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 with the possibility of transwiki. The prevailing wind here is that these articles are more than we need, and any possible merge targets already contain ample information on the subjects. As I don't think the StarCraft wiki is really a sister project of ours, I'm not going to mess with trying to transwiki this whole thing (also, it is possible/likely that their articles are better than what was here!). If someone would like the deleted content to do the transwiki work themselves, drop me a line. (ESkog)^(Talk) 07:38, 24 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Specific StarCraft units[edit]

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Original research, game cruft, game guide, whatever you like to call it, these articles' content features mainly strategy advice, unit statistics, and other content that is quite unencyclopedic. Regardless of goings-on on other AFDs, this content should certainly be deleted.

Nominating:

• Space Construction Vehicle (StarCraft)
• Probe (StarCraft)
• Marine (StarCraft)
• Zergling
• Firebat
• Dragoon (StarCraft)
• Hydralisk
• Terran Ghost
• High Templar
• Vulture (StarCraft)
• Siege Tank
• Protoss Reaver
• Goliath (StarCraft)
• Infested Terran
• Protoss Archon
• Ultralisk
• Wraith (StarCraft)
• Protoss Scout
• Mutalisk
• Dropship (StarCraft)
• Science Vessel
• Arbiter (StarCraft)
• Battlecruiser (StarCraft)
• Protoss Carrier
• Dark Templar
• Dark Archon
• Valkyrie (StarCraft)
• Corsair (StarCraft)
• Devourer
• Forge (StarCraft)
• Gateway (StarCraft)
• Shield Battery (StarCraft)
• Templar Archives (StarCraft)

Note that I am not including heroes/NPCs/characters in this nomination, only generic units. Judging by a similar previous AFD (here), most editors believe this content does not belong in a general encyclopedia and should instead be in a separate Wiki.

Wickethewok 04:47, 18 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

• Transwiki/merge to wikia:starcraft. — Kaustuv Chaudhuri 05:15, 18 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]
• Transwiki per Kaustuv Chaudhuri. All these games can be mentioned/described here, but this game guide material needs to be on game wikis, and Wikia seems a great answer for all of these! Shenme 05:24, 18 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]
• Transwikify: my original thought was to just delete. SynergeticMaggot 05:26, 18 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]
• Transwiki them somewhere that wants them (such as the SCWikia), but do delete as wholly unencyclopedic game-guide. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 05:32, 18 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]
• Delete per above. I'm sure they'll be better off housed at the Starcraft wiki. GassyGuy 07:11, 18 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]
• Note: This debate has been added to the list of CVG deletions. RandyWang (^raves/_rants) 07:46, 18 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]
• Merge to the articles about their respective races, or StarCraft units and structures if that survives its AfD. They may need to be pruned in the process. This is worth covering, but a page per unit seems excessive. Ace of Sevens 08:04, 18 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]
• Delete all/transwiki I looked at the race pages and these seem to be covered in sufficient detail on those pages, so these are unnecessary. This should be transwikied to a gaming wiki, though. Ace of Sevens 08:30, 18 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]
• Delete , because the Protoss, Zerg, and Terran already have sections on their respective units, which describes the units well enough. There is no need for any of those articles here. E946 08:15, 18 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]
• Delete Starcruft. The SC wiki has this covered. -- GWO
• Comment. Editors watching this review might want to be aware of this digg post. --Cymsdale 10:02, 18 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Unimportant comment Wow. "This is a travesty!" Somebody either has had a very, very good life, or needs to take a step back and analyze just how much they value StarCraft, or, at least, its presence on Wikipedia. GassyGuy 11:03, 18 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Transwiki --Flipkin 11:09, 18 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Side note: Someone posted on Digg to influence the AfD

• I like how the only post on Digg so far thinks they should be deleted, too. Wickethewok 13:05, 18 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

