User talk:Randall Brackett/List of characters from King of Fighters proposal

This is an subpage documenting an proposal regarding listing of character articles in the King of Fightes series.

Proposals from A Man In Black

Well, let's decide the structure like this. Which do you like best?

[List of major KOF characters] and [List of minor KOF characters] (or splitting this into "major," "minor/recurring," and "minor/one-off")
- This is how most smaller fandoms do it. If we don't have many minor characters, this could work.
[List of KOF characters appearing in foo saga], [List of KOF characters appearing in bar saga]... and [List of recurring KOF characters]
- This aids in keeping the characters in related stories together, but you end up with a LOT of important characters getting dumped to the recurring list. That said, since so many of the recurring characters will likely have their own articles, you can just have sectstubs with {{main}} links pointing to the comprehensive articles. This is how the Metal Gear Solid characters are arranged.
[List of KOF characters introduced in foo saga], etc.
- This is a variant of the above list. It eliminates the recurring list, but minor characters who nonetheless keep popping up (e.g. King, that one kid with the riceballs who idolizes Kyo) don't get mentioned in the later saga articles. Then again, they wouldn't get mentioned in any saga article if you use the appearing idea.
[List of KOF characters introduced in foo game], [List of KOF characters introduced in bar game], etc.
- A lot more granular, and allows for side-story (Max Impact, Dream Match) characters more easily. Then again, it means you'll have a LOT of lists, and no really good place to summarize the story of the sagas.
[List of members of foo team], [List of members of bar team], etc.
- Probably not workable, but I thought I'd toss it out there.
Something else

While I'm on the subject of KOF, how about we condense the plot summary of each saga down to articles on each saga, and remove most of the plot summary bulk from the character articles? Between all of the character articles, I think we have the story of each saga described in detail in (at least!) quadruplicate. -A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 20:15, 2 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Proposals from Zero

Make an seperate listing of characters that feature revetively new status (ie.the Ash saga), as those characters are the only ones lacking analysis or elaboration. -Zero^Talk 20:28, 2 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]
- Well, given that I don't know much about KOF past '99, why not go ahead and do that so we can get an idea about how big these lists are going to be and what is going to be necessary? There's just the two of us, so no need to stand on formality. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 20:34, 2 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I'll have to attend to it later. An anon has insisted on saturating the articles with an abundance of quotes, and I'm reverting and moving them to wikiquote. I'm also tending to business on wikipedia commons at the momment. -Zero^Talk 20:40, 2 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Here's my proposal in an more specified format- merge most of the characters articles from the Ash Crimson saga(the stubs) into one list, after looking, these articles are the only ones that lack sufficent analysis and elaboration (save for an overabundance of trivia). I've made the list here. -Zero^Talk 01:18, 3 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Wowee. First things first, we need an infobox template, one much smaller and with consistent colors. Then we need to cut the quotes and most of the trivia.

Are there any non-minor characters first introduced in the Ash saga? - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 04:34, 5 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Yes. Ash Crimson, Shen Woo, Mukai, Magaki. I've kept them out of the list, and I'll insert some other minors to the list soon. -Zero^Talk 11:04, 5 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Discussion

Infobox

I made an infobox based mostly on your table infobox, using the WP:CVG colorset and some kung fu that makes unused fields disappear (instead of using "N/A" for blank fields.)

That said, is it really such a good idea to include every single drib and drab of trivia from the official bios in the WP biographies? Is there encyclopedic value in the "fact" that Duck King likes buttered corn? I'd say we could lose everything from Blood Type to Hates The Most, inclusive.

In the meantime, I've implemented the new template in List of minor characters in the Ash Crimson Saga, as a testbed. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 06:12, 5 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

While I'm thinking of it, how about a gender field for the infobox? Not a small number of KOF characters are pretty androgynous. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 06:58, 5 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Oh yeah, I've got a scratch page for fiddling with the infobox; it's at User:A Man In Black/KOFscratch. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 06:12, 5 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I don't know why we would need an seperate box for the feamle characters in the series. Is there something in the current template that fails to involve data regarding to the females in the seires..? -Zero^Talk 11:04, 5 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

We don't need a separate infobox; I was suggesting that we could just use a little "Gender: Male/Female" field in the existing infobox, since it isn't always clear from appearance. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 00:46, 6 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I see. Yes, that might be an novel idea, but if there's any confusion, we can simply make note of it in the trivia section or it'll simply be explained in the article citations (the shion article consistantly refers to him as an he). -Zero^Talk 02:01, 6 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Moved from User talk:A Man In Black/KOFscratch

Cerainly not. Its missing an great deal of many information subsections. Whilst data such as favorite food and the like are not very important, they must be included for completeness. On the offical site, the current template included all of these fields, and we must do so as well. The point of an encyclopedia is to include as much information as possible.

