Section Standardization

[Chaos he/him]

Hello fellow Worldbringers (as in, people who work on the Coppermind a lot). I remember in a previous discussion about past vs. present tense we came up with a standardized sections for Character articles. Since our main book pages are generally awful (Well of Ascension is finally acceptable thanks to Feather), I thought we'd discuss some other section titles that should be standard for the primary content categories. First off we'll discuss what to do with books, and then this topic can expand this to other categories.

 

So what sections should be in a good Books article? Looking at the books articles, we get this list:

 

Cover synopsis

Summary

Characters

Magic

Publications

Awards

 

What else should be added? I also feel that we need to include multiple editions of the covers--at least the English ones--on a book page, which would be most important for the Mistborn books, where the covers changed a lot from hardback to paperback. 

[Argent he/him]

When I doubt, I like to look at Wikipedia. There is a reason we use a Wiki, after all. I understand that Wikipedia is a much more general encyclopedia and might not be the best source for a template, but it's still a pretty good one.

 

The Lord of the Rings page looks similar to what you have outlined there (disregarding order, I don't think the differences are significant; not in this case, at least). (Plot) Summary and (Main) Characters are pretty much mandatory. Magic should be mandatory for us, since Brandon is and definitely will be remembered as "the magic systems guy." Publications is present in both, and while I personally don't find it as important, I can see why it's included and don't mind it. Things like Legacy, Adaptations, and Reception should probably be left off for now - Brandon is still a pretty new author, so those things don't necessarily apply to all of his works (though we should probably add something for Mistborn: Birthright sometime down the line); Awards (as well as nominations and notable press rankings, such as #1 on various bestseller lists) can stay, I like bragging rights. Setting or World should definitely be added, I think - the bulk for those sections should go to the respective world's page, but we should have something.

[FeatherWriter she/her]

Can't imagine what might have sparked this line of inquiry... Certainly not an update to the WoA page... (/self promotion)

 

Yeah, I think that lineup looks good, but we should probably add a section about the Setting/World. 

[Argent he/him]

I think you misspelled "Yea, Argent and his ideas are pretty awesome and spot-on!"

[FeatherWriter she/her]

Hey, you got an upvote for it, silly! Don't get pushy. *raps your knuckles*

[cem he/him]

Do we really need the Magic section? This is from the tWoK page:

Roshar has several magic systems. Most of these are used by the Knights Radiant orders, with some of these powers including Soulcasting and Surgebinding. Independent of the Radiant orders is the Old Magic.

The Ten Essences have not been elaborated on much in the book, though they have something to do with Soulcasting.

I think we can all agree this is inadequate, vague and not exactly accurate. It was maybe good enough at some point because we didn't know much about magic then. But we got lots of new information about it since then and no one thought of updating the book page. It's understandable. Even if someone thought of it, it would just be a duplication of effort so it doesn't exactly motivate a person to do it, you know?

 

Another thing is Stormlight Archive is going to be a 10 book series assuming there are no spin-offs, short stories and the like. Are we going to put the same information for every one of those 10 books? That would be kind of pointless.

 

So I'm proposing we leave things like magic, culture of the world etcetera in the navigation box below. It would save us a lot of effort to keep the Coppermind up to date and well... I don't think redundancy is pretty.

 

So...

• Cover Synopsis
• Plot Summary
• Characters (a little info on main characters like Kaladin, Shallan, Dalinar, Szeth and a simple list of important but side characters)
• Awards, nominations, sales numbers etc.

I think these four sections are ideal.

Edited October 29, 2013 by cem

[Joe ST he/him]

Well maybe the Magic section should discuss magics introduced by that book (aka, Mistborn is Allomancy, then Feruchemy then Hemalurgy, with AoL having twinborn and compounding and stuff). The series page for Stormlight Archive should probably have a Magic section for over-all discussion, with a 'for more' link.

[Chaos he/him]

I like that scheme, Joe. I also like the idea of a Setting section, but it has a similar problem to the magic section. What do we do with sequels?

The book page for a sequel really ought to be a hub for getting to the new content introduced in that book.

