RuneScape:Requests for merging/Santa Claus

Santa Claus
He is revealed to be Santa in the end of the event and I think we shouldn't have multiple NPC article like with Father Christmas, Hooded Stranger and Santa Claus (they now merged) and I don't think it is an expection.

Merge - As nominator Zoli Ben

Oppose - Serves different purpose than the previous ones. I'm assuming this is about Thorvar Crittersmash and Santa Claus right? 05:52, December 21, 2010 (UTC)

Merge - Santa serves a different purpose every year, but the article has plenty of room for all his incarnations without becoming a mess. Also, according to RS:G "NPCs who are confirmed to be the same person should be merged" and Thorvar Crittersmash is confirmed to be Santa. However, if someone manages to dig up enough verifiable information about Thorvar that it doesn't fit neatly in the article on Santa, I think RS:UCS would override RS:G, like it does for Amascut and Sumona. Unless such information is found and added, however, I'm all for merging. -- 06:58, December 21, 2010 (UTC)

Merge Per MarkGyver -- 08:52, December 21, 2010 (UTC)

Oppose - They are different NPCs. While RS:G says things confirmed to be the same person should be merged, people will not be looking for Santa Claus when they search for Thorvar Crittersmash. They just won't. I think a note saying that this NPC is Santa is more than enough. 09:51, December 21, 2010 (UTC)

Merge - Thorvar Crittersmash is Santa. He admits it at the end of the quest, and people searching for Thorvar Crittersmash will be looking for Santa Claus, they will just be after him as he appears in the 2010 Christmas event. Its pretty easy to redirect to Santa Claus. Manga Maniac 10:43, December 21, 2010 (UTC)
 * I don't think anyone is debating that he is Santa Claus. But I disagree that people, at least now, will be looking for Santa Claus when they search for Thorvar. Yes, we could do anchor redirects, but that's useless when the NPC has enough information to have its own article. 11:02, December 21, 2010 (UTC)

Strong oppose - Read RS:G.
 * Does item A have the same purpose/use as item B?
 * No, this is a different year and different NPC.


 * Can item A be substituted with item B?
 * No, as this NPC has different dialogue, different graphics and a different name to Santa.

Just add a note to the article like Cook said. That will have the same effect. 10:49, December 21, 2010 (UTC)
 * Does item A have the same purpose/use at item B?
 * Yes, comes at a Christmas event and plays a crucial part to the event.
 * Can item A be substituted with item B?
 * Considering how he admits he is Santa at the end, I believe that they could've have just left the name Santa Claus as the name and had him pretending not to be him. So, yes.
 * That, of course, is my opinion. Manga Maniac 10:56, December 21, 2010 (UTC)
 * Could have, but didn't. They're different NPCs, and every NPC deserves its own article. Thorvar Crittersmash is a different name to Santa, and serves a different purpose to Santa. You really need more than that? 11:10, December 21, 2010 (UTC)
 * They're not different NPCs, Thorvar admits he is Santa at the end of the event, and thus "NPCs who are confirmed to be the same person should be merged." Manga Maniac 11:32, December 21, 2010 (UTC)
 * They are the same character, but not the same NPC. Just because the policy says so, doesn't mean you have to follow it. 11:41, December 21, 2010 (UTC)
 * You are confusing NPC with identity. Thorvar looks different, has a different examine, has a different name, says different things, and is in a different place. He's a different NPC. His identity is (likely) Santa, but he is a different person for the intent of the page. 11:45, December 21, 2010 (UTC)
 * Is identity isn't (likely), he is Santa. He admits it. If Thorvar is split off, then Hooded stranger should be split off as well, shouldn't it? Also, technically an "NPC" is a "Non-playable character" so if you're the same character, you'd be the same NPC, but I get what you mean. Manga Maniac 11:49, December 21, 2010 (UTC)
 * I'm surprised that Hooded stranger isn't an article, actually. PS: I have no idea what you meant at the end there. 11:58, December 21, 2010 (UTC)
 * I'd love to admit I had a point at the end, but I was just pointing out the faults with anagrams and divergent meanings. Which is totally irrelevant. Anyway, it was decided that the Hooded stranger be merged into Santa Claus because they were same person. Manga Maniac 12:02, December 21, 2010 (UTC)
 * I think of a different NPC as being a different object in the game. And I don't think there's anything wrong with splitting to Hooded stranger.  We don't even have an image for him (and if we did, there would not be a place for it on the page because we have the equivalent of a small stub on him.

