Guild Wars Wiki talk:Formatting/Missions

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[edit] Opening up discussion

So I've borrowed a bit from what has been before with the mission formatting stuff and given a rough first draft of a Guild Wars Wiki version. Of possible interest is some of the changes from what was before; A new mission info template(which doesn't exist yet), a mission overview summary, Duration and Skill recommendation sections, the complete drop of Dialogues section and the removal of Follow Up section (replaced with nextquest, nextmission in the template). So... thoughts, suggestions, improvements on what I've outlined so far? --Aspectacle 02:08, 15 February 2007 (PST)

I would like to see "skill recommendation" merged into "walkthrough", since it does not make sense to me to discuss the two separated. --Xeeron 05:14, 15 February 2007 (PST)
I made a new section because with some of the more difficult missions spawned pages on pages of "This particular skill is needed", "This particular build works" I was hoping to capture this in a more profession and build agnostic fashion. Plus it is something you have to think about before you go into the mission, rather than while you are doing it. :) So I'm happy to move the section around but I think that it provides a place, and an important guideline, for a very common form of tip which existed in GuildWiki. --Aspectacle 12:25, 15 February 2007 (PST)
Some thoughts on this, I'll try to keep it as short as possible :p
'Overview' as stated here = objectives + duration + walkthrough. Also, How do you state the 'toughness' of a mission ? Omit the article if short: see 'toughness'. For now I say: remove the Overview-section.
'Duration' is highly subjective. Are you gonna record the total time with 'recommended' skills or not? Also kinda depends on the article writers' skill as a player in itself. IMO it's sorta like speculative information (see Formatting/General).
Merging the Follow-up section in the template might be a good idea, but we'll have to see how it works out with rather long quest/mission-names, like 'Eliminate the Jade Brotherhood' or 'Grand Court of Sebelkeh'. I fear it's gonna mess up the box. Would be nice to have a working example with some extreme examples.
Not sure if you just forgot it or not, but I think 'Allies' should use the same ordering as for Foes/bosses. Maybe group per species as well ?
The only part that I absolutely don't agree with is the drop of the Dialogue section. We're documenting the game and facts of the game as it is, dialogues are a part of the game so why exclude it ? At least put in cutscene dialogues, although non-CS dialogue that doesn't show up in team-chat is much easier missed. How we should format dialogue (in general) is another thing.
Placing of Notes-section: bottom of the article because of wiki-consistency. NPC-/creature-/quests-/... articles will most likely have their notes-section on the bottom as well. --Erszebet 06:17, 20 February 2007 (PST)
Feedback! Hooray! <3 :)
For the overview I think that you need to know where I'm coming from; If you see for instance GW's Gate of Madness walkthrough this is so very detailed that you have to trawl through a huge article to get even a basic understanding of what you want to do in the mission. If you look at my draft version on this wiki ->Gate of Madness (Mission) it has the overview which gives you a run down of the mission and basic strategy without having to read all that stuff. It makes sense to me. Estimate of Toughness is something which can come later, on the wiki people complain about the mission difficulty, require specific skill strategies stuff like that, it gets a reputation as a tough mission - you don't have to state that up front in the first creation of the page. Not all missions need to have that sort of info, because there isn't anything particular which distiguishes them difficulty wise. For Nundu Bay (Mission) the overview notes it is frequently chosen over Jennur's Horde because it is easier to do. I like to know that sort of info up front, not hidden in the notes section.
Yup duration is subjective, but then so is much of the mission guide! Sometimes I'd like an idea of how long this mission is going to take me - taking it at fairly easy pace; perhaps it could be categorised into Short ( < 20 minutes), Medium (< 30-35 minute) or Long (> 35) and even tack it into the template? If it really doesn't work it can be dropped.
Ally list is usually pretty short which make me want to have it short and uncomplicated, but I'm neither here nor there on my formatting choice in this area.
I dropped the dialogue section because so many of the mission articles on guild wiki don't use it. I can re-add it, because I can see how you might want to capture that info; but I'm still not expecting it to be widely seen. As for format - I have no idea.
Notes section came before the monster section because I find that more useful/interesting than all the possible monster variations in the mission. If you look at gate of madness again, you can see that the list is long and the notes section placed underneeth it would be obscured by it. Consistency is good, so if Notes is last, Notes is last - I just rather it wasn't in some cases.  :)
I agree that a concrete example or two would be useful. I'll have a go sometime soon ... I hope. --Aspectacle 20:05, 20 February 2007 (PST)
I like that example page... especially the idea of estimated time as a template :D that's what i've always found missing in the other wiki. Giving a short Overview is a good idea, too. I don't have anything against your style. ;) - Y0 ich halt 01:12, 21 February 2007 (PST)
After seeing your example I'd have to agree about the 'Overview section'. Basically, it's a form of introductory text. Maybe we can keep it on 'section 0', this way keeping Objectives as first header on all pages ? Either way is fine by me.
Also in favor of the categorised duration thingy in the MissionInfo box (if that's what you meant ?).
More about Allies and Dialogue: now and then the nutcase inside me takes the upperhand and starts sprouting ideas like: "Let's do a complete overhaul of those Prophecies missions" - lol. It turned out that (on GuildWiki) nobody really bothered to add/complete those sections. Still I think it's info that has a place in these articles unless somebody has objections ? I must admit that the way I've been formatting dialogues isn't that great so far. I'll start a topic on the General Formatting page here to see if anything comes up. --Erszebet 05:00, 21 February 2007 (PST)
Excellent. It seems that we are in agreement. I've updated Gate of Pain (Mission) (it has a mission map you see and is mostly written) with the new templates and fixed the style a bit to match what was discussed. Please take a look and let me know if you like it. (The blue/grey in the templates is kind of arbitrary, change it if you think it needs to change!) --Aspectacle 04:51, 22 February 2007 (EST)

