Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Lathander

The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was no consensus, default to keep. Wizardman 18:53, 17 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Lathander[edit]

No evidence of real-world notability, has been tagged as such since January. An article about a Dungeons & Dragons character that is composed entirely of plot summary/character description, with no sources other than D&D campaign books - primary sources from the game manufacturer. ~ mazca ^{t | c} 22:00, 12 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Keep, important character within the Forgotten Realms campaign setting. I'll be working on adding a publication history momentarily. If the discussion does not rule as a Keep, I'll recommend retaining the edit history and redirect to List of Forgotten Realms deities#Greater deities. BOZ (talk) 23:16, 12 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Also, Le Grand's comment below[1] pretty well sums up my feeling on the subject. And even if the local consensus on this AFD is not to keep this article as a separate article, I see nothing wrong with maintaining the edit history as a redirect. BOZ (talk) 22:11, 13 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Keep or redirect - Peregrine Fisher (talk) (contribs) 23:43, 12 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Keep per Wikipedia:Five pillars (notability to a real-world audience, unoriginal research, consistent with a “specialized encyclopedia” concerning verifiable fictional topics with importance in the real world) and What Wikipedia is. Any claim that notability is not disputed when it clearly is is dishonest. But that doesn't matter as the article passes the general notability guideline anyway. --Happy editing! Sincerely, Le Grand Roi des Citrouilles^Tally-ho! 23:52, 12 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Keep Per others so far. Rray (talk) 00:13, 13 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
delete no secondary sources. wp:nor says "Wikipedia articles should rely on reliable, published secondary sources. All interpretive claims, analyses, or synthetic claims about primary sources must be referenced to a secondary source, rather than original analysis of the primary-source material by Wikipedia editors." as the nominator says, all the listed sources are primary sources from the game (lost) manufacturer. Jessi1989 (talk) 00:20, 13 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
- I think the thing to do is do a search with Lathander and review or preview or interview to find the out of universe secondary source material. --Happy editing! Sincerely, Le Grand Roi des Citrouilles^Tally-ho! 00:45, 13 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  - if you find some reliable, published and, most importantly, secondary sources and add them to the article then i will happily reconsider my vote. at the moment there are none and as such i am surprised to see so many keep votes here. Jessi1989 (talk) 19:53, 13 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    - I find the hits that show up here as reliable published sources. --Happy editing! Sincerely, Le Grand Roi des Citrouilles^Tally-ho! 19:55, 13 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
      - i emphasised the word secondary for a reason. yes those are published sources, but they are published by wizards of the coast so they are primary sources, not secondary. the first book is from a different publisher, but it gives the following description "This book is a compilation of stories from the online world Cerea Island. The stories were written by individual players involved in the adventures. Thus what you find inside are many people telling of their adventures in the world." i would hardly count this as a "reliable, third-party, published source with a reputation for fact-checking and accuracy" as described in wp:rs (reliable sources). if you find any suitable sources you should add them to the article and rewrite the article to be based on the sourced information, only then will this article be suitable for wikipedia. thanks and please let me know if you'd like me to clarify anything i have said :) Jessi1989 (talk) 00:27, 14 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
        In my opinion, the article and sources provided are suitable enough as is, although more would certainly help. When I see a secondary source titled "Praise Lathander: Ten More Years Of Atari D&D" it suggests to me that the term is somehow notable enough to be chosen of all the possible D&D deities as the one to use in the title of the article on a reliable independent site. Such things coupled with the published primary sources just add up. --Happy editing! Sincerely, Le Grand Roi des Citrouilles^Tally-ho! 00:33, 14 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Keep Major deity in Forgotten Realms settings. This god has had a role in several novels and game modules. Recurring elements of fiction within a setting are generally notable. --Polaron | Talk 01:30, 13 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Keep notable/important plot element across several genres within the diverse D&D portfolio. Cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 04:34, 13 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Redirect to List of Forgotten Realms deities#Greater deities, as was done in the past already. As of the moment I write this, there are no references independent of TSR or Wizards of the Coast to demonstrate notability. --Craw-daddy | T | 09:21, 13 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Delete. Fictional elements in a prominent game are only notable when they themselves have received significant third-party coverage in reliable sources. Where the content of the article consists entirely of game guide material or in-universe fiction, and where any references to the subject which are dug up are also game guides or source material, there's no established notability per WP:N. That's the case here. Nothing recoverable in the article which would really warrant keeping the edit history. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 10:03, 13 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Comment - "Entirely"? I just added a section that is neither game guide material nor in-universe fiction. That's got to be a start in the right direction, at least. BOZ (talk) 12:10, 13 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Conceded. However, a self-generated timeline is still reliant entirely on the primary sources themselves. Even secondary source which provided this timeline would be indication enough that the subject of Lathander has received secondary coverage. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 13:35, 13 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Keep - the article needs researched, but not deleted. Covered in various novels and third-party sources as well (such as Arthaus' Ravenloft 3.x core books). Web Warlock (talk) 10:29, 13 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Delete—Something many arguing here fail to realize is that a "novel" or "game guide" is not a reliable, third-party source. Any interpretation of such works is original research and should not be included in a Wikipedia article. What the article should be based on is third-party examination of primary sources such as game guides. If a D&D periodical had written an article "The Importance of Lathander" or something, then that would qualify as a source. As it is, this article contains no such outside confirmation of notability, and those in favor of keeping it have made no assertions that such sources exist. Livitup (talk) 16:15, 13 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
- It is still a reliable primary source. And since notability is disputed and subjective, we're best relying on verifiability. --Happy editing! Sincerely, Le Grand Roi des Citrouilles^Tally-ho! 17:02, 13 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Delete - Absolutely no assertion of notability through reliable sources. Judgesurreal777 (talk) 20:57, 13 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
- As has been indicated above, reliable sources have been used to assert notability. --Happy editing! Sincerely, Le Grand Roi des Citrouilles^Tally-ho! 21:01, 13 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  - More accurately, seven different primary sources (all published by the manufacturer of D&D, including the magazine) have been provided which demonstrate verifiability, which I never really thought was in question to start with. I've got to say I don't personally buy it that all that is required is a torrent of primary-source game guide material to make a fictional character notable. ~ mazca ^{t | c} 21:27, 13 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    - I do, as appearances in multiple such guides is a measure of notability (not all characters make so many appearances) and after all sometimes the primary sources are actually more reliable than the secondary sources. As far as notability goes, editors can't even agree how to label WP:FICT so because we have no real consensus on what constitutes fictional notability, it's hard to really base arguments on it. --Happy editing! Sincerely, Le Grand Roi des Citrouilles^Tally-ho! 21:38, 13 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
      - The fact that WP:FICT has repeatedly failed to gain precise consensus as to its status is not in dispute, which is the main reason I've made no particular reference to it. The general notability guideline, however, does seem to still hold the approval of the community in general and despite its overall subjectivity in places, it does clearly call for "coverage in sources independent of the subject". Reliable or not this article doesn't seem to demonstrate any of those at all and, in all fairness, it was tagged as such for six months before I started this AfD with no visible improvement. ~ mazca ^{t | c} 21:58, 13 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
        Notability as a concept seems disputed all over the place. Wikipedia:Notability/Historical/Non-notability/Essay, Wikipedia:Deletion policy/Minor characters, User:Hiding/What notability is not, a category of editors, etc. Thus, in that regard I have to go with "ignore all rules" and apply a common sense concept of notability, i.e. if it appears in mutiple published sources, which is does then that seems reasonable enough for a paperless encyclopedia in that editors and readers clearly find value in the topic and so if we keep it, they can continue improving it, and we are that much more comprehensive of a reference guide, whereas I see nothing gained from deletion. --Happy editing! Sincerely, Le Grand Roi des Citrouilles^Tally-ho! 22:03, 13 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
        And that second part is fair enough, it's an opinion I can respect - I don't agree with it as I'm personally rather happier to trim and remove our unfettered articles about in-universe fictional characters. But we're definitely disagreeing here based on differing personal philosophies rather than misunderstanding, so I doubt we're going to get anywhere in this particular line. I'll see how the consensus of others pans out. :) ~ mazca ^{t | c} 22:11, 13 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
        Okay, take care! :) --Happy editing! Sincerely, Le Grand Roi des Citrouilles^Tally-ho! 22:50, 13 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
        wikipedia policies:

wp:v: "Articles should rely on reliable, third-party published sources with a reputation for fact-checking and accuracy."

wp:nor: "If no reliable, third-party sources can be found for an article topic, Wikipedia should not have an article on it."

wikipedia guidelines:

wp:rs: "Articles should rely on reliable, third-party, published sources with a reputation for fact-checking and accuracy."

there are currently no reliable, third-party, published sources. for this article to be kept, someone needs to find some and re-wrtie the article based on them. sorry but that's the way wikipedia works. Jessi1989 (talk) 00:45, 14 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The article meets those policies and guideline which is why it will be kept. Any character covered in nearly fifty published books is notable for Wikipedia per any reasonable policy or guideline. Surely there's D&D magazines or other relevant publications that don't necessarily have online archive that also review these books and in that capacity mention this deity. --Happy editing! Sincerely, Le Grand Roi des Citrouilles^Tally-ho! 00:48, 14 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Delete This article fails the WP:GNG. Asserting that notability is "disputed" in order to avoid the deletion of this article on the grounds of failing WP:N is borderline disruptive. As long as the tag on top of WP:N says "guideline" it isn't disputed enough. IF editors want to argue that this article should be that 'common sense' exception to WP:N, I'm all ears. Protonk (talk) 03:10, 14 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Keep since it is better than most of the articles on the list. LA @ 04:37, 14 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Section break[edit]

Article has been improving since nomination. --Happy editing! Sincerely, Le Grand Roi des Citrouilles^Tally-ho! 03:17, 14 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
An originally composed timeline of primary sources covering the subject may have been a useful apprendix to a notable subject, but it's not in itself an establishment of notability. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 08:05, 14 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I have a different solution to the whole deity character problem for this entire franchise. I am just trying to figure out where to put the proposal. I am considering putting it as a sub-page to the main list. LA @ 04:37, 14 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
- Please give this a read and tell me what you think. LA @ 06:39, 14 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

That seems like it may be a reasonable goal. BOZ (talk) 07:26, 14 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Even that hierarchy is still reliant on secondary sources to be found to establish why the deities are notable. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 08:05, 14 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

LA's link above has been moved to Talk:List of Forgotten Realms deities/Merge proposal to remove it from the article space. Pagra shtak 14:19, 14 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

It has been moved again to Wikipedia:WikiProject Dungeons & Dragons/Deity article merge proposal. LA @ 15:08, 14 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Comment A cleanup template was added to this article in Janauary 2008 indicating that it has no reliable secondary sources, and none have been added since then. The only sources added to date are trivial and originate from primary sources or publications controlled by Wizards of the Coast, the owners of Dungeons & Dragons. The article itself if riddle with original research and weasel words such as "Lathander favours those who dispel the undead and aid others. He blesses those who plant new life." Overall, this article fails WP:FICT, WP:NOT#PLOT and has in universe problems which make it fail WP:WAF. --Gavin Collins (talk) 13:18, 15 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Keep, no apparent reason to delete. Merge is fine too. Stifle (talk) 13:48, 15 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
comment still nothing but primary sources. Jessi1989 (talk) 16:22, 17 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.