Mass Effect Wiki talk:Manual of Style

Devconfirmation

I have no problem with listing items that have been confirmed by developers as fact, but how will we get this confirmation? My concern is that we will have people entering random things and then tagging it as devconfirmed. SpartHawg948 21:03, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

That's a good point. We could limit the use of devconfirmed tags to admins or something. DRY, thoughts? --Tullis 21:07, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

I linked the tag through to a category page (which I haven't actually created yet in case you can think of a better name for it) which would act as a monitoring point. The idea really was to try to reduce administrative burden of policing removal of devconfirmed text (as a small number of recent edits did). However, it could be that the cure is worse than the disease . I certainly don't feel particularly strongly about it one way or the other. As I mentioned we could also just go with an unobtrusive HTML comment. --DRY 21:25, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

Or a comment embedded in the wiki code? (That could have been what you meant.) That might work just as well, though it sometimes didn't for the Races page before the Citadel / non-Citadel shuffle. We can try. --Tullis 21:32, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

Yes, I was thinking along the lines of <!-- not speculation --> or similar in the wiki markup. Users would only see it if they opened the page for editing. On the other hand, as you point out, it's a lot less attention grabbing - and is quite subtle for non-technical users - so it might not be as effective. Whatever you and SpartHawg think is fine with me, though (including the omnipresent "leave it as it was before I messed with it" option ). --DRY 21:42, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

I'm less concerned with the technical aspects of it than I am with ensuring it isn't being abused. If someone just enters some random, made-up factoid and then claims it's devconfirmed, what can we do to disprove it? It becomes sort of a he-said she-said kinda thing, without any real resolution short of talking to the developers. SpartHawg948 22:58, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

I'm not too sure how that differs from the current state of affairs with speculation disagreement resolution in general . My motivation is primarily administrative, so to my mind an administrative solution would be fine. --DRY 23:37, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

Optional Missions

I don't see a section regarding how to deal with things Shepard can do but doesn't have too. I want to add a section about Shepard taking a drink from the bar in the Afterlife Club and falling unconcious to the Club's article, but I don't know if "if Shepard orders a drink from the bar" is ok, or if I should just say "when Shepard orders a drink from the bar". Any insight would be great. Cheers. JakePT 11:05, November 20, 2009 (UTC)

This stuff shouldn't be added until the game is out so we can see how it works. Also: spoiler warning? :s --Tullis 15:07, November 20, 2009 (UTC)

First off, yeah, this is something that should wait for confirmation, and yes, some indication of spoilers may be nice. Also, as for insight, refer to Flux. That article seems pretty well laid out, I don't see any reason that can't also work for the Afterlife article. SpartHawg948 19:51, November 20, 2009 (UTC)

Adding to welcome message?

Would it be worth sticking links to the Style Guide and Community Guidelines pages into the autowelcome message? Might save us a lot of grief.

Also, the Style Guide needs updating, especially that screenshot of an edit-in-progress. It might also be worth underlining how we handle squadmate / critical character pages compared to normal ones. --Tullis 14:13, December 4, 2009 (UTC)

Image Size Standards

Paper Street's recent adding of images to Elanos Haliat and Lieutenant Girard got me thinking about establishing image dimension standards for different kinds of pages. Like a set resolution/aspect ratio for minor character images, squadmembers, major characters etc. Just to have some visual consistancy across pages, which we are generally lacking at the moment.

I don't know what they'd be, though my preference for major character images (i.e. ones with info boxes) would be that they should be 320px wide, so they fill out the info box. If you compare the Garrus page to the Mordin page, I'd argue that the Mordin info box looks significantly better, if a bit bigger, simply because the image doesn't have two large borders on each side, so that the image, name box and the info text are all aligned the same way.

Case in point:

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v637/NeoRicen/InfoBoxImageCompare.png

Aspect ratio is a different issue, but I'd argue for something more like the Mordin page with a greater width than height, as opposed to the Thane page which is the opposite and makes the info box much larger. A consistent aspect ratio would also be nice.

As for minor characters, my only preference would be that they are consistent across all pages. Though something like the Elanos Haliat and Lieutenant Girard pages would be good, though maybe a bit smaller.

Just a pet peeve of mine, but it's something to mull over.

JakePT 08:37, December 26, 2009 (UTC)

Images of Shepard note

I guess it doesn't hurt to mention it twice, but there's also an explanation of the no-images policy under Canon. Maybe this aspect needs its own section on here? It is kind of important. --Tullis 11:06, December 27, 2009 (UTC)

Oops... totally missed the note in the Canon section. I do indeed think that the no Shepard images policy needs it's own section. It is rather important, and it's one that has popped up quite a bit as an issue lately. SpartHawg948 21:31, December 27, 2009 (UTC)

Manual of style section for Squad Members?

I would like to gauge any interest in add a new style for squad members from the games. Such details like Location/Mission Found, Race, Affiliation (Alliance Military, Migrant Fleet, C-Sec), Paragon/Renegade (cause all squad members, when they are squad members, do have specific personality traits that lead towards Paragon or Renegade). Stuff like that. Since squad members are above the usually NPCs you interact with. -- (Lone Hunter 16:28, February 27, 2010 (UTC))

Proper Noun for Husks?

