The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was delete all, but merge information from the character pages to List of Guild Wars characters, except that the copyvio pages will be deleted without merge. I discounted all opinions, whether keep or delete, from editors with fewer than 50 edits; more delete than keep voters were disqualified by this pass. I discounted 2 keep votes because they provided no justification or discussion. About 75% of counted opinons were in favor of deletion. Nandesuka 00:40, 5 August 2006 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Guild Wars articles[edit]

If you came here because someone asked you to, or you read a message on another website, please note that this is not a majority vote, but instead a discussion among Wikipedia contributors. Wikipedia has policies and guidelines regarding the encyclopedia's content, and consensus (agreement) is gauged based on the merits of the arguments, not by counting votes.

However, you are invited to participate and your opinion is welcome. Remember to assume good faith on the part of others and to sign your posts on this page by adding ~~~~ at the end.

Note: Comments may be tagged as follows. Suspected single-purpose accounts: ((subst:spa|username)), suspected canvassed users: ((subst:canvassed|username)), accounts blocked for sockpuppetry: ((subst:csm|username)) or ((subst:csp|username))

This is a group nomination of the following articles for being gamecruft. Note that there is already a wiki on Guild Wars, GuildWiki, that is linked to from Guild Wars and has all the relevant information.

Characters

Mhenlo
Devona (Guild Wars)
Cynn
Aidan (Guild Wars)
Prince Rurik (copyvio from [1])
King Adelbern (copyvio from [2])
Nika (Guild Wars) (added 16:05, 28 July 2006 (UTC))

Guide-style information

Character builds in the Guild Wars universe
Equipment in the Guild Wars Universe
Locations in the Guild Wars Universe
Professions in the Guild Wars universe

None of these topics are notable enough for articles of their own, and these articles also have the usual WP:V, WP:NPOV and WP:NOR concerns.

Concluded AfDs that I am citing as precedent:

One possible remedy short of outright deletion is to merge them all into Guild Wars. If consensus heads that way and there are no volunteers, I will do the merging.

