Starting a Wiki

[echephron]

So is there a wiki? should i start a wiki right now? ACG was talking about making OCTGN link to it for rules clarification.

[Coshade]

This is a great idea. A single source to reference rules vs loading pdfs would expedite a lot of my rule questions.

[echephron]

I'm trying to start one right now, but i have no experience so its taking a while. I think i should make up some templates for spells or something. it would be sweet if i knew how to pull everything out of the OCTGN database

[Toxziq]

I don't believe we have a wiki, but if the fans demand one, I'd be interested in talking more about it. 

[ACG]

For our part (i.e. the OCTGN dev team), a properly formatted wiki would make it much easier to provide in-game rules clarifications. Currently, we have to enter every clarification into a txt file, which must be updated every time a change is made. What we want to do is allow players to access information from a wiki in game. Then we would no longer need to maintain the content side of such features; the community could take care of keeping the wiki current.

If a wiki is started, we can discuss the formatting. It would be best if Arcane Wonders were to host it.

[echephron]

So here is what I got so far. Just enchantment transfusion and acid ball. I'm new at this so the format may later change. I discourage others from adding to it until things are better cemented.

Arcane Wonder Bigwigs: If you have concerns such as fair use of images or something i dont understand, let me know and I'll correct it.

http://magewarsboardgame.wikia.com/wiki/Mage_Wars_Wikia

[Intangible0]

Echephron,

This is a great idea. I know I certainly appreciate you going out of your way to do this. I'll try to throw some stuff up there in the next few days as well. The more people we have contributing to the Wiki the sooner this community will have a fleshed out source.

[ACG]

Thank you for starting this. Once I have some time, I'll figure out how to link the OCTGN in-game features to the wiki, and let you know if there are any formatting requirements.

[ACG]

Okay, I successfully accessed information from the wiki from within Octgn. Which means we are good to go. Here is what we need from the wiki on the programming side:

1. We need a standardized format for the URLs of the wiki pages. For example, the URL for acid ball is:

http://magewarsboardgame.wikia.com/wiki/Acid_Ball

That is fine, but all pages that relate to spells will need the same URL format, and the name must appear exactly as it does on the card (no spelling errors). So:

http://magewarsboardgame.wikia.com/wiki/Veteran's_Belt
http://magewarsboardgame.wikia.com/wiki/Bitterwood_Fox
http://magewarsboardgame.wikia.com/wiki/Anvil_Throne_Crossbowman

I assume this is how you will want to handle this anyway, so no problem there. For pages dedicated to rules, it would be best if they were the codex entry names, for instance

http://magewarsboardgame.wikia.com/wiki/Melee_+X

(not sure whether + is a legal character for urls).

I'm not sure how to handle rules clarifications that don't correspond to a codex entry, though.

2. For rules entries, we need a standardized format for each section, and it needs to be consistent. For instance, Acid Ball has a "rules interactions" section; that's fine, but if that is the way that we format it, every card will need a section labelled "rules interactions", in exactly the same way. We are able to search for strings between other strings, so as long as we have a uniform format, it should be easy to access data for cards.

3. I was thinking that it might be nice to have a question-answer type format for the individual entries. For instance:

Q: Can my effect die roll be reduced below 1?
A: Yes. In this case, you will not inflict a corrode.

Then the questions can be posed as buttons, which produce the answer when the player clicks on them, so that the player has less information to read (doesn't matter so much for acid ball, but could be important with cards that have more complicated interactions).

We should settle on a format before you add too many cards, or open it up for the community to enter data. Consistency is important to ensure that all of the data can be accessed from in-game.

