Forum:BFF Rules Revision


 * I'm setting up sections to break up this discussion into smaller pieces in alpha order. To discuss a topic, post in its respective section. --れび (talk to Lavi!) 21:29, October 21, 2010 (UTC)


 * We're losing initiative AGAIN. If this continues, I will discuss with Wikia about demoting admins that are not contributing to this set of discussions on the assumption that he or she simply does not care enough to even say anything about these critical issues. --れび (talk to Lavi!) 14:57, October 26, 2010 (UTC)

Preliminary discussions
Let's get started on revising the current rules. From the Bleach Fan Fiction Wikia Rules and Regulations - Seireitou Administration, I strongly disagree on the use of actual characters to determine levels of strength. Just comparing characters without having to set up a whole list pointing out each thing and discussing it is enough. Characters can jump around power levels, so this is not a good system to be using. Also, blocking, deletion, etc. based on the power level of a character is entirely unnecessary: not every character made is for role-playing purposes and I personally find that the Kawahirus and Getsueikirites are quite OP'd in relativity to Bleach standards. Discriminating against newbies' OP'd material not only gives the wiki a bad name but it prevents the community from growing. We should always strive to attract newcomers, since that would guarantee the wiki's longevity. Instead of what we do now, we should be more proactive in fixing the bad articles ourselves without changing the content of the article. That means we would be allowed to edit the article that belonged to someone else if it was for spelling and grammar, formatting correction, etc. This is a wiki that anyone can edit. If you don't want your content edited by others, feel free to post them on a third-party blog, but being an ass about others editing your article is unacceptable when Wikias are supposed to follow the policy of assuming good faith. Most people come with the intention of positively contributing to the wiki; being a hardass when the intention is good is just terrible member relations. Of course, some come just to troll or make life difficult, but that should not be the first assumption made. --れび (talk to Lavi!) 14:53, October 21, 2010 (UTC)


 * Here's the thing. I agree with you fully Lavi. Personally, I don't like godmodding rules in general. Obviously we don't want characters that are so powerful that they can destroy the earth with a sneeze, but when I think about it, nobody wants to RP with powerful characters like that anyways, so why restrict people from creating them? I don't mind people editing other people's articles to fix grammar, reword a sentence better, and things like that. What I do have a problem with, is random users coming on saying "Ooo I like that character." and then start adding thier crap to someone else's character (and yes I've seen that happen). I do believe we should assume good faith in others and only take action in cases of vandalism or blatant disregard of a user's property. Now, back on subject. I think as far as godmodding rules go; we should drop them. We have people like Arch and Aha or me and Sei that RP a lot of stuff together and rarely with others that have their own fanfiction universe so they should be able to determine the power limits for their universe. Put simply, if someone is too OP'ed for you, then don't roleplay with them. No one says you have to RP with an overpowered character. Some people, as Lavi said, come to make their own characters and have no intention of RPing, so they shouldn't be held to a godmodding standard either. As long as they follow our Manual of Style and other policies (which will be revised and decided upon here) then I could care less if their character could kill Aizen with a twitch of his eye. ---Ten Tailed Fox talk page 15:34, October 21, 2010 (UTC)


 * Of course, adding onto an existing characters would be rolled back if no permission was obtained, since that would be vandalism of a page. It's not too difficult to look at the history page to see what edits have been made (it's on the drop-down menu where the name of the lastest editor is located). To add onto what Ten is saying with fan fic universes, it should be established what articles are within that one fan fiction universe and permission must be obtained in order to jump into that fan fic universe with personally created articles. On SWF, not doing so is fanon stealing (SWF editing policy can be found there too), which is a serious offense (though not a blockable one). --れび (talk to Lavi!) 16:10, October 21, 2010 (UTC)


 * I agree to this. ---Ten Tailed Fox talk page 18:09, October 21, 2010 (UTC)

