Talk:3.5e Homebrew

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Archive 1 (Discussions 1 – 30) Archive 2 (Discussions 31 – 60)

Namespace?

Should we make a nampespace (which would remove the identifiers) for all homebrew items on D&D Wiki? Thoughts on this idea? Also, any good ideas for the name of the namespace? --Green Dragon 15:06, 28 February 2008 (MST)

I keep toggling on this idea whenever I think about it. Does MediaWiki support nested namespaces? Then we could have "3e:" for all 3.x material, the 3e SRD would have the namespace "3e:SRD:", the UA would have the "3e:UA:" namespace, and the user-submitted section could be "3e:User:" or just "3e:". And if you did a search within the "3e" namespace, it would search all the pages with the "3e" parent namespace. —Sledged (talk) 15:11, 28 February 2008 (MST)

I also keep thinking about this as well, and I have not been able to come up with a perfect solution, although yours would be the ideal one if MediaWiki supported nested namespaces, which I do not think it does... How about one step not as advanced as yours; 3.5e (maybe User: tagged on the end? What are your thoughts on this?) and 3.5eSRD? Also, speaking of namespaces, do you have any good idea for the publications? --Green Dragon 13:33, 29 February 2008 (MST)

We could simulate nested namespaces. Does MediaWiki allow a colon as part of the namespace? Then we could still have "3.5e:SRD:" and "3.5:". They just wouldn't have any association with each other—which is how it is now. If colons aren't allowed, we could just use a hyphen instead "3.5e:" and "3.5-SRD:". No ideas I feel strongly enough for publication namespace. —Sledged (talk) 15:13, 29 February 2008 (MST)

We can do that. What are your thoughts on adding a mock identifier (not (DnD Class) but rather (Class))? --Green Dragon 20:50, 13 March 2008 (MDT)

I was going to bring this up soon! Interesting :). Maybe we need to think about the purposes of categories, identifiers, and namespaces. I don't know when and where to use each. What is best practice? --Aarnott 20:57, 13 March 2008 (MDT)

One thing about the nested namespace idea is that MediaWiki might identify "3.5e:SRD:Some Page" as the page "SRD:Some Page" in the "3.5e" namespace instead of "Some Page" in the "3.5e:SRD" namespace. We should find out before hand whether or not MediaWiki is "greedy" with identifying namespaces.

Identifiers exist to make a distinction between a term's two or more separate connotations, such as the feat Psionic Fist and the prestige class psionic fist. Category vs namespace I have a harder time pinning down when one should be used over the other. Should probably research it on Wikipedia or Wikimedia Meta-Wiki. —Sledged (talk) 21:28, 13 March 2008 (MDT)

Okay, where does this go?

I know some, for want of a better word, articles are. They've been stated repeatedly to be open-game content by the writers, and encompass mechanics, flavor, rule tweaks, base classes, and PrCs. Where should they go, or do we make a section for articles like them? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Genowhirl (talk • contribs) . Please sign your posts.

They probably go in Other. — OptimizationFanatic (talk) (contrib) 17:52, 12 May 2008 (MDT)

Search Problems

The search function doesn't work. When I type in even the most basic word, it says that it cannot find any page related to it, and I've tried words as simple as "magic." Noname 21:32, 18 May 2008 (MDT)

Below the search results (none), there is a Google search box. Use that for now. --Axaj 08:26, 18 September 2009 (MDT)

Names?

Should we make a link to help people think of names, such as names for towns, NPCs, etc.? It could be organized into towns, worlds, continents, and characters. The geographical places could be organized by climate and overall alignment, for example, an evil desert town. The character names could be done by race, class, and alignment.

68.55.33.112 08:11, 15 June 2008 (MDT)

Templates?

