User talk:Spymaster Cosades



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 * --Atvelonis (talk) 20:49, November 23, 2018 (UTC)

Re: Hist/Sleeping Tree Sap
Those connections are pretty small and not that noteworthy, similar links can be made about any number of items found in the games if we looked at them with that mindset. It's not enough to warrant a mention in each other's pages, these would be best considered as just two small similarities rather than something closely relating the two. Rozty (talk) 23:08, November 23, 2018 (UTC)


 * Fair enough! Tastefulnoodz (talk) 00:19, November 24, 2018 (UTC)

Easter Eggs
To prevent miscommunication, I would add an explanation for each "easter egg" in the trivia section of each page you added the category to. Otherwise, it's just randomly there, and readers won't know what it's for.
 * Normally I would wholly agree with you, but even with a trivia section explicitly spelling-out the intent of some Easter eggs, there are those who would outright refuse to even so much take it into consideration, accuse it of being mere speculation and demand citing sources that don't exist even though no other similar page is held to such an absurd standard. After a certain point, it stops being a "miscommunication" and starts to look alot like deliberately spiteful posturing that sacrifices the comprehensiveness and propriety of the wiki for the sake of conceit. All over a muffin. Ridiculous. Tastefulnoodz (talk) 18:11, December 5, 2018 (UTC)
 * In The Cat Master and Blademaster Jauffre's defense, the only thing you put on the page was the category (along with a number of other pages), so there wasn't really anything to back the category.
 * Fair enough but it's hard not to get a little irked when you're putting time and energy into explaining your reasoning behind why you put the article in a category in the first place and all you get is non-responses one after the other; especially when it's coming from people who aren't administrators and have no business acting so petty. Tastefulnoodz (talk) 22:56, December 5, 2018 (UTC)


 * It would also do to expand the actual Easter Eggs (Morrowind) article (et al.) if you are adding the category to more individual pages. This keeps the information consistent for readers. —Atvelonis (talk) 18:14, December 7, 2018 (UTC)

Attribution
Good afternoon Tastefulnoodz, thank you for the edits recently. I wanted to inquire about the source of the image you recently uploaded to the wiki, "File:Cyrus the Gremlin.jpg," because you did not provide a licensing summary. Is it your own screenshot, or is it from another website? If it's the former, you can find some pre-filled licensing summaries in the "Redguard" section of this page which you should place in the "Summary" box while uploading in the future. If it isn't your image, then in addition, you would also need to provide a form of attribution under CC-BY-SA, the license that we use to host copyrighted content on the wiki. A link in the "source" field is usually sufficient, and if there is a known author then including them in the appropriate field in the template as well is encouraged.

While it's on my mind, you should also remember to add references to pretty much anything potentially contentious/not necessarily well-known, or really anything in the lore in general. So for a situation like this, our sourcing policy would have you add a reference to the end of the sentence with a link to the original material from which you derived this information. Experienced editors would be able to figure out where to look if they wanted to find something Kirkbride said, but the same cannot be said for most readers, so it's important to make things easy for them. In this case, a link to the TIL entry on Kirkbride's posts is fine, although you would have to give the reference tag an "unlicensed" group. Let me know if you have any questions. Thanks, and have fun editing. —Atvelonis (talk) 21:24, December 8, 2018 (UTC)


 * So this question was not rhetorical, I actually need to know what the source of the image is so that I can add the appropriate file licensing (or you can do so yourself). There are legal implications for uploading copyrighted content to the wiki without proper attribution, and I would rather not have Wikia or Bethesda on our case about that. We rely on each of them for a certain amount of sponsorship, such as the ongoing raffle and other things, so it's important to maintain a good relationship in this regard. If you do not provide a source for your file, then it will unfortunately have to be deleted! —Atvelonis (talk) 16:30, December 9, 2018 (UTC)


 * Sorry, I just saw this. The picture is taken from a screenshot of a review by The Cantina: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8g1rv9aqHlw


 * I actually ment to add a summery of attribution but for some reason the option didn't pop-up when I uploaded the image and it completely skipped over my mind, so I do apologize for that. As far as unlicenced tags, I've rarely if ever had a need to use them, so I'm not quite sure how they work or how they're different from dropping refs in other cases. Let me know if you have any questions or how I can avoid this confusion in the future, thank you. Tastefulnoodz (talk) 16:40, December 11, 2018 (UTC)


 * Thank you, I've updated the file description now. I'm going to categorize the image as a creature image even though Cyrus is depicted, since he is in the form of a gremlin.


 * It occurs to me now that you seem to be using Wikia's proprietary VisualEditor to edit the wiki, rather than the Source Editor. The last time I used VE to actually edit was in 2014, so I could be mistaken here, but I think there actually is not a way to add reference groups in VE (it is not the greatest feature that Wikia has released). I would recommend that you go to the "Editing" tab of Special:Preferences and set your default editor to Source, then scroll down and click Save. The Source Editor has more tools and allows you to edit in a much more nuanced/direct way; instead of relying on the UI of a WYSIWYG editor like VE, you are editing the actual code/wikitext for articles. Wikitext syntax can seem a bit daunting at first, but it's actually not super hard to learn. I have a guide on editing in Source here, and I would be happy to join you in the Chat for a live session if you think you would benefit from that.


