Talk:Characters of 8-Bit Theater/Archive 1

Ultima trivia

I removed the line "Black Mage breifly mentioned the Ultima spell early in the comic" since it seemed stupid. So BM mentioned Ultima. And? Fighter mentioned claymores. Should we mention that? Crimson Shadow 21:51, 3 May 2006 (UTC)

Character alignments

Where did the information for the characters' alignments come from? Is this officially stated, or is it just speculation? --Matthew0028 03:50, 14 August 2005 (UTC)

I think most of them are "speculation", but given that you'd have to be nuts not to consider, say, Black Mage chaotic evil, they might as well be official. --Maru 02:05, 15 August 2005 (UTC)

In that case, I think they should be removed. They are presented in a way that they're implied to be official, rather than speculation. And if they were presented as speculation, they wouldn't really belong in an encyclopedia article (unless the speculation itself has general merit outside the article itself, which I don't believe this has). -- Matthew0028 05:38, 15 August 2005 (UTC)

A compromise: the alignment data provides a concrete example of just how 8T is D&D inspired, and also useful in giving a high level summary of how the character acts, and their personality; so how about we simply replace it with a blurb somewhat like "Black Mage often acts in accordance with the D&D philosophy chaotic evil", which is verifiable, not speculation, and not necessitating official sanction. --Maru 17:56, 15 August 2005 (UTC)

I don't think the alignment data would add anything useful. If people want information on alignments, they can look up the D&D alignment article. Also, I don't think the personalities of the characters were based on alignments any more than any given fictious character is based on an alignment. Adding in this information puts emphasis on something that there is no real evidence was used to create the character in the first place. If you want to note the D&D basis, it belongs more in the intro blurb. --Matthew0028 03:45, 16 August 2005 (UTC)

They can't look up the D&D alignment article if it isn't linked or mentioned; and I couldn't fail to agree with you less about the basis of the characters: look at their freakin' names fer crying out loud! "Black Mage", "Fighter" "White Mage"- do all these sound like carefully thought out, individuated, unique, clever, not-based-on-existing-archetypes characters? --Maru 18:30, 16 August 2005 (UTC)

Oh yes, if you insist on cites, here are a few: "Twinkin out", as nerdy and D&D as it gets, by Red Mage; one early comic wherein it is stated "I am the Fighter"- <sarcasm>real not-based on D&D there, alright</sarcasm>, another wherein Fighter himself states that "I'm a Fighter." (Note the capitalization). But I'm not going to troll through the whole archive, so I'll leave it at that. --Maru 18:40, 16 August 2005 (UTC)

Their names are based on their classes, as shown in the video game. Don't use that as an excuse that they characters in the comic were based on D&D. Yes, Fighter's a Fighter. But that is what he was called in the NES translation of the game.

Yes, the video game is clearly inspired by D&D. But one thing that was not represented in the video game was D&D's notion of an alignment. So claiming that the fact that the characters' names are similar to D&D classes means that the characters' personalities were inspired by D&D alignments is illogical.

To sum up. Character names: directly taken from characters' classes video game. Classes in video game: inspired by D&D classes. Alignments: not present in video game. Conclusion: The fact that the characters in the comic have names similar to D&D character classes does not imply that the characters' personalities are based on their alignments, or that the characters have any official alignments. --Matthew0028 21:31, 16 August 2005 (UTC)

Again, I have no objection to the alignments being mentioned unofficially; I do object to them being removed entirely- they provide considerable relevant data in a convenient package; I defy you to provide a single example of Black Mage not chaotic evil, or White Mage lawful good, or... --Maru 21:44, 16 August 2005 (UTC)

Okay, so I'm thinking the indent, indent, indent format may not be appropriate for something with this many levels of responses, so I reformatted this section of the talk page.

I don't deny that the characters generally fit the D&D alignment system. I just don't feel like using a system that's mostly specific to one RPG system to describe characters in a work that is neither: (a) using that system, or (b) mentioned by those alignments. The alignment system has its flaws: it's not necessarily accurate, and there's not necessarily a one-to-one relationship between behaviors/personalities and alignments. Thus, I don't think that an encyclopedia article about something that doesn't meet my previous two criteria should use D&D alignments to describe character personalities.

Does anybody other than Maru have any opinions on this? Right now, it's just me saying "this is bad, because..." and him saying "this is good, because...". Further input would definitely be useful. --Matthew0028 03:30, 17 August 2005 (UTC)

Well, usually when the indents get ridiculously big, the indents start over again- until they get too big again, at which point they start over again... The problem with no indents or otherwise delineating features is that it hurts the eyes to read. I too welcome our inputting Wiki-Overlords. --Maru 03:47, 17 August 2005 (UTC)

(You wanna see mass indenting, check out Talk:Megatokyo.) Personally, I don't like the alignments simply because it's an arbitrary way of describing the characters. --Nifboy 03:56, 17 August 2005 (UTC)

Well, since I was the one who formatted that page (and truly hideous it was before I started in on it), so I've already seen it; and trust me, Nif, Talk:Megatokyo was a pissant compared to some of the ones I've seen and edited, masses upon piled masses of text, misspelled, its guts spilling all over everywhere, hoary with age and puissance, veritable Great Old Ones of the Depths- I think one page took me a full three hours non-stop editing to cleanup (might have been Talk:Bjørn Lomborg, or maybe Talk:Invisible Pink Unicorn). But you weren't talking to me were you? --Maru 04:16, 17 August 2005 (UTC)