Well, I agree with both points by both of you. However, I feel as if I need to put my two cents into this, but for originality's sake, let's call it my three cents :3 Anyways, Lavi, while I agree in your declaration of the Kawahirus (especially Seireitou and Kamui) being OP'd in terms of general Bleach, they weren't written that strong once being here. In fact, because me and Ten have made so many stories here, I could state several justifications to their current power levels, but I doubt any of us wanna contest that right now when we have more pressing matters. Also, while I also agree with Ten's Anti-Godmodding Rules, I also want to mention that I see Godmodding in two different categories: One, being characters that may be very strong, but have some sort of equal standing (no, Seireitou cannot defeat Aizen with a sneeze, lol) with other characters. As Ten said, because we have different fanfictions, hence different universes of our fan work, the power levels differ pending the ideas of the authors; similar in regards to the Goku vs Superman debate. But, also, the second category would be the kind of characters that literally have powers all over the place (like if someone has a fire-type Zanpakutō, all of a sudden, they gained Getsuga Tenshō. WTF is the reasoning in that?) Also, characters that have levels that are clearly beyond Bankai (like my failed Shūkai idea), or beyond the Segunda Etapa (like, a Tercera Etapa), also fit into my second category. No matter what fan fiction anybody has, when something fits into this second category, it shouldn't be treated as an acceptable article. While Ten has a point, and I quote him, "Put simply, if someone is too OP'ed for you, then don't roleplay with them.", I also have to note that we don't want our wikia to look like a mess of OP characters that have no justification to their abilities. Simply meaning, if we should have any sort of Godmodding rules, it should be that the means must justify the ends; they need to have clear reasons (and I use this phrase strongly) to the OP, but in the case of the fire-type having Getsuga Tenshō, there is no clear reason, and should be treated as unacceptable. In the case of Seireitou, he was no stronger than an average Captain when he was first introduced onto this wikia, probably even weaker seeing as he couldn't use Bankai on a master-level. After several million arcs of my own, and most with Tenny, he grew in power through character development. This would be a fair case. In Raian's case, same thing. He's been part of many arcs, and not just with my Seireitou character, but for example, now he's involved with Sadow's Beliar and stuff. Also, as per to Lavi's assuming good faith mention, some people are clearly trolls when they come here. While I do agree that somestimes we go overboard (and by we, I mean me... and Panth >_> and maybe Ten <_<), some users come on here with very obnoxious behavior, and make characters that are just clear trolling. Does anybody remember the IchiOrihime KuroHime character, or something like that? You can't honestly tell me that was an actual attempt at character creation. --Seireitou-shishō (My True Identity 18:50, October 21, 2010 (UTC)


 * Even if your characters have been through a bajillion stories, the progress at which they gain power does supercede that of even Ichigo, in my honest opinion. Also, I don't recall Sei-Kawa being weaker than a captain: he has always been equivalent or obviously stronger than the "average" one. But I did not mean to bring up the Kawahirus and Getsueikirites in order to force the two of you to revise them: I was only giving examples that are relevant to this discussion. Also, we should not discriminate against troll articles either. This might seem strange, but if we focused on improving it in terms of aesthetics and ignore the strong possibility that it's a troll, then the troll member would eventually get bored and leave. This is the best way to get rid of trolls, but it would only work if the member base also goes along with this "policy." But if the article is constantly being updated, we can only assume that the member is acting in good faith. Unfortunately, the way Bleach is structured makes it realistically impossible to say "content should not surpass [insert level] or it will be deleted." The featured article section can easily encourage quality articles through a focus on quality writing rather than quality I-can-kill-you. Many users focus too much on giving their characters a broad range of powers and place too little emphasis on personalities and backgrounds, making a large population of BFF characters cookie-cutter people. In my opinion, readers are more interested in the background of a character than how easily they can squash a lieutenant-level character: I find the descriptions of powers very similar across many characters, making them boring to read. If a member is acting in good faith, the featured articles section can serve as a list of example articles as well as a standard for the member to aspire to. --れび (talk to Lavi!) 21:22, October 21, 2010 (UTC)

Anti-troll policy

 * How should the site deal with trolls?

