MarioWiki:Proposals/Archive/30

Navigation Templates
SUPPORT 13-0
 * ''Draft: User:Walkazo/Essays

This proposal is aiming to do for navigation templates, what this proposal did for categories. As seen in the draft, this will expand and update Navigation Templates, and while this will not overhaul the system like the categories proposal, there are a few changes, which I'll briefly go over here.

First of all, the policy includes a big chart of colours that should be used for all game- and series-based templates; I also have examples of recoloured templates further down my page. (There was already a proposal about this, but that user didn't create an actual code, so no actual changes could/should have come as a result of its passing.) Non-series-based templates (i.e. stuff like or ) can be given unique colours that pertain to their subject matter, rather than using the same colours as their parent series.

Secondly, the order in which templates should be placed on articles is outlined in the policy: namely, any random templates (i.e. species-based templates) should come first, followed by all the game/series-based templates, which should go in pure chronological order. So, unlike History sections, which clump series together, different games would simply be arranged according to the year they came out, with no regard for when the rest of the series' installations were released. Instead, the templates' colour-coding can be used to pick out all the members of a given series.

Finally, the policy outlines what types of templates can be made. Basically, there are three types of templates, each with slightly different content structure and criteria:
 * Game-specific templates will ideally contain everything about a game, like or, whereas separate templates about certain specific aspects of a game should hereon in be avoided. However, if a subject is very numerous, such as minigames, levels or RPG items, it can keep its own separate template, since merging it might make the main template too bulky. For example,  (bonus challenges) should be folded into , but  can stay separate. Both the main template and the separate level/whatever template should go on the level articles, but obviously, the level template wouldn't need to go on non-level pages (except the game's page itself, which should have all the relevant game-specific templates).
 * Series-wide templates should almost always be templates that list the games in a series, rather than templates for subjects that are found all throughout a series. These should only be made for things like that have lots of overlap or parallels between games best served by back-to-back comparisons, or things like, where a centralized list of far-reaching subjects is likely to be organizationally useful in a manner similar to species templates (see next entry), but limited to a single series and organized by game. In most cases, however, game-specific templates are a better way to organize things than templates like  or , both of which will be scrapped should this policy pass.
 * Everything else are species templates, which groups things based on what they are, rather than where they come from. Most of these templates will be species-based, like or, but important items like , and even a few miscellaneous subjects like  or  are given this sort of template too. The only stipulation is that they all have to be decently important, numerous and/or complicated: really minor and small, or overly large, vaguely defined groups of species (i.e. anything smaller than , or things like Category:Fish) don't need templates, and items and miscellanea are under even stricter scrutiny, so users will have to think long and hard before making templates like these.

The policy also has a big section on how to set up templates (i.e. what headers to use, how to arrange the lists of links, etc.), but that's a lot of nitty-gritty details, and it's mostly explaining what we already do, so I won't go over that here. If you have any questions about details on the draft or aspects that I could only briefly touch upon in the proposal, definitely post them in the comments, but overall, I hope this and the draft are enough to convince you that this will be a vast improvement to the small, outdated policy we have today.

Proposer: Deadline: March 30, 2012, 23:59 GMT

Support

 * 1) - Per my proposal.
 * 2) Per proposal.
 * 3) Per proposal.
 * 4) - Per proposal.
 * 5) This is a great idea. Per Proposal.
 * 6) Per proposal.
 * 7) - Per all.
 * 8) - Per proposal.
 * 9) Per proposal. Little bit complicated, but good idea.
 * 10) Per all.
 * 11) Per all
 * 12) Per proposal.
 * 13) Per proposal. We badly need this.

Comments
I know you're trying to be clear, but can you please clarify further/sum it up what the changes are? I can't really comprehend what's going to happen, it seems too complex.
 * I don't understand this proposal either. All I know is that it is supposed to improve organization or something in templates. The rest, I had trouble comprehending.
 * The first section (of this proposal) covers the various template colors that are to be used (the color depends on the template). The second section determines template priority (so at the bottom of an article, you'd have species templates, followed by game/series templates (in order of release date by game)). The third section details what information goes into each template. The rest is about making templates in general.
 * Ah, thanks for clearing that up
 * No problem.

