Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Dungeons & Dragons/Archive 31

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Editor wants to remove list of notable D&D players

An editor initiated a discussion regarding eliminating the list of notable people who have played D&D. If you have an interest, see: Talk:Dungeons & Dragons in popular culture#Players. Regards, RJH (talk) 15:04, 12 October 2011 (UTC)

Need book cover images

Hi there.  :)

As I've been going through all the magazine reviews, and books like "Heroic Worlds", I've noticed that we have quite a few articles about D&D books that don't have cover images - most do, but many do not. I have found over a hundred here, and I am not an image guy, but if you can find an image to upload for any of these that would be great. I did not check any that were not part of my current source finding mission, so there are probably some other articles about D&D books that I didn't list here, but I figure this is more than good enough for a start. I know there are a lot here, but just pick a few and then come back later for more if you feel like it! Any help you can give is great - thanks!  :) BOZ (talk) 06:05, 3 January 2011 (UTC)

Struck through the ones I saw easy to lay hands on. I'll look around. I have a really cherry Monstrous Compendium, but the platen on my scanner isn't large enough. Have to photograph it. BusterD (talk) 00:17, 13 February 2011 (UTC)
More books from the 2nd edition era

Done with these for now, but of course I may add more later. :) BOZ (talk) 18:36, 3 July 2011 (UTC)

Later editions

While I prefer to keep the focus on the primary section above because those are the ones for which I know independent sources exist, I know that there are other articles on D&D books floating around out there. Far be it from me to tell anyone not to work on those. :) BOZ (talk) 16:07, 25 January 2011 (UTC)

3rd edition

Monster Compendium: Monsters of Faerûn, Magic of Faerûn, Races of Faerûn, Complete Arcane, Complete Adventurer, Lost Empires of Faerûn, Explorer's Handbook, Magic of Incarnum, Complete Psionic, Fantastic Locations: Dragondown Grotto, Tome of Battle: The Book of Nine Swords, Complete Mage, Complete Scoundrel, Dungeonscape, Magic Item Compendium, Expedition to the Demonweb Pits, Complete Champion, Elder Evils, Tome of Magic (3rd edition cover)

Since these would all be fair use images, they can just be grabbed from the web. I can explain how if anyone is interested. Basically, create a good boiler plate raitionaly, grab suitably sized images from a google image search, and go. - Peregrine Fisher (talk) 03:22, 25 October 2011 (UTC)

RPG related AfD

Hi folks, I know a number of you have access to paper copies of magazines and the like. I'm suspecting that this topic, while not D&D, has a fair number of reliable reviews for at least a few of the game (all White Wolf titles I think). Any help would be welcome. Hobit (talk) 01:13, 25 October 2011 (UTC)

Merging Dragonlance characters

See discussion here. The articles in question are Steel Brightblade, Sturm Brightblade, Dalamar, Flint Fireforge, Tanis Half-Elven, Heroes of the Lance, Laurana Kanan, Palin Majere, Riverwind, Kitiara uth Matar and Tika Waylan. 129.33.19.254 (talk) 16:41, 5 November 2011 (UTC)

Image dispute

Recently, SudoGhost started an edit war with me at Lich (Dungeons & Dragons), removing the image from the article on the grounds that it violated copyright. I attempted to explain to SudoGhost that the same issue potentially affected a large number of other images at similar articles, but he has bizarrely asserted that this is "not important." See here. For my part, I think that potential copyright violations at other articles are indeed important, and I find SudoGhost's single minded emphasis on one article and refusal to consider the larger issue at stake to be inappropriate and disruptive. Comments from members of this project on the issues involved - both behavioral and the copyright issue - would be welcome. Polisher of Cobwebs (talk) 23:41, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