• Delete, gameguide stuff. Recury 13:25, 18 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]
• Don't Delete!, If this is removed from Wiki then obviously we have to go even further than that. Anything pertaining to Star Wars or Star Trek in complete details involving planets and race's have to be marked for deletion as well. If you remove one set of fictional articles, you remove them all. Personally, I don't think this is a path that should be traversed. --Wil2197 14:23, 18 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Eh? If you remove one set of fictional articles, you remove them all. Why would one have to do that? If one includes Romeo and Juliet, must we include every play ever written? Not all fiction is created equally, or has equally cultural notability. Furthermore, its not POV to point that out. -- GWO
    • Eh? I too am in favor of transwiki-ing, and you are right to point of the slippery slope fallacy. However! Starcraft is one of the most culturally notable videogames ever. Especially in .kr, but even in the English-speaking world, the starcraft is legendary. En taro adun, eigenlambda 19:10, 18 Jul 2006 (UTC)
• Keep Zergling, delete the rest Ironically, the title of this AfD is the one that should be kept, and seeing it on the afd list piqued my interest to come here and say so. Do we need an article on every SC unit? No way. But the Zergling has become extremely notable in popular culture - the term has come to be a word on its own, and is also more symbolic of the game as a whole than any other unit. However, it should be made into more of an article explaining these points than the strategy-guide reading they get having one for each unit. -Goldom ‽‽‽⁂ 19:22, 18 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Additional comment to my above - While I originally said keep zergling, delete rest, I'd like to clarify I have nothing against a transwiki, as seems to be the growing consensus. The thing is, while I don't know the SC wiki, I would assume they probably already have info on all these units, and probably more about them than we do. But if not, then sure, trans away. Also, there have been a few suggestions to merge to a list. I would say that this is probably the best way of keeping any info here, as a list of units with minor single-line-ish info. -Goldom ‽‽‽ ⁂ 03:11, 19 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]
• Transwiki and merge down to a single 'list' style article, after generous cutting. --InShaneee 19:32, 18 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]
• Transwiki all per first few comments. Maybe I might as well go ahead with this. --Slgr@ndson (page - messages - contribs) 19:56, 18 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]
• Delete, transwiki, smerge, any would be an appropriate solution to this problem. Goldom may be right that zergling should be kept, but I think it's really the concept of the "zerg rush" that's the culturally notable thing (I know what "zerg rush" means, I didn't know that it involved zerglings), and that is quite adequately covered in Rush (computer and video games). — Haeleth Talk 19:57, 18 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]
• Delete all, transwiki, merge Deletion based on Wikipedia is not an indiscriminate collection of information, nor is it a game guide hoopydink^{Conas tá tú?} 20:54, 18 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]
• Merge/Transwiki It appears Wikipedia is on an AfD rampage, but this one actually might be justified... however total deletion is still stupid and pointless, and the slippery sloper argument is becoming increasingly valid. Merge them into Starcraft Units, etc. or transwiki them to where they fit better. But don't delete outright. The game guide stuff should not survive any such change however, but it seems that rather than fix articles, Wikipedia is just deleting them altogether. I'm not sure that's a good idea. David Fuchs 22:19, 18 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]
• Delete All game guide. Someone could take all of this material slap "StarCraft Game Guide" on the cover and make some good money selling this at Barnes and Nobel. As to the slippery slope there is a difference between video games and movies or books. There is no issues of "succeeding" or "doing well" at movies or books. ALthough this should not mean that video games or individual components of videogames are inherently game guide material. For example Mario is highly notable and the article about him has no useful information in the execution of any of the vast number of games in which he has appeared. It is the collection of small bits of information that is useful in playing the game and fail any notablilty outside of the game that is the issue.--Nick Y. 23:09, 18 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]
• Merge to their races per above. --Pboyd04 23:11, 18 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

• The thing is, there's already sections on the units in the articles for the races, as I described earlier. Merging wouldn't accomplish anything because the information is already there. E946 02:31, 19 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

