Template talk:Creature/archive1

ALL PAST HERE IS HISTORY

Root immunity missing

I got a question about this template: why isn't there a "Root immune" below "Stun/Mez Imm" under "Combat Effectiveness"? In the Analysis Details a loremaster gets when inspecting a creature, the possible root immunity does show. So it seems too bad for me not to include it here in the template as well. Ravanel 16:10, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

This must have changed recently, it's been a while since I've looked at an inspection with my Lore-master. I'll check it out and add what's necessary to the template. This means of course that every creature needs changed. I hate that part.. lol Rogue 16:47, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

Oops... I didn't think about that, the thought just popped up when I was filling in information. It would be nice if some high-tech change-it-all function would exist, haha. But I guess it does not. If you are really going to change the template and mind stiffening manual stuff has to be done, I'm available. Ravanel 15:25, 6 January 2010 (UTC)

I'll see what I can do. Rogue 17:04, 6 January 2010 (UTC)

I went ahead and added the root immune to the template. Rogue 00:43, 9 January 2010 (UTC)

Thanks for that! I found out my inspects from before the Mirkwood release don't contain the root immunity option, so you were right about that. We will have to live with the old creatures missing the information for a while, but at least the new ones can be completed now right away. ^_^ Ravanel 12:03, 11 January 2010 (UTC)

About the Location field

I was wondering if it wouldn't be more easy for the correct categorization by location to use an if condition as used in the NPCs. Something along the lines of
{{#if: {{{location|}}}
| [[Category:{{{location}}} Creatures|{{PAGENAME}}]]
| [[Category:Stubs/Mob]]}}
Ahrien 13:53 January 11th, 2010 (UTC)

"Incredible" mitigations

~~File:Example Incredible.jpg~~
I found that Thaurlach has two mitigations that are Incredible. So far it's not possible to let this show up in the creature page. I wonder if someone could fix this. The mitigation has the text "Incredible" and is coloured red. See the inspect to the right for an example. I couldn't work out myself how to fix it. --Ravanel 12:07, 25 July 2010 (UTC)

I'm on it Ravenel :) Rogue 18:45, 26 July 2010 (UTC)

Yay! I changed some more, so it does show up. But the text isn't coloured red yet, and I don't know how to do that. See Thaurlach as an example. Thanks for being on this. ^^ --Ravanel 08:37, 27 July 2010 (UTC)

All fixed, sorry I missed that step. :) Rogue 16:30, 27 July 2010 (UTC)

It worked, you're a hero! Today in-game I found out that the last boss of Barad Gularan has 'incredible mitigations' as well, so you didn't change it for just one mob. :) Thanks again. --Ravanel 00:52, 28 July 2010 (UTC)

Anytime, let me know if you find more that we don't have yet. :) Rogue 16:40, 28 July 2010 (UTC)

Ancient Dwarf Damage

Is the header for this mitigation type also squished together without a space in-game? If not, we should be able to expand this to two words and make it look a little neater. :-P Sethladan 02:57, 31 January 2011 (EST)

It actually looks squished together without a space in-game. --Ravanel 08:26, 5 April 2011 (EDT)

Override Parameter for Image

If someone gets a chance (probably me at some point, heheh) it might help to have an option to override the default image path for mobs. See Ongbúrz Skirmisher (Ettenmoors) for an example why. I can't imagine this issue hasn't come up before, but I can't remember off-hand seeing if others have just set name to include the region...seems like a clunky way of doing it. Sethladan 23:18, 5 March 2011 (EST)

I'll do this. And if noone objects I'm going to add {{#ifexist: Image:{{{image|}}}.jpg | | {{Stub/Image}} }} to the template. This will hopefully lead to some new images :) --EoD 12:10, 9 March 2011 (EST)

I did both changes. There are many pages now which include the {{Stub/Image}} twice. I think that's ok, as those tags have to be removed anyway. At the moment there are 750 pages in Category:Stubs/Image and many more are following (as mediawiki is automatically rebuilding all the pages which contain Template:Creature now) :D --EoD 12:39, 9 March 2011 (EST)

Excellent, thanks! We do have Special:WantedFiles for all the redlinked image files (of which there are currently 2,707), but having the creature pages themselves flagged will help. Sethladan 13:21, 9 March 2011 (EST)

Update 2 additions

Since Update 2 we have creatures with Tier 1 & 2 Stats. For Bosses i think it best to make one page for each - due to the completely different mechanics / skills the bosses. But for normal mobs within the instance - would it be possible to add Tier 1 & Tier 2 stats? Morale / Power changes, Resistances/Mitigations/Combat Effectiveness all change from Tier 1 to Tier 2. Might also be usefull to make a new creature template just for these type of mobs ? --Marble 03:27, 25 March 2011 (EDT)

For bosses, that would be a good idea, for normal mobs, not so much since I don't see them having mechanics that would need an entire page. You can just add another creature box within the mob in addition to the primary stats. -- Starbursty 11:30, 25 March 2011 (EDT)

We have a similar issue with skirmish mobs that we're currently working around by just adding a chart below with the stats (Morale/Power) that differ. For now, feel free to add a second {{Creature}} below the first for a Tier 2 inspection, as Starbursty said. Having Tier 1 and Tier 2 stats in the same box should be doable in the near future, though. Sethladan 18:48, 25 March 2011 (EDT)