 * In VE you can just click a button to make a reference, but this does not seem to account for reference names or groups, which are still important for many articles. A regular ref in Source looks like this:




 * You can attach names and groups to any references you like, although the only time we really use groups are for unlicensed references (almost the same thing as "unofficial lore" on the UESP or "obscure texts" on TIL or our old terminology, "out-of-game," but with a focus on copyright rather than those sites' more subjective groupings). Naming references is useful when you want to use them multiple times in an article:


 * First instance:
 * Later instances:


 * Likewise, you can also attach a group to a reference to split it off from the rest of them. Here is how you do it:




 * You can name references with groups as well. Other than separating unlicensed references, groups are only really used for the occasional ==Notes== section (not the same as ==Trivia==). If you're using a group in a reference then underneath Refs, you have to make a new reference list that refers to the group, such as . —Atvelonis (talk) 18:00, December 11, 2018 (UTC)


 * So an example of where the UL template and associated reference tag would be used is here. Kirkbride's Reddit comments are not copyrighted by a ZeniMax Media Company and need to be noted as such. This doesn't denote anything about the canonicity of a statement (not really definable, which is why we tend to avoid the term), but many readers find it useful to distinguish between licensed and unlicensed content nonetheless. —Atvelonis (talk) 17:45, December 22, 2018 (UTC)

Games vs. lore content
Hey, I wanted to elaborate on my reversion here so that you understand why this action was taken. Typically we do not record much information in the way of lore on a game-specific page such as this. Technically, the Alduin (Skyrim) article documents the collection of polygons that has been assigned the name Alduin in Skyrim and any associated game data, not the broader figure in the lore. For the sake of organization, that information is generally kept in a dedicated lore page on the subject (in this case Alduin), which should be linked in the hatnote at the top of the article for quick access. Game-specific pages may have brief history/background sections if they really need them, but you should try to avoid adding lore trivia in these cases. Let me know if you have any questions. Thanks. —Atvelonis (talk) 21:25, December 14, 2018 (UTC)

Skooma
Wujeeta points out how it worked. It doesn't matter if her claims contradict the written word; what we see is more important than what we read. A book suffers from the unreliable narrator, what we see take place with our own eyes, however, does not. Wujeeta doesn't just "claim" it's all she needs; it literally is all she needs, as the quest proves.

Wether you choose to accept this or not is irrelevant.

Also: Same thing with Falmer. If Bethesda wanted to have them be elves, their souls wouldn't be white. The established lore is that only Black Souls can capture the souls of an Elf or Man. Indeed, only a Black Soul Gem can take hold of Arch-Curate Vyrthur's soul, yet those of the normal "Falmer"? A white soul gem is enough.

Bethesda made a clear intention here, I suggest you take it. Blademaster Jauffre (talk) 21:06, December 16, 2018 (UTC)


 * I'll take your "suggestion" into consideration. Please keep in mind in the future how you choose to respond to people on their talk-pages. It can tend to come off as unnecessarily confrontational. I'm not a troll nor am I just going around writing fanfic - I am a contributor same as you. Your authority on here only extends insomuch as your experiance and dedication to the wiki have proven. That's all I have to say about that.


 * As I said before, addiction is not a measurable in-game mechanic in Skyrim . The Drangonborn can never be addicted and neither can NPC's. So yes, in fact, the only proof we have that she was cured is her own words. No, we do not see her cured because again, we don't see anything. We can't see anything. Her stats, appearance, and dialogue interactions with other NPC's remain completely unchanged before and after she is given the potion. I don't know how you could possibly insist otherwise. While we're on the topic, how exactly is an in-game book which has been published four times within the series an "unreliable narrator" but the word of one NPC is? Keep it mind, I never said she wasn't cured, only that a descrepency exists within the text between what we the player learns and what we're told. Hence why it is part of a trivia entry and not the main article.  


 * The fact that falmer are elves is self-evident. If Bethesda didn't want us to make the connection between Falmer and other Mer (Bosmer, Altmer, Dunmer, etc) they could have... named them something else? Written an entirely different origin and back-story for them? The fact that during the quest "Discerning the Transmundane" we are instructed to collect blood samples from the surviving elven races, which includes falmer, only further supports that position. The precise reason that falmer produce white souls is up for debate, but the most likely answer for this is game-mechanics - black souls are meant to be somewhat rare and powerful, while the falmer are abundant and generally quite weak, intended mostly to break up the monotony of dwemer ruins and serve as a "goblin" analogue for Skyrim. Yes, the game technically treats them as creatures, but so were orcs in Arena and Daggerfall. The soul-gem argument is, as far as I'm concerned, null and void. The article in question is a lore page, not a strategy guide. Let's keep it that way. Tastefulnoodz (talk) 22:43, December 17, 2018 (UTC)


 * You're trying to use gameplay over the sake of lore. Her addiction is cured; that's the entire purpose of the quest, if it weren't cured, she wouldn't be grateful for your aid in "curing", it. What a book says means nothing compared to what you see take place in front of your eyes. It's not "the word", of an NPC, she isn't just "saying" she's cured, she was addicted, and after you provide her the potion, she notices she's cured. Hence why she is grateful, and why she doesn't say "well, this potion didn't do jack!".


 * "Self-evident", yeah right. Let's all just ignore the way souls work in TES in favor of some quest bogus involving a Daedric Prince who tricked his servant, because that's clearly more accurate? Black Souls are not meant to be "rare", at all. Any human NPC carries a black soul; nothing else but that. Human, elf, beastfolk, all three carry Black Souls. Arch-Curate Vyrthur, a traditional Falmer, has a Black Soul, yet his modern day counterparts? They do not. Reason being: His modern day counterparts are no longer elven, nor humanoid. Bethesda made this decision for a pretty damn good reason. Or would you argue that zombies aren't undead, but just badly programmed humanoids?


 * PS: Stop adding the easter egg category to every page you come across, and cease changing pages which were perfectly fine. You're POV pushing to the extreme.
 * Blademaster Jauffre (talk) 17:34, December 18, 2018 (UTC)
 * It's pretty clear from our previous interactions that your motivations are wholy personal and spiteful in nature. I'm done talking to you. Tastefulnoodz (talk) 18:25, December 18, 2018 (UTC)


 * I'm certain an editor of three years is clearly in this for personal gain rather than the betterment of the wiki... /s. Alas, this is going absolutely nowhere, this isn't the first time people have pointed out your edits. I recommend rereading the guidelines, your edits are in good faith, but not according to policy.
 * Edit: It'd also be appreciated if (and when) you add the "Easter Egg" category you provide an explanation for the easter egg, like you did for Giant Nirnroot Island after being informed by staff. Another such article would be Temba Wide-Arm, though the latter lacks an explanation.
 * Blademaster Jauffre (talk) 19:40, December 18, 2018 (UTC)

I apologize for the lateness of this reply. I have been working on getting a script for AkulakhanBot running and it has eaten up a lot of my time.