Mario4Ever's summary was bang on. And to clarify, this proposal isn't so much about making a few specific changes, but rather, getting a bigger, better policy approved. A lot of the drafted update to Navigation Templates is just explaining unwritten conventions that are already more-or-less followed, but from this point onwards, there will be something concrete to refer back to. It's also regulating a few things that are inconsistent now, or at the very least, making recommendations based on the various ways users are already setting up their templates. There are too many details to list, but there are a few notable features that I can further boil down if you guys do want the specific changes: The template classification and the terminology is also new (under the old system, there's four template types, whereas there's three types in the draft), but that's more of an internal change: it's important from a policy standpoint, but only the above list will really be affecting the wiki at large. A couple of the finer details (which I didn't talk about in the proposal to save space) that will also affect folks are: And that's all I can recall for now; I can't simplify the proposal any more than that without getting rid of the details, but like I said at the beginning of this post, when it comes to an in-the-nutshell description, M4E's post already has it covered. -
 * New colour-coding system (different series get different colours; random stuff gets personalized colours).
 * New order on templates (random stuff first, followed by games in chronological order).
 * Templates about subjects across a series (i.e. ) are now discouraged.
 * Everything about a game should be in one template, rather than multiple smaller ones, which used to be done periodically. The exception to this is when there's a really big subject like SMG galaxies, which can be left separate just to keep the templates from getting unmanageably large.
 * In the cases where there is a separate template for an aspect of a game, both that template and the main template would go on the page (i.e. a SMG galaxy would have both and, but an SMG enemy would only get ), whereas currently, the main template is often omitted.
 * Templates must be 100% wide (most of them already are, but there are a couple that run afoul of this, however a lot of them are already in trouble with the fourth bullet point).
 * If a page has 10 or more templates, they should be collapsed using ; the original threshold is 7. As always, the templates themselves should all be collapsible.
 * Templates should not have categories in them (this is already on the categories policy, but this emphasizes it).
 * Nav templates are for mainspace only (same as the current policy), with galleries and game subpages (/beta, /staff, etc.) getting their own special templates.
 * Really minor or vaguely defined subjects shouldn't get templates (i.e. yes to and, no to  or  , same as always.

Would Template:GPteams be merged to Template:PM2 as a result of this proposal?

I have a question about the templates: would it be a good idea if we add pictures to some templates? Or do all of them have to be a solid color?


 * Reversinator: No, GPteams is large and complex enough to remain separate: it's a good idea to sort the teams, but it would take up too much room and draw too much focus to a relatively minor aspect of the game to do so in the main PM2 template. LeftyGreenMario: Solid colour; templates don't need flashy pictures, and most won't get them anyway, which will just make things inconsistent and draw extra attention to a few select templates, wrecking the uniformity of the colour-coded blocks. However, I do think the image-background currently used on would be a neat addition to, seeing as that template is unique, and appears on a special group of articles (which are all about images).  and other templates like  or  might also work with that image setup, but with different background colours (i.e. dark blue from the water levels, and black for castles/underground; after that we'd have to get creative), or possibly different games' sprites, although that would be a lot more complex to make and set up. I didn't include that idea in the policy draft right off the bat, since I'm still mulling over the details, and seeing as it's a very specialized idea, I'd rather get specific approval for it with a subsequent Proposal. -
 * Also, it would be nice to see what the templates will look like when it's finished. Considering the support in this proposal, maybe you can work on the future templates as soon as possible. That way, I can have a better understanding what the result will be. Also, it is possible to make templates always expanded when only a few of them are present, like in the minigame articles?
 * The future templates are currently here
 * Hm, my CSS makes all those templates the same color. :P
 * You can see how it looks like when you log out.
 * Odd - I copied all the actual template codes directly and then swapped the colours, nothing more: no idea why there'd be a problem seeing them. (Also, this is actually a more direct link to the test templates.) Anyway, I don't know if there's any way to make templates automatically expanded on short pages, but I wouldn't recommend it anyway: it'd be inconsistent with long pages, pushing the [show] button isn't exactly arduous, and personally, I think it looks better when they're automatically collapsed anyway - it makes the pages less bottom-heavy. -