I disagree that there should be multiple templates on one page. I don't want to think about how many templates that would equal eventually -- 4 or 5? on one page? My option (not the best right now) would be to have Mob Tier 1, Mob Tier 2 pages... Rogue 20:10, 4 April 2011 (EDT)

Would you consider a revision (or a second creature template) that allowed for tier 1/2 (not more) stats in the same box? It might make the box itself slightly bigger/more crowded, but it might serve to condense things in lieu of two boxes or two pages. Sethladan 21:41, 4 April 2011 (EDT)

Add main page for example "Coldbear Wight" and on that page links to Tier 1 & 2 pages? That way on other pages you only ever need to link the first main page of the mob. --Marble 02:02, 5 April 2011 (EDT)

What Sethladan says would be the best option in my opinion, but it might take a while to create that (I can't do it myself, I'm too much of a template noob). I'd vote for a second creature template then, otherwise the templates of normal mobs get unnecessarily long. Until then we can perhaps best do as Rogue says: two different pages for each mob, with (Tier 1) or (Tier 2) behind the name. A page with two links to redirect to them might be a bit too much: on instance pages we can link to the correct mob, and if people search for them in the search box, both tier options will pop up. We don't do this for double NPC names either, but add a italics text on top of the page, linking to the other page. We could do something similar here. --Ravanel 08:24, 5 April 2011 (EDT)

Comment about the only-one-page idea: An easy solution would be to add both Tier1+Tier2 mob in a table where one is collapsed by default, the other one not. A (in my opinion) nicer, but harder solution would be to have only one black creature box with a "Tier 1" ("Tier 2") javascript button in a corner which does change the content of the box with Tier 1 (Tier 2) stats if you press it. --EoD 09:56, 5 April 2011 (EDT)

I agree here. Understand that I probably wont be able to figure this out without the help of my 2 favorite people, Skunark and Fedaykin, that have helped me in the past with templates. But the ultimate solution would be to have Tier 1 showing in the creature template, and then have Tier 2 a clickable option that would replace the template with tier 1 to tier 2. If that makes sense, I think EoD said that. I'll bring this discussion up with the 2 people mentioned if I happen to see them online. Maybe they have other ideas or solutions... Rogue 10:47, 5 April 2011 (EDT)

Sounds very nice! --Ravanel 11:13, 5 April 2011 (EDT)

A technical doable solution would be to write both boxes on the page, but to hide one. If you have the following layout

<div id="tier1" style="display:inline;">Tier1 Content</div><div id="tier2" style="display:none;">Tier2 Content</div>

you can exchange the style values with javascript (Hide the first/display the second box). Although this is probably not a great solution, it's an easy one and it would permit it to have both Tier1/Tier2 stats displayed on popups. :) --EoD 12:32, 5 April 2011 (EDT)

Using IDs is probably a bad idea. I created an example which demonstrate what I meant. --EoD 08:31, 13 April 2011 (EDT)

As usual, EoD and I are thinking along the same lines. I think having alternate displays would be the cleanest solution, as well (better than my original suggestion), and expands nicely beyond two tiers (skirmish mobs, anyone?). I definitely think the "harder" solution that EoD mentioned is the more elegant one, heheh. Sethladan 16:03, 5 April 2011 (EDT)

Tier 1 and Tier 2

How i would do it:

From maxhealth perameters down I would make them double with 1 and 2 at the end of their names. Ex: |maxhealth1 |maxhealth2 etc.
Write and if statement saying if Tier 1 selected then use 1, if tier 2 selected use 2. Rogue 13:48, 19 April 2011 (EDT)

I do like the link option to select tier 1 or tier 2. Rogue 13:48, 19 April 2011 (EDT)

Problem: I notice that Rav's additions to some creatures are not functioning correctly. When I click on Tier 2 it says this is Tier 2 for tier 1 click here, however the stats remain the same, unknown for both tier 1 and 2 and the health/power/type are the same on tier 1 and 2. Rogue 13:48, 19 April 2011 (EDT)

This problem was my fault, changing too many templates when I was testing it and not remembering to make the same changes back on Lotro-Wiki - should be fixed now. I like your suggestion (regarding an if statement) in theory, and it would solve the problem Rav is having with the page "jumping" when you change from Tier 1 to Tier 2 through the link. I originally had a big paragraph here saying that this might not be a workable solution, but I'm going to consider how it might be possible without/with less Javascript. :) Sethladan 15:23, 19 April 2011 (EDT)

Max Health

How do we indicate the different values for max health for the different levels that a creature can have?

I looked at the creature with the LM Knowledge of the Lore-master skill, and compare it to the information in the Lorebook. The Lorebook showed a significantly lower max health than I am seeing in game.

Exactly how do we indicate the different levels that a creature has? "12-11", "12,11", or something else? Some creatures have different drops depending on levels, e.g. light hide vs medium hide for bears in the Shire. Are we trying to be rigorous here, or just provide more of an approximate picture of a creature's characteristics?