Is the Husks among the capitalized name? It seems some pages has it capitalized and some doesn't. Case in point is in the Husks page where all instances of "Husks" are capitalized but in some other pages (eg, N7: Abandoned Mine), it is not. Also while on this topic, perhaps the gender-neutral section in the manual should be updated to capitalize "commander", as it is indicated as a proper noun by SpartHawg948 in one of his previous edit. Teugene 09:03, March 2, 2010 (UTC)

A Vague Manuel of Style

Moved from user talk page.

Hello, I'd like to make a mention of something I noticed when viewing this Wiki and our Manuel of Style. Obviously not everyone here is British, and not everyone is American, and there are different ways to spell certain words in both countries. (i.e. realization and realisation/ civilization and civilisation) Is there any specific form of the word that we must use? As a frequent write on my own school newspaper which has very strict rules, I must make note of the fact that this seemingly minor detail can really destroy our overall consistency with spelling. Identityis 15:46, July 1, 2010 (UTC)

We have no consistency. :)>Bastian964 16:21, July 1, 2010 (UTC)

Which is why we have the policy we do now in allowing both spellings. While I wans't here when that policy was made, I still enforce it becuase both spellings are acceptable. Personally I do like the policy as I get to see differnt things. Lancer1289 16:45, July 1, 2010 (UTC)

I don't want to sound rude, but honestly, without a consistent and strict style book, then we look unprofessional. Identityis 16:51, July 1, 2010 (UTC)

Well that is a little rude from my perspective becuase if you want to standarize our spellings then you would be chaning a policy that has been here since the site was stared three years ago. You would also be penalizing anyone from either the UK or the US if went to pure US or pur UK spelling respectivly. I don't see it as unprofessionsal, I see it as this site welcoming the world, who uses British and American spelling in various parts, and saying that we won't be correcting small spelling mistakes. Remember what seems wrong to you to may seem right to someone else. Since I am assuming that you live in the US, changing policy to one type of spelling just doens't fell right to me, and I live in the US. I also study history as a hobby, for lack of a better term, and I come across many books written in British spelling. To that end I don't see armour or armor as wrong, neither with the civilization thing. Chaning a policy that has worked well just, again, doens't feel right to me. On top of that, I see us as selecting a spelling would penalize anyone one from another part of the world if we were to select UK or US spelling. Lancer1289 17:18, July 1, 2010 (UTC)

Forgive me, I didn't intend upon making you angry. However, I must still disagree with you. Even though this policy has been employed for sometime, perhaps it's time for a change. I wouldn't mind using either US or UK spelling, I live in the US, but if we made a switch to UK spelling, that's right by me because I believe that we must, in some way be consistent. In a similar way that a newspaper defines how to write out a date and time (2pm on Tuesday/ as opposed to 2:00pm on Tues.) I don't think it's unreasonable to define certain things as part of our style. While I appreciate the fact that we're opening this wikia to the whole world, I don't see that as penalizing anyone. If we want to be a professional source of information, then a strict style book will ensure that. Other Wikis like Wookiepedia (the largest wiki mind you) have very strict rules like the one's that I'm speaking of.Identityis 17:39, July 1, 2010 (UTC)

I see both sides on this. On one hand, sure, you don't want to alienate anyone. On the other, however, Identityis is correct in that a no-kidding style guide would help make the site look more professional. For my day job, I use the Associated Press style guide, which provides consistent standards on dates (as Identityis pointed out), datelines (e.g., Colorado Springs, Colo.), and spellings of certain words (al-Qaida vs., say, al-Qaeda). It's not meant to offend anyone, simply to establish a consistent way of doing things.

In the case of British vs. American spelling, I don't think one way or the other matters as much as a consistency throughout the wiki. I'd kinda lean toward British spelling, in fact, because (a) I think it's cool, and (b) Mass Effect was produced in a Commonwealth nation. PhoenixBlue 17:56, July 1, 2010 (UTC)

(edit conflict)What's the old saying, "if it ain't broke don't fix it". This policy has worked for a while and I do see no reason to change it. Also this isn't Wookiepedia, or any other wiki. Each and every wiki has the right to set rules for governing that individiaul wiki. We have contribiutors from all over the world and I see changing our policy on spelling would be a slap in the face to anyone who doesn't use the new spelling standard. Even if we changed it, we would have to dig through every article for those "mistakes" and fix them. Which IMO, is a lot of very unnecessary work. If you really want to get specific, then we should use Canadian Spelling, which is US and UK spelling thrown in a blender. Because BioWare is a Canadian company, perhaps we should use Candian spelling. To which I reply, how about we keep the current policy as it has worked and chainging it either way would result in a lot of unnecessary, tedious, and fankly annoying work. Lancer1289 18:02, July 1, 2010 (UTC)

Furthermore, even if most people wanted to choose a specific spelling, we would have an extremely hard time doing so. BioWare is Canadian but Mass Effect is written using American spellings. So we could use the language Mass Effect was written in, the one the company that makes it uses, or the original form of the language which is spoken by the country Canada used to be part of. To make matters worse Canadian English is largely a combination of American English and British English to varying degrees with some Canadianisms mixed in. This is why it is better to just keep our policy as it is. Bastian964 19:19, July 1, 2010 (UTC)

Indeed and I completly agree. After reading that comment, and thinking on it for a few minutes, ok 15, I think that is the reason we have the current policy, and why it shouldn't change. Lancer1289 19:42, July 1, 2010 (UTC)

