Talk:Dragon

I am not sure what the grievance mechanism in this wiki is, so I am addressing my concern here. A new contributor to the wiki added his own interpretation of the Dragon article, possibly having been led to it from Special:Wantedpages where it was number 7 or 8. True, his text was a bit scattershot and featured bone dragons prominently (which, despite what the delete message says, are a kind of dragon). However, before any discussion or remedy was suggested, the article was simply deleted by an admin (Karlos in this case). In protest, I found all instances where Dragon was linked in the wiki, and unlinked them.

Now it appears that Karlos has re-created this article entirely with his own words! What a way to slap down a noob! It wouldn't surprise me one bit if we have lost a possible valuable new contributor to the wiki. This is administrating with a heavy hand, to say the least. It would be fair, I think, to at least bring back the text that was deleted, so it is in the history if nothing else. Also, I think it is important for the administrators and users to discuss proposed deletions for at least a day before any action is taken, especially if the text to be deleted is not clearly graffiti or spam.

Just getting it off my chest. &mdash; Deldda Kcarc 09:51, 23 November 2005 (UTC)


 * I find that completely rewriting entries is often neccessary when someone who isn't used to the guildwiki style posts a new article. Still, I never saw the original article - which is what the real problem is here. Karlos is an admin, therefore he gets to delete things. But consultation with the community is the way to go. For obvious reasons. Shandy 10:34, 23 November 2005 (UTC)


 * Fair enough that you don't agree with the deletion/mercilessly editing of a new users article, and I do agree with you (slightly) with the fact that some articles are deleted early but if you disagree with something or someone you can express your disagreement, voice your reasons, argue you case passionatly on several pages that a majority of the regular users read.
 * Obviously the first place to disagree with a deletion is on the Talk page after the deletion is added (admins will unlikly delete anything that has question/disagreement) but if that can't be done (as is in your case) you can always make a post on Talk:Main_Page, or if it's with the action of someone, on their user talk page. Going around and unlinking pages just means someone will revert them, users who happen to want to find the articles will not be able to, and it will generally piss people off. Your opinion is valid, welcome and encouraged in every case but going around unlinking stuff probably isn't the best way to make your point heard.--William Blackstaff 10:32, 23 November 2005 (UTC)


 * Yes, I agree that unliking Dragon was petulant (sorry!), but I hope you'll agree with me that deleting a page before any discussion of it has happened is at least as worthy of censure. I would have loved to debate the deletion in the talk page. Unfortunately, the window of opportunity to discuss it was on the order of a few hours, and contrary to popular belief, there are times when I am not online. However, I see that my gripe here isn't likely to be taken seriously, as the wagons are already circling around Karlos. I guess I'll busy myself with other things. &mdash; Deldda Kcarc 10:38, 23 November 2005 (UTC)


 * Yes I do (and did) agree with you that deletion of articles is something that can be discussed and postponed if necessary.
 * I do not expect you to be online at all time, I don't expect anyone to be online at all times, I'm certainly not online at all times
 * I did state that articles tend to be deleted early and that not everyone may get a chance to object before it gets deleted.
 * I am taking your gripe seriously or else I wouldn't be bothered talking about this.
 * I am not 'circling my wagons' in defense of karlos, he's a big boy and he can defend himself. I never stated I agreed with karlos not did I state I was agreeing with you. (I never saw the particular Dragon article which is why i'm sitting out on that aspect of your disagreement with karlos))
 * My one and only point, which was intended to be a helpful suggestion on how to approach such future events, was to post your disagreements on the deletion of the article was to post it somewhere else now that the article was deleted and not to unlink pages.
 * --William Blackstaff 11:08, 23 November 2005 (UTC)


 * After reading this, here is what my suggestion would be.
 * Create a place for all the articles slated for deletion (sp?) to go.
 * Set a certain period of time for them to be in that place before they are deleted.
 * Allow disscussion as to why or why not it is a canidate for deletion.
 * Have the users submit yay/nay vote to allow the community to determine what should be done.
 * Delete if that is the general consensus, relocate if it is to remain.
 * That is what I think would work well. This is a community place, why not have community descisions? That also is a failsafe for the people who tend to pasionatly cry "ADMIN ABUSE" whenever they don't get their way.
 * --AeSiR oDiN 11:20, 23 November 2005 (UTC)


 * I completely agree with the above suggestion. It's what we've done over at Wikipedia since before there were computers and we had to write wiki text on parchment carved out of sheep gut. There is no more tried and true procedure. &mdash; Deldda Kcarc 11:24, 23 November 2005 (UTC)


 * Ahhh the good old days. Although, editing was a B*tch then. Sheep gut smears reeeeeally easy. :P
 * --AeSiR oDiN 11:36, 23 November 2005 (UTC)


