Warriors Wiki:Characters/Guidelines

The succeeding points are some general guidelines that are to be upheld when creating, writing, or merely editing articles in Project Characters. =Project Articles=

General Style

 * Articles shall be written in English language, with US spelling.
 * Articles shall be encyclopedic in content, and shall written in present tense with a non-bias tone, mentioning all aspects of the topic while keeping opinions out of the article.
 * Citations are required in order to be highly graded in several areas. They will be listed bellow where necessary.
 * References shall be listed with the page number from the first U.S. edition of the book.
 * Create links for any article names that appear in the article.
 * Take caution to prevent double links in one article body.
 * Names should be held with appropriate capitalization as they appear in the first U.S. edition. (i.e. Gathering, as opposed to gathering)
 * Use cat terms. (i.e. Sunhigh, as opposed to noon. Leaf-bare, as opposed to winter.)
 * On the talk page of every character article, place the template with the appropriate grade.

Article Layout
All character articles must follow a specific formula, as listed below.

Featured Articles
If an article is currently featured, or was previously featured, the templates or  will be used, respectively.

Main Quote
This is optional, as not all character articles have quotes. However, if one or more are found, pick the best one and use the. Please not that quotes with multiple speakers cannot be used.

Charcat or Charother
Depending on the species of the character, either the or  template will be used. If the character is a cat, the former will be used. If the character is not a cat, whether they be a badger or a dog, the latter will be used. These templates contain the affiliations, post-death affiliation, the education, immediate family, and book appearances. The educations and post-death affiliation must be cited. Please note that Charother is only to be used for specific non-cat characters, such as Pip or Rat Leader.

The charart of the character's current rank should be used. If it has not been made yet, please use File:Noimage.png until it is approved.

Description
All character articles need a verified, spoiler-free description describing their looks and gender. Every piece of the description must be spoil-free and cited. If the author makes a mistake on the cat's appearance, use first appearance unless otherwise discussed.

Startspoiler
Place the template in between the description and the history.

History
This makes up the bulk of every character article.

Under a level two heading titled "History", document, in present tense, the character's history. The series must go in this order: Place these exact phrases in level three headings in this order. Then, place the books under their respective headings in order of release except the Super Edition Series. The book headings should be italicized and be linked to their articles. Write the character's history under each book title. When writing the history, do not include any bias opinions of the character. Keep a formal tone and make sure the history flows clearly and every appearance is included. Do not include quotes in the history. There is a separate section for quotes. Be careful not to write so much that focus is taken off of the subject of the article. Each paragraph should be indented with a colon and there should be one empty line in between each paragraph. If a character does not appear at all in a book except the allegiances, use the template.
 * In the Super Edition Series
 * The order of these books should be Crookedstar's Promise, Bluestar's Prophecy, Firestar's Quest, and SkyClan's Destiny.
 * In the Original Series
 * In the New Prophecy
 * In the Power of Three Series
 * In the Omen of the Stars Series
 * In the Stand-Alone Manga
 * In the Tigerstar and Sasha Series
 * In the Ravenpaw's Path Series
 * In the The Lost Warrior Series
 * In the SkyClan and the Stranger Series
 * In the Field Guide Series
 * The order of these books should be Secrets of the Clans, Cats of the Clans, Code of the Clans, and Battles of the Clans.
 * In the Short Stories and Plays
 * The short stories should be in alphabetical order.
 * In the Warriors App

Trivia
Under a level two heading titled "Trivia", list all interesting facts of the character. This includes Clan heritage, author mistakes regarding gender or appearance, information revealed in an author chat, or any other unique facts about the cat. These should be marked by bullet points. Do not add trivia unless a reliable reference can be added.

Character Pixels
A gallery of the character's pixels. This should not be edited by anyone other than a PCA lead unless there is a problem with the coding.

