Wikipedia talk:WikiProject A Song of Ice and Fire

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Looking forward

So obviously this Project has not been particularly active of late, no doubt due to the fact that the last novel (A Feast for Crows) was published in 2005. But the HBO TV series is now underway and with any luck we'll see A Dance with Dragons this year, so hopefully we'll get some renewed interest and participation. With that in mind I thought I'd list some general improvements that the ASOIAF articles seem to need, based on my initial cursory assessment. I'm a longtime editor but a new fan of the series, and have just begun working on some of the articles within this Project's scope; if you're watching any, no doubt you've seen me.

Media articles

The A Song of Ice and Fire article and individual book articles themselves are decent in structure and content, but looking forward we should address a few things in the following areas if we want their quality assessments to improve:

1. Citations - These articles are greatly lacking in references, both asserting notability and simply supporting existing content. A Dance with Dragons has a fair amount of references stemming largely from the anticipation for the novel, the delays, and Martin's willingness to talk about it. I would remind everyone, however, that per WP:ELNO blogs and forums are not acceptable sources. Obviously Martin's own blog is unlikely to be challenged, but sites like Westeros.org which sum up and archive other coverage are technically fansites and technically unreliable. I don't think we need to shun those sites, but obviously it is better to find as many reliable sources as possible (magazine articles, press releases, Publisher's Weekly reviews, etc.) to avoid problems later. The TV series will likely help us in this regard, because articles about it in entertainment publications and on reliable websites will no doubt reference the novels in some ways. If you come across any great sources but don't have the time, desire, or know-how to implement them, add them to the article under Refs or External links so that someone else can use them later.

1. Plot - Though obviously the novels are very complex, the plot sections may need some cleanup and streamlining to avoid the appearance of violating policy, in particular the one in A Storm of Swords, which seems excessively long.

1. Reception - More information related to reception and criticism is needed; some articles already have external links whose content just needs to be addressed in them.

Characters and locations

As with any fictional topic articles, much needs to be done to make sure that ours do not violate or appear to violate WP:NOTE or WP:PLOT. With the huge number of characters and plotlines the series involves, it is very easy for our articles and lists to appear as excessive plot-only description of fictional works.

1. Citations - There are a very limited number of references in the House and location articles and lists, which has obviously led to some being merged and/or deleted. In particular, the lead paragraph needs to really assert notability for the topic, backed up by references. As I get into the book articles and begin reading what sources we do have, we may be able to come up with a standard chunk of sourced information that can be customized and applied across several family articles.

1. Links - Per WP:NOTBROKEN, it is preferred to use redirects rather than pipe links directly; this enables the "What links here" function and helps with future article expansion and moves. So, we should be using [[Cersei Lannister]] or [[Cersei Lannister|Cersei]] rather than [[House Lannister#Cersei|Cersei Lannister]]. To facilitate this, I've updated or created redirects for most characters (see Category:A Song of Ice and Fire character redirects to lists) and have begun updating links as I edit articles. The same goes for locations, terms, and other elements like Braavos and The Seven (A Song of Ice and Fire); existing non-character redirects such as these are listed in italics in Category:A Song of Ice and Fire, and I'm creating them as I come across the need. My experience in TV articles tells me that once the series premieres, there will be an increased push to create individual character articles for some of the most notable; we should consider that with care, but at least if these articles do get created, the proper links will already be in place to guide readers to them.

1. Plot - The organization of characters into "House" pages was a great idea; the plot summaries don't seem excessive in most cases, though there's always room for streamlining and trimming, and cleanup of the "He's good at jousting" type of nonsense. As obsessive as we may be about Martin's luscious detail and intricacies, we have to avoid the appearance of trivia/cruft.

