mattekar Task, Arctic Mattekar Kill Task
    • Pros: Identifies creature right in article name.
    • Cons: Some tasks are for multiple creatures.

I don't think there is any naming system for kill tasks that will be able to cover all types of tasks, so we should just pick whichever one works best for most and is able to deal with the odd ones in an easy way. --An Adventurer 14:50, 12 February 2009 (CST)

I'd vote for <Creature Name> Kill Task and for tasks with multiple creatures pick the most common creature for the full page and create pages for the other creatures that redirect to the full page. This would only be for cases where the various creatures all count towards the same goal. Where there are separate counts, like for the Cragstone Drudges I think there should be a separate page for each creature even though they share the same NPC since the counts, timers and rewards are discrete. --Tlosk 16:45, 14 February 2009 (CST)

I added this to Naming Conventions. --Tlosk 16:45, 14 February 2009 (CST)

"Introduced in" standard

I think we should make a standard for the "Introduced in" text that is displayed at the top of most pages. I think "Introduced in: [[??]]" used on creatures and possibly other page types should be phased out in favor of the "From the [[??]] quest introduced in the [[??]] event." standard used on items. Like items, if the creature is not from a quest, the first section is deleted and it just states "Introduced in the [[??]] event."

Which brings up a request for Tlosk or anyone else that knows about templates: Can we make a template for this, that is able to display either the quest + patch or just the patch? For example: 

{{Intro|Frore|Sudden Season}}

Would display as:
From the Frore quest introduced in the Sudden Season event.

and 

{{Intro|N/A|Sudden Season}}

Would display as:
Introduced in the Sudden Season event.

Would that be possible? --An Adventurer 20:20, 1 February 2009 (CST)

edit: I forgot about "updated in". Maybe the template would look more like 

{{Intro
 | Quest = 
 | Patch =
 | Update = Patch1, Patch2
}}

And perhaps it would be easier to create a template if it was displayed like this:

From: [[Quest]]. Introduced in: [[Patch]]. Updated in: [[Patch]], [[Patch]].

--An Adventurer 20:36, 1 February 2009 (CST)

I've gone through a couple iterations while I was working on the Key Template over the weekend. Currently what I'm using is a little awkward but works for everything (noun agreement and modifiers always break on something when used) but it is grammatical. I moved updates to the Notes section so that a description of what was done in the update can also be included. The format is "From {{{Quest}}} introduced in {{{Patch}}}."

I will change the format for creatures to do what you suggested. So where the quest field is blank or left out completely it will use Introduced in ... but when a quest is specified, for things like boss creatures that are strongly associated with a particular quest, it will use From .... introduced in .... --Tlosk 06:50, 2 February 2009 (CST)

To: Tlosk
I like the idea that An Adventurer had, however it might be good to change the formatting a bit, since everything is introduced but not everything has a qu--An Adventurer 12:58, 2 February 2009 (CST)est. For Example: 

{{Intro|Sudden Season|Frore}}

Would display as:
From the Frore quest, introduced in the Sudden Season event.

And for items with no quest: 

{{Intro|Sudden Season}}

Would display as:
Introduced in the Sudden Season event.

The other alternative is to ONLY list the introduction at the top, like Introduced in: Sudden Season, and then underneath it, have a comma separated list of related quests like this example of the Empyrean Golem Stone: 

{{Intro|Rekindling the Light|Crafting Golems, Diemos Flagging}}

Would display as
Introduced in: Rekindling the Light.
Related Quests: Crafting Golems, Diemos Flagging.

