Editing Wiki Style Guide (section)

==Basics==

'''Write in the 3rd person.'''  This means that you shouldn't use, "I say you should probably do X."  Instead that should be written something like, "It's recommended that you do X."

'''Please check your spelling, capitalization, punctuation, and grammar for errors.'''  This should be basic common sense, since poor writing can make what you write look like crap, however many people still put "your" (belonging to you) when they mean "you're" (you are) and other such errors throughout their articles.

'''Use the American English spelling for words.'''  This means you should write "armor" instead of "armour", "color" instead of "colour", "defense" instead of "defence", etc., since that is how it will be spelled in the game.

'''Names of classes, "demon", and "sage" should be written in lower-case except when necessary.'''  So if you're writing about, for example, venomancers, do not capitalize the name of that class except at the beginning of a sentence.

'''Proper nouns and the names of skills, attributes (Str, Dex, etc.), specific creatures, and specific items ''should'' be capitalized.'''  So you should write, "sage Plume Shot" if you're writing about the sage version of the "Plume Shot" skill.  The creatures "Eldergoth Marksman" and "Eldergoth Sharpshooter" should be capitalized, however "eldergoths" in general should normally be in lower-case.

'''Please use the PWI version of names.'''  This means that, for example, you should refer to [[Twilight Temple]], and not "Holy Hall", as it is called in the Malaysian version of Perfect World.

'''When using abbreviations, explain what they are and/or link them to the relevant article the first time they are used.'''  For example, the first time in an article you can write "TW ([[Territory Wars]])" or "[[Territory Wars]] (TW)", and then just write "TW" every time after that.  Abbreviations should be avoided in cases where their use would look clumsy (i.e. too many abbreviations in one area), unnecessary (only used once or twice), or when explaining the abbreviation's meaning cannot be done in a non-awkward way (i.e. requires footnotes or such), with the exception of in tables that are getting too wide to display nicely.

'''Avoid all caps when possible.'''  Instead of writing in ALL CAPS, please use '''bold''' instead, unless the text is already in bold.

'''Articles should have a brief introduction before getting into the details.'''  This helps people new to the game figure out what the article is about, and gives all readers an idea of what they can expect to find in the article.  Brief articles that are basically only an introduction should have the "<nowiki>{{stub}}</nowiki>" tag at the top of the page instead.

'''Use proper internal links to other articles.'''  This means you should use two left brackets, the name of the article, and then two right brackets (so "<nowiki>[[Main Page]]</nowiki>" looks like "[[Main Page]]"), instead of one left bracket, the HTTP link to the page, a space, the name of the page, and one right bracket (which looks like this instead: [http://pwi-wiki.perfectworld.com/index.php/Main_Page Main Page]).  Add an "s" after the double brackets if you want to pluralize it (so "<nowiki>[[Cleric]]s</nowiki>" will appear as "[[Cleric]]s") or add a "pipe" (one of these: | ) and some text if you want the name to appear differently (for example, "<nowiki>[[Main Page|PWI Wiki]]</nowiki>" appears as "[[Main Page|PWI Wiki]]").

'''Try to link to other articles the first time a topic is mentioned when users may want further details.'''  For example, if you're writing an article and happen to mention "luring", you should make the first use of that word link to the [[Venomancer Luring]] article so the user can find out what that means and how to do it.

'''Please use the Summary line to describe your edits.'''  Using the Summary line below the edit box when editing articles helps explain what you did in your edits, which makes it easier to find out what edits were made and why in the edit history and [[Special:RecentChanges|recent changes]] page.

'''Try to keep the style of an article consistent.'''  If an article has five sections written in one style, and you want to add another, try to use a similar style to the other sections.  It can be odd/jarring/distracting to see most of an article written one way, and then suddenly shift to another style entirely, so you should try to avoid that problem.

'''Do not put personal information in articles.'''  This means that you should not sign your articles or such.  Personal information should be put on your user page.  These articles can and will be edited by everyone, so if everyone who edits them signs them then the page gets messy.  People can see who created and edited a page by checking the edit history instead.

'''Avoid calling new additions to the game "new".'''  Additions to the game will only be new for a little while, so it is better to write something like "added on 5/17/'11 (patch 522)", which will always be true, instead of "new".

'''Use the M/D/Y convention for dates.'''  For consistency, all dates should be in the Month/Day/Year format, and it is acceptable to abbreviate the year (so, "2012" can be shown as "'12").

'''Similarly, try to avoid referring to "current" sales or market prices.'''  Sales come and go, market prices not only fluctuate, but vary from server to server, the economy goes through steady inflation, and so on.  Thus, comments referring to prices of things that are not "fixed" prices (i.e. items sold by NPCs at a price that never changes and the like) should be avoided.  Instead, recommend that they check the Auction House and/or catshop prices if they need to find out the going prices of items.
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