Splitting off from this ATT
, there are several character pages on this wiki which are suffering from having lengthy descriptions. Sometimes these descriptions veer into Walkthrough Mode, which is more commonly seen in character pages for video game works. The focus of TVTropes is to document tropes, not to biographize. This applies to both work pages and the character pages split off from them.
The purpose of having a character page is to lighten the load that its corresponding work page has to handle. No work is entitled to have a character page and no specific character is entitled to have their own page. The focus of the page should be on the tropes that apply to each character.
How to Create a Character Page has recently been updated to help clarify what a "good" description is:
What does this mean? Generally, any description that has something that looks like this:
Attack Power: 9/10
Birthday: March 2nd
Blood Type: O+
Farovite Food: Tommy's Pizza
- Obsessed with Food: Bobbie loves Tommy's Pizza so much nearly all of his ambient dialogue references it and when the party reaches the city of Foeville, he immediately splits to go find the nearest Tommy's Pizzeria and the party must search for him.
This also includes descriptions that list a character's abilities or attacks.
- One For the Road: Bobbies pull out a bottle of alcohol and drinks it all, resulting in an increase in his attack speed and power, and also a buff to his strength to the point that he can carry allies out of danger.
If you can pull a characterization trope out of an ability, then it can be added at the appropriate trope. However, make sure it is a characterization trope. Most tropes associated with abilities and attacks should be on the main work page. For example, using the ability Bobbie has listed above, it's possible The Alcoholic could be listed in Bobbie's folder, provided there is move evidence he is an alcoholic.
- The Alcoholic: Bobbie is introduced to the party in a bar, where he is accompanied by seven empty beer bottles and nursing a half-empty one. In every town the party visits, Bobbie will remark on visiting the bar and if the party does visit the bar, he will immediately start ordering drinks. One of his abilities also shows him downing an entire bottle of alcohol with no problem and a "Gods I needed that".
So then, what is "short"? This one's harder to define. It depends a bit on the character: are they part of a Long Runner? Are they a millenia-old recluse? These are both reasons a character may have a longer description but a good rule of thumb is that we don't need a character's entire backstory in their description, nor do we need a description on how this character is acquired in the game. Keep in mind all that's necessary is a summary that familiarizes a reader with the basic information needed to understand a character.
Does a character page have additional issues beyond their description(s)? Try heading over the the Character Page Cleanup
or the Character-Specific Pages Cleanup threads.
Edited by Hello83433 on Oct 27th 2023 at 8:06:45 AM
I might be a casual troper, but I felt like throwing my hat in the ring given how sudden this purge of biodata occurred. I'll admit that I don't quite understand what biodata is or why everyone wants to cut it down, but I don't think that this policy should have been enacted without a vote of some kind.
I'll use Fate Grand Order's biodata as an example:
ID: No. 316
Command Cards: QQABB; (B)
Alignment: Chaotic Evil (Vortigern) / Lawful Good (Oberon) (NPC only)
Attribute: Earth
Origin: Literature (A Midsummer Night's Dream), England (Arthurian Legend)
First appearance: Fate/Grand Order (Oberon), Garden of Avalon (Vortigern)
Illustrated by: Chica Umino
Voiced by: Toshiyuki Toyonaga
While my preference would be to keep all of the biodata, I can understand removing rarity, ID number, command cards, alignment, and attribute, as these are all heavily tied to gameplay and don't relate much to the listed tropesnote , so let's see what this would look like:
First appearance: Fate/Grand Order (Oberon), Garden of Avalon (Vortigern)
Illustrated by: Chica Umino
Voiced by: Toshiyuki Toyonaga
If nothing else, I'd argue that the most essential piece of information besides the voice actor is the illustratornote , since they play just as big of a role in forming the character as the actor.
I have to echo sentiments voiced by other tropers on this thread as well; this change seems targeted on gacha games and leaves the character pages a little barren. Surely there are ways at trimming down folder length without cutting biodata wholesale?