1. Real-world context - The articles obviously need to avoid an in-universe perspective, but of course this is made more difficult by the general lack of external coverage/sources on the specifics of the fictional universe. Bolstering the lead paragraphs with appropriate citations is a necessary step in the right direction. But within sections, we should note the specific novels and their publication dates as related to the fictional events we describe. For a quick example, check out Arys Oakheart; his short entry now covers all of his plot from the entire series in chronological order, and I've noted in which novels each of these groups of events occur. This reminds the reader that this is fiction and establishes the necessary context. Citing primary sources (the novels) as footnotes may be an option in some articles or in specific instances (as is done in many cases across WP), but having this info clearly spelled out in the text really dispels the appearance of in-universe.

1. Tense - Per WP:TENSE, plot summary should be written in present tense (as I believe it is in the book articles). Much of the character/location stuff is currently in past tense or inconsistent.

Thanks, and I look forward to seeing the improvements to come.— TAnthony^Talk 00:07, 4 March 2010 (UTC)

proposing merge of all ASOIAF location articles

In case somebody is still busy with the project, I have proposed a mass merge of all location articles remaining. Yoenit (talk) 12:32, 10 August 2010 (UTC)

The discussion is here.— TAnthony^Talk 00:14, 14 August 2010 (UTC)

Moving fancruft information

I can understand why for wikipedia a lot of information is considered fancruft. But for a wiki dedicated for the books it is perfect. So if there are people who would like to contribute or move to information great. And also we have something to offer to wikipedia:sources. A growing number of our articles are sourced. So for the wikipedians feel free to use the sources of our wiki. Scafloc (talk) 12:13, 27 August 2010 (UTC)

Blind Guardian songs about the novels

Hi everybody, The power metal band Blind Guardian have written a couple of songs about the novels. I think that it would be nice to include them in the article. I had written a new section about it, but it was deleted claiming it was not "a part of the novels". What do you think? Should we at least add a sentence about this? I think it is definitely worth it.

You can see more details about the songs here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/At_the_Edge_of_Time#Song_Information The songs are "War of the Thrones" and "A Voice in the Dark".

Cheers, Trelos physikos (talk) 17:22, 1 September 2010 (UTC)

I commented on this here, thanks.— TAnthony^Talk 22:19, 1 September 2010 (UTC)

Pronunciation of character names

HBO has released a pronunciation guide for the characters; I would like to contribute an IPA transcription of said list and publish that on the character list page (of course marked as "pronunciation according to HBO"). DonSqueak (talk) 01:51, 28 February 2011 (UTC)

A new assessment

Can have another look at the articles and discuss the changes in the last two years?

I must say that I am appalled by articles like Major houses in A Song of Ice and Fire, [[]Characters in A Song of Ice and Fire] and World of A Song of Ice and Fire. It is just one long list without any sensible structure or references. Compare this to the old House Targaryen article. I though it was a good article. It had a good structure and was easy to read. Maybe it had a bit too much detail (the historical Targaryen section was too long) but is the merge really an improvement? Also I noticed that there are less contributions. People liked to contribute to the old articles though they were sometime a bit too much Crufty. There must be a way between Fancruft and merging-all-things-in-one-article! Looking for your suggestions! Scafloc (talk) 21:11, 16 March 2011 (UTC)

Game of Thrones (season 1)

I am continuing my efforts to get the first season of the TV show to a good topic. 7 of 10 articles are now GA, and I'll be continuing to work on this in the run up to S2's premiere. Any help is welcome... Jclemens (talk) 23:37, 15 January 2012 (UTC)

Hi, I'm a big fan of the series (read the novels and saw season 1 of the HBO show) and I just joined the project. I'm hoping to help out with stuff just like that and clean a few things up a bit. Cheers, Magister Scienta^talk 20:28, 20 January 2012 (UTC)

Working on A Song of Ice and Fire

Hi. After a long semi-wikibreak, it's itching me to develop a fiction article to GA status again. I am crazy about ASOIAF at the moment, so I've chosen the A Song of Ice and Fire article for a major expansion and rewrite. I have already started collecting sources in my userspace (User:Sgeureka/ASOIAF) and work on a new article structure. I'll continue working on the article offline for the next two weeks (I'll be on vacation) and start inserting my work into the real wiki article after that. Just FYI to prevent two people working on the same article without knowing it. :-) – sgeureka ^t•c 20:17, 21 January 2012 (UTC)