Any of those options would work, however it would be nice if we had a template that was designed to hold multiple quests. --Atarax 11:37, 2 February 2009 (CST)

I think having each piece of info a separate line like this might actually be a better format. And since it isn't trying to form the information into a sentence, we don't have to worry about the Quest at the end of quest names. I think if we go with this, we should still include the "Updated In" section at the top - this is a useful tool for navigation. For example, say you are trying to find a quest, and you know it was added in the patch that Branith's staff was updated. You search branith's staff and right at the top is the patch link you are looking for. --An Adventurer 12:58, 2 February 2009 (CST)

To: An Adventurer
My only concern is when quests are updated multiple times, which has happened a lot, especially recently with mana forge keys. Its always nice to see what was changed/updated in addition to when it was updated. This is why I propose that it be included in the notes setcion, or somewhere else on the page. If we add it to the top, it would have to be duplicated below if we want to describe what was updated in each patch. Maybe something like this would be useful? 

{{Updated|Patch Name|Added a [[Mana Forge Key]] to the rewards.}}
{{Updated|Patch Name|Increased XP Reward}}

Might show up as something like:

Just an idea... Any direction we take is fine by me. --Atarax 13:19, 2 February 2009 (CST)

To: Atarax
Quest pages don't use the "introduced in" standard. They have intro and update patch info in the summary, with details of updates in the general section.

Items and creatures are rarely updated multiple times, and certainly not in any ways that require explanation in notes sections. For example, when an item is updated we don't need to explain what was changed, we will include post- and pre-patch stats on the page, like the Crystal Sword. As for monsters - for the most part, updates to monsters is not worth mentioning. Knowing that a creature had a new trophy added, or got updated stats, isn't really useful information since only the current version of a creature can still exist in the game. The only time I can think of when a creature update would be useful is for big changes to bosses, like the various changes that happened to aerbax.

If we do ever feel like including old stats of creatures (I have both the original and AC:DM strategy guides, I have lots of info on old stats), we could simply include them in a fashion similar to old stats of items - list them on the page, below notes. --An Adventurer 13:34, 2 February 2009 (CST)

To: An Adventurer
Sounds good to me. So it appears the answer is to have multiple lines. Introduced In:, Updated In:, and Related Quests:. Would we ever possibly want to add Related Topics to this? Should it be kept separate? It wouldn't happen very often I would imagine. --Atarax 13:52, 2 February 2009 (CST)

To: Atarax, Tlosk
I cannot see any instance where we would need to use the related topics template on an item or creature, and only rarely on NPCs. Related topics should be kept its own template, and always be displayed as the first line. For the intro template, I agree. The 3 line method looks like the best solution.

As for the template itself. Tlosk has included the intro patch + quest as lines within the creature template and key template. I think that the intro template should be a separate wiki template - one that is placed at the top of Item, Creatuer, and NPC templates. This will make it easier to update if we decide to make changes, because we won't have to change the template code for npcs, creatures, armor, shields, jewelry, melee weapons, keys, and so on. There are a lot of page types that use the "introduced in" line, it would be much better to have it its own template. --An Adventurer 14:05, 2 February 2009 (CST)

To: Atarax, An Adventurer
I mocked up some options, see what you think: Sandbox Two. --Tlosk 16:54, 2 February 2009 (CST)

To: Tlosk
I like 1 and 6 the best, but would change "Quests" to "Related Quests". I think 1 would work best, because most entries are not updated, and only from 1 quest, so with 6 you would have these two little bits of info spread all the way across the page. But with 1 they are closer together. --An Adventurer 17:19, 2 February 2009 (CST)

I added a 7th example to Sandbox Two that combines 1 and 6, the full width box for uniformity and left justification for the text (couldn't figure that out before) and have a more typical text (1 quest and no updates) for comparison.

If there's one variable with an arbitrary number of parameters you can have the formatting in the template, but with more than one it isn't practical so the bracketing will need to be done manually the same as is done for trophies with creatures. For example: 

{{Intro
 | Patch Introduced = [[Sins of the Fathers]]
 | Related Quests = [[Hidden Presents]], [[Pets]]
 | Updated = [[Shifting Tactics]], [[Ancient Enemies]]
}}

--Tlosk 03:15, 3 February 2009 (CST)

To: Tlosk
7 looks very nice. It has my approval to be the basis for the intro template. --An Adventurer 09:44, 3 February 2009 (CST)