Edited by Mewaddlee on Oct 29th 2023 at 9:39:42 AM
"If brevity is the soul of wit, then I simply have no soul." He/Him
![[up]](https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/smiles/arrow_up.png "[up]"){kind=icon}
The Servant Class (i.e., "Pretender" for Oberon) is itself a gameplay-based sorting criterion, albeit crucial enough to be considered "quasi-metadata," which could be easily demoted to the biodata section should another criterion be deemed more suitable (like, say, his real-world origins or first appearance in Nasuverse material), which under the current setup would've gotten the boot, so that's another layer of headache. IMHO, trimming the biodata for each gacha game should be done as an internal affair and, whenever possible, limited to "proper" and "quasi" metadata.
Edited by zero5889 on Oct 30th 2023 at 12:57:34 AM
Showtime!
My two cents (originally posted in the character page cleanup thread in September)
On the Genshin Impact character pages, using Ningguang as an example:
Rarity: 4★
Birthday: August 26
Element: Geo
Weapon: Catalyst
Model: Tall Female
Constellation: Opus Aequilibrium, the Gyroscope
Specialty Dish: Qiankun Mora Meat (Mora Meat)note
Normal Attack: Sparkling Scatter
Elemental Skill: Jade Screen
Elemental Burst: Starshatter
Utility Passive: Trove of Marvelous Treasures (displays location of nearby ore veins on the mini-map)
Affiliation: Liyue Qixing
The only things I can think of that are relevant in this format are rarity, element, and weapon (directly involved in gameplay), affiliation (story info) and maybe constellation, for the motifs. Birthday and specialty dish mostly exist for Garnishing the Story and if they're relevant they can be troped under Significant Birth Date and various food tropes. Model type is one step down from an appearance trope and if it is relevant we have a trope for it. Elemental Skills and Bursts are described in the paragraphs before the trope list and can be troped as well.
On the Arknights character pages, using Myrtle as an example:
the Retromancer
I made a reply to my own ATT query hoping that it would give more visibility to the concerns we're having.
There is a good reason for a "Character Description Clean-Up" project like this to exist, yes. But honestly, this specific debacle shouldn't have escalated if this thread didn't cut all "biodata", because there can still be justifications to keep at least some lines from them.
How exactly does "pinging" work invite a troper here again?
~Hello 83433, there has to be some detailed guideline on character pages first... There are still plenty of things that needed to be clarified in this thread's pinned "guidelines", and in the updated part of the How to Create a Character Page administrivia page. If you know how to suggest creating an entirely new administrivia page like What Should Be In A Character Description, it will be appreciated... because we don't know where to start writing a draft or suggesting edits for one.
Edit: Damn, I got ninja'd by a mod again a minute between I sent this comment. ![[lol]](https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/lol2v12_4863.png "[lol]"){kind=small}
Edited by DanteVin on Oct 31st 2023 at 1:34:25 AM
With Great Power, Comes Great Motivation
the Retromancer
I'm not a moderator.
TroperWall / WikiMagic CleanupApologies then, I thought engineers are also a part of the mod team.
Big Catch, Sparkle Edition
Nope, we're the lower rung of the staff. 
he/him
Sorry for the delay on this response - it took a little while to get it drafted.
The focus of the site is, and has always been, on tropes. We're not The Other Wiki and we're not trying to be. We're not here to catalogue every attribute of every character.
Even on character pages, we're always trying to stay accessible to casual readers. That means keeping the introduction in line with Clear, Concise, Witty and remembering that it's mostly there to explain the character's role in the story and support the example list.
This particular cleanup thread is intended to help implement that policy - and exists alongside the broader Character Page Cleanup and Character-Specific Page Cleanup threads.
Like them, this thread's scope potentially covers all character pages - not just games - and the same general guidelines apply to character pages for any type of work.
