Geneforge wiki?

[Celtic Minstrel]

Is there a Geneforge wiki? And, if not (as I suspect), is there any interest in such a thing? After all, the Avernum games have their own wiki .

[Drayk Armitage]

EE draws from Exile as much as Avernum.

 

And, no. EE exists mainly because of Blades scenarios, and secondly because of creative forum activity years ago. Geneforge has neither of these things.

 

While a site covering some of the major players, locations, ideas, etc. in Geneforge might be cool, the world isn't even remotely as expansive as Ermarian is.

[Callie]

Voila!

 

That certainly isn't much. I could add to the articles if I felt motivated, but I've only played the demos.

[Celtic Minstrel]

Quote:

Originally written by Unhasty:
EE draws from Exile as much as Avernum.

I know this. But storyline-wise, they're basically pretty much the same games.

(Okay, there's a few differences, such as gorgons and apparently the golem dungeon.)

Quote:

Originally written by Unhasty:

While a site covering some of the major players, locations, ideas, etc. in Geneforge might be cool, the world isn't even remotely as expansive as Ermarian is.

Maybe not, but it's still pretty expansive. Way more so than Nethergate, for example (there wouldn't really be a point in having a Nethergate wiki).

[Drayk Armitage]

Excalibur, a wiki article is not the same as a wiki. Wiki is also not short for Wikipedia, in case that was the confusion.

 

The reason an E/A wiki makes sense is that there are numerous world elements (be they people, places, races, laws of nature, or what have you) that do very different things in different games in the series.

 

In the Geneforge series, world elements tend to either be one-shot appearances, or be fairly static. There are a relatively small number of recurring characters, compared to literally hundreds of recurring characters in the Avernums. There are no recurring locations. Individual creations, apparati, and magical effects do not change much over the series. Instead of learning something new about clawbugs in each game, each game tends to say the same things about clawbugs. The result is that, unlike Avernum, there is not a lot of information to cross-reference. For most subjects you can find all the information there is by checking just one part of a game.

 

That said, I wonder how much work it would take Aran to set one up.

 

EDIT: I changed my mind. This sounds neat, even if less useful than EE. Aran, how much work would it take to set one up?

[Drayk Armitage]

Encyclopedia Terrestia.

 

Aran tells me this is quite doable. The bandwidth isn't an issue and the installation is simple.

 

I think it could be neat, so the question becomes, are there several people interested in contributing to it?

 

My own involvement would probably be organizing, categorizing, editing, and making lists and templates. Are there others who are interested in actually writing articles? If so, this could be a good project.

[Dikiyoba]

I suppose I'm interested, mostly in article writing and fact-checking.

 

Dikiyoba hasn't played G3 but is fairly familiar with the other games.

[Aran]

I will gladly provide hosting and occasional tech support, but would like to leave the administration to someone else as I have played far too little Geneforge to contribute any content.

[Sudanna]

Nalyd'll help with most anything, he's played all the games.

[nikki.]

Oh, go on then. I've played all of the 4 games, and am familiar with them.

[Drayk Armitage]

That's five people counting myself and (I am assuming) Celtic Minstrel. Assuming at least three of us follow through, that should be sufficient to make ET worthwhile. (Hey, it's a new ET acronym.)

 

I'll volunteer for admin duties, since my experience with EE might be helpful there. Aran, let's make this happen.

 

So the next question is:

 

terrestia.ermarian.net

or

geneforge.ermarian.net

or

 

something else entirely? vlish.ermarian.net? shanti.ermarian.net? danette.ermarian.net? defniel.ermarian.net? barred.ermarian.net?

[nikki.]

My opinion, "terrestia.ermarian.net" sounds good.

[Sudanna]

Seconded.

[Drayk Armitage]

My one concern about terrestia.ermarian.net is that it inherently sounds like it supports Geneforge-Avernum syncretism.

[wxxqut]

fyora.ermarian.net

[Dikiyoba]

Originally by Slartucker:

 

Quote:

My one concern about terrestia.ermarian.net is that it inherently sounds like it supports Geneforge-Avernum syncretism.

terrestia-not.ermarian.net

 

Seriously, Dikiyoba's vote is for terrestia.ermarian.net.

[Celtic Minstrel]

Quote:

Originally written by Unhasty:
That's five people counting myself and (I am assuming) Celtic Minstrel.

I am certainly willing to contribute, but I've only played the demos. So I won't be able to contribute a lot.

