BattleTechWiki talk:Manual of Style/BattleTech Style Guide

House vs State

I know for a lot of old school BT players this might be a bit of a contraversial one but I would like to request that it is formally included in our style guide that the state and ruling family are seperate entities. So House Davion would be the family and Federated Suns the state.--Dmon (talk) 13:13, 3 June 2021 (EDT)

I like that. And I like the section title. Consider it done.--Revanche ^{(talk|contribs)} 20:04, 3 June 2021 (EDT)

Thank you, and you put it much more eloquently than I did.--Dmon (talk) 05:42, 4 June 2021 (EDT)

Thank you for *that*. However, I can expect Frabby can cut thru all my flowery BS and make it even more clear.--Revanche ^{(talk|contribs)} 08:20, 4 June 2021 (EDT)

Hyperpulse generator style

Even in its own article use of uppercase and lowercase characters is wildly inconsistent. Sourcebooks and similar products mostly use hyperpulse generator within sentences, which seems a reasonable standard to add to the Style Guide. Madness Divine (talk) 00:25, 6 February 2022 (EST)

Going by gut feeling, the term is (should) usually be spelled all downcase though there may be instances where it reads better when capitalized (when discussing fictional BT technology for example). It should never be spelled in CamelCase though, ie. not with a capital P. Frabby (talk) 02:08, 6 February 2022 (EST)

Scope of the Style Guide to include other parts of speech

I understand that the majority of topics on the BattleTech Style Guide deal with nouns (mostly proper nouns).

Would it be appropriate to recommend style for other parts of speech, like verbs?

For example, would it be out of the scope of the BattleTech style guide to recommend that Sarna wiki articles that are historical in nature should strive to use verbs in the past tense over verbs in the present tense?

Like, "Vlad Ward was a trueborn warrior" versus "Vlad Ward is a trueborn warrior". 75.23.228.139 04:11, 28 July 2022 (EDT)

There has been discussion of that several times in the past, but no real consensus. Maybe it's time to raise it again, because—as I recall—there was only disunity on which types of articles should practice it. If you're on Discord, send me a DM and we'll hash out how to get a consensus discussion started.--Revanche ^{(talk|contribs)} 06:06, 28 July 2022 (EDT)

Capitalisation and italics

The Style Guide could use a section on what should and should not be capitalised/italicised. Madness Divine (talk) 10:02, 28 July 2022 (EDT)

We're in the midst of discussion with CGL this very week on this subject. We want to have a policy that aligns. And I agree with you, in spirit. The list of what should not be capitalized could be unnaturally long, if not done right. --Revanche ^{(talk|contribs)} 11:47, 28 July 2022 (EDT)

I was thinking of something simple like these things are capitalized but these similar things aren't; everything else isn't, but better worded. Madness Divine (talk) 17:52, 28 July 2022 (EDT)

To start the discussion, what are some examples of what would be listed on the "do not" list? --Revanche ^{(talk|contribs)} 18:45, 28 July 2022 (EDT)

Capitals:

• Weapons types: Gauss seems to be always. Streak usually, LB always, ultra is inconsistent...
• Why is OmniFighter capitalised and camel case but aerospace fighter is now neither? Where does DropShuttle fall? How about Starport?
• Are all 'Mech derivatives in camel case?
• How about compounds formed with Omni? OmniPilot? Omni pilot? OmniVehicle/Omnivehicle crew members?
• How consistent is aerospace?
• Inner Sphere military units - regiment, battalion, company, etc.

Italics:

• Spacegoing thingies: drones, small craft, missile systems - I think these should all be normal text but even I have frequent doubts.
• Airgoing thingies: sometimes I have to look at the type of infobox used to know whether an aircraft is an aerospace fighter or conventional.
• The various Ryuken units - are they or are they not italicised?
• Common loanwords - a lot of Japanese words are in a gray area because they're common enough to be recognised by most English speakers but aren't fully accepted into everyday language, like seppuku, bonsai, and katana.
• Unique 'Mechs - I believe it's supposed to be italics if the pilot has given the machine a name (like Bob naming his 'Mech Burger) but quotes if it's the name of the individual pilot (like Atlas "Bob") but even record sheets are inconsistent on this.

Numbers:

• Cardinals: 6-ton or six-ton? 10 or ten? 100 or (one) hundred? Is it different for unit names and tonnage/capacity/armament?
• Ordinals: First through Tenth is something every guide agrees on. 21st, Twenty-First, or Twenty-first? 105th or One Hundred and Fifth? 4077th or Four Thousand and Seventy-Seventh or Four Thousand and Seventy-seventh or Four-Oh-Seven-Seventh?

No doubt other stuff will occur to me. Madness Divine (talk) 21:45, 28 July 2022 (EDT)

I suspect we'll be able to answer some of these soon, though the "Why is OmniFighter..." is probably best for the "Ask the Writers" forum.--Revanche ^{(talk|contribs)} 12:56, 30 July 2022 (EDT)

Was the number question ever clarified? Also, wanted to know if the following numeric designations under 100 should still be spelled out , because it looks strange to have some units in this list follow one form and yet others follow a different form, simply based on an arbitrary boundary of a three digit unit designation.

Tenth Lyran Guards Aerospace Brigade

- 35th Tharkan Attack Wing

- 217th Skye Fighter Wing

- 43rd Donegal Fighter Wing

- 607th Avalon Fighter Wing

75.23.228.139 02:00, 8 April 2023 (EDT)

Well, User:Mbear/StyleGuideUpdate#Numbers is pretty clear on this (it should be Thirty-fifth Tharkan Attack Wing and Forty-third Donegal Fighter Wing). But I personally only change the description text and generally leave the Officer, Composition, and Game Rules sections alone since I see them more as tables and lists. Csdavis715 (talk) 02:42, 8 April 2023 (EDT)

Clan warrior surname disambiguation best practice

Several issues with Clan warrior surnames have cropped up, maybe it's good to setup best practice in the style guide? (Most of the issue seems to be with disambiguating different articles)

Here are my recommendations, along with my questions about what to do about potential disambiguation.