Merge - He admits that he is Santa, (although his examine text may not) so basically it proves he is the same guy as Father Christmas and all that. So there's no point of having a different page about the same guy under a different name. (And a different hat.) 12:43, December 21, 2010 (UTC)
 * Again, no one is disputing that he is Santa.  19:41, December 21, 2010 (UTC)

Oppose - I can see how this could be argued either way, but I think that they should be kept separate since a reader looking for Thorvar Crittersmash is likely only looking for the information for this specific NPC in the 2010 event. Furthermore, he only reveals himself to be Santa at the end of the event, so throughout the event effectively operates as a separate character. I think I'm right in saying that he also doesn't give any specific references to his appearance as santa/events in previous years (may be wrong on that). As for Hooded stranger, the problem with that is that we didn't particularly have any information about him on the wiki, so there would be nothing contained on a separate article. This is not the case with Thorvar. Henneyj 18:12, December 21, 2010 (UTC)

Merge - There is no reason to have two articles on one person except for cases like Sumona/Amascut. Thorvar is Santa, and "NPCs who are confirmed to be the same person should be merged." Santa Claus is an NPC, and Thorvar is an NPC. Are they the same person? Yes. They should be merged. 19:19, December 21, 2010 (UTC)
 * Consensus overrides policy, and like I said below, people looking for information on Thorvar will not be looking for Santa.  19:41, December 21, 2010 (UTC)
 * Couldn't there be a section on Santa Claus's page on Thorvar specifically? 20:09, December 21, 2010 (UTC)
 * See my comment to Manga Maniac below.  20:18, December 21, 2010 (UTC)

Strong support - Per RS:G, but then Manga Maniac's reasoning. and also per DUH! "cmon guys lets make 2 articles for 1 guy!" 19:34, December 21, 2010 (UTC)
 * Look at this practically. At first people do not know that he is Santa.  In addition, people (at least for the duration of the event) will not be looking for Santa Claus when they search for Thorvar Crittersmash.  They will be looking for information on the Fremennik Santa from the 2010 event, not a grouping of all of the different people that you find out later on is Santa.   19:41, December 21, 2010 (UTC)
 * Which is why it can be redirect to Santa Claus. Redirecting to sections is very useful, I find. Manga Maniac 20:15, December 21, 2010 (UTC)
 * It certainly can, but it's useless when we have a full-fledged article (including a large picture, infobox and paragraphs of information. It's destructive if we want to actually reduce the amount of information we have on a character just to put them on the same page.  20:22, December 21, 2010 (UTC)
 * Paragraphs of information? Its two paragraphs, that make the same amount of space as a normal section. The article even has a stub tag on it. And the infobox could easily be merged in with the normal Santa Claus one. The only problem with that might be the Examine text, but everything else fits in delightfully. As for the image, it could still fit in the Santa Claus article, as a picture under the 2010 Christmas event section, possibly with some resizing. Manga Maniac 20:40, December 21, 2010 (UTC)
 * So what if it's 2 paragraphs? That's still paragraphs. There are shorter articles on here. 20:57, December 21, 2010 (UTC)
 * The point is that there's enough information to constitute a good article.  20:59, December 21, 2010 (UTC)
 * But there isn't, at least in my opinion, enough information to constitute a good article. There's enough information to constitute a good stub. Manga Maniac 21:04, December 21, 2010 (UTC)
 * Ugh, another person that misunderstands stubs. THEY ARE NOT SHORT ARTICLES, THEY ARE INCOMPLETE ARTICLES! 21:07, December 21, 2010 (UTC)
 * Very well then, I shall rephrase: "[T]here isn't, at least in my opinion, enough information to constitute a good average size article. There's enough information to constitute a good overtly short article." Manga Maniac 21:18, December 21, 2010 (UTC)
 * We do not merge articles because they are short. 21:22, December 21, 2010 (UTC)
 * Keep in mind I'm responding to a comment that says that there's enough information (i.e. enough length) to split it off, and that I'm not suggesting that articles be merged because they are short, but rather that this article should not be split because it is long enough, because it isn't long enough. Manga Maniac 21:47, December 21, 2010 (UTC)
 * ...You just said it isn't long enough to be an article. That's the same as saying it's too short, is it not? 21:53, December 21, 2010 (UTC)
 * No, no, no. I'm saying its not long enough to be split off, using the hypothesis that it is Santa. Had Santa not existed, it wouldn't be too short for an article. However, as Santa exists and they are the same subject, and not a different subject, they shouldn't be split off because there is not enough length to be split. Manga Maniac 21:58, December 21, 2010 (UTC)
 * It's not being split off. It is already split off. So you cannot use splitting here; this is a request to MERGE. If you say it shouldn't be split off because it's not long enough, you are saying it is not long enough to merit an article. 00:03, December 22, 2010 (UTC)
 * Here is a quick test edit that shows what the article would theoretically look like merged. The image has not been resized and all that jazz in order to fit in or reworded, it is just a simple test edit to get an idea of how it looks. Manga Maniac 20:47, December 21, 2010 (UTC)

Keep Separate - Per Cook. 20:26, December 21, 2010 (UTC)

Oppose - While they are the same person, they don't serve the same purpose. 20:47, December 21, 2010 (UTC)

Comment - I see you made a prototype of what Santa Claus would look like. Without the infobox (which includes all sorts of important information like examine, release date, featured) it can't work. 20:48, December 21, 2010 (UTC)
 * Look at the prototype. It has examine. I can add release date and etc. quite easily, but I find those unnecessary. Manga Maniac 20:53, December 21, 2010 (UTC)
 * I've always disliked greatly when there are multiple examine options on an infobox. Especially when there would be about five of them on this one.  It's too many.  As for the release date, you may not like them, but the community clearly does.   20:56, December 21, 2010 (UTC)
 * Splitting Thorvar into his own article is just the same as giving each year's version of Santa a different article, its just that Thorvar has a different name. And when I said it was unnesscary, I meant it because I felt that Thorvar was the same character as Santa Claus, meaning he was not released in this update. He was reintroduced in this update. Manga Maniac 20:59, December 21, 2010 (UTC)

