A New Type of Profile - Locations

[KieranH10]

If extreme advantages to one side are generated via a location, a balanced alternative should be discussed in the relevant versus thread. This can include bystanders that need to be rescued or are able to provide outside assistance, as well as poisons or diseases that are present in the area.

I believe this is a much more effective wording for the rule, and helps generally sum up how Locations should be used in many fields.

Would either participant be allowed to be assumed to potentially indirectly or directly threaten this person? And would we assume it does nothing in regards of this?

Probably not. If someone could win a battle without even attacking the actual opponent by instead just destabilizing the battlefield by killing whoever is stabilizing it. That isn't really a battle, plus it could be assumed that either character would be capable of such, which would result in an incon anyway.

 

[Bobsican]

Probably not. If someone could win a battle without even attacking the actual opponent by instead just destabilizing the battlefield by killing whoever is stabilizing it. That isn't really a battle, plus it could be assumed that either character would be capable of such, which would result in an incon anyway.

The problem becomes clear in cases where characters have simply range with moves too wide to expect the one that sustains the place to not be affected.
I think this sort of locations are best just being banned to avoid going into fanfiction territory.

 

[Lou_change]

What if bystanders make the battle fairer for example a super genius tactician mind controls a dozen bystanders to fight someone who otherwise out matches them or has a defensive ability they can't get around but a bystander does I would assume those have to be banned.

 

[Apex_Predator_GX]

Agree with this!

 

[Antvasima]

It seems like we have reached a sufficient consensus to apply this now.

 

[Colonel_Krukov]

I feel like we should have a few examples made before people start to go crazy with location pages.

 

[Antvasima]

Yes. That is true.

 

[KieranH10]

I can upload the example profiles I gave in the OP if we wish. I will have to adjust them slightly though according to some of the changes that have been discussed.

 

[Colonel_Krukov]

Just curious, are they only for locations like buildings or cities, or can they be smaller/bigger than that?

 

[KieranH10]

Just curious, are they only for locations like buildings or cities, or can they be smaller/bigger than that?

they can be anything, size isn't a restriction. From a house to a multiverse, or even further either way if valid.

 

[Colonel_Krukov]

Okay, good

 

[KieranH10]

I can upload the example profiles I gave in the OP if we wish. I will have to adjust them slightly though according to some of the changes that have been discussed.

I have finished editing these examples to our new accepted format. I will upload them later if nobody is opposed.

 

[Antvasima]

Isn't it better to just link to the example pages from the relevant standard format page?

 

[KieranH10]

I'm unsure. The profiles will be uploaded at some point either way while they're done. Do you mean link the created profiles on the Standard Format page once it is uploaded?

 

[Antvasima]

Yes.

 

[KieranH10]

That would be a good idea then. Do you mind if I upload them all soon then? standard format page too.

 

[Antvasima]

I personally do not mind, but we preferably need more community input.

 

[The_Impress]

I'm not sure if this is addressed yet, but can't alot of mundane and repetitive files be made if we consider this?

In terms of mundaneness, what exactly stops someone for making a Location file of someone's house, or a park, or a desert, and you can very well just bulk up the wiki by making irrelevant areas like "this park near my area" or "this street near my place" or "this landmark near me"

Another factor can very well be repeating locations, let's say someone makes a page for idk, Hawaii, then they make a page for every volcano, then they make a page for every locale and you get this file matroyshka doll

You may say "use your common sense" but we have very well in the past received extremely dumb files like this because HAHAMEMES and this just sounds something really exploitable, unless you're making rules against this

 

[Antvasima]

Impress makes a good point. We need some regulations to include in the standard format page.

 

[Colonel_Krukov]

Well maybe we could list some criteria for real world locations that have to be met.
For example:
Is it important/famous historically or geographically?
Does it have rare/unique geographical features?
Is it famous for being the biggest/smallest/most dangerous etc?

 

[Antvasima]

I think that only significant fictional locations should be allowed.

 

[Colonel_Krukov]

I have also made an attempt at creating a location profile. Although I'll leave it for now, until we've come to a more solid conclusion on the rules and whatnot.