 * Those who have been around for a while know that I'm usually the first to b*tch about Karlos' edits. But in this case and in defense of Karlos I have to say that when I read the original article featuring the Bone Dragons as the dragon prototype I immediately thought: "Ugh ... this needs to be rewritten! But off course deleting the article (especially without the appropriate warning time), and then re-creating it shortly after is the worst possible way to edit an article. I think Karlos had a little black-out here. This is not his normal style. --Tetris L 11:38, 23 November 2005 (UTC)
 * Tetris, I didn't delete it then re-create it. It was really bad, I deleted it. That's it. Then Deldda came around and started to de-wikify every dragon reference as some kind of silent protest or something. I noticed what he was doing and reverted it. He complained that it was there was no Dragon article. So, just now I filled it in with a a couple of meaningful lines. I did not plan on writing the article and frankly had no time to, I just did it so that there is a starting point. --Karlos 12:49, 23 November 2005 (UTC)


 * There are three elements to this problem:
 * The article itself and whether ClassicKirriyama's edit deserved a revert or not.
 * Whether the decision to delete was given enough time to be discussed.
 * Whether an admin has the right/authority to delete a page he deems trivial without going through the usual delete/talk page process.
 * Here are my answers to the three:
 * The article was very poor. I was going to revert it to Tetris' original entry, but found that to be a redirect to Drake (not a wanted page). A one liner saying that Dragons are NOT drakes and then giving examples of non-Dragons as Dragons is not exactly usable material here. I cannot imagine a SINGLE attempt to improve that article that did not involve rewriting it. In addition, the article in THAT state was wrong and mis-leading. Bone Dragons are classified as undead in this wiki, a decision made a few months ago. Maybe you didn't get the memo :) maybe you'd like to challenge that decision but that is why I deleted the article.
 * I deleted the article seven hours after Skuld made the request. If this was an article anyone cared about, I would have, of course, left the issue up for debate (see talk:UAS and talk:Leaver, I was turned down both times). But this was a BAD article that no one seemed to care about.
 * I believe yes. There are a ton of articles deleted like that everyday. If the user has that power, how can you take it away from the admin? When that anonymous user edited the Sundering article in what you, Deldda, perceived to be a very shabby edit, you mercilessly removed his edit, and then went and lambasted him on his talk page. Way to encourage new contributors! You already possess that power and you already exercise it. You want to deny it admins? If an admin deletes a page you like, then talk about it. Recreate the article or the article's talk page and complain. If you believe an admin has a poor history of making these decisions, then complain about him. Build a case for the poor decisions he is made, and I am sure Gravewit will be listening to your complaint.
 * Now, the point about you not being on-line all the time is somewhat scary. Are you suggesting we should not move on edits/deletes/issues without your approval/presence/acknowledgement? That every decision taken before you can provide input is not good? How are we to understand that statement?
 * I think the delete system is working fine, I don't see any "merciless" deletions going on and I believe the system provides a recourse in case something is wrongfully deleted. --Karlos 12:04, 23 November 2005 (UTC)


 * I am not suggesting that you, as an admin, be denied the ability or the right to delete pages. I find it unfortunate that you are characterizing my position in that way. It indicates to me that we will not see eye to eye on this issue. I am, as of this comment, dropping it. Let us find different things to do. &mdash; Deldda Kcarc 12:09, 23 November 2005 (UTC)


 * I Haven't had the oppertunity to read the Dragon article before this all started so I can't give my input related to the article. However, I do have an opinion as to your responce to this Karlos. If this is a "community" place, then why is it left to the descision of one person to delete someone else's hard work? Just because admins possess the power to delete articles, doesn't give them the right to trash someone's work before given AMPLE time to defend their case. (And no, 7 hours is not a reasonable amount of time!)
 * You misunderstood what Deldda was saying to you about not being online all the time. He meant that you NEED to give the community ample time to view the issue at hand and submit their opinions on the matter. People have lives outside of wiki and need to be given a reasonable period of time so they can check back as thier lives outside of wiki permit.
 * Let me make myself perfectly clear; I am in no way "taking sides." I am merely submitting my opinion on the matter.
 * --AeSiR oDiN 12:20, 23 November 2005 (UTC)


 * Let me be "mercilessly clear" here. If someone has not even read the article (check the link Deldda posted up there), then I don't think they should judge my decision in this specific incident. As Skuld says below, this is absurd, the article was pathetic. If someone has an issue overall with my deletions being excessive or impatient or not giving enough time for the community to discuss, then please take that up with Gravewit or post a request to review my actions on the Main Page. --Karlos 12:44, 23 November 2005 (UTC)