Now I have no idea how to indent this. Anyway, I do not see any real reason to include the alignments. If they were officially divulged I'd feel different, as they'd be additional factoids. Saying that Black Mage is chaotic evil does not inform us of anything not covered by pointing out that he deals only in destruction, is violence-prone, etc. Since the character alignments are simply inferred from the biographical sketch, it seems redundant to include them. Instead, it would be better to include more details about the characters' actual behavior. For example, it is not mentioned that Red Mage often tries to bend the D&D rules through sophistry, such as his attempt to consolidate all thieving skills into "pickpocket". --Jagan

Ugh, the allignments were terrible. Thief Lawful Evil!? What were you thinking? Thief LAWFUL? And he's far too neutral to be Evil. A perfect example of a chaotic neutral character. Red Mage being chaotic neutral makes no sense, as he obsesses over rules. He is Lawful Neutral. Princess Sara isn't really evil, despite the name. She just got so tired of being kidnapped. She's most likely Neutral good. Black Belt is pretty similiar to Fighter in his outlook, so I'd say he's Lawful Good.

- Wetflame(From the Nuklearpower forums)

Thief is Lawful Evil or Lawful Neutral. Look at the alignment page here on Wikipedia. Red Mage I'm not going to argue about, but Sara is evil, period! I'm not sure about Lawful/Neutral/Chaotic, but she's definitly evil!

Um, why was Garland changed to Lawful Evil?

Unless the comic states explicitly what the alignments of each character is then they have no place in this article. Regardless of what the editor who added them thinks, unless he can show a source (i.e. the comic) where these alignments are delineated he is engaging in original research and it has no place on Wikipedia. I suggest all alignments be removed until a source (a link to a specific comic where the character's alignment is explicitly stated) is provided. Kit O'Connell (Todfox) (user / talk / contribs) 09:44, 17 January 2006 (UTC)

True, it's too much speculation for an encyclopedia.--Viridis 11:58, 17 January 2006 (UTC)

As per Wikipedia:No original research I have removed the alignments from this article. They should be added back only if a citation clearly stating a character's alignment can be provided. Kit O'Connell (Todfox) (user / talk / contribs) 20:34, 17 January 2006 (UTC)

"Nutrinal"

FOR GODS SAKE, IT'S SPELT NUTRINAL IN THE COMIC. STOP CHANGING IT. --64.0.112.13 09:00, 14 August 2005 (UTC)

Yeesh. You don't have to yell. Besides, it's the only time I've changed it, so telling me to "stop changing it" seems a bit excessive. --Matthew0028 13:04, 14 August 2005 (UTC)

It's gone back and forth a couple times already, so I can understand anonymous-san's frustration. --Nifboy 16:05, 14 August 2005 (UTC)

I've added [sic] to the quote, to indicate that the misspelling is in the comic, and not the quotation. --Matthew0028 20:40, 14 August 2005 (UTC)

Character names and ages

The article lists Sarda's "full name" as being Sardathusra (a typo of Sardathustra?). The only time this is mentioned is in an episode title "Thus Spoke Sardathustra", a play on words of the book Thus Spoke Zarathustra by Friedrich Nietzsche, a book of sayings by a fictional sage. I believe the comic title is only supposed to be a clever allusion, and the author did not mean to imply that the character's name is actually Sardathustra. --Jagan 05:39, 19 August 2005 (UTC)

Where exactly in the comic are Fighter and BM given Surnames. I am reasonably sure they were part of a joke and not actually real.

I believe about half-way through, during flashbacks. --Maru

Somewhere in the middle, yeah. BM says something along the lines of "Fighter's last name isn't Knight", and Fighter replies with "Duh, it's McWarrior. Yours is Evil Wizardington." Methnor 18:12, 11 December 2005 (UTC)

Well, there's a thread going on on the Nuklear Power forums, 8-Bit Theater section about this little issue. (In case any of you didn't know.) It's | Black Mages Last Name. I'll put up a small notice about the last names.

Honestly, the surnames are clearly one-time jokes. Mr Clevinger himself said so ([1]). If they were regularly used in the comic, fine, but it was once. It does make sense to keep the elven clans though.

Also, who put in ages? I didn't think we had any clues to that, so I removed them. --R. Wolff 13:04, 27 January 2006 (UTC)

Compromise time, methinks. The last names are in the individual paragraphs now, and I put up a notice to explain the situation. I hope this works out okay. --R. Wolff 22:53, 27 January 2006 (UTC)

I think this is relavent to mention here: In the latest comic, Red Mage makes a figurine base for Fighter (of a brandname that slips my mind currently), and where Fighter's name is, it shows his full name, Fighter McWarrior. I personally think the surnames deserve at least some mention.--Vince Skrapits 04:38, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

They surely do now. "Statscowski" is still highly debatable as the author only mentioned that name on the 8-Bit discussion forums and was clearly joking, but then a) he was "clearly joking" when he mentioned Fighter's and Black Mage's last names in the comic and b) he is fond of descriptive nomenclature. We're talking about an individual who named a judge Hangemall Letgodsortthemout in his novel. --R. Wolff 22:59, 5 April 2006 (UTC)

Good God, the spelling in this article is criminal

Can we get cracking on actually making this make sense, please? I'm going to start spellchecking my way through, but there's not a whole lot I can do for some of the grammar issues because I honestly can't tell what some of the sentences are trying to say. Rogue 9 05:38, 17 January 2006 (UTC)

Whatever you do, don't change "nutrinal". --A WikiUser.