— Kaustuv Chaudhuri 11:54, 25 July 2006 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Comment: I just discovered this after writing the above nomination rationale, but several of the articles such as Prince Rurik are cut-and-pastes from something called "Guild Wars Manuscripts", which Google tells me is the name of the documentation booklet that comes with the game. Thus, these areticles are copyvios as well and might satisfy CSD A8, though I am not tagging them as such. — Kaustuv Chaudhuri 12:44, 25 July 2006 (UTC)Reply[reply]
Further comment: I have discovered that these manuals are available from the guildwars.com site itself[3]. I have noted above the two articles that appear to have their text essentially completely cut-and-pasted from the "Prophecies" manual. — Kaustuv Chaudhuri 15:18, 25 July 2006 (UTC)Reply[reply]
Comment, My first thought would be to merge all of the character articles into a "List of" article and delete the other articles because Wikipedia is not a video game guide. However, if these are copyvios, then Delete all is the only response. --TheFarix (Talk) 13:50, 25 July 2006 (UTC)Reply[reply]
Keep. These articles could - and should - be improved, expanded on and made into decent substantial articles. If you deleted these, you would have to also delete BlizzCon, Corrupted Blood, Gold farming, Leeroy Jenkins, List of Warcraft characters, Locations in the Warcraft Universe, Pop culture references in World of Warcraft, Warcraft the Roleplaying Game, World of Warcraft: The Board Game, World of Warcraft Forums, World of Warcraft items and equipment, World of Warcraft terminology, World of Warcraft Trading Card Game, .BLP, .DBC, and .MPQ file formats, since they are all to do with a popular MMORPG and are generally of same relevance (I mean, why have an article on a player just because he did something funny? Is Leeroy Jenkins seriously more notable than Guild Wars?). And before you start waving your big red flag of nonnotability, I feel the need to inform you that Guild Wars has over 2 million sales, hitting the #1 spot of video games simultaeneously in Europe and America. Also, I would be willing to bet that if you merged all of those with their respective articles, the page sizes would increase exponentially, which is never a good thing. --Lugiatm (talk • contribs) 14:32, 25 July 2006 (UTC)Reply[reply]
Comment: The notability of Guild Wars is not the issue and you should note that I have not nominated Guild Wars, Guild Wars Factions or Guild Wars Nightfall for deletion. The question to answer is: is Mhenlo notable? Where (outside of Guild Wars) is he notable? Similarly for the rest of the nominated articles. If you want to "expand" these articles, you should find a more appropriate location, such as GuildWiki or Wikia:GuildWars. — Kaustuv Chaudhuri 14:41, 25 July 2006 (UTC)Reply[reply]
Comment: With regards to the notability issue would adding extra references to where Mhenlo is mentioned (besides the game manual) help in increasing his notability? I ask this since for World of Warcraft there is a list of characters page that has over 100 characters and it doesn't even have a list of references for the characters. Secondly, WoW also has a wiki with all the relevant information. Thirdly, some of the characters listed there aren't even major NPCs in terms of their relevance to the plot (see Captain Placeholder for an example). However, as we can see with the Captain Placeholder example, he is somehow allowed to exist on Wikipedia. The only reason I could fathom why is because of the extra references to his existence on the page which hasn't prompted anyone to mark it for AFD. Deletion of the GW character articles would appear hypocritical taking this information on-board. Just letting you know ;) --Rambutaan 04:27, 26 July 2006 (UTC)Reply[reply]
I am now curious. Where outside of the Guild Wars games and their associate manuals, web-sites and fansites has Mhenlo become notable? — Kaustuv Chaudhuri 13:28, 26 July 2006 (UTC)Reply[reply]
That's exactly my point. If you wish to delete character articles based on their notability outside their fanbase then it confuses me why the GW characters have been singled out for deletion, when there are hundreds of others out there (not only from games, but from more obscure TV shows as well) that have gone under the radar. I've provided WoW as one example but can provide more examples if requested. To answer your question directly though, I don't think Mhenlo is notable outside of Guild Wars - but neither is Captain Placeholder out of WoW :P --Rambutaan 00:51, 27 July 2006 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Comment: just because other games do it, does mean that it is justification for the Guild Wars pages to exist. I don't think it creates a precedent. I mean when you look at the WoW characters page do you think that it's interesting information for a non-wow player, useful information for someone trying to find out the basics of WoW without actually owning the game? Do you think they should exist? Do you think that a Guild Wars equivalent would be any more useful?
If we add more pages where do we *stop*? I can think of at least 2 characters (from prophecies) not created which I consider more important than those which have been created.
Finally, the factions article remained incomplete and inaccurate for a long time after the release of the game. Only one person did any significant work on the article post release - me. There is not the interest from the guild wars community in this wikipedia site for the content to be significantly expanded. --Aspectacle 06:57, 26 July 2006 (UTC)Reply[reply]
That's true, "two wrongs don't make a right" but I'm wondering why GW was targeted in particular instead of WoW? I'm trying to get to the root of the problem here. If the style or information is scarce then fine leave it for improvement. Isn't wikipedia meant to be a collaborative and dynamic piece of work that is continually improved by multiple editors? Articles can be made into "perfect articles" but are by no means expected to be one from the start - that basically defeats the purpose of Wikipedia being a collaborative environment. With reference to the characters that weren't mentioned here (I'm assuming you're possibly talking about Vizier Khilbron, Saidra, Evennia, etc.) it is true that they're important too and I would recommend that articles be created on them too. Your final point Aspectacle however is perhaps the only reason I'll probably back down from keeping the article :P since if informed GW Wikipedia editors are scarce then it is unlikely that the articles as they stand will be improved (I'll try my best to improve them when I have time but I'm usually pretty busy). If this truly is the case, if noone else can be bothered improving the articles, then I agree they should be removed - even though it's pretty disappointing in my view considering the initial effort I put in getting them to slot in nicely in Wikipedia :P. --Rambutaan 00:51, 27 July 2006 (UTC)Reply[reply]
