Talk:List of live action role-playing groups

Read this before adding a LARP!

The english Wikipedia has become increasingly strict in demanding that articles only be added about notable topics. If you add a LARP group that doesn't meet the notability guidelines, it will probably be promptly deleted, which can be frustrating. The following will help you determine if your group is notable by Wikipedia's standards and reduce the chance of it being deleted.

If you're not familiar with Wikipedia's guidelines for the notability of organizations, check out the "Primary criterion" section. Essentially, you'll need to be able to provide reliable secondary sources about the group.

Can't find secondary sources? Regrettably now is probably not the time to add your group to Wikipedia. If you think your group is notable, just under represented, try getting some non-trivial coverage in reliable secondary sources. Perhaps your local newspaper would like to write up an article for their entertainment section.

Can you find some secondary sources? Great! Now lets get you properly added.

1. Create a new article for your group.
   1. Be sure to clearly state what is notable about your group. Things that might be notable would include age, size, or coverage of the group.
   2. Be sure to include the secondary sources. For web sources, just add a link. For print sources, include the sort of summary you'd put in a bibliography for a college paper. Don't worry too much about the exact formatting; as long as all of the key information is there, other editors can easily reformat it to Wikipedia standard. The key is: can someone visiting Wikipedia track down this source themselves to confirm the information?
   3. Include a singular link to the most official home page of your group. (You don't need to, but I'm guessing getting this link into Wikipedia was your original goal this whole time, so here's the spot to do it.)
2. Add your group to this article (List of live action role-playing groups).
   1. The name should be a link to the article you wrote in the previous step. Just stick some double-square brackets around it, like this: [[International Fantasy Games Society]]
   2. Include a very brief description of the style of game, genre, and location. Keep it to a bare minimum; readers wanting more information can follow the link to read the full article. Use the other entries in the list as examples.
   3. Do not include a link to your group's web site. Readers wanting more information should go to the article you just wrote and can find the link there.

Discussion and notes about editing the above

This section is for discussing improving the above guidelines. If you just want to add your group, you don't need to read this.

My goals: 1. Minimize the frustration of a well meaning editor visiting, adding their group, having it promptly deleted, and ending up with a negative view of Wikipedia. Originally authored. By setting reasonable expectations up front, I hope we can avoid this. 2. Minimize the number of ultimately reverted edits, minimizing the work for editors watching this page. To accomplish this these goals, it's important to keep it simple. The people adding these links are typically new editors, and it can be very daunting to want to contribute to Wikipedia and suddenly be confronted with a wall of links to guidelines, policies, drafts, and other bureaucracy. Thus, no links to WP:NOTABLE, secondary source, WP:RS, and the like. Thus, the specific link to a single section that really is the key of the organization notability guidelines. I welcome anyone else's improvements to the above. — Alan De Smet | Talk 23:26, 3 October 2007 (UTC)

Note about adding LARPs

A reminder to anyone adding LARPs to this article: Wikipedia is not a respository of links. This article should have no external links. Instead, add an entry for your favorite LARP, but link it to a full Wikipedia article for your group. The external link to your favorite LARP belongs on that article page. If your favorite LARP doesn't have an article yet, take a moment to write one. If you don't know enough to write much, you can at least write a good stub and tag it with {{rpg-stub}}. This revision of "Brassy's Men" is an example of an okay stub. Alan De Smet | Talk 02:51, 21 September 2006 (UTC)

Note that while Wikipedia's guidelines for the notability of organizations are just an unofficial proposal, you will likely be held to those standards. You may disagree with this (The notability guidelines are heavily disputed), but you'll need to take that up at a higher level than here. Alan De Smet | Talk 04:23, 12 December 2006 (UTC)

Terminology

It seems beneficial to use some unified terminology on this page for the purpose of comparison, but I'm not sure about some of the distinctions being employed at the moment - for example, the Lorien Trust as a "Fantasy boffer combat group" is a description which I don't think would be recognised by most of its participants; firstly because 'boffer' is not a term ever used in UK LARP (for me, at least, it suggests the heavily-padded unlatexed weapons which are more or less unknown in Britain), and secondly because, while combat is a significant part of LT events, it's never the sole focus; all battles are brought about in some fashion by roleplay interactions.