If an attribute like blood type or star sign is significant to the plot and relevant to examples, we should be explaining how and why - and if that's true of every character, it can potentially be done with a single note at the top of the page (or an "in general" section) rather than listing the detail for every character.
For similar reasons, if an attribute is relevant to just one or two tropes, we can cover that in the examples and it may not warrant a place in the intro.
Where the intro or the page/folder layout already clearly covers something, we don't need to repeat it in a template. If the character is on the Game of Thrones - House Stark page, we don't need a template line explaining which house they belong to. If MCU: Tony Stark gives Tony's full name in the first line of the intro, we shouldn't need a line in the template repeating it.
This isn't a sudden policy change, it's an attempt to keep Characters pages in line with the existing guidelines. And it's not intended to be a complete purge of templates and biodata - instead, we should be confirming which elements are really relevant to the tropes and story, keeping them on the page, and agreeing on the clearest way to present them.
Does that clarify things?
No objections here
I'm especially fine with "taking which appropriate parts should be in the biodata" - I would expect that we're not gonna take "official" biodata wholesale, just a few most relevant parts of them
@ Mrph1
No objections, too.
With that said, I would like to propose provisionally reversing the mass deletions of biodata and templates, so at least editors can still have a foundation to work with when reviewing and trimming (personally, I was already working with those of Genshin Impact when this happened). If you may, you can then send a summons for editing, either through the forums or discussions sections of a given work.
Thanks for these answers Mrph1, they do clarify several questions that I have brought up on the related "What goes to Character Sheets?" Wiki Talk.
Especially for clarifying this part below, because it really did seem like this specific clean-up thread's purpose included a complete purge of templates and biodata, looking at the first batch of character pages that got affected.
Edited by DanteVin on Nov 2nd 2023 at 8:17:53 PM
With Great Power, Comes Great Motivation
he/him
With mod hat off for a second, I think a lot of the challenge is that 'casual reader' aim - which is a factor for justifying multiple images as well as template data.
Looking at COUNTER:SIDE - Coffin Company, for example -
- We've got color-coded folders (which we might have to change anyway, if it clashes with Administrivia guidelines) but nothing on the page to say what the colors mean.
- Olivie Park is:
Role: Operator
Rarity: SSR
Subtitle: Corruption Biologist
Command Skill: Ph.D Aesthe (Sniper > Defender > Supporter)
If I'm a reader who's never played the game before, how much of that is meaningful to me, and how much is just jargon that would make me think this page wasn't written for people like me?
What does an "Operator" role mean? How rare is "SSR" (and how does that affect the character as a character, the story and the tropes)? What does a "subtitle" actually mean in this context?
...and what does that Command Skill and the associated hierarchy mean in terms of story and play?
Some of that might need guidance higher up the page, some might need a rewrite to the character intro. Some might get cut, or moved to the main game page.
The key thing is that the page should be complete in itself - I shouldn't have to search the main VideoGame page (or other wikis) to understand any of it.
[end ramble]
Edited by Mrph1 on Nov 2nd 2023 at 12:26:54 PM
As a long-time observer of the Gacha Games business (all the way back to the late Brave Frontier from 2013), and as I mentioned in an earlier post on this thread, such games tend to have dozens, if not hundreds, of playable characters (or at least alternate gameplay styles, and not counting "evolved" forms), thus some biodata details can help rearrange their sorting order should the need arise; these I can call "quasi-metadata," especially if they have been heavily advertised in a given game's promotional materials and/or official social media accounts.
With regards to your example from COUNTER:SIDE, Olivie's rarity and role can be considered "quasi-metadata," as does her affiliation (i.e., Coffin Company), while we can dispense of her Command Skill biodata blurb (and possibly explain it in the description paragraph(s)), and her subtitle moved as a caption to her picture.
