Guild Wars Wiki talk:Builds/Archive 2

User build categories

Do we want to specify and structure the subcategories for the suggested Category:User build lists and Category:User builds? For the former, it's probably difficult to predict what kind of build lists we'll end up with. But for the latter, it'll obviously go over 200 articles very quickly. I'm wondering if subcategories by type would be useful, like Category:Nukers, Category:Tanks, Category:Batteries, etc. The examples are very broad, but this could be a good way to link user builds to the roles or build concepts. -- ab.er.rant 17:48, 10 June 2007 (UTC)

We should specify them, but in a formatting article, not in the policy. --Xeeron 18:35, 10 June 2007 (UTC)

Right. But should we change the wording regarding build categories in the policy itself, like saying all user builds must be categorised in a subcategory of Category:User builds. -- ab.er.rant 19:01, 10 June 2007 (UTC)

Hmm if you think they should be, go ahead and edit the policy. For my part, I could not care less - remember those are all user name space subpages. If someone wants to stick a build in his user page without categorizing it, why care? The one thing that matters, the policy states: They should not end up in the wrong namespace/categories. Whether they are categorized or sitting lonely on a user subpage is up the author as far as I am concerned. --Xeeron 21:38, 10 June 2007 (UTC)

The fact that the current policy actually mentions that a user should attempt to search for an existing user build that matches what they had in mind before posting their own, to me, warrants mentioning some categories. Without categories to give either the user builds or at least the user build lists some structure and meaning, search would become mostly limited to the wiki search function. -- ab.er.rant 12:57, 11 June 2007 (UTC)

I changed user builds to say that editors are encouraged to categorize user builds in user build categories. --Xeeron 14:40, 11 June 2007 (UTC)

Continuing to move onward

Any other glaring revisions that pop out at someone right now? (Aiiane - talk - contribs) 11:42, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

Well I did say it could use some refining but I really can't spend that much time trying to refine it further. It has the right info in it and it can be condensed in the future if people see ways of communicating the info in a shorter method. All I see missing are examples. That's how the newbie learns and the experienced may use as a rule of thumb. My 2¢. --File:VallenIconwhitesmall.JPG Vallen Frostweaver 12:00, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

Examples can be added in when actual articles get created. This has been pretty quiet. Looks like no one has any objections. -- ab.er.rant 09:03, 3 July 2007 (UTC)

Implement?

Since I've not seen much in the way of further issues raised in regards to this, I'd like to see if the community agrees with implementing this as a policy. Feel free to weigh in with any comments you have in regards to implementing this as of the current draft. (Aiiane - talk - contribs) 22:22, 3 July 2007 (UTC)

It's too late for me to post a long message, but just to prevent hasty decisions I'll just quickly say that I don't think it's perectly okay yet. -- (gem / talk) 23:49, 3 July 2007 (UTC)

That's the kind of feedback I was looking for, but I hope you'll follow up soon with more details. ;) -- (Aiiane - talk - contribs) 11:40, 5 July 2007 (UTC)

The only change I would propose, and that's just a small detail, is to rename the "Vetting builds" section into "User build lists" - I think that's a "softer" name, that reinforces the idea about promoting builds by showing them on user lists, as opposed to judging the builds themselves directly. Erasculio 13:41, 5 July 2007 (UTC)

Agreed, User build lists describes the section much better. I took the freedom and changed it in the proposal. --Xeeron 14:26, 5 July 2007 (UTC)

I'll give more detailed input todays if Kalomeli stays happy with Diablo. (got her hooked :P ) -- (gem / talk) 19:34, 10 July 2007 (UTC)

I'd prefer to see some distiction between Build Concepts and 'Guides on how to play x well'. The former is like dictionary entries, but I could easily see conflict arising over a more subjective subject as the latter is. Backsword 18:02, 20 July 2007 (UTC)

The latter shouldn't be on the wiki, IMO - both because of the subjective nature, but also because this isn't a strategy guide, it's a reference. (Aiiane - talk - contribs) 20:18, 20 July 2007 (UTC)

"This isn't a strategy guide, it's a reference." I'd like you to provide a source for that fact, please. :) Without a statement of purpose from ArenaNet, we're not anything in particular. —Tanaric 21:59, 20 July 2007 (UTC)

I'm not going to source it (because I can't), but I will clarify that such is merely my opinion. That good enough for you, Tanaric? :) (Aiiane - talk - contribs) 22:02, 20 July 2007 (UTC)

Absolutely. :) I disagree though, since we have plenty of things here already that aren't merely references. Every mission article has a walkthrough, which can only be interpreted as strategy information. Similarly, many skill articles have notes on good synergy with other skills. I'd go as far as to say that we're primarily a strategy site. —Tanaric 22:07, 20 July 2007 (UTC)