The factual inaccuracies of who "began" to edit war aside, any editors are more than welcome to visit the article's talk page and discuss the image in regards to NFCC. Thank you. - SudoGhost 00:03, 11 November 2011 (UTC)
I've chimed in on the talk page. J Milburn (talk) 00:10, 11 November 2011 (UTC)
I've resolved never to have anything to do with Dungeons & Dragons articles in future, and I mean it. Polisher of Cobwebs (talk) 04:16, 11 November 2011 (UTC)
May your journeys bring you wisdom. Regards, RJH (talk) 16:18, 11 November 2011 (UTC)

Hey I was wondering

Could someone who's more familiar with dungeons and dragons put the most notable examples of fictional cities here for me? I really don't know anything about it, but I'd like the list to be as complete as possible (and feel free to rename the section, if you think it should be renamed). Also I wasn't sure if I should have tagged the List of fictional towns and villages article with WikiProject Dungeons & Dragons. Ncboy2010 (talk) 16:17, 10 December 2011 (UTC)

5th edition D&D announced

Per Wired, WotC has just announced that 5th edition D&D is in development. Glad I got off feeding that gravy train. Wired also noted that the Pathfinder RPG has been the number one selling RPG for the past six months. Regards, RJH (talk) 21:54, 9 January 2012 (UTC)

Yeah, I heard about that earlier today! Ethan Gilsdorf posted on his Facebook page yesterday that he was going to be posting an article today... no idea it would be about that.  :) Well, consider me interested, but it's too early to say if I'm happy or disappointed.  ;) BOZ (talk) 22:33, 9 January 2012 (UTC)
I read the Forbes article with interest. In hearing the news about PF's predominance, I admit to a certain amount of schadenfreude, since it seemed that WotC/Hasbro was dumping longtime D&D gamers in favour of a younger audience. Guinness323 (talk) 00:21, 10 January 2012 (UTC)

[1] - for those who might be interested in that sort of thing. :) BOZ (talk) 02:09, 11 January 2012 (UTC)

D&D Adventure System Board Games

WotC released some Board Games which became quite successful. Maybe s.o. could create a article:

I'd looking forward to it! greetz --95.208.41.60 (talk) 23:00, 21 January 2012 (UTC)

Ravenloft was two years ago? Wow, time flies. I'm not sure if they would warrant separate articles, or would rather be appropriate as a section in the "parent" articles (such as Ravenloft (module), unless there's a more appropriate one). But I remember a third-party source commenting on the Ravenloft one, if these become articles, I can try to find that source if needed. - SudoGhost 23:08, 21 January 2012 (UTC)
I added redirects for these. Anyone with the material to turn them into articles can feel free to do so.  :) BOZ (talk) 19:33, 22 January 2012 (UTC)

Assessment categories

I took the liberty of adding a (hidden) table with links to assessment categories to the front page of this project. This is used in other projects and I find it more convenient than the quality and importance table for accessing articles of a particular ratings category. Just click on the 'Show' link on the gray bar where it says "Assessment categories". (Sorry the totals don't quite add up correctly; I've been told that's a bug.) Thanks. Regards, RJH (talk) 01:51, 10 March 2012 (UTC)

P.S. In order to develop more consistent importance ratings, some projects build a dedicated scale. Here are a couple of examples: Wikipedia:WikiProject Astronomy/Importance ratings#Importance_scale & Wikipedia:WikiProject Physics/Quality Control#Importance scale. Regards, RJH (talk) 15:27, 10 March 2012 (UTC)
That's not a bad idea. 129.33.19.254 (talk) 16:30, 10 March 2012 (UTC)

WikiProject Dungeons & Dragons at Facebook?

How about a Facebook page for "WikiProject Dungeons & Dragons"?

If there was a page on Facebook people could click the "Like" button to show that they support the project. (I prefer pages over groups, as it is far easier for people to join, they don't get spammed with a notification for every post and — more importantly — a "Like" shows up on a user's Wall/Timeline, and that "Like" may encourage other friends to check out the link and perhaps hit the "Like" button themselves.)

