VirtueVerse Maintenance: Fridays at 2300 EST

From Unofficial Handbook of the Virtue Universe

Please provide direct link to whatever thread is discussing this page. I've just spent half an hour scanning the forums, and cannot find a relevant topic. Thank you. --LooneyToons 04:32, 28 August 2007 (MST)

All categories that players wish to discuss can be created under General UHVU Discussion, As the Mods and Admins will be streamlining the categories soon as well as locking them to prevent further misc additions we will be taking recommendations/feedback on the forums so if there is a category you wish to see deleted, merged or changed it behooves you to particapate and make your voice heard.

We will not be using the discussion pages to reach a consensus --Scarfgirl 10:38, 28 August 2007 (MST)

I could not find one either. Seems like this needs to be discussed since it appears to be pretty Redundant. Perhaps add it to the Redundant category?

I believe that this category is overly specialized. Since a category for "Female" already exists, shouldn't this be changed to just "Magical"? --Quindorrian 09:19, 11 July 2007 (MST)

"Magical Girl" is a term with a specific meaning: teenagers (and sometimes tweens or even younger girls) mystically empowered to fight evil, popularized in Japanese media. Typical features of the genre include toyetic items that allow the heroine(s) to transform to their heroic identity (in lushly animated stock footage), "called attacks" (powers with improbable and elaborate names that are always spoken/shouted when they are used), talking animals that function as advisors, and masked love-interests (Kamen) who mysteriously appear to rescue the protagonist from a too-strong opponent, or at least buy her time to recover and defeat it herself.

Sailor Moon (and her fellow Sailor Scouts) and Card Captor Sakura, to use some of the most popular/well-known examples in America, are magical girls. Rather amusingly, the first season of Buffy the Vampire Slayer also follows the formula fairly closely. (Joss Whedon is a huge SM fan.) --Megajoule 09:44, 11 July 2007 (MST)

None the less, without suggesting this isnt a valid theme. I think this is the type of thing that should be minimized. Otherwise there will be thousands of them for every mix and match cartoon or comic style. I vote for what it is worth that simplicity for order is better. It opens the door to "Cyborgs that were human" as a diff catigory then "Humans that were cyborgs". woefull

Sorry, I disagree. "Magical Girl" -- Mahou Shojou -- is a broad category that encompasses many types of heroine that share a common theme. Yet it's also specific enough that you can say "it's a magical girl show" and many folks will know exactly what kind of program you're talking about. And is it any worse than, say "Alien", "Dimensional Traveler" or other similar categorizations? It identifies an archetype. Maybe not one of the five big-A Archetypes enshrined in the game, but it is an archetype, just like "Speedster" or "Gadgeteer" are. As for the suggestion that it'll spawn thousands of trivial subcategories, well, there's no evidence of that so far. Punishment after the crime, not because you think the crime might happen.

Oh, by the way, Megajoule, we ought to put that masterful summary of yours into the category page proper. Any objections? --LooneyToons 10:04, 11 July 2007 (MST)

Do it. DOOOO EEEEEET!!!

-- Soul Train 10:11, 11 July 2007 (MST)

Heh. Well, if it's going to be "definitive," I may end up tinkering with it a bit, after the fact - but sure, go for it. (I was making a talk-page argument off the top of my head; others, including *cough* some members of my playgroup, whose characters these are, may have a better definition.) --Megajoule 10:49, 11 July 2007 (MST)

Your point was well made, and well stated.woefull

Are they magical? Are they female? Are they teens? We already those. Those things will never change (so to speak) but magical girl from what you say is a style. Should be have categorys for play style themes? We do have them in a sence I guess with loner. woefull

After hearing several of these points that were made, I still disagree with making this its own category. I thought the general rule is that a category cannot be a combination of other categories? If you say that this is a particular style of character, then perhaps a category should be created for that style? Perhaps a category called "Anime Character" should be created for characters of this style? That would allow male characters to also fall under this character and would also allow for non-magical anime style characters as well. --Quindorrian 10:59, 11 July 2007 (MST)

Good point. I likey woefull

You might as well make another category for "Comic Book Character" and put half of the entries on this site into it. Magical girls are a specific archetype/genre. (See Looney Tunes' comments above.) --Megajoule 11:35, 11 July 2007 (MST)

Exactly, I don't think magical girl is any less broad then some of the other categories. Yes it does fall under a broader anime category, but truthfully how many other categories is Anime really going to spawn? Not many, most anime archetypes fall under standard archetypes already here like Hero, Villain, etc. -Ransim 11:43, 11 July 2007 (MST)

