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Roleplay Namespace Cleanup and Maintenance

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Lately, we've been having some trouble with pages in the Roleplay/ namespace, and much debate over how to handle said pages. Problems include:

  • Auto-Erotic Troping
  • Major problems with example context
  • The difficulty cleaning up or verifying the content on said pages, often due to these roleplays being private or otherwise inaccessible

In this thread, we will discuss and clean-up these works so they conform to the rules of the wiki, and can be understood by any reader regardless of whether or not they take part in the roleplay.

Here are some useful sandboxes for our cleanup effort:

  • How to Clean a Roleplay - a sandbox guide to determining availability of, locating, and cleaning up pages to roleplays.
  • Roleplay Cleanup Thread is used for sorting pages after we examine them, whether they've been cleaned, cut, or shelved, and anything in-between.
  • Roleplay Cleanup Thread Indexing is used after a cleaned and verified page has been added to the first sandbox. We try to add these pages to our indexes, with the plan to create actual indexes later on.

Edited by Tabs on Mar 15th 2022 at 11:27:21 AM

whizzerd Transcender of Gender from Scotland Since: Oct, 2010 Relationship Status: I'm just high on the world
Transcender of Gender
#251: Aug 4th 2019 at 2:35:28 PM

For Bad Magic, some Googling gets me this forum. There's only a few threads in the texting subfora, but there is some content for it. I get the impression that it died out pretty quickly.

For Battle Despair, the only thing I can find is the posts in this Tumblr tag. I can't find any sort of unified hub for the various characters accounts (such as the one for Doubt Academy).

they/them || "Forgive me, regent of queer amphibians" - Lt.BGob
WarJay77 It's NaNo, Bay-beeee! (10,238/50,000) from My Writing Cave (Troper Knight) Relationship Status: Armed with the Power of Love
It's NaNo, Bay-beeee! (10,238/50,000)
#252: Aug 4th 2019 at 4:25:32 PM

The troper Tama Mahou Shoujo just caught my eye. Their history is mostly involving their edits to roleplays, being Roleplay.Danganronpa Heroes Academy and Roleplay.Brilliant Despair The Heartbreaking Voyagethrougha Deceptive Sea, which both have similar ZCE issues.

One line on Heroes Academy stands out to me, which is: "The rp was cancelled because Sushi sexually abused a minor and the cast decided to jump ship. Fuck you, Sushi." Finally, neither of the RPs seem available from first glance, with one lacking a link and the other being a membership-walled Discord RP.

(Note that the current page for Brilliant Despair has been cutlisted due to the title, which is how I came across this information)

That said, since they're active, I'll call them in, and see if they can lend us a hand.

~Tama Mahou Shoujo

Edited by WarJay77 on Aug 4th 2019 at 7:30:21 AM

Working on: Author Appeal | Sandbox | Troper Wall
WarJay77 It's NaNo, Bay-beeee! (10,238/50,000) from My Writing Cave (Troper Knight) Relationship Status: Armed with the Power of Love
It's NaNo, Bay-beeee! (10,238/50,000)
#253: Aug 4th 2019 at 5:18:00 PM

  • Battlefield Crossover RP: God this one is so poorly done I wanted to just cutlist it, but there are examples on the character page that can be swapped in, so that's what I'll do.
  • Battle Of The Elders: Another bad one, needs an index, unfortunately there's no link to the work. Google just sent me Elders Scrolls stuff.
  • Battle Royale Pichi Pichi Pitch: Long page, needs an index, but not the worst. A lot of "Trope Happens" examples.
  • Battleworld and Battleworld 2.0: Both lack links to the roleplays. However, both pages were also edited just five days ago, so I'm calling that troper in for help (at the bottom of the post). Character pages are stubs with empty folders and few tropes, but hopefully that can be resolved. I'll clean up what I can for now (well, the Battleworld page has nothing to fix), and see if this troper stops by to lend a hand.
  • Bay 12 Castle Foxhound Squad: An unindexed "work in progress" untouched since 2017. As per usual, characters page has tropes that can be moved. Characters page also has YMMV tropes and other problems, but it's cutlisted, so I don't really care too much.

Bay 12 is, incidentally, where Foxhound Squad was played; up next will be a bunch of other RPs from the same site.