This AfD singles out Guild Wars articles in order to remain coherent, but you should be aware that in recent weeks there have been a large number of gaming-related deletion discussions (several of which I have cited as precedent). Note in particular Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Deadmines that purged a large number of World of Warcraft articles from WP. Please do not think that I am singling out Guild Wars for unfair treatment. — Kaustuv Chaudhuri 00:59, 27 July 2006 (UTC)Reply[reply]
Yes I've read the other game articles that have been cited as a precedent but NONE of them have had their pages with character bios deleted. 1. The WoW article that got deleted was talking about various "instances" in WoW - this isn't an article on "instances" or various arenas that are in GW. 2. The Zergling article from Starcraft is about one of the units in the game not a character with background story 3. The CS article is on maps you can play in the game, again these articles aren't concerned with character bios, 4. The rest of the articles on RA2, Starcraft and AoE are all on units and structures in the RTSes - not character bios. Putting these articles in the same vein as these articles when GW is an RPG and NOT including any other articles with character bios from other RPGs is discrimination IMHO. All the aforementioned articles are concerned with "gameguide" material whereas the character articles which are being AFDed aren't --Rambutaan 01:14, 27 July 2006 (UTC)Reply[reply]
I don't dispute your characterisation of these articles. In fact, if you read the nomination, I have marked which articles I consider to be in the style of game guides. I nominated the characters for deletion because they are not notable. Incidentally, I am led to understand that these NPCs ("henchmen") can be used like units in an RTS, which would make them quite akin to Starcraft or AoE units, though the articles currently (and wisely) avoid documenting this aspect. — Kaustuv Chaudhuri 01:52, 27 July 2006 (UTC)Reply[reply]
Lol if we keep this up we're going to have very narrow paragraphs :P. Alright, now that we've made the distinction between the Profession, location, etc, articles and the character articles we can get back to the debate on them being "not-notable". As mentioned earlier, this is a grey area since how do you decide when a character is notable or not? Judging on other material in Wikipedia that has been allowed I would say that just because the character isn't notable in media besides its native one doesn't imply that it's not-notable full stop (I've provided an example previously). If you wish to say I'm wrong in this regard then I accept that but under protest since an injustice is being committed as there are several other examples of "not-notable" characters dwelling in Wikipedia that are somehow, notable, even though they don't exist in any form besides existing in a game. I can see how people may perceive these major NPCs in GW as like units in an RTS, but it's not one view I prescribe to. They aren't exclusively used as tools to aid the player in PvE exploration but add their own contributions to Guild Wars lore (especially now they've been tied-in with both chapters with the release of Factions). In fact, in preview trailers of the original Guild Wars, Devona, Aidan and Cynn were featured with Devona's character narrating the setting of the game giving further evidence that they are not intended as simply units to be ordered about. --Rambutaan 03:18, 27 July 2006 (UTC)Reply[reply]
Keep. -- SonicChao> 14:57, 25 July 2006 (UTC)Reply[reply]
Comment - as per Wikipedia:Guide_to_deletion#Discussion - please always explain your vote, or it may be ignored by the closing admin. Proto::type 10:19, 27 July 2006 (UTC)Reply[reply]
Keep. --PetteriH 15:49, 25 July 2006 (UTC)Reply[reply]
Comment - as per Wikipedia:Guide_to_deletion#Discussion - please always explain your vote, or it may be ignored by the closing admin. Proto::type 10:19, 27 July 2006 (UTC)Reply[reply]
Note: This debate has been added to the list of CVG deletions. — Kaustuv Chaudhuri 15:02, 25 July 2006 (UTC)Reply[reply]
Delete - I like Guild wars, but the frst chunk is articles about pretty non-notable NPCs, which belong on the guild wars wiki, and the second group is obvious game-guidery. --PresN 16:00, 25 July 2006 (UTC)Reply[reply]
Delete per nom. Game guides can go to a game-specific wiki if they want it. The rest is cruft. Recury 16:30, 25 July 2006 (UTC)Reply[reply]
Merge - Possibly into the GuildWars article, or as an alternative if there is enough interest, into one "List of GuildWars Characters", in the same vein as the "List Of Warcraft characters" article. There's enough background story of interest to possibly warrant that much, I believe. As it stands, I don't think each character needs their own article, at least not now. --Reverend Loki 17:50, 25 July 2006 (UTC)Reply[reply]
Delete - Delete the character articles they do not have a place in the wikipedia. Guildwiki does a fantastic job of keeping that information up to date and detailed. The rest are Merge. However, I am concerned that a direct merge will result in the main page being too large so a reduction in the content is necessary if this is to go ahead. I believe wikipedia should be a terse summary of the games, leave the detail to guildwiki. --Aspectacle 22:52, 25 July 2006 (UTC)Reply[reply]
Keep - Suspected copyright violations, such as Prince Rurik and King Adelbern should be tagged with ((Copyvio|source url)), and posted on Wikipedia:Copyright_problems, not deleted through the AFD process on the basis of the apparent copyright violation, since process on Wikipedia:Copyright_problems allows for a fuller examination of whether the work was licensed so as to allow use on Wikipedia, whether the use qualifies as fair use, whether the work was copied from Wikipedia, etc. As for the remaining articles, Wikipedia:Fancruft is an essay, not a policy, and thus does not supply a policy basis for deletion. Additionally, articles about characters in a popular video game would seem to be just as notable as articles about narrow aspects of any other similarly popular field of endeavor. Articles about video game characters aren't per se non-notable. John254 22:57, 25 July 2006 (UTC)Reply[reply]
Comment: I am not putting those two articles through the ((copyvio)) process because even if the copyvio issues were fixed they would continue to be articles on non-notable NPCs. — Kaustuv Chaudhuri 00:41, 26 July 2006 (UTC)Reply[reply]
Delete all per nom, except merge condensed and cleaned versions of Professions and Equipment to the main article. None of this is notable outside of Guildwars. GassyGuy 22:59, 25 July 2006 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Keep or Merge - I agree that there are suspected copyright violations for the Prince Rurik and King Adelbern articles but they can be worked on. Reading the fancruft page, I noticed these points: 1) "This is an essay expressing the opinions and ideas of some Wikipedians. While it can help explain and understand existing Wikipedia policies and guidelines, this is not an actual policy or guideline." - as such this is only a viewpoint and is not Wikipedia policy.