I detist cruft as well, but I disagree with stripping this information out in these respective formats. The individual articles are not cruft. Absolutley not. They are simply the product of "self-proclaimed fans and editors" not putting forth effort. I have been overhalling these articles almost religiously, and I have had almost no assistance. Cruft is unnecessay information and over analysis. This is an episode of one editor trying to do the work all by himself [1]. -Zero^Talk 19:35, 5 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

No information has been lost in my implementation of the infobox. It just automatically hides empty fields (so, infoboxes for characters like Adel don't take up a ton of space to say nothing at all). I think we should remove a lot of the inane fields, but for the time being I've only had it automatically remove the empty fields.

Just so there's no misunderstanding, no information is lost whatsoever. Take a look at this diff between this version and this version. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 00:46, 6 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Nevermind, my mistake. I'd neglected to see your code, so I assumed it was evicerated information. My apologies. Still, I do hope people stop making blank articles [2], amd then making me do all the work [3]. This has happened on an great deal of many articles and it needs to stop. -Zero^Talk 02:01, 6 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Random cleanup stuff

Links to Orochi need to be pointed instead to Orochi (King of Fighters). - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 06:52, 5 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]
All references to games should be italicized (and probably wikilinked). - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 06:55, 5 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I believe I've cleaned up most of the Orochi links. I'll insert references soon. -Zero^Talk 11:04, 5 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Proposals by Loona

Why not at least split things properly, by origin? There could be an article for minor Fatal Fury characters where the likes of Duck King would be much better off along, with a few others from the same series whether they're represented in KoF or not (the likes of Tung Fu Rue or Raiden/Big Bear come to mind, as does Gato, who being originally from Garou:MotW, is technically a Fatal Fury character as well) - characters will little plot and development could get some minor info in an article that might not support them by themselves. Then something similar could be done for Art of Fighting, also very represented in KoF. With that you'd shave off plenty of characters from a KoF character list.

From memory, Fatal Fury series characters with minor roles in KoF: Li Xiangfei, Duck King, Tizoc/Griffon Mask, B. Jenet; then there's the likes of Yamazaki, Blue Mary and Billy Kane, popular enough in Garou that a plot was made for them in KoF97 thanks to a poll that got them selected to be in that game - and they've been in quite a few since then, even if their roles are considerably smaller than in their game of origin. Gato seemed to involve some similar plot push to them in 2003, but no poll was involved that I know of - his story, like that of most Garou characters, is a bit underdeveloped when compared to others. And I almost forgot Krauser's appearance for the 96 boss team... Every other FF character I can think of is too much of a series staple (like Terry, Mai, Kim, Joe) or major SNK universe figure to be tossed into such a list - namely Geese Howard.

I figure most of the AoF ones that made it to KoF have enough of a plot of their own to keep their own articles: Ryo, Robert, Takuma, Yuri, King, Kasumi Todo, Eiji Kisaragi and Mr Big, if I'm not missing anyone The Kyokugenryuu Karate article looks rather fishy though - I would have it deleted like I did with the Magatama (martial art) one, but there's stuff that I'm just not declaring fancruft for lack of any official sources claiming the conrary...

Beyond that, the only characters that are realy series-specific are the 3D Maximum Impact ones - there are at least 3 "dream match" KoFs featuring characters (presumed) dead in their respective sagas, which appeared after those sagas are over, so that doesn't seem like a very reasonable way to devide them IMO... And there are always popular ones that tend to stick around even after their plot relevance has pretty much died... then there are cases like Kensou (he's the kid with the riceballs, but the one who idolizes Kyo is Shingo - there are similarities in their personality types - Kensou's thing is for Athena - , but they're quite different in just about everything else) which, despite appearing to lack plot relevance in most games, seem to be slowly building up some major importance for future events (see the Athena team endings since 99 for a glimpse of that particular case).

If you want to cover plot points in one place, do it in articles about the actual games where those plot points were introduced. Loona 01:36, 8 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I'm pleased to confirm that Loona is incorrect in what's being attempted here. The point of a list is simply to merge characters that have small info that don't specifically warrent an full article at the momment. After going through the articles, I only found an few characters worthy of an list merge: the new characters of the Ash Crimson saga. Fatal Fury and Art of Fighting absolutely do not determine what is kept and what is not moved on these lists. It's merely an attempt to consolidate the consensus and format to an list that evicerates stub articles. To attempt to pass off an article about Duck King in an seperate and dead series is a travesty. -Zero^Talk 04:54, 8 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Template (copied from User talk:Megaman Zero)

Please stop using this template immediately! There are a number of problems with it, a number of which I have listed on my talk page. Even were the appearance of this template not a problem, the syntax and implementation have major problems. Please stop implementing it. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 05:10, 28 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]