Wow! That's sounds amazing. I'm new to the project (do you like the tabs and border?) and would love to help out with that. Magister Scienta^talk 20:51, 21 January 2012 (UTC)

Amidst everything else I'm working on, about all I can commit to doing is racing you to get GoT S1 to GT before you do. :-) Cheers, Jclemens (talk) 23:13, 21 January 2012 (UTC)

How do you guys feel about the project's new layout and style? Magister Scienta^talk 00:20, 22 January 2012 (UTC)

It looks fine to me, but I'm not too big into design and decoration--using infoboxes and making userboxen is about as complicated as I get. Jclemens (talk) 01:47, 22 January 2012 (UTC)

Good to hear. Magister Scienta^talk 02:23, 22 January 2012 (UTC)

I have begun synchronizing my userspace (User:Sgeureka/ASOIAF) with A Song of Ice and Fire by expanding the Publication history section. The other sections will follow one by one over the next 1-4 weeks (I have the information ready, I just haven't prose-ified it sufficiently). I didn't want to have trouble later on with synchronizing the references, so have dumped them all into the References section, outcommenting those not needed at the moment. So, what's left to do for now? Copyediting for prose and redundance, moving not-so-relevant info into the subarticles, and sourcing the few {{fact}}s (mostly publication dates) for which I couldn't find good sources quickly. If someone wants to help with those points, be my guests, but it is in no way required. I'll do all of this eventually, but I might prefer working in userspace for a while, I don't know. – sgeureka ^t•c 13:57, 3 February 2012 (UTC)

Meta-article restructuring

New article proposal: Themes in A Song of Ice and Fire; merge proposal: World of A Song of Ice and Fire (pending)

The A Song of Ice and Fire article is currently about 59kB of readable prose per the User:Dr_pda/prosesize.js tool, and it will continue to grow as I add/expand the last four sizable subsections. However, per WP:SIZERULE, an article >60 KB should "Probably should be divided (although the scope of a topic can sometimes justify the added reading time)". I've been thinking about ways to reduce the article size down the road, like moving out material to the individual book articles or start a new article altogether. What I think as the best way to go is spinout the themes section (A Song of Ice and Fire#Themes) that already starts overwhelming the article without being finished, and hence start a Themes in A Song of Ice and Fire article.

Having previously worked on such articles ( Mythology of Carnivàle), I noticed that there is some overlap with World of A Song of Ice and Fire, particularly regarding "Religion" and "Biology" (i.e. magical beings). "Background" could be spiced up with the last paragraph of A Song of Ice and Fire#Narrative structure. On the other hand, all the geography info could and IMO should be merged with the Houses information in the character articles (too in-universe-y as a stand-alone section). I therefore propose to get rid of World and start Themes, i..e one article less with WP:MOSFICT issues, and a new article on a very good way to GA status.

I won't start spinning out material for a while (I want to finish A Song of Ice and Fire first and then look into reducing its size), but what do people think about a new Themes article with World being merged in? – sgeureka ^t•c 08:22, 14 February 2012 (UTC)

Update: Yes, I'll spin out the ASOIAF Themes section as Themes in A Song of Ice and Fire as soon as I've settled the {{close paraphrasing}} issues. This might take one or two weeks though. I'll only add the {{Merge}} for World of A Song of Ice and Fire afterwards. – sgeureka ^t•c 10:57, 28 February 2012 (UTC)

If themes and world will both eventually be appropriately sized, why not work on both of them at once? World is just going to grow as the HBO series gives RS'es more and more reason to write about the locations. Jclemens (talk) 15:46, 14 February 2012 (UTC)

I've been thinking long and hard on this, but I've come to the conclusion that there is only like one sentence each à la "King's Landing was filmed in Malta and Croatia."^[ref] Anything more would better fit into the main TV article like Game of Thrones (TV series)#Production design or Game of Thrones (TV series)#Filming or whatever. The main thing that I want to learn here is whether I can give the merger a try without getting reverted immediately. If I come to realize that a merger hurts more than improving the ASOIAF coverage, I'll of course revert that merger attempt. – sgeureka ^t•c 10:57, 28 February 2012 (UTC)