I would like to clarify that everything in TES lore suffers from (or is enhanced by, depending on your perspective) the unreliable narrator, not just content that happens to be given to us in a textual format. This includes dialogue, and even physical events the player character observes with their own eyes. Since you are inhabiting an entity in the TES universe, your in-game perception of everything is subject to whatever slants said character happens to have (these could range from implicit biases about this or that to literally hallucinating, for example: who knows?). Nothing that you see is ever indubitably The Truth, so we are expected to accommodate varying interpretations of topics, even conflicting ones. That's just the way the lore is designed. As long as we do so in an encyclopedic fashion, it doesn't have a negative effect on readers' understanding; if anything, it encourages them to look at the lore less narrowly. They can come up with explanations for these things on their own; we don't typically need to decide for readers which one is definitively correct.

The initial edit to the Wujeeta page added the line, "Although she claims a healing potion is all that's needed to cleanse her of Skooma addiction, this is contradicted by in-game sources." The phrase "in-game sources" is not an adequate citation for such a claim. That would be like saying "peer-reviewed science proves that dark energy exists." It might satisfy a casual reader, but it's not helpful to anyone doing research and isn't becoming of an encyclopedia. You need to be extremely specific whenever you add anything to the wiki, because if readers cannot trace back the origins of content added to our articles, we may as well be making up everything we're saying. I would tend to think that the current line, "Despite Confessions of a Dunmer Skooma Eater stating a skooma addiction cannot be cured, Wujeeta's addiction is cured through a healing potion.," is perfectly fine.

I think Jauffre is correct about not strictly considering Falmer to be Mer, insofar as their souls have changed enough that they are more akin to an everyday creature than actual Elves, but this doesn't necessitate that their Merish history be completely ignored. The use of Falmer blood in "Discerning the Transmundane" is pretty clear evidence that their ancestry is still biologically relevant (at least more than it is for, say, Bretons). On the other hand, as Jauffre points out, the "-mer" suffix in "Falmer" is not standalone proof that they are still Mer; the term "Betmer" has the same structure, but the races it describes are considered Beastfolk rather than Mer. Although, from an in-universe perspective, I might attribute this to the Aldmer originally treating anything kinda humanoid (meroid?) or kinda intelligent as just another kind of Elf for the purpose of language (i.e. it is not a particularly scientific classification, more of a historical one). By extension, one could argue that this does not apply to the Falmer, whose name was definitely not misapplied from the start (when they were undoubtedly Mer). However, whatever conclusions we reach based on this are probably a little too shaky to really use as evidence. I personally think it would be fine to use Category:Mer on the Falmer page since their treatment in biology is somewhat ambiguous; anyone seeking to learn more specific information will quickly realize from the lead that it is not entirely clear-cut. The categorization system is not really the primary thing that people use to determine what is true, articles are. But I do not have an especially strong opinion on this topic, and defer to the will of the community.

I have a final comment to make to Jauffre specifically: you have been and are being needlessly hostile in your interactions with Tastefulnoodz. I'm not sure why you feel the need to so openly condescend (is it really just because you disagree with his analysis?), but such behavior is not wanted on this wiki. On the Talk:Muffin (Morrowind) page, your response to his initiation of a dialogue was literally just, "No." As I remarked on that page, such a curt response is rude and does not help improve anyone's understanding of a situation. Your comments on this page are certainly more thought-out, but the fact that you ended the first one with, "Bethesda made a clear intention here, I suggest you take it." is an indication that you do not respect Tastefulnoodz' point of view. It is a very "shut-down" sort of comment, implying that you are right and he is wrong and that there is no way it could possibly be the other way around or somewhere in between. This is not the way you want to approach a consensus. You need to be open to the possibility that what you have to say is not as accurate or helpful as you initially thought. You can still argue in favor of a specific perspective for the course of a consensus, but you should also be willing to concede the claim that you are undoubtedly and universally correct, because it is almost never the case that anyone is. —Atvelonis (talk) 18:29, December 23, 2018 (UTC)



Since Jauffre hasn't responded I'll consider the situation dealt with - thank you Atvelonis for your input (also sorry about the confusion earlier between the Dwemer Culture and Lore: Dwemer categories) - I just wanted to clear up a few things real quickly on the way out: Confessions of a Dunmer Skooma Eater does not say that addiction "cant be cured", and in fact goes out of it's way to state the opposite, it's just the addiction cannot be cured by a potion. It requires personal effort, willpower and self-acceptance. As someone who has dealt with addiction in my personal life, this description is much closer to the truth then what we see with Wujeeta, so admittedly there may be some bias here. That being said, practically speaking if a minor healing potion's base-cost is 17 gold and a bottle of skooma is 25, what stopping anyone from being cured? Why didn't Caius Cosades just take a healing potion insted of letting his addiction get so out of control he's re-called back to the Imperial City? I know it may seem like I'm nitpicking here but I'm just pointing out that this revelation has some pretty important implications to the lore that are worth commenting and arriving at a consensus on.

Also, I'm glad you pointed out the aldmeris use of "mer" being more akin to "folk" but for practical purposes is synonymous with "elves". Language is weird.

