GuildWiki:Style and formatting/Skills

This article provides information on starting, expanding on and completing articles relating to individual Skills in Guild Wars. This information should be taken into account along with the more general information in Style and formatting

Starting A New Skill Article
Before starting a new Skill article make sure it isn't already listed in the Skills category.

The Name
The correct name, capitalization and punctuation of a Skill can be found by checking your Skills window in the game. Press "K" to make the window appear and click on the Skill to get the official description. In general, you can use the in-game text as the authoritative source for Skill articles.

Skill Stub
All new articles should be classed as stubs, and to avoid confusion it's best to mark a new Skill article a Skill Stub. You can do this by using the wiki code  . This adds the Skill-stub template to the new article. In doing so it also automatically lists the article under the Skill stubs category, so that anyone interested in expanding on this skill article can find it on the skill stubs category page.

Categories
Each skill should be listed under the appropriate categories. If the skill is connected to a particular attribute then it should be included in that attribute's category. Since Orison of Healing is tied to Healing Prayers it should be included in the Healing Prayers Skills category. This means that anyone looking through the list of Healing Prayers Skills can easily find Orison of Healing. To do this add the line " Category:attribute Skills  ". See the example later in the article if you're unsure. Unlinked skills that belong to a profession should be included directly in that profession's category with " Category:profession Skills  ".

If a skill is not tied to an attribute and it is not tied to a profession then it can be included in the Common Skills category with " ".

Skill Details
The next thing to do is add the Skill Box template, which can be seen on the right hand side of this page. This is the Skill Box used for Dismember. It provides details about a particular skill. The template consists of several parts.


 * Skill_New - starts the table. Takes the parameters Profession, Attribute, Type, Imagename, and one unnamed parameter to be left blank.
 * Optional Parameters: Use these templates to describe energy consumption, activation time, recharge time, adrenaline, or upkeep. Each takes the paramter value
 * Skill_energy_entry - The amount of energy this skill consumes
 * Skill_activation_entry - The length of time this skill takes to activate
 * Skill_recharge_entry - The length of time this skill takes to recharge
 * Skill_upkeep_entry - The cost of maintaining this skill (e.g. -1 Energy Regeneration etc.)
 * Skill_adrenaline_entry - Whether this skill uses adrenaline
 * Skill_sacrifice_entry - The amount of health this skill consumes
 * Skill_New_end - ends the table

This might seem a little intimidating, but it's fairly easy to use. Each template can accept some parameters to customise the Skill box for each individual skill, while retaining the same look and feel. Here is the wiki code used to produce the skill box for Dismember.

It's tidiest not to include entries such as Skill_energy_entry if the energy cost is zero.

Also, for fractions, in order to get 3/4 or the like, use 3/4

More Detailed Skill Information
After including all the other information you can actually start writing something about the skill! Important information includes:


 * Description: A description of the skill. Preferably, the official description you get from the Skills window in the game. Note that the skill box automatically creates the header for Description, you needn't create it yourself.
 * Usage Notes: Advice on how to use the skill.
 * Acquisition: Where to acquire, the cost of acquiring and a link to further information on acquisition. For example:
 * Serenity Temple: Quest, Replacement Healers
 * Ascalon City (Post-Searing): Trainer, Sir Bertran
 * Elona Reach: Capture, Vassa Ssiss
 * Related Skills: Other skills that do similar things. For example Resurrect might include a link to Restore Life since they both resurrect a fallen party member.

Expanding On Skill Articles
There are currently plenty of skills that could do with more information. Every skill needs a complete set of details in the skill box, a description of what the skill does, where to get the skill and optionally how and when to use the skill and related skills.

The finishing touch to a good skill article is a relevant icon for the skill. Many already exist on the wiki but are not yet being used. Have a look at Special:Unusedimages to see if an icon already exists before uploading another one.

Skill Ranges
Many skills in Guild Wars have green numbers which will change depending on the value of a linked Attribute. These numbers are represented in the wiki thusly, 1...10. The first number corresponds to the green number when the linked Attribute value is 0. The second number corresponds to an Attribute value of 12. Keep in mind that sources other than GuildWiki may use values from different attribute levels (Guild Wars update notes in particular use levels 0...15).

Some skills are noticeably more powerful at 16. One may optionally indicate this in the Usage Notes.

Hyperlinking
It can be useful to hyperlink some of the Guild Wars terms in the Description text.


 * Conditions: If a skill causes a particular condition hyperlink it to the Conditions page, but preserve the original text. For example skill 'Immolate' uses the following wiki code for its description text:
 *  Target foe is struck for 5...41 fire damage and is set on fire for 1...3 seconds. .
 * Which produces this output:
 * Target foe is struck for 5...41 fire damage and is set on fire for 1...3 seconds.

Completing a Skill Article
All Skill Articles should undergo peer review before having their stub status removed.

Example Skill Article
See the example (fake) skill article at GuildWiki talk:Style & Formatting/Skills/Everything Example that demonstrates how skills should be formatted, and should contain enough sample information to be useful.

Old Skill details format
Most skills still use this, older, wordier format. Information about its use is preserved here for the sake of maintence.


 * Skill_begin - starts the table
 * Skill_image - allows for the inclusion of an image
 * Skill_begin_info - begins the different optional entries
 * Skill_profession_entry - The profession related to this skill, if it is profession specific
 * Skill_attribute_entry - The attribute related to this skill, if it is attribute specific
 * Skill_type_entry - The type of the skill (e.g. Spell, Enchantment, Nature Ritual etc.)
 * Skill_energy_entry - The amount of energy this skill consumes
 * Skill_activation_entry - The length of time this skill takes to activate
 * Skill_recharge_entry - The length of time this skill takes to recharge
 * Skill_upkeep_entry - The cost of maintaining this skill (e.g. -1 Energy Regeneration etc.)
 * Skill_adrenaline_entry - Whether this skill uses adrenaline
 * Skill_sacrifice_entry - The amount of health this skill consumes
 * Skill_end_info - ends the optional entries
 * Skill_end - ends the table

This might seem a little intimidating, but it's fairly easy to use. Each template can accept some parameters to customise the Skill box for each individual skill, while retaining the same look and feel. Here is the wiki code used to produce the skill box for Orison of Healing.

It's tidiest not to include entries such as Skill_energy_entry if the energy cost is zero.

Also, for fractions, in order to get 3/4 or the like, use 3/4

Please bear in mind that all skill boxes should be colored lightgreen to allow for other colors for other types of boxes, such as bestiary, items, locations etc.