Talk:Boilerplate:Named Monsters

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Contents 1 General 2 Infobox 2.1 Specials / Attacks 2.2 Infobox Reg/NM 2.3 Known Attributes 2.4 Location 3 Pre-Release & Resources 4 Notes & Trivia 5 Monster Screenshots

General

So, what do you think? What else do we need on the page? What improvements can we make? --Cydira 00:27, 30 November 2007 (CET)

Oh, lots of questions! --Leord 14:46, 30 November 2007 (CET)

Infobox

What should we restrict the infobox's width to? What else should go in the box? --Cydira 00:27, 30 November 2007 (CET)

I am uncertain on the infobox. It should be a bit less wide. Perhaps have the aforementioned Health/damage there. "Special" should perhaps be split up into "Attacks", with a list of attacks, or just keep "Special" below "Attacks" with other information.

If possible we should try to add total Health, some damage infos on his attacks and level. This would mean 3 different stats, depending on level. --Leord 14:46, 30 November 2007 (CET)

Should the health, level, and attacks go into the infobox? I thought the monster's level depended on the player's level. --Cydira 18:44, 30 November 2007 (CET)

Not so much; monster level is more based on location. You can take your level 25 character back to Act 1 to fight Shulgoth and he'll still be level 5 or 6. (Probably 5.) Also, somehow you might be able to take your level 20 character to fight level 23 things in Act 4 (oops) but for the most part monster levels seem to be tiered across Acts and quest difficulty. -- Mileron 18:54, 30 November 2007 (CET)

Excellent! We should definitely have the monster's level in the infobox, then. I guess the health is more or less static, too, then. So we need a space for that in the infobox, too. --Cydira 19:05, 30 November 2007 (CET)

The only problem with that is quantifying it. How do we go about seeing how many HP they have, outside of very close counting of shots and multiplying damage? -- Mileron 19:56, 30 November 2007 (CET)

I have zero idea. It was Leord's idea. I hope he has a method in mind. :) We can take HP out of the infobox if there's no easy way to figure it out. It's not a big deal, once you know the monster's level. --Cydira 20:33, 30 November 2007 (CET)

In case it wasn't clear, I meant that once you know the monster's level, knowing its exact number of HPs isn't so important, not that figuring it out based on the level was easy. --Cydira 21:39, 30 November 2007 (CET)

If we ever figure out a formula for mob HP we could have the infobox calculate it and display it automatically. Until then it seems to be too much work. --Pixelz 21:32, 30 November 2007 (CET)

Let's keep the Health thought in mind for now. With no combat logs, add-ons or database scrapers, we just can't figure that out at the moment. Level should also be one per difficulty, IE: one for normal and one for nightmare. --Leord 13:13, 3 December 2007 (CET)

Specials / Attacks

Specials shouldn't be too long (in the infobox). --Cydira 00:27, 30 November 2007 (CET)

"Special" is definitely misleading. Since there's no other mob types like Shulgoth (er, wasn't one of the Lies?) we can assume this is a "standard attack" for his monster type.

Similarly I would think it should be "Attacks" because there are slight differences with monster types through the levels. ie Imp Snipers eventually actually Snipe you, and also there are Imp gunners that Reflect/Ricochet/Multishot you.

Further, since the majority of named/rare monsters have random monster attributes, this list could conceivably become very long... that is, if we put the attributes in that section. As you can see from the Lady Itimach page, I added a "Known Attributes" section. This, too, could conceivably become long, but it might look better than having it in the Info Box. -- Mileron 15:46, 30 November 2007 (CET)

I agree that we can have just "Attacks" in the infobox, instead of "Specials". But if you've noticed that their attacks are random, we should just say "Random" or "Random for Type" or something. You're the expert on them, Mileron. What do you think makes sense? Also, if you make a change to another Named Monster's article, please do it to this template, too, so we can keep current on what's needed. --Cydira 18:44, 30 November 2007 (CET)

Hardly an expert :) The monsters themselves have (so far) seem to have kept their initial attacks, but the random attributes (which you can see when targetting the monster) are what changes the encounter thusly. -- Mileron 18:54, 30 November 2007 (CET)