 

[AKM sama]

In terms of mundaneness, what exactly stops someone for making a Location file of someone's house, or a park, or a desert, and you can very well just bulk up the wiki by making irrelevant areas like "this park near my area" or "this street near my place" or "this landmark near me"

Another factor can very well be repeating locations, let's say someone makes a page for idk, Hawaii, then they make a page for every volcano, then they make a page for every locale and you get this file matroyshka doll

You may say "use your common sense" but we have very well in the past received extremely dumb files like this because HAHAMEMES and this just sounds something really exploitable, unless you're making rules against this

I already brought this concern up above and I completely agree. Locations like Gotham, Avengers Towers, etc. are basically just that. Mundane, redundant, and will bloat the wiki. That is why I advised a strict quality control over this.

 

[KieranH10]

Something else I've just thought of would be. How do we think the likes of Mario worlds could be handled, their design and themes would make them each definitely viable for profiles. But they repeat and change from game to game, and cannot be so easily composited as the Characters of the series are.

Would the likes of World 1 (New Super Mario Bros) warrant a separate profile to World 1 (Super Mario Bros)?

 

[Antvasima]

I still agree with Impress and AKM.

 

[Antvasima]

Something else I've just thought of would be. How do we think the likes of Mario worlds could be handled, their design and themes would make them each definitely viable for profiles. But they repeat and change from game to game, and cannot be so easily composited as the Characters of the series are.

Would the likes of World 1 (New Super Mario Bros) warrant a separate profile to World 1 (Super Mario Bros)?

I suppose that you would have to specify the location, but we obviously cannot spam every single Mario stage in every single game.

Maybe a generic "Mushroom Kingdom" would be enough? Meaning, create composite very iconic stages if you can, and discard the others.

 

[BigSmoke4269]

I think that only significant fictional locations should be allowed.

at the very least, central park should get a profile. it's the standard location for vs debates, so it'd probably be helpful to have a profile for it.

 

[KieranH10]

I suppose that you would have to specify the location, but we obviously cannot spam every single Mario stage in every single game.

Maybe a generic "Mushroom Kingdom" would be enough? Meaning, create composite very iconic stages if you can, and discard the others.

Creating a Composite Page for the Mushroom Kingdom would be a massive task and would have huge walls of text on the page if it were to note every single notable area throughout the series. There would also be inconsistencies inside the profile, since the Mushroom Kingdom, and pretty much everything in Mario changes from game to game.

I understand we cannot spam all of the Mario stages. But I personally don't believe that 1 composite Mushroom Kingdom would be a realistic or worthwhile task.

 

[Livinmeme]

Okay i know i am not a mod by any mean and this will be the last time i talk in threads but what about locations that have defined Dimensions?

 

[BigSmoke4269]

wait, ****, this is staff discussion. sorry

 

[Lou_change]

How do we go about areas only shown in 2d?

 

[DontTalkDT]

Regarding the stuff about the presence of bystanders: A similar question came up regarding the SBA before. My opinion on that when it comes to the SBA is that bystanders are allowed. One of the reasons the central park was chosen as SBA location was that it contains some amount of what one would expect to find in most populated regions on Earth these days, like water, earth, plants, animals, electricity, metal etc.
Having a normal amount of things for people with manipulation powers to manipulate was part of the goals. As such it makes sense for mind controllers to have normal humans available as things to control. It's not just mind controllers either. There are stealth users or shapeshifters that are good at blending into a crowd or social influencing users that could rile up a mob. Or things that feed on human bio-mass or people that can turn humans into undead fighters, like zombies or vampires, etc.

However, it is obviously a problem for characters that don't kill innocents if those people are present. For low tier fights it's also bothersome that the police or military could enter the battle.
Instead of banning them, I would fix that with an addendum to the SBA stating that the character's morals regarding bystanders are off and that bystanders may not join the fight without one of the combatants making them do so.

Now for location profiles other than our real-life central park, this approach would need an extra rule to ban superhuman fighters, as those are just outside influence of other verses characters. For that, we can simply say that any sentient being that isn't (equivalent to) a real-life human or animal is assumed not to be present in the location.

 

[AKM sama]

Makes sense. Morals regarding bystanders being off also gets rid of the problem of taking people hostage, as that won't have any effect on the battle after this addition.

 

[Antvasima]

I suppose that makes sense, but it seems tasteless to let traditionally virtuous characters like Superman tear through millions of bystanders. Oh well, I seem to be outvoted anyway.

