Talk:Collectors

What's up with the weapon and armor collectors? All I get is an error when trying to access the pages.


 * It's not only this page, but many others too. There is something wrong with the database. Gravewit is aware of it and is working on it (At least I hope so, because the situation is becoming somewhat dramatic. Not a single skill article seems to be working anymore!). See also GuildWiki_talk:Fansite_Status/Official_Status_Letter --84.175.126.253 20:34, 24 Jul 2005 (EST)

As explain in other page, isn't great to have a picture who described the objet of collector ? like alpine seed (picture.jpg) ? stonebeard

Collectors by Region
This was talked about here, but nothing ever happened. So I decided to do it. I did not remove the links to Weapon and charm collectors or Armor collectors because I realize that people may very well hate what I've done. Please check out the pages and make improvements where you deem it necessary, or discuss alternative proposals here. --Rainith 17:50, 5 November 2005 (EST)


 * Oh, I agree with what you've done and I would call for the big ugly Armor collecors and Weapon collectors pages to be wuiped out and replaced with links to the region lists. It's called a series in Wikipedia and it is the standard way of breaking apart any large content.
 * The only modification would be that you ought to link back to the "mother" list from the sub lists. --Karlos 21:23, 5 November 2005 (EST)


 * I LOVE the "big ugly Armor collecors and Weapon collectors pages!" I use Ctrl-F on those pages to quickly find the reward item that I seek. I start at the Crystal Desert region and Ctrl-F my way down to the end. It's fast. It's easy. It's functional. I can still access those pages only because their links were included this discussion, but how does a new visitor find them? Will all new visitors, when looking for a reward item, be forced to click a region, search, back page, click a region, search, back page, and so forth? --Krissy 11:18, 15 November 2005 (UTC)


 * One of the issues with those "big ugly Armor collecors and Weapon collectors pages!" is the size of them and the number of page hits that they got. We weren't down for almost a week because we weren't using enough bandwidth.  ;)  The splitting up of these pages was meant in part to specifically reduce the amount of data that was sent as the two collectors pages were (the last time I checked) in our top ten most popular pages.  As it is now if you were starting in the Crystal Desert and working down from there, you really only need to look at two pages now.  Weapon and charm collectors (Crystal Desert) and Weapon and charm collectors (Southern Shiverpeaks) or their respective armor pages (as the only items given by collectors in Sorrow's Furnace and the Ring of Fire Islands are scrolls).
 * As a side note:
 * Time from removal of links to massive collectors pages to when the screaming and shouting started: 14 hours 13 minutes  --Rainith 11:52, 15 November 2005 (UTC)


 * Fair enough, if it's a recognized trade-off of useability for site stability. I appreciate the explanation. --Krissy 15:44, 15 November 2005 (UTC)


 * Having the items separated into item types is good, since that's one major way people will want to use it- "I have strange item X, what's it good for?". But what the new layout doesn't address at all is "I want the +20 recharge fire wand, where is it and what do I need to get it?"  Having things also arranged by class and skill would be required before I give up my bookmark on the "big ugly" version.


 * I don't know who you are, but perhaps you would be willing to contribute to the Elementalist Collector Weapons article? You can look at Mesmer Collector Weapons and Unique Items Quick Reference/Elementalist to see what I have done.  This is a wiki, if you can't find the resource you want, you are more than welcome to chip in and create it! -PanSola 05:54, 22 November 2005 (UTC)

Weapons & Charms... ?
The "Weapons & Charms" collectors feel more like the "Misc" collectors, since EVERYTHING not armor got lumped there.

Belt pouch and bags, if anything, really belong to "item you wear on your body", compared to weapons and charms which are things you weild. Devour egg? Quest item. And nowadays we got experience scrolls (not to be ambiguated with focus scrolls), which also don't belong to "weapons & charms".

Has this been discussed before? I don't really want to merge them. The only time I care about everything (weapon, armor, whatever else) together, is when I want to look up an particular item, in which case I can just... look up that item. Keeping the armor separate has reduced page loading time when I try to find which mobs to kill for my next piece of armor.

My suggesstion is to further break down weapons & charms into "Weapons" (lumping focus and shields under that name, since the 4 "weapon slots" isn't called "weapons & charms slots"), "Experience Scrolls", and "Misc".

Misc collectors will only have one "big" page, inside that page the collectors will be sub-divided into pre and post searing, so we won't an additional column in the table (put them outside the table). Likewise, exp scroll collectors can just be one big page. Feedback on the idea?


 * Please, no. If it feels better to name the category "Miscellaneous" or "Weapons and Miscellaneous," then by all means rename it. But please don't cut it into smaller pieces. I don't understand the desire to pursue compartmentalization after compartmentalization, chopping users' information into smaller and smaller bits (unless it's necessary in order to reduce server-load.) Doing so makes it more, not less, difficult for users - well, for me anyhow - to find what they seek.