RingTailCat 08:51, 21 May 2011 (EDT)

If there are multiple levels walking around in the same area, you can just enter level 11-12 (not the other way around!) and morale/power ...-... (lowest to the left, highest to the right). If you want, you can add a sentence about the different loot per level under "Drops" if you consider it important (like with the example of the hides). Everything is possible as long as it stays within the proper format. :)

A small note, don't forget to add the "Location" caption (with specific area and coordinates) on new creature pages you create. This is the most important part after the Lore-master inspect! Otherwise they'll always remain a stub. --Ravanel 13:20, 21 May 2011 (EDT)

Regarding Lorebook, heheh... If you find something in-game that conflicts with what's in Lorebook, don't be too surprised or place too trust in what they have to say. :-p Otherwise, what Rav said - having a sentence mentioning any level-dependent drops and then including them all in the lootbox as necessary - note that this only applies to mobs that are otherwise identical (same area, species, difficulty, etc.). If things get too complicated down the line with drops and stats, we could definitely take a look at applying or expanding the "tiers" functionality, but I can't imagine that'd be necessary for a bit...unless Turbine begins feeling even more creative... Sethladan 16:39, 21 May 2011 (EDT)

Totally agree with Sethladan there - in a lot of cases, the Lotro-wiki is actually more up-to-date than the Lorebook, thanks to all of us, hardworking contributors! *throws feathers in the air, cheers and dances around happily* --Ravanel 17:34, 21 May 2011 (EDT)

Just wondering

I am curious why there is no text in the box to tell what each 'fair' or 'average' thing is that we're looking at. I mean, if you don't already know what things are listed in the box (I have a Lore-master, so I do), then looking at the creatures here would seem kind of confusing to some people, I would think. I didn't see anyone else ask about this, but there are a few templates that do this, so I was wondering.--Bluedee 20:13, 21 May 2011 (EDT)

Not sure what you mean here. Do you mean that if you look at the creature's page and see Fire: Feeble you might not know what the "Fire" or "Feeble" meant? Or do you mean when you're creating the page and have

|fire          = 
|light         = 
|shadow        = 
|lightning     = 
|ancientdwarf  =

its not clear what you put in each field? Or is it something else? Amphoras 09:42, 22 May 2011 (EDT)

WHat I mean is this, the damage types do not show on the page, I mean the text that says

    Fire: average

When looking up a creature, it just says 'Blank: average'. So, is the default black text on the template, which has a black background, so its not showing all the info? I am not new to gaming, but for someone who is, and may not know what damage types are listed in the form, it seems as if it may be sort of confusing. Does that make sense? I am sorry if I wasn't more clear about what I said. Thanks! --Bluedee 13:27, 6 June 2011 (EDT)

That's weird. You don't see gold/white-ish text for "Tactical defence," "melee defence," and so on to the left of the colored writing? The creature template should look almost exactly like the Lore-master's inspect; that's how it was designed. This image shows part of what it looks like on my scren:

(feel free to click it for a bigger view) Sethladan 13:41, 6 June 2011 (EDT)

Yep, thats what I see as well. Thats why I was confused as to what you meant. Amphoras 13:44, 6 June 2011 (EDT)

I just changed my preferences, and found out that in the 'Cologne Blue' this doesn't show, but in the 'classic' it does, I am very sorry for the confusion! Thanks though! I have the text I was talking about now that I changed to the 'classic' format in my preferences!! I am very sorry!--Bluedee 13:48, 6 June 2011 (EDT)

Ah, I see what you mean. I get that problem as well using that skin. Thanks for letting us know, maybe it can be fixed. Amphoras 13:54, 6 June 2011 (EDT)

Checked through all the skins, and its only that one that I can see the problem in. Amphoras 13:57, 6 June 2011 (EDT)

So, I was gonna show you what I meant, but I'm glad you checked, I couldn't understand why I had no text, when I know that the text is in the templates!Thanks!--Bluedee 13:59, 6 June 2011 (EDT)

Wow! Things look really different in other skins, sometimes quite ugly, hahah. I use Vector - thanks to you guys for finding the issue. Some of our coding people (Me, EoD, Lotroadmin, I guess? - And Amphoras because he's amazing at learning new things!) probably need to take a look at the different skins and see what's breaking. Sethladan 14:05, 6 June 2011 (EDT)

Not sure how to edit the skins, but I think I found a fix that can be applied through the template. Testing it just now. Amphoras 14:08, 6 June 2011 (EDT)

Right, it looks fixed to me now. Can you check and see if it appears properly for you as well Bluedee? Amphoras 14:15, 6 June 2011 (EDT)

Yup, it looks fine, thanks for checking and fixing that. I don't know how many people use the other skins, but I'm glad it works in the skin I really like anyway! Sorry I haven't been around here, I have been kinda busy lately. --Bluedee (talk) 22:36, 21 July 2011 (EDT)

Update 5

I've changed the creature template to reflect the changes with Update 5. I wonder if someone could help me with hiding the "Melee/Tactical/Range Def" parameters from the template, because I don't know how to do that. I don't want them to be entirely removed from the template, since they are still used by almost all creature pages, but it would be nice if they would be 'hidden' from the page, like the "tier =" parameter is. Just to avoid confusion for people creating new creature pages. For those who are interested an example picture of the new inspect to the right. --Ravanel (talk) 04:44, 16 December 2011 (EST)

Sorted, with many thanks to Amphoras! --Ravanel (talk) 10:09, 16 December 2011 (EST)

Changes June 2012

I have changed the template in two ways:

Lore-masters cannot inspect "harmless" creatures, thus it does not make sense to display old, obsolete data. I added a parameter named noharm to the template. If set to any value it hides all combat/restance/mitigate values from being displayed, otherwise it does nothing.
I removed the obsolete values from being being displayed: Melee, Tactical, and Range Defence.