Radio Conversation Characters
MERGE TO AN ARTICLE SPECIFICALLY FOR THEM 5-0-0-0

Peppy Hare, Slippy Toad, Krystal, Panther Caroso, Leon Powalski, Colonel Roy Campbell, Otacon, Mei Ling. All of these characters appear in codec conversations, either with Fox, Falco, Wolf, or Solid Snake. Panther, Krystal, and Leon have articles that redirect to the list of trophies, while the rest of them don't. I really can't see why they don't have articles. I mean, they all have the same role, and it's a minor one. Do the Metal Gear characters have articles because they have more dialogue? More dialogue doesn't change their minor role. Do Slippy and Peppy have articles because they appear in Arwings on Corneria to shoot people? We don't have articles on Tingle or Ultimate Chimera, even though they are also stage characters. There are quite a few options we could take: merging all of them to the stages they appear in (Lylat Cruise and Shadow Moses Island), merging all of them into one article specifically for them, making articles for Krystal, Leon, and Panther, or doing nothing.

Proposer: Deadline: March 31, 2012, 23:59 GMT

Merge to an article specifically for them

 * 1) Seems like the best way.
 * 2) Per GreenDisaster
 * 3) Per other two
 * 4) I don't think they all warrant a seperate but they should get an article that lists all of them.
 * 5) Sure. Per all

Comments
Peppy and Slippy were both in Meelee and brawl so that's why they have an article much like how Whispy Woods has an article but aside from that I pretty much agree with this proposal
 * Whispy Woods has an article because of its appearance in a Club Nintendo comic, I believe. We have a precedent of merging SSB-only stage hazards to stage articles, but not when they have other Mario-related appearances.
 * Would Peppy count? I mean, he did appear in a comic, but it was a really minor role.

Creating Separate Level Pages in Super Mario Platformers, and Reworking Use of World Pages
FAILED 4-8
 * ''Draft: User:Bwf8398/Draft

Since the creation of this site, users have been told that if a level has a name, such as Awesome, it gets its own article, but if the level is a number, such as World 2-4, then it does not. Currently, World articles are being used to house information about 6 or 7 different levels, in places such as World 3 (New Super Mario Bros. Wii). If the levels had names, they would most certainly be given separate articles, and the idea that the entire position and most of the writing quality of a level article is based on its name is absurd. People say that it is because it can be hard to find a specific level, such as world 2-4, when there are multiple levels under that name, but the current system is no better! Users have to find World Articles instead, and there are even more articles about World 2 than there would be about something like World 2-4. It is much better to have many short to medium length articles that use infoboxes to be easier to understand than to create long, useless world articles, where information about the levels are basically non-existent.

People say that inconsistency is a bad thing, and this is another case of it. The fact that some games have their own level articles, while others are instead lumped together in world articles is very confusing to someone not familiar with the site. I remember spending a long time trying to find an article for World 9-6 in NSMBW before I was on the site, because I thought that the description on the world page was just an overview, and that the actual article was elsewhere.

Though in theory, it is true that articles will be the same length regardless of if they're in a World Article or a Level Article, this is not true in practice. The truth is that there are several paragraphs in a well-written level article at least, and writing quality suffers severely in the level articles. The reason is that the page is already so long, and seems to have so much information that users do not feel it necessary to add more. However, it becomes a problem when articles turn out to be this short: ''This is the only level that features Huckit Crabs. There are also a lot of Urchins and Mega Urchins.'' From World 4-3 (NSMBW) This gives no information about the level, just that three enemies appear in it. Compare that to articles such as this, from Super Mario World, or Bramble Scramble, which attained FA status, and you realize how much having its own article affects if people actually work on it.

Naming
Articles should be named as "Level name (game it's from)". For example, names should be like World 2-4 (New Super Mario Bros. Wii) or World 1-3 (Super Mario Bros. 2), and redirect for all abbreviations (e.g. World 2-4 (NSMBW)). For levels where the second number is a picture, name them as World 3-Fort or World 6-Airship. Disambiguation pages will also have to be created, but there are so many of these already for world articles that it won't increase the total that much.