Infobox Reg/NM

I edited the infobox. What do we think of it now? What else needs adding/changing/moving? --Cydira 20:35, 5 December 2007 (CET)

Did a small edit myself. Removed the headline type cell for the leftmost top cell. Perhaps we should use headline cells for the left column "headlines"? We should also add a "number of attributes" and linking to the newly created Monster Attributes in the infobox. Opinions for or against? --Leord 14:10, 6 December 2007 (CET)

Known Attributes

Instead of having a section on the page for "Known Attributes", maybe we could put them into the infobox? This would also mean we'd have all of the information in the monster's information bar in its article, so we wouldn't need to see the bar in the screenshot in the infobox. Or maybe use commas for the list of known attributes, if it's still a section on the page? The unordered list seems to take up a lot of space for the information it conveys. Also, its placement on the page is a little problematic. The information is good to have, but it's a bit prominent. --Cydira 19:03, 30 November 2007 (CET)

I've been pondering this, because you're right, especially with cases in mobs that can appear in different places, not to mention the fact that, when spawning, monster attributes are picked from a random list anyway, every rare/named monster can, so far as I can tell, take any attribute from the list. So perhaps a short comma broken list with a link to the (forthcoming) Monster Attributes list would look better? As far as placement, though, that's up to you :) -- Mileron 19:54, 30 November 2007 (CET)

(Reply to both "Specials / Attacks" and this topic) Yes, attacks are regular, like Shulgoth's hit, cleave and poison cloud. Many have a random monster attribute, and I would think there is room to make a monster special attributes article, and linking from there. We might also want to make these a special attributes into templates, to easily link in to all the monsters that uses them. Or, we could do it like that, and just have the names. Perhaps one summarizing article with them all (templates) and then individual articles for each attribute (also a template, plus notes and tips). --Leord 13:13, 3 December 2007 (CET)

Mileron has made a really good start with Monster Attributes. Just reporting that here. --Leord 14:10, 6 December 2007 (CET)

Location

Should we have a space in the infobox for the named monster's location? For the ones who are objects of quests, it would be self-explanatory. For ones who just show up randomly, it would be a bit longer explanation. For that, we could have "See Notes" in the infobox and then a longer explanation in the notes, like Mileron did for the Lady. Thoughts? --Cydira 19:25, 30 November 2007 (CET)

Going through the screenshots I have, it seems that, outside of a few monsters (Lady Itimach, Rolar, Olomil) each are restricted to their respective areas. IE you won't see Blobbo anywhere but in A Step Into Hell or Sumatran Rat Monkey anywhere but Holborn Access Shafts (among others). So for some, a "See Notes" would make sense, but others, a link to the respective page should work just fine. -- Mileron 19:54, 30 November 2007 (CET)

Why not have "Quest Specific" and "Area". Some mobs always appear in one area, regardless of quests. --Leord 13:13, 3 December 2007 (CET)

The problem with that is that the Quest Specific mob always appears in the same area, since it's the target of the quest. Maybe "Area-Specific" and "Quest-Specific"? They seem clunky, though. Maybe if it's the object of a quest, list the area. If it always appears in the same area, list the area. If it only appears where there are monsters of a certain type, say "Special" or "See Article" or something. --Cydira 16:55, 3 December 2007 (CET)

Just pointing out the closest we got to figuring out damage at the moment: Using a Guardian/Blademaster with a low damage sword, and analysing how many hits it takes to kill a certain monster without using skills. That could give an estimate, at least on lower level monsters. A bit too much work though, but that is the only way it can be done reliably right now. Possibly a close range Marksman, where no shots misses... --Leord 11:50, 4 December 2007 (CET)

Sounds about right. --Leord 12:06, 4 December 2007 (CET)

Pre-Release & Resources

Where can we move the pre-release information to? Should we have a "Resources" section at the end to send people to the pre-release information? --Cydira 00:27, 30 November 2007 (CET)

Pre-release information is currently moved to "Category:Pre_Launch" with a {{Pre Launch}} template. Also "move" to the new location, with the name "Pre_Launch:ARTICLENAME". Do you mean we should have more than this for old articles? --Leord 14:46, 30 November 2007 (CET)