Quote:

Originally written by Unhasty:

terrestia.ermarian.net
or
geneforge.ermarian.net

I like these two the best. As for the Geneforge-Avernum syncretism thing, there's nothing that can be done about that if Arancaytar is hosting it, unless he wants to buy a new domain name. Which I very highly doubt.

[Aran]

Not to be discarded, actually. The cost is about 15 dollars per year. On one hand, it would be possible to get that back with Adsense, on the other I don't know if placing ads on a reproduction of Jeff's intellectual property is legally sound.

[Randomizer]

Quote:

Originally written by Arancaytar:
on the other I don't know if placing ads on a reproduction of Jeff's intellectual property is legally sound.

It'll more likely irritate the users. Besides if it confuses people too much, then they aren't the ones you want using it.

[John S]

So will this essentially be another Encyclopedia Ermarian, except for Geneforge? Or will it be something new?

 

If you folks want to break the mold, I think it would be a good idea to include information on character builds, even though they aren't directly mentioned in the games.

[Drayk Armitage]

That's a good question. The lack of a scenario creator and fanon community makes this very different.

 

First, I think we can say that ET should only have information from the games and not anything that's made up. In another direction, I don't think anything would be added by writing the encyclopedia "in character" as EE is. It would probably be more useful to discuss "out of character" information like creation stats if we find it useful.

 

Thoughts?

[Celtic Minstrel]

I like the in-universe perspective. However (assuming MediaWiki), you could reserve the Main namespace for in-universe content, and create an extra namespace for the kind of gameplay stuff you mentioned.

 

Of course, in-universe is by no means a requirement. If you'd rather not have an in-universe perspective, that's perfectly fine.

[The Ratt]

I like the idea of discussing it out of character, since that would allow for the most content. YOu could include creation and pc stats, suggested builds for each of the character types, and links to geneforge help stuff, to name a few.

[Dikiyoba]

I guess I'm still thinking of a EE-type project--a unified information source for everything we know about Terrestia and Shaping--rather than any gameplay stuff. I would prefer an in-character style most of the time, but I'm not against an out-of-character perspective when necessary.

 

Dikiyoba.

[Drayk Armitage]

I'm not sure I see the sense in making ET a repository for FAQ-type information -- which would be redundant and not useful -- or for build ideas or other strategy or play hints, which are subjective and do not belong in an 'authoritative' style project like an encyclopedia.

 

I do think it would be nice to be able to say "The Guardian Claymore provides a +2 Strength bonus" rather than "The Guardian Claymore enhances the physical prowess of those who wield it."

[nikki.]

Quote:

Originally written by Dikiyoba:
I guess I'm still thinking of a EE-type project--a unified information source for everything we know about Terrestia and Shaping--rather than any gameplay stuff. I would prefer an in-character style most of the time, but I'm not against an out-of-character perspective when necessary.

Dikiyoba.

Seconded. I'd seen it as more a place to go read about Sucia Island, for example, than a place to find out which kind of sword was best to beat Monarch, or whatever.

[Celtic Minstrel]

Heh... it was my search for an article on Sucia Island to link to that made me suggest this in the first place. (I ended up linking to Wikipedia's Geneforge article instead.)

[Drayk Armitage]

What do you think about the following standard: using a "=== Gameplay Information ===" section for any out of character information we may want to include? This preserves the main article text in the EE tradition while allowing for inclusion of OOC info without contorsion.

[Aran]

Quote:

Diki:

I guess I'm still thinking of a EE-type project--a unified information source for everything we know about Terrestia and Shaping--rather than any gameplay stuff.

Quote:

Nikki:

Seconded. I'd seen it as more a place to go read about Sucia Island, for example, than a place to find out which kind of sword was best to beat Monarch, or whatever.

Quote:

Slarty:

I do think it would be nice to be able to say "The Guardian Claymore provides a +2 Strength bonus" rather than "The Guardian Claymore enhances the physical prowess of those who wield it."

Wait, wait. I'm beginning to see that what we have here isn't one idea, but two.

Would there be a point in creating both a Gameplay and a Story project? These could be very well integrated - for example, such that the IC and OOC pages of the same article - "Guardian Claymore" link to each other in the sidebar or as a tab. Or if that is not a good idea, the portals could be separate and only loosely related - being on geneforge.ermarian.net and terrestia.ermarian.net, respectively.

Any ideas?

[Celtic Minstrel]

If it's two ideas, I would favour having one wiki but with an extra namespace called, perhaps "Gameplay".

[Drayk Armitage]

No, it's definitely not two ideas. Besides what's quoted above, I also said that I think a FAQ type wiki is pointless. I was simply suggesting that, in the absence of a scenario creation program and a fanon community, I didn't think it was necessary to be as strict as EE in pretending we didn't know we were talking about a video game.