No worries. I saw your reply on your userpage and began to place your qualms into effect immediately. I'll just finish up, and get things rolling again as soon as possible. -Zero^Talk 05:14, 28 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I still don't understand what you want to do that {{Kofinfobox}} doesn't do. Right now, you're essentially duplicating my work from a month ago. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 05:22, 28 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Its not the usability. Its the pretense of the creation of a template without a proper inquiry concerning the original one. We also have the second images (which I do believe some to be unnecessary) but its much too late in the game to engage in mass deletions and the second design neglects a syntax necessary for such an inclusion. As for the situation of Benimaru, yes, the template screwed up whilst I fiddled with it which was very odd. In general I think the difference of such templates constitutes an suitable use for the sake of differing subject areas and sub-areas, particularly of the Template namespace. If you strongly disaprove of my template design, don't complain. Please assist me in the construction so we can get things up and running. -Zero^Talk 05:31, 28 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]

They're decorative fair-use images. They're fair game to be removed at any time. Hell, be bold and get rid of any images that aren't helping anything.

You want my assistance. To do his, I need your instruction. What do you want to do that {{Kofinfobox}} doesn't do? If if the answer is "Nothing," then why on Earth are we not using that template? - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 06:03, 28 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]

From memory, I think I recall User:Jonny2x4 uploading a great deal of unnecessary images such as for Angel (King of Fighters). In most cases where took command (and being I created most of these articles that is the case) the practice was using images that depicted something drastically different concerning the character in the lower field. It was only after this some users misintepreted the reasoning for a additonal image and proceeded to festoon the articles like some sort of damnable gallery.

However there is no steadfast rule about this, it's just a rule of thumb that I attempt to use different templates in various situations in line with the source subject. Your statement is on the talk page and is certainly respectable, and had the template lifted from the CVG, I would be more accepting, but its much too commonplace now. I see not the problem with simply using a different design that's currently in use. -Zero^Talk 06:14, 28 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Is there any reason not to use the standard infobox style, since you don't really want any new features? I don't really see the precedent made by substing a handmade table as overriding the longstanding infobox style guidelines. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 06:19, 28 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Seems good. -Zero^Talk 06:21, 28 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Well, if you want to get started implementing, Duck King has an example. I still need to do some minor maintenence stuff before I go and start implementing it myself. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 06:28, 28 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Yikes. Again, please don't use Template:King of Fighters Character statistics. It doesn't use proper parameters, and it isn't in standard style. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 06:54, 28 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]

{{King of Fighters Character statistics}} uses non-standard style. It doesn't use proper parameters (making rearranging the fields a nightmarish task). You aren't using linebreaks when you implement it. It has an unnecessarily long title, with unneeded caps.

And, above all else, {{Kofinfobox}} doesn't have any of these problems, and you haven't yet told me any reasons it has, other than the fact that it doesn't share the problems of the godawful substed templates that already existed.

Why are we not using {{Kofinfobox}}? - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 06:58, 28 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, I'm aware its somewhat outlandish, as it's a bit exclusive. Fortunately it's of no consequence to the running of Wikipedia. The infobox guidelines does not require we dictate the use of standard syntaxes.-Zero^Talk 07:01, 28 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Why are we not using {{Kofinfobox}}? There are all sorts of usage problems with {{King of Fighters Character statistics}}. {{Kofinfobox}} has none of these usage problems. I could fix them, but it would involve copying and pasting the syntax of {{Kofinfobox}} into {{King of Fighters Character statistics}}. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 07:05, 28 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]

We've already discussed this. The latter template neglects the inclusion of a second image field and its wordly design is far from what I intented.

Why not do the copy and paste as suggested...? We utilize the latter for list format (consise and compact) and the origianal for full-flegded articles. I think that would be lovely. Surely we can agree on this.-Zero^Talk 07:10, 28 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Please refer to the templates by name. I have no idea what "the latter" and "the original" are. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 07:22, 28 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Let's not do two images. They're already too large, and the second image is usually nothing more than decoration. If two images are needed, the other image can go into the body of the article. (If the body of the article isn't large enough for two images, the articles doesn't need two images anyway!) - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 07:22, 28 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]

What the heck does "wordly design" mean? What's wrong with the standard infobox styling?- A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 07:22, 28 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Why not do the copy and paste as suggested...?

Because I was being facetious. I made a template that solves all of my problems with the old substed awful template, and it's {{Kofinfobox}}. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 07:28, 28 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I really think you need to calm down about this. I have no strong feelings about the suitability of your argument, but it does seem like you're no longer discussing the article. This yelling that you're engaged in seems to me like an unproductive way of making a comprimise. When are you going to discuss why and how the first template harms wikipedia? Why bother having the varible means of a wiki if you insist on people conforming to one format because of trivial disputes? -Zero^Talk 08:53, 28 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]

The first template is built upon hiddenStructure (see Wikipedia:Don't use hiddenStructure). That's how it harms wikipedia. The proposed solution is hardly better, though, for it makes use of hiddenStructure, too. See Template:Infobox Arcade Game for a template that works exactly the way a KOF character template would have to work, only that it does not make use of hiddenStructure. --elias.hc 11:21, 28 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Arduous task

Update

It doesn't use proper parameters, and it isn't in standard style.