A major distinction in UK LARP is between "fest" and "group" LARP - group is generally frequent events for a smallish number of regular players (up to about 100), in which, generally, all the characters are involved to some degree in a single plot or series of plots. Fest is less frequent events for large numbers (high hundreds to thousands) of players, usually taking the form of 3-4 day events with people camping on site, with different plots and interactions going on among different groups of characters.

Is this a useful distinction to apply world-wide, or are the LARP scenes in different countries too different? TSP 13:03, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

I'm not familiar with the fest/group distinction here in the US, but as Lorien is a UK event, it seem reasonable to me to use UK terminology. I've readded the details on combat as it's an important distiction, although I've used "latex weapon combat" instead of "boffer combat" in an attempt to be clearer. Alan De Smet | Talk 13:54, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

Perhaps so. I think almost every UK group involves latex weapon combat, so I suppose that should be added to all of them. TSP 03:16, 3 October 2006 (UTC)

AFD Machine-gun needs to be turned on this and associated articles.

This list is awful - I'll be turn the AFD Machinegun on pretty much everything (there are a couple of expections where 3rd party sources exists. --Fredrick day 18:28, 15 June 2007 (UTC)

Why Lorien Trust and Fools and Heroes? While LARP is a somewhat enclosed and specialized arena, both societies are notable within that arena; Lorien Trust is the largest UK LARP system, and Fools and Heroes is the oldest LARP system in the UK using its original setting and rules system. While it's true there are few secondary sources, that's because there are virtually no secondary sources about generic LARP at all - those that are written tend to be copyrighted manuals for a particular system. While I agree that it's ridiculous to expect everybody's local LARP group to appear and be detailed, both the groups I have mentioned are large, active and nationwide.

I've added a few sources to the LT one. F&H proving trickier. TSP 13:29, 30 June 2007 (UTC)

Try - http://living.scotsman.com/index.cfm?id=1763592005 - An article from the Scotsman regarding the Edinburgh branch of Fools and Heroes. Justin Andrews (no account) --195.70.93.16 14:45, 17 September 2007 (UTC)

An editer has added Spearhead larp (I fixed it to a wikipedia link rather than external), another editer has removed it on grounds of lack of notability. If those grounds were applied to the entire list much of it would disappear, especially links to articles that don't exist yet but which may prove notable given time. I think a great many larp groups have been covered in their local media (here's a third-party article about Spearhead, UK locals could probably come up with a better mainstream print media reference), and we should give them the benefit of the doubt that references will be provided given a little time, rather than deleting links before stub articles with references even get a chance to be created. --Ryan Paddy 21:27, 24 October 2007 (UTC)

A brief look at the Spearhead website (posted by the original editer) turns up this article about them in the The Sunday Times, the UK's largest Sunday newspaper. Therefore Spearhead is notable, it just wasn't given the opportunity to demonstrate it. My point isn't specifically about Spearhead, it's that many larp groups are perfectly notable by Wikipedia standards and we need to give them the opportunity to develop their own articles with suitable sources rather than aborting them before a stub article is even created. Give them the benefit of the doubt, post citation warnings to the stubs (once they get created) if appropriate, but please don't just delete links to new articles or delete new stubs lacking citations out of hand. It's unfriendly to new Wikipedians adding this material who aren't aware they need sources (but could probably provide them if asked nicely), and in the long run is depriving Wikipedia of well-referenced articles about genuinely notable organisations. --Ryan Paddy 22:37, 24 October 2007 (UTC)

if they are notable, then they have their own article and they then appear on a "list of" - not the other way around. The first article you link to is not considered a WP:RS, it's a NN website, the second mentions them in the context of discussing the wider scene - it is not about them in particular - so that does not result in notable coverage. They are non-notable, they will be removed. If you think they are notable - create an article about them (and if that's all the coverage they have, I will AFD it) and go from there - you are doing it back to front. Oh and we don't work on "benefit of the doubt" - we work on multiple reliable sources - which you don't have and have not presented. Oh and for the record I AM a UK local. --Fredrick day 23:05, 24 October 2007 (UTC)