I have no hard feelings and I do appreciate all that Blademaster has contributed to the wiki, I just want a chance to be able to make meaningful contributions as well. Tastefulnoodz (talk) 16:46, December 27, 2018 (UTC)



Re: Glenmoril-Hagraven Articles
Hello, my point is that the transformation is not specifically pointing out to these coven sisters but to the hagravens. Also I don't know how you are assuming the sentence implies that they were already hagravens in Bloodmoon. Maybe then it needs to be changed to "Her and her coven sisters are depicted as hagravens in Dragonborn." --Rupuzioks (talk) 16:24, January 5, 2019 (UTC)


 * That's perfectly fine with me. Thanks! Spymaster Cosades (talk) 17:05, January 5, 2019 (UTC)

Planes of Oblivion
Hey Cosades,

Considering we started off on a rough start, I suppose I should apologize for the way I acted. It was uncalled for, and I was a tad bit stressed a while ago. So, apologies for that.

Now that I'm here, I felt like I should let you know that your new article is pretty damn good, congratulations are in place. I tried to spot the flaws, and aside from some very minor ones (namely the usage of the word "you"), it seemed to be in order.

As for the lore page of the same article, I felt the need to inform you that in a previous Moot we decided to try and rid ourselves of "(Lore)" articles, preferring to instead have the disambiguation page turn into the lore page. Kind of like we have on the Imperial Legion article, which covers the lore of the Legions and has a "By Game" heading for every game it appears in, in which details specific to said game appear.

I'll repeat what I started with, apologies for the rough start, I hope to see you around. If you have any questions, let me know, I might be able to help.

But most importantly, happy editing!

Blademaster Jauffre (talk) 14:43, January 6, 2019 (UTC)



I appreciate it, and don't sweat it, we've all been there. I myself was in a pretty weird headspace a few months back due to a personal tragedy, which is actually one of the reasons I hopped on the wiki in the first place so I had something constructive to do while I learned how to cope. I know if you've been doing this for a long while now you've probably had your fair share of "know-it-all" kids messing around with pages, I imagine it can get tedious. Just know that if I get heated it's only out of my love for this series, it's never personal.

Thanks! It's still very much a work in progress, but I wanted to get a rough outline and periodically update and move things around when I have the chance. I wasn't aware of the proper protocol, but I just wanted to make sure the pages were clearly distinguished from each other, so people looking for information specific to game-play in Oblivion aren't confused when they sift through an article discussing every plane of Oblivion in canon that doesn’t cover those aspects and vice versa. Duly noted.

And will do! Thanks again Spymaster Cosades (talk) 03:54, January 7, 2019 (UTC)

Image
Hi Spymaster, could you tell me where your file File:Caius.jpg is from? Did you take it yourself? How do you know that it depicts Caius? There is no entry for him in the Creation Kit. Would appreciate an answer when you have the time. Thanks. —Atvelonis (talk) 15:55, May 29, 2019 (UTC)


 * Hi, yes I took the screenshot myself. While he isn't in the creation kit, he appears on the ramparts of the broken wall well before Alduin comes down. As far as I can tell, he's scripted to be there. Went through several play-throughs using console comands to ensure that this was the same npc who gets picked up and thrown off the other side later during the argument between Ralof & Hadvar. Hope that clears things up, let me know if there's anything more I need to do, thanks. Spymaster Cosades (talk) 04:52, May 30, 2019 (UTC)


 * Ok. The dialogue you wrote is in the Creation Kit, so I'll take your word for the rest. For future reference, there's a link on Special:Upload to User:Atvelonis/Licensing, which has some pre-filled image summaries (ignore the "licensing" dropdown tab on the upload form if you do it this way). The source being the game for these snippets indicates that the uploader took it directly, as opposed to getting it from another website. Doing this covers attribution fully (see: CC-BY-SA).


 * For now your image has been flagged for reupload since it's not cropped to a 3:5 aspect ratio (e.g. 600×1000, 648×1080), per policy. It can stay on the wiki, but if you want the notice removed then you can follow the steps I've laid out in this guide. If you're taking screenshots from Steam, you can go to Settings -> In-Game -> Save an uncompressed copy to get a PNG version of your images. This is preferable over JPG as it is a lossless format.


 * P.S. I overlooked the bit in that paragraph about Caius being flung away, sorry. You should try to use an encyclopedic tone when writing here. i.e. use the indicative mood/be straightforward/avoid flowery language. I know it's less interesting than having fun with your writing, but it's one of the guidelines of the wiki. Let me know if you have any questions. Thanks. —Atvelonis (talk) 16:51, May 30, 2019 (UTC)


 * Hi, sorry to bother again. Could you tell me how you know that File:Emperor Crab Kirkbride.jpg is licensed as GFDL specifically? If there is no clear licensing at the original point of upload, it's generally best to go with fair use. You also have to provide attribution for legal reasons; I traced it back to TIL per your edit summary, but you have to include this on the file summary itself too. I don't like being a pain about such things, but the last thing I want is to get yelled at by Wikia over a licensing complaint from Bethesda or another copyright holder.


 * I'm also curious where you found the quote for the Emperor Crab article, "Once, the mighty and colossal emperor crabs ruled all of Vvardenfell! But they put aside divine pursuits in favor of mundane satisfactions, and were diminished to become the mudcrabs of today. And are we any different?" apparently from Visrula the Mad Prophet, a name I've never seen before. The only thing I've been able to find is this quote from the UESP's Twitter, which lacks an actual source. Could you clarify these things for me? Thank you. —Atvelonis (talk) 20:14, May 31, 2019 (UTC)


 * Disregard the first bit, we actually already had a version of your image on the wiki, here, which is licensed under fair use. But I am still curious about the quote. —Atvelonis (talk) 20:17, May 31, 2019 (UTC)

Ah, the quote is from an ESO loading screen - I have no idea who "Visrula the Mad Prophet" is either. I tried to add it but I couldn't figure it out. But yes thank you for the explaination and I'll get right on that re-upload when I have a spare moment. Spymaster Cosades (talk) 21:14, May 31, 2019 (UTC)


 * I see. That's acceptable, then. In the future, if a loading screen quote is attributed to a person in the screen itself, you would include the "—Visrula the Mad Prophet" (or whatever) as part of the actual quote (first parameter in Quote). You would then put the speaker (second parameter) as  and the source (third parameter) as "The Elder Scrolls Online." —Atvelonis (talk) 19:39, June 3, 2019 (UTC)

Image licensing reiteration
I notice that you uploaded another image without the full licensing again. Including this information is not optional: it is a rule of the encyclopedia. We are lenient about this with new editors, but you have been around for a while and I have personally explained this concept to you twice. I will do so one more time to be absolutely unambiguous.