Where would I place a template? In the Races section? — OptimizationFanatic (talk|contrib) 12:50, 17 August 2008 (MDT)

Templates are totally under the DnD Creatures heading and then onto 3.5e Creature Templates. Though, yeah I often want to look for them amongst the 3.5e Races. Perhaps a link to templates on that page would be handy. (I'd do it, but I'm not sure on the policy of editing those pages, plus, I checked the formatting there, and it frightens me). --Ganteka 13:19, 17 August 2008 (MDT)

Thanks. — OptimizationFanatic (talk|contrib) 17:56, 3 September 2008 (MDT)

Add A New Page

Valentine and I want to add the Special:AddPage link to this page. What is the protocol for doing so? Also, the drop down menu on Special:AddPage, how can we get the coding for that somehow? --Ganteka 17:09, 2 April 2009 (MDT)

I am not completely sure, however I think that the dropdown menu is only their because of SMW. The question is: Do we want to consider preloads or forms standard? I feel that preloads grant a lot more freedom of editing, make it so people learn wiki-code, etc, but also leave a large margin of error. Thinking about it more (I know I said otherwise on Discussion:Flaw Addition Page is Bad) I feel that preloads are a better option. If we could figure out a way to make it so we could have a dropdown selection for preloads (and not just forms) then I agree - this would make a great addition to this page. --Green Dragon 18:49, 4 April 2009 (MDT)

DPL?

Why in the name of all that is holy is this page made with DPL? It has things added to it so infrequently, and it is so small, that it is totally pointless. Also, as TK has pointed out with a practical demonstration, it allows easy vandalism of this page, just by adding a category to another page. --Daniel Draco 22:13, 24 June 2009 (MDT)

I see no reason to keep it as DPL -- I don't really think this matter requires consensus... Someone can just revert it if there is a strong disagreement. Getting started on the change now. --Aarnott 08:18, 25 June 2009 (MDT)

Done. --Aarnott 08:35, 25 June 2009 (MDT)

Page Name

This page is just titled Dungeons and Dragons, and the corresponding fourth edition page is titled '4e Homebrew.' Should we change this page to "3.5e Homebrew" and perhaps have the "Dungeons and Dragons" page be an actual page about D&D in general, ala wikipedia? Or perhaps a disambiguation page that links to each edition's SRD/Homebrew?   Hooper   talk    contribs    email   08:33, 6 September 2009 (MDT)

Ya, or do you think something like "3.5e User Submitted Content" would be better? Of course we have to wait for the double redirects. --Green Dragon 22:18, 6 September 2009 (MDT)

Nah, just "3.5e Homebrew" would be fine, no need to break established convention. But yes, such a huge change should probably wait for now. Also, what's been going on with the site? It was down for most of the day, and now it keeps coming up and going down again... --TheWarforgedArtificer 22:22, 6 September 2009 (MDT)

User Submitted Content is more correct though. --Green Dragon 22:42, 6 September 2009 (MDT)

I say stick with "3.5 Homebrew" - most people know what you mean. Any input that would make you think otherwise? -- xido 15:16, 7 September 2009 (MDT)

Either way you think GD. I agree that Homebrew is specific, but also User Submitted may be more accurate - as some of the stuff - especially those articles found in the "Other" category may not qualify as "homebrew" as they may not be game-specific. If done I can clear out the double redirects using WhatLinksHere pretty easily, if someone just makes sure to MOI me so I don't miss it.   Hooper   talk    contribs    email   15:20, 7 September 2009 (MDT)

Alright. When one has time please feel free to fix some breadcrumbs, links, preloads, etc. It's going to look very messy for a bit. If one has time please help. --Green Dragon 23:40, 7 September 2009 (MDT)

Spell Points?

Okay, I remember there being a page around here somewhere for a variant spellcasting option that used spell points in a similar way that psionics does. However, I can't seem to find this article back no matter what I do.

Also, I think th search feature on this site is broken, because out of all the times I've used it, it may have gone to the exact page I was looking for twice. Maybe. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 205.250.76.241 (talk • contribs) 19:25, 20 November 2009 (MDT). Please sign your posts.