Unregistered users adding new groups here are likely to be newcomers. When I talk about giving the benefit of the doubt, what I'm implying is please do not bite the newcomers. Newcomers often don't know about the history function, so they won't see you reasons for deletion - they'll just see that their addition is gone, wonder why, and perhaps re-add it. What I'm attempting is the friendly approach. Turn the external link into an internal link, thus encouraging the user to create an article on the organisation. If insufficient sources are given for the organisation, slap a lack of citations warning on it - that whole approach is conducive to helping newcomers understand what Wikipedia requires. Adding Wikipedia links here is an alternative way of requesting articles, one that newcomers are much more likely to actually respond to. If there is a policy against this approach of creating links first and then articles later, please direct me to it. On the contrary, on the Wikipedia:Lists (stand-alone lists) style guideline it states "Ideally each entry on the list should have a Wikipedia article but this is not required if it is reasonable to expect an article could be forthcoming in the future" which directly contradicts your assertion that things are being done "backwards" here in the specific context of a stand-alone list, which this is. On the subject of Spearhead, your criteria for notability is too restrictive, and your assertion that it is "not notable" seems unprovable. Surely the most you can say is that notability has not been established here, unless you are expressing your personal opinion based on personal experience that this organisation is not notable? The Sunday Times article is a perfectly good reference for notability. While the article is not solely about Spearhead, it's hardly possible to write an article about larp without lots of explanation for the general public. If it didn't give an explanation of what larp is, it would be a poor article for a general audience - i.e. no good mainstream article about a larp organisation will ever meet your criteria. Over half the contents of the article focuses on Spearhead and the particular way larp is done at Spearhead compared to other larps, so it is just as much an article about Spearhead as about larp in general. Please refer me to the guideline stating that an article has to be completely about the subject for the subject to be considered notable. --Ryan Paddy 00:30, 25 October 2007 (UTC)

Two third party articles have been presented. One is a major newspaper. That should be more than enough to establish notability. — Alan De Smet | Talk 04:22, 25 October 2007 (UTC)

But it's not, you seem to have been here for a while so I'm surprised you don't know policy about such sources - we don't consider all third party coverage to be equal - at the top end of the scale you have peer reviewed material and we work down from there - the first is a NN website - that does not establish notability, the second IS in a WP:RS, but group is mention within the context of discussing the wider scene, that is NOT considered the same as an article ABOUT the group - it's trivial coverage. The group is not notable or at least no evidence of notability has been presented. I'm leaving the country this morning but will do a RFC when I get back to have that section removed. --Fredrick day 05:24, 25 October 2007 (UTC)

According to WP:ORG examples of "trivial" coverage are "newspaper articles that simply report meeting times or extended shopping hours, or the publications of telephone numbers, addresses, and directions in business directories". The Sunday Times article is not trivial by that definition, it is real article by a journalist that is about both the organisation in question and larp in general in equal measures. --Ryan Paddy 05:49, 25 October 2007 (UTC)

It may also be worth bearing in mind that a lot of LARP organisations refuse to deal with the Media, due to problems it has caused in the past. Certain sections of the Media have covered the hobby in a negative light, and generally LARP organisations will refuse media coverage to avoid bringing their organisation into disreput. This can mean that the number of notable sources for even the Larger LARP organisations can be disproporanatly low. So finding a single article from a source such as the Sunday Times, or the Scotsman, is an achievment in of itself. --Justin Andrews 12:52, 25 October 2007 (UTC)

The Scotsman article was also published in the paper itself as an article. I don't have a copy or a scan of it, but it might be possible that some I know does. Is/would that be enough to establish notability? --Justin Andrews 13:25, 25 October 2007 (UTC)