Family
This section lists all known relatives of the character, both immediate and distant. A level two section titled "Family" should be added first.
 * Members of the family should be listed by closeness in relativity. The member(s)'s relationship to the character should be listed in bold and followed by a colon. Under the relationship, the character(s) should be listed and indented by a colon. Immediately after the colon, a reference of this relationship must be placed. After the reference, one of the following must be placed:
 * Deceased, Verified StarClan/Place of No Stars member
 * Deceased, Suspected StarClan/Place of No Stars member
 * Status Unknown
 * If a character is alive and has known family, a template titled "Alive/CHARACTERNAME" will be created. All this information should be placed under a level three heading titled "Members".
 * After the members, a tree should be placed under a level three heading titled "tree". Place the tree of the closet relative if the character doesn't have a tree of their own. Here is a list of family trees. Please note that trees are only created for families with three or more verified members.
 * After the members, a tree should be placed under a level three heading titled "tree". Place the tree of the closet relative if the character doesn't have a tree of their own. Here is a list of family trees. Please note that trees are only created for families with three or more verified members.

Quotes
After the family section comes the quotes. They are used to describe the character's personality, or to quote significant events, monologues, speeches, etc. There are two templates that can be used for quotes; and. The first is to be used for quotes with one speaker, and the latter for quotes with multiple speakers. The most quotes that are necessary are usually 5-6, but always aim for quality over quantity.

Ceremonies
Using the, quote every rank/name-changing ceremony that is specifically quoted in the books. If a ceremony is performed outside of a novel, it cannot be quoted, and therefore, cannot be placed in an article.

Endspoiler
Place the right before the References and Citations section.

References and Citations
Under this section, place the, and nothing else. This will automatically create a list of references and citations that were placed throughout the article. =Project Operations=

Housekeeping
The following tasks are to be carried out regularly throughout the project.

Concerns List
Any user who feels that an article has issues that should be publicized should add it to the concerns list located on the main project page. The characters on this list are sorted by Affiliation.

Moving and Creating Pages
When a new book is released, it is almost guaranteed that new characters will be introduced and/or characters will go or have gone through name changes.

When a whole new character is introduced, create a new page for the character, including the appropriate sections.

When a character experiences a name change, the article should be moved to the appropriate title.

Creating Disambiguation Pages
When multiple characters are known by the same name at any point in their lives or the novels, disambiguation pages must created to specify which characters are which. For example, four different Robinwings are introduced in the series.

First, move or create pages as necessary so that each character has a different article name. (i.e. Robinwing (RC) vs. Robinwing (SC)). Use abbreviations such as (SC) for ShadowClan, or (OS) for Original Series to distiguish the characters from each other. If the page that falls into this disambiguation is a former name of a character, (i.e. Whitepaw) create a redirect using the abbreviation.

Next, create a list containing every page that falls under this disambiguation. Include, and a brief, distinguishing description of each, character, like so: Robinwing.

Creating Redirects
For the most part, redirects are created automatically when a page is moved, but there are times when redirects need to be created manually.

Create the page, and paste the following coding on the page:


 * 1) REDIRECT ARTICLENAME

Adding and Removing Members
When a request for a roster change is placed on the talk page, the leader, deputy, or a senior warrior should carry it out accordingly.

Archiving the Talk Page
Certain sections of the talk page should be archived by a lead or an experienced member of the project.
 * Nominations older than 3 weeks without being close to being put up for vote.
 * Roster change requests older than 3 days.
 * Any other outdated, cluttering sections of the talk page.

Featured Articles
PC, PB, and PW all post a featured article once a month. A featured article is an article that is exceptionally outstanding and can represent the hard work each project is doing.

Once a month, a lead of PC opens up a form to discuss what the next month's featured article should be. Once a general consensus is reached, a lead then opens up a new form to decide two things: 1) If this article should be featured. 2) If this article is featured, does it qualify for gold status. An article can be featured and not receive gold status, but an article cannot be granted gold status without being featured.

Article Nominations
To nominate an article, create a new section on the talk page called "Character name - Silver/Gold nomination" and then state why you think it deserves that rank. People will comment on it saying what could be improved, and as nominator, you should check back regularly and try to fix any issues pointed out. This is not to say that no other people can help with a nomination made by someone else, but don't just nominate an article and leave and expect someone else to fix it, please.

NB: Only silver and gold ranks receive nominations.

User Nominations
From time to time, there are members of a project that shine above the others. These users are worthy joining the leads of PC as senior warriors.

If you believe we may have a member such as that, nominate them to become a senior warrior. Be sure to follow the instructions listed on the page when placing your nomination.