2) "While 'fancruft' is often a succinct and frank description of such accumulations, it also implies that the content is unimportant and the contributor's judgement of notability is lacking. Thus, use of this term may be regarded as pejorative." and "Generally speaking, the perception that an article is fancruft can be a contributing factor in its nomination and deletion, but it is not the actual reason for deletion. Rather, the term fancruft is a shorthand for content which one or more editors consider unencyclopaedic, possibly to the extent of violating policies on verifiability, neutrality or original research."

With this in mind the article cannot be deleted on the grounds of it being "gamecruft" although if you do find the information unencyclopaedic or not well written then I suggest that this warning is placed instead and hopefully others will contribute (Note that the articles are already mentioned as stubs on fictional characters and as such are not complete. There is still a great room for improvement as there are several quests and background lore that can build a picture of the characters mentioned).

I would be supportive of merging the character descriptions into the main article or into a Guild Wars Characters page, however I anticipated the articles to become quite large (although this obviously hasn't happened as of yet) hence my justification for creating separate articles.

I think the addition of articles on fictional characters is allowed since I've already seen numerous ones listed here on Wikipedia and considering at least 1 million (perhaps 2 million, although some may be duplicate accounts) have played this game coverage of these characters may be insignificant when compared to lets say characters out of the Bible for example, but still considerable enough to not be completely obscure.

Anyway that's my two cents worth.