Components of an Article
Many users oppose this, claiming that this would just create stubs. However, these articles will certainly be longer than things like the minigame articles, such as this, if written correctly. In each platformer article, there should be:
 * An infobox, containing a picture sized at 260 px. There is already an infobox available for New Super Mario Bros. Wii, which could probably be recycled for other games, such as Super Mario 3-D Land.
 * A short introduction, describing the setting of the level, any unique characteristics the level has, etc.
 * One section for each room in the level. A room is defined as a continuous sections of a level, such as the beginning of a level to the first Warp Pipe. If the screen has to redraw, then the player has entered a different room. Rooms which must be gone through in order to complete the level should be called "Main Room (Number)", and optional rooms, such as those that only contain 1-Up Mushrooms or Star Coins, should be labeled as "Secret Room (Number)", where the numbering is based on how early on they appear in the level.
 * One section containing a list of all enemies in the level, such as in the Super Mario Galaxy 2 levels.
 * One section briefly describing position in world; what levels it unlocks, and what levels are prerequisites to play this.
 * One section describing any Hint Movies for the level, if applicable
 * One section for trivia
 * If available, a level map, such as what is currently featured here.
 * Description of Boss Battle (Fort and Castle levels only)

Components of a Room Section

 * Brief description of setting, if changed (e.g. grassland to underground)
 * Any Star Coins or 1-Up Mushrooms in it
 * Hazards: Enemies, Pits, Scrolling Camera
 * For main rooms, any rooms it leads to.
 * For secret rooms, what room leads to them.

Using Template:Main
The other main complaint users have as that this would require a lot of extra clicking, and navigation. To counter-act this, I propose that we write brief descriptions of each level in the world article, and then link these to the main article. That way, the world articles could focus more on the world itself, rather than merely being a collection of disjointed information about different levels. This could be used to give a short summary of the level, so that readers can distinguish and select the level they want, without going to over-the-top detail.

Navigation Template
To make navigation even easier, I propose creating a navigation template for the levels in each game. Similar ones exist for things like "Levels in DKC", and it would make navigation between levels and worlds even easier, as well as streamline it.

Though this will require a lot of work, it will make the information many times easier to understand, and improve the quality of writing on all Super Mario Platformer levels greatly. Please consider carefully, and post any questions in the comments. Example articles are included in the draft.

Proposer: Deadline: April 12, 2012, 23:59 GMT

Support

 * 1) - Per the proposal.
 * 2) - What is special about level names? I consider each level equally important, as all of them are necessary to complete the game. There is next to no information about the "non-named" levels, even though technically they do have names, (1-1, 2-8, ect.) and there is a lot of information on the "named" levels.
 * 3) We need to have consistency. Levels with names shouldn't be given different treatment
 * 4) - Per Arceus79

Oppose

 * 1) Per the arguments in ever other proposal that deals with this matter
 * 2) From a navigational standpoint, it makes more sense to have all of the levels in one article (e.g. by world) rather than separate articles on the levels.
 * 3) Proposal passes = possible load of new stubs. No.
 * 4) – Per Raven Effect.
 * 5) - I stand by what I said on all those Proposals that Raven Effect linked to: everything should be in world pages, regardless of whether they have names or not. Having all the info on world pages rather than separate level pages streamlines navigation, and just because the descriptions are all in one central place doesn't mean they have to be short - on the contrary, long world levels should be striven for. And, at the same time, not feeling pressured to write an entire article will help avoid unnecessary fluff from being added to the level coverage: rambling walkthroughs are for FAQs, not us, and "padding" sections should be avoided too (Each room getting its own speculatively-named section? An entire section devoted to where a level occurs when one line in the intro could cover it? Officially-discouraged Trivia sections? Sorry, but none of these are a good idea). Not everything needs separate pages: what matters is using the best method to deal with a given subject. For example, Rainbow Road contains plenty of individual courses, yet they all have infoboxes, galleries and nice big descriptions, and if we could treat levels the same way, that would be ideal as far as I'm concerned.
 * 6) - Per all.
 * 7) - Per Walkazo. Also, I don't really think that any levels, even ones with names, should get their own articles.
 * 8) - Per Super Famicom 64, As somebody who does wiki maintenance I think That Extra Stubs are Not Needed.