I'm posting this here because it doesn't really fall into any of the below sections. Like Sei, I openly admit that I can go overboard, but also agree that sometimes we have people who are trolls, or the people who are so obnoxious that they can't be dealt with (Creator5000, if anyone remembers). Lavi, I must respectfully disagree with you about not discriminating against trolls. Yes, if something is possibly a troll, we should give it the benefit of the doubt, and try to help them improve the article, but if it's obviously a troll, then in my opinion we should just deal with it. Also, if we are going to try to improve poorly written and/or godmod articles through examples/guidance instead of forcing users to change material, then i suggest that we somehow communicate that while admins can't force you to change something that's within the rules, their advice is likely solid and should be given consideration, at the least. Otherwise, we will end up with some people who say "It's within the rules, so you're not allowed to tell me to change it," when we try to give advice/suggestions. Just my perspective. --The Raven Master 23:43, October 21, 2010 (UTC)


 * I must agree with Lavi here. If you discriminate against trolls then you only encourage more trolls to come. Take 4chan for example. When they invaded the chat, they left once everyone simply ignored their presence and moved on with their discussions. However, when we started fighting back and screaming at them and judging them, that made them bring more anons and also edit raid NF. Trolls and troll articles are best dealt, as Lavi explained, by ignoring them completely. ---Ten Tailed Fox talk page 00:50, October 22, 2010 (UTC)


 * It only makes sense, Panth, to listen when an admin makes a suggestion for improvement. However, wikia does not make who's-an-admin very clear because it honestly doesn't matter all that much. If you're given suggestions for improvement, you should at least listen regardless of who it is. A big problem that I find with this community is that trolls are not ignored very well. This leads to more trolling and prolongs the whole situation. If you just stop listening to them, they won't bother you: this doesn't take rocket science. Plus, the purpose of this discussion is to make the rules streamlined. To avoid what you quoted, the rules can just be non-specific regarding particular things (again, this has to be discussed). --れび (talk to Lavi!) 01:04, October 22, 2010 (UTC)


 * Well, I am not for the whole screaming and stuff, I'm just saying, and possibly may have understood you, that we don't want to just not ignore troll work. If someone trolls, we don't give them a big shouting match, freak-out reaction, but we do delete/undo the trolling, in my opinion. And on the topic of admins, I just said admins because it was what came to mind. I agree, you should give consideration to suggestions from anyone. --The Raven Master 04:42, October 22, 2010 (UTC)


 * I actually seen this community freak out a lot over trolls. You might not see something as "freaking out," but take my word for it: being an admin in various communities (both past and present), I've seen a lot of it all over the place. Simply making a comment in regards to what a troll said is feeding the activity and is an indicator that the one who made the comment is at least bothered by the troll comment enough to say something about it. This is counter-productive since it'll keep the troll there for more lulz. --れび (talk to Lavi!) 14:16, October 22, 2010 (UTC)


 * Exactly. We do kind of freak out and jump the gun when it comes to trolls. As long as they aren't blatantly vandalizing the site, we should ignore them completely and they'll go away. If they continue to edit, as Lavi mentioned above, we must assume that they are a new user who is simply oblivious to the rules and we should lend them a hand in tuning thier work. ---Ten Tailed Fox talk page 15:34, October 22, 2010 (UTC)


 * Well, as long as we dont ignore blatant vandalism, I am fine with this. --The Raven Master 23:39, October 22, 2010 (UTC)


 * Vandalism is vandalism: ignoring it is like ignoring that there's a gunman in your school. --れび (talk to Lavi!) 02:33, October 23, 2010 (UTC)

Editing policy

 * Should all articles be edit-able by others, as long as content remains unchanged?

To answer the above statement, yes. --れび (talk to Lavi!) 21:37, October 21, 2010 (UTC)

Yes. I always found it somewhat stupid that we could not, and even more so when some people yell at others for editing to change grammar (I forget who it was, but I've seen this happen once or twice). --The Raven Master 23:34, October 21, 2010 (UTC)

Yes. ---Ten Tailed Fox talk page 00:43, October 22, 2010 (UTC)

I myself think we should be careful with this. As an admin, I totally agree that allowing people to edit spelling and grammar on any article is good but as a user I think it is highly important to make a clear line; spelling corrections are obvious but grammar can be tricky. I once had a character article that someone edited for grammar but did a poor job of it. The sentence that was edited was decent enough to start with but I found it after the edit to be horrible and it didn't convey the exact nuance that I was going for. This annoyed me some especially since I believe the user was an admin. I was tempted to change it back but instead decided to edit it into a whole new sentence so as not to cause a problem. I tell this anecdote to illustrate how grammar editing can be subjective and thus should have exact guidelines to it. Maybe there can be a tag for articles if the user doesn't want to non-admins editing the grammar of the page? Or there maybe there should be no grammar editing of simple things and limit it to obvious grammar problems?