People like me could then try to send our D&D loving friends there and try to do our bit to raise awareness of the existence of the project and work that the team does. I've spent some time networking with a number of D&D fans over there, and I think it would be a good environment for guerilla marketing of WikiProject D&D. I'm not sure exactly how many Facebook users could be attracted, but it would not be too hard to set up a page and I'd expect to get hundreds of people to sign up within the first few months. Once the number of people "Liking" the page was pushed into the hundreds, it would reach "critical mass" and start to go up by itself. Someone, or a few people working together, would need to keep an eye on the page, but I would bet that a few of the project team are already on Facebook.

Pages can also "Like" other pages, so you would be able to network with other projects that have a Facebook presence, like "PathfinderWiki". I am an admin on a few D&D based pages and I'd be willing to add a few "Page Likes" to help get the thing going.

And if the project them here was doing important work, like trying to find citations to improve a specific article, an admin could log in as WikiProject Dungeons & Dragons and post a message that would show up in everyone's feed.

Maybe something like this could get more people involved in a small way. And maybe, the people running this project could post some articles up on Facebook, that explain to D&D fans why things like citations are needed and how people that want to sign up and help can make edits in a useful way.

I think that pages which need reliable sources (and according to the cleanup listing there are plenty of those) would be an area, where it would be fairly easy for a single Facebook admin to log in, put out an open call for a link that could be used for a citation. They could then check any links that get posted and scratch a problem article off of the list, if anyone on Facebook discovered a source that did the job.

Having people post useful secondary sources over on a Facebook page might be a way to get non-Wikipedia editors to start feeling more involved with the pages here, and start to feel like they could be a part of the process. I think there are a number of people that are experts in D&D's specialist areas, but who are scared away by the thought of learning to deal with the Wikipedia interfact. Those people could perhaps become a resource that people here could turn to for information on specific facts. Eventually some might begin to take ownership of Wikipedia's D&D content and might sign up for an account, so they could fix problems directly. But I think that a presence away from Wikipedia, could be a way to get other people as involved as possible.

What do you think? Big Mac (talk) 20:23, 13 April 2012 (UTC)

Sure, why not? I think it's been done with other topics. However, people visiting the Facebook page may not be immediately familiar with some of the Wikipedia philosophy and policies. They are likely to start proposing things like blogs, social media pages, anonymous reviews and other unreliable links as sources. If they end up getting smacked for proposing those, they may not come back. Regards, RJH (talk) 21:23, 13 April 2012 (UTC)
You make a great point, RJH. That is why, as well as "marketing" this project, it would be a great idea to "market" the philosophies of Wikipedia and the reasons for desiring "reliable secondary sources", a "neutral point of view" and other things. I think some people look at Wikipedia's D&D content and just see the activities of the delitionists (and think of it as similar to an Edition War) rather than understanding the need to build great research material. If they can be "sold" the reasons for doing that - and if they "get" that doing that will mean that there will be more D&D stuff (instead of stuff that goes up and comes down again) maybe that might give more people an "Eurika" moment and make them excited about this project. Big Mac (talk) 02:03, 14 April 2012 (UTC)
What other topics have used a Facebook page? I'm curious how they've used it. What kinds of wikiproject connection exist? I'm not impressed with results of a simple search. Lots of mirrors. WikiProject:Oregon? BusterD (talk) 02:41, 14 April 2012 (UTC)
A few years back, Facebook imported articles from Wikipedia en masse, in an attempt to increase the number of things that its users could 'Like'. I believe this is down to the 'Like' system being connected to the way that they sell adverts. My call for this was not to attempt to copy other WikiProjects, but to go to a place where D&D fans are known to be and actively try to connect with them. The page for PathfinderWiki could give you an idea of how this connection might work. Big Mac (talk) 03:19, 14 April 2012 (UTC)

David, I think this is an interesting idea. It may be loaded with potential benefits, or fraught with hazards depending on how you look at it. Yes, like RJ says there are people who would be inexperienced with Wikipedia that might come here, do some things that they get smacked around for, and leave with a bad taste in their mouth. And I would also hate to attract more attention from deletionists - lord knows, we had enough of that a few years ago, and this really drove down participation in our project. I am more than a bit leery about the idea of having "hundreds of people to sign up within the first few months", as I worry about things getting out of control.