(Reset indent) Looks good to me. I noticed you changed the box color to orange (yuck :p ). Dunno if it was already taken, but that blue was nice. I checked the history and noticed some template-changes made by Gordon Ecker without discussing it here first. That's a big 'no-no' as it is, and I don't think those were valid changes as well. Now we have main headers for Allies - NPCs - Foes, with Bosses a sub-section of Foes. I favor the method we used at GuildWiki: one main header 'Creatures' with following subheaders: 'Allies' (merge of Allies and NPCs), 'Foes', 'Bosses'. The reason for this is simple: if it ain't broken, don't fix it :)
As to listing / grouping of creatures; I've given it quite some thought in the past. Check out my Sandbox at GuildWiki for examples, especially the 'Bosses'-parts, 'cause the way it's done in our current template is definitely not what you want, trust me ;) --Erszebet 07:07, 24 February 2007 (EST)

Hehehe. The Blue was ok (possibly ugly but I'm a poor judge of such things), the orange is a bit Meh in my opinion (I didn't change it!). I don't know what sort of overall style they're going to have with the template boxes - so I'm not going to mess around with it too much, it just needs it to exist with the bits we want in it.
As I said before I'm neither here nor there with the Allies/Foes stuff. Can we think of a better term than Creatures I don't particularly like it (I don't like to refer to allies as creatures, just as I don't like to refer to humans as monsters), possibly something like "In the area", "Met in mission" - ok maybe neither of those are very good either. :)
You've put heaps of effort into that boss example page! Most of the the comments there on the page (as in only available xyz) don't apply for missions, but we can request the style be used for zone stuff as well. I really like the boss table at the bottom with the colours, it looks weird without them. How would you see greens fit on a table like that? Do you think it is a good idea to capture greens as well (zone style stuff more than missions). I prefer the other stuff to be without table, so that you don't have to do too much typing/thinking for it. I prefer the grouped by type scheme if there are a lot. Like on the monsters stuff. For Allies I prefer less. Kormir, for instance, is it really necessary to specify that she is a human every time she crops up in a mission, especially if she is the only ally. But for consistency would prefer the group scheme applied across both. --Aspectacle 17:36, 24 February 2007 (EST)
Heh, that colourful table was a little joke actually :p Besides, past discussions on GuildWiki always ended up in tables being too 'advanced' for non-regular contributors. Maybe something we can change later.
I guess we can add greens too, don't care too much about 'em personally but can be nice to have.
We can keep the grouping then ? I can only speak for Proph. missions mostly, not much missions with only 1 ally afaik. I'll update the template/project page and re-add Dialogues (C.S. only for now). If you can review it and make some corrections where needed, so we can remove the 'under construction'-tag and make it official. I'm keeping this in my watchlist anyway, should there be people who see things differently. --Erszebet 08:13, 26 February 2007 (EST)
Well I still like the look of the table, even if it was a bit of a joke. :P
I think that the guidelines are pretty complete and I'd be happy to have them leave the under construction phase. I think if there were any significant objections or suggestions we'd have seen them by now. --Aspectacle 16:29, 1 March 2007 (EST)
I like the look, and can't think of anything specific to add, which means good deal :P I think if people are going to discuss the mission in depth, they'll use the talk page and probably debate it anyways. It looks like that on a lot of the mission pages as is, and I personally like the format. If I'm having trouble, consult the wiki. If it still isn't working, consult the talk page. So I like what you've got here. Good job. MiraLantis 10:02, 20 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Elite skill arrows