Yeah, I know enough about 8-Bit Theater to know about that one. :p Rogue 9 13:18, 23 January 2006 (UTC)

Just making sure. --A WikiUser.

Cleaning up

I went through the entire article and did some editing along the way. Mostly cleaning up, but I did take out a bunch of stuff that seemed to me like nothing but retellings of funny passages. I can understand wanting to share those, but there's a time and a place - I don't think we need entire storylines retold if it's not absolutely necessary for the understanding of a character, and even if, we should keep it brief.

Also, there was a misconception of sorts about my login state. I'm 193.175.236.198 (Cleaning up and shortening where necessary.)

--R. Wolff 19:15, 18 January 2006 (UTC)

~~There still seems to be a lot of irrelevant information, like notes about in what episode did an event in particular occured. I suggest this also is taken out, since it is overdetailing.

--Regulus Tera 19:35, 20 January 2006 (UTC)

Simple citation? (See my most recent edit.) NoDot 03:55, 21 January 2006 (UTC)

If I can keep one thing in here, let it be the characters in each section being listed in order of appearance, specifically Black Belt being listed fourth in section 2.

--jprime 22:50, 20 January 2006 (UTC)

I think they should appear in order of importance, being that Black Belt had more impact to the story than Princess Sara and King Steve.

--Regulus Tera 22:54, 20 January 2006

Agreed. I also went through the article and removed some unnessecary information. I edited some spots for clarity and corrected some grammar mistakes, I hope that helps.

65.33.250.189 19:20, 22 January 2006 (UTC)

Whoever keeps deleting the links I put on Waroween, stop! Are you annoyed that the text is blue? I have the correct episode, and this page has unlimited space, so why not keep it? Its not like I posted one of those stupid episode numbers without a link. In my opinion, that whould be worse...

Character stats

Having just removed alignments from this article, can a regular fan assure me that character stats actually appear in the comic at some point for the characters in this article which include them? Otherwise this is just as bad as the alignment problem. Kit O'Connell (Todfox: user / talk / contribs) 21:57, 18 January 2006 (UTC)

The stats have been removed. The author has publically stated many times that the characters' attributes (such as relative ability, level, etc.) are not set and are only determined by what would be funniest at the moment.Kurosen 00:08, 19 January 2006 (UTC)

Thanks. I am at a loss as to why this particular article seems to attract this sort of thing. Kit O'Connell (Todfox: user / talk / contribs) 09:02, 19 January 2006 (UTC)

The main reason is probably the fact that it's fans who write most of this, not normal Wikipedians. I'm wondering if a Wiki (not open to edits from the general public) on [2] would be a good idea, and most of this could be moved onto it, so the effort here wouldn't have been wasted. NoDot 22:13, 19 January 2006 (UTC)

Two words: overanalyzing and... uh, taking-things-at-face-value-a-lot. But I do like the Wiki-on-the-page-idea. Almost as much as I like hyphens. --R. Wolff 11:35, 20 January 2006 (UTC)

"Overanalyzing"? Please explain. NoDot 03:44, 21 January 2006 (UTC)

... well, okay, mainly taking things at face value. --R. Wolff 15:29, 25 January 2006 (UTC)

I gots your overanalyzing right here. [3] Several people analyze how Fighter isn't talking. That's pretty much what I mean. (Unless, of course, it turns out that does have some significance. Eheh.) --R. Wolff 02:11, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

The Light Warriors VS The Dark Warriors

I am of the opinion that the article has to make the theories on which Dark Warrior relates to each Light Warrior more reliable or remove any reference of it from the article. For example in the section on Drizz'l it says, “Drizz'l is the closest to Thief.” With no argument to support this view. El Cid The Hero 09:40, 26 January 2006

Mind you, the creator himself has stated he intends no such connection. Reason enough to remove it, I guess. --R. Wolff 19:06, 26 January 2006 (UTC)

Wikipedia is not a place for theorizing. --Regulus Tera 01:13, 27 January 2006

Nice job about the puberty thing.

Whoever put in the line about Black Mage having just hit puberty a year ago - good job. I would have dismissed it as another one-time joke, and while it probably is, it explains so much if you think about it. Kudos. --R. Wolff 13:06, 27 January 2006 (UTC)

Not a joke, see episode 653...

Yes, that's where it's from. I know. It's probably a joke anyway (those do appear in the comic, after all), but one that may explain a lot, as I said. So... I guess I don't quite get your point. Please elaborate.

Also it's considered polite to sign your comments. --R. Wolff 13:27, 31 January 2006 (UTC)

What characters to take out?

Let's face it, the article is a complete mess. A lot of the characters that are listed here are completely irrevelant to the plot, like Left Hand Man Gary, Akbar, Jeff or Queen Jane. Who else thinks they should be taken out of the article and make them into a little list of minor characters? Regulus Tera 23:38, 3 February 2006 (UTC)

I'm comfortable with removing or radically shortening the entire "Side Characters" section. Maybe we could make an extra section ("Running gag characters" or something) for Onion Kid, Akbar, the messenger and Hank and the Real Light Warriors? --R. Wolff 21:20, 4 February 2006 (UTC)

I just had a look through the contents. I'd say we could eliminate Jane, Jeff, Vargus, and possibly Gary. All agree with me? NoDot 02:53, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

OK, I just removed The Dark God, Queen Jane, Vargus, and Jeff. None of them, IIRC, have appeared more than once. The Dark God can come back with he appears some more. NoDot 16:28, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

Made the minor character list. Now up to clean it up, since I just copy pasted it. Regulus Tera 01:51, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

Done and done. --R. Wolff 15:52, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

I think that characters that tend to reappear in running gags should stay, namely Akbar and the like. They are not directly relevant to the plotline but certainly relevant to the comic as a whole, which gives enough reason to mention them here. And it's not like the additional 10kb text are going to do much damage, so I vote for keeping 'em.