Comments
Please be more specific Raven Effect. You are not giving a reason as much as a redirection to proposals on different issues, and this explains nothing to people who haven't extensively read other proposals that may be similar.

Thank you for the links, but please point out one thing in there that isn't covered here. I have studied them carefully and taken measures to counteract such problems. This won't create inconsistency, which was the main point in number 5, because it will be for all platforming game. Proposal 4 merged them because they were stubs that were badly written, which I have explained how to avoid in the proposal. Proposal 3 is similar to what Mario4ever said- it would be combatted by leaving enough info on the page so that users can distinguish between levels, and if a user wanted to read a level more extensively, it's just one click. Proposal 2 was similar to point 3- users said the info would be harder to reach, which is combatted by main article template. And Proposal 1 was incoherent, since the user seemed to want to merge every World 1-1 into one article, which is irrelevant to my proposal. None of the points in those aren't covered in the proposal

@Mario4ever: That's what the use of Template:Main is all about- there will still be info, but much more will be presented in the actual article. They will all still be in one place, and it will be easy to access.


 * We do have articles for galaxies for SMG 'n' SMG2, but they don't count as levels, and if users search for example World 3 (Super Mario Bros. 3) in search for level information, they won't find it.

@Super Famicom 64 This would not mean that we would have stub articles if they are written correctly

Sorry if I'm going to go mad but MOST OF THE SMW LEVEL ARTICLES ARE NOT STUBS AND THEY ARE THE SAME LEGTH AS NSMBW. Everything needs an article.
 * Wow, stay easy, stay easy. @Raven Effect – I did not mean all articles that are small and have all possible information are instantly marked as new stubs.
 * @New Super Yoshi: Why don't you help out and support the proposal then?

I still have not seen one thing in the links that is not covered in the proposal. @Super Famicom 64, did you not read my entire 'What goes in an article' guideline? I even created a sample article of a level with only one room, which is the shortest level there will be. People are ignoring all of my work in creating guidelines to prevent the problems that they are pointing out. The only opposing argument with merit is that of Mario4ever. I call for the removal of the inaccurate arguments made by Super Famicom 64, Raven Effect, and those who referenced their reasoning. I mean no disrespect to any user in this, but I am merely utilizing rule 4. And even if there is one flaw, which I would be willing to concede to, the articles right now are completely useless! Though my system may not be completely perfect, surely it is much better than the current one! Bwf8398
 * Why would you remove valid votes just because you call for a guideline doesn't mean people will follow it. Also my vote is completely valid because I pered 5 proposals which all shot down this idea

And as I pointed out in my previous comment, none of the previous proposals you 'pered' are relevant to the current proposal or are fixed under the guidelines. I mean no disrespect to any user whose vote I call for a removal of, I just do not think that there vote is fair. When I said that, I was mostly speaking to the stub person. I apologize for any offense taken. Bwf8398
 * Well IMO Super Famicom 64 is invalid he sites the misinformed opinion that this will make loads of stubs which doesn't make any sense that level articles can be very well written but every other vote is invalid
 * I didn't mean every level article being marked instantly as new stub. Now, "Proposal passes = possible load of new stubs."
 * If people follow the guidelines, there will be no new stubs. Bwf8398
 * Now it's you that you have misunderstood: I said "possible", not "guaranteed".

I'm sorry, but could you give me two reasons from the link that are against the proposal? I could make changes to adhere to something I had overlooked because it has been fewer than three days if you just tell me how. Bwf8398

@Walkazo, I think you misunderstood some things. The description of a setting will be one line because that is a component of what goes in the introduction. It will be only one line. And in my opinion, naming them after numbers is better than what they do for the SMG and SMG 2 planets, where they're all subjectively named. How is this any different than those? They would not be padding sections, they would be a better organization method than a long clump of text, which most users generally avoid. I only included a trivia section so that people wouldn't put the wrong thing in there, such as where it is in the world. If you're against splitting, fine, but we desperately need new guidelines, so vote for the third section. Bwf8398

Per requests, I have included a section on Navigation Templates. I would be perfectly willing to make them. Bwf8398

@ Walkazo - Rainbow Road all share a name, and are not levels, they are courses. World 1-1 doesn't share a name with World 1-2 or World 1-Castle.