New article proposal: A Song of Ice and Fire fandom / Game of Thrones fandom

Similar to Tolkien fandom and Harry Potter fandom, I think an ASOIAF fandom article would make sense. The A_Song_of_Ice_and_Fire#Fandom section currently isn't that large to warrant a spinout, but it used to be longer before I trimmed it, and I have more material in my userspace. Now, the question is:

1. Whether to create a separate article at all? (I think yes, to cover more aspects that the main ASOIAF article simply cannot bear to size/weight issues.)
2. What name it shall have? "ASOIAF fandom" is more encompassing, but the TV show may actually increase the fandom size beyond anything the novels may have achieved (I may be wrong about the latter). I'd prefer "ASOIAF fandom".

– sgeureka ^t•c 10:57, 28 February 2012 (UTC)

Merge/redirection proposal: The Winds of Winter

I've been looking for reliable TWOW sources left and right, but all I could find is presently at A_Song_of_Ice_and_Fire#Planned_novels_and_future. There is a major overlap with the The Winds of Winter article except

• the TWOW article has some unsourced info about the Arianne sample chapter (no reliable sources found)
• the ASOIAF#Planned_novels section has some extra info about what GRRM has been doing between the publication of ADWD and January 2012

Since hardly any new useable info of substance will emerge for the next 1-2 years (I think), I propose to redirect the TWOW article to the ASOIAF#Planned_novels section in the meantime. – sgeureka ^t•c 10:57, 28 February 2012 (UTC)

The paperback of A Dance with Dragons with the sample chapter will be released in March. Then we will probably have the chapter.--Oneiros (talk) 18:42, 28 February 2012 (UTC)

Yes, and at that point, the current sentence Martin promised to release a second chapter in the back of the A Dance with Dragons paper-back edition,[47] released in March 2012.[8] will simply be updated to Martin released a second sample chapter covering character XXX in the back of the A Dance with Dragons paper-back edition, released in March 2012.[8] If the new sample chapter is in fact Arianne's (which I assume), the Arianne sentence in the TWOW article being unsourced becomes moot. – sgeureka ^t•c 19:35, 28 February 2012 (UTC)

Even with the sample chapter coming with the paperback, I still don't think there is much yet (especially with the WP:RS threshold. I agree with Sgeureka's suggestion for the redirect. As more comes out it can get its own article again in the future.Caidh (talk) 20:38, 28 February 2012 (UTC)

I don't think so. I know when I was waiting for Inheritance, I kept a bookmark on all the news pages and constantly checked to see if something had been updated; it would have been annoying to find everytime, and harder to tell if anything had been updated if they had merged it with the Inheritance Cycle page. The same with Brisingr. Besides, more will be added to this page, and it will simply have to be moved back again. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 199.216.211.64 (talk) 18:47, 16 March 2012 (UTC)

Initial inquiry: Fate of the three character lists

So there is Major houses in A Song of Ice and Fire (136kB), Characters in A Song of Ice and Fire (63kB) and List of characters in Game of Thrones (62kB, but mainly redundant with the other two lists). All three lists are large, and I can live with that division. Despite the redundancy, I'd leave the TV character list a stand-alone for now until the fate of the two book character lists has been reconsidered as proposed below.

So I wonder whether there are more appropriate ways to arrange the book characters. The books structure the characters into affiliations, not necessarily House descendants. I've also had good experiences with sorting characters by affiliations/associations with my Characters of Carnivàle. Particularly when combining the World info with the character lists, affiliations would make very much sense. With a good trim per WP:WAF, the two book LoCs might even fit into one list (no guarantees though), or might be divided into Westeros/Essos for the distinctly separate storylines. Opinions? (The changes would largely affect Characters in A Song of Ice and Fire, not the Houses LoC.) – sgeureka ^t•c 10:57, 28 February 2012 (UTC)