The policy exists primarily to avoid pointless, spelling-only edits (which serve only to clog up the RC) and to avoid the inevitable revert wars which result (which also clog up the RC). Past experience here has suggested that it is better in this instance to let sleeping dogs lie. --DRY 19:58, July 1, 2010 (UTC)

I should just point out real quick in response to PhoenixBlue's comment (i.e. I'd kinda lean toward British spelling, in fact, because (a) I think it's cool, and (b) Mass Effect was produced in a Commonwealth nation.) Yes, it was produced in a Commonwealth nation. A Commonwealth nation that is much more influenced by the U.S. than the U.K. lately. For example- which side of the road do they drive on in Canada? And they do by and large use U.S., not U.K. spelling, I believe. After all, in ME and ME2, Shep wears armor, not armour. All in-game stuff is done in U.S. English, which is why the only exceptions to the U.S./U.K. both being good rule are item names and Codex entries, which explicitly use U.S. English. SpartHawg948 22:23, July 1, 2010 (UTC)

For the record, British spelling is far more usual here in Canada. Nevertheless, I would strongly prefer that we not start making wholesale changes — a foolish consistency and all that… --DRY 03:01, July 2, 2010 (UTC)

Agreed. Lancer1289 03:03, July 2, 2010 (UTC)

Oh! Take that me! Shows what I know about Canada! :P SpartHawg948 03:06, July 2, 2010 (UTC)

Move/Delete/Merge, etc vote tallying policy

At Lancer's behest, I'm moving this discussion from an obscure category talk page to here.

Basically, I'm looking for things to be laid out in plain language:

1. What is the length of a voting period once it has been brought up? Does the voting period start as soon as someone places whatever tag on the page? (Delete move, etc.) I've heard "a week" stated... but I don't remember reading that in any style guide or other place. (I could have missed it, obviously) Just as word-of-mouth from other users.
2. Once a voting period is over, how long is that decision binding for? I'll illustrate via example. If there is a vote to delete a page, and the vote fails (but is close), how long before someone can re-add the delete tag to an article and begin discussion in that direction again? I feel like this is important to have. Allowing people to continuously call votes would be extremely bothersome to the wiki. Right now there's no policy that says cut-and-dry "the decision has been made, you must wait for X amount of time before bringing up this issue again."

• I'd be in favor of a relatively short period... say a month after the vote has ended, before a new vote can be called on the same issue. Things can change quickly on a wiki, so in a month opinions could easily have swayed to one way or another.

Like I said on that talk page, I could just be blowing what I perceive to be a problem out of proportion... but it irks me that there's no document to point to and say "this is the rule right here." Thanks for reading. :) Dammej 08:06, July 6, 2010 (UTC)

Ok... well,

1. - It is a week. This isn't written in the Manuals at all, it's somewhere on a talk page or something. Basically, a week was arrived at by myself and another admin deciding a week would be appropriate.
2. . There's really no set policy as yet, so let's try this- how about a week? A week for voting, and then another week before it can come up for deletion or whatever again. Just my opinion on that last bit... SpartHawg948 08:32, July 6, 2010 (UTC)

I have no immediate objections to those time periods being the policy. But like I said, having it spelled out somewhere "official" would help immensely. Should this discussion be considered the place to go for this information? I don't intentionally want to make more work for you as an admin, I just want to be sure that there isn't a more "official" place for this information to be placed. :P Dammej 08:56, July 6, 2010 (UTC)

After looking at this for a few days, I think a few section should be in the Community Guidelines becuase the Style Guide is more for editing while this falls under guidelines. So opinions on adding a new subsection in the Editing Etiquette section in the Community Guidelines headline: Deletion, Moving, Spliting, and Moving Articles. Thoughts? Lancer1289 06:28, July 8, 2010 (UTC)

Surely you meant Deletion, Moving, Splitting, and Merging Articles? But yeah, I would agree that looks like the correct place for it. Also, the "speculation" section seems to be repeated from the MOS, so I'll just delete that... Dammej 06:36, July 8, 2010 (UTC)

(Reset indent) We also tend to work on a "cross that bridge when we get there" basis. Too many hard and fast rules simply lead to wikilawyering, which can be worse than the problem the rules were meant to solve. Leaving it discretionary has worked well so far. FWIW, the interval before action on a proposal is intended to be long enough that people who are in different time zones can reply and ideally long enough for those who don't log in every day. --DRY 19:04, July 10, 2010 (UTC)

I can respect that. :) Right now the wiki has relatively few contributors, so it's not -too- big an issue, but I could image it getting hectic as the release of Mass Effect 3 is upon us. It's tough to think about, really. On the one hand, you want to allow everyone who has an opinion to state it, and on the other hand, you want to bring issues to a close in a timely manner so that actual progress can be made. The reason I wanted rules to be explicitly stated is so that we can always say "yes, there will be progress made here." I don't want to silence anyone's opinion, but I also don't want discussion on a topic to sit in limbo for months on end because new people keep weighing in after protracted periods of time. Tricky issue, to be sure.