 * -- Tsukiyume *w* (talk 00:43, October 23, 2010 (UTC)


 * If the grammar is made poorer through the edit, then just edit it again to fix it. If you believe that it would turn into a problem, I think putting a note on the article's talk page should work out for most individuals. --れび (talk to Lavi!) 02:26, October 23, 2010 (UTC)

Featured articles

 * Should featured articles be used to encourage new members to write quality articles?

My suggestion. Discuss. --れび (talk to Lavi!) 21:39, October 21, 2010 (UTC)

Yes, but we would need a system that does not fall apart, and is not biased in favor of certain members, but still chooses exemplary characters. --The Raven Master 23:35, October 21, 2010 (UTC)

Again. Yes we should, as per Panth above. ---Ten Tailed Fox talk page 00:44, October 22, 2010 (UTC)


 * In order for this to go forward, we need to discuss requirements in order to make sure that every article is not suggested to become a featured article (let's abbreviate this as FA). First off, I would suggest having an introduction (the section at the beginning of the article that summarizes the entire article) consisting of 1000 or more words. Also, the article must have no spelling and grammar problems and follow all of the wiki's policies, including layout and manual of style. We will have to finalize this after discussing a standardization of the policies, of course. --れび (talk to Lavi!) 01:08, October 22, 2010 (UTC)


 * I can agree to those things. Also we need to make it to where a FA doesn't get voted in more than once over a certain period of time. For example, Βleach wiki allows a character that's already been an FA to be one again after six months or so. Also, unless it is unanimously voted upon, the same user shouldn't get continuous, repeated FA awards. For example, the FA of this site thus far has always been one of Sei and I's articles and it is either always there or switched to another one of ours; this should not happen. ---Ten Tailed Fox talk page 02:34, October 22, 2010 (UTC)


 * I agree to this; my only question would be how long should an article be featured for? We might need longer incumbencies than Bleach Wikia or Narutopedia because of our lower number of qualifying articles. --The Raven Master 04:42, October 22, 2010 (UTC)


 * I agree with all of this, though ... does it have to be 1000 words? I find the content of an article should be in the body, but if it 1000+ words then some of the basic content would have to go in the intro to make it long enough. I understand it could just be a summary and then detail in the body but I find to much of that sort of thing repetitive. Maybe half that? 500+ words?
 * -- Tsukiyume *w* (talk 00:49, October 23, 2010 (UTC)


 * Well, after having it pointed out to me by another user, I have to agree with Haruko. One thousand words is, in my opinion, a massive amount, not only to require, but to have for an introduction. If I ever saw an introduction that long I would argue that it became ridiculous at that point. While five hundred words would still be within sanity for an intro, I think that it might be a bit high for featured article requirement, at least at the start (perhaps later people will start to flesh out their into's more, because of this emphasis, and we could heighten it), because I have never seen a character intro on our wikia over 300 words. I checked some of my, Sei's, and Zaraikou's articles (in my experience, the three of us have some of the larger character intros), and found that 230-250 words is the typical range for those user's articles, and that of the characters recently edited, the longest had 275-ish words in its intro. Unless I am wrong and there are articles with longer intros out there, I suggest that perhaps we make the intro requirement 300 words, as that would still require some expansion, but not doubling of length. Just my opinion. --The Raven Master 01:09, October 23, 2010 (UTC)


 * I'll admit that I didn't put too much thought when I said 1000 words. 300 words should be a sufficient introduction for a proper length article. Since we don't have many qualifying articles, one per month, like what we had before, shouldn't be too bad. Also, in regards for articles becoming FAs again, I'm personally against it since making a previous FA the featured article again is a redundancy and we have the infinite potential to expand, unlike Bleach wiki. So instead, we should have articles with FA status remain with the FA status (denoted with a special tag or something) and not be voted in again. However, previous FAs can still lose its status if the quality bogs down some time after its accepted into the FA "group." --れび (talk to Lavi!) 02:24, October 23, 2010 (UTC)

Godmodding policy

 * Should the policy be continued?

