Wokistan
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Tldr a character's profile should list that character's capabilities that's the entire point
I don't really think the way the current Iron Man profile is done is the best, and the particular issue I have with it is that it doesn't list the powers he has with the armors for some reason. The profile is formatted in a way that seems to mostly revolve around an unarmored iron man and then also a plot device cosmic one, instead directing the reader to find information about iron man through the individualized suit profiles.
Well, this is just not how profiles work.
Vs battles wiki profiles are written with the general user in mind. The objective is that someone with zero familiarity with the source material should be able to read a profile and get at least some understanding of what the character's capabilities are. The objective is not to cater to the enthusiasts, and as such profiles should minimize jargon and be user friendly. It is not very user friendly to look up "what does iron man do" and be met with "iron man does what his armors do." A casual viewer is probably not going to be able to tell the similarly colored Iron mans apart, they're not going to know whether the version they saw represented in some out of context screenshot their buddy posted is mark 18 or 64 or 18,000,000. Telling them to "look up the iron man suit" is just telling them to control+f on 24 profiles instead of just 1 like a normal person. There's a thing in web design called the three click rule, the idea being that the client of a web service should be able to complete their task in three clicks or less. Loading into the website is one, loading onto Tony's page is two. Clicking the "iron man armors" tabber would be click number three, and in an ideal world the information would be visible from there, but it's not. In catering to the niche tastes of enthusiasts, the profile gets too lost in the sauce and violates standard web design principles, creating an overall inferior user experience and ultimately failing to accomplish its goal as a profile. The current layout of his profile is simply not the best way to convey the capabilities of the character.
So, what should be done instead?
Technically I don't have to answer that question. The validity of criticism is not defined by whether or not the complainer has a better idea, that's not the point. I could theoretically just thrust this onto the comics people and force them to figure something better out. Not going to do that here, though. I don't think it's that productive to start problems and not even try to fix them, and I don't think the fix for this is even that hard. Here's the thing: The work of indexing Iron Man's abilities is already done, it's just that this collected information is presented poorly. There's no need to scrap all the individual armor profiles, they're still perfectly capable of working as an aid here. Really, all you need to do is actually list the abilities the suits would provide on the main page, except rather than a description or justification all you've really got to do is say which armor it's from, provided that armor has a profile. This should satisfy both crowds: The casual viewer can pop in and get an idea of Iron Man's capabilities, satisfied at being able to see what he can do and with what armor within the allotted three clicks. Someone who's more critical or into greater detail? Well, this method inherently points them to where they can find more. The armor profiles are able to be as detailed as they like because they're not really constrained by more aesthetic fears such as creating too much clutter on the main one, and can include more intricate detail on the exact mechanisms of a power and the justifications for that power's existence and so on. With a 60 year old character you're bound to have a bigger file than most, but this method should get the best of both worlds of having all the information in one place while also providing easy access to further reading for those wanting more (which is really not the majority of viewers of any given web page.)
Some of the more technically inclined members on the forum could definitely just put together a script to organize that in like ten minutes. Personally, I could learn to do that or I could just control f control c control v my way to the end of it if I had to within like, an hour max. Like I said, the majority of the work has already been done, this is just a formatting change.
I don't really think the way the current Iron Man profile is done is the best, and the particular issue I have with it is that it doesn't list the powers he has with the armors for some reason. The profile is formatted in a way that seems to mostly revolve around an unarmored iron man and then also a plot device cosmic one, instead directing the reader to find information about iron man through the individualized suit profiles.
Well, this is just not how profiles work.
Vs battles wiki profiles are written with the general user in mind. The objective is that someone with zero familiarity with the source material should be able to read a profile and get at least some understanding of what the character's capabilities are. The objective is not to cater to the enthusiasts, and as such profiles should minimize jargon and be user friendly. It is not very user friendly to look up "what does iron man do" and be met with "iron man does what his armors do." A casual viewer is probably not going to be able to tell the similarly colored Iron mans apart, they're not going to know whether the version they saw represented in some out of context screenshot their buddy posted is mark 18 or 64 or 18,000,000. Telling them to "look up the iron man suit" is just telling them to control+f on 24 profiles instead of just 1 like a normal person. There's a thing in web design called the three click rule, the idea being that the client of a web service should be able to complete their task in three clicks or less. Loading into the website is one, loading onto Tony's page is two. Clicking the "iron man armors" tabber would be click number three, and in an ideal world the information would be visible from there, but it's not. In catering to the niche tastes of enthusiasts, the profile gets too lost in the sauce and violates standard web design principles, creating an overall inferior user experience and ultimately failing to accomplish its goal as a profile. The current layout of his profile is simply not the best way to convey the capabilities of the character.
So, what should be done instead?
Technically I don't have to answer that question. The validity of criticism is not defined by whether or not the complainer has a better idea, that's not the point. I could theoretically just thrust this onto the comics people and force them to figure something better out. Not going to do that here, though. I don't think it's that productive to start problems and not even try to fix them, and I don't think the fix for this is even that hard. Here's the thing: The work of indexing Iron Man's abilities is already done, it's just that this collected information is presented poorly. There's no need to scrap all the individual armor profiles, they're still perfectly capable of working as an aid here. Really, all you need to do is actually list the abilities the suits would provide on the main page, except rather than a description or justification all you've really got to do is say which armor it's from, provided that armor has a profile. This should satisfy both crowds: The casual viewer can pop in and get an idea of Iron Man's capabilities, satisfied at being able to see what he can do and with what armor within the allotted three clicks. Someone who's more critical or into greater detail? Well, this method inherently points them to where they can find more. The armor profiles are able to be as detailed as they like because they're not really constrained by more aesthetic fears such as creating too much clutter on the main one, and can include more intricate detail on the exact mechanisms of a power and the justifications for that power's existence and so on. With a 60 year old character you're bound to have a bigger file than most, but this method should get the best of both worlds of having all the information in one place while also providing easy access to further reading for those wanting more (which is really not the majority of viewers of any given web page.)
Some of the more technically inclined members on the forum could definitely just put together a script to organize that in like ten minutes. Personally, I could learn to do that or I could just control f control c control v my way to the end of it if I had to within like, an hour max. Like I said, the majority of the work has already been done, this is just a formatting change.
