Deadlock:Style guide

This style guide will serve as a guideline for writing articles and related content on the Deadlock Wiki. It establishes our in-house style, to help editors produce content that follows a consistent, clear, and precise language, layout, and formatting manner. If everyone follows standardized conventions, it will make reading and navigating easier for readers, and editing and coordinating easier for editors. Reading this style guide is important to preserve consistency among edits.

A more expansive set of guidelines can be found on Wikipedia at the Manual of Style.

Articles

Structure

Different pages with different sections will not have the same information, but there is a general structure for every article. The follow sections should always be shown in this order:

1. Notice: This includes {{cleanup}}, {{construction}}, and {{outdated}} templates.
2. Disambiguation:
3. Infobox: Corresponding information is displayed here.
4. Introduction: This covers a brief overview of the article. It can also include the patch it was introduced in.
5. TOC: On most articles, the TOC will automatically appear before the first section.
6. Main Page: This covers the main information of the article or goes in further depth.
   1. Heroes, Items, Units, and Update History have varying section orders, but they should all be consistent.
7. Version History: If content has changed over the course of the game, that information is listed here.
8. Background: For Hero pages, this is the hero's in-game background. For non-Hero characters, this can be renamed "Lore" (see below).
   1. Lore: Subsection of Background, lists extra information about the character and their backstory from other official sources (voice lines, visual novels etc.)
9. Character interactions: For Hero pages, lists relevant information from voice lines related to other heroes.
10. Gallery: The gallery shows images otherwise too bulky to fit into the main article.
11. Trivia: This covers tidbits of information not appropriate for the main page, or make references to content outside of the game. (Whether a lore-related information should go on "Trivia" or "Lore" or "Character interactions" is based on relevancy)
12. Navigation: Navigation templates go at the end of the article.

Quote Page - Structure

The following sections should always be shown in this order:

1. Select
2. Unselect
3. Ability voice lines
   1. Ability 1: The name of the sub-section should match the abilities name, for example, Abrams' Ability 1 would be called "Siphon Life." Voice lines such as use_power and use_power go here.
   2. Ability 2: For example "Shoulder Charge."
   3. Ability 3: For example "Infernal Resilience."
   4. Ability 4: For example "Seismic Impact."
4. Generic voice lines
   1. Generic kill voice lines: Unspecific voice lines, which are triggered by a kill, such as kill_anyhero, kill_high_networth and similar voice lines.
   2. Item use voice lines
   3. Gameplay voice lines: Contextual voice lines, such as shop_reminder, tower_denied and similar voice lines.
5. Hero-specific voice lines
   1. Enemies: Any lines referring to another Hero on the opposite team, such as pings, kill_hero and similar voice lines.
   2. Allies: Any lines referring to another Hero of the players team, such as pings, killed_in_lane and similar voice lines.
6. Conversations: Match start conversation between Heroes are listed here.
7. Other characters: Voice lines of other characters referring to the Hero, such as Patron match_start voice lines.
8. Removed and unused voice lines
9. Other voice lines: All voice lines that do not fit the above categories in any way.

Spelling

American spelling, grammar, and sentence structure is used on the wiki and any templates involved. There is one exception:

• If quoting a source, never alter any part of the quotation, even if it does not use American spelling or contains spelling errors.

Capitalization

Capitalization should be reserved for proper names only. All heroes, items, abilities, monsters, and locations are always capitalized, along with any content that Valve capitalizes regularly, or quoted content.

Punctuation

Commas

Use commas to structure large numbers.

Grammar

Tense

All sections should follow the same tense.

Vocabulary

Formal use of language is mandatory on all wiki pages.

Third Person

• All articles are written in third person.
• Never use 'you' when referring to the reader.

Formality and neutrality

• Never use contracted forms.
• Never instruct readers in directing information, or presume readers knowledge about specific information. Do not inject point of view or subjective perspectives.
• Strategy sections may take some liberties with recommendations, but should also give reasons for why specific outcomes may or may not work.

Categorization

Every page should have a category, including images.