Whoever did the copy-paste part should REALLY clean up the contents, though. There is a whole lot of incomplete sentences scattered around. When I have the time I'll maybe look into it myself. --TheOtherStephan 03:32, 7 February 2006 (UTC)

Now maybe this is overly picky, but...

It seems to me that, seeing as Blackbelt is confirmed to be now and forever dead, that referring to him in the present tense is incorrect. Basically, turn all the "is"'s into "was"'s. ^_^ —Preceding unsigned comment added by Capgamer (talk • contribs)

Character Images

The images for Thief and R.Mage seem to have been un-uploaded. Did someone remove them?

Also, I suggest possibly supplying links to the characters' first and/or most notable appearances, especially with the minor ones.

--- 208.47.211.5 17:33, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

My mistake. It's White Mage's image that's missing. --- 208.47.211.5 17:35, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

Actually, the images for King Steve, Red Mage, White Mage, and Thief appear to have been deleted by an administrator, namely SCEhardt. I would imagine this is because whoever uploaded them in the first place failed to follow some rule concerning licensing or something. Whoever uploaded the images should find out why they were deleted and correct the problem. DarthVader1219 06:45, 17 March 2006 (UTC)

White Mage's attacks

I believe that the lightning behind White Mage in one of the panels was for dramatic effect (showing her anger), not an actual attack by her toward Black Mage.

Swordopolis

Is the information on how Swordopolis, er, "posesses" someone correct? It seems entirely too scatological to not be vandalism. --maru (talk) contribs 07:24, 14 March 2006 (UTC)

I'm afraid the comic seems to imply it, and it's certainly not outside the range of 8-Bit Theater. Feezo (Talk) 09:41, 14 March 2006 (UTC)

It's certainly correct, but I'm not sure if it merits mentioning in the article, seeing as that was the only time it happened (wasn't it?) --R. Wolff 10:11, 14 March 2006 (UTC)

I was the one who added that particular bit about his "possessing", and certainly did not mean it as vandalism. The comic (and Swordopolis's own comment) seems to heavily imply it, and I chose to add it simply to comment on it being one of his apparent abilities. I've now added a link to the comic in question to keep people from thinking it's just vandalism on my part.70.70.210.215 04:04, 2 June 2006 (UTC)

Monster List

I honestly admire how well the section is written, but is it really necessary to include descriptions that exact? I don't think very many of those encounters had much impact on the story, at least not on the same level as, say, the Fiends. At most, the random encounters (which would make a smashing title for the section) should get as much space as the side characters such as Vargus. --R. Wolff 22:05, 14 March 2006 (UTC)

It looks like the section in question has been taken out and replaced since this was posted. Even with the new title, it should probably be removed. This article is huge (74 KB) and taking this out would bring it down by about 9 KB. The giants could be salvaged into the minor characters section, but the rest of it just looks like one time gags. Feezo (Talk) 05:46, 19 April 2006 (UTC)

I've taken out the section entirely. The article is now 49KB, which is still larger than it should be. - Kalarchis 20:13, 13 May 2006 (UTC)

He is the Red Mage!

"The most important factor in Red Mage's plans working, it seems, is how "down on their luck" the party is; it's been noticed that while a random battle gives the party all kinds of trouble ([4] and following), the party can blow through bad situations with relative ease. Both Lich and Kary took fewer comics to defeat than the recent Green Monster and this is mostly due to the fact that the characters "goof off" during random battles. For a major fight, however, the characters seem to "shape up"; whereas Red Mage keeps trying to convince Thief to do a "Ninja Blade" in the background during the fight with the Green Monster and Thief actually *threw* Black Mage at the Green Monster to start the fight, the entire team pulls together to defeat a more dangerous foe (usually a fiend). Likewise, when captured by the Eye, the party wasted no time in slaying the cultists who'd stuck them there upon escaping their prison (or the Eye, though this occurred off-comic).

This factor is nowhere more true than it is for Red Mage. Essentially, Red Mage's plans will work when they need too; otherwise, the party is out of luck. Besides his successful battle strategies against Lich and Kary, Red Mage also came up with the plan to slay Vilbert when he proved unkillable with normal weapons (and, coincidentally, he's the one who initially dropped the Armoire of Invincibility on Vilbert's head). This was because Vilbert was "tougher" than normal; Black Mage's stabs had no effect on him. It could be argued that Red Mage's strategies only ever work on "bosses"- Vilbert, as a future Dark Warrior, could well have been considered a boss (and this also fits in with a FF1 reference; Lich's dungeon, the Earth Cave, has a vampire as a midboss. Facing Vilbert von Vampire before fighting Lich could count as a reference.)

Another idea is how much more powerful the fiends are. While there is generally some safe path out or some stronger force that can save them when fighting random encounters or the Dark Warriors, there isn't anything like that when fighting a fiend. As such, they have to work harder, since they are now in a life-or-death secnario."