Creature pages with these values should perhaps be "cleaned" but this is not necessary any time soon. -- Zimoon 10:40, 3 June 2012 (EDT)

* What creatures are harmless? I.e. why do they have creature pages in the first place? The only one I can think of is Goldie in the Moors, and that bear is really an NPC, quest-giver.

*Here's a "bot" question -- considering the "change in stats" which Turbine did, is it possible to

A) Generat a list of pages with old stats

B) Update/modify those pages to reflect the new template values?

C) add LM Level parameter to those pages which do not have it?

D) flag those with obsolete LM inspects with a tag (and category) "Creature needs updated KOLM information."

It is a damm nuisance to have to rebuild a particular creature page when simply updating the values would be easier.

And, since we're on the subject -- is it easy/possible to "parameter-ize" the template so that typing (spelling) errors are less prone? There are very few parameters, and those parameters are already recognized by full name (or else we wouldn't get the pretty colors), so it should be fairly easy. :)

--Wm Magill - Valamar - OTG/OTC (talk) 15:35, 3 June 2012 (EDT)

@Magill: By "parameter-ize," do you mean adapting the template so that it recognizes (just as an example) F for feeble, E for extraordinary, that sort of thing? If not, could you clarify a little more? Sethladan 19:29, 3 June 2012 (EDT)

I was told that what I did see was the result of having an Elf Lore-master, they are not supposed to be able to harm level 1 critters. Either way, the parameter will only be used for what Turbine call "Critters", which is another word for "scenery creatures" which are level 1-2.

Yes, a bot could do that, but we need to inspect to be able to add "finesse" and "root-immune" so I don't know which is best. A bot could remove the old and add two empty parameters. Creatures are already tagged into a Stub-category when something is missing, no need for new finesses ;) However, running a bot for this comes with a cost: extra entries in the wiki-database for no benefit whatsoever. As long as the bot does not add useful values the job is moot.

I do not know what you mean with "rebuild a particular creature page"? What I have done today is exactly that, updating two values per creature.

Yes, it is possible to change the Q template to do that. But I do not know if that template is used also elsewhere, neither do I know if it is worth it. I did about 110 creature pages today and not one misspelling on the color-izing value ;)

-- Zimoon 19:55, 3 June 2012 (EDT)

Creatures versus Mobs Categories

And "No!" .. I will not bring up the suspected topic ;)

Today it seems the long long switch case is made up by Mobs. We have only 19 or so regions, growing slower than the number of instances and dungeons. Why not reverse it? Have the switch case handle regions and the rest to default ==> X Mobs? I have not looked deeply at the code, are there any obstacles that would make this question/suggestion worse?
-- Zimoon 09:19, 10 June 2012 (EDT)

This sounds very reasonable to me; our regions are a very clear-cut and well-defined list whereas dungeons and instances pretty much grow willy-nilly. I would support this restructuring. Sethladan 16:37, 10 June 2012 (EDT)

Yeah, regions are well-defined, if we disregard Turbine is playing the The-game from time to time ;)

Are the creature-herders around to comment? -- Zimoon 02:27, 11 June 2012 (EDT)

Requested Features

Collecting here from a couple of conversations I've had recently:

Mob/creature title. Many of these critters have smaller text under their name identifying some sort of tribal allegiance, title, role, and so on. In the past, I'd just sort of snuck this information into the description under the == Location == header, but Zimoon and RingTailCat have agreed on a rather neat alternative that I like as well. See for example this revision on Baushat in which Zimoon slips the title right under the mob's name. It's a little clunky forcing this with HTML, so the introduction of another parameter here would definitely ease this along. Any objections?
Mob visual labels. Another idea from Zimoon, which I think would be a very neat effect if pulled off properly. Consider the frames listed at Creatures#Portrait Frame - what do people think about including something visually similar on the page somewhere? His suggestion was "to the left of the mob name," but I'm not sure if he meant simply having the circular image there with black space in the middle, or something else. Two other options might be: a) placing the level inside this circular frame with the whole thing where the level sits now, or b) somehow stretching the image out and using that to frame the larger 250px mob image.
While the in-game Lore-master panel indeed reads "Type" in plain white, hovering over the mob "signature" reads in red, "elite" in yellow, "normal" in green" and there should be one for Purple too I think. See from an informative point of view it would be nice to have those colours also at the creature info-box. We are not bound to mimic every single detail of in-game looks, and in this case only LMs can notice the difference, and I doubt they complain when something becomes more "at a glance" informative, do you? -- Zimoon 13:33, 2 September 2012 (EDT)

Just food for thought and ideas as I begin making my template rounds and making dreams come true. ^_^ (Or something like that...) Sethladan 18:14, 18 August 2012 (EDT)

I like that suggestion. It is backward compatible as well so it won't break anything. And the "clunky", or "brute force" as I would put it", requires using the image parameter, which will be superfluous :)
I simply meant the ring, indicating the difficulty level. But, for it to work as a "warning indicator" I wonder if it would be best to only use it for creatures/mobs stronger than "normal". Having it for all creatures would make the "signal" disappear in the visual noise and people must decipher the icon. Or we dull down the "normal" icon (manipulate the image so it is duller and and not bright) to make it clear it is not an elite.
Your idea about overlaying the level is brilliant.
I need to think of the rest. Stretching could be done with 1px images and let the browser fill rows and columns with background, that could look cool. I will bring in my LM and see how the LM-window looks like and if that gives some ideas.