I think the focus we had for a while on getting more GAs and FAs really helped to increase our profile, and if you want to go ahead with this I think that article improvement is where our focus should lie. The bulk of people I'd like to see in a FB group would be devoted to helping with that in whatever way they can, or at least supporting that goal. We have a page here on the WikiProject of sample sources that have been used and could be used on other articles. As for groups we could connect to, I know that Canonfire! has a related FB group that could be linked to our project. Give me some more thoughts on what you'd like to do with this. BOZ (talk) 16:35, 16 April 2012 (UTC)

Thanks for the comments BOZ. I do agree with the negative as well as positive possibilities. Let me use another D&D wiki (my own one) as a case study.
Back on the 12th of October 2007, I set up a wiki called Spelljammer Wiki, with the aim of it being a well-researched encyclopaedia of canon from the Spelljammer Campaign Setting. (One goal was to set up an encyclopaedia that describes the Spelljammer universe, from an in-game perspective. Another goal was to ensure that it was up to the standards required to qualify as a secondary source for Wikipedia articles on the setting.) On the 23rd of December 2009 I set up a page on Facebook for Spelljammer Wiki. Bearing in mind that my wiki has a different scope from what WikiProject Dungeons & Dragons is doing, the Facebook page for my project is a good way to look at the features. (Please also bear in mind that I'm pretty much a one-man band on my project, and do not have a team, like you guys do. So anything I do, can be done quicker and better by you lot.)
Facebook just converted the page over to their new Timeline system, and I'm still working out the best way to use each feature. The Timeline itself is what used to be called a Wall. You can 'highlight' certain 'stories' on a Timeline to make them fill up the entire width of the page, instead of just half the page. I've decided to 'highlight' everything that *I* post on the Timeline and leave anything else that gets posted there (including automatically posted notifications and posts by other people) 'unhighlighted'. I think that makes my 'official' stuff show up more. Your mileage may vary on that. Everything can show up on the Timeline, even if you use the other features, so I'll come back to examples of what things can be posted on the Timeline later, after going through the other features.
The About page was there before (but looks different now). It 'does what it says on the tin' and gives a basic description of what my wiki is and what the URL is. For WikiProject Dungeons & Dragons, the About page could give a link directly to the project itself (and let me tell you that, as a Wikipedia user, I find this place very hard to locate). I'm not sure when this project was founded, but I think that actually 'marketing' the idea that this team has been working on improving D&D articles for several years may help spread awareness that this is a professional-standard project and that editors are not just doing whatever they want.
The Photos section is something I am still working on. There are two default albums there: 'Profile pictures' and 'Cover photos'. I use the Spelljammer Wiki logo as my page's profile picture (WikiProject Dungeons & Dragons has its own logo, and you would obviously upload it as the profile picture). Cover photos is a new thing (that came in with the Timeline concept). I've currently put the cover of the AD&D Adventures in Space boxed set up there (on the SJ Wiki page). I may periodically swap that out for other photos to make the page look visually interesting. For WP:D&D it might be interesting to take screenshots of individual Wikipedia articles. As for the other albums. They are what you make of them. I've got another Facebook page (for a different RPG product) and on that page I put up cover photos of every product in that product line, along with details of what they were in the description. I'm going to do the same with Spelljammer Wiki. I've already started, but there is still a lot to do. If you look at photos that I do have up there already, like the AD&D Adventures in Space photo, you will see that I add in links to my wiki articles in the description.
What might work well for WP:D&D, is to organise photo-albums for articles that show the FAs and GAs. If an album was created called Featured Articles, and screen shots of those articles were added (along with a link to the article itself) people could click the 'Like' button, to show that they like that actual article. You will notice, from my photos, that there is a 'Share' button, as well as a 'Like' button. I find, on my pages, that people will click like on a photo of a product that they like. Occasionally, but not often, someone will use 'Share', to put the photo on their own Timeline/Wall. If you had a Featured Articles album, and people hit the Share option, that would spread that screen-shot, along with the great story that your work had hit the front page of Wikipedia, across Facebook. And if you had a Featured Article album, that could show screen shots of the Wikipedia homepage with D&D content on it. (I think that might help sell the concept of the need for quality editing, as well as the recognition that comes from the hard-work.)
Another, less useful looking, section is the Likes page. This shows how many people like the page. It also shows some basic stats for visitors. (For admins, this also shows how many of your friends like your page.)