[Argent he/him]

Even books within the same series often differ in terms of setting and magic. While all three Mistborn books talk about all three of the Metallic arts, Allomancy is most strongly covered in The Final Empire, Feruchemy - in The Well of Ascension, and Hemalurgy - in The Hero of Ages. The setting is also different between those three novels. Similarly, Elantris and The Emperor's Soul might take place on the same planet, but they differ vastly in terms of both magic and setting. Bottom line, I don't see the problem - each book usually offers some measure of new information, and it is this new information that should be the bulk of the Magic section for that book's page (with quick summaries of other relevant but already covered / not yet covered magics in the series). A brief summary of those in-book descriptions of the magic systems can be added for the series' page. An in-depth description of each magic system belongs to that magic system's page, and it alone.

[FeatherWriter she/her]

Even with books in the Stormlight Archive, I'm assuming we're going to see more than just The Shattered Plains and Kharbranth, so the "Settings" sections are going to be very different for each book. For individual books, the "Magic" section, I concur that it should focus on developments and reveals in the magic system that take place in that book.

[WeiryWriter he/him]

I like the idea of a Setting section, it is one of the three pillars of storytelling and it makes sense to have a section for each.  I would actually have "Magic" as a subsection of "Setting" though, since the magic systems are technically a part of  setting.  And I agree with having those sections dealing specifically with the new information brought to light in each book.  (As people have mentioned before, TFE-Allomancy, WoA-Feruchemy, HoA-Hemalurgy, AoL-Twinborns).

 

Also for Characters, are we dealing with Main Characters or Viewpoint Characters because those two lists, while mostly the same, are not exactly the same.

[Chaos he/him]

I like the idea of a Setting section, it is one of the three pillars of storytelling and it makes sense to have a section for each.  I would actually have "Magic" as a subsection of "Setting" though, since the magic systems are technically a part of  setting.  And I agree with having those sections dealing specifically with the new information brought to light in each book.  (As people have mentioned before, TFE-Allomancy, WoA-Feruchemy, HoA-Hemalurgy, AoL-Twinborns).

 

Also for Characters, are we dealing with Main Characters or Viewpoint Characters because those two lists, while mostly the same, are not exactly the same.

 

I like having Magic being a subset of Setting. Also, Main Characters. There are a lot of throwaway viewpoint at times that do not need to be listed.

 

Should we have a quotes section for awesome quotes in the book? I realize it will duplicate effort a bit, but I really like Quotes in character articles. I think it adds a lot.

[WeiryWriter he/him]

I like having Magic being a subset of Setting. Also, Main Characters. There are a lot of throwaway viewpoint at times that do not need to be listed.

 

Should we have a quotes section for awesome quotes in the book? I realize it will duplicate effort a bit, but I really like Quotes in character articles. I think it adds a lot.

 

Oh by "Viewpoint Characters" I meant primary viewpoints, not throwaways. (i.e. Elend has viewpoints in all three books but he is only a primary viewpoint in the second two) Primary viewpoints are by default main characters but not all main characters have viewpoints.  (I do think a Character should be all main characters but should have the primary viewpoints noted as such)

[Chaos he/him]

I'd like to bump this topic and also open up discussion about section standardization for Places. This is actually surprisingly hard, since some Places articles are short, some are long, and some just have different purposes entirely. Roshar's page will have way different sections than, say, Alethkar. How in the world do we begin to standardize it?

[cem he/him]

Yeah, I don't think it's a good idea to use the same layout for every place article. Let's divide them into four categories and create a different layout for each of them: Shardworlds, nations, settlements (cities/towns/villages), and buildings.

 

• Nations
  • History
  • Geography
  • Politics
    • Government
    • Internal politics
    • Foreign relations
    • Military
  • Culture
    • Religion
    • Language
  • Demographics
• Settlements
  • History
  • Geography
  • Cityscape
  • Administration
  • Culture
  • Demographics

I think these are good for cities and nations. If there is need for extra sections, AonDor stuff for Elantris for example, it can be added of course. I'm not sure what to use for worlds and buildings, except that both should have a history section and buildings should have layout and architecture. I'll think on it.