-- Zimoon 20:18, 18 August 2012 (EDT)

Yet another feature was suggested by User:Cyrilgar in User_talk:Zimoon#Creature_Level_Tables_887.

Basically he suggests that we have tables for creatures stronger than "normal". Tentatively they would include the interesting stats and maybe a note. While DynamicPageList could gather those already today, based on several Category:REGION Creatures && Category:XXX where XXX is Rare Elites, Elites, and all the different level indicators, such results would not display any stats, they would just find the names.

Personally I suggest we change, or add to, this template so it adds anything stronger than "normal" to a new "Category:REGION Elite Creatures" that would be kept within each "Category:REGION Creatures". That would at least sort them out, lower the amount to manageable, and whoever is interested may add a sortable table for them with the most interesting stats, plus a notes field for irregularities. I would prefer that we add that logic, using the existing parameters of "type" and "location" (and only when we are within a region, not instances). Objections? Advices? Suggestions? Feedback?

-- Zimoon 14:52, 20 August 2012 (EDT)

1. sounds good to me, smart idea! 2., hmm not sure. Could be nice, I guess, as long as it looks good. Get the feeling it might break up the page visually. @Zimoon, the lore-master inspect looks exactly like this: File:Knowledge of the Lore-master.jpg, but with values filled in (it's up to date, I took the screenshot myself). Explanation on how it works on Knowledge of the Lore-master under Tactical Information. Not sure about the category mixing, sounds complicated. --Ravanel (talk) 04:56, 21 August 2012 (EDT)

When suggesting a "difficulty alert" I thought of something like this. Any "normal" creature/mob would look like today, but from Signature and stronger use this alert. Somehow. The layout etc could differ. The frame around the name is the first to skip to make it easier. And I did never think of anything more that would affect the frame or so. And no, this does not look exactly as a Lore-master window, but so is this wiki not about being anything lookalike but to provide information, and I think it is much valuable to alert that this is a stronger mob than usual. -- Zimoon 12:31, 16 September 2012 (EDT)

Notice, this is a quick mockup, the scaling could be much improved etc.

Creatures that can never be LM read

Currently we have loads of creatures in the "Region/Instance Mob Stub" categories, but no Lore-master will ever be able to read their stats. There are a few but unsolvable reasons for that:

Their levels are way below 20 and even if a LM did read the stats they would be useless, mainly reading Feeble.
They appear only in Session Play when the character does not have access to the LM abilities.
They appear only in class instances.

Personally I would like to see a way to indicate that a LM cannot read their stats and also make it so they do not enter the Mob Stub category since we cannot never "fix" that issue. But I do not really want them to look like the "Critter" pages, e.g. Lone-lands Fox. How to indicate they cannot have a LM read I do not know, maybe just a "n/a" or "***" or something neutral. To fix the category seems easier but needs either a new parameter, or we expand the use of "noharm" in some way. I suggest the template gurus think more about that one and not me who do not really have a good record with templates. Yet.

However, I think there are more pressing issues we could fix first, I just wanted to jot this down so it won't be totally forgotten about.
-- Zimoon 12:07, 16 September 2012 (EDT)

Am in agreement that mob stubs (and un-inspectable creatures) need to be handled better, but am not yet sure how to go about managing it. Hopefully we'll have a chance for some brainstorming discussion when the time comes to try out/implement all the above suggestions. Sethladan 12:26, 16 September 2012 (EDT)

Technically I suggest having a hard limit of something between 15 and 20. I do not know how well the reads are the further away from LM the creatures' levels are, but I notice a different already 2 levels away, though the read still indicates weak and hard spots, just with less precision. -- Zimoon 15:31, 16 September 2012 (EDT)

Wanted: A NOCAT parameter also to this template

We should add a "nocat" parameter also to this template, so that it is not added to any category of "nocat" is set to something. The main use wil be together with the "obsolete" template. -- Zimoon 16:23, 4 November 2012 (EST)

Can you explain a bit better why we want a nocat parameter? Shouldn't we just delete creatures if they don't exist in-game anymore? --Ravanel (talk) 04:48, 5 November 2012 (EST)

There are a couple of places where a nocat parameter can be useful, besides for obsolete pages. Mainly, it allows documentation and discussion pages to include examples, without those pages getting categorized, like a normal creature page. Likewise, beta and test or sandbox pages can be excluded. I don't believe a nocat parameter should be used simply to hide obsolete pages. After all, we have a template to mark such pages, and we cannot operate with an assumption that our readers are going to miss seeing that on the top of the page. We can't discriminate against long term players who remember prior content, but can't find it with their new characters! RingTailCat (talk) 05:49, 5 November 2012 (EST)

Ah, thanks. Those sound like good examples indeed. Hope someone with more knowledge about this complicated stuff can work on this. --Ravanel (talk) 06:01, 5 November 2012 (EST)

I guess RTC nailed the most common use cases, at least I cannot come to think of more than those. Primarily we not not delete anything really, other than stuff that nobody will ever miss (such as mistake pages, unused meta-pages such as redirects and categories, duplicate images, and maybe a few more). But I believe it is good not to have truly obsolete stuff in live categories but in the obsolete category. At least for maintenance: bots do not scan the obsolete categories but maybe all categories under Cat:Creatures, less links to click to only to find an "obsolete" topmost, etc.