I haven't read all that but the page was a shabby sentance about Dragons being called Drakes and something about glint being a Dragon, don't see what all the fuss is about.. 12:23, 23 November 2005 (UTC)


 * My thougts on the matter, in random order:
 * Karlos, I think you're judging a bit harsh about ClassicKirriyama's article. It certainly had its problems and needed discussion and clarification, but to say that it was "very poor" or even "pathetic" is undue.
 * Editing an article and deleting an article are two very different matters. An edit can be discussed and - if found unjustified - reverted. But a deleted article is gone for good, including the history. *Poof!* No chance to inspect the history, let alone restore it, at least not for users. That's why only admins can delete articles, not normal users. So your powers as an admin are not quite the same as the ones of a normal user like Deldda.
 * There is one major problem about saying "Bone Dragons are no Dragons": According to their name, they are! That's a fact that is hard to ignore. They may be undead too, but does that rule out that they are dragons? Is Kilnn Testibrie a human? Hmmmm ... he was a human when he was alive. But now he is a ghost. The ghost of a human. Kinda like ... both ghost and human. I take it, the same goes for Bone Dragons. They are undead dragons. Both undead and dragon. And there are other cases like this. Just one more example: Is a Smite Crawler a Scarab or a Phantom? Or both?
 * On the matter of dragons and drakes: I think in GuildWars these two terms blend in with eachother and the difference is pretty fuzzy. The definition article for Drake (Species) says that the difference between drakes and dragons is the level of intelligence. But some drakes look like a classic dragon and seem pretty intelligent (for example Whiskar Featherstorm). I still think that the two articles should be re-merged. Maybe my simple solution of a redirect wasn't such a bad one after all.
 * Glint is an Ã¼ber-creature, almost divine. She hardly fits in any bestiary category. And it's hard to justify saying that Glint is the only dragon in the game when there is an other creature in the game that even bears the term "Dragon" in its name.
 * To sum it up, I think we should merge Dragon with Drake (Species), categorize Bone Dragon under Category:Undead, but mention in the article that he was a Drake/Dragon in living, categorize Glint under no category, and then drop the topic. --Tetris L 14:08, 23 November 2005 (UTC)


 * Here goes:
 * I am convinced it was a lousy article.
 * Nothing is lost in this wiki. All information is archived. Even the deleted articles. If a delete was unwarranted, an admin can undelete an article. I did mistakenly think you guys can see the deleted history. You can't. But it's been told over and over now, otherwise I'd post it here.
 * I recall distinctly that I made a motion to move Bone Dragons into their own sub-species of Undead and that motion was denied. I am acting on that collective decision even though it is against my own preference. If we seek to "re-classify" Bone Dragons, please go through the proper channels and do it on the Bone Dragon page. They're not going to be redefined on the fly here.
 * Drakes are not Dragons in this game or any other game. This is not the thread for that, however.
 * So, the only creature labeled dragon in the entire game, you want to take out of the dragon species? She is called a dragon by the Ghostly Hero and by virtue of her home and by her servants. And we would refuse to call her a dragon.
 * --Karlos 14:54, 23 November 2005 (UTC)


 * I would recommend that you resurrect whatever that article text used to be. Perhaps post it here, in the talk page, as a blockquote. Otherwise we have your and Skuld's word that it was worthless, and Tetris and my word that it was poor but not worthy of nuclear retaliation. I think other users in this wiki deserve a chance to form their own opinion. &mdash; Deldda Kcarc 14:59, 23 November 2005 (UTC)

Original Article
'''Not to be confused with Drakes, Bone Dragon's are powerful creatures in Tyria. Glint is the only storyline based Dragon in the game, however there is a collection of these magnificent beasts in Majesty's Rest, that includes Rotscale, a Level 30 Dragon, believed to be the highest non-NPC, non-mission based creature in the game.'''

Note that this reposting of the article does not include the stub template, categories, or wiki links, just a cut and paste of the last edit done by the original poster which seems to be (in part) causing such a rukus. Discuss as necessary. --Rainith 16:11, 23 November 2005 (UTC)

Drakes and Bone Dragons
Starting a thread for Tetris' suggestions of merging Dragon with Drake (Species) and classifying bone Dragons as Dragons. Thought? Ideas? Objections? I will provide mine later, I'm too tired. --Karlos 14:54, 23 November 2005 (UTC)
 * The one question here is: Do we have exclusive categories, or can an article belong to more than one category of beasts? If we are exclusive, I vote for bone dragons being undead rather then dragons, if we handle it non-exclusive, I vote for making them both undead and dragons. --Xeeron 17:13, 23 November 2005 (UTC)