Too close to original research for comfort. --R. Wolff 20:33, 16 April 2006 (UTC)

Eh, sorry for being gruff, but it does strike me as too interpretational for an encyclopedia article, and too in-depth descriptive. It is well observed, though. --R. Wolff 18:24, 26 April 2006 (UTC)

Trimming

I removed Minor Characters and the cultists since none of them had a particularly large part to play in the story. Random Encounters are already gone, I notice, and rightly so. I think there's still more that could be trimmed, though, especially in the descriptions of the main characters once they're back in this article (which, I suppose, will happen soon), and just maybe we can at some point scrap this article entirely and use it to enlarge the actual article on 8-Bit Theater. Let's face it, the comic doesn't have a particularly large number of significant characters, and an extra article to list and at length write about every single character seems, frankly, fanboyish.

Thoughts? --R. Wolff 11:28, 14 May 2006 (UTC)

Fancruft is an ever-present problem, but I don't think it's a reason to scrap the article. If the character biographies are cleaned up a bit, and some standards set for inclusion of minor characters, (multiple appearances, not one time jokes) I think it could be a fairly encyclopedic article. Feezo (Talk) 13:33, 14 May 2006 (UTC)

It's not that I want it gone, I just think if we can include its contents in the main article to improve that, we should. That article is a bit on the slim side anyway. --R. Wolff 13:59, 14 May 2006 (UTC)

Put them back! Everything you took out, I want them back! I didn't work hard on some of those entries just so you could cut them out! jprime

I worked hard on some of those entries myself. I realized, though, that in the end none of them is absolutely necessary to understand what the comic is about. If people want to know every little joke and every character, they should go and read the comic.

By the way, I'd appreciate if you didn't try and boss a fellow editor around. Thanks. --R. Wolff 13:59, 14 May 2006 (UTC)

Sorry. It's just that I really liked it the way it was before. jprime

As it stands, I don't see any reason to scrap the article. I removed the sections on Dr. Malpractice and King Astos. Personally, I think they're minor characters, and without them the "Friends," section makes more sense. That knocked the page down to 40KB, which is better. Hopefully, Clevinger won't introduce any more significant characters besides the two upcoming Fiends. - Kalarchis 21:15, 14 May 2006 (UTC)

The exact wording of the name that section prior to the deletion of Doctor Malpractice, Clan Sahn'Ta, Chancellor Usurper, Clan Sahn'Ta, AKA King Astos, Clan of the Dark Elves and The Cultists was as follows: Friends, enemies and those they have met. As I type this, (Evil) Princess Sara remains. Don't tell me you couldn't go to the trouble of reading an entire one-line section title. jprime

I'm quite aware of what the full name of that section was. However, to include enemies and have Doctor Malpractice and King Astos as the only ones that were covered seemed a little non-sensical. All of the major enemies are covered elsewhere in the article, and I really wouldn't consider Sara an enemy. If you can think of a better place for her in the article, have at it. Or, if you would like, we could rename that section to better include her. - Kalarchis 02:40, 15 May 2006 (UTC)

No, leave those things the way they are. Also, you left out The Cultists. jprime

Actually, the Cultists weren't in that section when I got to it. Looking at the history, it would appear that they were taken out just prior to my edits. Back to trimming, I'm wondering whether or not the Dwarves can be considered running gag characters. Should we put them in, or should we wait and see if they show up again in the story? - Kalarchis 18:24, 15 May 2006 (UTC)

Alright, I did some work, and managed to trim down the article considerably. It's under 30KB now, and is still long, but is a lot more concise. - Kalarchis 20:30, 17 May 2006 (UTC)

Excellent work. --R. Wolff 09:48, 18 May 2006 (UTC)

My apologies on the revert - I think I jumped the gun because the first thing I saw on User talk:R. Wolff was a warning about protections and speedydeletes... Can I recommend moving the wikified minor character data here to the talk page somewhere so it is still available without digging thru diffs but yet not encyclopedic enough to keep in the main article? -- RevRagnarok ^{Talk Contrib Reverts} 15:15, 2 June 2006 (UTC)

Merger of the four main character articles

I have merged together the articles for the four main characters into the new article Light Warriors (8-Bit Theater). I did this in response to the discussions that took place in Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Fighter McWarrior. However, as I am not terribly familiar with the comic, I did not make an attempt to trim the four articles before putting them together. As you can imagine, it's kind of flabby, though not so bad as some of our other "Characters of..." type webcomic articles. –Abe Dashiell ^(t/c) 21:27, 18 May 2006 (UTC)

Guideline (Please read before editing the article)

This is getting ridiculous now. To anyone looking to edit this article: Do not throw in new information based on the current comic. Three times today people have thrown in a quip about White Mage because today's comic (697). These are not meant to be character biographies, so please do not add information/speculation every time a new comic comes out (I know it seems weird to some of you, but people are doing it.) This applies especially to comics that leave you with a cliffhanger. Please wait a few comics and determine if the information is important enough to add to the article. Thank you. - Kalarchis 01:00, 19 May 2006 (UTC)

Also, information from guest comics is generally considered non-canon unless explicitly stated, much like fan fiction isn't canon. And no, if the guest comic appears on the front page, it doesn't count because all guest comics do. --R. Wolff 07:36, 28 May 2006 (UTC)

Also also, we took out all that clutter for a reason. Please don't reinstate it. Thanks. --R. Wolff 11:53, 30 May 2006 (UTC)

Onion Kid?