I will look into it, I guess it is no harder than the noharm parameter ;)

This means, NOCAT is implemented, case is closed. -- Zimoon 12:15, 5 November 2012 (EST)

The "nocat" part worked well. But the Q-template is causing me trouble, I don't get why Q does not get the no_cat parameter. And that was the second variation, when I thought there could be some magic name-clash somehow. Best would be to always just give {{{nocat|}}}, whether defined or not.

PS: I have ping:d EoD at IRC. If I do not get any response this evening I will roll-back the stuff with Q. Of course. -- Zimoon 13:35, 5 November 2012 (EST)

Leaving the not-working edits over night, at least they do not destroy anything. -- Zimoon 16:32, 5 November 2012 (EST)

Fixed the error in Creature vs. Q templates, with help of User:EoD, though I still don't get the magic ;) -- Zimoon 01:42, 6 November 2012 (EST)

A significant issue with Creatures vs Mobs

Interesting... A category was auto-created by the "Creature" template from "Create new creature -- while creating Gîmtog.

Category:Whitshaws Mobs

However, Boilerplate:Creature states:

==Naming Conventions==

* Use "Mobs" when referring to enemies INSIDE an instance

* Use "Creatures" when referring to enemies OUTSIDE an instance

So, the question immediately becomes -- is the template broken, the Documentation wrong, or ????

I note that we also have Category: Entwash Vale Mobs -- while Haglob is in Category: Norcrofts Creatures -- where he belongs.

Haglob was created on 13 June, while Gîmtog was just created today (18 June).

The only difference I can see between the two is that Haglob is location=Norcrofts while Gîmtog is location=Whitshaws.

* * *

Aha! Now I sse what is "broken" -- and one assumes this problem will exist with all or maybe even most "auto catagorization" templates...

The template has no knowledge of any Wildermore area!!! and not all of those in East Rohan either i.e. Entwash Vale and the Eaves of Fangorn, in particular are missing. The fact that the categories are in alpha order makes seeing which ones areas are truly missing a pain.

This issue is compounded by the fact that the documention states

|location = <-- Region; Unless inside a larger instance (see boilerplate info), then use instance name -->

However, when one looks up Region one finds that MOST of the entries in that table are WRONG! (As are many if not most of the entries in "mob" categories.)

Or else the explanaton/documentation is wrong.

How do we go about fixing this issue?

A quick check shows no "mobs" in Category: The Great River only "creatures" -- and all are in the top-level category "The Great River," i.e. the Region.

When looking at Category: East Rohan Creatures, one discovers that there are multiple sub-categories, one for each area... including the mobs for Entwash Vale, with only two in the top level.

Ok, they are easy enough to fix...

However, the problem still remains -- all of those other areas which are NOT regions in the template. And the fact that the template defaults to category "MOB" not "CREATURE." ... which also means points up the basic problem of auto categorization -- the lack of parameter validation. I.e. if someone provides an invalid parameter, as in location, the template goes ahead and creates the bogus category.... calling it a "Mob."

BTW, this topic was apparently addressed, but never discussed back in 2012.

Wm Magill - Valamar - OTG/OTC - talk 15:58, 18 June 2013 (EDT)

Related to this discussion...It appears this template puts creature pages into category: __(location)__Mob Stubs automatically, even if that category doesn't exist. There are numerous such occurrences just on the first page of Special:WantedCategories. I propose this is changed so all creature pages missing the inspection info will instead be categorized into Category:Stubs/Creature. Or Category:Stubs/Mob, but the former seems to be more highly used so would require less manual changes. The issue of is it creature or mob seems irrelevant here as both designations (however you define the terms) use this creature template anyhow. Thoughts? --Savi (talk) 17:09, 22 January 2014 (UTC)

A New Look?

Awhile back I created Template:Mob and ~~Template:Moblore~~ to try and make the monster pages a bit easier to see at a glance. I've used them on a handful of monster pages since, but I would like some feedback to finalize things and return to consistency. Even though I'm not a fan of the current look of this creature template, I will be reverting my template changes so all relative pages look the same again. If the new look is wanted I can then modify the template here, otherwise I'll just leave it be I suppose. For comparison sake, current template: Ironbound Slave vs modified template Ironbound Slave 2 (Left drops out of the test for simplicity sake). I realize all the Helms Deep changes are first priority at the moment, but would appreciate some feedback on where to go from here, thanks! --Savi (talk) 17:57, 12 December 2013 (UTC)

I do like your new look for the page layout, especially for not having to scroll down past the stats to find anything on the rest of the page. I think the main reason I haven't been supporting it super-enthusiastically is the idea of having to convert all of the creature pages to the mob template, and then we have the chaos of an in-between time when nothing is consistent. If you can make changes to this template so that it proliferates automatically, I would support it. As long as everything's thoroughly tested and doesn't break half of the wiki when it goes live. ;)

Helm's Deep may be a priority for some people, but that doesn't mean we should stop working to improve our existing content too. I think it's great that you've been working so hard on this, and I think it can be an improvement to the wiki as a whole. We're built on the enthusiasm of volunteers, after all! -- Elinnea (talk) 18:10, 12 December 2013 (UTC)

Thanks for the feedback Elinnea. I have now finished reverting the changes so all pages are once again using the Creature template. I will certainly do as much testing as I can before saving :) I am thinking I will modify this template in small steps rather than a single huge jump. That way if others have more feedback on certain pieces it can get discussed as it 'morphs' so to speak. --Savi (talk) 21:55, 16 December 2013 (UTC)

Skirmish type?