If there's no rule explicitly stated, then I will be glad that this discussion is "on record" as a sort of guideline. I suppose it may be the case that some issues will need more (or less) than a week to come to an agreeable resolution. But I can't think of any at the moment. Perhaps it would be best to "cross that bridge when we get there", as you said. :) Dammej 23:05, July 10, 2010 (UTC)

Real-Life info?

So yeah, removed the real-life info blurb, as there are actually quite a few instances in which real-life info is not only acceptable, but is encouraged outside of trivia sections. Something like that, inventing a new rule out of whole cloth, seems like it should be at least mentioned before being implemented, but maybe that's just me. I don't think it's needed, as it really wasn't accurate, but if there are people who think I'm wrong and that it needs to stay, let's here it so we can get it ironed out. SpartHawg948 19:08, July 18, 2010 (UTC)

Yea after taking some time to mow the lawn, I was planning on removing that bit when I got back. I guess I jumped the gun here, or catapulted seems to be more accurate. After just taking 20 mintues I found so many exceptions that I might as well have stuck my foot in my mouth and hit myself over the head, especially with the current argument on the Talk:Arcturus page. So after taking some time, what I guess was trying to do was to limit the amount of real world info, such as the recent addition to the Collector General article, and the additions to the Illusive Man article, with the (known to the fans ad TIM) thing. Hmm, that new thing had so many holes a sive would have been a drastic understatement.

So now that my "beat myself up one bulkhead and down the other" is over, how about something along the lines of no using fan fiction in articles or bringing up things that should be in articles like the Collector General edit I mentioned. Things that take the article out of the universe. Lancer1289 20:31, July 18, 2010 (UTC)

Well, the Collector General bit wasn't so much a real-world info issue as it was a 'what some fans are doing' issue. The same thing as any time people try to post crap from the BioWare forums or what have you into articles, like adding to the Illusive Man article 'known to fans as TIM', or to the Human-Reaper article that in the forums it has come to be referred to as 'Baby'. That's not an issue of real-world info being added, it's an issue of people adding sayings and such from fan forums. Honestly, I don't think we need any new rules to cover this, as it happens so rarely. Generally you can just tell people that it's not the appropriate place for it, and leave it at that. I don't think we need to draw up rules for every possible scenario, no matter how rare. And we haven't had a fanfic issue that I can remember since that (word I shouldn't say as it's an insult) User:Gormtheelder was running around making things up. SpartHawg948 20:34, July 18, 2010 (UTC)

(edit conflict)And this is why I like conversing with you. You seem to be able to reach in my head, pull out what I was trying to get at or say, from the mess that my brain is usually in. That is percisely what I was trying, and falied epicly, to get at. Becauase people keep adding stuff like that, then it gets removed, and then some complain about it, I was thinking that we should just have a general ban on that kind of stuff, this is an encyclopedia after all, not a forum. Lancer1289 20:39, July 18, 2010 (UTC)

Yea I guess that would work better, and while it does happen infrequently, it still happens enough were I though just putting something down would maybe help stem the tide a little. I was thinking along the lines of the walkthough information in articles sort of thing, which in perspective happens more frequently than this does. So I guess I need to go bash my head against a wall for a few mintues, again. Lancer1289 20:41, July 18, 2010 (UTC)

Capitilization of Paragon and Renegade

Are "paragon" and "renegade" supposed to be capitalized? I was editing a page that had them in lowercase, but I have seen other pages that have them capitalized. I didn't see anything about this in the Style Guide.

Perspective undo

Ok, so here's the full reason for the undo I just made to the edit in the "Perspective" section. It seems to me that, as the perspective section explains intro paragraphs, and as intro paragraphs are purposely written to be spoiler-free, we should emphasize that the perspective should be spoiler-free in our examples. Now, let's consider: Do we write the intro for the Systems Alliance article from a start of Revelation standpoint? By this, I mean, is it written to avoid spoilers and such from Revelation? No. Why? Because there are no spoilers (or any pertinent information, for that matter) in Revelation that would fit there. On the other hand, we explicitly write the intro to omit the biggest Alliance spoiler of all, the ending of the first game. This concept isn't even debatable, as we've applied it consistently for quite some time now. As such, I tend to think that the current wording is more suitable. Anywho, that's the reasoning behind my undo. I tend to avoid these undos, but this one seemed warranted. SpartHawg948 07:54, August 30, 2011 (UTC)

And I'm going to disagree, but I feel that I'm going to have to end up dropping this one as well despite my reservations. I believe the wording should have been changed, and in all honesty, should have been that way from the beginning. If we are going to avoid spoilers, then we should write the intros from when something is introduced. That way, we avoid the spoiler issue altogether. Now since you pointed that out, if there are no spoilers, then the other part of it applies due to the wording of the paragraph. "These paragraphs are supposed to provide a brief intro to the article and contain no plot spoilers". If there are no spoilers, and it is still accurate, as it is written without spoilers and, in the case of the Alliance article, from the perspective of Revelation, then there is little need to argue the issue. Revelation does provide information without spoiling everything and the paragraph can be written without spoiling anything, then it is still in line with the policy as it is still written from that perspective, but since there are no spoilers, there is a bit more freedom with that article. Lancer1289 12:35, August 30, 2011 (UTC)