• Delete all. Love the game, but this is a crystal clear violation of WP:NOT. If this isn't a video game guide, nothing is. Aplomado ^talk 01:50, 19 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]
• Transwiki I didn't know there was a SC wiki. Prolly be nice if it were listed on the Interwiki map. Great info, I play the game, but let's keep it where it belongs. -- MrDolomite | Talk 02:46, 19 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]
• Transwiki per StacyD. The game guide material needs to be on game wikis Stacyd
• Transwiki per above. These articles are non-encyclopedic, and most of the usable information is already well covered in other articles, as said. --SevereTireDamage 07:46, 19 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]
• Keep, tag for cleanup if necessary. I'm sure the Starcraft wiki doesn't need our contribution. If the articles have too much advice in them, they need editing, not deleting. I see no reason why we can't have articles on individual Starcraft units when we have articles on individual Pokemon. Mangojuice^talk 14:17, 19 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]
• Strong Keep All - These articles provide objective information on one of the most popular computer games of all time. [1][2] [3] [4] [5] There are basically three rationales to this mass-AfD: original research, notability, and "game guide", and they have to be address on two levels: what content could ideally make good articles but is not currently of high quality, and what content is inherently non-encyclopedic. As for the quality issues, these should be resolved by IMPROVING rather than deleting articles. From what I've seen, most of what has been called original research is actually insufficiency of references; these issues can be addressed by deleting true OR and improving the articles with more and better references for the objective information. As for notability, there is little question, as the references a few lines up indicate, that Starcraft is one of the most popular video games in the world and has remained so for the over eight years since its release, with indicators such as media coverage and endorsement contracts for professional Starcraft players (!) continuing to go up. As for the fuzzy, poorly defined "game guide" objection to encyclopedic worthiness, the proper dividing line is an active area of discussion, but I think should be between providing recommandations on strategy (not encyclopedic), and providing objective information on details of how the game works, as we do for detailed explanations of the rules for any notable game or sport (encyclopedic). Otherwise, where is there a principled dividing line between eliminating specific game mechanics, and eliminating any rules of a game, and eliminating any content at all related to a game or sport? If forms of recreation are encyclopedic at all, providing specific descriptions of their rules or mechanics should be limited only by the same criteria as for anything else, i.e. notability, references, etc. An apt comparison here might be made to chess, which has dozens of categories, with up to 137 articles per category; these are all properly encyclopedic as well, and must have been found so by the untold number of WP editors it must have taken to write them and who must have read them without a problem. I for one find them relevant, informative and fascinating and wouldn't want to see them deleted, just as with these Starcraft-related articles. They are filled with the sort of detailed game mechanics that populates the content of these Starcraft articles, such as this passage from Queen (chess): "The queen can be moved in a straight line vertically, horizontally, or diagonally, any number of unoccupied squares as shown on the diagram at the left, thus combining the moves of the rook and bishop. The distance it can move is known as the Chebyshev distance. As with other captures except en passant, the queen captures by occupying the square on which an enemy piece sits. Ordinarily the queen is slightly more powerful than a rook and a bishop together, while slightly less powerful than two rooks. Because the queen is more valuable than any other piece, it is almost always disadvantageous to exchange the queen for a piece other than the enemy's queen, unless doing so leads to a position where the king can be checkmated." An even more apt comparison might be made to Final_Fantasy_X, which is today's featured article on the WP front page (as of this writing). Final Fantasy X passed the gauntlet to featured status in part because it is well-referenced, obviously a notable subject, and provides objective information on detailed specifics of how the game works - see, for example, Final_Fantasy_X#Battle_system. The editors who agreed that this deserved featured status did not seem to apply an absolute rule against "game cruft" as opposed to detailed, objective information on a notable recreational subject. This is the same in principle as each one of these articles would do in their ideal state, after being appropriately improved, rather than deleted. - Reaverdrop (talk/nl/w:s) 00:36, 20 July 2006 (UTC) (repeating some comments made previously elsewhere)[reply]

• 'There are basically three rationales to this mass-AfD: original research, notability, and "game guide"' In my case, this is incorrect. I want them deleted because the articles on the three Starcraft races already have sections for all of their units and structures which describe them well enough. The fact is, there's not much to say about most units, and what there is to say has already been said in the unit sections of the race articles. E946 02:22, 20 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

• Strong Keep: Wikipedia is an encyclopedia for ALL subjects! I want to know the statistics for the Protoss Arbiter (besides the fact that I wrote the article on the Arbiter). Where do I find them? Wikipedia? Yes. Unless this AfD comes through. And, like E946 said above, AfDs have 3 reasons: original research (definitely not), notability (StarCraft is VERY popular), and game guide. I fail to agree with his reasons, though. StarCraft units fit none of those! — Preceding unsigned comment added by RelentlessRouge (talk • contribs)
  • Starcraft is notable. That's why it has an article. A Protoss Arbiter is not notable. Therefore, at best, it should be included in the game's article. And then it should still not be about how to use it in the game, or that's a guide. If you want to look up stats on units, there's tons of sites with that info, including the official one, so it's not like you're gonna be out of luck if these pages are deleted. -Goldom ‽‽‽ ⁂ 18:19, 20 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]
• Delete per Wikipedia is not a game guide. And we aren't discussing whether or not Starcraft is notable which it is very much. However Wikipedia isn't a game guide and these articles are and that is why they need to be deleted. Whispering 17:45, 20 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]
• Delete what with WP:NOT being a game guide. There is a starcraft wiki where this might be welcome. If so, transwiki, but delete whether transwikied or not. Angus McLellan (Talk) 20:35, 20 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]
• Ugh, Delete all. The only articles that I considered keeping might be the ones for specific units which are extremely well-known, such as the Zergling. However, the current edit of the Zergling article is - like most of these articles - primarily focused on the unit's statistics in-game. While this information may be of interest to some, it is not the sort of material that belongs in an encyclopedia. Blizzard already has a page with this information and more.