Looking through the different auto categorizations of this template, I ran into one I don't understand. It specifies that a creature can be of the type skirmish, putting it in Category:Skirmish Difficulty. However aren't the mobs inside of a skirmish still designated with the normal types (Elite, Signature, etc)? Specifying skirmish as a location makes perfect sense, but type? Can anyone shed any light on this differentiation? --Savi (talk) 20:38, 2 January 2014 (UTC)

Argh... yet another undocumented template!!

A LOT of these auto-categorizations are only intuitive to the person who created them, at the time they created them.

I have no guess as to what Category:Skirmish Difficulty "means" or why it exists in the first place.

Looking at the parent category Category:Creatures by Type doesn't help much.

Template_talk:Creature#Update_2_additions (above) "sort-of" discusses the issue, but doesn't shed much light.

Wm Magill - Valamar - OTG/OTC - talk 22:27, 3 January 2014 (UTC)

The only thing that this category could designate is if a creature in a skirmish would have multiple creature types depending on the lvl/tier selected. Does anyone know if such a thing ever occurs? I do not skirmish hardly ever, but the few times I have it seems the same creatures are always outlined in the same type, though their stats obviously change. Any evidence to the contrary? .... AAhhh, perhaps I found an example. The stat table for Blackfeather does indeed list different types for different tiers if the information is still accurate. --Savi (talk) 14:48, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

As I understand it, normal Skirmish mobs are named according to their difficulty (e.g, "Weak" corresponds to Swarm, "Hale" to Normal, "Hardy" to Signature), however, skirmish Lieutenants, Bosses, Encounters and a few other mobs don't follow this convention. These special skirmish mobs use the same name but can have a different difficulty depending on the group size of the skirmish. So a Dourhand Keg-master lieutenant could be a Signature-type mob in a Solo skirmish, but a Nemesis-type mob in a Raid skirmish. Neum (talk) 15:06, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

Personally, I think this whole issue is more than slightly overdone. Does anybody other than a Taxologist even care? Turbine is less than consistent with this sort of thing -- frequently reflecting the "naming conventions" used by a particular developer working at the time. The original creature template reflected the fact that several of the original Wiki editors were Lore-masters as main characters. However, once they lost interest, the "completion" of these templates vanished. There are a huge number of them which have never been filled in. (Ignoring the Level of the Lore-master issue.) The issue is similar to the admonition at the top of the template -- Mobs are different from Creatures depending upon their location! Template:Mob and ~~Template:Moblore~~ probably make much more sense, as well as being easier to read.

As for the "Classification" business... clearly if one believes the admonitions

Use "Mobs" when referring to enemies INSIDE an instance
Use "Creatures" when referring to enemies OUTSIDE an instance

No "Creature" could ever be classified as being in a Skirmish, as a Skirmish is nothing more than a different name for an Instance.

We already destroyed the integrity of the Category system with the changes people made to Moria by elevating Zones to Areas and Areas to Regions.

Personally, I would recommend getting rid of "Skirmish Difficulty" completely -- for one thing, it is meaningless in-game today, what with scaling instances and all.

BTW: I briefly tried to determine when and who inserted the change, but it's not obvious as it's not commented, and I wasn't in the mood to go through the history change by change looking for it.

Wm Magill - Valamar - OTG/OTC - talk 20:56, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

I do not use the information gathered from loremasters myself either; however, I have no problem with leaving the information that exists as is, just hide it away a bit (as the moblore template looks like) I'm slowing figuring out how the pieces of this template work so I can edit the visuals without it blowing up :) The moria zone/area issue is on my to-list, or at least as far as this template (add an area classification and remove the current area names from region holder).

Per the creature vs mob ... I could care less what enemies are called but for how implemented and used the creature template is it's probably much easier to just keep using it. The mob and moblore templates are at this point only still around to look at until I can update this template to more closely resemble them. Also, in my opinion, skirmish and instance are 2 different things. Similar perhaps in that they are an 'independent area' but very different to each other. --Savi (talk) 21:31, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

Modification

This template Highly uses the template ! (Template:!). Which looks to simply insert a "|" (used in a table). Is there a reason this is done rather than simply entering | itself into this template? --Savi (talk) 15:49, 15 January 2014 (UTC)

Still wondering about the question above; however, I have worked through some editing and I believe I'm soon ready to update this template. A few things will be perfected after this (some category issues for example), but the bulk is ready presently. If you have a few minutes please run a few tests on some pages currently using the creature template, change the template to User:Savitara/Sandbox5 and see if the preview goes crazy on any. I'll continue testing myself and if all goes well I'll implement the changes this Saturday. --Savi (talk) 15:47, 16 January 2014 (UTC)

So how do I use your User:Savitara/Sandbox5? I took a look and it seems automated but not sure who to implement. WhiteAlaska formally matthew.zellmer (talk) 18:14, 16 January 2014 (UTC)

Template:! is needed for dealing with tables inside parser functions (e.g. {{#if...}}) because a plain pipe (|) character is interpreted by the parser function instead of as a new table cell. When the MediaWiki engine reads over a page's code, it first goes through all the #ifs (and their siblings), then expands any templates, and then renders the tables (that's how it works in my mind, anyway). For this reason, we "hold onto" the pipes (using the ! template) until the #ifs are dealt with, then they get expanded and treated (as we want them to) like table cell markers. (You'll notice that they only appear here inside the #if:noharm block.)