Rambutaan 00:28, 26 July 2006 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Comment: note that "cruft" is an extremely common shorthand for failing WP:N, WP:V, WP:NOR and WP:NPOV, which you can read as the reasoning behind the nomination. With regard to articles that are simply not encyclopedic, the counteroffer to expand them is without merit because an article of any length on a non-notable character will still be worth deleting for the same reason. As has been repeatedly stated, there is no danger of the reader not having access to this information as there are much more comprehensive wikis on the topic of Guild Wars that WP directs interested readers to. Also, and once again, the notability of Guild Wars is not being disputed here— merely the individual notability of various NPCs within that game world. — Kaustuv Chaudhuri 00:41, 26 July 2006 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Comment: Would it be suitable for the wikipedia to use external links in the text to link to complete articles in the guildwiki. For instance Prince Rurik because if we are going to expand the wikipedia articles on the characters would we ever want to say more, or say it better, than what has already been written elsewhere? --Aspectacle 00:50, 26 July 2006 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Reply: I noticed after reading the article on "cruft" that it usually hints towards those issues but by itself doesn't necessarily indicate an article has those issues. That aside though (since that's not the crux of the argument), I am aware that your issue with the article was that the characters are "not-notable" and that is a fair challenge to make. As I mentioned earlier there is a lot of background lore and information on these characters available through the course of the game (which will be hard to verify for anyone who hasn't played the game) and through the GW Manual and Lore section (which will be easier to verify since this information is publically available from the Guild Wars website). I guess one of the interesting dilemmas about fictional characters in games is "Does anyone actually take notice of them?" This will depend on the game's player demographics and the genre of the game. Characters and storyline tend to be crucial to the success of games in the adventure and RPG genre - although whether a majority of the gamers actually take any notice of the NPCs in Guild Wars, I'm afraid I cannot give a definitive answer, although my view is that they do - hence the inclusion of the articles :). --Rambutaan 02:08, 26 July 2006 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Reply: Indeed there is some information in GuildWiki and best of all, it gives practical information on the NPCs too. My aim on adding them to Wikipedia was to expand on the actual character traits derived from Guild Wars fiction - sadly I may be alone in this regard as the current state of the articles testifies --Rambutaan 02:08, 26 July 2006 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Delete all character articles, as well as 'Equipment in ...' and 'Character Builds in ...' as those contain no encyclopedic value, and those pieces are better covered in the various fansites, including the above mentioned Guildwiki.org. Merge 'Locations in ...' and 'Professions in ...' into the Guild Wars product articles as a summarized version of the locations and professions may be useful to give someone an idea of what's in the games - although they should be condenced prior to merging. --- Barek (talk • contribs) - 09:31, 26 July 2006 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Comment After further review, I realized that the Guild Wars product articles already contain some profession information. The location information could still be expanded within the product articles, but just to summarize the regions, no need for an outpost-by-outpost listing. This can be done without doing a formal merge process - so I would change my recommendation to delete of all above nominated articles. --- Barek (talk • contribs) - 10:04, 26 July 2006 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Observation: I still support deletion of all nominated articles. However, I recently spotted this, which to me appears to be a WikiProject created for the sole purpose of finding ways to get around all the policies that would otherwise require deletion of those articles as well. While I am against keeping any of these articles, if that project succeeds, then in fairness I would have to support the existence of these types of articles in the future. --- Barek (talk • contribs) - 13:24, 28 July 2006 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Keep the characters and fix any copyvio problems, neutral on the rest for now. --badlydrawnjeff talk 11:00, 26 July 2006 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Comment: if anything, Guild Wars suffers from an abundance of wikis devoted to it. I have been able to discover at least the following:
1. GuildWiki (most comprehensive of the lot, having over 8k articles and several millions of page views) and its "unofficial" German version guildwiki.de.
2. GWO Wiki hosted by gwonline.net, a fansite officially sanctioned by ArenaNet.
3. Wikia:GuildWars and Wikia:GuildWarsCn (Chinese)
These sites have got the game covered. WP:NOT a fansite. — Kaustuv Chaudhuri 00:35, 27 July 2006 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Delete Lets see violates WP:NOT, WP:V, WP:OR...the list goes on. I like Guildwars but this stuff really isn't for Wikipedia. Whispering 01:12, 27 July 2006 (UTC)Reply[reply]
Strong delete - WP:NOT, WP:RS, WP:CVG, WP:NOR, WP:V all cast aside because of WP:ILIKEIT. And that's ignoring the fact many are copyvios. Proto::type 10:19, 27 July 2006 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Point of information "Many" of the articles aren't copyvios. Only the King Adelbern and Prince Rurik articles. Just setting this straight in case anyone is misled :). --Rambutaan 00:58, 28 July 2006 (UTC)Reply[reply]