I suppose "strategy" was a bad choice of words. Let me attempt to clarify. I don't see the wiki as being a place (at least, on main article pages) to express opinions about builds or strategies - mission walkthroughs are objective, skill synergies are objective; "how to play this build well" is subjective, what skill bar is best for this build is subjective. It's that objective vs. subjective differentiation that I think is key here - objective content belongs in articles, subjective content belongs in talk pages. (Aiiane - talk - contribs) 05:13, 22 July 2007 (UTC)

I agree on the separation of objective and subjective content. However, I also feel that it would not be inappropriate to include some information on how players typically play a particular build (common skill chains, and the like). Take the 55 Monk for example. The majority of players would not debate the necessity of casting maintained enchantments (Mending, et al.) immediately after zoning in such a build. Whether you would consider this as more an explanation of the mechanics of the build, or a suggestion on how to play it effectively, I'm not sure, but either way I feel it is necessary to explain how the build works at the most basic level. Players would, however, debate the usefulness of Vigorous Spirit as opposed to Guardian in certain situations - this I feel should go on the talk page. --SoraMitsukai 13:26, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

Just to clarify, I am not voiceing an opinion on what shouldn't be on the wiki, but I do think a clear policy on what goes where is desirable. Currently, the two are often conflated.Backsword 10:18, 21 July 2007 (UTC)

A "Build concept" (i.e. the common build) is a definition of the build, it is the what of a build. It explains how that build was created, the primary purpose of the build, the defining profession(s), skill(s), or attribute(s) of that build. Strengths and weaknesses and how to deal with them. A "Guide on how to play x well" is a detailed explanation on how to play a build concept. Party composition, positioning, how to use the skills of that build concept for maximum effectiveness, the order the should be used, what equipment and mods are critical, etc. basically everything on how to excel at that build concept.

I fail to see why the latter should not exist on this wiki. Yes, it's subjective, but if we're allowing farming guides, hero handling guides, title guides, and modding guides, I don't see why gameplay guides should be denied. I foresee the creation of getting started guides and profession guides; should those be disallowed? They considered subjective as well.

And finally, given that trying to differentiate the above two things are irrelevant to this policy, can we focus back on the task at hand? Any other problems with this policy? Oppositions? I see that the names of the templates and categories haven't been finalised yet. The bottom part of article feels incomplete and needs to be expanded and cleaned up. -- ab.er.rant 14:32, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

Do we allow such guides as mainspace articles, titled with the name of what they are the guide for? (I.e. would we allow a guide of how to handle warrior heroes with the title "Koss"?) That is essentially what I'd see allowing subjective commentary w.r.t. builds on the build pages themselves to be. For user builds, I'd say it's fine, they're in userspace, but for mainspace build pages I'd say that at the very least, editors should be highly encouraged to stick to objective or near-objective content. (Aiiane - talk - contribs) 00:02, 26 July 2007 (UTC)

I don't feel that the differentiation is entirely irrelevant: it should be more clear, in my humble opinion, that users should not be constantly editing the skill bar of a popular build because it is the way they feel it should be set up. Debates on which "optionals" to include that aren't core to the build should go on the talk page. By the same token, I also see what you're saying about including a section on why those skills that make a given build what it is (Shock for Shock Axe, etc.) are included, and how they are used in concert effectively. As you say, we have mission walkthroughs and the like, why not something similar for builds? Beyond that, I myself don't have any qualms about adopting this policy, beyond what has already been mentioned.--SoraMitsukai 23:50, 25 July 2007 (UTC)

If you feel that the wording for the "Common build concepts" is not clear enough, could you explain how you would change the wording of that section? To me, as written, the whole idea of a common build concept is something that is mostly objective (as Aiiane put it). Users who keep trying to edit a build concept to put in their less-than-common personal idea is going to get reverted and refuted, simply because a build concept (we could add a notice at the top I suppose) is not for personal preferences or variations. And with the user builds section, they'd be encouraged to go ahead and create their own personal variation in their user space and do whatever he/she wants with it; but the build concept article will be kept up-to-date to reflect how things are generally done.

The formatting guidelines for that needs to be rewritten as well I think, to highlight the fact that things like tips and tricks, strategies and such have no place in a build concept article. Things like "how to play" is more appropriate on guides. And I still say the differentiation is irrelevant. Because this policy clearly defines what a common build concept article should be. Strategy and how to play are not mentioned and are implied that they are irrelevant to a build concept page, because it should be objective about it.