I tested out the different characters, and in Firefox, both → (single arrow) and ⇒ (double arrow) appear correctly, but in IE 6, the double arrow is replaced by the generic "uknown symbol" box. Can anyone say if other browsers including later version of IE work properly? --Thervold 02:01, 2 March 2007 (EST)

I had a look at the double arrow at work after you suggested there was a problem. That was probably one of the latest patch versions of IEv6 and it showed up fine. However, I do have the problem you describe at home with my IEv6sp2 (out of date, never used browser). Trying the unicode character code gives the same result. It is possible that the sp2 version of IE simply does not support the character? If its going be a problem we can switch to the single arrow. --Aspectacle 03:14, 2 March 2007 (EST)
I went ahead and changed the template back to the single arrow version. I tested it with IEv6-sp1 (even more out of date :p ) and got the unknown symbol box too. Since Opera is my default browser I never noticed this problem, and I assume most people use IE so... --Erszebet 09:04, 2 March 2007 (EST)

[edit] A couple ideas

I was looking at the missions today and had a couple ideas on the article structure.

  1. On the info-box, rename "Followup" to "Followed by" and add "Preceded by" to note both the mission/quest directly previous to the current one, as well as the one directly following from it. (cf. how Wikipedia does it for movie articles)
  2. I suggest a bit of a reshuffling of the factual/informational sections at the beginning:
    • Mission Info
      • Requirements (add this section to note what hero is required, as well as other requirements)
      • Objectives
      • Rewards
  3. To me, the "Skill Recommendations" section doesn't make sense where it is: a visitor reading the article straight through wouldn't yet know what is involved in the mission and probably wouldn't understand the reasons for the recommendations. Either make it a subsection of "Walkthrough" as Xeeron suggested or move it after that section.
  4. Add a subsection called "Neutrals" to the "Mission NPCs" section for listing non-combatant NPCs (Allies fight with you, Foes fight against you, Neutrals don't fight at all), like Kormir and Shahai in Pogahn Passage (Mission).
  5. Add a "Trivia" section, also needed for Pogahn Passage.

Okay, so it turned out to be more like a few ideas... :P —Dr Ishmael 15:29, 2 March 2007 (EST)

I agree with 1 - 3 and am indifferent on 4 & 5. --Rainith 15:34, 2 March 2007 (EST)
Sure. I don't have any objections. I'll make the skill recommendation as the last section of the walkthrough. --Aspectacle 15:45, 2 March 2007 (EST)
A thought. Spoiler tags. Walkthroughs by their nature are a huge spoiler for what happens ... in the mission. Someone attached a spoiler tag to the Hells precipice, when it did nothing more than what all other mission walkthroughs do -> spoil the mission (and the game) for you. Where does the line get drawn for adding spoiler tags?
I've updated the formatting guideline, but the neutral NPCs didn't make it because I became confused on the "attacks with you then it is an ally", when I felt that allies could also include those you need to keep alive, or non-assisting tag-alongs (I don't see them as Neutral NPCs they have a vested interest in your success - think Kormir in the later missions) and then I kept on thinking and it was getting dangerous. So I stopped. ;) --Aspectacle 16:27, 2 March 2007 (EST)
I object 4 too: for example: this way any animal can be listed as 'neutral npc'. But that doesn't mean they don't fight at all though; I've seen animals turn hostile to both me and my enemies. Let's keep it plain and simple: any character that actively participates in the mission or PvE storyline that's not hostile to you (in said mission) is an ally...And Trivia should be below Notes lol :p --Erszebet 16:41, 2 March 2007 (EST)

The template looks good to me. I think it holds all information that is needed about the missions. Nice work :-) Greyshade 04:50, 3 March 2007 (EST)

If nobody objects or has other ideas he wants to share I'll remove the 'Under construction'-tag on Monday. --Erszebet 08:29, 3 March 2007 (EST)
Looks good to me. Glad I was able to sneak my suggestions in at the last minute. XD —Dr Ishmael 17:28, 3 March 2007 (EST)