That said, new readers will have to pay attention to the game's main trope page for the justification(s) of most quasi-metadata apart from rarity, which is a very common element among gacha games and thus is already baked into these games' DNA, so to speak; for example, we can explain the characters' Roles under the "An Adventurer Is You" trope (which unfortunately the game's main trope page has yet to cover).\\
So, should get to restoring the deleted biodata on the character pages and then approach the matter of cleaning out biodata on a case-by-case basis? Am I understanding this correctly or am I completely off the mark?
"If brevity is the soul of wit, then I simply have no soul." He/Him
More or less. We can undo the deletions so at least future editors still have a reference as to which to retain and which to trim, then send a summons for anyone willing to pare them down, whether through the Discussions or Forum sections (I was already doing that for the character pages of Genshin Impact when this mass deletion happened).
So can I/we do it now? The biodata thingy? I've been waiting for some time but this thread seems to have been silent
Big Catch, Sparkle Edition
Well, discussions are still happening at wiki talk if it matters.
Currently Working On: Incorruptible Pure Pureness
Go ahead if you want to. Right now I'm kinda busy restoring some data for Genshin Impact just in time for Furina and Charlotte.
Big Catch, Sparkle Edition
So, I wonder if we may need the rule clarified. Nothing in that comment implies to me that we can keep most of this biodata, and the discussion at Wiki Talk is also leaning in that direction. But the edits to the character pages are going with the opposite interpretation.
Can a mod clarify if the biodata is actually accepted or not?
Currently Working On: Incorruptible Pure Pureness
the Retromancer
It's returned until Wiki Talk is finalized. Which is leading to removing it again, but with more formal ground, but we are yet to clarify this formality beyond "case-by-case, whatever's useful".
Edited by Amonimus on Nov 16th 2023 at 10:39:57 PM
TroperWall / WikiMagic Cleanup
Big Catch, Sparkle Edition
I'm asking because I saw an edit reason that claimed Mrph's post said that the biodata was allowed but should be trimmed "at most". Which doesn't seem to track.
Currently Working On: Incorruptible Pure Pureness
Me as a Merman
Yeah, to be honest, I kinda feel Mrph should have waited a bit before restoring it.
BTW, please call me Jake.
he/him
Just to be clear, I don't think I restored it?
I made a mod post regarding policy, which tropers have interpreted and used for subsequent edits.
Nobody from the mod team, as far as I know, has looked at those edits. If they don't seem to be in line with the policy statement, by all means call that out and we can discuss.
With regards to biodata (this thread should've been about trimming descriptions, which I see little issue with so long as within reasonable bounds), I don't mind seeing these trimmed (if not eliminated altogether from other media), but again, with regards to gacha games—a major topic in this whole affair—it's a whole lot more complicated.
The rationale for the biodata sections of gacha games is that they often have dozens, if not hundreds, of playable characters which are periodically added, so certain entries can help facilitate any rearrangement of their sorting order should it be deemed necessary, with alphabetical order being the lowest priority whenever possible. Right now, it is most fashionable to sort them according to their position in the game's narrative, of which I am strongly in favor, but even I acknowledge that doing so entirely is not always feasible, so as fallback they can also be sorted (either entirely or additionally) according to certain gameplay-related criteria (such as rarity, element, weapon type, role, etc.—the "essentials" I have been talking about), especially if these have been openly advertised on promotional materials and/or official social media accounts. Examples of the latter point include Fate/Grand Order (Servant Classes), Arknights (combat roles), and the late Dragalia Lost (narrative role, then elements), with the former two having in-story justifications (in the former, Servant Classes have always been an integral part of Fate/ lore; the latter, because all playable characters are either employees of, or at least outsourced to, Rhodes Island, the player's faction). In case the sorting order changes, the old criterion can always be demoted to, and the new promoted from, the biodata section, which under the current setup would've been eliminated.
P.S.: Come to think of it, the "essential" gacha biodata entries can be considered not so much "biodata" per se as much as "quasi-metadata," of which even their story appearances can count.
Edited by zero5889 on Oct 30th 2023 at 4:09:55 PM