Talk:Prestadír

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Prestadír is causing some trouble here at the wiki! The NPC appears in multiple places throughout Middle Earth, including at least two in Enedwaith. One of those latter locations is specifically in the Gloomglens in Enedwaith. I personally haven't logged in to find the other location, but it is referenced in the comments of the revision history on this page.

I haven't been on the wiki for nearly 3 years, so I'm not current on how this phenomenon is treated. However, it appears, based on edits, that the general consensus is each appearance of Prestadír should have its own page. Thus we should have 1. Prestadír (Gloomglens) and 2. Prestadír (other location). My opinion is that since Gloomglens is in Enedwaith, that calling the #2 appearance "Prestadír (Enedwaith)" confuses the issue, because technically both #1 AND #2 are in Enedwaith. This has resulted in a double redirect on this page. I vote for calling the #2 appearance "Prestadír (Specific Location Name)".
Since he appears in so many locations, would it be best to have Prestadir (un-accented) redirect to plain old Prestadír, which would be basically a disambiguation page, containing links to Prestadír (Mirkwood), Prestadír (Gloomglens), and Prestadir (third location)? Adelas (talk) 15:52, 18 August 2011 (EDT)
Part of the confusion arises from the spelling of his name: Prestadir looks a lot like Prestadír. So we get a set of redirects from pages using the unaccented name to the correct accented name. The accented lowercase I is more difficult to distinguish from the unaccented lowercase I than most other pairs.
I am not sure where he shows up at another permanent location in Enedwaith, other than at Echad Idhrenfair. Many of the rangers show up inside instances, as well as in the landscape. Off hand, I don't recall where else he shows up. This wiki tends to serve as a memory enhancement for me.
We are attempting to deal to with an early implementation of Turbine's phasing technology. I have a feeling that the way we are doing the quest NPCs now will need some adjustment to accommodate changes coming in Rise of Isengard (RoI). Remember that the NDA prohibits beta players from even admitting that they are such, so we are missing general access to the information we need to make any decisions. I suspect that changes will be required here to effectively document quests and NPCs when RoI is released.
What I have been trying to do is pick a good modifier for the base name, and only change that if it turns out to be really misleading. Ideally, the actual page name should be hidden behind replacement text, so we could do things like [[Frodo (1)|Frodo in the Shire]], [[Frodo (2)|Frodo in Rivendell]], [[Frodo (3)|Frodo in Moria]] (in my opinion).
Just my two coppers. RingTailCat (talk) 17:06, 18 August 2011 (EDT)
Curses, RTC got his answer in before mine and said a lot of what I'd written, heh. Anyway...
Boy, you're really catching all the "issues" on your first day back, hahah. This is indeed a challenge for us with many of the Ranger NPCs who appear and disappear in Rivendell, Eregion, and Enedwaith as you progress through the Volume 3 Epic quests. From what I surmise from File:Prestadír (Enedwaith).jpg, the "other" Enedwaith Prestadir should be renamed as [[Prestadír (Lhanuch)]], but no one's gotten around to making that page yet.
The issue of disambiguation is still - dare I? - ambiguous. User:Starbursty seems to prefer the idea of using dedicated disambiguation pages (see Item:Helm of the Aurochs, for example) while User:Rogue4ever prefers to keep all the "disambig"ing on the pages themselves (like you see at the top of [[Prestadír (Gloomglens)]] without any distinct disambig page.
At the least, I'll go ahead and move pages around so we've got one for Mirkwood, Lhanuch, and Gloomglens; I agree there's no point in having a "Prestadir (Enedwaith)" if there are two in Enedwaith. Hopefully someone more NPC-oriented than I will come along and fill in [[Prestadír (Lhanuch)]]. In the meantime, Prestadir will still forward you to Prestadír as it's "sort-of" policy to let the first instance of a mob/NPC/item keep it's original page name and just disambig the others. Emphasis on "sort-of." Wheee, long answer! Sethladan 17:12, 18 August 2011 (EDT)
Just to reiterate: the [[:Category:Ranger NPCs|Ranger NPC category]] page helps. The other Prestadír is [[Prestadír in Enedwaith]]. RingTailCat (talk) 17:19, 18 August 2011 (EDT)
Ah, thanks. That's the one that should be at [[Prestadír (Lhanuch)]], I guess? Sethladan 17:26, 18 August 2011 (EDT)

LOTS of info here. And I guess this is the time to ask the question it's begging: Why create separate pages at all? Why not simply create one page? In this case, Prestadír, with

Description

Prestadir is a ranger dude who likes long walks on the beach.
He can be found in Mirkwood at Hotel Whatsit.
He can be found in Enedwaith at Camp Whosit and BigTown.