And that's precisely what I've done. A perfectly good template saved by spending a few minutes just changing the primary syntax. Why did I not do that in the first place?

Black, when you state that actions that I have taken have no conceivable reason, please consider that we vary in our viewpoints of relevant content for wikipedia, and some of us posess far different viewpoints on content than others.

There's still a few fields to fiddle, which is to be expected becasue of its complexity. For this, I'll continue and inquire for more assistance.-Zero^Talk 13:00, 28 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Success! I've completed it. See here. I'm so happy with the results. -Zero^Talk 14:20, 28 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I did ask nicely for you to not implement the template until I had a chance to look at it. I still need to do a lot of work on it, and it's going to break in EVERY SINGLE ARTICLE IT APPEARS IN.

I'm gonna use #if and standard infobox appearance. You'll also see a lot of fields disappear; the info isn't gone, but, because you perpetuated the caps problems in the parameters (one of the reasons I asked you not to use the template until I had a chance to look at it).

If you want to fix the appearance, replace all the capital letters in the parameters with lowercase ones (so "Birthplace" becomes "birthplace" and "Fighting Style" becomes "fighting style"), remove the color1 and color2 parameters, and move the image from the image2 parameter into the body of the article. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 00:19, 29 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Well, I've done most of the fixing, and merged the two templates into Template:King of Fighters character statistics. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 03:41, 29 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Oh I see now. Those are very special cases. What happened was the introduction of a substantial amount of hiddenstructure, which wasn't properly dealt with at the time. Recently I presumed that the only problem we had was that mty design didn't have a simplistic nature of conveyance for the editor. Since the introduction of the repalcement material, I see you have taken to using the CVG design, which as a sub-cateogry of articles seperate I precieve as unnecessary. I'm reverting to the immediate prior version while trying to implement my design. -Zero^Talk 04:06, 29 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]

The problem with your design is that it doesn't use the standard infobox styling. I took your design, stole the design headers from the old Kofinfobox, added the #if functions to get results like hiddenStructure without the compatibility problems, did some superficial fiddling, fixed the parameter names, and moved the whole deal to the new name.

You wanted me to fix {{King of Fighters Character statistics}}. I did. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 04:10, 29 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Nothing ever came of it. Your view of "fixing" was a little broken at the time, I think, and no comprimise came forward to address our case, which was at any rate not particularly serious at the time. I was just trying to work out what syntax was neater and how to view things. I've gained more experience since then and seen more of the pattern of #if working.

If this is your good-faith attempt to assist, then please cease. Your decision to nullify the previous design and essentially work on the newer template without retaining the syntaxes and design whatsoever is extremly greedy. This is an extraordinarily hostile way to act. Please stop. Its simply inexcusable to see one who claims to be offering assistance confroming himself in this way. If you cannot resign yourself to the basis of retaining the original design (And you know what I'm refering to) then I shall simply revert to my last version. I asked for your help. You replied (rather unfriendly) that you weren't and mocked me and the messiness of the design. That's your entitlement, but your action here, conducted numerous times over a short timeframe, and (I now realise) deliberately, was needlessly unconstructive.-Zero^Talk 04:40, 29 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I originally asked you to stop and discuss with me your issues with Kofinfobox because I saw that you were duplicating my original work needlessly, and, from inexperience, clumsily. I've gotten frustrated when (on two occasions) you've gone ahead with ill-concieved designs despite the fact that I asked you not to, because I knew that implementing a poorly-designed infobox would only cause more work later. (In fact, I just had to do all of that cleanup work, because of the mis-named parameters.)

I consciously eliminated the previous substed template, as it didn't use standard styling, either standard infobox styling or even consistent styling from article to article. (Additionally, it was full of typos, had a second - usually huge - image for no reason I can figure out, and wasn't consistently implemented even when the colors are set aside.) I'm willing to debate it on its merits, but I will revert changes to {{King of Fighters character statistics}} (like superficial parameter renames) that break the template in articlespace.

I've made my arguments for each change I reverted on the talk page of the template itself. I split them into headers so that each conversation could be threaded separately. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 04:51, 29 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]

How, dear Black, is my work a duplication of yours when your design is based upon my original in the first place? The redundancy of this boggles the mind!

As you're well aware, I'm contributing to the conversation at the current timeframe. -Zero^Talk 05:44, 29 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]