• Scenario 1: A Clan warrior has no surname indicated by any canon source. Clan warrior's birth status is not definitively stated in any canon source.
• Recommendation: Sarna article should assume that the Clan warrior in question is trueborn and has no surname.
• Disambiguation: If the Sarna article about the Clan warrior needs to be disambiguated from an existing Sarna article with the same name, use "<Warrior name>_(Clan_<clan_name>)" as the title. Unknown what additional disambiguation should be used if two different freeborn warriors are from the same Clan (hypothetically, what happens if there were two different warriors known as Horse Jade Falcon that were serving in the Jade Falcon Touman at roughly the same time? What would be the best way to disambiguate these individuals?
• Discovered at least 10 articles that need to be disambiguated this way on the Clan Wolf character list and the Clan Jade Falcon character list.

• Scenario 2: A Clan warrior has no surname in a canon source. Clan warrior's birth status is stated to be freeborn in a canon source.
• Recommendation: Sarna article should use the warrior's Clan as their surname.
• Disambiguation: Sarna article title should use the the surname. (example: Horse Jade Falcon, Zane Nova Cat, Elson Nova Cat, warriors listed under the Gurbeng listing in Clan Wolf Sourcebook). Unknown what additional disambiguation should be used if two different freeborn warriors are from the same Clan (hypothetically, what happens if there were two different warriors known as Horse Jade Falcon that were serving in the Jade Falcon Touman at roughly the same time? What would be the best way to disambiguate these individuals?

• Scenario 3: When two Clan warriors have no surname indicated by any canon source, and both warriors belong to the same Clan. The birth status of both warriors is not definitely stated in any canon source.
• Recommendation: Sarna articles should assume that both Clan warriors in question are trueborn and have no surname. (example, the multitudes of warriors with the same first name and no surname in the phonebook Tukayyid combat rosters in Clan Wolf Sourcebook and Clan Jade Falcon Sourcebook)
• Disambiguation: Unknown the best practice about how to disambiguate the two articles, though. Disambiguation based on the last known unit seems extremely prone to error, because unit assignments are temporary, not permanent. Disambiguation based on phenotype, while permanent, may not completely disambiguate the warriors in question, because it is possible for the warriors to be the same phenotype. Disambiguation based on which century they served is not useful, because the majority of examples come from the same period (aka whenever the Battle of Tukayyid was).
• Discovered at least 3 (three) pairs of articles (making 6 total) where 2 warriors have the same first name, and no surname.

In closing, I don't know if the answers to these questions about disambiguation are worth documenting, considering that TPTB are unlikely to post lengthy phonebook combat rosters in canon ever again, and because the subjects in these articles tend to be very minor cogs in terms of how much canon actually refers to them.

Ideally, I'd like to create some sort of truth table for these Clan warrior surname scenarios, because I think there might be other scenarios that I haven't considered yet, but I'll wait for a response re: best practice on the scenarios I have identified first.

Please let me know if my understanding of Sarna best style practice with Clan surnames is correct, and I'll try to start correcting the articles I've found. 75.23.228.139 19:24, 2 August 2022 (EDT)

EDIT: I found the Policy for surnames, but this topic wasn't clarified there. Should this discussion topic be deleted from here and reposted on the Policy for surnames instead? 75.23.228.139 20:07, 2 August 2022 (EDT)

The Article Naming policy talk page is likely the best place for this. Lets move it over there, we can agree an approach, and then I'll update that policy accordingly. --HF22 (talk) 21:34, 2 August 2022 (EDT)

Acknowledged75.23.228.139 23:09, 2 August 2022 (EDT)

Clan warrior name alphabetical sorting

For lists of Clan warrior names that are sorted alphabetically, what is the best practice?

• Process 1: Sort alphabetically by surname (aka Bloodname for trueborn or Clan surname for freeborn). If a warrior has no surname, treat their first name as their surname)
• Existing Sarna examples: the list for Clan Wolf characters

• Process 2: Sort alphabetically by warrior's first name, regardless of what their surname is.
• Existing Sarna examples: None known that are entirely of this process

The reason I ask is because the list for Clan Jade Falcon characters seems to use both Process 1 and Process 2 interchangably. For example, heading "K" contains "Karen Roshak" (aka Process 2) and "Dan Kyle" (aka Process 1).

Which process is correct?

75.23.228.139 19:43, 2 August 2022 (EDT)

EDIT: I found the Policy for surnames, but this topic wasn't clarified there. Should this discussion topic be deleted from here and reposted on the Policy for surnames instead? 75.23.228.139 20:11, 2 August 2022 (EDT)

For purposes of the wiki name sorting is done by first name in lists, surname in categories unless the character doesn't have a surname, then it defaults to first name.

As for where to post, I think you have posted this one surname topic about six times today in slightly different ways, something I find as an admin really gets to me. so I think we should try and get it sorted out regardless of where the right place to post it may be.--Dmon (talk) 23:24, 2 August 2022 (EDT)

I found the answer to this particular question: if a soldier article happens to include a first name and a surname and if someone adds that article to a category without piping the article name in the following format <surname, first name>, then BTW sorts by the soldier's first name by default, rather than their last name. I've taken the liberty of policing Category pages and correcting obviously missorted names. 75.23.228.139 22:34, 11 August 2022 (EDT)