If looking for exact names please keep in mind that pages have an identifying tag present (e.g. "(3.5e Class)") which, when trying to pop up with a certain page, should be searched for as well. Additionally keep in mind that pages are sorted; so a certain unpopular page you are looking for may not show up first in the list as such. Although search works fine — it is not down. Also I have no idea what you are talking about with spell points — sorry. --Green Dragon 20:22, 20 November 2009 (MST)

In 3.5e spell points are in Unearthed Arcana. --Name Violation 22:15, 20 November 2009 (MST)

OK, I guess I didn't explain that too well. What I meant was that most wikis have redirect pages for situations like this. For example, when you type in zimmy on wikipedia it takes you to the Bob Dylan page. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 205.250.76.241 (talk • contribs) 20:47, 21 November 2009 (MDT). Please sign your posts.

Right. Each page having it's own redirect page is worthless and pointless work and makes the overall page architecture unorganized and messy. It's better to just utilize the search tool. Of course, however and to note, we use disambiguation pages to the fullest. E.g. Player's Handbook, Necromancer, Living Dead, etc. Category:Disambiguation. Many SRD pages have a redirect which change to disambiguation pages with other editions or related things. If you know of any pages which require a disambiguation please set them up accordingly — it helps tremendously. --Green Dragon 23:02, 21 November 2009 (MST)

Search results - 'Ego'

I was doing a search for these keywords, to see where my own homebrew idea for 'Ego Rolls' would come up after the SRD pages for Item Ego, and I got neither any results for Ego or Ego Roll, and only after entering the Intelligent Item keywords did I even see the SRD page for Itelligent Items in the results. I got many searches that came back with No Results. The following keywords were searched with minimal results. Is there any way to make these pages more accessible for a search using the integrated page feature in the left hand sidebar? Can keywords be placed, or in some way make the search more apt to find results like this?

• Ego
• Item Ego
• Ego Power
• Ego Force
• Ego Roll
• SRD Ego
• SRD: Ego
• Ego Dominance
• Intelligent Item Ego

I finally got results on the last keyword search, and even in that, it did not come at the top of the results.  ??? Is there is a solution to this?

At some point, I am going generate descriptive text for 'Ego Roll' that will in many ways be equivalent to the text for Item Ego - it would be nice to have the two pages easily reached in a search for 'Ego', 'Item Ego', 'Ego Roll', 'Ego Dominance', etc. Is that possible? -- xido 20:40, 17 December 2009 (MST)

Oh... The search does not work with words three letters or less. I'll see if that can be changed (D&D Wiki uses lucene search so maybe the code can be changed to make it work). I'll see. --Green Dragon 07:56, 18 December 2009 (MST)

Got it. Let me know what eventually happens here. I am looking to make my pages more efficient, finalized, and clean (including while searching for them). I am also interested to know how it is that an SRD page on Intelligent Items did not come up as the primary result in a search for 'Intelligent Item'. That is a strange quirk that I found while checking on this issue. -- xido 22:31, 18 December 2009 (MST)

Actually we don't use lucene search anymore. I got that wrong. I guess it was acting up a bit ago and, although I forgot I did, I asked someone to change it back to the MediaWiki one so that is the current one currently in use. I could get it to be in use again if we want. So I guess it is the MediaWiki one which does not search for words three words or less. I'll see what I can do to make it work with words of any size (maybe something like Special:Prefixindex could be implemented — that works with words of all sizes). --Green Dragon 12:15, 19 December 2009 (MST)

Great - if that will work, then I am all for it. I just think it's funny that an SRD item cannot be searched for, and my own homebrew item is just a variant from that... So I wondered what the deal was. It's interesting that the search has those kind of limitations on it. Merry Christmas, GD. ;) -- xido 03:03, 25 December 2009 (MST)

Happy winter holidays to you as well! Anyway Sphinx search has been implemented and that works with words of three characters so you can search for it now. --Green Dragon 03:27, 30 December 2009 (UTC)

I did this, and saw that my own page comes up after another homebrew page for "Ego", and Inath and Intelligent Item material comes up in the first page of results. I made some comments on the other person's Ego page about reviewing and balancing that system, although I am not even sure of the author's username yet. I also made on a comment on the main Inath page about if it needs to be changed / redirected to (3.5 Variant Rule) segment...? Hopefully 2010 is a year for productivity, prosperity, and harmonious balance for all - including D&D Wiki.  ;) -- xido 04:49, 5 January 2010 (UTC)

Help!