No. The difference is that "Comic Book Character" is extremely broad and not specific at all, where-as "Anime Character" is specific enough to get an accurate picture of the character. When "Anime Character" is combined the with "Female" and "Magic" categories, you get the exact type of character you are speaking of. In addition, these separate categories can be combined in different ways to describe different characters. Finally, I also wish to say that the term "Magical girl" is not a good descripter for this category to begin with. Only someone who is a fan of anime would have a clue that it is an anime specific term.--Quindorrian 11:53, 11 July 2007 (MST)

And because you are obviously not a fan, you have no clue how broad a category "Anime" really is. Consider, for example, that Western animation (even just 2D cel animation) covers everything from Disney to Spike and Mike and Heavy Metal. --Megajoule 12:09, 11 July 2007 (MST)

I think more people are cued in to the term then you think given how highly popular it is. I think Anime Character as a category would be redundant given most anime character archetypes already exist here as categories or existing game archetypes. Given that would Anime Character be in direct competition with the existing character category? The only difference characters in anime have with some of the existing categories is the naming, but I don't think we have any categories that cover what a magical girl is. But like I said, most people especially the younger set know what a magical girl is, they grew up watching Sailor Moon, and Card Captor Sakura. - Ransim 12:06, 11 July 2007 (MST)

Obviously, you are a fan. It is obvious by your vehement defense of the category. Would "Japanese-Style Anime Character" be more fitting? Also, I don't see a category for anime character.--Quindorrian 12:17, 11 July 2007 (MST)

"Japanese-Style Anime" is redundant. I submit that you do not have the necessary context or knowledge to discuss this, any more than I could have an informed discussion with you on the various subtypes of "metal" music - it all sounds the same to me. (And "Anime Character" is still a hypothetical category at this point, one that I would be opposed to for the reasons stated above.) --Megajoule 12:21, 11 July 2007 (MST)

BTW, if "metal musician" were a category here, I would not be complaining that it was too broad EVEN THOUGH there are more sub-genres of metal than ANY other form of music. You have to put it into context on this site. Some categories are just not meant to be so specific. --Quindorrian 21:08, 14 July 2007 (MST)

Truthfully no I'm not a fan, I hated Sailor Moon, and Buffy, and dislike most stuff in that style given how much it patronizes to overtly feminine girls usually focused more on boys and trivial life matters then the things girls should be focused on. And while they often purport to make girls stronger and empowered, they generally do neither presenting a ideal that real girls can never achieve.

That said, I'm speaking on the basis of looking at the Wiki Categories as they currently stand, and redundancy is a problem. I do feel strongly that by creating an "Anime Character" or "Japanese Style Character" or whatever type category is only inviting redundancy. Most anime characters fall under archetypes that already have categories, for example: the Hero, the Villain, Catgirl, Demon, Vampire, Cyborg, etc.

Now if you want my two cents, there are plenty of categories that should be sub cats to existing ones. Magical Girl could very easily be a subcat to Teenager. Lycanthrope and Werewolf can be a sub cat to shapeshifter, and those are just two examples right off the top of my head. My point is simply that the category does have merit, its something thats been around over 10 years now, and its part of popular culture enough that *most* people will recognize it. - Ransim 12:34, 11 July 2007 (MST)

I fully agree, do we need Inventor, engineer and gadgets? woefull

I may be wrong, but wasent there some talk about vampires and category division? Something about there are at least five sub types of vampires and not using them, but putting them all just under "vampire"? If you have this category for these reasons I dont see how you cant allow a Brujah, Sabbat and even Kine as a category. (and yes I had to wiki that) woefull

You mean, aside from them all being copyrighted terms from another game that has nothing to do with superheroes? :p --Megajoule 13:09, 11 July 2007 (MST)

If copyright is the only reason, then nevermind.woefull

"Dreadfully unoriginal", "doesn't fit the genre", and "you have your own game for that, why do you have to bring it here?" also come to mind, but those are personal opinions and probably not relevant (especially to this discussion). --Megajoule 13:40, 11 July 2007 (MST)

Ok, here goes...

There is a big balance when it comes to creating character categories. Categories that are too general tend to not give enough information or insight to describe the character. Categories that are too specialized run the risk of causing everyone to want to create a category for every little thing.

I will say that Lycanthrope is already a subcategory under shapeshifter, and I believe werewolf is already a sub-category under that. So, that problem is solved.