keep please these are informative erasing them does not help the encyclopedia Yuckfoo 13:47, 27 July 2006 (UTC)Reply[reply]
Delete None of the pages flagged for deletion serve a purpose for persons that do not own Guild Wars. Neither are they useful for people owning Guild Wars, since all that information is presented on various other pages, most notably GuildWiki, in a wastly superior way with completely wikified articles. Compare Character builds or (Brother) Mhenlo. --Xeeron 15:04, 27 July 2006 (UTC)Reply[reply]
Delete GuildWiki link is all that is needed, and the "guides" don't tell anything useful. Skuld^‡ ^insult 20:10, 27 July 2006 (UTC)Reply[reply]
Delete The main articles for the Guild Wars campaigns are what the wikipedia needs. The rest of the info, like NPC descriptions, should be found on sites specifically documenting the game, eg GuildWiki. 82.181.108.10 21:31, 27 July 2006 (UTC) (User:Gem from guidwiki)Reply[reply]
Delete the game style information. It is very useful for those who own Guild Wars but is not suitable for an encyclopedia. It is suitable for a wiki, that wiki being GuildWiki. Keep and merge the character articles, either into their own list or the main article. Obviously the copyvio problems need to be sorted out. — blobglob talk 22:44, 27 July 2006 (UTC)Reply[reply]
Merge or Keep I'd argue there's not enough to learn about each character to make it worth separate articles; however, information such as their role in the game is hardly cruft, and I don't think its so horrible to have some information about their personalities or motivation either. We already have a List of Locations in the Guild Wars Universe, so why not do the same for the characters? Definitely no reason to delete.--Blue Crest 04:52, 28 July 2006 (UTC)Reply[reply]
- Comment: In case you didn't notice, I have nominated the Locations in the Guild Wars Universe article also for deletion in this joint nomination. — Kaustuv Chaudhuri 06:08, 28 July 2006 (UTC)Reply[reply]
delete Nothing here constitutes information that is "significant" to someone outside the Guild Wars community. On top of this, there is a very good resource that contains this information, linked from the Guild Wars article. Arguments about whether the information is "good" or useful are irrelevant, it's not useful information outside GuildWiki. Delete the lot.Martin Thomson 12:25, 28 July 2006 (UTC)Reply[reply]
Delete - The articles listed under "Guide-Style" information, most especially "character builds", which is most definitely OR. The "Guide-style" articles seem to contain statistical information/small details that really don't add anything to a non-player's understanding of the game. That said, the character articles could be merged into a single list and hopefully re-written with better tone and only NPOV/verifiable info, though I would like to see some references in the article of course. Clearly the copvio information should be gotten rid of. Wickethewok 14:05, 28 July 2006 (UTC)Reply[reply]
Comment: multiple people have said to merge the character articles into a list-of, and there is certainly precedent for such listified pages according to WP:FICT. It is a compromise that I am happy to accept, as I indicated in the nomination. I have initiated a merge on List of Guild Wars characters and invite all interested parties to contribute to that page. I propose that a deletion consensus on the individual character pages not be taken as a consensus to delete the character list page also, but that it be put through AfD separately if anyone wishes it deleted. — Kaustuv Chaudhuri 04:20, 29 July 2006 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Comment: What do you consider to be the consensus for the equipment, builds, locations and professions articles? They were also a part of this discussion. I note that several discussed the character pages but ignored these other pages. --Aspectacle 22:17, 29 July 2006 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Delete per nom.--Peephole 14:11, 2 August 2006 (UTC)Reply[reply]
Comment Its sad that "precedent" is being used as a reason to attack video game articles, yes I said attack. Noone is putting baseball bat up for AfD even though its just a game piece, noone goes and deletes "Robert Langdon" even though he is a fictional character with little notability outside of the people who read the book or seen the movie. A better example would be the article on "Cattie-brie" which is little known outside of a specific series of books. Deleting cahracter from a game is equiv to deleting characters from books and movies, especially since their notability outside of a book review is scant. --zero faults ^{|sockpuppets|} 17:44, 2 August 2006 (UTC)Reply[reply]
Precedent is not the reason. Cruftiness is. Or, if you prefer guideline and policy citations, WP:OR, WP:V (from WP:RS), and WP:NPOV. There are very clear guidelines for notability of fictional characters: WP:FICT. If you think there are other articles about non-notable fictional characters, bring them to AfD. — Kaustuv Chaudhuri 18:02, 2 August 2006 (UTC)Reply[reply]
The issue then isnt that it fails WP:FICT as it states:

Major characters and notable minor ones (and places, concepts, etc.) in a work of fiction should be covered within the article on that work of fiction. If the article on the work itself becomes long, then giving such characters an article of their own is good practice (if there is enough content for the character).