As far as design is concerned, I wonder if it would be more visually appealing to have the stats expand from the bottom of the creature's basic information instead of as a disconnected sort of hanging box. Major credit for working on this, though - it's not a straightforward template. Sethladan 18:42, 16 January 2014 (UTC)

Matt, if you go to a creature page, and at the beginning of the code where is says {{Creature, you can put in the text {{User:Savitara/Sandbox5 instead and preview it. If you save it to see how the collapsing box works make sure you revert the change once you are through

Seth, thank you for the explanation on the !template, that is very helpful to understand. Regarding the advanced stats, I will have to think about that. The width of the sidebox was minimized, so if it expanded from under it, either it would be changed to one stat per line (which I'm not a big fan of) or when its expanded, would squish the left elements more (a possibility I suppose). I was simply excited to figure out how to make the entire div with that box collapse :) I've done it with tables a lot but never a div. --Savi (talk) 20:19, 16 January 2014 (UTC)

To provide a view for what Seth proposed on the adv stat box, use User:Savitara/Sandbox4 as the template (An issue I cannot find a fix for with it...Its a div inside a div to allow the easy collapse feature, the outside div is a smaller width than the second; once the table is expanded you can see the information, but any info from the rest of the page will overlap the table (only stops at the smaller width). I can make the outside div bigger but it would look really awkward that way. --Savi (talk) 16:37, 17 January 2014 (UTC)

Glad my rambling explanation was useful, and thanks for taking the effort to try it another way! I can't blame you for your excitement in the least - that sliding effect is very neat and I think whichever way you set it up will look totally slick. I agree that the one-stat-per-line wouldn't look good at all, and having the bigger box appearing out of the smaller one is kind of odd although I don't actually mind the content overlap. I'll leave it to you to find the arrangement that you're happiest with (I'm not dealing with templates right now, so I don't want to offer too many suggestions since I can't help make them happen). Sethladan 19:29, 17 January 2014 (UTC)

Next order of business here is ironing out the categories...The areas potentially could have numerous auto categories applied depending on values (specific instances and skirmishes for starters). This can be done just adding to the switches, however my question is - is there a limit to how many switches SHOULD exist in one template? The switch type already exists but the amount of different values that could be added is huge...wondering if there is any negative impact to doing that? --Savi (talk) 14:59, 24 January 2014 (UTC)

Double Categorization

I just noticed that a number of recently created pages using the "new" Template: Creature (for Warband leaders in Wildermore, such as Varg are being categorized in two Categories:

Category: Wildermore Creatures
Category: Wildermore Mob Stubs

Creatures is the "normal" Category, while the Category, "Mob Stubs," on the other hand is "new" -- and follows no existing pattern.

Is this a "bug" or intentional?

If Intentional, what is intended?

Wm Magill - Valamar - OTG/OTC - talk 15:51, 28 January 2014 (UTC)

The Mob stub category actually is not newly coded. The template as it was written originally automatically creates a category (even if it does not exist) when the inspection information is missing, based on the location value. I'm guessing the intent was to make the inspections easier to fill out later by areas? But in my opinion it is more confusing and annoying than helpful. As I mentioned above, I'm planning on changing this auto category so all missing inspection creatures go into One category, rather than 100s. It's a ways down my to-do list but I'll eventually get there ^_^ --Savi (talk) 16:37, 28 January 2014 (UTC)

Yeah, the intention is that mob stubs are categorized by region, so you can for instance login your lore-master with the wiki next to it and fix all the mobs in the region. I think it's a bad idea to remove this if we ever want all creature information complete. If you remove this, there is no easy way to easily fix a lot of creature pages. --Ravanel (talk) 16:44, 28 January 2014 (UTC)

I'm wondering if the information gained from the lore-master inspection is really important enough to warrent so many categories...Plus, anytime the location is entered incorrectly (misspelling and otherwise) a new category pops up regardless. I understand the need for simplicity if someone were trying to fill them all in one region, but isn't that also possible by just comparing the list of all missing creatures with a certain zone category? (Simple excel cross table search,etc) --Savi (talk) 17:02, 28 January 2014 (UTC)

I personally don't know what a "simple excel cross table search" is and I'm not willing to go in great lengths to figure out how to do this sort of stuff. The wiki is just something I do next to other things in life, and the easier it is to do things, the higher the chance it will actually be done. Sorry to hear you don't care so much for the lore-master info. --Ravanel (talk) 11:48, 30 January 2014 (UTC)

No offense was intended from my previous inquiry - As you feel strongly about having the auto red links I will simply leave them as they are for now. If I'm the only one who would like to see this changed, this subject can be dropped; hopefully some additional editors could share their opinion on this to better weigh where to go from here --Savi (talk) 14:46, 3 February 2014 (UTC)

Roving Threats

After running into some problems revolving roving threat categorization, I noticed that there was no category for roving threat creatures. I've created an optional parameter to the creature template that you can use for roving threats; it will automatically add the page to Category:Roving Threat Creatures. This is only relevant for roving threats: the parameter won't show up on other creature pages. If I messed something up or you think this is a really bad idea, please let me know and it should be easy to revert the changes. --Ravanel (talk) 14:09, 23 June 2016 (UTC)