Going back to the topic at hand... Let me present a scenario to try to better clarify what I am talking about. Let's say that a person wants to create a Yui-Gi-Oh style character and make it a male character... Upon browsing over the categories, he see that there is no category for Japanese anime style characters, so he creates one... Now, the user who has a sailor-moon style character sees this category and decides to add this to her character. After all, this is a perfect descriptor for her character. So, now, she has the following categories under her character: "magical girl", "Japanese anime style character", "female", and "magic". Now, the problem here is that the category "magical girl" is a confusing term to the uninitiated to begin with and easily misunderstood. But, you also have to realize that you have a bunch of redundant categories now. But, categories aren't supposed to be redundant to this level, are they?

My point is: yes, we can analyze this down to the tiniest detail and split it up into 10000000 categories if we wanted too, but if there are overlaps, it would be a big waste of time and do nothing for the wiki. Do we really need to go this far? Technically, "Magical Girl" is a subgenre to begin with. My only feeling at this point is that the category should not be gender specific since there are already categories for gender. If the powers that be still want to keep this category as is, there is not much more that I can say...--Quindorrian 13:49, 11 July 2007 (MST)

I dunno. Personally, I can see us using subcats if people need them.

For example:

Cartoons

 \--- Japanese Anime
          \--- Magical Girl
                  \--- "Sailor Moon"

Would work just as well as:

Hero

 \--- Technological Origin
           \--- Power Armor
                  \--- "Iron Man"

in that each is a subset of the one above it. Now, that said, I'm not a fan of atomic-level categories (where each only has one member), but at the same time, if a genre or category is broad enough for multiple people to construct heroes (or villains) within it (as part and parcel of their character concept, NOT what the game 'supports') then they are perfectly valid here. I DO see a lot of Sailor-Moon'ish characters, so I think the category would not hurt for members.

If there were a sudden proliferation of [[Category:Blaxploitation]] then Soul Train would be a member. But right now, I don't think very many people on Virtue are trying to model characters after Coffey or Shaft, or bad Samuel L. Jackson roles... so I'm not about to create the category just for one character. -- Soul Train

I don't think we necessarily need a Japanese anime or even cartoon category. I think thats too specific, especially given we have the broad reaching character category already and the origin categories, but certainly:

\--Character

     \--Teenager
           \--Magical Girl

or

\--Character

     \--Origin
          \--Magic
               \--Magical Girl
                \--Sorcerer
                 \--Magician

Alright I'm gonna stop, almost time to do home and I think if I keep thinking in this category type sense I'll go bonkers in the fifteen minutes before I leave. But I think teenager is a better broad fit for Magical Girl then the Magic Origin Category. - Ransim 14:14, 11 July 2007 (MST)

Actually that last one makes the most sense to me. -- Soul Train 14:51, 11 July 2007 (MST)

In response to Quindorrian's staement: "No. The difference is that "Comic Book Character" is extremely broad and not specific at all, where-as "Anime Character" is specific enough to get an accurate picture of the character." I think this is absolutely untrue. Anybody who's familiar with modern anime knows that it spans pretty much every genre out there - possibly even more than comics themselves - and anybody who thought they could form an accurate picture of the character based only on "anime character" would probably be tremendously over-generalising. "Anime character" tells you almost nothing of any value about a character, so it would be a useless category except possibly to say "drawn in an anime-ish style when separated from the in-game model". And even that's reaching. Does "anime character" really give you any idea of what Black Caiman is? What about Jackson Ketch? I don't think so, but they would both fall into that category, as would all my characters.

I think "Magical Girl" is a valid category because it refers to a specific archetype which is a combination of more and more specific traits than female, teenager, and magic - the same way that "vampire" is more than combination of magic, undead, and oversexed. Yes, we shouldn't be too specific with categories, but we have to be specific to some degree, or it's pointless (incidentally, I noticed that somebody used the "werewolf" category as an example - I actually would never have bothered creating it if I had noticed the "lycanthrope" category first. "Shapeshifter" is very generic, but "lycanthrope" is a much more specific term, which I think is a quite appropriate level). And shifting things into subcategories is just asking for trouble - there might be Power Armour wearers who aren't tech origin, for example, and even magicians who aren't magic origin (these might merely be aspects of the characters, rather than the source of their super powers). And there are occasionally magical girls who aren't teenagers, too. In short, I don't think more specific character traits should be couple to origins unless there is no chance that they don't fall into that category, like shapeshifters and lycanthropes.

