User talk:TEF/Templates/Replication

its a bit ugly in terms of colour, but it looks way better than any of the awful replication walls of text we have atm. --File:User Chieftain Alex Chieftain Signature.jpg Chieftain Alex 17:28, 21 March 2012 (UTC)

Thanks. (Also: never rely on me for browser color schemes; no one ever likes the ones I use.)

I've been thinking more about this and it seems to me that our current approach (which this template follows) makes things look more complicated than they are. This might be a first stab at simplification, but it requires a lot of manual parameter setting.

Essentially, there are only a few ways to replicate a unique:

1. Find another unique with identical stats.
2. Find a fully modifiable weapon and apply the necessary mods.
3. Find a collector weapon with some / all of the stats and upgrade it.

For the first, we should just say: these uniques have the same stats. For the second, we should just say "fully modifiable [weapon]" and list the mods and rely on people to follow the link to find the various sources. More often than not, people are going to upgrade one of their cool-looking gold drops rather than track down a crafter.

Only the third case is actually helpful, because it is the only one that offers a lower-cost version. It's also the only non-straightforward combination, because for all intents and purposes, the necessary collectors (and required trophies) are random — there's no way to figure out where to go without the wiki (or keeping track using a personal version of the same). Short of overhauling how we track collector weapons, the replica section of weapon articles is the only place that makes this easier. In short, we should reduce the clutter so that this case is simple to read.

If you (or Kirbman when if he reads this) have any ideas how we can make things easier, I'd love to hear about them. – Tennessee Ernie Ford (TEF) 17:49, 21 March 2012 (UTC)

Ok I put what i think it should look like on User:Chieftain Alex/sandbox - I can't get the display text for the axe haft and grip to work though, even though it worked perfectly on the inscription. (using User:Chieftain Alex/Templates/Icon) --File:User Chieftain Alex Chieftain Signature.jpg Chieftain Alex 18:37, 21 March 2012 (UTC)

I like where you are going with that.

• For prefix/suffix, I would try to remove the redundant text, e.g. Vampiric under prefix (instead of Vampiric Axe Haft).
• As noted above, I'd like to see simply, fully modifiable axe in place of a list. Otherwise, we repeat an identical list on every unique axe page, which seems like unnecessary clutter.
  • This would require separating the fully mod replication tips from the collector/crafter inherrently modded items, but I think that's worth it.
• I'd also like to distinguish between replica as an exact copy and replicating the stats (those that use a different skin).
• I like the middle version with the icons (less horrible to the eye).

Good stuff. – Tennessee Ernie Ford (TEF) 01:56, 22 March 2012 (UTC)