~Game Guru GG

Working on: Author Appeal | Sandbox | Troper Wall
GameGuruGG Vampire Hunter from Castlevania (Before Recorded History)
Vampire Hunter
#254: Aug 4th 2019 at 7:33:25 PM

Yeah, I tried to clean up the two Battleworld pages since I've heard the people here were cleaning up Roleplay Works pages. I did not notice both pages lacked a link to their respective RPs, but both RPs are on TV Tropes and I've just added the links to the main Works pages a few minutes ago. As far as the pages go, those who are in Battleworld 2.0, which is currently active, say that you should do what you think is best with them. I do admit that the Character pages in particular aren't exactly in the best state.

Edited by GameGuruGG on Aug 4th 2019 at 9:51:59 AM

Wizard Needs Food Badly
WarJay77 It's NaNo, Bay-beeee! (10,238/50,000) from My Writing Cave (Troper Knight) Relationship Status: Armed with the Power of Love
It's NaNo, Bay-beeee! (10,238/50,000)
#255: Aug 4th 2019 at 7:34:58 PM

I think the main pages are in pretty good shape now that you added links, but if the character pages can't be saved, they're best just cut. Any valid examples can just be moved to the main pages.

Working on: Author Appeal | Sandbox | Troper Wall
GameGuruGG Vampire Hunter from Castlevania (Before Recorded History)
Vampire Hunter
#256: Aug 4th 2019 at 7:38:45 PM

Moving examples to the main pages is actually what I did try to do with anything that wasn't a Zero Content Example. If you feel the character pages should be cut, then do as you wish. Again, those who are in the current iteration of Battleworld, Battleworld 2.0, accept your judgement on the matter.

Edited by GameGuruGG on Aug 4th 2019 at 9:39:03 AM

Wizard Needs Food Badly
WarJay77 It's NaNo, Bay-beeee! (10,238/50,000) from My Writing Cave (Troper Knight) Relationship Status: Armed with the Power of Love
It's NaNo, Bay-beeee! (10,238/50,000)
#257: Aug 4th 2019 at 7:39:41 PM

Right-o, then. Cutlisting. Thanks for your help [tup]

Working on: Author Appeal | Sandbox | Troper Wall
GameGuruGG Vampire Hunter from Castlevania (Before Recorded History)
lakingsif Since: Dec, 2012 Relationship Status: Wanna dance with somebody
#259: Aug 5th 2019 at 4:13:52 AM

~War Jay 77 I didn't make the Roleplay.Rise page, I moved it from the Main.Rise page because it was in the wrong namespace; I don't know if the Main/ history goes back far enough to see who actually made it.

ETA: no, it doesn't, because it got deleted before becoming a redirect.

Edited by lakingsif on Aug 5th 2019 at 4:15:00 AM

OH MY GOD; MY PARENTS ARE GARDENIIIIINNNNGGGGG!!!!!
NTC3 Since: Jan, 2013 Relationship Status: Above such petty unnecessities
#260: Aug 5th 2019 at 6:20:56 AM

So, here's how the namespace move is going:

  • Roleplay.Alchemical Solutions: Moved from fanfic. The page is decent, had no sub-pages and only a few ZCEs, so we can consider it cleaned. Also placed it on the index sandbox as crossover, quest and ongoing.
  • Roleplay.Conquest Quest: Similar to above, though it's abandoned rather than ongoing.
  • Roleplay.Embers In The Dusk: Moved from fanfic. The page has only a few rather minor ZCEs. Added to fandom, quest and ongoing roleplay indexes.
  • Roleplay.A Sword Without A Hilt: Moved from fanfic. Also a pretty good page with few ZCEs. The characters page is more of a problem, however: three character entries are good, but the rest are complete stubs. It seems like someone with a knowledge of the work has edited it just a few days ago, so I messaged them, and they should hopefully fix it up pretty soon.

Now, some of my other findings:

  • Roleplay.Evil Mastermind RPG: Original setting roleplay hosted on this website, which appears to have been abandoned in 2011. The main page had a lot of ZCEs I had to marked, and the Characters page almost entirely consists of them. However, I messaged two tropers involved in the roleplay who appear to still be active on the website, and I can find more if it becomes necessary, so we don't have to rush this page for now.

  • Roleplay.Legion Of Hetalians: Added its tumblr link and moved two more tropes from the characters page in case someone else decides to cut it. The characters page has some good tropes but many entries on it are blank, so the best solution is likely to move them to the main page and cut it. Page's creator was last active in 2018, and since the last tumblr post was in 2017, contacting them is likely unnecessary.

I think it's one of the cases that should be moved to the Journal Roleplay index from Play-by-Post Games, as the Tumblr structure clearly makes a difference there (and IMO, much less convenient than that of a forum). The other indexes are clearly abandoned roleplays and fandom roleplays.