Another feature is the Notes section. I kind of use this as a blog of what I'm doing with my project. Notes are more detailed that standard posts on the timeline, and you can add both pictures and hyperlinks. My first note has a list of the products in the Spelljammer Campaign Setting (and links to the articles for my wiki) and other notes include pictures. For WikiProject Dungeons & Dragons, I think that it would be possible to make a note that gives an expanded overview of what the project is and then follow that note up with other notes that explain important concepts ('What is a Featured Article?', 'What is a Good Article?', 'What is a citation?', 'What is a secondary source?', etc etc.)
One slightly weird thing about notes is that they also go onto your Timeline/Wall (so you see them in two places) and if you add a photo to the note you will see that photo in both the photo section and the note itself (in fact new photos show up on the Timeline too, so they can be seen in three places). This is important to bear in mind if viewers are going to be using the 'Like' and/or 'Share' buttons to spread news of things they see on your page. Once you get your head around it, it makes sense, as the Timeline only shows a summary.
The last feature is the Events feature. I don't use this myself - not yet anyway, but I can imagine this being very useful for WP:D&D if you want to promote something like a D&D article going up onto the front page of Wikipedia. Make an event for something like that and Facebook users can 'invite' their friends to that event. This can quickly spread awareness (once the initial fanbase is built up). But an even better use might be to create an event for a drive to turn an article into a Good Article. Were the page owners (or maybe the community via some sort of interactive process) to pick an article that should go onto the to-do list, that to-do list could be used to schedule improvement drive events. We could, for example create an event like: 'Improvement drive: Get Greyhawk article to GA status', it would then be possible for people to invite Greyhawk loving friends to read the article, and reply to the event page and put out appeals (in plain English and on a single, easy to locate event, for the information needed to verify facts, locate secondary sources). If information itself is lacking, it may even be possible to motivate the secondary sources into doing further research on those areas where Wikipedia has no sources to work from. (This sort of thing, I think could be the single biggest advantage of having a Facebook page.)
I think there are four key-groups that you could be aiming at.
  • One group is people that have never edited an article on Wikipedia - They are the ones that might do an edit, and see it get reverted and have a bad experience. But they might do that anyway. Having a page - to reach out to them - and to try to 'manage expectations' and provide information on how to work with other editors could actually help make their editiing experience something they enjoy more.
  • Another group is people that are already editing D&D articles, but not working with this WikiProject - Attracting existing editors to the WikiProject, should hopefully be a totally good thing. Even with people that don't do much editing here, you may find that some of them will be happy to come here, visit a WP:D&D to-do list and see if they can make a few edits that sort out problems identified by other users. Improving the ability for members of the project to communicate with each other could help make people feel more involved (and make things a lot more fun for newbie members of the project).
  • External Dungeons & Dragons projects are out there - Websites like Candlekeep and Dragonlance Nexus already have Facebook pages. This is a chance to build up a working relationship with their editors. The people working on these projects already have a professional attitude towards the sort of things they put online. If they can be made to see the importance of using citations (on their own content) this could open up a lot more pages as valid choices for a secondary source over here.
  • Last but not least are the Dungeons & Dragons professionals - There are a lot of RPG designers on Facebook and many are happy to talk to fans. Wikipedia has 'no original research' rules, but that doesn't mean that industry experts can not point out flaws in articles and let us know where they have posted something that clarifies the situation. (I actually think this is an area where Wikipedia, in general, has a bad reputation as an expert who is a bad Wikipedian may quickly have accurate information removed by delitionist-editors, while a person who lacks knowledge, but who adds citations to their lower-quality work, will have their edits stay up for much longer.) This sort of thing could be a chance to team up an expert with a WP:D&D editor and get the best out of the expert's knowledge, while ensuring that articles go up with good citations at the moment they are created.
Even attracting the sort of people that tag D&D articles for notability (etc) may be good as they may be people that can be persuaded to add things to a 'to-do' list or just post on the page that they think an article needs to be improved.
Anyhoo, that is how it works for Spelljammer Wiki, and I think that, with a bit of care, it could work even more effectively for WikiProject Dungeons & Dragons.
I have been compiling lists of the individual D&D campaign settings that my Facebook friends like. If a WP D&D page was set up, I would personally invite all of my D&D-loving friends to join it. And if the page was doing things that were specific to campaign settings (like improving the main Greyhawk page) I would use the 'Share' option to promote it to any communities that care about that setting. Big Mac (talk) 03:08, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