I was curious to know where the name "Onion Kid" came from. Also, I noticed in episode 700.1([5]), in the "Foster Parent Slayer" article, he's given a name, Rex Crockett. 151.204.67.177 18:42, 27 June 2006 (UTC)

This[[6]] explains his name, and the episode you're referring to is a guest comic, so it's non-canonical. Thank you for discussing it here, though. Most people just go in and blindly edit the article. - Kalarchis 19:39, 27 June 2006 (UTC)

Turns out Mr. Clevinger actually does consider that comic canon: http://forum.nuklearpower.com/showthread.php?p=464708#post464708 . I opt for leaving the info in on that grounds. (Mind you, it's only now that this is actually confirmed that we can include the information.) --R. Wolff 20:28, 11 January 2007 (UTC)

Question for 24.141.123.37

Seeing as there's a minor edit war going on, I'd like to know what prompts you to insert those commas into the first sentence over and over again. They don't belong in there, you know. If you set something in commas, you have to be able to take it out - but then the sentence would read "The events in the webcomic center around four major characters," and the reader doesn't know yet what webcomic this is about. No well-written Wikipedia article starts off like that and relies on the reader to infer the topic from the article's title. They all repeat it in the first sentence

I'd like to ask you to cite arguments for your commas or stop inserting them. --R. Wolff 19:21, 8 July 2006 (UTC)

It was at the beginning of this year that I gained punctual enlightenment. I don't know if you noticed, but since I started editing that article, there has been perfect sentence structure all throughout it. I've also been sending grammar, spelling and punctuation errors to Brian Clevinger with his consent, though he has yet to use them. Here are two examples of proper sentence structure:

Accountant John Smith/The accountant, John Smith

Though it didn't used to before this year, it now bothers me to see improper sentence structure in many things I read. If I can do something about it, I should be able to without having worry about someone making it improper again. Please let me put those commas there. It just seems so right to me. --jprime 13:54, 9 July 2006

If you believe you have achieved punctual enlightenment, then you need to talk to your punctual buddha. The commas are incorrect. See WP:MOS for more. — RevRagnarok ^{Talk Contrib Reverts} 18:49, 9 July 2006 (UTC)

Jprime, allow me to expand a little on R. Wolff's explanation. I can fully understand why you feel those commas should be in there, and you would be correct if the sentence had the right context. By adding the commas, you are making the name of the webcomic something of a side note in the sentence. The 'the webcomic' in the sentence no longer refers to '8-Bit Theater', but instead to something outside of the sentence entirely. This would be fine if there was a preceeding sentence that introduced the webcomic without naming it. But there isn't, so the 'the webcomic' is refering to nothing, and '8-Bit Theater' is completely unsupported.

But, without commas, the sentence makes perfect sense. 'The webcomic' is suddenly reffering to '8-Bit Theater', which is now the subject of the sentence instead of a side note. Do you understand? - Kalarchis 21:49, 9 July 2006 (UTC)

Yes, I understand. I'm going to try to go back to reading things the way they're written, even if I can't do anything about it. It won't be easy, though. --jprime 19:24, 9 July 2006

I couldn't find any basis for your capitalization of the first letter after an apostrophe, so I reverted that and changed the spelling of "Drizz'l" while I was at it. I've never seen this style used anywhere, to be honest, but if I'm mistaken, tell me and we will speak of it no more. :p (The Wikipedia Manual of Style, incidentally, doesn't mention it. Also, pity we can't use the comics for reference.) --R. Wolff 21:00, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

comment from an 8-bit fan

The following comment was added to the article. I've moved it here. Michael Slone (talk) 17:39, 26 August 2006 (UTC)

(just a comment from an 8-bit fan: black mage is possibly the 2nd smartest and i like black mage the best but when he gets that stupid outfit i feel sorry for him) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.169.237.190 (talk • contribs)

Project Fate

The line about White Mage being "a member of Project fate" seemed somehow fishy to me, so I went and asked the author. He said: "I don't remember doing anything like "Project Fate", especially since I'd have a colon in that phrase if I had done it." So I changed it. I also remember reading a comic where it said "protect fate," and I guess someone just misread that (I did, too, initially). If someone does find a source that says "Project Fate," feel free to change it back. --R. Wolff 07:15, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

The Cultists

Um, I'm not entirely sure that the cultists fit into the "Friends and those they have met" section. Actually, they don't seem to fit into any section here. Perhaps we could create a new section entitled "Minor Enemies." Along with the cultists, the section could include Astos and Doctor Malpractice (as one sub-section; they contributed to the overall plot), and Bone Dragon and the Ordeals (also as one sub-section; they, particularly Bone Dragon, were important enough to be considered minor bosses).

Also to add to the cultists:

• The names of the cultists are pronounced as common female names (Mrr'grt, L'zhle, Suz'hanne). Related to that, the name of the head cultist should at least be mentioned (Mrr'grt).
• Several things relating to their cult will drive people mad (The name of the cult, texts regarding Ur, their formula for the end of the world)
• Despite looking exactly the same, the Cultists are able to recognize each other and tell each other apart. You Can't See Me! 23:09, 30 September 2006 (UTC)

Maybe we should simply rename the section, because we used to have one about minor enemies that contained the exact same information, and that didn't work out too well for the article as a whole. Check section 17 ("Trimming") on this talk page to see the discussion from back then. --R. Wolff 07:50, 1 October 2006 (UTC)

Sorry. I didn't skim through that previously. I just saw the cultists under a section with "Friends" in the title and immediately thought that they didn't belong.Rather than continuing the debate there, I'll just state my reasons here:

As with most television, literature, movie, or comic series, 8-Bit Theater has gone through several arcs. And all arcs in an action-oriented series require a boss at the end. Astos was the final boss of the Matoya's Eye saga. The Cultists were the final bosses of the Frozen Bowels of the Earth arc and appeared again in the current arc. The Zombie Dragon was the final boss of the Class Change arc. The Ordeals also deserve mention, as they were each character's sub-boss. Dr. Malpractice, though not a major opponent, was the sole reason that Thief left Elfland, and thus deserves mention for plot relevence. I feel that this warrants mention on the Characters pages.