[edit] Hard Mode

So obviously explorables and missions are going to be the area which see the greatest churn from the introduction of Hard mode. I'm probably being a bit premature, but there isn't much they can change but the enemies - so I'm making some assumptions. :)

I'd like to see the articles stay as one (rather than breaking out a new page for the new mode) because at least the area and locations of interesting things and what you actually have to do is still the same. (You still have to kill Shiro...y'know?) Without seeing the hard mode I'd like to introduce a "hardmode" sub-section of the mission walkthrough section to cover anything of note and then parhaps wrap the 'foes' section of the NPCs section in a simple table like:

Normal mode Hard mode

Afflicted

Afflicted

Let me know if you think I'm getting too excited about this and I'll shut up ... for the meantime. ;) --Aspectacle 17:55, 20 March 2007 (EDT)

We'd need to convey different AI behaviours, different drops, different skill bars for foes, different bosses(?), different elite skill(s) for capping? I'm guessing we'll probably have to go with different pages for hard mode. Vladtheemailer 18:05, 20 March 2007 (EDT)

Two pages is a lot of duplication of content - same allies, goal (although possibly different time taken for timed missions), dialogue, map, in part the walkthrough will be largely similar between the two. If there are different bosses or different elites - a table could be used to show that too like my example above?
The creature pages already have a scheme (I think?) for dealing with creatures which have the same name but different levels and skill bars. The missions articles do not capture the skill bars of the foes, nor do they cover general descriptions of the AI's behaviour, that is assumed knowledge. If anything about skills or AI is captured it is to note something which makes the mission particularly difficult or can be exploited to make the mission easier. --Aspectacle 18:37, 20 March 2007 (EDT)
I don't think we'll be able to tell whether keeping them on the same page is feasible until the details of Hard Mode are released. I certainly think it would be beneficial to do so but not the differences are such that the article becomes unwieldy. BTW if you are being kind of premature, I was thinking what was going to happen for Guild Wars 2. Vladtheemailer 20:34, 20 March 2007 (EDT)
I agree that we won't really know what we are going to need until we see it in action, but I think Aspectacle's table doesn't give enough info, and two articles is too much duplication of data. I would suggest we have a separate section of the article, at the very bottom labeled ==Hard mode== and in it we can put as much data as we need, in whatever format makes the most sense (once we actually see what Hard mode is). It could include the creature table, list Hard mode only drops, new elites offered, etc... --Rainith 23:12, 20 March 2007 (EDT)
Fair enough - I'm a little early on this and assuming a bit too much. ;) We'll see what comes and decide then. --Aspectacle 00:44, 21 March 2007 (EDT)
I'd prefer to have some kind of rough guidelines in advance in order to keep hard mode info separate, making it easier to reformat the articles after a final decision is reached. -- Gordon Ecker 22:43, 18 April 2007 (EDT)

<ri> Right! Unfortunately we know about as much as we did before on the nature of hard mode. But we can speculate. :D Here are the things which I think could be different between HM & EM; Reward, Walkthrough and Monsters.

  • Reward. Timed missions in particular are going to have different required times to meet to finish the mission at Expert level. I think this can be integrated into the existing reward template.
  • Walkthrough. While I think that the objectives and the best/fastest path through the mission won't change many of the walkthroughs are written with specific groups and tips for EM worked in. Ideally I'd like the path walkthrough and the tips to be seperated out so the straight forward "this is where you go and what you need to do" is the same for both, and have different skill recommendations, monster tips and such for each of the different modes. I don't know how practical that is.
  • Monsters. It seems that completely different sections rather than the table was favoured by those above.

So layout

  • Mission information
    • (as is with HM in reward)
  • Walk through
    • Bonus
    • EM tips
    • HM tips
  • EM monsters
  • HM monsters

Or

  • mission information
    • (as is with HM in reward)
    • Walkthrough
      • Bonus
  • EM
    • (Walkthrough here?)
    • Tips
    • Monsters
  • HM
    • (Walkthrough here?)
    • Tips
    • Monsters

Thoughts? :D --Aspectacle 00:29, 19 April 2007 (EDT)