 * Before I see a collector, I want to know ALL of what he offers. If the compartmentalization change is made, here's what I'll do:


 * 1) Click on weapons collectors, find the weapon and associated collector that interests me.
 * 2) Back page.
 * 3) Click Misc Collectors.
 * 4) Ctrl-F for the same collector, to see if he offers other reward items. (Do I want to collect more items before seeing him? Won't know until I see all that he offers.)


 * Result: More of my time is spent, page requests to the server are tripled, and bandwidth is about the same as before.


 * I realize that I've popped out of nowhere to add lots of comments on the collector-related pages. It's because I'm suddenly aware of my most-used pages -- for which I am very grateful -- becoming less usable. I'm not trying to ruffle people's feathers, some of whom have contributed untold hours of work to the site. Thanks.


 * EDIT: If, when I locate the weapons collector, I can click on his name to a stub that includes all of his other, non-weapon items, then my obection is moot, except to say that sometimes it's nice to browse. The change would still reduce serendipity via browsing. --Krissy 16:27, 15 November 2005 (UTC)


 * I guess I have a much different usage pattern than you. I usually don't window-browse.  I'm usually looking for something specific.  Thus the less unrelated information on an article, the faster that article loads, and easier to locate the info I want once the article loads.  When I'm not hunting down some specific info, I hit alt-x to load a random page. -PanSola 19:23, 15 November 2005 (UTC)


 * A few thoughts:
 * I've always taken "charms" to mean left hand items in this instance.
 * I think the original split was done to give a page for what any character finds at a collector and a page for the class specific stuff (armor) a character finds at a collector. (I don't know for sure, they were named that way when I first came here.)
 * If we go with my assumption from #1, then the only items which aren't covered are Bags/Belt Pouches, Devourer Eggs, and Scrolls (the XP kind). Is it really worth the trouble for those few items?  It would make more sense to me to list that info on the specific item pages for the Eggs/Bags/Pouches, but still leave them on the W&C collectors pages.
 * The XP scrolls are essentially already on their own pages as they are only offered in Sorrow's Furnace and ROF, all that would need to happen if we can't live with those two pages being named as they are now is to re-name them.
 * Those are my thoughts, take them for what they're worth. --Rainith 17:01, 15 November 2005 (UTC)


 * I definitely think scrolls should be renamed to scrolls, and not as weapons and charms. As for weapons & charms, should we rename it to "Weapon & Charm & Misc" (or just "Weapon & Misc"?  Again, the Game defines all left-hand items as Weapons anyways (weapon slots and weapon crafter), and it makes the overal name shorter.  I want to put "Misc" in there otherwise just felt completely arbiturary (and even counter-intuitive) to find belt/pouches with "Weapons and Charms" (or "Weapons") as opposed to armor...  Adding "Misc" to the name would sort that out. -PanSola 19:23, 15 November 2005 (UTC)


 * Me suggests: Weapon, Shields and Focus Items (in terms of categorization) vs Armor. --Karlos 20:34, 15 November 2005 (UTC)
 * That doesn't solve the main (well my) issue of belt, pouch, and devour egg (as well as exp scrolls) are really not "Weapon, Shields, and Focus Items". Maybe "Armor Collectors" vs "General Collectors", if the majority feel not wanting to separate misc items from the "Weapons"?  By the way, does the Game itself actually refer to caster offhand equipment as "focus" anywhere?  I kind of thought it did, but can't think of any place that did that off the top of my head... -PanSola 21:53, 15 November 2005 (UTC)

Based on Rainith's point 2, I would like to rename "Weapons and Charms Collectors" to "General Collectors", so it will cover weapons, bags, quest items, and scrolls. Is that cool? -PanSola 11:20, 17 November 2005 (UTC)


 * Sounds sensible to me. You have my vote.  --Rainith 12:10, 17 November 2005 (UTC)


 * I don't mind it. But I would say wait till others chip in. Don't just act on a couple of votes. --Karlos 18:39, 17 November 2005 (UTC)

renaming "Weapons and Charms Collectors" to "General Collectors"
I got two favorable votes over the past two days. Between now and Monday night (Nov 21st Pacific time), if no one else speaks up (either to oppose it, or think that 2 votes over 4 days is insufficient to make a drastic change), I'm going to rename them all. --PanSola 19:59, 19 November 2005 (UTC)
 * No one other than Rainith and Karlos voted, so I'll give it one more day. I'll really rename things on Tuesday night if unopposed. -PanSola 06:03, 22 November 2005 (UTC)
 * Done. -PanSola 00:07, 23 November 2005 (UTC)