This got a little off-track in the above discussion, so let's focus on it in this section. --れび (talk to Lavi!) 21:39, October 21, 2010 (UTC)

No, no and no. It doesn't help anyone and isn't really needed. If someone is a godmod, just don't RP with them. Plain and simple. ---Ten Tailed Fox talk page 00:45, October 22, 2010 (UTC)


 * The godmodding policy might keep articles out in the short-run, but in the long-run, we still have godmodded content, a la Kawahirus and Getsueikirites. This makes us seem hypocritical and elitist. I've been against the GM policy since the start because it is taking a role-play rule and applying it to general fan fiction (which role-playing does not completely encompass at all). This is impeding both the reputation of the wiki as well as deter writers from learning how to write better. The makings of a good character is not the godmods: it is the writing and creativity related to the character. --れび (talk to Lavi!) 01:12, October 22, 2010 (UTC)
 * To expand on Lavi's train of thought, Shiratori, take Aizen for example. I think we all agree that he is probably the most godmodded villain in the history of godmodded villains, however, his character and the way Kubo portrays him is very artistic. Strip aside his powers and he is a very well thought out character. Now, you may start and think that he is hax and he knows everything, but let me just stop there and say that this is your first mistake. Aizen fulfills his role perfectly because of the way Kubo writes the role. Aizen infuriates us because of his arrogance, his power, and his disposition; something a villain is suppose to do. A villain is supposed to cause the reader to hate them or associate them with evil, thus giving more sympathy to the protagonist when he triumphs. It's the same in fanfiction. The power level is a very small fraction of how a character should be judged. How he/she is written and portrayed is far more important than whether or not he/she can teleport, or destroy entire cities. ---Ten Tailed Fox talk page 02:40, October 22, 2010 (UTC)

If we do as you say, it would take away the focus on working on good writing, which ends up as a catch-22; we would be telling people not to do this and that to "prevent bad writing" when it would actually take the attention away from preventing bad writing in the first place. Of course, good writing is not an overnight change: it takes repetition and practice in order to turn a poor writer into a respectable one. --れび (talk to Lavi!) 14:05, October 22, 2010 (UTC)


 * You're completely misunderstanding him, Cullen. NF degraded to what it is for several reasons and none of those had to do with godmodding. It came from poor leadership, a lack of organization, feeding trolls like 4chan, and a simple lack of good writing. Godmodding has nothing to do with anything. Now, if we were based on a forum like TheStarWarsRP.Com, godmodding might become an issue to consider; but we're not. We are a fanfiction site that supports roleplaying. In fanfiction, you can either stick with the canon or completely ignore it, so long as you stick within the guidelines set forth by Kubo (reiatsu, zanpakutō, Hollows, Shinigami, etc). Some people come here for the soul purpose of demonstrating their fanfiction and couldn't give two flips about RPing. Should they be held to the godmodding standard too? Even if their stories don't involve any other user? What happens then if they decided that they want to roleplay? Do we force them to tone their character down then? No. Quite simply put, a fair minded user will not roleplay with a character that can blow out the sun accidently while blowing his/her nose. Now, if this is true, then what will happen? Well, if the godmodded user really wants to RP, he'll tone down his character so that others will RP with him. That right there will be enough to stop our godmodding problem. Even then not all godmods will comply with that, but they just won't be able to roleplay because no one will want to.


 * Also, I don't think Lavi was at all suggesting we don't use a Manual of Style. Manual of Styles are very important to a wiki like ours and it would be counter productive to his "good writer" policy to get rid of one. We are simply throwing out the godmodding policy in order to promote good writing. Along with a FA policy, this will make this site much more functional than NF. ---Ten Tailed Fox talk page 15:45, October 22, 2010 (UTC)

I think this discussion has ran its course. If no one has anything to add by Monday, October 24, we can start a vote. --れび (talk to Lavi!) 02:28, October 23, 2010 (UTC)


 * I'm fine with this and all, but Monday is the 25th ^^' Today is the 23rd, unless you meant Sunday the 24th. ---Ten Tailed Fox talk page 16:49, October 23, 2010 (UTC)


 * I meant Monday the 25th. >.> --れび (talk to Lavi!) 23:15, October 23, 2010 (UTC)

Voting

 * Let's get this out of the way: you can only vote once. If you support removing the GM policy, sign under support. Same goes if you oppose: sign under oppose.

