Team Fortress Wiki:Policies

This page documents accepted policies and guidelines in use on the Team Fortress Wiki.

Terms of Use

Main article: Team Fortress Wiki:Terms of Use

Content

Unreleased content

See also: Currently unreleased content

Unreleased content refers to content for which there is some expectation of pending Valve release, but has not been patched into the game and has not been made public; examples being content Valve claims to be developing or content mentioned in an ongoing ARG.

• Generally, images or articles relating to expected but unreleased weapons, items, or other game content are not permitted until they are officially released. This is because until that point, what the content is, does, or looks like cannot be confirmed.
• The main purpose of this is to reduce unverified speculation or other ridiculous conjecture appearing as 'fact' on article pages.
• You are, however, free to start creating the article in your user space and have it moved back into the article space upon official release. Note: main space categories are generally not permitted on articles in user space; you may comment them out while in your user space, like so: <!-- [[Category:Example]] -->; or use the colon: [[:Category:Example]].

Unused and cut content

See also: Unused content

Unused and cut content refers to content found within patched game files. When documenting findings related to unused content, you should always provide solid evidence that the content is genuine and real.

The following qualifies as proof:

• The ability to access said content via Valve's content servers, the game's .VPK files, official SDKs, or Web APIs.
  • This means that anyone can access or download the content to verify its legitimacy.
• Quotes from current or former Valve employees or associates.
• Quotes from Workshop creators.

If there is any uncertainty regarding the proof provided, you may be required to provide additional information.

Leaked content

Leaked content is allowed on the Wiki in limited capacity as we do not have permission to share source code or game assets in behalf of Valve. When documenting findings on the Wiki based on leaked source code, using a plain text statement such as "from leaked source code" is the only method allowed.

When documenting leaked content you must not:

• Include or link to parts of the actual source code.
• Include or upload screenshots of models, textures and/or other game assets that have not been released by a current or former Valve employee.

Images and media

For image licensing policy, see Team Fortress Wiki:Licensing images.

For guidelines on image quality, see Team Fortress Wiki:Images.

For placing images in articles, see Help:Images.

Languages and localization

See Help:Language translation for help and specific guidelines related to article translation.

The content on Team Fortress Wiki is multilingual, and every effort should be made to ensure that readers of other languages can access the same content in their own native language.

• Articles should have multiple language translations. Content related to the organisation of the project (i.e. pages in the Team Fortress Wiki and Help namespaces) should normally not be translated.
• Many articles are kept translated via translation switching templates. This allows consistent formatting across pages, and ensures that localized text and template code are kept in one single template.

Community websites

The community website pages on this wiki have always been prone to abuse, and as time went on, concerns of bias and the usage of the wiki as a vehicle for product advertising became more pronounced. A lack of guidelines acceptable to all parties has also always been an issue, so as of 2014-05-12 the wiki is enacting a concrete policy of no site pages whatsoever in favor of more helpful and informative basic guides that document the features more generally. This should solve the concerns of advertising and bias, as well as giving a more concrete starting point for newcomers. The new guides are: Basic Market guide, Basic trading guide, and Basic inventory guide.

Mod notability

Because the Team Fortress Wiki is treated as a reliable source of information by players, all new page additions are reviewed by staff to ensure that they meet minimum quality standards. In the case of community content, certain notability requirements also have to be met, in order to maintain this standard of quality. Before creating a new page for a community mod, please ensure that it meets these requirements, and be prepared to show them to staff should the need arise (either via IRC prior to creating the page, or on the talk page for the mod after it has been created). Beware that if a mod is not deemed as notable, it may be summarily removed.

• Running on multiple servers: The mod in question must be shown to be in use on multiple servers, run by different entities (meaning that if there are a half-dozen servers being run by one group or person, it doesn't count). These servers also have to show a reasonable amount of player activity, and not simply be empty all the time. If a mod truly is notable in the community, then players will request that server admins run the mod and/or plugin, and it will see reasonable activity in those servers.
• Discussion among the community: Discussion of the mod must extend beyond the thread announcing its creation and development. It must be shown that the mod is actively discussed by multiple users over multiple communities, in order to illustrate its popularity among players.
• Exposure via YouTube: A very good marker of popularity is if a prominent YouTuber uploads a video of gameplay of the mod, or a popular Twitch streamer plays it (with or without fans/subscribers is acceptable). Simply showcasing the mod over the course of a few videos and a few personalities is proof enough of trending popularity, it does not have to be multiple videos over a consistent time period.

Editing

For basic help with wiki editing, see Help:Editing

For tips on style, see Help:Style guide

For a complete list of help pages, see Help:Contents

Community engagement

Beyond the Wiki website itself, the Team Fortress Wiki has a presence on social media channels like YouTube, Twitter, and IRC. Usage of this presence should be strictly restricted to the following purposes:

• Releasing Wiki-specific content, e.g. weapon demonstration videos made for embedding on the Wiki website.
• Amplifying official TF2-related news and updates, such as patch notes, official TF2 blog posts, etc.
• Amplifying unofficial TF2-related news and updates that Valve has officially endorsed, e.g. community tournaments featured on the official TF2 blog.
• Celebrating Wiki-specific or TF2-wide milestones, e.g. the Wiki website having reached a certain number of contributors, or celebrating TF2's birthday.
• Featuring high-quality Wiki content, e.g. "Articles of the month"-type announcements.
• Featuring low-quality Wiki content, e.g. shitposts and memes about the Wiki itself.
• Wiki user support, e.g. directing locked-out users on how to perform account recovery, or providing help with Wiki syntax and editing guidelines.

All Wiki members (including staff) are free to perform any other type of broader TF2 community engagement, as long as they do so in a personal capacity which does not imply official endorsement from the Team Fortress Wiki.

Other

User content

• Images

  Some images are permitted to be uploaded for personal use on user pages. However, users who abuse the right to upload decorative images may have them removed.

  User images should follow these rules:

  • They should have the user's name in the file name (e.g. File:User MyName Steam avatar.png)
  • They should be placed in the category User images (place the code [[Category:User images]] into the upload box)
  • User images should not be used in articles, or share categories with article images.

• Signatures

  Custom signatures are allowed. However, we would prefer that more attention is paid to improving articles rather than your own signature. As with user images, misuse of signatures may result in you losing the right to have one.

• Pages

  User pages should not be placed in any article category.

Elevated privileges

See Help:Group rights.

Deletion

See also: Wikipedia:Deletion policy

• Pages may be deleted if they show low effort, or break the unreleased content, noatabilty and community websites rules above.
• Images may be deleted if they are low quality, not properly licensed, or if they are simply not used.
• Obviously egregious policy violations may be speedily deleted, but the nominal process is to apply a deletion tag, discuss, and close.

Protection

See also: Wikipedia:Protection policy

Generally most pages are not protected to encourage new edits and additions to content. However, some pages and articles are deliberately locked against editing, mostly for the following reasons:

• If an edit war breaks out and involved parties refuse to stop;
• If the page is high-risk: this can include templates like {{lang}} that are transcluded heavily, or pages that are heavily trafficked like Main Page.

  If a template needs protection and translation switching, consider making use of the Dictionary to allow translators to update strings.

Blocks

See also: Wikipedia:Blocking policy

Users are only blocked from editing if they prove to be consistently disruptive to the wiki.

• This includes but is not limited to:
  • Vandalism
  • Edit warring
  • Ignoring warnings on your talk page
  • Intimidating behavior/harassment
  • Spam