When you upload a screenshot of yours to TESWiki, you must do it exactly like this:


 * 1) Go to User:Atvelonis/Licensing
 * 2) Go to the Table of Contents on my licensing page
 * 3) Click the game you're uploading an image for
 * 4) Find the particular template that suits the image, e.g. "Redguard Character"
 * 5) Copy it to your clipboard (Ctrl+C)
 * 6) Go to Special:Upload
 * 7) Upload your screenshot from your hard drive with the "Choose file" button
 * 8) Paste (Ctrl+V) the appropriate template into the "Summary" box on Special:Upload
 * 9) Do not select anything under the "Licensing" dropdown tab.
 * 10) Click "Upload file" to complete the process

In the case of a character from Redguard, the appropriate code is this:

You may adjust it as needed, of course. This format is valuable for multiple reasons:


 * 1) Having a standardized template for file summaries makes maintenance significantly easier.
 * 2) These variables allow for you to extremely clearly denote the source of your image, which is critical.
 * 3) They also ensure that any other editor will understand the important details about the file instantly.

Note also that if you are uploading a file that is not yours, you must include a link to the original source of the image, per CC-BY-SA. The Bethimage (or Zenimage) template will be on the file no matter what; it is not sufficient licensing by itself.

Generally speaking, I think most people here would agree that I am a pretty easy-going admin. I have no interest in exercising my authority for its own sake. My goal is not to enforce arbitrary rules, but to ensure that the wiki remains as reliable a source of information as possible. For over a decade we have been developing systems to maximize our efficiency and the ease of knowledge transfer for readers, and licensing is an important part of that. It cannot be ignored.

If you are having trouble using the proper licensing, that is a different story. The layout of Special:Upload is not especially intuitive, which is something I intend to address when I get the chance. It is not embarrassing to ask about something if you are confused, even if it seems obvious. I recall experiencing more than a certain amount of self-consciousness when I first joined the site. If there is anything that I can do to help you edit/upload more smoothly, please let me know on my talk page or elsewhere. Thank you. —Atvelonis (talk) 23:15, June 7, 2019 (UTC)


 * I'm sorry, I seem to always run into trouble with uploading pictures. I thought I had it figured out but apparently not. I thought the drop down tab was suffient in most cases, and trying to enter information to the image after the fact is confusing. I'm actually about to upload another image (for the Vander article) and I will use the parameters you've laid out to do so to the letter. Please let me know if I've overlooked anything or done so incorrectly, I appreciate all the hard work you do and don't want to make it anymore difficult. Thank you for your patience. Spymaster Cosades (talk) 23:51, June 7, 2019 (UTC)


 * I’m going to answer here. I fixed the picture you added to the Restless League page. I just had to take the “nowiki” things out. I put that in my last message, so I don’t create a link to the file. I’m not as good at the explaining things as Atvelonis is, but I will provide as much help as I can. One last thing, we prefer .png files over .jpg files as they don’t degrade over time like .jpg files can. Cheers The Cat Master (talk) 02:56, June 8, 2019 (UTC)


 * Hi Spymaster, it's fine. We're tough on images and references here, so people tend to have trouble with them. The two files you just uploaded are licensed perfectly; they each satisfy our licensing policies fully. You might want to add the precise timestamp of the video where each screenshot was taken from (either in the URL or in text), as that makes tracing back the source of the image easier for any curious readers, but this is not strictly necessary. If you didn't crop the image, you can of course remove the "cropped" notice. If you did crop it yourself, then it's fine as it is.


 * To answer your question about the image placement on articles, you're having difficulty with Cat's explanation because you are using Wikia's proprietary Visual Editor instead of the Source Editor, which is more standard. VE is a great tool to get people started with editing because of the "what you see is what you get" appearance of it—I used it myself when I first joined. However, as you begin to make more advanced edits, you will run into a lot of bugs and functional limitations with VE (the "nowiki" tag that Cat is talking about is one such bug). It is therefore strongly recommended that you switch to the Source Editor when you feel comfortable doing so (though we would prefer sooner rather than later, haha). You can set it as your default in the "Editing" tab of Special:Preferences ("Preferred editor" -> "Source editor" -> Save).


 * Source looks complicated but it is actually very simple. Text is simply text, but you can use "wikitext" markup and some HTML to manipulate elements of the page. For example, to bold something in Source, you would write it like  instead of normally. To add a link, you would write  . When Cat says "the image parameter," he is referring to . You're going to have to learn some new syntax, but once you get past the basics, you can do a lot more with Source. I have a pretty thorough syntax guide here. It's long, so don't feel pressured to figure it all out at once. Editing syntax is best read about on help pages like that, and then applied through trial and error on articles or sandboxes.


 * I would also suggest joining our Discord server as it's a bit easier than communicating on talk pages. There are a number of staff and other editors on there who can help with questions. You may of course also message me here if you'd prefer, but as you can see I can't always respond quickly. —Atvelonis (talk) 03:23, June 8, 2019 (UTC)


 * And this is quite minor, but any template you use (like Information, or an infobox) should have all variables, even if they remain empty. This makes maintenance on my end significantly easier (my bot is not actually that smart, and relies on consistency to get anything done quickly). —Atvelonis (talk) 03:31, June 8, 2019 (UTC)

Can you please change your editing setting from visual editor to source editor. Atvelonis already explained a bit about it and gave you the link to where you can go to change the setting in a message above. Having to format edits by people who use the VE can get pretty frustrating. The Cat Master (talk) 09:28, June 8, 2019 (UTC)

Image in the infobox
Greetings! When you add an image in the infobox, it is not necessary to write "". The infobox accepts the "Filename.png" format. —TinyClayMan (talk) 09:20, June 9, 2019 (UTC)

Further feedback
Hi Spymaster, thank you for continuing to upload content, it's much-needed. Just an FYI that the reason we have been bothering you about the Source Editor is because using Visual creates significantly more work for us. If you look at this edit to the Mariah page, for instance, the infobox is put onto a single line instead of being space out properly, the quote is in the wrong place, the file syntax isn't correct (per Cat and TinyClayMan), the header spacing is a bit off, there are extra spaces at the end of each line, VE uses extraneous formatting for many links, and templates like Morrowind or Mo seem not to work. You can control none of this in Visual, which is why it's such a poor editor.