  • Roleplay.Lets Work Together: A reasonably detailed page, and an even more detailed characters page. Both had a few ZCEs that I marked, but not too many of them. The only problem is that it is completely unverifiable. Roleplay page was moved from tabletop, the creator of the characters page stopped editing in 2012, and the only linked website is unaccessible, and is not even on the Wayback Machine. Seems like the content from both pages will have to be moved to Unpublished.

  • Roleplay.The Light Of Our Solus: A pretty good page for an off-site quest fandom RP, with hands-down the best characters page I've seen. It had a couple of ZCEs and wrongly placed Trivia/YMMV examples, but that's about it. (Roleplays are allowed to have these sub-pages, right?) If yes, then we can consider it cleaned.

However, it did get me to wonder about another ambiguity in my proposed classification: should multi-part roleplays like this one (which has one completed thread that runs to nearly ~1500 pages, and then a second one that already crossed 1k pages and is actively ongoing) be classified as ongoing and finished, or just ongoing?

Edited by NTC3 on Aug 5th 2019 at 6:25:19 AM

whizzerd Transcender of Gender from Scotland Since: Oct, 2010 Relationship Status: I'm just high on the world
Transcender of Gender
#261: Aug 5th 2019 at 6:44:19 AM

(Roleplays are allowed to have these sub-pages, right?)

That's something we haven't come to a consensus with. YMMV/Trivia pages created by the author of a work violates our rules on Auto-Erotic Troping, but there's two issues with it: 1) It's not always clear whether a YMMV/Trivia page was added by a fan of the work, or one of the participants, and 2) Do the roleplayers themselves also count as an audience for the work? (Especially in the case of Quest Roleplays, where the input of participants besides the GM is very minimal).

My personal view (and I understand this runs contrary to what others in the thread have said) is that I'm iffy with keeping YMMV pages for Roleplays, but I don't have a problem with keeping Moments like Awesome/Funny/etc. Part of me understands that it's probably violating Auto-Erotic Troping to have them, but another part of me looks at their existence and just thinks 'what's the harm?'.

(As for Trivia, I'm not entirely sure why it's not allowed for creators to add to them. Aren't most Trivia tropes based on objective behind-the-scenes facts?)

should multi-part roleplays like this one (which has one completed thread that runs to nearly ~1500 pages, and then a second one that already crossed 1k pages and is actively ongoing) be classified as ongoing and finished, or just ongoing?

I had a similar issue myself for instances where a roleplay has completed parts but the current one is abandoned (for example, Doubt Academy has six completed years with the seventh one being abandoned); should it be classified as finished or abandoned?

For now, at least, we could put them under which category our guts tells us and leave a note about its extenuating circumstances, and then have a look over them once we've amassed a few?

they/them || "Forgive me, regent of queer amphibians" - Lt.BGob
Tabs Since: Jan, 2001
#262: Aug 5th 2019 at 9:33:08 AM

[up] Trivia: adding trivia about your own work falls under auto-erotic troping. I've cut listed a page or few with blatant self-troping.

I'm still neutral about whether any roleplay subpages shouldn't exist.

And I disagree with indexing based on ongoing/finished/abandoned, for the reason stated [up] and because I believe it'll be more work for the cleanup team down the line.

Edited by Tabs on Aug 5th 2019 at 9:35:03 AM

NTC3 Since: Jan, 2013 Relationship Status: Above such petty unnecessities
#263: Aug 5th 2019 at 10:21:56 AM

[up] I don't really think the three subjective tropes (two Trivia and one YMMV) for The Light of Our Solus will do any harm. Besides, the proposed approach of pre-emptive subpage locks rather implies guilty until proven innocent: we are placing the onus on the tropers adding such tropes that they are not the (main) author, and I'm not really comfortable with that. YMMV.Embers In The Dusk is much more extensive, but looking at the history shows additions by multiple tropers, so it's definitely not (just) the author.

Also, I'll restate that the easiest approach to when part of the work is completed and part is ongoing it to place the work in both indexes. The readers who care enough to look at these indexes should care enough to read the page's description and figure out why it was placed in both.

In the meantime, a couple of other findings:

  • Roleplay.The Dragon Has Three Heads - a great page for an ASOIAF roleplay with no subpages and where every example has plenty of context. Spoiler tags may cover a bit too much, but that's the only real issue with the page itself. However, its source is a login-to-read website, so that's a complication.