Since I have no idea what hard mode will do, I'll wait and see and drink tea. --Xeeron 09:47, 19 April 2007 (EDT)
*pouts* You're no fun.  :) *waits impatiently* --Aspectacle 20:05, 19 April 2007 (EDT)
Tea-time's over. Personally I'd go for Aspectacle's 2nd option. -- Image:Corrran.png (CoRrRan / talk) 04:41, 20 April 2007 (EDT)
2nd option for me too, so far. I think that there is certainly sufficient difference to merit a HM section separately within the article, although I don't think that a separate article is necessary. *aside* Wow, those Grawl got spunky since I was last at the Wall :D THK anyone? lol Image:User Fox.jpg Fox (talk|contribs) 05:59, 20 April 2007 (EDT)
Yes I think that the second version looks the tidiest. It seems that it should work fine - although at this stage I've only done one mission. I don't think that many missions would require a second more detailed walkthrough for the different modes but I think that can be added in if necessary. --Aspectacle 09:56, 20 April 2007 (EDT)
I like the second one but for monsters i think we should use a table. Also i think that there should be in all explorable areas the hard mode and Normal mode levels for monsters. Also with the new vanguisher title i think we should include how many monsters are in each area on average so in the larger areas players can track there progress.66.225.141.109 10:33, 20 April 2007 (EDT)

I know that I was the one starting to drink tea, but this debate seems to have stopped unfortunately. With HM being around for a bit now (and being known), we should adopt a proposal as policy, so that people can start adding HM content to the mission articles. --Xeeron 08:51, 8 May 2007 (EDT)

Bumpage. Anyone still interested in this? If noone objects, I'll implement aspectacle's second idea soon. --Xeeron 14:53, 11 May 2007 (EDT)
Looks like we'll have to try it out, but I assume the 2nd version will do fine. I'm not so sure about the anon user's proposal to include the amount of monsters for the Vanquisher title. Sounds like a difficult task to keep it accurate and synchronized with the Vanquisher article, even if you work with averages - and with data still being gathered and all... --Erszebet 17:25, 11 May 2007 (EDT)

I put in hard mode as discussed here. The numbers in the HM example are still off, they should be replaced by the HM levels of foes. --Xeeron 09:38, 24 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Location disambiguation template

Any objections to using {{Location disambiguation}} instead of the {{Mission outpost link}} and {{Explorable area link}} templates?

The syntax for {{Location disambiguation}} is {{Location disambiguation|The Eternal Grove}}''.

Disadvantages:

  • It requires the user to write that extra |The Eternal Grove parameter.

Advantages:

  • Only one template, instead of two.
  • The same template can be used in the outpost and explorable pages that need a disambiguation note as well, since it'll link back to the mission and the other location automatically. The syntax is still the same regardless of whether the template is used in an outpost, explorable or mission page, it's always {{Location disambiguation|The Eternal Grove}}''.

Thoughts? --Dirigible 03:48, 16 April 2007 (EDT)

No objections to doing less work. :) Nice that it works with those which only have the outpost and the formatting is much tidier/easier to control with your template. I say yes. --Aspectacle 04:04, 16 April 2007 (EDT)
Looks easy. The description on the page is a bit lacking though, I had to look up eternal grove to see how entering only one parameter affects the result. --Xeeron 09:47, 19 April 2007 (EDT)
I reworded it a bit, hopefully it's clearer now. --Dirigible 04:39, 20 April 2007 (EDT)

[edit] Hard Mode

Suggest Normal Mode NPCs and Hard Mode NPcs are folded into a single NPC section, as the only thing that differes is creature levels. That's what most editiors do anyway. Backsword 11:44, 19 August 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Bonus Mission Pack

How should we handle the infobox for these four missions? Currently, Bonus Mission Pack is used for the campaign field and bonus is used for the type field, categorizing them as both "Bonus Mission Pack missions" and "bonus missions". -- Gordon Ecker 05:31, 1 December 2007 (UTC)

