Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/A World at War

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 delete. Spartaz ^Humbug! 21:29, 19 July 2020 (UTC)[reply]

A World At War

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This monster wargame is not notable. Few sources exist beyond BoardGameGeek, ConSimWorld, and the publisher's site, and it's not particularly well-known on BGG. Could be redirected to its ancestor Rise and Decline of the Third Reich. Ungulates (talk) 23:46, 28 June 2020 (UTC)[reply]

I grant you it's a niche interest, but lots of board wargames have articles with similar number of page views (average about 10-20 per day). Nobody's forcing anybody to read it, and it would be a pity to throw it away. It must be one of the most detailed simulations of WW2 ever designed. The ancestor game is certainly notable and has even been referenced in a published novel. But there are several descendant games and several spin offs - too much to put in one article, and perfectly appropriate for a family of articles.Paulturtle (talk) 10:12, 1 July 2020 (UTC) It was reprinted on GMT's P500 (ie. at least 500 pre-orders needed to reprint) a couple of years ago, so people are still buying it.Paulturtle (talk) 10:16, 1 July 2020 (UTC)[reply]

No one's being forced to read it, but WP:NOTE is pretty clear that if a topic can't be shown to be notable it shouldn't have a Wikipedia page. If the very extensive discussion of mechanics and strategy is worth saving, it should be moved to Wikibooks or a another place where it would be appropriate. Ungulates (talk) 21:44, 1 July 2020 (UTC)[reply]

I'm not entirely sure that's true any more. Military History articles, for example, permit and indeed encourage the writing of articles on each and every unit above a certain size or officer above a certain rank, even though there is little in the way of independent third party coverage - they are simply deemed to be notable within the context of the larger topic. I doubt that's the only area of interest which has started to go down this route over the years. As for articles on historically accurate board wargames, few of them have independent sources beyond Boardgamegeek and Consimworld - some of the older, classic games have lists of articles about them in long-defunct magazines but that's about it. Wikipedia does have vast numbers of articles about obscure albums and TV programmes and computer games which got tagged for questionable notability and then left alone.Paulturtle (talk) 02:52, 2 July 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Games-related deletion discussions. Ungulates (talk) 00:20, 29 June 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.
Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, Megan Barris (Lets talk📧) 22:36, 2 July 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Note to closer for soft deletion: This nomination has had limited participation and falls within the standards set for lack of quorum. There are no previous AfD discussions, undeletions, and no previous PRODs have been located. This nomination may be eligible for soft deletion at the end of its 7-day listing. --Cewbot (talk) 00:02, 10 July 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Current redirect ↪ A World at War

Logs: 2019-01 move to → A World at War

Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.
Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, Sandstein 18:38, 10 July 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Delete --and not softly (as it fails WP:NSOFT): Also fails WP:GNG and does not come close to fulfilling any requirements found in the Five pillars. This is a single primary sourced article. The source contains approximately 21 lines of prose and the article contains "hundreds". We could keep this filed as an example of original research. The subject also fails the criteria (#2) of the WikiProject. If an editor wishes to revive the article with reliable sources it is not hard to request a REFUND but current policies and guidelines do indicate that certain criteria is not optional. -- Otr500 (talk) 19:15, 18 July 2020 (UTC)[reply]

The above editor is perfectly entitled to his opinion that the article should be thrown away. However, he's not entitled to try to give his opinion a veneer of "authority" by misquoting Wikipedia policies. Specifically:

It's not entirely clear what policies about computer software articles have got to do with anything, although I suppose analogies could be made.

“does not come close to fulfilling any requirements found in the Five pillars”. Patent nonsense. The five “pillars” are that Wikipedia is an encyclopaedia, consists of free content, is written from a neutral point of view, that editors should be civil to one another, and that it has no firm rules. I don’t see how it falls short of any of that.

It’s not “original research” – it is a factual description of the game, similar to the plot summary of a film. The source is self-evident and available for anybody to purchase and verify if they wish. To coin a phrase, we could keep the above comment filed as a failure to understand what “original research” is. The rule against Original Research is there to stop crackpots from posting their own pet theories in “serious” articles, not to stop people from posting obvious factual descriptions of things that are self-evident.