I guess that you are referring to the Scotsman article about Fools and Heroes that was linked above. That online Scotsman article is a good proof of notability of Fools and Heroes, there is no need to scan a hard copy (it doesn't matter whether an article is online or in print, only whether the source is considered a reliable source). I have added Fools and Heroes to the list with that article referenced as proof of notability.--Ryan Paddy 21:30, 25 October 2007 (UTC)

Looking at your user page, I feel its safe to make the assumption that you are the same Ryan Paddy that wrote the Article "Dealing with the Media" http://www.larpguide.co.uk/pages/larp_articleview.asp?ID=50 on LarpGuide.co.uk. Good article, and it does sum up the trouble that LARP has experienced with the media in the past. Thank you. --Justin Andrews 09:20, 26 October 2007 (UTC)

That's me, thanks for the kind words on the article.--Ryan Paddy 22:41, 28 October 2007 (UTC)

For a clear demonstration of what I mean about putting off newcomers, see the response to the removal of the Spearhead entry on their forum. I imagine the ***** is "twats", which is what the general public think of wikipedians when their additions are removed and they don't know where to look for a reason. Putting off newcomers who might become useful contributers limits wikipedia. What we should do is add some sort of "request for proof of notability" tag to new links on this page, and remove the articles only if such proof is not forthcoming either in this article or in a linked article after a reasonable period. --Ryan Paddy 21:11, 25 October 2007 (UTC)

Unfortunately an in-line version of the notability template doesn't seem to exist from what I see on the dispute template messages page. There is only this non-inline one, which would be the right choice for article stubs but is unsuitable for inline use:

Perhaps an in-line version of this should be created for the purpose of creating in-line dispute of notability notices of items in lists that link to articles that don't yet exist. --Ryan Paddy 22:29, 25 October 2007 (UTC)

Fredrick, you're continuing to delete items that notability is not yet established for but you have not answered my suggestion that a warning would be a better first step. Many of these items could probably have notability established if users knew that was a requirement, via a polite warning in the article. Rather than deleting things outright, it would be more constructive for you to search for proof of notability first. Can we attempt to reach a consensus on the procedure here please? --Ryan Paddy 23:35, 7 November 2007 (UTC)

In future, I'll put a warning on their page that their entry has been deleted and if they wish to add it they need to provide notable sources. Warnings on the article are a waste of time because many of those people will never come back and we just end up with a load of nn unsourced fancruft and advert spam. If they DO come back, they will see the message on their talkpage and hopefully find sources or know not to bother. but let's be clear about this - the onus for searching for sources is on the person ADDING the material, there is no requirement for people removing content to find sources - so the consensus on procedure is pretty clear - no sources, no assertation of notability and it's removed - that's wikipedia wide consensus. --Fredrick day 23:44, 7 November 2007 (UTC)

I appreciate that you're wanting to clean out non-notable material, that's great. However, I don't agree that the general Wikipedia consensus is to delete material that hasn't been demonstrated as notable immediately. The consensus is that a suitable warning should be displayed, to give editors unaware of the policy the opportunity to find material. That is why warnings like the one I posted above exist. Immediate deletion breeds bad feeling and does not help new users to engage in the editing process. See my link to the Spearhead forum above for an example of bad feeling being generated. Note also that the Spearhead editors clearly did return as they noticed the item disappearing. They would have seen a warning if one had been posted.

Under the notibility guideline the suggested course of action if you find something not-notable is to 1) ask the person who added it for advice on where to find sources, and 2) add a notability alert. Thus the Wikipedia consensus is clearly that we should all look for proof of notability, we should add warnings, and we should only delete if proof is not forthcoming or if speedy deletion criteria are met (which in this case they are definitely not). --Ryan Paddy 00:15, 8 November 2007 (UTC)