Quests

In Mirkwood he can't sleep at night and wants you to kick wolf booty [ie, description that is only applicable in this area]
quest list
In BigTown he wants you to have a chat with the Brehares.
quest list
In Camp Whatsit he wants tell tell you all about ancient history.
quest list
Categories: Mirkwood NPC, Enedwaith NPC, Ranger NPC, (plus new category, Multi-location NPC?!)

This would, admittedly, cause you to have multiple NPC photo-data-templates (the gray box) on one page. Obviously this system would not be appropriate for mobs that appear in multiple places, but I think it could work for NPCs. Adelas (talk) 21:26, 19 August 2011 (EDT)

I would be amenable to this kind of change. Most of the cases where we had to distinguish between NPCs with the same name, they actually WERE different NPCs. With the planned increased use of phasing technology that RTC mentioned, Adelas' suggestion might be infinitely more practical than a separate page for each instance of an NPC. As RTC also pointed out, though, we really will have no idea until we get our hands on Rise of Isengard and see what's what.
We might also be able to avoid the "clunkiness" of multiple infoboxes on one page by adding a gallery of images at the end of an article for NPCs that appear in multiple places. Using {{Tooltip Coords}} usually serves pretty well for pointing out locations. Taking a long view, I think there are some tentative plans in the distant future to have NPC infoboxes pop-up on hyperlinks like Items do now. Having multiple boxes on one page, or one box with incomplete information, will hamper that effort somewhat. More food for thought. Sethladan 22:01, 19 August 2011 (EDT)
I looked back at one of the old pages where we were using the two info box approach. See Daervunn (2011-06-29T04:14:29) for instance. I am somewhat reluctant to go back to that style of page. We could probably fit all the information about Daervunn onto one page. But, it might only be useful to the active player at level-cap. The relatively new player encountering him in Esteldín for the first time might be overwhelmed by the detail.
The rangers of the Grey Company in Rivendell, Eregion, and Enedwaith might very well be accommodated by just two pages each, one for their lower level incarnation and one for their level 65+ selves.
I am hesitant to rush toward a final solution to this problem until we see what we are dealing with in RoI.
RingTailCat (talk) 23:05, 19 August 2011 (EDT)
Just so that I'm sure I understand, do you mean to say that each ranger would have two pages? Upon first read I thought you might mean one page for all the collective rangers in each region.
Thanks for the link to Daervunn. Just thinking of locations and quests, it seemed like the only annoyance would be the width of the additional info box. But now I can see how, with one version being a "seller" (like in Daervunn's case) and one NOT being a seller, and/or with the different quotes for the different areas, it could get confusing. Just to continue exploring options, since we still have time to do so: what about the possibility of a javascript hide/swap on the page, like has been suggested for tier 1 v. tier 2 mobs in instances? I know I was just reading about that on some talk page somewhere, but now I can't find it. :/ Adelas (talk) 23:50, 19 August 2011 (EDT)
Additional question I just thought of: Is spoilering a facet of this issue? I originally assumed not, seeing how the purpose of hte wiki is to explain everything, including quest locations and walkthroughs, but I don't want to assume anything. Adelas (talk) 23:52, 19 August 2011 (EDT)
We know from the lore that the Grey Company ended up in a battle at the ford on the Isen River. I think we can expect to see the members popping up at various places along the way as they make their way south through Dunland. If they make a permanent camp, like Echad Daervunn, further south, then the permanent NPCs at the camp should have pages. Most of the rangers that appear in Rivendell are only there during a few quests. If you are not doing those quests, you don't see them. Perhaps they should be documented on the quest page instead of on an npc page. But how do we deal with the motile quest givers, like Halbarad in Rivendell?
Other example characters include Wadu and Nona. They are less of a problem because they do not take on static roles, i.e., as stable-masters or vendors.
The question of spoilers is a very good one. Without phasing, most of the puzzles were hidden inside a quest, where we do initially hide the rewards, notes and walk through text. Who knows what's coming?
RingTailCat (talk) 00:57, 20 August 2011 (EDT)

Wow, just saw this ancient discussion and read it. In the last days I have consolidated the contents of most pages that describe the same NPC but in different locations (e.g. Prestadír) since that was the case with well-tended pages like Aragorn and Elrohir. I think it is better to have just one page with subsections than multiple ones with confusing names. --Tharondir (talk) 13:56, 24 February 2015 (UTC)

Good catch! Wm Magill - Valamar - OTG/OTC - talk 20:24, 24 February 2015 (UTC)

This discussion was originally located at Talk:Prestadír and has been moved here since that page was merged into Prestadír. Sethladan 04:10, 25 February 2015 (UTC)