Talk:Kronos

From Traxus

Category(s)

If there's going to be articles about things in third-party scenarios, should they be categorized according to which scenario-universe they appear in? (Devil in a Blue Dress in this case, since EMR is its canonical sequel^{[citation needed]}.) --Andrew Nagy 16:01, 20 August 2007 (CDT)

Yeah, probably. We have not discussed how to categorize them yet. Any good ideas? My first reaction is to let everything in the Marathon universe stay directly in the major categories. Category:Characters would hold Durandal and Tfear, etc. Category:Characters in third-party scenarios could be a quick drop box for everything else. Later, when we wanted more detail, would could split that category up into specific Scenario content. What do you think? MrHen. 09:40, 21 August 2007 (CDT)

I'm not sure yet, but things that need to be considered include: (1) How wide is the definition of "weapon" in Category:Weapons? (2) If we have Marathon-canon-specific categories, should deleted/aprocryphal stuff like the Hound, the Pfhor Mating Ritual and the Cortana Letters be included in them? (3) We might at some point have articles for things from neither the Marathon universe nor a Marathon scenario, like for example Duality stuff. --Andrew Nagy 17:45, 21 August 2007 (CDT)

Direct responses to your questions, more comments afterward. Also of note, these are all opinions, everything is still open for discussion. 1) A weapon is something the player can pick up and "fire". It is a definition based entirely on role from the engine's perspective. NPCs do not have "weapons" according to this definition.

2) If there is enough of a particular group of things that a category would hold enough to be useful, then the category should probably exist. The hound is a good exception: how many nixed aliens are there? Probably not enough to deserve their own category.

3) Very true. In the case of plotlines and their ilk, categories can be created.

After thinking about it more, I am beginning to agree with you that the Marathon universe deserves its own subcategories. What I would like to see avoided is an obsession with tagging categories on everything. Terminals are a good example of things that are hard to classify. It would be great to look at a list of every terminal that mentions Leela... but Terminals from Scenarios can mention Leela... so now we have a hazardous time categorizing things in a way that is comprehensive but not confusing or useless. MrHen. 20:01, 21 August 2007 (CDT)

Since I posted that, I've discovered that categories can be nested within other categories. That seems to simplify things; we can have an overall Category:Characters, a Category:Marathon universe characters and Category:Characters in third-party scenarios within that, and then create sub-sub-categories for individual scenarios as the need arises.

Still, a question remains: what should be the overall category title for articles about the DiaBD/Excalibur universe?

--Andrew Nagy 18:53, 12 October 2007 (CDT)

"Category:Devil in a Blue Dress", and then make "Category:Excalibur: Morgana's Revenge" a subcategory of it? --Andrew Nagy 16:43, 7 November 2007 (CST)

Categories must be useful as well as accurate. It may be accurate to distinguish characters in this universe from characters in that universe, but how useful is it? It is very easy to overcategorize to the point of trivialization, and end up with disjointed, fragmented categories of only a few entries each. If you think you're treading into the realm of pure trivia, consider creating a list article rather than a category for it. ⇔ ChristTrekker 11:50, 22 August 2007 (CDT)

The use is that someone who wants to add or fact-check information about a particular scenario might want to be able to examine at a glance all the information that Traxus has on that scenario. Also, doesn't creating a category automatically create a list article for that category anyway? --Andrew Nagy 18:47, 12 October 2007 (CDT)

List articles are different from Categories in the sense that you can group large lists of articles together for the purposes of comparing while still leaving the articles in the higher category. In this case, a category would be "Characters not in the Marathon universe" (or whatever) and there would be lists that could split them up into the correct groupings. "List of characters not in the Marathon universe" would have different sections, but you could scan the whole thing without an issue. MrHen. 13:15, 14 October 2007 (CDT)

In my opinion, the biggest use would be to keep third-party characters separated from the Marathon universe. After that, I have no major preference (or interest). MrHen. 13:15, 14 October 2007 (CDT)

Proposal: Start by naming the top-level categories "Marathon canon" and "Third-party Marathon content". Halo and Duality would be in neither category; ZPC and Carlos On The Run would count as Marathon content because of the Marathon engine. --Andrew Nagy 21:13, 16 October 2007 (CDT)