The burden of evidence lies with the editor who adds or restores material. All quotations and any material challenged or likely to be challenged should be attributed to a reliable, published source using an inline citation.[1] The source should be cited clearly and precisely to enable readers to find the text that supports the article content in question. that is from from policy - WP:V. I am explicitly challenging it by removing it - this is noted by my edit summary. You want to re-add it, you find the sources. I don't think there is anything else to discuss here, I will continue to remove unsourced additions that make no assertion of notability - and they WOULD be CSD'd if they tried to create an article on that basis. --Fredrick day 19:43, 8 November 2007 (UTC)

That's a policy regarding verifiability, not notability. I linked the guideline for notability above, which suggests that before removing something on basis of notability editors check for proof themselves. There is still plenty to discuss here, as consensus has not been reached and reasonable objections have not been responded to. --Ryan Paddy 11:08, 12 November 2007 (UTC)

...and for verifiability, self-published sources are acceptable for non-controversial claims about the publisher (see WP:SELFPUB); so for verifiability, the group's own website is an acceptable source. This doesn't establish notability; but as Ryan says, Wikipedia's policies on deleting non-notable content are rather less extreme - and, indeed, specifically say that "the particular topics and facts within an article are not each required to meet the standards of the notability guidelines". This isn't strictly applicable to this, as it is a list rather than an article, so probably should only contain those entries notable enough to deserve their own articles; it does mean that there is no need for unsourced entries to be deleted immediately, however, if they can be verified at least with a self-published source. TSP 11:23, 12 November 2007 (UTC)

I propose that we give groups at least two months to notice their request for demonstration of notability and fulfil it. --Ryan Paddy (talk) 20:57, 25 November 2007 (UTC)

unsourced material can be removed at any time - the responsibility for sourcing fails on those adding information not those removing it. your proposal is unenforceable and any good faith editor can remove unsourced material on sight. --Fredrick day (talk) 21:01, 25 November 2007 (UTC)

The editing style for all pages is ultimately reached by consensus of the editors regarding what seems reasonable for the specific page. I am proposing a process for warning editors of this specific page of the requirement of notability, so that they have a reasonable period of time to notice and respond to that request, before removing the link if no evidence of notability is added. This page will always have LARP groups adding themselves, some of which will be notable, but most of the editors won't be aware of the requirement for demonstration of notability until we warn them. The frequent editors of this page could agree a process that enables us to capture the notable groups while eliminating those that are not notable. Two months' warning would enable this, and minimise annoyance to new Wikipedia editors in the process. --Ryan Paddy (talk) 21:59, 25 November 2007 (UTC)

:::The editing style for all pages is ultimately reached by consensus of the editors regarding what seems reasonable for the specific page. You'd be wrong about that - many of the special interest groups try that tactic and unaligned wikipedians have to stop them trying to "opt-out" of bits of the project policies and guidelines - here's an example of where an special interest group had to be stopped from trying to put restrictions on the application of common wikipedia practice. The way to do this in line with policy is to delete the material and leave a note on their talkpages linking them to policy on sources and telling them they can re-add it, if they have sources. --Fredrick day (talk) 22:08, 25 November 2007 (UTC)

Just to check, would you consider the group's own website a sufficient source? If you would, then we really are talking about verifiability. If you wouldn't, then we're probably actually talking about notability, for which I don't think the same 'delete on sight' policy exists. TSP (talk) 22:37, 25 November 2007 (UTC)

I'm not suggesting opting out, I'm suggesting we reach a consensus on how the standard Wikipedia policies and guidelines could be applied in this instance. We have the same goals for a final outcome, groups with evidence of notability will be included in the list and those without will not be. All we're quibbling over is how notice can best be given. Many additions are made anonymously, so talk page messages are not an option. Also, people other than the person adding the group may be better placed to find evidence of notability (with so many random passerbys often someone is aware of pertinent information, which is why cite tags are so useful). That's why I think that tagging the items with "evidence of notability required" for a minimum period of time before they're removed is a better way to capture the notable groups and evidence, while being more sure that what's removed isn't notable. --Ryan Paddy (talk) 23:01, 25 November 2007 (UTC)