It's in line with the policy, sure, but the way it's worded now makes it obvious exactly what it is we're trying to avoid. We've literally never had a problem with spoilers from Revelation being added to the intro, because there aren't any spoilers from Revelation that can be added there. But, as stated above, we've had quite a big problem with people adding spoilers from the first game to the intro. As such, the wording we have now seems much more appropriate. SpartHawg948 20:49, August 30, 2011 (UTC)

Type of English

In this article it states that either British or American English can be used, but also that Mass Effect is in American English. Is this true, or is it in Canadian English? Since Mass Effect was made by Bioware, a Canadian company, I would assume that it would be in Canadian English. I can't tell myself as I am unfamiliar with the specifics of Canadian English, is anybody able to give me an answer? It is my understanding that both "armour" and "armor" are acceptable in Canadian English but I really don't know (I also don't know if the writers are mostly Canadian, or what studio did most of the work on the game or anything like this). If it is in Canadian English, would it be a good idea to have that as the sites preference? Phalanx-a-pedian 19:51, February 19, 2012 (UTC)

Introductory Paragraphs

"The intro paragraphs to most of our articles are written from the perspective of when they were introduced." This is the only wiki I've ever come across with this stylistic choice. Does anyone else find it limiting? Derpherpherp 09:35, March 12, 2012 (UTC)

No because it avoids spoilers right off the back. Lancer1289 11:30, March 12, 2012 (UTC)

Isn't the point of an encyclopaedia spoilers? :p Derpherpherp 22:08, March 12, 2012 (UTC)

No because they are above a spoiler tag. There's a reason we have them, to put spoilers under so people don't get slapped with them off the back. Lancer1289 22:15, March 12, 2012 (UTC)

Which still makes this the only wiki that doesn't use the introductory paragraph as a general summary of that character with information from all available sources. Derpherpherp 22:19, March 12, 2012 (UTC)

And this is relevant how exactly? We are free to write our own policies and our own rules. We agreed this was the best way so that new readers aren't hit with massive spoilers off the back. Lancer1289 22:27, March 12, 2012 (UTC)

I just feel it affects quality, and was curious about the choice. I supposed the aversion to spoiler is also why we don't have more detailed character boxes here.Derpherpherp 22:36, March 12, 2012 (UTC)

Race Capitalization

I just replayed Priority: Eden Prime. In the coversation afterward, the word "Inusannon" is capitalized in the subtitles. See at around 11:26 here. Should we update that manual? TheUnknown285 05:45, May 3, 2012 (UTC)

The same goes for Priority: Thessia. If Javik is with you, he mentions that the Protheans built off of the Inusannon. "Inusannon" is capitalized. TheUnknown285 09:18, May 6, 2012 (UTC)

I'm leaning towards no. In the primary source we have for the inusannon, Eingana, inusannon is not capitalized. Javik may be correct, in which case it seems that inusannon would be a title as opposed to an actual race name (like Reaper, Collector and Prothean), but again... the actual in-game source, as opposed to captioning of dialogue, does not capitalize. SpartHawg948 09:39, May 6, 2012 (UTC)

I would argue that the captioning is every bit an in-game source as a Codex entry. Afterall, the captioning follows the spelling and capitalization rules for other races. We don't see any other races' names capitalized in the captions except the Inusannon, Protheans, Reapers, and Collectors. If that codex entry and the captions came from the same game, I think I would agree with you that the codex should take priority, but now it seems like the developers decided to upgrade the inusannon when developing ME3. Sorry for the very late reply, by the way. TheUnknown285 (talk) 19:02, August 5, 2012 (UTC)

Just for future reference in case someone comes across this conversation: I'm withdrawing my argument in light of the fact that the subtitles for Javik's lines are the only places it's capitalized. According to TempEditor, it's not even capitalized in the game files save for Javik's lines. TheUnknown285 (talk) 04:56, May 4, 2013 (UTC)

Bioware writers make mistakes too. :-) Cattlesquat (talk) 22:20, May 4, 2013 (UTC)

Race Name Plurals

I suggest adding a section to denote the correct race-name plurals. BioWare apparently wanted to be weird and have many race names have identical singular and plural forms. I have seen instances of people saying "krogans" or "asaris." So, how about adding a section saying that the only race names in which the plural or collective form is the singular form with an -s added to the end are humans, salarians, turians, quarians, batarians, keepers, Reapers, Collectors, Protheans, Leviathans, oravores, and husks. The other races are the same as the singular form: asari, geth, drell, elcor, volus, Inusannon, densorin, arthenn, zha, zha'til, thoi'han, vorcha, raloi, hanar and krogan. TheUnknown285 (talk) 21:26, February 26, 2013 (UTC)

Another actor Twitter

@RaphaelSbarge is the Twitter for Raphael Sbarge -- confirmed by Chris Priestly. TheUnknown285 (talk) 06:35, March 25, 2013 (UTC)

I'll add it. (Should've remembered to do so a long time ago; he does a lot of fan communication stuff.) Trandra (talk) 17:22, March 25, 2013 (UTC)

More Twitters

Writer Jo Berry - Listed in a post on the BioWare Blog.

Edmonton and Montreal studios GM Aaryn Flynn - Retweeted by Jo Berry on March 27 (sorry, don't know how to imbed it to directly show that Berry retweeted it.

Senior Level Designer Dusty Everman - Listed in a post on the BioWare Blog.

Composer Sam Hulick - Listed in a post on the BioWare Blog.