Not to mention, the article still remains under 30kb with the info we have on the page now. Most of the extra kb came from the Light Warriors, which have since moved to another page.
You Can't See Me! 18:56, 1 October 2006 (UTC)

Those are good arguments, and you're right - the Cultists are anything but friends. (Then again, so's Sarda, if you think about it.) Well, these writeups are significantly better than the ones we had previously (good job!), and as long as they stay at about that length, I don't have any problems with them. Maybe we could merge Malpractice and Astos though, as the description of one doesn't go well separated from the other. --R. Wolff 12:05, 2 October 2006 (UTC)

You mean something like this?:

===Chancellor Usurper, Clan Sahn'Ta, AKA King Astos, Clan of the Dark Elves, and Dr. Malpractice===

Astos is a boss in the first Final Fantasy game, and the father of Drizz'L. He had originally planned to ovethrow the Khee'bler Clan to make way for the Sahn'ta elves; eventually, he decided to betray the Sahn'ta clan, as well, plunging Elfland into a civil war and eventually destroying it. In order to take the throne, he used the alias "Chancellor Usurper" to get close to the king and Prince Thief.
Doctor Malpractice was the doctor consulted by King Astos to dispatch of Clan Khee'bler, starting with its king. However, upon discovering his father's "illness," Prince Thief told Dr. Malpractice that he would go around the world, stealing treasures and sending them to the doctor to fund research on the disease. The doctor, taking the opportunity to get easy money, agreed; however, he told Chancellor Usurper that he had poisoned the prince to continue receiving money for that job as well. His plan went to waste when Thief returned. Dr. Malpractice was last seen running as far away as he could get from both parties that he betrayed.

In a stroke of luck, Thief and the Light Warriors accidentally walked in on Astos as he was dictating his plot to himself. In a last attempt to dispatch of the Light Warriors, King Astos sent ninja to assassinate them in their sleep. However, Thief predicted that he would attempt this and prepared his team. The next day, the Light Warriors confronted Astos for the final time. They never got around to an epic battle, however, as Astos was killed by a bad pun from Black Mage.

You Can't See Me! 03:53, 3 October 2006 (UTC)

I mean exactly like this. Inserting it right away. --R. Wolff 08:29, 3 October 2006 (UTC)

I gave Dr. Malpractice top billing because he appeared first, if only his voice. When he and Astos were physically introduced, Malpractice was the first to speak in that panel, so he'd have to get top billing in either case. --jprime 15:49, 3 October 2006

Megahedron

I've been thinking about Megahedron. Aren't we, by choosing to include him in this article, technically speculating on his reappearance? At the moment he's appeared once, and I think we're giving him more credit than he deserves, all hints by Brian Clevinger notwithstanding. I move we take his entry out of the article for now. He might just be a one-time joke, and we can store the text here and still include him once it's clear he's a recurring character. --R. Wolff 08:49, 4 October 2006 (UTC)

I agree. Even within the context of the comic, it's pointed out that he may not be a diety on the level of Swordopopolis, Raven, and "Darko," but rather a hallucination. You Can't See Me! 23:09, 4 October 2006 (UTC)

Megahedron

File:Megahedron.JPG

Megahedron.

Megahedron, who resembles a 20-sided die with aviator sunglasses, appeared only once as Red Mage's patron deity. Red Mage, however, claims he is nothing more than a result of his "three-point hallucination flaw" (a reference to a series of RPGs stemming from a rule set by White Wolf) and it is currently unclear whether or not Megahedron will make another appearance and if he does, in fact, exist outside of Red Mage's mind.

- stored here until his role becomes clear. --R. Wolff 17:23, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

Fancruft

I've added a comment to the top of this article asking new users to read Wikipedia's policies and guidelines. I think this will help protect from the speculation and overanalysis that articles about web-based media attract — this article in particular, since Wikipedia is fairly well known at the 8-bit Theater forums. If anyone has other ideas, or suggestions about the wording, please let me know. Feezo (Talk) 23:42, 8 October 2006 (UTC)

My grammar fixes

Hey, could a native speaker look over this edit of mine [7] and tell me if those commas do or don't belong? I'm fairly sure they don't, but they get reinstated a lot and who knows. --R. Wolff 21:14, 30 October 2006 (UTC)

Speculation

I don't think this article should attempt to predict the fate of Red Mage. Although the cited comic strongly suggests RM was killed in an extremely painful way, there are plenty of ways for the author to avoid his actual death. So I've removed "and killed" from "engulfed and killed" in the section on Ur, since we have direct evidence for the engulfing but not for the killing. Michael Slone (talk) 06:15, 1 November 2006 (UTC)

My attempt to define speculation:

Everything that hasn't been explicitly stated or shown in the comic.

