Talk:RPG World

Recent Traffic

After wondering where all these edits are coming from, I checked the RPG World site, and found out that the blog entry [1] says "...there appears to be an RPG World Wikipedia entry that needs some love. I'd do it myself but I'd write 'RPG World is drawn by an AWESOME SUPER STUD' and that, while true, would be innapropriate." I see that someone decided to add that. Um... what he said, I'm taking that out. ;)

Anyway, if you're new here, welcome. - RedWordSmith 22:13, Nov 24, 2004 (UTC)

Earlier today I created the Characters section and later added Key Items and Important Items. These last two probably should be alphabetized? I started adding the information from the official profiles by Andrew Bonia and Ian J while maintaining all the other additions other people had done in the mean time. There's still more information and characters from the profils that should be added. Specifically, the monsters, more first appearances, minor villains. Some older comics use "Tascachore" while recent comics read "Tascacore". Not sure which is more correct. Keep up the good work all. --Sketchee 23:20, 24 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Um, about that; since Andrew Bonia and Ian J wrote the profiles, they're actually the copyright holders for them. I'll send him an email and see if we can get permission to use those descriptions.

As for "Tascacore" vs. "Tascachore", I'd recommend using the more recent "Tascacore", and adding a note about the alternate spelling. - RedWordSmith 00:00, Nov 25, 2004 (UTC)

I stay in the IRC chat with Ian. I'll just ask him there. --Sketchee 00:17, 25 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Ian says it's okay :) --Sketchee 02:22, Nov 29, 2004 (UTC)

Character profiles

A lot of the character profiles could use some work. They employ colloquialisms and I imagine some of them would be confusing to non-readers of the comic. Aerion 00:57, 11 Dec 2004 (UTC)

I'm working on it right now! Yoshiguy 19:08, 23 December 2006 (UTC)

Massive overhaul on this page

I redid all of the character profiles, took some of the less notable characters out, rearranged some stuff, merged Detestai's Earl's and Larry's profiles into one, shortened up the plot section a whoooole lot. Feel free to redo my stuff, I'm sure a lot of it is poorly-written and repetitious. If you feel the need to take out the abilities, weapons and other things, please leave the classes. This is my first big edit to Wikipedia and I hope I did good! Yoshiguy 23:13, 23 December 2006 (UTC)

Plus, I'm not good at citing sources, so if someone else could, where needed? Yoshiguy 23:14, 23 December 2006 (UTC)

RPG World finished

I think the closest to any official announcement that IanJ doesn't intend to carry on with RPG World at all is in this LiveJournal entry. He's said more elsewhere (such as on chat channels) but an excerpt from someone's IRC logs isn't quite going to cut it as a citation. Keenspot still categorises it as on hiatus/sporadic though.

Main RPG World forum, Offtopic RPG World forum. If you scroll down to the bottom of the pages, you should see this locked symbol by the bottom-left of the pages. Hardly surprising considering both are filled mostly with random trolling, but there ya go. I can't say whether it was Keenspot's decision or IanJ's decision to lock those forums however, so I'll just remove the external link to it. But if anyone feels like mentioning it anywhere, you can cite those pages themselves I guess. -masa ♫ 16:05, 6 May 2007 (UTC)

Although actually, the anon seems to have been right about Ian's parting message: [2]. --Gwern (contribs) 18:10 6 May 2007 (GMT)

Ah, guess he was right, but it's hardly encyclopaedic content =P I'm under the impression that he's more aiming that at the horde of forum trolls that he's amassed than his fans, but eh, who am I to try and read between the lines? -masa ♫ 13:53, 7 May 2007 (UTC)

No, no, I got the same impression; hence my recent edit. --Gwern (contribs) 17:04 7 May 2007 (GMT)

WOW! Whoever added that back into the page, I'm glad you did. I remember how antagonistic he became towards his fans, and while that sounds perfectly in keeping with the attitude he developed, he was never that direct with his fans and critics... I never felt any sympathy for him; he spent ages cultivating his fan-base, pushing merchandise, advertising all over the place, and then got pissed off when people started expecting semi-regular updates from him. But they must have really pushed him over the edge for him to come back and attack forum-members who were apparently DEFENDING his decision to abandon the strip! --Awakeandalive1 19:53 31 May 2007 (EST)