I don't know how to move pages, especially old versions of pages. How about a quick tutorial? If I could do it, it would make this go easier, since I wouldn't have to mark them as stubs, I could just move the old article and link it to the new in Resources. --Cydira 18:44, 30 November 2007 (CET)

Yes, I think the "Resources" headline should be on almost every info article, and if it has an old HellgateWiki article, it should be linked there. --Leord 14:46, 30 November 2007 (CET)

In the Shulgoth case, we should have "Evolution of a Shulgoth" under "Resources" rather than "Images", which IMHO should be updated images of the current game. --Leord 14:46, 30 November 2007 (CET)

I agree that images should be the in-game images, but I was working with what I had to make the template. --Cydira 18:44, 30 November 2007 (CET)

"Trivia" should be moved under "Images", but over "Resources". --Leord 14:46, 30 November 2007 (CET)

Since we have the picture in the infobox, I think extra pictures are a little redundant. Surely, they're less important than the trivia, which could be less than trivial. I think that it should go "Trivia", "Images", "Resources". Mileron? Anyone? --Cydira 18:44, 30 November 2007 (CET)

Trivia - Images - Resources sounds better but I can't imagine very many creatures having multiple pictures unless more Shulgoth-like pre-release/art pics come out, or people start taking better action shots to replace my own hastily-grabbed ones ;) -- Mileron 18:54, 30 November 2007 (CET)

People may start taking action shots to replace ours (for the NPCs, too). It's nice to have a place for them to move the old ones. Can't hurt.  :) --Cydira 19:17, 30 November 2007 (CET)

Ok, I see your point, I agree. I do think, however, that around 3 pics on any given mob is a good aim. More then if more articles than "Development of a Shulgoth" is released, ore created by us, perhaps. --Leord 13:35, 3 December 2007 (CET)

I think we'll probably end up with a good, cropped pic for the infobox, maybe the source of that pic in the images, and maybe a cropped pic of the monster's stat bar in images. I think people will replace bad pictures more than add to them. Don't worry about too many pics, Leord.  :) Also, somce might be useful to show other things, like a mob affected by a certain thing (burning, spectral, etc). --Cydira 16:57, 3 December 2007 (CET)

Good point. Also, pics on Burning, etc would be most useful in the article we make for monster special Attributes. anyone got a snazzy name for that article? --Leord 11:52, 4 December 2007 (CET)

Well, yeah, I figured that if we have Monster X on fire, the screenshot could be cross-categorized to the effect and used on both pages. (Or maybe, eventually, just the effects page.) What I'm saying is that it's too early for us not to take all the reasonably good content we can get. We can sift and rearrange and discard as we go. --Cydira 17:08, 4 December 2007 (CET)

Agreed. --Leord 18:46, 5 December 2007 (CET)

Notes & Trivia

I don't think we need separate sections for "Notes" and "Trivia". How about one: "Notes & Trivia"? Most named monsters will have at least one fact to stick in there, rather than leaving most with one of the two separate sections empty. --Cydira 18:49, 30 November 2007 (CET)

I like it --Leord 13:15, 3 December 2007 (CET)

Monster Screenshots

If it's only my preference, I'll be quiet about it, but I have to discuss it first. I think screenshots in infoboxes look best if they're cropped to feature only the subject of the screenshot. I understand that when it's a named monster, it's nice to get the monster's information bar in the shot, so it can be analyzed outside the heat of battle, but I think it should be cropped before inclusion in the infobox. The whole screenshot or a cropped shot of the monster's information can be added to the "Images" section. I just think that a screenshot like the one on Lady Itimach's page has a lot of dead space, which conveys no information. It's a bit more work to crop the shots (and to upload two instead of one), but I think it's worthwhile because it makes the articles look more streamlined and professional. --Cydira 19:00, 30 November 2007 (CET)

Yes I agree. Unfortunately, I know of no command to hide the GUI like in WoW, which would have made thing easier. For now, I think cropping is the way to go. Anyone should feel free to update current images with cropped versions, unless the uncropped images show some specific GUI thing (in which case, all the other stuff should be cropped out) --Leord 13:19, 3 December 2007 (CET)