A reasonable standard that I've been mulling over in my mind for topics such as this is the following: "Fictional topics should only receive articles if they are featured to a significant extent (i.e. not a cameo appearance) in works which are significantly separated from the ones in which they originally appeared." For example, Bulbasaur (to use a popular example) gets an article, as it has appeared in a bunch of Pokemon media -the collectible card game, various video games, the TV series, etc. However, aside from a brief cameo appearance in Warcraft 3, the Zergling has never (to my knowledge) featured prominently in anything besides Starcraft. Neither have any of the other units listed here, so none of them should have articles. The same goes for Charles Foster Kane (of Citizen Kane); I may eventually propose that that article be merged to Citizen Kane. Zetawoof^(ζ) 01:20, 21 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

• That's certainly a...unique opinion. The Bulbasaur example makes no sense under your criteria, since all of those other works are all Pokemon works and not any more "significantly separated" than the Starcraft books. Also, I think it's fair to say that Holden Caufield deserves an article, even if J.D. Salinger refuses to license any of his works for treatment in other media formats. 129.61.46.16 19:08, 21 July 2006 (UTC)Josh[reply]

• Ooh, the existence of Starcraft books actually throws a real wrench into this particular issue. The difference as I see it is that the various Pokemon works are not as directly connected to each other as the Starcraft books are to the game: as far as I know, the Starcraft books serve as minor expansions and "riffs" on the story told within the game, while the Pokemon card game (again, as far as I know) shares very little with the TV show or the video game. Holden would, incidentally, actually be safe under my policy, though, as he appears in (or, at least, is strongly connected to) several other works of Salinger's. Zetawoof^(ζ) 00:23, 23 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

• Strong Keep all. These articles have been worked on for YEARS now (look at the history on some of these), and contain a lot of valuable information. If they read too much like a game guide, there's no reason they can't be modified (after all, this IS Wikipedia). Those that have little information left after removing strategies could simply be redirected to the main StarCraft article. I think the biggest issue here is that if these are removed, there's really no telling where to stop. I mean, what about this? There are articles for just about every character in the Mario series. In fact, "Goomba" was once the featured article of the day, which is why I bring up this point. Also, what about the countless articles on Wikipedia dedicated to schools and songs and episodes? Are these somehow more notable than StarCraft units? I strongly urge you to re-think your votes. This sort of careless deletion immediately throws about 90% of other Wikipedia articles into question. Czj 06:02, 21 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

• Goombas have been in many different games and pieces of media. No StarCraft unit can claim such for themselves. The argument that there are articles worse/less notable than these are not a defense. If you have issues with those articles, bring it up there. Though, right now the Goomba article is large uncited and parts of it could very well be original research. Wickethewok 12:53, 21 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

• Strong Keep all. Why shouldn't Wikipedia have this information? Wikipedia is supposed to have information about all subjects. If you don't like the pages, don't look at them. Some of the Star Trek related pages are better here than on Memory Alpha. Some of these pages need cleaning up, that's all. Rondmc170 07:09, 21 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

  Have you read the nomination or the discussion here? It has been amply explained why Wikipedia shouldn't keep them. I think you are mischaracterising Wikipedia; it is not supposed to be a compendium of "information about all subjects", as you put it. Rather, Wikipedia is an encyclopedia. For an encyclopedia a mere mention or a short sentence or two of description of the minor units of this game is sufficient and the interested reader can be pointed to other more comprehensive sources. — Kaustuv Chaudhuri 12:02, 21 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

• Popular This game is extremely popular in Asia, so popular in fact it is a live "sport" on television. I believe this dictates keeping the page. Founder 02:01, 22 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

• That example would be excellent if we were nominating the article StarCraft for deletion. However, that doesn't really do anything for anything for giving individual units any encyclopedic value. Wickethewok 03:30, 22 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

• Keep or Merge to an aggregation While the unit statistics and game strategy should probably be removed it seems as though there is enough information on the individual units as fictional "characters" ("place in society", quotes) to be worth preserving. A little more sourcing would be nice, but I think most of this is taken from the game manual or in game story --Topkai22 11:19, 22 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]
• Delete/transwiki per Kaustuv Chaudhuri, but Keep Zergling per Goldom. WP:NOT a game guide. Kamek 23:06, 22 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]
• Keep This is the norm is all [[:Category:Fictional universes]. Jon513 23:31, 22 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]
• Keep and rework to meet WP:NOT. Fredil Yupigo 00:20, 23 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Keep! 24.146.24.61 03:36, 23 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

• Strong keep per Mango. If articles are not up to a standard, they need editing not deleting! -- Grafikm ^(AutoGRAF) 11:48, 23 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]
• Strong Keep Terran Ghost - not any of the other ones. Ghosts are pivotal characters, and a spin-off game is based on them. It will be useful to have a reference article to discuss the character type when Starcraft: Ghost comes out. MrKeith2317 17:35, 23 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]
• Delete. These articles all clearly violate WP:NOT by being part of an effort to create a comprehensive game guide for Starcraft. No matter the vote count, it must be deleted as a violation of wikipedia policy. Indrian 01:55, 24 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]
• Strong keep per Mango. Lets provide useful information through prudent editing, not through large sweeping deletion Enigmatical 06:46, 24 July 2006 (UTC)[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.