To: Tlosk
Yes, I like 7 as well. I actually enjoyed the Icons in #3, but they were too hard to read for someone unfamiliar with what they represent. Lets go with 7 and move on, I assume we could always adjust them in the future if we wanted to. --Atarax 10:21, 3 February 2009 (CST)

To: An Adventurer, Tlosk
I'm thinking it may be a good idea to create an extended, large, or vertical version of the intro template fragment for articles that contain a lot of quest references. For example I was looking at the Empowered Armor of Perfect Light Sets article that An Adventurer is working on, and honestly, the intro template does not work well here. There are so many "related" quests, that the top of the page is completely smashed, even on 1024x768. It would look decent for pages like this if the Related Quests portion was on its own line below the Introduced and Updated lines. Any thoughts on this? --Atarax 14:02, 4 February 2009 (CST)

To: Atarax
I think that the Empowereed Armor of Perfect Light will be a rare exception. First, it is really two sets combined in one page. Since they were introduced at different patches I had to show that. And three of the quest names and one of the patch names happens to be very long.

The intro template is going to be used on creatures, NPCs, and all types of items. For the majority of these entries, there will only be "introduced in" and "related quest" links. A few will have updates, and fewer will have multiple quests. I don't think we need to modify the template to work with these more rare occurrences. I'll just edit the PL armor page with shortened link names, or maybe make a Quiddity Seed Quest disambiguation page similar to the burun kings page. --An Adventurer 14:17, 4 February 2009 (CST)

To: An Adventurer
Works for me. /signed --Atarax 14:42, 4 February 2009 (CST)

I hadn't mentioned this, but I also had in the back of my head to have a section either on the template's page itself or on its talk page for a box of nontemplate code, that is all the code you'd use to produce the page without using any templates, this would allow you to manually tweak things for those exception pages where you want to deviate from the template. (Also it would help serve as a reference as the template code is just about unintelligible the first time you look at it.) --Tlosk 16:27, 4 February 2009 (CST)

Jan 2009

Housing Settlement Standardization

We need to come up with a standard way to handle housing settlements. There are two ways to do it. Either create a page for each settlement, or do it like we did with spells, and simple redirect the settlement name to the appropriate Housing Settlements page (which needs a drastic face lift, lol). I'm thinking the redirects is the way to go. Any suggestions? --Atarax 16:34, 31 January 2009 (CST)

To: Atarax
I like the idea of each settlement having its own page. I actually created cottage, villa, and mansion icons for the mapping templates with this in mind. I do agree though it will be a lot of work. I don't see much benefit in the settlement index, or having settlements redirect there. There is some vital information about settlements - type(s), exact number or housing, purchase items, drop coords, town hub - and I think this would be better displayed on a unique page. Also, using the Map Point template to display where the settlement is will be useful for people who choose their house by environment.

A possible problem with redirecting everything to an index is unnamed single housing and settlements. How would we deal with those?

Ideally, I would want every settlement to have a unique page, and have the coordinates displayed with the /hslist command redirect to the correct settlement - that way someone can just type in the coords and know exactly how to get there and what item they need.
--An Adventurer 17:26, 31 January 2009 (CST)

To: An Adventurer
Interesting thoughts. My only concern is that there are so many. If we can come up with a system for it, then I'd be all for it, but personally I think I'd want to look a a list of settlements in alpha order. That way I can just click "WhatLinksHere" and see all the quests and routes that go through the settlements. Granted, you could do this on each "individual page" as well, but it will take a lot of work. I'm down with it though, lets just come up with a solid template before we start, so we don't have to go back and re-do anything. --Atarax 13:12, 1 February 2009 (CST)

To: Atarax
Well your whatlinkshere function would probably work better with the portals to the the settlements, rather than settlements themselves. That's one thing I forgot to mention - settlements and their portals should be separate entries. --An Adventurer 13:28, 1 February 2009 (CST)

To: Atarax, An Adventurer
There will be some additional options available to us after the upgrade to 1.14 so we may want to put this on the backburner for a little bit. --Tlosk 05:38, 5 February 2009 (CST)

I Updated the Far Claw Villas page and added a sample housing template page. Any thoughts? Talk --Atarax 11:17, 20 February 2009 (CST)

To: Atarax
That looks great. --Tlosk 11:31, 20 February 2009 (CST)

Quest Transclusion Page

I have created a transclusion page for the quest by letter pages, Quests - Development. It mirrors the current contents of all the individual pages in one place to make it easier for those of us working on old quest writeups to search for aliases or see tables that need updating without having to click through all the letters.