You can do an external (off-site) link with only one set of brackets instead of two, the format for an internal link. For example, for an internal link you would write  (which produces Vivec), but for an external link you would write. The latter formatting is called a "pipe" and can be done internally with a vertical line, e.g.  produces that guy in Morrowind while linking to Vivec. This is explained more fully in my editing guide. You should also aim for descriptive yet accurate file titles, free of unnecessary characters but easy to read. CamelCase is not suggested; spaces and normal capitalization are recommended for file names. So "Mariah.png" would be preferred over "Mariah.png," and "Silent Mariner.png" would be preferred over "Silent1.png."

Are you sure you don't want to join the Discord server? I think it is a much less stressful place to talk about editing, and has methods of private communication if you'd prefer some one-on-one help. —Atvelonis (talk) 14:48, June 9, 2019 (UTC)

Apologies
I'm sorry for my snarky comments on the edit summaries in response to some of your edits. I was in a cranky mood, but whatever the case, that was rude and unprofessional of me.

I will ask however, can you please take the editing advise given to you in previous messages regarding the use of the visual editor vs the source editor? It would make things easier on our end when patrolling new pages. As ATV pointed out, visual editor is a rather poor editor. It may be fine for small edits such as typo fixes, but for large edits, it just doesn't work out well. Cheers The Cat Master (talk) 17:03, June 10, 2019 (UTC)

UESP content
Hello, we appreciate the missing content you are adding, but plagiarism is not allowed, like you did on this article. You need to write it in your own words or leave it unfinished if it is not your strong point. I am myself horrible at writing longer than one or two sentences paragraph. If you have any other questions feel free to ask any staff members. --Rupuzioks (talk) 17:20, June 11, 2019 (UTC)


 * Oh absolutely, I understand. I've never played Battlespire and the only referance I have is Let's Plays and the UESP. I'll just start from scratch then.Spymaster Cosades (talk) 18:23, June 11, 2019 (UTC)

I offer you a sweettroll
The Cat Master (talk) 08:35, June 12, 2019 (UTC)


 * <3 Spymaster Cosades (talk) 08:38, June 12, 2019 (UTC)


 * I have been noticing an an improvement in your editing. keep up the good work. Your contributions has been a huge help! Thank you! The Cat Master (talk) 08:55, June 12, 2019 (UTC)


 * I appreciate it! I was a bit hesitant switching to source, but once I figured it out I found it a lot faster and easier. Also, while you're here, I noticed some errors in the mounts template - specifically "White Lion" and "Shadwoghost Guar". As far as I can tell, the White Lion was something data-mined at one point believed to be an upcoming mount but there's no information on it anywhere and I believe it may of just been the Noble Riverhold Senche-Lion. The Shadwoghost Guar is just a typo of the Shadowghost Guar. I don't know how to edit the template but just thought I'd bring it to your attention, and thanks again!Spymaster Cosades (talk) 20:12, June 12, 2019 (UTC)


 * Autoconfirmed users such as yourself can edit any unprotected or semi-protected page, even templates, in this case OnlineMountsNav. That template is a little confusing as it calls on a Lua module to display the appropriate part of the template based on the input parameter on articles. We may simplify this in the future, but for the time being you can edit the appropriate sub-template being called on by the module, e.g. OnlineMountsNav/Wolves. —Atvelonis (talk) 23:05, June 12, 2019 (UTC)

Disambiguations
Hi Spymaster, good work as of late. We appreciate the effort you're putting forth here. When you rename a page to disambiguate the title (e.g. if something appears in multiple games), please go to the redirect automatically left from the old title and turn it into a disambiguation page. Then go to Special:WhatLinksHere on that page (My Tools -> What links here) and update the link on those pages accordingly, or add it to my bot page to be done by Akulakhan.

The code for a disambiguations is very simple. All disambigs are structured the same way.

  may refer to:
 * (Daggerfall)
 * (Battlespire)

Here is a live example. The lead should contain that exact phrasing, and the links should be ordered by release date. The template will handle the categorization. Also, while I have you, please also try to name an image the same thing as its article. Spaces in file names to separate words are encouraged; this makes them easier to read. Following these steps will minimize confusion for readers. Please let me know if you run into any problems. I am only a few clicks away. —Atvelonis (talk) 23:01, June 12, 2019 (UTC)

Comic images
Hi Spymaster, thank you for the uploads as always. Could you provide a more specific source for these two files? The link that you provided no longer works. The page is broken on Bethesda's website, so you need an archive link.


 * File:Cyrus and Iszara's Father.png
 * File:Baron Volag.png

Thanks. —Atvelonis (talk) 00:23, June 15, 2019 (UTC)


 * Sure, the images can also be found on the Imperial Archive [] & [], respectively.Spymaster Cosades (talk) 00:27, June 15, 2019 (UTC)


 * Wonderful, thank you for the timely response. —Atvelonis (talk) 00:45, June 15, 2019 (UTC)

ESO characters
Hi Spymaster, I have some feedback about the ESO character pages you've been making lately. Generally speaking, these are good, but there are some small things you're forgetting/getting confused about.