Oppose - While he may be Santa Claus, I think he has a big enough role as Thorvar for that to remain on a separate article. Besides, the infobox becomes too cluttered as it will have several different examine options, locations, and features. I just think it'd be simpler to keep them separate. 20:54, December 21, 2010 (UTC)

Oppose - RS:G 21:18, December 21, 2010 (UTC)
 * Could you state which part of RS:G opposes this move? There are various parts of RS:G that both support a merge and oppose one. Manga Maniac 21:20, December 21, 2010 (UTC)
 * Er, all of it? Different uses? Different names? Different release? 21:22, December 21, 2010 (UTC)
 * Every Santa has a different release (for obvious reasons, as time has not collapsed and each Christmas takes place on a different day). Every Santa has a different use. Honestly, different uses are very hard to apply to NPCs, in my opinion. And Thorvar is confirmed to be Santa, and thus they have the same name. Its very unwise to use your normal name as a disguise. "Hi, I'm Manga Maniac, which is why I'm not Manga Maniac." Honestly, if we go by that, Father Christmas should have his own page, as he a) had a different name. b) has an different and older design. c) had a different purpose. Manga Maniac 21:29, December 21, 2010 (UTC)
 * I said above that I was surprised that Father Christmas is just a redirect. 21:36, December 21, 2010 (UTC)
 * You said that you were surprised the "Hooded stranger" was just a redirect, not Father Christmas, but fair enough. Also, not "all" of RS:G says they should stay separate, the bit specifically referring to NPCs says "NPCs who are confirmed to be the same person should be merged." and Thorvar was confirmed to be Santa. Manga Maniac 21:40, December 21, 2010 (UTC)

Oppose - Per opposition. They are not similar enough to be merged. -- 23:58, December 21, 2010 (UTC)

Merge - I'm a huge supporter of RS:G, but that's no basis for having multiple articles on the same subject. Some people are arguing that there's enough information on the 2010 Santa to create a standalone article for him, and I would agree with them. But I feel the information could be presented just as easily, in as great a depth, and in a much more streamlined manner, in one main article. As others have pointed out, they are the same character. He may have slightly different appearances and event roles each year, but that shouldn't matter because it's the exact same person, just appearing in a different event the same way another character may appear in multiple quests, with a different role in each. Should we have multiple articles for every character that has more than one appearance/location/use? Obviously, the answer is no. Additionally, we know Santa's history; that he was taken to the Land of Snow by mistake, married the Queen of Snow, has a child named Jack Frost, etc. If we were to keep a separate article on every version of Santa, then we would need an exact copy of this same information on every single one of those articles in order to fully cover the subject. That's just ridiculous. 00:00, December 22, 2010 (UTC)
 * We obviously would not have different articles for things in different places. But Thorvar has his own examine, own model, own release date, own quirks.  If we included all of this in the one infobox, it would stretch to a great length.  And you can't pretend that the Duke Horacio involved in Rune Mysteries is any different from the Duke Horacio in Recipe for Disaster.  They are the same in every way.  These are different in every way but identity.  We would obviously duplicate as little information as possible.  Most information pertaining to Santa Claus would not be found on Thorvar Crittersmash.  We are also forgetting about spoilers; people who have not completed the event will not know (they may have their suspicions) that Thorvar is Santa; if we redirect it to Santa Claus there will be no place to put a spoiler warning, obviously.   01:32, December 22, 2010 (UTC)
 * Actually, the two different quests mean he would have a different purpose. In the first quest, to want a cake. In the second, to send you on a quest to start Runecrafting. And we could always put Thorvar Crittersmash as a soft redirect. Manga Maniac 09:47, December 22, 2010 (UTC)
 * Sure he's different in purpose, but that's not what I was talking about. He is the same character, model and examine and everything else.  For the purpose of the game, he is the same character.  11:09, December 22, 2010 (UTC)

Split - Per the people that mentioned Granularity - 04:13, December 22, 2010 (UTC)

Oppose - RS:G and it will create a single sprawling mass of text and templates, which looks horrible. Not to mention squeezed into a tiny column thanks to Oasis. 07:00, December 22, 2010 (UTC)
 * I made a test edit, and honestly, it doesn't look that bad. Manga Maniac 09:47, December 22, 2010 (UTC)
 * You didn't include examines, release dates or other information.  11:09, December 22, 2010 (UTC)
 * Leaving out all that actually reduces granularity, anyway. Either you put another infobox on the Santa Claus page, and have an exceptionally ugly page, or keep them separate and keep everything nice and tidy.  11:24, December 22, 2010 (UTC)

Merge - per all 08:47, December 22, 2010 (UTC)