Template talk:Appearances

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As everyone is probably aware, we had based this entirely on Wookieepedia's template with almost no modification but obviously it should be adapted to the Assassin's Creed universe. For example, I was wondering if we should just merge "creatures" and "sapient species" into "species". For one thing, the only two sapient species in Assassin's Creed are Isu and humans. For another thing, this precise terminology may be a bit awkward for Assassin's Creed fans. Star Wars makes a point of misusing the term "sentient species" to mean "sapient species" and always referring to non-sapient species as "creatures" not "animals".

Apart from this, I am wondering if we should distinguish between geographical locations and political locations. While editing the appearance box for Assassin's Creed: Dynasty, it felt a bit imprecise to list all the locations in China under "China" rather than the actual name of the country at the time, the Tang. So I was confused about this. And yet then again, I also listed geographical locations like mountains which were within Tang territory, so within a state, political and physical geography maybe can blur.

By the way, I noticed that sometimes we list the planet Earth (again, after Star Wars practice), but I would argue we should just omit Earth since essentially all Assassin's Creed settings have been on Earth, so it basically cancels out. It would also remove a level of indentation.

Finally, I want us to consider what other ways we should reorganize our categories for this to tune it to Assassin's Creed. For instance, there is a miscellaneous category, but could we group some things that would go under there into another category? Sol Pacificus^(Cyfiero) 15:37, 11 February 2022 (UTC)

Honestly I have always felt this section unnecessary given our use of the navbox at the bottom of the page covering all the important elements much more succinctly imo. Lacrossedeamon (talk) 04:31, 5 March 2022 (UTC)

Agree with Lacrosse on this. XOdeyssusx (talk) 04:58, 5 March 2022 (UTC)

The appearances section for media articles was introduced at the same time as the same section for in-universe articles, but we only ever made partial efforts in implementing it. I am not sure if the navigation boxes fulfill all the functions of having an appearances section for media pages because the navigation boxes are not comprehensive and contain within them probably less than 1/100 of the subjects that do appear in a source. This section may be helpful for editors and readers trying to identify all the subjects that have appeared in a source or what has or has not appeared in the source. Certainly, it has proven incredibly useful for me on Wookieepedia, but I do not know how much benefit it could provide for Assassin's Creed and whether it is necessary. For the latest games, I can imagine that it could be too challenging for us to make the lists complete although it might also be helpful for readers wanting to have a ready-made list of everything in those games. So I am 60/40 on this. Sol Pacificus^(Cyfiero) 07:29, 5 March 2022 (UTC)

I would also add that I do fear that the appearance section for media pages would be too overbearing to really work on, but I also disagree that the navigation boxes have been succinct. I almost never rely on navigation boxes anymore precisely because I think they've become too messy and inconsistent, but this is more a problem with updating our formatting standards of navigation boxes and our criteria for inclusion in them. But we should settle all this quickly because I think the half-implement section in media pages look really unprofessional. Sol Pacificus^(Cyfiero) 07:32, 5 March 2022 (UTC)