 

[The_Impress]

I actually disagree with turning bystander motivation off, this is genuinely approaching more and more into "SBA means Bloodlust" territory if we do that.

If opponents get unfair advantage, good, the major point of Pre-Indexed Vs. Debating in the first place, is character discussion. You discuss what the CHARACTER will do and how they will win, it's separate from conventional vs. debating where it's a scan hunt, that part is already done, and if the character is being hurt by the SBA we are indirectly killing what's even left to debate.

I already dislike immensely the SBA "Willing to kill" but this is too much, if the problem is "limited by bystanders", it's better to change the location, which is something the OP can VERY WELL do

 

[Colonel_Krukov]

I've always taken the "In character, but willing to kill" with the mentality that, if the character prefers to not kill, they'd exhaust all possible options first before going in for the kill.

Other than that, I also dislike heroes giving up their principles and just blindly attacking their opponent.

 

[The_Impress]

And actually, genuinely, what is the difference between bloodlusted and SBA if this goes through, the hero doesn't care about EITHER the bystanders, OR the opponent surviving, why WOULDN'T he go max strength? Aside from a few rare examples where characters are just "playful" I don't see any other reason.

Why wouldn't Superman and Hulk just blow up the planet as the opening move? They have LITERALLY nothing to lose by standards imposed.

We made SBA "Uneven Bloodlust", amazing development. At that point it's MORE unfair to the select characters who have a fraction of their character left, like Frieza or someone, as they're now fighting an uncaring broken killing machine with no reason left to let them live

 

[Antvasima]

Impress largely makes sense to me. We should try to make the fights as fair as possible, and preferably reasonably in-character as well.

 

[DontTalkDT]

And actually, genuinely, what is the difference between bloodlusted and SBA if this goes through, the hero doesn't care about EITHER the bystanders, OR the opponent surviving, why WOULDN'T he go max strength? Aside from a few rare examples where characters are just "playful" I don't see any other reason.

Why wouldn't Superman and Hulk just blow up the planet as the opening move? They have LITERALLY nothing to lose by standards imposed.

We made SBA "Uneven Bloodlust", amazing development. At that point it's MORE unfair to the select characters who have a fraction of their character left, like Frieza or someone, as they're now fighting an uncaring broken killing machine with no reason left to let them live

Until now bystanders were never factors in debates. Did you have the impression that our characters currently are all bloodlusted? I don't.

I generally don't think having morals AND characters present is realistic. In practice I am almost certain that it will result in one of three things in every match:
1. It isn't relevant for the matchup.
2. It is technically relevant, but gets ignored.
3. It would be relevant, so the location is changed because it would be a disadvantage to one of the characters.
Outside of some gimmicky matches, I can't imagine that anyone actually wants a hostage situation inside their duel. The cases where that is relevant and desirable are in the minority IMO and can be better managed by changing the assumptions for the threads where it is supposed to happen.

Is it the same as bloodlusted? No, it's not. Bloodlusted means the character wants to kill the opponent at any price and as hard and brutally as possible. A bloodlusted character will in most cases instantly launch the most powerful attack in their arsenal at the opponent. None of this applies to our SBA.
Our SBA conserves the character's fighting style and morals towards the opponent exist to a degree, just that they are willing to end the match by killing if they can't finish it otherwise.
Would Superman and Hulk just instantly bust the planet? Don't think so. It's still planet Earth. Their home planet and the home planet of humanity. The lack of relevant bystanders at the moment doesn't diminish that. Maybe they would if they find that they can't win otherwise, but personally, I'm ok with that.
Sure, I bet there are also other characters that wouldn't use any AoE techniques with bystanders around usually, but again, that's a trade-off I'm ok with. Our matches are supposed to be in-character, but they also are supposed to be a serious fight between two characters fighting at their best. A fight where a City level character needs to fight at Building level power to not hurt bystanders just doesn't reflect the character fighting properly.

That's my stance at least.
We could also try to make some compromise. Maybe some rule of large numbers. Like, individual bystanders are irrelevant, so that characters can fight properly, but when it comes to attacks that would wipe out the populations of large cities morals regarding the population in general apply or something. Don't know if that's a solution anyone likes

 

[Antvasima]

Well, the main issue is that Superman would never use his full power in a manner that would blow opponents right through populated buildings, for example.