 * Race names should always be capitalized, and quotes need a source (e.g. the game).
 * It's critical to include a character's location in both the lead and the infobox. If you don't know it, use the Missing template with the appropriate game/DLC parameter, e.g..
 * You also need to remember to use the proper categories on character articles. For most NPCs, this is their race, gender, and location. You can see some of the pages of yours I've edited for examples. If they're in a faction, they also need a faction category.
 * You should list out characters who appear in a given location on that location's page too. Otherwise, these pages will be nearly impossible for people to find.
 * For ESO, the "occupation" field should remain empty unless the character is a merchant. If they are, write "Merchant" under "services" and write the merchant sub-type (e.g. "Tailor") under "occupation." Just note that this is not the title that you see if you pickpocket an NPC; that would go under "class." UESP refers to this pickpocket class as the "profession," if I'm not mistaken. The terminology is not really consistent.

If you have any questions, please let me know. Thanks. —Atvelonis (talk) 01:02, June 15, 2019 (UTC)


 * Ah, also, Murkmire is a region, and Black Marsh is a province, not the other way around (Location -> Region -> Province in order of increasing size). And if it makes it easier, the proper way to use OnlineCharacters is laid out very clearly in the template documentation, which you can read here.


 * I know it's a lot to remember, all very specific, but hopefully these resources can serve as a checklist for you when making ESO character articles in the future. Everything is standardized; there are a lot of details you have to keep in mind while editing. —Atvelonis (talk) 01:17, June 15, 2019 (UTC)
 * Gotcha! I'll use your recent edits as an example to follow, I'll ask if anything comes up that I'm not sure about. Spymaster Cosades (talk) 01:31, June 15, 2019 (UTC)

Nudity
Hello, Wikia will just delete your images if you don't censor the nudity like here and here. I see that you started to do it yourself already, but I'll inform you just in case. It's a global Wikia rule, not a TESWiki rule. --Rupuzioks (talk) 08:24, June 15, 2019 (UTC)

Trivia
Hi Spymaster, there is no need to add trivia points along the lines of, "This creature has not appeared in any later title." This is evident from the "Appearances" section and the disambiguation, if applicable. See here and here. Thanks. —Atvelonis (talk) 22:34, June 16, 2019 (UTC)

Interwiki links
Hi Spymaster, you have to be careful that you don't copy+paste content in such a way that it removes relevant info from an article. In this case, you removed two links to versions of the article in other languages, which are necessary.

I would also request that you try to keep your edits to as few distinct revisions as possible. We have to manually check all edits made to the wiki, and it's significantly less time-consuming to scan a single large edit than five small ones. Thanks. —Atvelonis (talk) 16:30, June 17, 2019 (UTC)

Redirects
If you want to create a page and the name is already taken because the page is a redirect, this generally means that you should not create that page, because it has intentionally been redirected to a different page instead of left as a redlink. For something like Daggerfall skills, I think it's reasonable to have individual articles for them, so in that case it is preferred that you edit the redirect page instead of creating a new one. —Atvelonis (talk) 16:41, June 18, 2019 (UTC)


 * Okay, how would I do that? Spymaster Cosades (talk) 20:16, June 18, 2019 (UTC)


 * If you click on a redirect link, you will be redirected to a different page, but if you go to the top of that page then there will be some small text underneath the title that says, "Redirected from X." If you click on "X" then you will be taken to the redirect page itself. You can simply edit it as you would any other article at that point. Alternatively, you may append  to a redirect URL to get to that point. —Atvelonis (talk) 11:32, June 19, 2019 (UTC)

Ren-dro Members
Hi Spymaster, is the name of this faction actually "Ren-dro Members," or simply "Ren-dro"? A faction page does not just list members (though you're welcome to create a category for that purpose), so it should probably not be named in that way. Thanks. —Atvelonis (talk) 11:36, June 19, 2019 (UTC)


 * I just used "Ren-dro Member" because that's what was listed as the faction on the individual pages (Ren-dro Cryomancer, Ren-dro Duelist, etc). I actually originally planned to name the page simply Ren-dro untill I saw that, so it's only for consistancy sake. Your call. Spymaster Cosades (talk) 13:44, June 19, 2019 (UTC)


 * Ah, those links are a mistake that slipped by in Sept. 2017 when the pages were made. I was off having a crisis at the time and wasn't paying attention to the wiki, and apparently no one else was either. :P The page should be renamed to "Ren-dro" and the links corrected. —Atvelonis (talk) 04:01, June 21, 2019 (UTC)

ESO quests
Hello again, I notice that you made a quest article earlier, "The Witch of Azurah." It's good that you have such a broad interest in page creation. I have some quick feedback for you.


 * In general, if an article is missing an image, you should not put Missing as the parameter for that variable. Our infoboxes are designed in such a way that lacking any content in that spot will automatically generate the appropriate category (this one didn't because we're reworking the categorization right now, ignore that). So you can just leave it blank in the future, or add an image.
 * We typically separate unique entries in fields with a line break  instead of a comma and space. The latter formatting can be confused with a "place, overarching place" format (e.g. "Whiterun, Skyrim").
 * This quest is from Elsweyr, so it necessarily has to be auto-categorized as such. You can do this by adding a parameter to the end of the infobox called, with "Elsweyr" (no quotes) passed through. The lead, appearances section, Stub, and Missing should also refer to the quest as being from Elsweyr as opposed to Online, which signifies the base game.
 * Quest pages for ESO usually need three additional categories: one for the region (e.g. Category:Online: Rivenspire Quests), one for the type (e.g. Category:Online: Side Quests), and one combining those (e.g. Category:Online: Rivenspire Side Quests). However, because this is a DLC quest, it just needs Category:Elsweyr: Side Quests.
 * We have a specific system for describing gold rewards given for completing ESO quests. So ZeniMax has a very stupid pair of linear progressions detailing the gold rewards for each character level up to 50 whose slopes I calculated some time ago as being approximately 8/1 for levels 3–15 and 4/1 for levels 16+ (technically 7.91 6 /1 and 3.912/1, respectively, but some error is involved). We built a formula to show this, which can be generated by ESOGold if you give it the correct parameter based on the difficulty of the quest under consideration. The terminology is described in the template documentation. If you are adding content to both wikis, note that the UESP's terms do not match up with ours (I think theirs are made up, but I don't remember with certainty). In this case, you would write.
 * For those who cannot understand the template, we also record the gold reward in the actual "Rewards" section as the actual range of values that it could be. "Average leveled gold" is a useless metric in and of itself; our formula is better, but still confusing, so this just covers all our bases. You can look at the template documentation for the ranges (no need to do the calculation yourself, in fact you should not do that as there is some error in it; it's more of a napkin math thing). In this case, since the quest has the "Appropriate" difficulty (corresponds to "Standard" in the table), you would write the range as.
 * If you don't want to deal with any of this, just mark that variable with Missing, and don't add the gold range to the Rewards section.
 * Generally speaking, please do not copy+paste existing articles when making new ones. Use the pregenerated article templates at the top of the editing window when creating an article, as these are guaranteed to be up to date. It is better to use existing articles as a roadmap, but not a baseline, because they are sometimes wrong.