Incidentally, I hate magical girl shows, so don't be accusing me of fan blindness XP --Fox Lee 14:55, 11 July 2007 (MST)

OK. I subcatted this under Magic and Character Categories, with Megajoule's explanation as to what it means. I think it works as a generalized 'type' of character, but doesn't get TOO specific. Thoughts? -- Soul Train 14:58, 11 July 2007 (MST)

I think that works for me as well, and I think this sort of idea could be expanded to cover some of the other categories that are in a similar kind of situation, like Engineer could easily go under Origin -> Technology, Mad Scientist could go under Origin -> Science. It makes more sense to me that way then it just being some broad character type right underneath the main character category. It would clean up that folder a lot too. - Ransim 17:18, 11 July 2007 (MST)

I'll second/go along with that. --Megajoule 17:24, 11 July 2007 (MST)

I would be very careful putting certain things in subcats. For instance, Engineer is not neccessarily part of someone's Origin. A natural Origin character could easily be an engineer in his spare time, and so could a magic or any other origin. The same goes with Mad Scientist. These should NOT be subcategories of Origin because they can have nothing to do with origin. In this case, a mutant could easily be a mad scientist.

This can get very technical in nature, and I am not sure if many of the users are able to properly wield wiki tools and logic to accurately subcategorize everything. The only reason I pointed this one out to begin with is partly because I never heard the term "magical girl" refer to anime, and secondly because I think that the category should be genderless. I realize that there are vast differences between different types of Japanese Anime, but the same can be said about many things. I guess the line has to be drawn somewhere.--Quindorrian 17:58, 11 July 2007 (MST)

Very strongly seconding your point about Origins there. To assume that a job, vocation, hobby, skill or personality trait is tied to any specific origin is to be wrong. A "Mad scientist" does not need to be created by science any more than a video game fan needs to be created by a video game. An engineer is no more inherently part of the "technology" origin category than a biologist belongs in the "animal" category. Magical Girl is probably safe in "magic", but subcategorising things like professions under origins a bad move. --Fox Lee 19:50, 11 July 2007 (MST)

This is a muddy issue, mainly because half the people talking about it have no idea what they're talking about. In all seriousness, Magical Girl, for those who know the term, conjures up a meaning, but then, so does Kine for those who know the term from its context. The fact is, Magical Girls carry with them a lot of tropes.

Personally, I feel that the solution should be pragmatic; let the Magical girls be Magical Girls, because to them, and the characters made to fit the type, the phrase actually has some meaning, whereas to those who don't understand it, it's greek.

To assume that Magical Girl, from a position of ignorance, is the same as Teenage, Magic, and Female together, is just twittery, though. It'd be like assuming that a Mass Driver is called that because it pilots a car and weighs something. Words lend their context to the words around them.

I don't go around telling Vampires characters that their category should be 'dead', after all. - Talen, Ninja Moding in his typical acerbic way.

The point however is that Magical Girls do fit under the Teenager or Magic and Female BROAD categories. They are teens, they are magic and they are female. It was a point made on ignorance it was a point made on logic based on my knowledge of it whether I like it or not. Magical Girl may be the topic at hand but i think this actually spurned a larger topic regarding categorizing things. And I think you do most users a disservice by assuming they couldn't navigate a wiki or the category system. Most people use Wikipedia proficiently, and Wikipedia has a HUGE category system there. Because if you can't find a specific category thats what the search function is for. - 66.92.167.70 19:14, 11 July 2007 (MST)

Yes, and what I'm saying is that if you don't know what you're talking about, your position should not be one of 'do as I say', but one of 'why is it so'. Besides, off the top of my head, there are at least four Magical Girl characters who do not fit the Teenage, Magical and Girl category, as one group are in fact boys, one is older than time and not, in fact, a teenager, and then there's the whole slew of them that are technological.

So no, Magical Girls do not necessarily fit the three categories you mentioned. It's its own thing that has many different interpretations and is far more than the sum of its verbal parts. - Talen, Still Ninja

I understand where you are coming from after researching "magical girls" a little more closely. I just think that the verbal terminology is confusing and should be changed so that poeple won't misinterpret it at a glance (like I did). "Magical Girls" are really a manga subgenre, so that is why I suggested a slightly broader category. I know, me personally not being a manga or anime fan, I still would picture a sailor moon type character immediately if you told me it was a female magic manga type character. I think we really need to make categories as self-explanatory as possible. This is not always possible, but I truly believe it is in this particular case. And, I also don't feel that we need to truly differentiate sailor moon type characters, from Vampire Hunter D characters, from other manga and anime characters on this site. I think it is enough to classify it as simply a Japanese-anime style character for the purposes of this site. Of course, I am not a die-hard fan, but there are things that I am a die-hard fan of, that I am willing to compromise on (and have compromised on), when it comes to these categories. Just my thoughts, and I don't mind either way, but it is something to think about.--Quindorrian 20:17, 11 July 2007 (MST)