SO then the issue is WP:V and WP:OR meaning these articles should just be given time to be cleanedup, the ones on specific characters and some are sourced per WP:V already. --zero faults ^{|sockpuppets|} 19:39, 2 August 2006 (UTC)Reply[reply]
As has been repeatedly pointed out in this AfD, these characters are not notable. Notability of a character does not increase with the quantity or quality of text written about them, so this is not a simple matter of cleanup as you make it out to be. The game manual does not count as a reliable secondary source for citations of notability (because of a clear conflict of interest) and no one yet has shown where outside the Guild Wars fanbase these characters have become notable. The game certainly is not a reliable source as it cannot be cited. Even ardent Guild Wars players in this AfD have argued that these articles serve no purpose. The compromise I have suggested a few comments up is List of Guild Wars characters, as the character articles are unlikey to ever become larger than stubs; however, if this list itself is brought to AfD I will vote to delete. — Kaustuv Chaudhuri 20:04, 2 August 2006 (UTC)Reply[reply]
Do you play guild wars to say such a thing? The idea isnt that they are notable to everyone on the planet, as per WP:FICT they are main characters given a spin off article on the basis they no longer fit in the main article. Also WP:V doesnt state that sources have to attest to notability, just that they have to say the item exists, is real etc. Which the manual does state them as main characters in Guild Wars. As for notability if the character is noted in the games manual, then they are obviously a main character. Please again read over WP:FICT, these main characters are given spinoff articles on the basis they do not fit in the main article. THe manual is a WP:V valid source because its a first party source talking about itself. How can the manual by the game company about the game not be a reliable source about the game. Its like saynig a book by an author cannot determine the facts of what happens in itself. There is no more reliable source then the creators themselves. --zero faults ^{|sockpuppets|} 20:11, 2 August 2006 (UTC)Reply[reply]
Also you are arguing that the game is notable but the story is not. Furthermore a book is a valid primary source, you do not need someone saying Drizzt is a main character in the Dark Elf Triology, the book already states him as a main character. So no its not a valid secondary source, its a valid primary source. --zero faults ^{|sockpuppets|} 20:21, 2 August 2006 (UTC)Reply[reply]

We are talking about sources for different things. I want reliable secondary sources that assert the notability of Mhenlo, for example, not that he exists as a main character, which I don't dispute. And no, I don't play the game, but several people who do and are regulars at guildwiki have voted to delete here. In any event, whether I play the game or not is irrelevant to the nomination. — Kaustuv Chaudhuri 20:25, 2 August 2006 (UTC)Reply[reply]
Wouldnt you be basically admitting your guage of notability is if you know about it then? If the people who created the story assert him as a main character then he is obviously notable to the people who engage in that story. The story itself determines who the main characters are, not reliable third party sources. Unless of course your guage of this is if you yourself without doing research know about that topic. But NN isnt about your own knowledge, we arent asking if you know of topic X. --zero faults ^{|sockpuppets|} 20:54, 2 August 2006 (UTC)Reply[reply]