  • Fanfic.Big Sister - I actually don't think this should be moved to Roleplay; having looked through the thread, it appears that the audience participation (which we decided was the dividing line between fanfics and roleplays) is essentially non-existent besides straightforward commenting, since there are no polls or anything of the kind.

  • Fanfic.The Shape Of The Nightmare To Come - I believe this is also just a conventional forum fanfiction (its sequel, FanFic.The Age Of Dusk is straight-up posted on a blog), so no need for us to get involved.

  • Fanfic.Age Of Strife - This is a work by the same author as the Big Sister above, and unlike it, it's definitely a quest roleplay. However, there's another complication: it was abandoned by the end of 2015, and then rebooted into an original sci-fi setting in a new thread (which was also abandoned a year later), thus blurring the lines between our fandom/original definitions. I guess the easiest approach is to just focus the page on the WH40k story: if there are 3+ tropes on there that belong explicitly to the reboot, they should be moved to a new page for it.

  • Roleplay.Deus Ex Mechanicus Reboot - an abandoned fandom quest, but the page itself is without issue and has no subpages.

  • Roleplay.In The Beginning There Was Man - moved from fanfic. Abandoned fandom quest, and has a pretty decent page + characters sheet. Has YMMV and Trivia, but I doubt the creator described his own ship as crack pairing, and the latter is genuinely notable.

  • Roleplay.Elemental Doom - I was just getting positively pleased by how nicely put together the pages for all the WH40K-related forum stuff are, and then I come across this. It has both a large characters page and several lengthy character folders on the main page before the main tropes. Most importantly, the whole thing was apparently hosted completely offline between friends at the University of Pittsburgh, so the whole shebang can be safely moved to DarthWiki.

whizzerd Transcender of Gender from Scotland Since: Oct, 2010 Relationship Status: I'm just high on the world
Transcender of Gender
#264: Aug 5th 2019 at 10:44:59 AM

Oof, that Elemental Doom page sure is something.

In regards to Age of Strife: I agree that we should focus on the 40k story and split between that and the reboot if there's enough tropes for the latter. Either way, I'd say put it under Fandom Roleplays with a note that its reboot scraped off the trademarks.

Also, as a short update, I've been busy today and yesterday cleaning up the Characters.Academy Of Merlin pages. I've been working backwards and only have about four to go. There's been issues with ZCE's/character stubs and overly informal writing (first person, etc.) but overall the pages are pretty solid.

they/them || "Forgive me, regent of queer amphibians" - Lt.BGob
Tabs Since: Jan, 2001
#265: Aug 5th 2019 at 10:51:53 AM

Roleplay.Yukari Is Free: Page is solid at a glance (haven't yet looked at subpages). However, the last non-cleanup editnote  was in 2013, a line saying the roleplay was cancelled. The Wayback Machine didn't save much and only displays broken/unavailable pages after 2013. Shall this be placed on Darth Wiki?

Edited by Tabs on Aug 5th 2019 at 10:58:27 AM

WarJay77 It's NaNo, Bay-beeee! (10,238/50,000) from My Writing Cave (Troper Knight) Relationship Status: Armed with the Power of Love
It's NaNo, Bay-beeee! (10,238/50,000)
#266: Aug 5th 2019 at 10:52:14 AM

~lakingsif, understood, I really just wanted help solving the mystery and that (plus other's digging into the situation) helps to clear it up.

As for everything else I've missed, I'll say:

  • I'm generally against subjective pages for RPs, because they blur the line so much between creator and audience, so even in the best case scenarios there'd be bias getting in the way of "Audience Reactions" and YMMV tropes based on intent rather than reality (I can imagine, say, a character being listed as a CM because that's what the players think they created, even if it wouldn't pass the thread's vote). Moments pages, though, are harmless, even if they're also breaking the rules... so I'm a bit torn, but leaning toward "cut".
  • As for the indexing problem, it goes back to what I said before, about how sometimes it's impossible to categorize these roleplays. Another issue is that once we slap an RP on "ongoing", we'd be expected to keep an eye on it to change the index if the RP suddenly stops, and how many of us would remember to do so? Otherwise, it sort of violates the "No Time-Based Language" rule, as "ongoing" is only true of any work temporarily.