Use the links to go to the original pages if you will be editing something. --Tlosk 11:03, 29 January 2009 (CST)

Live Image Placement and Size

In working on the templates for a couple of things that use live shots at the top right, I've found a way of anchoring the image so that it will always appear just to the right of the summary table. This allows you to use larger images if desired without worrying about breaking the page for people using a small browser window (where the image overlaps and hides part of the summary table). However it may not look as good when using a larger browser window (large white space in the right corner). I wanted to get a consensus on what the preference would be? I've temporarily edited Eldrytch Web Stronghold and Radiant Blood Stronghold for comparison.--Tlosk 09:08, 28 January 2009 (CST)

I figured out a sneaky way of forcing the image to justify right regardless of how large the browser window is while never overlapping the text if the browser window is small. I'll be integrating this feature into the other templates. Also it will no longer display an image if there is either no image specified or if Live.jpg is specified. --Tlosk 09:03, 30 January 2009 (CST)

Chests and Packs

Category talk:Container - --Tlosk 08:52, 28 January 2009 (CST)

Creature Stats Page

I've made a few changes to the Creature Entry Template, adding a Quests section with links to quests that are centered around that particular creature type and renaming the bestiary description section to simply Lore so I can include tidbits of fiction from the teasers and rollouts that I can find. I also changed the table appearance slightly and put the formatting information into a template so all 70+ creature pages can be manipulated at once if it needs to be changed. I finished adding all of the spawn maps and am now going through the creature pages one by one to update them. Also if you can look through your old images to see if you have any creature related artwork, especially player made from the early days of AC that would be great. --Tlosk 17:36, 27 January 2009 (CST)

Titles in Patch Page

I noticed all the Future Titles in the Current_Patch#New_Titles section. I guess this is from the hacked client data, but do you think we should include this in the Current Patch? I think it will become confusing because people will think that's when those titles were actually available. --Atarax 01:51, 24 January 2009 (CST)

To: Atarax
Personally I think they should go there as long as they are labeled as such, it helps a lot in trying to discover new content (although in this particular case we know it won't be for a while until some of them are actually available in game). Also it is useful historically in knowing when something was actually added. So as long as the labeling is clear, I think it's more helpful than not. --Tlosk 08:35, 24 January 2009 (CST)

Page Template Updates

All Page Templates are currently under review/construction in preparation for the next release of the Wiki Swiss Tool.--Tlosk 08:26, 24 January 2009 (CST)

Spells

I've started a cantrip template here. We'll use the talk page there to discuss improvements. --An Adventurer 13:10, 23 January 2009 (CST)

Individual Creature Template

To: Tlosk
I was thinking the that you could use the Class Variable to dynamically build the [[Category:Creature Class]] portion. That would eliminate any edits required at the bottom of the page for a typical creature. --Atarax 13:21, 23 January 2009 (CST)

To: Atarax
I've added that feature to the template, it can have it twice (at the bottom too), but it now automatically adds the Creature Category, the Class Category, and if there is a Subclass, that too. So you can just normally leave the bottom blank now when using the Creature page template and it will categorize itself according to what is put into the Class and Subclass fields.


The Individual Creature Template has been significantly changed in form though not in substance. It now uses a template for the table that lets you fill out the data in line rather than amongst tons of formatting info. The notes section has been kept out of the wiki template because there's a lot of variability there and also for a technical reason (you can't have actual page sections like == Notes == within a wiki template because when you click on edit it will take you to the template page and not stay on the page where the template is being used. Also just to clarify, a Page Template is what we use as a skeleton for an entire page, a Wiki Template is a smaller section of formatting code that is used within a page. So a page template can contain several wiki templates as part of it.