“fails the criteria (#2) of the WikiProject”. Nope again. Those criteria are to refine the style guidelines, to ensure NPOV and NOR (discussed in previous bullet point), to create a notability guide (I don’t see any evidence that this has been done), and to ensure that notable topics are covered. Again, I don’t see that any of that is being breached.

As for the "21 line source", the main “source” for the article is the game’s hefty rules & reference manuals, which from memory run to several hundred pages (they used to available online at one point on the game’s website, along with other essays and commentaries about aspects of the game, but I’ve no idea if they still are). That is considerably more than the length of the article as it currently stands.

Regards, Paulturtle (talk) 22:48, 18 July 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Whilst I'm here, I note that Dungeons & Dragons, a game I haven't played since the early 1980s, has a family of articles, some of which go into quite esoteric detail about various versions of the game and expansion kits. Efforts have been made in places to provide "references", but many of these are simply "circular" references to guides produced by enthusiasts, rather than wholly objective third-party commentators. Obviously it's more widely-played than the Third Reich system and its descendants.Paulturtle (talk) 23:07, 18 July 2020 (UTC)[reply]

I don't see why you view this as some kind of personal affront, but I'd like you stop doing that. With regard to some of the claims that you have made: Obviously extensive discussion of strategy and mechanics with no external references is original research. Obviously. The game's manual, while no doubt an authoritative source on the mechanics of the game itself, is of no use for establishing the notability of the game. Wikipedia policies designated as official policies are not optional. I am not, of course, saying that this game is bad or shouldn't be discussed; I am saying that it does not meet the criteria for a Wikipedia page. Ungulates (talk) 04:01, 19 July 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Just because somebody does not agree with you, or, worse, thinks that you are wrong, does not mean that they are making “claims” or that they are taking “personal affront”. And I’m certainly not going to stop responding to somebody who posts a bombastic comment full of references to Wikipedia “policies” which he clearly hasn’t understood.

The policy against Original Research is laid down clearly, in plain English, for anybody to read in the opening paragraphs of the article on that policy. It means that information has to be verifiable to reliable published sources, even if it is not directly cited, and does not state conclusions that are not obvious from those sources. Put two sources together and present a conclusion deduced solely by the editor in question and it becomes “synth”. The plot section of a film article is not “original research” because the source is self-evident: watch the film. A description of the mechanics of the game is verifiable from the hefty rules manuals of the game. “Obviously”.

I’ve done quite a lot of serious article-writing over the years, although less so lately. OR is hard to define but my God you recognise it when you come across it – somebody relatively new to a controversial subject and overconfident in his abilities, flicks through a few books, sometimes (but not always) published compilations of primary sources, and thinks he has discovered that the historians who aren’t telling him what he wants to hear are “wrong”. There’s not much you can do other than say “you need to read and learn more” and hope he has the maturity not to, as the saying goes, “take personal affront”.

You are quite right that the game’s extensive rulebooks are not in themselves proof of notability, but that is a separate matter. In reality very few Wikipedia policies are completely hard and fast, other than that you can’t libel living people. I’ve already drawn your attention to articles about military hardware and senior officers, where rules about notability are interpreted a lot more loosely (to put it mildly). Almost very objection you’ve raised could be raised against the families of articles devoted to well-known games like chess or poker, which are presumably read by people who enjoy those games or want to learn them. Of course those games are clearly and demonstrably notable, but for the moment I’m talking about the nature and content of the articles themselves.

The editor above claimed, wrongly as far as I can see, that the article is in breach of the game project’s rules about “notability”. In fact the section to which he posted a link says that it is an ongoing aspiration of that project to come up with a policy on notability. They don’t appear to have actually done so. Regards, Paulturtle (talk) 11:05, 19 July 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Delete. The article cites no substantial third-party coverage and therefore fails WP:N. No appropriate sources have been proposed in this AfD either. Sandstein 14:27, 19 July 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Delete mainly per Sandstein. While there has been much assertion of the subject's notability, the walk hasn't matched the talk: where are the sources that demonstrate it? Not on the article, where they should be: a WP:BEFORE indicates that that is vecaus ethey do not exist. ——Serial 15:53, 19 July 2020 (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.