Working on: Author Appeal | Sandbox | Troper Wall
whizzerd Transcender of Gender from Scotland Since: Oct, 2010 Relationship Status: I'm just high on the world
Transcender of Gender
#267: Aug 5th 2019 at 11:03:36 AM

[up][up] That seems to be in a similar situation as Jellyneo Altador Cup VI and Jellyneo Altador Cup VII, which were brought up earlier in the thread. Some of them were archived by the Wayback Machine, but the majority of it seems to have been lost. I'm inclined to put all three into Unpublished- even if there's enough available to technically be troped, I don't see the value in troping a work that doesn't form a comprehensible story due to most of it being lost.

they/them || "Forgive me, regent of queer amphibians" - Lt.BGob
WarJay77 It's NaNo, Bay-beeee! (10,238/50,000) from My Writing Cave (Troper Knight) Relationship Status: Armed with the Power of Love
It's NaNo, Bay-beeee! (10,238/50,000)
#268: Aug 5th 2019 at 11:07:36 AM

[up] Yeah, agree.

Working on: Author Appeal | Sandbox | Troper Wall
Tabs Since: Jan, 2001
#269: Aug 5th 2019 at 11:14:59 AM

[up] You mean Examples Are Not Recent? I'm still thinking about that because over on Fanfic Recs subpages, we're allowed to say whether a fan work is ongoing or no.

As for subpages, I'm against forbidding even YMMV pages on principle: cutting all YMMV pages assumes that the page editors and roleplay participants are always the same. If it's blatantly obvious it's all self-troping, then yes, cut. Otherwise, let it stand. I wouldn't assume that no page editor is capable of following the rules of Auto-Erotic Troping.

"Moments" in the sandbox's subpages folder means all moments, right? It has all five (awesome, funny, heartwarming, nightmare fuel, tearjerker) subpages?

[up][up] OK, then. I've taken that step. I forgot to add that the home page is the only page archived, and that contains no tropable content.

Edited by Tabs on Aug 5th 2019 at 11:19:27 AM

WarJay77 It's NaNo, Bay-beeee! (10,238/50,000) from My Writing Cave (Troper Knight) Relationship Status: Armed with the Power of Love
It's NaNo, Bay-beeee! (10,238/50,000)
#270: Aug 5th 2019 at 11:22:06 AM

[up] Yeah, I meant Examples Are Not Recent. "Ongoing" is technically time-based language, but people are far more likely to notice a fanfic ending than we are an RP ending, is all...

And yes, "moments" on the sandbox means all five pages, I believe.

Working on: Author Appeal | Sandbox | Troper Wall
whizzerd Transcender of Gender from Scotland Since: Oct, 2010 Relationship Status: I'm just high on the world
Transcender of Gender
#271: Aug 5th 2019 at 11:26:10 AM

I've been using "Moments" for any pages that have at least the big three (Funny/Awesome/Heartwarming). We can reserve it exclusively for all five if that would be more informative though.

they/them || "Forgive me, regent of queer amphibians" - Lt.BGob
Tabs Since: Jan, 2001
#272: Aug 5th 2019 at 12:19:35 PM

Roleplay.Yu Gi Oh Duel Academy Second Year: Not much to clean up. The character page was a bigger issue, but it's not bad. Along with a smattering of other old problems, someone felt the need to pothole Hoist by His Own Petard to Hoisted By His Own Petard and chain-pothole a word letter-by-letter.

Uh. Wait a sec. Is this a copy of Roleplay.Yu Gi Oh Duel Academy Saga? They reside on different threads ("Saga" is the younger one), but some entries are copied. I think "Second Year" is a chapter/part of "Saga", so I guess that has to be cut for being a duplicate. Wah...

Edited by Tabs on Aug 5th 2019 at 12:21:36 PM

WarJay77 It's NaNo, Bay-beeee! (10,238/50,000) from My Writing Cave (Troper Knight) Relationship Status: Armed with the Power of Love
It's NaNo, Bay-beeee! (10,238/50,000)
#273: Aug 5th 2019 at 12:22:09 PM

[up] Maybe cut and merge?

Working on: Author Appeal | Sandbox | Troper Wall
WarJay77 It's NaNo, Bay-beeee! (10,238/50,000) from My Writing Cave (Troper Knight) Relationship Status: Armed with the Power of Love
It's NaNo, Bay-beeee! (10,238/50,000)
#274: Aug 5th 2019 at 12:40:02 PM

Anyway, should we move the Jellyneo roleplays too?

Working on: Author Appeal | Sandbox | Troper Wall
Tabs Since: Jan, 2001
#275: Aug 5th 2019 at 12:42:52 PM

Crying. OK, I'm going to copy and paste the overlapping stuff from Second to Saga.


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