Support

 * 1) --れび (talk to Lavi!) 03:09, October 26, 2010 (UTC)
 * 2) -- 楽しい Vui  Kiryu's Eternal Eyes.png (吐露) 03:12, October 26, 2010 (UTC)
 * 3) --The Raven Master 03:35, October 26, 2010 (UTC)
 * 4) ---Ten Tailed Fox talk page 23:38, October 27, 2010 (UTC)

Under 13 statement
Okay, so I hear that Sei unblocked a user under the pretense of "we're not following the under 13 years of age rule." I want to make it clear that there is no negotiating that we are following this because it is explicitly stated in Wikia's Terms of Use, which all of you agreed to when you registered your account on this wiki host. Allow me to quote directly from the Terms of Use (as of the most recent revision):

With this passage, it basically says that you are verifying that you are 13 years old or older and that anyone younger is not authorized to have an account on Wikia. I am fully aware that Bleach is an anime focused more on the teen population than anything else, but this passage is not there just because Wikia said so. Because of COPPA, there have been lawsuits against websites that allowed children under the age of 13. This passage safeguards Wikia against federal law by stating that they refuse members who they know to be under-aged. Of course, there will be under-aged members that lie about their age, but we can't do anything about it and we should not goad members into revealing their actual age. This is aimed solely against members that state that he or she is under-aged without being pressured into doing so. --れび (talk to Lavi!) 01:40, October 26, 2010 (UTC)


 * Agreed. I didn't know that it was for editing too, I thought it was just for personal information stuff. After looking through this, I completely agree. ---Ten Tailed Fox talk page 23:36, October 27, 2010 (UTC)


 * I would also like to point out that turning a blind eye to a member who explicitly stated that he or she is under 13 is pretty much supporting the breaking of Wikia's ToU. Not knowing is an entirely different story. Again, I want to stress that we should never police our members and ask them if they really are following the ToU; this is only so that we can show that yes, we act in accordance with Wikia's rules. --れび (talk to Lavi!) 17:50, October 28, 2010 (UTC)

Real Life Picture Usage
Should we allow people to use pictures from real life for characters, etc.? --The Raven Master 02:30, October 26, 2010 (UTC)
 * I personally don't care, though it's widely accepted to just use anime pictures. --れび (talk to Lavi!) 14:58, October 26, 2010 (UTC)

User names in signatures
It may seem minor to the rest of you, but we should require that all users' signature include his or her Wikia username in some form, since I honestly don't want to have to constantly cursor over signatures to figure out who is who. Some people go crazy with what links to his or her userpage and stuff, and it's an unnecessary hassle for others. --れび (talk to Lavi!) 17:44, October 27, 2010 (UTC)
 * I agree and am also guilty of making my Signature alittle too out there.-- 楽しい Kiryu's Eternal Eyes.png (Talk to Fenix) 21:32, October 27, 2010 (UTC)

Canon Characters
This is a big question for everyone I think. Personally, if we are to consider everyone's fanfictions in a different universe (unless stated otherwise by the user in question), then we should allow Canon Characters to be freely accessed as long as they have the user name of the owner in the name (example; Tia Harribel (Ten Tailed Fox)). They do it over on SW fanon, and it works pretty well, so the same should be okay for here too. What do you guys think? ---Ten Tailed Fox talk page 00:52, October 28, 2010 (UTC)

I personally think it is fine, as long as people make sure they choose a single version of the character to be their "canon" version for a given story, so that we don't have collaboration stories with multiple versions of a single character. --'''User:Thepantheon 02:39, October 28, 2010 (UTC)


 * I personally disagree with writing about canon characters, but this is a fan fiction wiki. You can be allowed to create your own article based on an actual character from the franchise so long as, as Ten stated, it's mentioned in the name of the article that it is yours. Also, you should not redirect a page with the plain version of the subject to your own version of the subject. If it's needed, a disambiguation page would suffice. --れび (talk to Lavi!) 17:52, October 28, 2010 (UTC)


 * I agree, disambiguous pages will work much better than the plain redirects. I'll leave this discussion opened for another day or so and then open this up to vote. Speak now or forever hold your peace :3 ---Ten Tailed Fox talk page 03:32, October 29, 2010 (UTC)