I think that's a reasonable plan, Ryan Paddy, for all of the reasons you've given. We should err on the side of helping newcombers add notable groups. — Alan De Smet | Talk 01:30, 26 November 2007 (UTC)

I disagree and will continue to act in line with policy and delete unsource material when i come across it. after four weeks. --Fredrick day (talk) 06:38, 26 November 2007 (UTC)

Fours weeks seems like a reasonable period to allow for editors to notice the "notability" tags on this page and track down citations. Glad that we've been able to come to a consensus on this. --Ryan Paddy (talk) 20:35, 26 November 2007 (UTC)

Infobox

I've created an infobox template for LARP groups, here: Template:Infobox_LARP_Group. This can be used on LARP group articles to provide a quick summary of a group. --Ryan Paddy 21:28, 7 November 2007 (UTC)

See this infobox in use at Maelstrom (live role playing game). --Ryan Paddy 22:12, 7 November 2007 (UTC)

Create a category for LARP groups

I propose also creating a category for LARP groups instead of just a list. Any reason this should not be done? Jesse Crouch (talk) 02:53, 24 August 2008 (UTC)

As in a category and this list? It just seems redundant, so why have both. Of course there may be benefits to it being a category that I'm unfamiliar with. If we have to choose between the two, I think the list is superior because it includes brief summaries and context that a category page can't provide. — Alan De Smet | Talk 15:30, 24 August 2008 (UTC)

There is already a category called "Category:Live-action_role-playing_games". Most larp groups use that. If that category gets really full, it might be worth creating sub-categories within it, such as one for groups. But for now it seems sufficient. Ryan Paddy (talk) 20:17, 24 August 2008 (UTC)

Notability

So TT and Maelstom have been deleted which I would argue are pretty notable in the UK. It does seem the point of encylopedia is lost on some Wikipedians. User:Alex —Preceding undated comment was added at 10:08, 13 September 2008 (UTC).

Both Maelstrom and Treasure Trap are certainly notable in the sense of "things the mainstream press would be interested in covering" but for one reason or another that coverage is hard to come by. The problem with Maelstrom and notability is that while they're a huge game they seem to deliberately avoid the press. They don't want press at games getting in the way of their players' fun or invading their privacy, and press usually want to photos or video of gameplay. As for Treasure Trap, it was probably in the news at the time (early 1980's) but news from that period isn't archived online so it requires someone to dig out physical newspapers to reference. On the other hand, both games have been referenced in articles about larp published in books about larp like Playground Worlds which make good references. If you believe that many of the recent deletions were in error, as I do, then go to the deleting admin's page and contest them based on any evidence of notability you can find. Don't use the argument that the people involved don't understand encyclopedias, it won't get you anywhere. We can also ask for the articles to be userfied to our personal pages so that we can see their deleted contents. Ryan Paddy (talk) 18:52, 16 September 2008 (UTC)

Curious Pastimes and One World by Night are sufficiently notable too. Ryan Paddy (talk) 19:04, 16 September 2008 (UTC)

Removal of items from the list

In the recent Article for Deletion discussion, some editors noted that many of the larp groups listed here show no evidence of notability. In light of that, I've started to remove groups from the list that have had due warning of the requirement to demonstrate notability and have failed to do so. We're now seeing one of these groups being re-added, with no evidence of notability provided. If you are considering re-adding a group, please read the top of this talk page first. This is a stand-alone list, and the guideline for such lists states that you must demonstrate the notability of your group for it to be listed here. Groups that do not demonstrate notability after an appropriate warning period will be removed. If you want to add a group, you'll need to demonstrate that it is notable. Ryan Paddy (talk) 01:46, 15 October 2008 (UTC)

You have defended many times the hardships of notability for a LARP, how do you recommend this be established? Many of the LARPs on the list have no articles, refrances, or any evidence of notability yet they are still there. Picking and choosing LARPs because you have not heard of them is hardly justifiable. Also, define "an appropriate warning period", because 10 minutes does not seem like one to most people. -Non Registered User 02:41, 15 October 2008 (UTC)