GuildWiki talk:Suggestions/Improved presentation of skill tables

Stuff from my Talk page
Hi! I think that's a very good idea, giving a forum of sorts to discuss what is and is not felt to be needed from skill pages. I can list plenty of improvements that spring to mind in the short term, but I'm not sure how many would truly be useful in the long term. Dialogue would be dandy.

Is there an established process for creating a "discussion of ideas about subject X" page where people can freely browse and contribute? :P -- AudreyChandler 08:57, 13 March 2009 (UTC)


 * People are free to browse and contribute to nearly any page on the wiki, so it only remains to find an appropriate location for the discussion. You can use the Forum: namespace to make Forum:Skill QR formatting or such. You could use one of the various relevant talkpages. You could use the Community Portal. Etc... I hear that putting stuff on certain people's talkpages is also a good way to generate attention. [[Image:Entropy Sig.jpg]] (T/C) 11:02, 13 March 2009 (UTC)


 * A big part of the "established process" on this wiki is to reply to discussions where they got started. :) This means that you could keep it here (that's perfectly ok), or, if you want a more "neutral" location, take it to the Community Portal or make a Suggestions page for it. -- ◄mendel► 15:19, 13 March 2009 (UTC)

Some thoughts to kick off controversy

 * is there a better way to display the impact of attribute on skills than the current does 15...50 damage for 1...3 seconds ? I always find that makes it hard to compare to damage skills, esp. taking into account warm/cool times. Worse (to me), when attribute affects two variables, I find it hard to match (e.g. why not 15 dmg for 1 sec...50 dmg for 3 sec instead)
 * is there a better way to present long/short descriptions? The official site needs to use the official descriptions, but this wiki does not.
 * why don't we ever include the formulas for how rank affects results?
 * Why not include some analysis, in addition to the basic facts, e.g. how much damage do we get for investing this energy in that skill? in a 60 second battle, which skill ends up dealing more damage?  &mdash; Tennessee Ernie Ford ( TEF )

Kitchen Sink Example
§ Assumes 1 attack/2 sec, which is between min/max attack rates.

So, if you're an Me/El, you can see that (all things being equal in short periods) you get more bang for your buck to invest in domination over fire. (Not obvious IMO to newbies.) I've left off the impact/60 sec (laziness: you have to take into acct max energy, etc.), but I would also find that useful. &mdash; Tennessee Ernie Ford ( TEF )

Some Other Thoughts
This table is, no doubt, too busy; it's mostly an example of the types of things that could be included rather than a suggested presentation. Maybe ppl like the impact info, but find the analysis to be overkill. On the other hand, we could keep all the data and use wiki-formulas to present; that would allow us to change the view depending on the emphasis of the article (e.g. an advanced guide might use analytical info, the skill page might present a basic box and an advanced box, and a newbie guide might display just the basic info). &mdash; Tennessee Ernie Ford ( TEF ) 22:00, 14 March 2009 (UTC)
 * I fear I haven't yet completely understood your vision. On the formulas, what we have so far on the skill pages (not in the QRs, but we could have them there) are the progress bars which represent the formulas, such as they are. If I understand you correctly, I would suggest a different type of progress bar, which shows not just how the basic stat changes with the attribute, but also how derived stats (such as damage output against a Lvl 80 armor target over 60 seconds) would vary -- does that come close to what you want? Or do you want a presentation such as the one used on pvxwiki's skill bars, where the skill description's ranges are folded into the value that corresponds to the attribute stats of the build? -- ◄mendel► 10:20, 15 March 2009 (UTC)

Flare:

Empathy would need a quadratic progression, which we don't have yet, I believe.

Healing Breeze:

The effect that you experience in combat depends on a number of other factors, such as the armor level of the oppononent, synergy with other skills, and in the case of regen the assumption that the regen will not be wasted on a full health bar. That means that these data should probably only be displayed in an analytical context, because otherwise they invite drawing false false conclusions. -- ◄mendel► 10:52, 15 March 2009 (UTC)


 * His approach reminds me of the Arreat Summit; Summon Skeletal Mage example (3 tables). Big pages are big. --- [[Image:VipermagiSig.JPG|Ohaider!]] -- (contribs) &emsp;(talk)  11:28, 15 March 2009 (UTC)


 * Yeah, big tables are indeed big...and not what I have in mind. Neither so much the standard pvx presentation (also too busy). So, focusing on the vision (rather than my poor implementation of it)...I think we can offer things that are not available on other sites. In particular, I think the standard descriptions try to combine too much information in a single cell. I think we can also provide clearer quantitative analysis than the standard impact bars offer. And, sure, that has to be done carefully (to avoid too-much-data/not-enough-screen) and laboriously (b/c, as noted, total impact depends on more than just the skill/attribute).


 * So, ignore my table; focus on my questions before the behemoth, the short of which is: is there a better way? I'm not so much advocating a particular vision as suggesting that we question whether we like our current one and its corresponding presentation. On the other hand, maybe folks are pretty happy already. Do ppls like the current setup?  &mdash; Tennessee Ernie Ford ( TEF ) 18:10, 15 March 2009 (UTC)


 * I'm quite used to the way skills are done here, and have been for years, with the only major bad point being how we use skill templates to store skill data and other auto-sorting information. This is unnecessary, confusing, and born on a mistaken premise that it would help to deter vandalism to skills pages. (It hasn't.) Sometime, when nothing else important is going on, I had planned to float the idea of moving all the skill templates directly onto the pages themselves (as GWW does) and then deleting all the redundant Template:Flare etc. But I may as well bring it up now that you ask. [[Image:Entropy Sig.jpg]] (T/C) 18:38, 15 March 2009 (UTC)
 * That would kill QRs and a bunch of other things (like skill icons that don't require #ifexist), and given our stength right now, it is likely that the wiki could get stuck in a half-converted state. Keep the templates, they're not what's limiting us. -- ◄mendel► 18:46, 15 March 2009 (UTC)


 * I think the main reason it does not is because of the obvious [Edit skill details] link, leading to the template page >.>"" Transplanting the info over is the easy part, though (remove edit link, subst in skill page, delete template page). --- [[Image:VipermagiSig.JPG|Ohaider!]] -- (contribs) &emsp;(talk)  16:54, 16 March 2009 (UTC)