Guides are not covered by this policy and is not the concern of this policy. How someone chooses to write a guide is up to them. Unless of course, you want to propose that guides to builds need to fail under this policy as well, which is going to be difficult to govern because of the subjective nature of guides. I fail to see why strategies should be kept minimal. Isn't helping people play better part of documenting the game? It does imply that most of Category:Guides is not suitable; mission and quest walkthroughs would probably not be objective enough as well. If someone writes a guide on Koss, I'd stick a merge tag on it telling people to merge it with a hero guide. A warrior hero guide? I'd leave it be if it's detailed enough, or merge-tag it otherwise. -- ab.er.rant 04:04, 26 July 2007 (UTC)

Here is what i see should be vital to a page containing a build:

Description, Name, Proffesions all rolled up into one thing

Skill Bar hopefully with tooltips...this really saves a lot of time the n continually loading up pages of skills because you never saw them or knew what they did

Variations THIS IS KEY. The poster of the build should make the main skills but then other people might put in their little skill change here and there will save lots of arguing

counters, equipments, general usage, not sure how you would handle some peoples personal opinion on usage.

Anybody agree with these basic paremeters? it seems no one listed these on this talk page.

The main problem I see with the whole builds thing is that if we dont come up with something good people will just stick with PvXwiki.com. It's been true to me so far very helpful organized and im sure other people think the same.

Im kind of new to the Wiki hoping to register soon so forgive me for any thing i might have done wrong in this post.

~Ashvirenza --The preceding unsigned comment was added by User:65.41.43.130 .

You're basically describing what's on the old builds section on GuildWiki... and trust me, look through the archive and see why we don't want that. This is policy formulation, so we're more concerned with what is the definition of a build article rather than what exactly should appear in a build article. That sort of thing is more suited for the builds formatting guidelines. -- ab.er.rant 09:02, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

Why not do a link to [[1]] for a builds section or if not that at least adopt some of the formating that they have used. If a template is created and stuck to then I think it would be good but I do remember that it seemed to me the old guildwiki site was slow most of the time from everyone messing with the builds and when they took that feature of the wiki away it seemed as if the site worked much better so maybe if we don't want to use PvXwiki we can get a seperate wiki set up for builds. Pimpologist 16:36, 17 August 2007 (UTC)

You might want to read through this page's archive - the has been proposed before and there are a number of reasons against it, which would be too long for me to efficiently repeat here. (Aiiane - talk - contribs) 23:50, 17 August 2007 (UTC)

Outstanding issues

Does anyone have an outstanding issue with this policy as currently written? Is the wording "common build concept" still an issue? (Aiiane - talk - contribs) 23:34, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

Good luck with this lol. We have a hard time running the site, and all we do is Builds lulz. This will will probably be a GW Epic Fail, and they certainly have less then you guys :P. Readem Sorry, I'll stop trolling now. 23:37, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

That's why we're taking a different approach, focusing less on builds and more on concepts - and with a requirement of notability, as well. (Aiiane - talk - contribs) 23:58, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

I think there are still plenty of issues to debate, but that for now, people have neither the energy nor the time. Backsword 14:50, 30 August 2007 (UTC)

I'll come round to this policy eventually (as will many others I guess), but first I want to have some other out of the way. --Xeeron 14:54, 30 August 2007 (UTC)

For now the policy seems ok, but I think we shouldn't introduce a build guide section to the wiki just yet. Let's get the sysop/bcrat stuff otu of the way first. -- (gem / talk) 07:30, 26 September 2007 (UTC)

A simpler solution

Have outside pvxwiki redirects. If someone types in [[Zergway]], you can have #REDIRECT [[pvx:Build:Team - Zerg IWAY]] and have an outer-wiki redirect to it instead of messing with a builds section and all of the assorted shenanigans of such craziness. —ǥrɩɳsɧƿoɲ 23:05, 25 September 2007 (UTC)

Already discussed in the archives. Feel free to bring the relevant sections back to the main page if you don't think the proposal was adequately addressed. (Aiiane - talk - contribs) 23:09, 25 September 2007 (UTC)

Redirecting to other wikis is some kind of adopting the content and we should not maintain any builds as they are maintained on PvX Wiki.. We should concentrate on having build descriptions without skills and subjective things.. poke | talk 23:20, 25 September 2007 (UTC)

Wouldn't it be worthwhile to at least include the core skills that pretty much make up the build? e.g. Searing Flames Nuker can't really spam Searing Flames particularly well without Glowing Gaze, Glyph of Lesser Energy, and Fire Attunement. Then again, people would just argue over what's crucial, heh. ~ File:GeckoSprite.gif Pae 02:53, 26 September 2007 (UTC)

Both your proposals are already covered by this proposed policy. This section is just a suggestion to link to an external wiki. -- ab.er.rant 05:10, 26 September 2007 (UTC)

PvX wiki won't be able to be linked to much longer due to money issues and is looking for a place to put the builds. Here would seem like a good choice imo.