Forum:Notable loot formatting: Groups, colons, dashes!

Forums: Index > Wiki discussion > Notable loot formatting: Groups, colons, dashes!

The following is proposed by _Tagaziel ^(call!)

Formatting change

I would like to propose a simple change to the formatting in notable loot tables. At the present, they use dashes primarily:

Bobblehead - in the small service building right next to the radio telescope.

I believe that is not the correct puncuation mark to use. An en dash is for equivalent parts such as painter-writer or 2018-2019, while an em dash is for an interruption. Neither is suitable here. Using a colon instead of the dash would unambiguously show that what follows is an explanation or elaboration:

Bobblehead: In the small service building right next to the radio telescope.

This is not a big change, but would go a long way towards standardizing the look of the notable look section and make it easier to understand.

Loot grouping

A secondary change I'd like to propose is the use of loot grouping. Some pages have lists of notable items that can have over two dozen entries, mixed between various types of items with no real way to sort through them. This is a simple change to the format that would see items grouped according to their top level categories if there are, say, seven or more notable loot entries (thanks to FDekker for suggesting this number).

Basic categories would be notes and holotapes, collectibles, then other loot as needed. I would encourage users to add headings as needed; the RobCo Research Center in Fallout 76, for instance, has several robot models scattered about, which are now neatly ordered under a single heading, which also emphasizes their notability.

;Notes and holotapes
;Bobbleheads
;Magazines
;Other notable loot

Discussion

I don't see why this shouldn't be a policy.--Ant2242 (talk) 13:41, November 27, 2019 (UTC)

I like the proposal! I think it would be good to standardize the order in which these subsections are placed to make it even easier to find items. Since some pages may have unique subsections I think the easiest way to do this would be to sort them alphabetically. What do you think?
- FDekker ^talk 16:44, November 27, 2019 (UTC)

It sounds like a valid policy in my opinion. I say let's do it!--Kingclyde (talk) 04:43, December 2, 2019 (UTC)

Notable loot sections aren't very standardized anyway, when looking at locations across the games. This could help a lot. AllYourFavorites! (talk) 05:24, December 2, 2019 (UTC)

I personally like the dashes because they visually break up the text more distinctly than colons, even if they are grammatically incorrect. If changing all the dashes to colons isn't botwork then I'm hesitant to support something this labour-intensive when there's a lot of other stuff to be done, but it's also not a hill I'd even shed blood on. Subsections for notable loot sections sound good to me. --L84tea ^{Would you like a cup of tea?} 12:13, December 6, 2019 (UTC)

Being sick is not fun, sorry for the late replies. This will be a bit of work - not a GREAT GRAND PRIORITY after all - but it can be done with a bot relatively quickly, one category at a time. The interactions templates were similarly done and they work well, last I checked. :) _Tagaziel ^(call!) 17:01, December 17, 2019 (UTC)