How about we change "Campaign" to "Product" instead? Or maybe "Package" or something, since both EotN and BMP are technically not campaigns. Once we change that term, the rest falls into place nicely. -- ab.er.rant sig 05:48, 1 December 2007 (UTC)
I think we should just format it as either a quest or a mission. — ク Eloc 貢 21:01, 1 December 2007 (UTC)
Campaign = core and type = Bonus or Bonus Mission Pack? poke | talk 23:27, 1 December 2007 (UTC)
I take responsibility for labeling things as Bonus Mission Pack Mission. At first it made sense, but its too wordy and redundant. Its a pack of Bonus Missions -elviondale (tahlk) 23:28, 1 December 2007 (UTC)
But it's also some kind of name for that specific pack.. poke | talk 00:54, 2 December 2007 (UTC)
imho, campaign is fine and Bonus would fit just as well without creating headaches. Granted, its not 100% accurate, but if you take a look at how the BMP is presented both on its page and elsewhere, it appears to be a separate "product", which in my mind distinguishes it as its own campaign. -elviondale (tahlk) 02:52, 2 December 2007 (UTC)
Just put core as they are available to every campaign, and at least ONE campaign is required to access them. Then you can put somewhere that you needed to qualify. No need for a new category. We can always change this later if lots of BMP type things happen, otherwise leave it as core. Anon
what are the determinants for qualifying something as a quest vs a mission? is something a mission only if it doesn't have working res shrines? is something a quest only if it is listed in the quest log? the bonus missions are haphazardly organized now b/c some have the quest infobox and some have the mission infobox. some pages mix in both nomenclature. so which is it? since this talk page resides under mission formatting and the pack is actually called "bonus mission pack" i'd prefer calling this a mission or mini-mission even if it gets listed under the questlog. i disagree w/ the suggestion to put it in core b/c it isn't available to everyone and core by definition is available to everyone. eotn would be core too if u use that definition. i like product tho. --VVong|BA 00:48, 9 December 2007 (UTC)
According to official statements from ArenaNet, they're missions, and the repeatable primary quests from Eye of the North aren't, I think that's enough. And missions are listed in the quest log, so that isn't a disqualifier. -- Gordon Ecker 01:49, 9 December 2007 (UTC)
By the way, should the Fissure of Woe and the Underworld be considered missions now that they have mission objectives in the quest log? -- Gordon Ecker 02:30, 9 December 2007 (UTC)
No. — ク Eloc 貢 03:13, 9 December 2007 (UTC)
i was actually wondering about that specific question earlier. i could see someone making an argument for that. --VVong|BA 07:43, 9 December 2007 (UTC)
I guess the name is what causes confusion. People see "Bonus Mission Pack" and so gets the expectation that they will technically be implemented as missions too. Backsword 21:16, 9 December 2007 (UTC)
They are missions though. — ク Eloc 貢 21:50, 9 December 2007 (UTC)
if they are missions they why do they use the quest infobox? --VVong|BA 14:10, 11 December 2007 (UTC)
Shouldn't the campaign field for these list the campaign you were required to own to be able to play the bonus mission? I understood that you wouldn't have access to Gwen's Story if you didn't own GW:EotN, and so on... Then just list the Type as "Bonus". --Ari Image:User_Ari_sig.jpg (talk) 18:25, 11 December 2007 (UTC)
I thought you could do all of them regardless of what campaign you used. — ク Eloc 貢 00:33, 12 December 2007 (UTC)
You do not have to own any other campaign specificlly to do any of the quests. Backsword 00:35, 12 December 2007 (UTC)
Do we have concensus in favor of using the mission infobox? -- Gordon Ecker 10:34, 14 December 2007 (UTC)
Rather far from it; it dosen't cover the correct formating. Backsword 10:38, 14 December 2007 (UTC)
So far, Ari, Eloc, Elviondale and myself have stated that they are or should be considered missions, you have stated that they are or should be considered quests, Wongba seems to be undecided and Anon and Poke haven't made any statements on the mission vs. quest issue, although I'm the only one who has explicitly stated a preference for a specific infobox. -- Gordon Ecker 11:44, 14 December 2007 (UTC)
To me it seems pretty straightforward that these are missions not quests so the mission infobox should be used. It's the Bonus Mission Pack. You click the "Enter Mission" button to start them. Even the official faq states these are missions not quests. It's already been stated that all missions use the quest log to display objectives and information. I also agree with using "Bonus" for the type parameter. Tedium 03:57, 15 December 2007 (UTC)
I don't consider them to be anything special, and I don't mind people considering them whatever they like. I don't see it as our job to try to make other peoples think in any special way.
But when it comes to formating, I thought it obvious that we'd implement the data actually in the game, rather than make up our own. Backsword 05:16, 15 December 2007 (UTC)
Can I reset the last one now? Backsword 09:13, 19 December 2007 (UTC)
reviving this issue. i say go w/ mission infobox. if no one disagrees in the next couple days, then i'm going to switch it. --VVong|BA 23:31, 29 January 2008 (UTC)
Want to agree on this. See also my say on the issue on Talk:The Battle of Jahai#infobox conformity. -- Totte 09:46, 20 February 2008 (UTC)