Important: If you agree with the guidelines, but want to keep the articles merged in world articles, vote for the third category. Bwf8398


 * I figured those sections would be paltry, and the fact that they're supposed to be one-liners just emphasizes that it's not a good idea. One-liner sections are almost always completely unnecessary: they make the page look fragmented and skeletal, and it'd be better to keep that info in the intro (or even put it in an infobox). I think the SMG galaxies are handled poorly too: I'd rather get rid of all the "planet" sections altogether and only have the missions (and I've said as much in past proposals). Long clumps of text are bad, but level overviews can be broken down into a manageable number of reasonably-sized paragraphs without needing sections: here's an example (done as an example for this discussion). Furthermore, merging the levels will create an even greater impetus to avoid long walkthroughs like that page's original incarnation (single pages being swollen like that is tolerable to some, but an entire world's worth of walkthroughs would be much harder to ignore). And while I do agree that new guidelines are needed, I don't agree with the ones in this proposal, and they'd work even worse for merged levels (the extra sections would clutter up the merged worlds way too much), so I'm afraid I can't use the third option. (Plus, the third option sorta waters down the opposition to splitting, so those that do want things to stay merged would be wiser to keep their votes pooled...) I am fully aware that levels =/= courses, and "same name" =/= "same world", but pages merging courses together is still comparable to pages merging levels together, and I stand by my use of Rainbow Road as an example of how merging multiple things into one overarching page can be done well. -


 * We are somewhat in agreement then. Just to clarify, the one-liner you were referring to is just one line in the section before the table of contents, not a section designed to have one line. The problem is, there need to be some sort of guidelines to clarify which section is which. I suppose that we could take out the title components (e.g. Main Room 2) and simply divide into paragraphs. The problem is that my solution really does require worlds being split, like you said, or else the world pages would be cluttered. I'm still not convinced that using Template:Main wouldn't fix that, but the thing I fear is what you said. Users, afraid of making stubs, post as much information as they can, lots of it irrelevant or repeated. I agree that the way BLIZZARD!!! is used is good, but as a community, it's too inconsistent to have some articles in world pages and some in separate articles. We need it one way or the other, and these guidelines fit with articles being split. If someone wants to counter-propose a way for merged articles, then both ways could be used, but again, this creates further inconsistency if the level articles follow different guidelines based on their name. However, once you get that far, you could argue that minigame and microgame articles of the same type should be merged, because it doesn't make sense to have longer level articles merged and keep these semi-stubs split. What I'm trying to say is that, one way or another, the level articles need to be uniform, and it just comes down to personal preference, as to if you prefer them merged or split. These guidelines would only work if articles were split. Bwf8398
 * Ah okay, but my vote was talking about the "section briefly describing position in world; what levels it unlocks, and what levels are prerequisites to play this" (and then I thought you were using "description of the setting" as another way to say "description of the position within the world"). That may not be a one-liner, but I still feel like it'd a be pointlessly short section. Short articles are not "semi-stubs": "stubs" are articles missing info, and short yet complete articles aren't "stubs" in any way. Minigames all have unique controls, gameplay, flavour text, ending and opening sequences and non-English names, but I'll admit that microgames have far less going for them and probably could be merged quite handily. -
 * I agree with you two with a new way of organization. I think that by working together we might be able to create another guidelines that fit if the articles are split. The current format that we have could probably be altered to allow us to use it on merged articles. However, as previously stated, this would create inconsistency between level articles. I am also afraid of users adding a lot of pointless information and having the article required to be cleaned up. There isn't any way that we could stop this as far as I know. I see your point of your comparison to Rainbow Road, and I agree with your point there as well, now that I understand your thinking.

@ Hippihippi and Super Famicom 64 - Even named levels are stubs. Look at Piranha Grove and Lots O'Fish from Yoshi's Story. These are both stubs, and yet have names.
 * Not all levels. These yet have a length reaching other levels.