List of Dragonlance locations to be deleted on 20th of April!

A deletion template (citing WP:GNG) has been put onto List of Dragonlance locations. I believe that this article is culturally important and that the deletion template should be removed and replaced with an improvement one. I have listed Dragonlance Lexicon as a secondary source, that could be used for citations, over in the talk page of the article. Big Mac (talk) 03:05, 14 April 2012 (UTC)

Monte Cook leaves wotc and D&D Next playtest announced

anyone still working with this project should be on the lookout for radical changes to articles related to these two events, or defacing the pages. i have added the playtest info to 3 pages including Monte's page since his leaving WotC was mentioned in the playtesting date announcement as a "surprise" to Mike Mearls. others might vandalize the pages so might want to keep close watch on them. shadzar-talk 00:39, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

Jean Wells

I have expanded the stub on Jean Wells to a start-class wiki, based on several interviews she did in the two years before her death. Feel free to improve and expand further. If you have a CC photo of Jean, that would add enormously to the article.

It's too bad we always seem to wait until the person has died to do this.Guinness323 (talk) 04:12, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

Well that's not true, but it's mildly curious that you have that impression. Regards, RJH (talk) 02:49, 9 June 2012 (UTC)
Several articles about luminaries from the early days of D&D have been greatly improved/expanded only in the subject's last days or immediately following death, including:
Yes, my phrase "we always seem to wait until the person has died" is an exaggeration, but certainly I have been guilty of not making the effort to expand a brief one-paragraph stub while the person is still alive to see it. Guinness323 (talk) 03:43, 9 June 2012 (UTC)
You've got a point that I agree with, but if you want to change the world you've got to do the work.  :) They may not all need expansion, but if you're looking for people from the early days of TSR (for the sake of argument, we'll say "the 70s") Tim Kask, Robert J. Kuntz, David C. Sutherland III, Jim Ward, Lenard Lakofka, Terry Kuntz, Mike Carr, David A. Trampier, Tom Wham, Darlene Pekul, David S. LaForce, Erol Otus, John Eric Holmes, Jeff Dee, Harold Johnson, Bill Willingham, and Stephen D. Sullivan could all use some work with rewriting and/or sourcing, and Lawrence Schick and Allen Hammack at least could be started. If you want to get into the 1980s, the list will exlpode out of control easily.  :) BOZ (talk) 17:44, 9 June 2012 (UTC)
I would suggest removing Tim Kask and Len Lokofka from the list--I've already expanded on their wikis (even though they are still alive :) ); probably expanding the other stubs would be more productive.Guinness323 (talk) 23:29, 9 June 2012 (UTC)
Yeah, I knew you had gotten some already, but I didn't check them all. Come to think of it, I remember the Kask article was in pretty bad shape previously, and I noticed it was looking better now, so I had completely forgotten that you rewrote it. Still, you have some other good ideas there to work on if you like. :) BOZ (talk) 03:16, 10 June 2012 (UTC)
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