How did he become antagonistic toward his fans? By not continuing his strip? I'm not really sure if the article deserves to have the quote in the top section of the article, especially while taken out of context. I think this should be moved to a separate section at the bottom of the page. If you believe that closing the forum was an important part of the RPG World site and fanbase, then feel free to retain the quote - but keeping it up there at the top seems to suggest Ian's "fatigue" and antagonism toward his fans was one of the main factors of the comic, which it's not. JeffreyAtW 18:07, 5 June 2007 (UTC)

I'm the one who added that in. I was actually planning to add it somewhere else, but I couldn't figure out where to put it so i added it to all the other statements explaining the history of the artist and the comic itself. The rest of the page after the initial section has more to do with the story and the plot so I figured I'd leave it as is. I used to read his comic and the forums and, while I don't know that I'd put it as strongly as AAA1 did, it did seem like as his decision to close down the comic drew nearer he became more and more hostile to his fans, posting angry and absuive messages. Sometimes he'd lash out at confused new readers, or people who were just curious as to why he'd stopped posting and if he was all right. Whether his "lash-outs" were provoked or unprovoked is a matter of opinion, and not something we can authoritatively include here. I can't find the original forums (does their being closed mean that they were deleted or just locked?) so I can't add any of those links, but I don't think that would add much anyway - same problem as deciding whether or not he was provoked or unprovoked. And maybe I didn't read far enough back, but the quote looks in context to me: he grew tired of working on the comic, so stopped writing his comic; he got sick of the fans, so closed the forums; and when he discovered a still-open forum he snapped at the people who were still posting and had it closed down. It gives an idea of the author's state of mind and his attitude towards his former fan-base and creation, using a quote from the author himself. It relates to the future of "RPG World" as a work. a non-registered, casual Wikipedia user

The forums were locked, but not deleted. They are still accessible:

• http://forums.keenspot.com/viewforum.php?f=50

As a friend, I know Ian stopped the comic because he was busy with other school- and work-related projects and eventually lost interest because of his declining activity with RPGs and webcomics in general. I also know that his decision to close the forums was due to the fact that no active threads were on-topic - in fact, speaking about the comic was frowned upon and new posters asking about the status of the comic were often insulted. This is the reason Ian was hostile in his last message before the forums were locked. Of course, I have no formal citations for any of this, nor do I think it matters at all.

To be honest, I don't think it is professional to include such a quotation, especially when the other side of the "argument" is the forum's regulars and estranged fans - to be neutral one would expect to see quotations from them, as well. It seems as if the only reason the quotation there is to "smear" Ian or give him a reputation as being hostile, when I don't think it is true, nor does it matter in relation to the article. If we look at this from further away, we should ask why there is any mention of the forum and its closure in the first place. Most importantly, I don't know if mention of forum closure, or even the future state of the comic, meets Wikipedia's notability requirements at all. JeffreyAtW 19:50, 5 June 2007 (UTC)

Well, it's not there to smear him, but as you're personally invested in him I can see how you might read it that way. I felt it gave insight into his state of mind and current attitude towards the whole RPG World milieu; the version of the article I edited was, if anything, a little too friendly and made it sound as though he might start the comic up at any moment. I initially thought the mention of the forums combined with the implication that he had started the comic up again gave the false impression that he had re-involved himself. I added that back because it seemed relevant and because I felt it added balance. As for the forums, they were affiliated with the comic and its distribution, and the closure of them seems therefore to be relevant as an indication of Ian's divesting himself of the remnants of his long-abandoned project. In some ways they're the webcomic equivalent of the "critical response" cited in relation to other artistic projects. I guess if he did have some more recent, more official statements those could be used, but as the quote puts it so succintly, he "doesn't owe" anybody anything. Without that, any arguments to the contrary would seem pretty specious and therefore even less professional. Though I don't disbelieve your claim to be Ian's friend, there's no proof that such is the case - anybody could come around editing this and arguing that they did so as a "friend". The quote contains the cartoonist's own words, or as close as we can find. me again

"I felt it gave insight into his state of mind and current attitude towards the whole RPG World milieu"

See, that's where we disagree - he doesn't at any point make it explicit who the "you" he referred to was. Was it the poster immediately above him? Was it the "community" of the forums? Or was it his entire fanbase? Each of those are valid possibilities with completely different meanings. I'd say the context implies the second of those, myself. If he was aiming the remark at his entire fanbase, surely he'd have posted it on the main RPG World site, so that his entire fan base could see it?