Social Media Coordinator David Hulegaard - Listed in a post on the BioWare Blog. TheUnknown285 (talk) 21:10, March 29, 2013 (UTC)

Another Twitter

Composer Jack Wall - confirmed in a tweet by fellow composer Sam Hulick. TheUnknown285 (talk) 21:32, April 7, 2013 (UTC)

Bumping to call attention to this. TheUnknown285 (talk) 23:49, May 4, 2013 (UTC)

Manual of Style and Gameplay Mechanics

I put this on LilyheartsLiara's talk page, but this is really a community issue (I made a few tweaks from my original post just to make it more community-directed):

I realize I'm extremely late to the party but are editors on the ME wiki aware just how inaccurate or incomplete significant chunks of ME3 gameplay information are? The manual of style requirement of having a ME-specific Bioware developer explicitly confirm bits of gameplay information is an *extraordinarily* high bar, especially now that Bioware has all but moved on from ME (e.g. they shut down ME3 weekend challenges). As a new player (picked up ME3 a few weeks ago) I've found that any time I read anything about a power or weapon on the ME wikia, I end up having to google it elsewhere to see how it has changed through patches or if there are undocumented issues or features not mentioned here.

The manual of style: "Here at the wiki we strive to present information about our topics as accurately as we could, citing only from the most reliable sources. This oftentimes presents problems in that while we know certain things about the franchise have occurred we still need them explicitly spelled out in order to avoid ambiguity. [emphasis mine]" This I can understand when it comes to issues of canon and lore (i.e. don't want to put wild fan conjecture in an article), but sticking the gameplay mechanics in with the same strict verifiability requirement makes the wiki itself de facto inaccurate. It's not like for my edits [which have since been mostly reverted] I was referencing random posts on BSN where some guy/gal was wildly gesticulating that they thought X ability was doing Y, I was referencing posts where people have been doing lots of in-game testing, sometimes in collusion with game data file analysis or building off explicitly-developer confirmed info.

I'd like to draw a contrast here between the ME wiki and the Fallout wiki, of which I've been a significant contributor and the very different experiences I've had in the communities. Fallout's wiki has no such strict confirmation requirement. So yes, on occasion, incorrect information filters into an article because sometimes it's based on wild anecdotal information. But because it's a wiki, eventually there are people who can verify things in-game with repeated testing and make alterations until the information on gameplay mechanics is effectively accurate, if not completely accurate in the sense that all variables are known. This, in fact, seems to be the point of building a wikia community or any wiki whatsoever: things eventually become accurate through progressive edits (hence wikipedia's stance on NPOV).

Even if the Fallout wikia may have articles that are momentarily inaccurate at times, the gradual accuracy is still better compared to the ME wiki's stance. The gameplay mechanics discussed on the ME3 parts of this wiki might match what the in-game text says, but the ME wiki itself becomes effectively inaccurate because the in-game text itself is wrong. In other words, the manual of style may be purporting to ensure reliability of in-game information, and it may work so for purposes of ME lore and canon, but I can say that the manual of style's reliability requirement is in fact turning (at least the ME3 parts of) this wiki into an unreliable source for gameplay information. Increasingly my experience is that if I'm googling for information on some ME3 gameplay mechanic, I'm starting to tune out any search results coming back from the ME wikia. By contrast, if I'm googling for information on some Fallout mechanic, results from the Fallout wikia are the first place I go. Because I actually like ME3 and I like wikia in general, I thought I could help remedy this, but the manual of style creates an impossibly high bar to fixing some of the endemic issues on this wikia.

In short - I'm a little flabbergasted that this wiki has a very un-wiki-like policy.

As for bugs, I get that it's not good policy to just let everyone mention bugs willy-nilly, but there's no provision for bugs that are confirmed on BSN? You can get way more than just three independent confirmations for something through BSN, so it seems odd having to have yet another confirmation requirement on this wiki itself, especially since many pages for ME3 seem to have very little edit/talk page traffic.

(Thelee (talk) 16:50, May 14, 2013 (UTC))

Hi Thelee - and welcome! You've stumbled across a long-time set of policies. It's definitely sometimes controversial but the first to know is that you'll find it pretty strongly enforced here. One of the main reasons is what has happened with sites for other games where the bar was set lower. That doesn't mean policy can't be changed or at least amended - we have a Policy Forum for just that; I'd suggest you read through some of the previous debates of policies that have passed and failed. And in general just spend some time here first and you will get the hang of it - many times I find the high bar does a lot of good. On the other hand I recently sponsored a minor policy amendment where something was still bothering me and it passed. Based on my sense of the community here I think you'd want to stick with small changes - e.g. possibly there's something to the idea of counting bug confirmations on BSN toward the 3 independent confirmations rule in some way, I haven't thought it through all the way but etc. You'd need to put it in a form that got majority community support which isn't impossible to do but will require some care and patience in the wording etc. Meanwhile - I saw that some of the info you put up was devconfirmed, so thank you very much: the Shield Gate / Health Gate stuff I'm especially glad to see. Cattlesquat (talk) 17:05, May 14, 2013 (UTC)

The edits you've made recently that I've removed on the basis of poor sources don't add very much "information" anyway. (One of the removed notes about Overload claimed that 60% of 60% is 16%, where the correct math is actually 36%.) But the main problem with these edits is that they are claims made by random people on the internet with no solid evidence to back them up—they are literally people just saying "it's true, I say so!" One of the threads you used as a source stated specific modifiers, with the only attempt to support the information being a claim that it was "tested in-game". How exactly would someone verify that power combos have a "x.5833333" damage modifier on Narrative difficulty based solely on in-game testing?