(Reset indent) I think being so hung up on a name that we change the formating to exclude valid content would be silly. The formating exists to present the content, not the other way around. Excluding Durmand or the initial text or inventing data to fit mission formating (as was what started this) has a feeling of absurdity over it. Control the tools, don't let the tools control you. Backsword 11:05, 22 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Zaishen Challenge and Zaishen Elite

Are these missions considered cooperative missions or challenge missions? The Challenge mission article lists them, but this Template:Locations in the Battle Isles says they are cooperative missions. Tedium 02:37, 16 December 2007 (UTC)

The author of hte challenge mission article worked hard to include them, but the game dosesn't treat them as such. They're sort of in a class of their own, being meant to train people for PvP. Backsword 04:39, 16 December 2007 (UTC)
Checked the game; refers to them as "Zaishen Battle"s, vs "PvP Battle"s for areans and such. Don't have any challenge mission NPCs. Guess cooperative is the closest we have. Backsword 09:13, 19 December 2007 (UTC)
I think we should just make them their own special category for them. — ク Eloc 貢 07:46, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Two small suggestions

I have two small suggestions for changes to this guide. First, bosses section: 

====Bosses====
<!-- bosses and any (elite) skills / greens found in this mission. -->
[[Undead]]
*{{w}}28 (28) [[Avah the Crafty]] → [[Soldier's Stance]] ([[unique item]])

Having the elite skill not in ( ), but the unique item instead. → (skill) doesn't really make sense to me. Second, navbars. I just want to change the order, Area mission nav first and then Campaign mission nav. From smaller area to bigger area. :) (Atm it's "Areas of Kourna" in the example, which I haven't even seen used. I've seen "Missions in Kourna") - anja talk 13:41, 7 January 2008 (UTC)

Hi Anja. Your suggestions sound fine to me. I don't recall there was any special reason for the format of the boss. The area mission nav replaces a previous template ("Areas of X") which listed all outposts, missions and stuff in that area. The new nav bar lists only the missions and links out to the rest. Unfortunately it makes it rather redundant because it was "the rest" we were really interested in. :) Mayhaps if it was a "Locations in Kourna" template and drops listing the missions again it would be a bit less redundant and could stay as the bottom nav? --Aspectacle 04:08, 8 January 2008 (UTC)
I dont feel strongly about this, but Anja's ideas sound good. --Xeeron 11:02, 8 January 2008 (UTC)
Do you mean we should create a new nav/remake the old one, Aspectacle? - anja talk 20:00, 14 January 2008 (UTC)
I don't think that listing all of the locations is especially productive, so recreating the old one is not a great idea. So a new one, because the existing name is no longer right, but exactly the "Missions in X" template without the missions listed, or perhaps an added Missions link. As a player using mission walkthroughs for a campaign I've never found it especially relevant to know other missions in the region, especially if the missions don't track linearly through a particular region.
As an aside, I'm finally set to get back into tidying and finishing the mission project, so if you like I can push the changes through when I start a sanity check on the mission articles. --Aspectacle 21:45, 14 January 2008 (UTC)
That would be awesome. I'm not really into the mission articles, so I'm not sure what works best. I just know I dislike two navs, but if it's necessary I'd like them sorted from smaller to bigger area. - anja talk 21:48, 14 January 2008 (UTC)
A few more days to sort out my 'net connection and I'll be all over the mission articles. :) I'll continue to think about the navs - there may be a better solution. --Aspectacle 22:04, 14 January 2008 (UTC)
Image:Tick green.png — ク Eloc 貢 04:58, 15 January 2008 (UTC)
Regarding Anja's concerns on the elite skill, is it this way because location formatting does it that way, or is it the other way around? If we do change it here, it's probably best to change it there as well. -- ab.er.rant 11:13, 22 February 2008 (UTC)
I've always wanted to merge the formating. Having one formating for every location type except one... Perhaps I'm the only one who likes consistancy? Backsword 11:19, 22 February 2008 (UTC)
Well, I suppose it's all right if you can keep them easy to glance through for someone new to the formatting. If it starts getting littered with a lot "omit this section if blah-blah", then it's probably not a good idea. -- ab.er.rant 11:23, 22 February 2008 (UTC)
The thing that seperates them from other locations are the mission objectives. Since they have those, there is the walkthrough. That's two sections. Of course, there is the infobox, which coudl either stay or be merged, eing fairly similar. So, there would be some of that, but nothing like the NPC formating. Backsword 13:40, 23 February 2008 (UTC)
The only real thing in common between missions and locations is the list of NPCs? If you think that is a good reason to merge them - then go nuts. It doesn't especially make sense to me.
Re: the skill/unique formatting. The missions are pretty consistently on the former format (without uniques for the most part) but the few explorables I've looked at are fairly randomly formatted in this area. That is an aside because I think this format was changed for the format used by locations. --Aspectacle 09:43, 24 February 2008 (UTC)
I would not call a mission a location, they have more in common with quests than a town, for example. A mission is not a location, it's a "happening", the mission takes place in a location, just like quests. That's how I see it. - anja talk 19:23, 24 February 2008 (UTC)