 

I particularly dislike the separate namespace idea. Even with sidebar or tab links, that becomes a hassle to organize and to navigate. It's extra work for us, it's extra clicks and time spent for site users, and I don't see what it adds. What exactly is the problem with having OOC information, if there is any we deem relevant, on the same page? In all likelihood there would be very little.

[Celtic Minstrel]

I suppose it's fine in certain situations. Like, as someone said, saying an item gives +2 to strength rather than saying it enhances your strength.

 

Maybe have a marker (like the Wikipedia-style spoiler warnings) to label larger chunks of OOU info.

 

Speaking of spoiler warnings, they would probably be a good idea too.

 

Edit: Many book series have their own wikis, despite not having anything that could qualify as a "scenarios creation program". I don't think the lack of a scenario editor is a problem at all.

[Aran]

My concern is that if the project is not separated clearly enough, its scope will eventually become biased toward one or the other of its goals. Should the OOC be mixed in with the IC? Below it? Above it? Hidden in a spoiler tag, even? Or vice versa?

[Drayk Armitage]

Spoiler warnings seem kind of redundant. If you don't want spoilers you have no business reading an encyclopedia about the game world. Common sense really, and otherwise we'd have to slap them on everything.

 

The books and series that have their own wikis tend to be sprawling series with large fanonical communities, the other thing I mentioned besides the editor. Geneforge has no fanon, really.

[Aran]

... yet.

 

Would the existence of such a thing be an undesirable result?

[Drayk Armitage]

Simple fact: Geneforge is not going to have that kind of community. Without either (a) some kind of mass media publication of the sort that fantasy novels and TV shows enjoy, or ( a scenario editor as accessible as BoE was.

 

Personally, I would really like to avoid total fabrication in ET. That way there's no need for an Apocrypha / Sourcing system like we use in EE now. Reasonable extrapolation is one thing, but genuine fanon is another.

 

Perhaps a good way to put it could be as follows:

 

1) "The primary purpose of ET is to organize and present information about the world of Geneforge, as presented in the games."

 

2) "Other information may be included provided it neither conflicts with nor muddies this primary purpose. Such information should be clearly labelled and separated from general content."

 

#2 suggests that anything besides story/world information can be included if there is a compelling reason, but it should be clearly separated and labelled. I really think page sections are the simplest way to do this; either "Fan fiction" or "Gameplay details" or whatever.

 

The only thing this interferes with is the stupid conceit that the encyclopedia is actually written IN the world of Geneforge. Which adds nothing. An encyclopedia project is not an RP. The general content can be written in the same realistic tone without fabricating a Defniel University.

[Emperor Tullegolar]

If Aran made a Geneforge Wiki, I would happily do a ton of the entries myself. And I support the position of keeping everything canonical, unlike all that Ermarian (even the name is fanon) nonsense.

[Dintiradan]

Y'know, I think very few game wikis have the same level of fanwank that the EE does. In any case, there's no need to make the tone of the entire wiki the same. Take the FreeSpace wiki. It's hardly monolithic - there's mission walkthroughs, modding instructions, in game descriptions of races, characters, etc., stats listings for all ships, and so on. The whole point of a wiki is the ability of average users to post what they want for the benefit of the whole. So long as a page isn't incorrectly categorized, I can't see why it would be a problem for the Geneforge wiki to be more than just a walkthrough, or just in-game descriptions, or whatever.

 

--------------------

Beernuts!

[Sudanna]

Nalyd thinks that we should have a clear and simple division. One page (or more likely section) for the IC, and one for the OOC. Perhaps even label them In Character and Out Of Character. Much easier that way.

[Emperor Tullegolar]

Quote:

Originally written by Slarty:
I do think it would be nice to be able to say "The Guardian Claymore provides a +2 Strength bonus" rather than "The Guardian Claymore enhances the physical prowess of those who wield it."

Oh, all my entries would most definitely be in character.

[Drayk Armitage]

Dintiradan put it well.

 

I'll suggest we adopt my two statements above (to start with; not in immovable ink, and certain open for debate or rewording). Since the primary reason we're making the wiki is the game-world information, let's have that be the default type of content for a section and not require a section header. Gameplay information can go under a "Gameplay information" section header. If later on we start putting too much in for one section, we can decide to split it up for certain types of entries (creations are all I can really think of where this might apply). Fanon should probably be avoided, but if any is relevant it should go under a "Fan fiction" header.