You continue to miss my point. I have never disputed that these characters are "major characters" in the Guild Wars plot, but the question continues to be whether detailed exposition on these characters is necessary, i.e., whether these characters are notable. As it currently stands, every single character article is a stub, and, based on the very comprehensive guildwiki, I find it hard to believe that these articles can be expanded significantly without entering game guide territory. You should refresh your memory of what a reliable source is for Wikipedia; remember that we cite secondary sources, not primary sources, for critical topics such as notability. An assertion of notability in a primary source is not valid. It appears from your comments below that you do not consider this AfD to be in good faith. I am sure the closing admin will take your opinion into account, and there is no reason for us to keep repeating the same two points. — Kaustuv Chaudhuri 21:31, 2 August 2006 (UTC)Reply[reply]
Your inability to read whats right below you does not change its existence. Now once again I would like to see some proof that main characters in a story need to be verified by third party reliable sources. Until then you are making stuff up. Again please read below these character get their own articles according to WP:FICT when they cannot fit into the main article. --zero faults ^{|sockpuppets|} 01:35, 3 August 2006 (UTC)Reply[reply]

(indented)Just because you want something doesnt mean its required. A primary source has been provided.

Material from self-published sources, and other published sources of dubious reliability, may be used as sources of information about themselves in articles about themselves, so long as:

It is relevant to the person's or organization's notability;
It is not contentious;
It is not unduly self-serving;
It does not involve claims about third parties, or about events not directly related to the subject;
There is no reasonable doubt about who wrote it.

(indented)Again the primary source is all that is required. That is from WP:V. Fictional characters do not need their main character status verified by third parties. Show me this policy you are quoting. --zero faults ^{|sockpuppets|} 20:45, 2 August 2006 (UTC)Reply[reply]

To add, the character of Mhenlo at least is cited as a key character on the guild wars website[4] and so popular users in another MMO make costumes that look like him [5] He even has a ringtone based on his theme song in the game. Spitting out a bunch of accronyms saying they apply to a group of 10+ articles is not a proper AfD--zero faults ^{|sockpuppets|} 21:00, 2 August 2006 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Keep Characters who appear in the manual as main characters should be kept. They are main characters and as per WP:FICT they are allowed to hae spin-off articles as long as they do not fit in the main article. They are notable to the population of the game 2+ million people, and they are verifiable as they are in the manual of the game, by the creators, who say what does and doesnt exist in Guild Wars. As for WP:OR unless they articles are asserting facts not supported by the manual, then that needs to be brought up seperatly and addressed, not have the article deleted.
Major characters and notable minor ones (and places, concepts, etc.) in a work of fiction should be covered within the article on that work of fiction. If the article on the work itself becomes long, then giving such characters an article of their own is good practice (if there is enough content for the character).

That is the exact point in WP:FICT, as of now I have no opinion on the other articles. --zero faults ^{|sockpuppets|} 20:18, 2 August 2006 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Zer0faults, you have quoted the reason why these characters do not deserve their own pages and why the list page which Kaustuv has created is the best compromise solution for the characters pages. (if there is enough content for the character) - most the characters have no motivation or back story beyond what is given in the manual and their actions in the games add little more. The manual content is all the information there is on the character, hardly more than a paragraph of content when it is distilled down and re-written to be encyclopedic. Kaustuv's page represents the best solution which compromises between our different opinions on notability, quantity of available content and wikipedia standards. --Aspectacle 23:14, 4 August 2006 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Delete I am an avid player of Guild Wars, and I was shocked to see these pages contained on the real Wikipedia when they are more than adequately covered by the GuildWiki. Fancruft of epic proportion (such as Guild Wars information and Homestar Runner material) is given a Wiki all its own for a good reason. Keep one or two general pages describing the phenomenon of the Guild Wars game series, but delete every one of these minor pages. Guild Wiki is awesome in its sufficient detail. --TheTriumvir 19:46, 3 August 2006 (UTC)Reply[reply]
Comment I dont understand the basis here. Are you saying if another Wiki has the information that we should not haev it here as well? --zero faults ^{|sockpuppets|} 20:38, 3 August 2006 (UTC)Reply[reply]
~~Delete~~ Keep ~~If this game is mega-notable, then perhaps keep it. Otherwise delete, or simply put a small description with a link to the Guild Wars Wiki and then lock the page.~~ --HResearcher 02:32, 4 August 2006 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Guild wars is a major MMO title I think in the top 10 in terms of player base with over 2 million players worldwide. The game is highly notable and carried in all major retailers. --zero faults ^{|sockpuppets|} 10:31, 4 August 2006 (UTC)Reply[reply]

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.