For example, we don't know yet if the second entity inside Ur is Kraken, or Red Mage turned Kraken, or what. We can interpret the situation, and it's also really obvious what's up, but interpreting is not wikipedia's task. Please stick to the facts. (Like this will actually reach the people I'm addressing. Who am I kidding.) --R. Wolff 20:13, 5 November 2006 (UTC)

Today's episode confirms that the original tentacled mass was a way to transport Kraken/Ur (Brian referred to the fiend as Kraken/Ur) across realities so that "his full glory doesn't destroy them before payment". However, we still do not know if Kraken is just the new humanoid fiend, and if Ur was just the original tentacled mess. Also, I don't think Fighter and Black Mage damaging it caused the tentacle thingy to collapse but instead was Kraken/Ur breaking out. --Jopasopa 02:48, 8 November 2006 (UTC)

Kraken, Ur, or what?

"The thing that the Light Warriors fought was a shard of an ancient and terrible entity. These things have many names. Kraken works as well as Ur." [8] Words of the author himself. I made it Kraken for now as that was its name in the game, but I'm not opposed to changes within reason. --R. Wolff 21:47, 9 November 2006 (UTC)

The Dwarves

Besides Berserker, none of the Dwarven Kingdom is here (unless I'm blind). I feel that they deserve a little description under either "Friends and those they have met" or "Running gag characters" since it seems to be a running gag that, much like Onion Kid and the Real Light Warriors, Dwarf Land is always getting hindered by the antics of the Light Warriors (usually Black Mage). However, I do realize that these pages are dwarfing (no pun intended) the main 8BT article in content. --Jopasopa 02:34, 2 December 2006 (UTC)

Notability Message

Normally I wouldn't take notice, but it appears as though the Notability message was added by a bot. So, what should be done?

8-Bit Theater's characters are... well, not very notable on their own. But, there are quite a lot of them (enough so that they will not fit on the main 8-Bit Theater page), and they are notable in the context of the series.

Is there anything that we can do to make it more notable to the bots? Sorry; despite having an account for more than a few months, I'm still an infrequent editor and therefore know little about how things work. You Can't See Me! 04:02, 3 December 2006 (UTC)

Alaibot just changed the date tag. Simonkoldyk put the original notice up. Feezo (Talk) 04:52, 3 December 2006 (UTC)

The tag has been up for about two weeks now. Is anyone contesting it? Feezo (Talk) 20:10, 8 December 2006 (UTC)

It doesn't seem as though anybody minds it. Take it down? You Can't See Me! 23:36, 9 December 2006 (UTC)

I'm removing the tag. Other web comics, such as Penny arcade have lists of their characters on separate pages, so it doesn't seem unreasonable that this one should as well. If the person who put the notice the notice there in the first place would like to contest this, than please do so, but I would appreciate it if you would justify the tag on the talk page instead of just placing it there devoid of substantiation. --DarthVader1219 07:05, 27 December 2006 (UTC)

The existence of articles which may (or may not) merit inclusion doesn't normally affect whether similar articles should be kept, unless a precedent was established in a previous deletion debate.Feezo (Talk) 07:56, 27 December 2006 (UTC)

Akbar

According to the article the character Akbar is a reference to a Matt Groening character. However, I always took the reference to be to Admiral Akbar, as in, the character Akbar sells shoddy products, and people should realize that "It's a trap". Does anyone have a reference, such as statements by Brian Clevinger, as to exactly where the name came from?

Sdr 14:07, 15 December 2006 (UTC)

Actually, yes: http://forum.nuklearpower.com/showthread.php?p=239510&highlight=Akbar#post239510 Thanks for asking, though - that bit of information would probably have qualified as speculation without Clevinger backing it up, and I couldn't remember whether he had or not. --R. Wolff 14:33, 16 December 2006 (UTC)

Awesome, thanks for checking. Sdr 15:51, 5 February 2007 (UTC)

Overhaul

I gave this article a makeover. I did put some thought into it, especially the headlines - I don't think every single character has to have his own linked-at-the-top heading and have put some groups (the Dark Warriors, the other Warriors) under one heading. I organized it like this:

• 1. The Light Warriors Should be self-explanatory.
• 2. Other main characters Characters who have in some way furthered the plot and are more or less friendly towards the Light Warriors. Mainly as in "they haven't, as such, fought."
• 3. Major enemies As it says. Somehow most of these seem to be based on game characters.
• 4. Minor characters Now this is important. These are all the characters who either have appeared only one or two times, who haven't had much plot significance or whose plot significance is still unclear. If, say, the Dark God becomes a major enemy later in the comic, we can still move him up to the appropriate section.

As always, criticism is welcome. The formatting isn't perfect, but I'm sure we'll sort it out in no time. Oh, and we need some new pictures - the Dark and Other Warriors probably should have group shots. --R. Wolff 20:02, 19 December 2006 (UTC)

Addendum: I specifically put the running gag characters under one heading so the list at the top wouldn't get overly long. They are extremely insignificant to the plot (being, well, nothing but running gag characters) and, as such, don't merit their own section (if it was up to me entirely, I'd have removed them altogether months ago). Hardly anyone will want to look for, say, the messenger specifically as much as, say again, King Steve. --R. Wolff 12:02, 2 January 2007 (UTC)

But the cast of characters in this comic isn't altogether very large, and the running gag characters are an essential part of the humor in it, if not the actual plot. Removing them altogether would be an unfair move as such. SamSandy 09:31, 6 April 2007 (UTC)