Terraria Wiki talk:Style guide

Trivia Guide
I think we should try to cut down on the amount of postulated pop-culture references on the wiki by having a more thorough description of what constitutes suitable trivia as part of this style guide. I'd write it up myself but I'm not sure I'm in a position to make assertions of that magnitude, so I'm just proposing it. Gearzein (talk) 22:59, 30 October 2014 (UTC)


 * I was thinking about that too, I'm just not sure how to codify it, or it even can be. "Cutting down" is a subjective thing. We can certainly see which items tend to be stepping over the line but I'm not sure if there's any rule we could write that would define the boundary. I'm open to suggestions though.  Equazcion ( talk ) 23:01, 30 Oct 2014 (UTC)


 * Okay. A couple of guidelines I think are worth expounding on:
 * Be sure to read the page before editing. Editors frequently add tips and trivia that are actually explained in the first paragraph of the page.
 * Trivia should be points that are not immediately obvious and are interesting beyond a purely gameplay-oriented point of view. Points like Gold being super malleable and not suitable for weapons and armor, or explaining who George is, are good examples. Many things posted as trivia and not immediately reverted could still be just as easily classified as tips or bugs. If trivia seems far too obvious (e.g "Boreal Wood is wood from a Boreal Forest") it's probably not worth mentioning.
 * Trivia should not be speculation or untested research on item functions. If something is legitimately found to have interesting properties that are both provable and able to be replicated then they're better off as tips. (Untested phenomena may be anomalies or even bugs, but look into them a bit first, lest they turn out to be unrelated phenomena. For example, bosses spawn of their own accord sometimes, and it's easy to miss the warnings. Just because you threw a potion before it came into the world doesn't mean throwing that potion causes it to appear.)
 * Before adding trivia stating an item to be a reference to another piece of media, google it a bit to be sure that a) Terraria didn't come first and b) that media isn't referencing an older literary idea. A good example is the Broken Hero Sword- while it's commonly said to be a reference to any number of video games, most of those games in turn draw from knightly imagery dating back to the first swords ever forged.
 * Most pop-culture references in Terraria are plainly laid out, as with the several vanity sets that directly mimic the appearance of trademarked characters, so be certain when making large leaps in logic to justify a mention. A good rule of thumb: If you consider using the phrase "might be a reference", it's probably not. Re-Logic probably has no idea who Minamitsu Murasa is, so it's unlikely that they're the inspiration for the Anchor dropped during the pirate invasion, which actually is part of a public cross-promotion with Pixel Piracy. Which leads to the final point-
 * If at all possible, source your references. Some things like the Dye Trader having lines that reference Anchorman seem really farfetched, but have been confirmed by the team at Re-Logic. The word of the devs trumps anything else, so if they've outright said that something in the game is meant to reference something else then that's that.
 * That's all I've got for now. Really, I think most infringing cases (like almost everything said to be a reference to League of Legends) are clear-cut enough to not require a hard adherence to a set of rules, but general guidelines for newer users could be good nonetheless. Gearzein (talk) 00:09, 31 October 2014 (UTC)


 * Thanks! I added some of this, albeit pruned down and edited to be a little more concise. Pages like these tend to be ignored unless they're very very easy to read so I distilled down to the essential points. Hopefully it will help. I may add a link to this guide in the wiki's sidebar soon.  Equazcion ( talk ) 01:11, 31 Oct 2014 (UTC)

Standard sections
Where should "References" be placed? Before, or after "History"? Ferretwings (talk) 01:33, 9 November 2015 (UTC)


 * After "History", because that section might contain &lt;ref&gt; tags, too. --Rye Greenwood (talk) 21:54, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

Capitalization
Item names are to be always capitalized, and it seems monster names too. What about groups of items or mobs? Should I put critters or Critters? Similarly, statues or Statues? I have seen both capitalized and uncapitalized versions on the wiki. HnZ88 (talk) 06:09, 16 December 2017 (UTC)


 * The titles of the objects should all be capitalized no matter if it is in the middle of the sentence or not. Terrariahelper2726 (talk) 00:50, 22 August 2018 (UTC)


 * As described in a more recent addition to the style guide, groups of items (or enemies, objects, etc.) should be lower-cased. --Rye Greenwood (talk) 21:54, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

Text Color
How do you change the color of text? For example if I wanted to turn the word "fire" to red instead of black how would I do that? Terrariahelper2726 (talk) 16:29, 30 August 2018 (UTC)


 * You can use HTML tags in Wikicode, so to re-color a word you could wrap it in  tags and set a   attribute changing the font color, using a RGB, HEX, (HSL, RGBA, HSLA) color code or a predefined HTML color name.


 * Example:
 * Result: The four elements include fire, water , air , and earth.
 * Reference: The "span" tag, the "style" attribute, colors. --Rye greenwood (talk) 17:31, 30 August 2018 (UTC)
 * That said... please don't do that in main text without a really good reason, random changes in text color can seriously hurt readability. Color-coding tables and the like is sometimes useful, but still warrants care and restraint. --MentalMouse42 (talk) 04:19, 17 June 2020 (UTC)

Version pages
Is there a set layout for the headings and sections of version pages? They seem a bit random, with stuff like Crafting and Tweaks as h2 headings. Additions, Changes and Fixes with specific subheadings would work. Nixinova (talk) 01:17, 17 May 2020 (UTC)


 * They are indeed rather random, because they are usually just copied from the official changelogs that Re-Logic publishes. That being said, standardization efforts are always appreciated! --Rye Greenwood (talk) 21:54, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

Capitalization of headers
Headers seem quite inconsistent on this wiki; should they be in Title Case or Sentence case? Nixinova (talk) 06:05, 24 May 2020 (UTC)


 * Sentence case for sure. I have added that, thank you. --Rye Greenwood (talk) 21:54, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

Tone, second-person, bugaboos
There are a few aspects of wiki style which mostly are being followed by editors here, especially the more experienced ones, but which are not actually mentioned in the style guide. It might be worthwhile to actually put them into the guide. I will summarize some here: --MentalMouse42 (talk) 11:17, 12 June 2020 (UTC)
 * Neutral tone: Do not include personal opinions, statements like "this is the best weapon" should not appear unless they are obviously justifiable by game considerations (damage/speed values, etc).  Likewise for comments about beauty/uglyness of sprites and such.
 * Do not use second-person writing (addressing the player as "you") in main pages. However, second-person is acceptable in Guides (tutorials) and perhaps in Tips sections, depending on the page's overall style.
 * While the second-person rule may require some use of passive voice (such as "should be avoided"), don't overuse it.
 * In that vein, avoid phrases like "it is recommended...". By who?  Why?  If a statement such as "a wise player will" or "players should..." is warranted, then use it, and even so it's better to specify the purpose of doing such-and-such.

Another Bugaboo: Excessive images/icons. Not every reference to something needs to be a full-featured item template rather than a text link. Icon clutter can easily get out of hand, and the larger images (especially for the NPCs) mess with line spacing. (It would be nice to have a separate "npclink" template that inserts their map-icon headshot instead of their full-figure image.) --MentalMouse42 (talk) 23:58, 13 June 2020 (UTC)