And of course, how is IanJ's state of mind at all relevant to an article on his webcomic?? -masa ♫ 02:03, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

Ian explains the situation in his own words here, as of today. Also mentions this Wikipedia nonsense. JeffreyAtW 06:38, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

Well, he said "you guys" so I'd say that safely knocks out the first of your proposals. And his state of mind is relevant in that it is integral to the state of the comic itself, as he is its creator. Have you read any of the articles on works of literature or art? They almost always include similar information when it is available. I read his response, since someone was kind enough to include a selection and a link to it in the article; I'd say that the quote in the context in which it exists here matches his description, though that may not have been what I intended.

My mistake - I misremembered the quote as containing "you" as opposed to "you guys". But I included the first only to create a third option. But even if I agreed with what you say about IanJ's state of mind being integral to the state of the comic, I would disagree about how useful the quote is for that purpose, because his state of mind now can't in any way retroactively affect the state of the comic that ended almost two years ago. Similarly, if twenty years down the line he replies on a forum that he loves the world and all of its inhabitants, it still wouldn't have any bearing on the state of the comic. If you want a quote for the purpose you're expressing, find one take one from when he was still making the comic. -masa ♫ 02:57, 7 June 2007 (UTC)

But...the quote is included in a section discussing his attitude NOW. A quote from two years ago wouldn't be right in that particular part of the article. I'd say this argument has gone on long enough. You both make good points, but the reality is that a) Ian did say that in relation to something RPG World related, and b) the anonymous guy was wrong about Ian's intent in writing it. Awakeandalive1 01:16, 7 June, 2007 (EST)

But... we need more indentation colons... -masa ♫ 07:26, 7 June 2007 (UTC)

I hated the sketch when I first saw it, but for some reason this is the only thing I could think about when i saw your responses: "I've got a fever, and the only cure is MORE COWBELL!" that anonymous guy

Delete forum quote, condense information?

Now that we've discussed this for a bit and decided that it was taken out of context, should this remain on the page? I vote for condensing all the recent information (as I believe it suffers from Recentism) and simply discussing what Ian's current stance on the comic is, as well as what is currently being updated on the page. JeffreyAtW 18:11, 7 June 2007 (UTC)

I'm in agreement that it should be done, but I'm not volunteering :P -masa ♫ 20:59, 7 June 2007 (UTC)

I think the condensing is a good idea. I'll give that a shot. But I think the italicised quotes should stay. anony

Added his clarification from his site

After seeing his website, and not believing the artical was clear enough, I went ahead and added some clarifications. They are liseted below in bold.

In May 2007, Jones-Quartey had the then-active RPG World Keenspot forum and all related forums locked, due to their off-topic nature. [1] He replied to the remaining members, which he discribes on his site as being a hive of lamers who posted nothing but off-topic posts, porno, and RPG World-bashing: "you guys have always hated me and I don't owe you shit," [2]. For a clarification, he explaines on his website, "it was directed towards the inhabitants of the now-locked Keenspot forum" and not the loyal readers of the comic themselves. Dream Focus 17:34, 30 July 2007 (UTC)

Awakeandalive1 just undid what I had added. I'd like to know why? What is there now will be misleading to some people, so I went ahead and clarified what he said, using his own words from the RPG World website. Reading your comments in the discussion page, I'm curious of your motives. Everyone post their opinions please. Should my additions have been edited out? Are they not needed to make things clearer? Dream Focus 08:17, 31 July 2007 (UTC)

I still maintain that the entire section should be deleted as I don't believe deletion of the forums are at all notable. JeffreyAtW 01:18, 2 August 2007 (UTC)

Sorry I didn't clarify. The additions just felt a little too much like an apologetic (and there was one part that just flat-out didn't fit with NPoV). That said, I do think the current revision could use some tweaking...but if there's no way around it then sure, just delete it. I still hold that it's very relevant, but people are going to believe what they want to believe anyway and it's just too tantalizing a target for an edit/revert war. Awakeandalive1 20:24, 2 August 2007 (UTC)