 

If we ever decide to put in information that is entirely FAQish, such as build advice, we can develop a separate structure for such entries and categorize them as something appropriate. Though I don't think that's likely to happen.

 

To summarize, an article would consist of the following:

 

- One or more sections detailing in-world information. Typical sections might include Biography, Location, Physical Appearance, etc., just like on EE.

- Optionally, one section titled "Gameplay information"

- Optionally, but very rarely, one section titled "Fan fiction"

 

I've also been working on a very long list of stuff that probably deserves an article, using batch find and all four game script sets, which I'll post up once the wiki is up and running.

[Celtic Minstrel]

Huh... this was active for a couple of days or whatever, and now has been apparently forgotten...

 

I'm just wondering if you're all still interested. I know I am, even though I haven't bought them yet.

 

Slarty's suggestion above is quite a good one, if this actually happens.

[Sudanna]

Nalyd is in, though you'll have to tell him what you want.

[Drayk Armitage]

Yes, let's do this.

 

Aran, let me know when the wiki is online -- at your convenience, of course -- and I'll get started working on the basic structures.

[Student of Trinity]

What about the endless factional debates? You can't just leave them out, but there have already been plenty of debate threads on these boards, and we don't need a second place for individuals to fight it out over whether Takers or Shapers are better or more evil or whatever. The ideal would be to make an archive of concise best statements of the cases for the various sides, and leave it at that.

 

Despite the ideal of a Wiki, I think that open editing of argument summaries would immediately just turn the argument archive into a debate forum with even less moderating than we have here. So there would have to be some way of approving who writes what.

 

If Aran hosts the site, he should just decide despotically, after taking whatever advice he wishes. I think that among the people here who have shown interest in these debates there are probably enough level headed and capable writers to champion each side. For that matter, there are probably several people who could summarize all the arguments well and fairly, regardless of which they personally supported, if any.

[Milla]

This idea does sound really interesting and I like the idea of some sort of IC/OOC combination.

 

For the record after several boredom/curiosity induced internet searches I can say there is a Geneforge fandom of sorts out there.

[Emperor Tullegolar]

Quote:

Originally written by Student of Trinity:
For that matter, there are probably several people who could summarize all the arguments well and fairly, regardless of which they personally supported, if any.

Yes, I believe I already volunteered.

[Celtic Minstrel]

Quote:

Originally written by Student of Trinity:
What about the endless factional debates? You can't just leave them out, but there have already been plenty of debate threads on these boards, and we don't need a second place for individuals to fight it out over whether Takers or Shapers are better or more evil or whatever. The ideal would be to make an archive of concise best statements of the cases for the various sides, and leave it at that.

Despite the ideal of a Wiki, I think that open editing of argument summaries would immediately just turn the argument archive into a debate forum with even less moderating than we have here. So there would have to be some way of approving who writes what.

If Aran hosts the site, he should just decide despotically, after taking whatever advice he wishes. I think that among the people here who have shown interest in these debates there are probably enough level headed and capable writers to champion each side. For that matter, there are probably several people who could summarize all the arguments well and fairly, regardless of which they personally supported, if any.

I would say that if this is an unsettled debate, say so. Don't put one side of the debate, show both sides.

[Drayk Armitage]

I don't think the factional debates are really the issue. The philosophical ones are, and those are closely connected. "Regulation of shaping" certainly ought to present the views of different sects, as would "Creation freedom". But I think those debates have mostly been civil and calm here.

 

The ones that get out of hand are the ones about pointless moralistic judgments, i.e., are the drakons more or less morally reprehensible than the humans. Who cares? That's not an encyclopedia topic. Moralizing is not an encyclopedia function. "Loyalists" "Barzites" and "Rebels" (and so on) could certainly have small sections on "Criticism" or "Acclaim" (much as Wikipedia has for many public figures and institutions).

 

And really, these are fairly straightforward. Every faction will be criticized by others for its views on shaping regulation and creation rights. Every faction will be accused of being hypocritical. And each faction has one standard ad hominem argument: the Shapers are slow to adapt, the Awakened have their heads in the clouds, the Barzites are megalomanaical, and so on.

 

If any articles DO get out of hand, they can always be locked so that only designated users can edit them.

[Aran]

Regarding in-game politics, see NPOV .

 

Regarding the setup: If you have a consensus, I'll put it up tonight. What was the choice of domain name? geneforge or terrestria?

 

To make sure that this works without my supervision, I'll draft Slarty and one other contributor for Sysop duties. Please don't volunteer unless you really have the time, and please note that without clear public opinion or Slarty's most strongly-worded advice (and Slarty has some strong words when he advises ), I'll pick.