Wiki editors have a responsibility to ensure that the information on wikis are accurate and do not potentially mislead readers. And that means that when you want to say that something has a specific number/effect, you either have to provide evidence from the game or a reliable source. Random people on the internet are not a reliable source; anyone on the internet can say just about anything they want, whether it is accurate or not. After all, how much do you want to bet that there are plenty of other random people who have completely different figures and beliefs on how these things work? LilyheartsLiara (talk) 17:41, May 14, 2013 (UTC)

LilyheartsLiara - I would like to raise the issue that perhaps you didn't investigate the sources properly? For example, the it's not 60% * 60% = 16%, it's 40% * 40% = 16% (because it's a 60% damage reduction, not 60% of normal damage). And I feel like every source I used either references test data or has test data in the thread itself or is trivially verifiable (such as Neural Shock on Overload causing a double-shock effect). I suggest that you might be attacking the strawman of unreliable sources instead of actually considering the edits that I made. These aren't unverifiable claims, these are claims backed up by test data and very frequently grounded in either devconfirmed equations/numbers or game file data. Anyone else can verify these claims and that's kind of the whole point. The stuff that I was changing (and would like to continue changing) is stuff that is verifiable, repeatable, etc. Like a science. (Thelee (talk) 18:50, May 14, 2013 (UTC))

And when you say "Wiki editors have a responsibility to ensure that the information on wikis are accurate and do not potentially mislead readers" I think you're missing the fact that sticking just with devconfirmed or in-game information as regards to mechanics is misleading readers. (Thelee (talk) 18:54, May 14, 2013 (UTC))

One simple sentence you should think about: How do you know that when someone says that they tested something, a.) they actually did tests, b.) the tests were not flawed in any way that would impair perceived results, and c.) the tests actually provided the feedback that these people claim that they did?

And no, providing information verified by people who are actually more than just random users on a forum is not misleading anyone. LilyheartsLiara (talk) 18:57, May 14, 2013 (UTC)

Because, like a science, discussion occurs, people can comment, people can verify. Overload, for example, has had 3 distinct long threads of test runs where people have tweaked the conclusions and tweaked the information until a consensus was reached as to how it worked. Hence why in my policy proposal, simply one person posting test data isn't good enough.

And as for how using solely devconfirmed or in-game ifnormation can be misleading: for example, using Overload again as a case study (since I made many edits to that page), the in-game text used on the wiki to describe the Shield rank 6 evolution is misleading as it stands. Does it double damage to barriers (100% multiplicative)? Does it increase the multiplier from 300% to 400%? In fact, neither is wholly true. Has a dev confirmed it? Aside from the base multiplier of 3x, no. How then do we know that it does something different (doubling to 6x against shields, increasing from 3x to 5x for organics)? Just because someone said so? No, because someone said so and then provided many, many actual runs with test data, and in such a way that anyone else could verify the information (like science). And in fact, these tests and theories came about because it became trivially verifiable for anyone playing multiplayer that neither a wholesale doubling (from 3x to 6x) or additive (3x to 4x) matched in-game experience. (Thelee (talk) 19:01, May 14, 2013 (UTC))

And since by your vote it doesn't look like I'm going to convince you otherwise, I just have some rhetoricals for you. How does a wiki function? It is supposed to be an absolute purveyor of truth or is it supposed to be more evolutionary in process? How does science work—just because some with a PhD said "gravity is real?" And does it concern you at all that ME3 gameplay information on this wiki IS in fact without a doubt inaccurate at times because of an exceedingly high bar for edits? Doesn't it strike you as odd that frequently incorrect "strategies" and "tips" have no such verifiability requirements, but the data that shows such things as being wrong cant be used on this wiki? (Thelee (talk) 19:11, May 14, 2013 (UTC))

In real life, you have things that can measure things like gravity. You can watch it in action, you can measure its qualities, the rate at which things fall affected by the things themselves. In Mass Effect 3, there is no ruler which you can use to divine the exact radius of a Tech Burst. There isn't a numerical indicator of an enemy's health so precise that it allows you to calculate exact damage modifiers to power combos to five decimal places. And furthermore, the BSN threads you've used as sources don't even mention how they measured and "confirmed" these details. LilyheartsLiara (talk) 19:22, May 14, 2013 (UTC)

There's no ruler, but you can use strides and other things that do have fixed measurements. There isn't a numerical indicator, but you can assume things like a linear bar graph for shields and pixel measurement OR game data files. I'm not sure how this is different for how people started analyzing gravity or classical physics before they had the theories and equations to understand it.

As for methodology on BSN, obviously it varies. But go take a look at the console commands, you can basically set/get whatever information you want. It's even linked from the wiki: PC_Tweaks_(Mass_Effect_3), though you have to go to the actual .py file and dig around.