I know that was a lot of information. Please let me know if anything there doesn't make sense. I would be happy to elaborate as needed. —Atvelonis (talk) 12:09, June 19, 2019 (UTC)

Low-quality images
Hi Spymaster, this can be arranged if you were being serious, but it is not acceptable to upload low-quality screenshots to the wiki. The wiki also generally does not permit screenshots from non-official websites to be uploaded, e.g. from random YouTube walkthroughs. We sometimes let this slide, either because uploaders are new or because the content that they're adding is very difficult to come by (e.g. for Travels, Battlespire, etc.), but generally speaking it should be avoided. It is bad form. —Atvelonis (talk) 20:07, June 24, 2019 (UTC)


 * I'f you're being candid with me, I would take you up on that. Forgive me, I'm little stressed. I'm sorry if the images I uploaded weren't the quality necessary, but I did spend a lot of time looking up, screen-shotting and organizing hundreds of pictures for the past three days only to find them being deleted out of nowhere.Spymaster Cosades (talk) 20:18, June 24, 2019 (UTC)


 * It's ok. I should have informed you about this earlier, but have been distracted by work and various other tasks. Most of your images are still on the wiki and will remain up unless reuploaded in the future. Today, I deleted 11 that were either duplicates, blurry, or contained UI elements. The reason we do not permit this content is because it reflects poorly on the wiki to host media that readers would consider "low-quality." We would prefer to be seen as a source of high-quality content in all respects.


 * And yes, I was being candid with my offer. You play on PC, correct? If you add me on Steam then I can gift ESO to you. I do this with the explicit expectation that you will upload content from the game to the wiki in accordance with the wiki's policies and style guidelines. —Atvelonis (talk) 21:03, June 24, 2019 (UTC)


 * I do - I only need the Elsweyr update, as I already have ESO, so only $39.99? That's incredibly generous of you. I'll add you on Steam.Spymaster Cosades (talk) 16:16, June 25, 2019 (UTC)


 * Done, please let me know if there were any transactional errors. —Atvelonis (talk) 22:41, June 25, 2019 (UTC)


 * I don't know what to say, you're too kind. Thank you. Spymaster Cosades (talk) 01:12, June 26, 2019 (UTC)
 * I just uploaded a full-body screenshot of the character Zamarak. Let me know if it works or if I missed anything.Spymaster Cosades (talk) 05:31, June 26, 2019 (UTC)

UESP content and ESO images
Hey Spymaster. I believe you have been warned about this before, but it is important to understand that we do not allow content to be added from UESP under any circumstances, in accordance with our guidelines. Changing the order of the sentences or slightly altering the content of the text is not enough, any kind of text you add in pages like Hollowjack should be ideally your own, and not plagiarised from unaffiliated sites. Especially regarding the UESP, this is a point we very strictly practice and continuing to go against it could result in a ban. Please take it into consideration when adding information, and instead use direct sources like character dialogue and in-game books to structure new articles. Your work is appreciated, but we cannot keep it if it is taken from somewhere else.

Similarly, images cannot be taken from other websites, such as UESP and even Youtube. Even with including the source in the summary, it is not proper for a wiki to be hosting content retrieved from unrelated people, as it does not paint a positive image for us. Please read through the guidelines so that you can be better informed for all your future uploads. Any images you have uploaded so far that have been taken from Youtube videos will be marked with the Imagequality template and will have to be replaced by screenshots taken directly from the game. However, if you upload any future images that have been from Youtube we will have to delete them. Avoid leaving hostile messages such as this in the future about the matter, we cannot be over the users' heads at all times and sometimes it will take some time to get to an issue. It's understandable that you did not know this at the start, but now that you have been informed please do not continue to add such images. You are not under any obligation to add to everything by yourself, and we do not expect our editors to do it either, it would be unrealistic. It's fine if you do not have the resources, another editor can contribute to the work you started.

Finally, I would advise you to read through our character image standard. Unlike other types of images, like location and book ones, the character images one uploads have to abide by a somewhat stricter set of standards. Specifically, they have to be full-body and have a ratio of exactly 3:5. Images as the ones you have been adding from the dialogue screen are permitted for ESO characters, but are considered secondary and not a priority. For more details, the guide is very thorough and will help you through the process.

Please take the time to familiarise yourself with our guidelines more in order to avoid the content you add to be marked as low quality/deleted/etc. We do not expect you to know everything from the start, it is only natural that you wouldn't be aware about a lot of different things, which is why we are letting you know about them. You are in the process of learning and that's fine, but it is not appreciated to answer to us with hostility. Rozty (talk) 20:12, June 24, 2019 (UTC)


 * Will do.Spymaster Cosades (talk) 20:26, June 24, 2019 (UTC)