[edit] Formatting Rewards

I request that it be considered by all, that my new template be integrated into this Mission Formatting Guide. Ongoing input is happening here. Example of template here:

Template:Mission_Rewards

Normal Mode Time Taken (minutes) Experience Gold
Standard >25 1000 100
Expert <25 1500 150
Master <20 2000 200
Hard Mode Time Taken (minutes) Experience Gold
Standard >25 1000 200
Expert <25 2000 300
Master <20 3000 500

-- RavenJWolfe image:User_RavenJWolfe_Icon4sig.png 21:44, 11 March 2008 (UTC)

I've added a comment to your original thread. --Aspectacle 22:34, 11 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Link to cinematics page

I propose removign the cut scene information for the mission pages and using this template. {{Cinematic link}} under a ===Cinematic== header. You could still place this under the lvl 2 dialogue header. — Seru Talk 01:34, 12 August 2008 (UTC)

I am opposed to removing cinematic dialogue from mission articles. Cinematic dialogue is part of the mission dialogue, there is no reason to remove a significant portion of a mission's dialogue from its' main article. I'm okay with restricting other cinematic-specific information on the cinematic pages. -- Gordon Ecker 05:54, 12 August 2008 (UTC)
Same with Gordon. It would seem inconvenient to have full mission dialogue spread out in multiple pages, especially for missions with multiple cutscenes. -- ab.er.rant 06:33, 12 August 2008 (UTC)
Even if the mission has 2+cinematic they are all still on the same page. — Seru Talk 14:17, 12 August 2008 (UTC)
See the cinematic project page and guidelines. — Seru Talk 14:23, 12 August 2008 (UTC)
I don't mind whether the dialogue stays, but if it doesn't, I don't think we should use a template. Templates can make things harder for ordinary contributors because most may not understand how they work. Rather than having to look around for the right template, it's just as easy to type it manually -- it's nothing overly largeor confusing. Also, I'm opposed to the spoiler warning... as I said at Template talk:Cinematic infobox. -- Brains12 \ talk 14:51, 12 August 2008 (UTC)
Even if it does stay there should be a "See mission (cinematic) for more information." or something similar to that. — Seru Talk 14:54, 12 August 2008 (UTC)
Agreed. My earlier concern was similar to Gordon's but perhaps I've misunderstood you. I'm reading your suggestion as "deleting the dialogue portions that's seen in cutscenes and replacing it with a link". That's why I didn't agree to it. The sequence of reading the dialogue won't be a natural sequence when there are multiple cutscenes with non-cutscene dialogue interspersed between them. -- ab.er.rant 07:26, 13 August 2008 (UTC)
The Cinematics pages are nearly done, I think we need to come up with a way to integrate the two areas Mission (or Quest) articles and Cinematics articles to make it easier for users to find the more detailed information. I can understand the concern of interrupting the flow of the dialogue, however, I must point out that the dialogue transcriptions on mission and quest pages are in some cases incomplete, in many cases inconsistent, and in other cases non-existent. I think the easiest way might be to make the dialogue sections of the Cinematics pages into subpages (like what is done with collectors and weaponsmiths), and simply include them in the appropriate mission or quest page, and then link the word Cinematic to the corresponding page. That would maintain a consistency in the dialogue transcription across the wiki. --Wyn's Talk page Wyn 06:10, 25 August 2008 (UTC)
I do think dialogue should be listed on the mission pages, even if it is in the cutscene, since it sometimes is necessary to understand the mission. Having it on subpages to include on both cinematic and mission pages seems like a good solution to me, it is just one article to edit but the information is visible where it is needed. - anja talk 18:45, 25 August 2008 (UTC)
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