I don't understand how to make a prestige class using the templates. Could somebody please help me? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Red Dwarf (talk • contribs) . Please sign your posts.

Another way is to find a current Prestige Class page and copy - paste the code into your new page, then just edit all the information over to your new PrC. This way you can keep the other old "example" PrC page open in a different tab/window and if you get confused on what a bit of code is and/or does, you can just glance back at the page to see.   Hooper   talk    contribs    email   14:00, 6 January 2010 (UTC)

Wording

Has anyone else noticed that under the "To Do", the descriptive text says "Walk the taxes, File the dog, etc."? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 207.165.122.3 (talk • contribs) 2010-09-02 11:02. Please sign your posts.

It originally said something like "File the laundry, walk the taxes, do the dog, etc..." —Sledged (talk) 11:57, 2 September 2010 (MDT)

It has been changed again with the reorganization of the To-Do lists. If you have a problem with it please state your problem. --Green Dragon (talk) 07:34, 29 August 2013 (MDT)

Place to Discuss Campaign Ideas

I can't seem to find anywhere on this site to post my ideas and/or get help on making my ideas possible. Any help would be great. --Lyrad8791 00:44, 3 January 2011 (UTC)

Is Template:Campaign Setting Rating/meta#Helpful Know-How what you are looking for? --Green Dragon 11:28, 10 January 2012 (MST)

How about a DM hints and tips page?

I wanted to contribute to the site by sharing my experiance as a DM and point out some less obvious pitfals that any starting DM would suffer from, but also to share some practices and ideas on how to handle certain situations in game. Playing DM is litterarely playing god and it isn't as easy as it looks for a starting DM. Often more experianced players will abuse your good will and lack of knowledge, inside but also outside the game (friends politics and such). I believe that starting DM's will benifit a lot from this while regular DM's may learn how to improve their games. Just throwing it in from the dark. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Crashpilot (talk • contribs) 23:20, 15 February 2011 (UTC). Please sign your posts.

I think that's a great idea. Maybe you could start something in 3.5e Other and maybe it will be moved to DnD Guidelines depending on the content. For Q&A I recommend you link to pertinent discussions. --Green Dragon 22:59, 15 February 2011 (MST)

Factions, Nations and Organizations - A new DM subcategory?

One of the most interesting parts of Dungeons and Dragons (at least, for me) is creating the nations that players can align themselves with or against. I've found that creating interactions between organizations is far more interesting work than creating and balancing magic items. Indeed, the two campaigns I've placed here on the wiki (Tiberium Rising (3.5e Campaign Setting) and The Nuclear Wasteland (D20 Modern Campaign Setting) are far more focused on the tribes that influence the world than the equipment the players wield.

Perhaps we can add a section to the D&D and D20 homebrew pages dedicated to factions, including opinions on general concerns (human/non-human relations, chaos/order, good/evil, religion, magic/technology, etc.), leadership, general history and possible relations to other, generic organizations. This can be a great opportunity for DM's to set up their own world, but relax a bit on major political issues. Furthermore, those who focus on story and people more than magic and statistics (like me) will have the chance to contribute more to the wiki, without having to go through the rather involved process of making a campaign.

I appreciate any feedback on this idea!

--Yossarian (talk) 18:19, 7 August 2013 (MDT)

You can find them on the environment pages: 4e Environments, 3.5e Environments. --Green Dragon (talk) 19:21, 7 August 2013 (MDT)

But that isn't exactly an obvious place for them, particularly given that the links are described as "Planes and terrains". I still hold that organizations deserve their own tab, since none of the current pages truly encompass what organizations are; NPCs is too small, yet campaign settings is too broad. Organizations which are not necessarily tied to a city, but can instead be global influences, should have their own distinct area. --Yossarian (talk) 17:31, 14 August 2013 (MDT)

Are you saying that it would make more sense to have Campaign Seeds (DnD Other) put somewhere more prominent, or is what you referring to not included as campaign seeds? --Green Dragon (talk) 07:32, 29 August 2013 (MDT)