I mean, the general point that I've been trying to make is that your own personal refusal or indifference to verify test data does not make the data invalid. (Thelee (talk) 19:55, May 14, 2013 (UTC))

I know one thing that (at least in principal) we have tended to accept is something that any wiki user can independently verify themselves. So for example at least at the simple level it was okay pre-devconfirmation to note the existence of some kind of "shield gate" effect for Shepard in the sense that you could stand there and watch the bullets hitting you and you not taking any damage. On the other hand there has been an allergy to "data file mining" because numbers in data files have often in the past not proved to be the complete story. I can't speak for the community but I can see there might be room on the point of independently verifiable stuff when it can be shown to be independently verifiable. But the complexity of something where you'd have to run 100 tests and dig around in data files might get problematic. Cattlesquat (talk) 20:14, May 14, 2013 (UTC)

Another Twitter

https://twitter.com/CabLivingstone

Caroline Livingstone, voice actor director for BioWare. If I'm not around to make the edit when we add this Twitter, please add Brian George as the voice of Oleg Petrovsky.

https://twitter.com/Grey_Nayr/status/273248978219433984

Lksdjf (talk) 11:46, June 9, 2013 (UTC)

Here's a confirming link for Caroline Livingstone. Hope this helps. Cattlesquat (talk) 13:24, August 15, 2013 (UTC)

this source more preferred. flat-out job confirmation. T̴̴͕̲̞̳̖̼̱͒͛̎͒ͫ̃ͧeͩ̈̽̈҉͓̝̰̼̦̫̤̀͠m̫̪̪̯̻͎̫̅̇̓̇͌̚p̸̙̝̓̓͌ͨ͆ͣͥ̂̕o͒̽͐̽͏̞̬̻͕͔͕͚̰͍͠͞ṙ̢̞͚͈̹̰ͨ̓ͭ̈́̌ạ̢̧̪̹̺̺̣̹̲͂͆̏ͪͨ͒ͭř̹͈͜͠y̷͍̻̜̹̼̾̽̈́e̵̹̼̟̦͚͐̈́͌͘d͉̲̣̻͉̱͗̅ḭ̷̻̆͋̆̓̔͝t̨͍̦̫̗͂̅̍̋̆ͩ͝ộ̫̟̬̳̝̲̾ͫ̒̿ͮ̑̚rͯ̎ͨͭ̄̿̽͛҉̠̫̱̠̘̘̲́ͅ7̩̻ͤͩͨ͝͡8̜̣̙͇̻ͨ͛͛̆͒̆̽̒͐͜͡ ͥ̍̉̃̇ͥ̓ͨ͏̕҉̥̹͓̗̤̠̖̤ (talk) 13:43, August 15, 2013 (UTC)

Twitter verification for @tibermoon

Ian Frazier - previously we've heard in the gaming press that he's involved with the series, but in any event this tweet from @GambleMike should hopefully do to confirm him. He's apparently going to be our Lead Designer for Mass Effect 4 so w00t on that!

I'm new to the verification-of-new-sources business here, so somebody important please tell me how much more discussion/confirmation/etc before we can add. Cattlesquat (talk) 13:19, August 15, 2013 (UTC)

Some Twitters

Composer Jack Wall - confirmed in a tweet by fellow composer Sam Hulick.

Actresses Ali Hillis and Courtenay Taylor are both confirmed in a tweet by David Gaider (notice also that Patrick Weekes also participates in that tweet thread, so we have confirmation from two confirmed sources. TheUnknown285 (talk) 02:06, September 19, 2013 (UTC)

Developers' Twitters for ME4

Here are some more according to this post on the Bioware blog:

Chris Schlerf, Lead Writer for the next ME game.

Chris Wynn, senior development director

Fabrice Condominas, producer for the next game.

Ian Frazier, lead designer

Joel MacMillan, art director

We already have Mac Walters, but he is "creative director" for the new game. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by TheUnknown285 (talk · contr).

legit, all of them, of course, since the official blog is the source.

on a semirelated note, i'm considering spinning off the sources section into its own page since it sort of grew long enough and also to consolidate relevant questions about it on a separate talkpage. not yet a proposal, just looking for other inputs. T̴̴͕̲̞̳̖̼̱͒͛̎͒ͫ̃ͧeͩ̈̽̈҉͓̝̰̼̦̫̤̀͠m̫̪̪̯̻͎̫̅̇̓̇͌̚p̸̙̝̓̓͌ͨ͆ͣͥ̂̕o͒̽͐̽͏̞̬̻͕͔͕͚̰͍͠͞ṙ̢̞͚͈̹̰ͨ̓ͭ̈́̌ạ̢̧̪̹̺̺̣̹̲͂͆̏ͪͨ͒ͭř̹͈͜͠y̷͍̻̜̹̼̾̽̈́e̵̹̼̟̦͚͐̈́͌͘d͉̲̣̻͉̱͗̅ḭ̷̻̆͋̆̓̔͝t̨͍̦̫̗͂̅̍̋̆ͩ͝ộ̫̟̬̳̝̲̾ͫ̒̿ͮ̑̚rͯ̎ͨͭ̄̿̽͛҉̠̫̱̠̘̘̲́ͅ7̩̻ͤͩͨ͝͡8̜̣̙͇̻ͨ͛͛̆͒̆̽̒͐͜͡ ͥ̍̉̃̇ͥ̓ͨ͏̕҉̥̹͓̗̤̠̖̤ (talk) 22:50, November 27, 2014 (UTC)