[echephron]

Seems like "Q and A" and "Rules Interaction" would cover the same material, so one or the other. When i look up rules, its usually the interaction of thing A and thing B, so I would just search for A on page B or vice versa. Maybe I could put bullets under rules interaction like:
----
"Enchantment Transfusion
Interactions with other Stuff:
   *Block- If you move block at the end of the declare attack step, it may block the attack in the avoid attack step.
   *[[Spells which destroy enchantments]] - if you move a targetted enchantment to a new target before the spell resolves, the dispelling spell is cancelled. If you move an untargetted enchantment to outside of the effect before the spell resolved, it is not destroyed."
----

+ signs are fine. I made a page after that melee+x link

Yes I am trying to have a standard format for every spell with specific headings. basically copy+paste the template then fill in the details. I also want to copy->paste codex stuff, so people can verify some interactions themselves.

I'm thinking of removing half of the Stats section since just looking at the card image answers a lot of it. not the stuff that can use links like (sub)types or schools, but more like the "costs 5 mana" stuff. I am still not sure if I can just post every spell card image on the wiki, so I am waiting.

I also need a template for non-spell entries like conditions, traits, and mages. I'll also need to find some images of conditions since I was gonna pull spell images one at a time of the card database.


yeah, I'm pretty lazy so links to non-spell images would save me some time(conditions, tokens, and mage cards mostly)

[echephron]

The only pages I'm putting up now are for specific spells. Pages like Corrode and traits will take different templates and more thought. I think I have a template design set for spells. It just includes Interactions and Codex. The QnA can be worked into the Interactions. Maybe a "See Also:" at the end as well.

I'll start putting some spells up. I'll do it in alphabetical order form the codex. So today I finished the "D"s from the codex. The interactions part will be poor for now since each spell requires individual thought. Prolly about 35 spells up there now.

I suppose people can add stuff to it now since I have a format now. Filling in the interactions part is pretty easy, and will need some effort later. If you add a Spell or Image without my exact format, I may just overwrite it all.

[ACG]

So the interactions format is

[Card name or codex term]: [Entry]

That is fine; what about the codex entries?

Basically, I want to give each bullet point a short and descriptive label to be used as a button, so that players don't have to read through all the text when looking for clarifications. I think Q&A format would work the best, but anything that lets you shorten things to a sentence would work.

For example, with Blue Gremlin you could simplify his codex entries by moving some of them to interactions:

Unmovable/Restrained:Blue Gremlin can Teleport even if Unmovable or Restrained.

Hindering:

And then labeling the codex entries:

Description of ability: When this creature is activated, you may pay 1 mana. If you do, Gremlin gains the Fast trait until end of round, and until end of round he can’t take normal move actions but can Teleport to an adjacent zone instead of a move action.

LOS requirements: He does not need to have LoS to the zones he Teleports to.

Interaction with mandatory action effects:If a mandatory action effect would force Blue Gremlin to move, and this move could only be performed by using the Teleport ability, Blue Gremlin would not be forced to use that ability. (This is because the mandatory action effect only applies at the moment Blue Gremlin would be choosing an action, which is after the time that the Blue Gremlin’s ability is used. If Blue Gremlin did choose to use the Teleport ability, it would then be bound

Meaning of "Move Actions": Teleporting to a zone counts the same as a move action for the purpose of the number of actions you can perform in a round, but are not “move actions” for any other purpose. Thus, by paying the 1 mana, Blue Gremlin could teleport twice, and then take a quick action. He can do this even if hindered (hindering has no effect on Teleporting).

Maybe not the best headings, but the important thing is to break up clarifications into little parts when possible and label each part clearly.

[echephron]

I figured the codex would be a complete cut n paste so its more official. Maybe rewording it would be good.

[Laddinfance]

The beauty of a Wiki is that your can link related rulings and such. That would be an area where the codex could be improved upon for this endeavor.

[netzhuffle]

Could you please add the card numbers (e.g. MW1E18) to the spell pages in the details box?

The spell names change in the non-English editions, but the card number stays the same. That would make it easier to find a certain spell if your playing with German cards.

(Bear in mind that there are spells with multiple card numbers because they are contained in different sets.)