I made two more tweaks, now any stat left blank will automatically show as ?? so when go back to fill them in don't have to erase and for the xp just put the number. --Tlosk 06:37, 23 January 2009 (CST)

To: Tlosk
Nice, those changes will work. Question... Can you use the variables in more than one page on the page? Like Class? Or is it a 1 to 1 relationship? The other suggestion I have is to change some of the wording at the bottom to make the What Links Here line be automated instead of relying on someone to properly pluralize it. So, by default even the Class, Maybe something like this: 

* [[:Special:Whatlinkshere/{{PAGENAME}}|Locations]] where a {{PAGENAME}} can be found.

--Atarax 16:35, 23 January 2009 (CST)

To: Atarax
That's a good idea, to avoid agreement issues (a/an etc) I made it so it just says "* <Name> Locations." and added it the creature template. As I'm going through the old creature entries and changing them I've come across quite a few that were either missing the plural name all together or weren't pluralized so this will make it a lot better.

For example: 

{{Locations|{{PAGENAME}}}}

displays as:

--Tlosk 13:08, 23 January 2009 (CST)

Point Maps

See Template talk:Map Point Plus and Template talk:Map Point.

Wiki Templates

I've created a new help page, Wiki Templates that references several new formatting templates with more to come soon. The general idea of a template is it takes formatting code that is complicated and/or used in many articles and lets you refer to it rather than use it on every page. There are two benefits to this, one it makes posting simpler and second, it makes it possible to change the formatting for all those pages with a single edit to the template page rather than to all the individual pages.

These are different from Page Templates because they are used within a page for a part of it, rather a layout for an entire page.

There's no obligation to use them, and they aren't universally good, what you gain in ease of use, you give up in terms of being able to customize or stray from the format when you need to add things unique to that page. But overall templates help give the wiki a uniform feel, allow neophyte users to make complicated constructions, and minimize errors. --Tlosk 06:38, 24 January 2009 (CST)

Creature Template

To: Tlosk
I think I found a bug with the creature template, see Coral Tower for an example. If you try to show a creature class like Misc. Creature Class it will not work. Also, if you want to mask that link, like Wall, it will not show the label, only Misc. Creature Class

To: Atarax
Misc is an exception, you put just Misc. Creature Class for the Class, then put what is displayed under the Subclass and it will show correctly. However if a case comes up where you need to have an alias for a parameter for a template, you can use {{!}} instead of a pipe. For example: 

{{Related|:Category:Maps{{!}}ALL MAPS|Unmapped Dungeons}}

displays as:

Related topics: ALL MAPS, Unmapped Dungeons

--Tlosk 13:20, 22 January 2009 (CST)

Dec 2008

Spells

To: An Adventurer
I added the spell Mucor Jolt as a redirect for Drain_Health_(Spell), but as it is not "castable" (only found on a weapon), would this properly classify itself as Spell? It's not really a cantrip either, so where do you think it should be redirected to? Maybe Drain Health (Cantrip) ?

To: Atarax
Unique spells like that can have their own page, marked as Category:Unlearnable Castable Spell. The only time that a unique quest only spell should redirect to a standard spell page is when it has an effect that can be seen to stack with or surpass regular spells. For example, there are many quest only cantrips (like on the living weapons, or the spear of purity) but these can be proven to stack or override standard spells and cantrips.

So in short, most unique quest/item spells that mimic a life, creature, or item spell/cantrip will redirect to the appropriate page. Unique war and offensive life spells will have an individual page. And I think, for now at least, most of those special boss only debuffs should have unique pages, since many of them do not have a standard spell counterpart, and it is also rather difficult to find what standard debuffs they do stack with. --An Adventurer 18:30, 19 December 2008 (CST)

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