Oh, god, absolutely. I can't stand the genre and find even its parodies and satires to be god-awful. I think they deserve differentation for the same reason that 'dark' heroes deserve to be differentiated from comedy, four-colour golden-age style heroes. - Talen, Ninja'd

Alright now you're got my curiousity involved... I know a bit about it, but for the most part really dislike it myself, the sub types of magical girls I knew about were the Magic Warrior, the Dark Magical Girl and the Cute Witch, but boys? The Magic Warrior type is the most popular and the most readily identified one, especially outside of Japan. But I've definitely never heard of a magical boys genre, but to be honest the whole Yaoi thing thats popular now kinda weirds me out... especially seeing moms getting their daughters into it. Just creepy... - Ransim 21:00, 11 July 2007 (MST)

Actually, the Sailor Stars are boys that transform into girls as part of their Magical Girl transformation. You can also see this in the webcomic... uh, hell, forgot its name, Magical Super Valkyrie, I think it's called. Anyway, the point is, it's not so niche. Sailor Pluto, from Sailor Moon (THE Magical Girl series) is an adult woman, and the Sailor Stars are, well, guys, who turn into girls. There's also a surfeit of 'magical girl' styled characters who use technology - the most recent incarnation of same escapes me, but it's a common enough trope.

The thing is, for example, Witch Hunter Robin is a teenager, magic user, female, and an anime character, and she is definitely not a Magical Girl. One is not the sum of the other.

As for mothers getting their daughters into yaoi, thank god. At worst, we run the risk of having a generation of people who aren't terrified of the 'wrongness' of sex and sexuality, an issue dear to my heart. If it means that parents and children are communicating on this important issue, then hells yes. - Talen, Liberterian Ninja

IMO wrong kind of communicating, my parents were both very open with me and my brother, we learned the right words to use, never the pet names parents use with children, my mother bought me my first porn mag, and was always very open with me about it. Probably why I wasn't so rushed to do it as a teenager, and didn't end up like almost all the other girls in my class, pregnant at least once or more before graduating. The yaoi thing takes it to a whole weird creepy level though, I'm quite open but I found something frightening about older women teaching their young daughters about the wonders of boy on boy relations, not men on men, and not even necessarily homosexual relations, but boy on boy. Nevermind the few times I heard mothers encouraging their daughters to chase boys at conventions, some they didn't even know to hit them with yaoi paddles even when they continued to protest. Bad bad things I see in that all around, not only is it pushing negative behavior thats bordering on sexual harassment, its an unhealthy idolization for young, impressionable, often under the age of 15 girls. I dunno i found it creepy when one of my ex's told me his dad had shared his barely legal porn with him too. Creepy... - Ransim 22:31, 11 July 2007 (MST)

I'm from an opposite spectrum; my parents never talked about the matter, made it clear it was sinful, and I can count on the fingers of one hand the number of times my parents made the subject known around me. I learned everything I ever did about sex from reading, of all things, a dictionary, followed by an encyclopedia, just because well, it would give me answers. So from where I sit, parents communicating: Good. What you're describing there is pretty lurid behaviour in ANY person, so I'm not sure it's yaoi's fault. Besides, there are terminology issues at work here. Still, interesting to hear a tale of someone raised with a parent who knew a thing or two. - Talen, slightly bitter at his parents still.

There's also a surfeit of 'magical girl' styled characters who use technology - the most recent incarnation of same escapes me, but it's a common enough trope.I believe you're probably thinking of Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha which is a clever blend of homage to and deconstruction of the genre. Nanoha also blows away the "Teenage, Female, Magic" assumption because while she is female, she's nine and her artifact is indeed a technological item (which manipulates magic for her -- but magic is just another branch of science). --LooneyToons 10:15, 12 July 2007 (MST)

I find it insulting that I keep reading statments like 'if you dont agree, you dont know what I know'. So far we have had a very good exhange and debate on this topic. .woefull

I suppose, as the person who originally created this category, that I should have something to say.

When I was creating my original entry for Alexis Morgan, I looked at the character categories category, and saw the sort of things that were there - assassin, vigilante, time traveller, student, and so on. (Though I'm not certain all those were there at the time.) And then I created magical girl, because it seemed on a similar level, and because I knew it was a concept that would probably see a fair amount of use. (At least, I see quite a few people who *dress* like magical girls when I play.)

Magical girl to me is really about having a certain sort of style. It's not about using magic (though that's often a part of it), it's not about the outfit (though there tend to be some similarities here too), and it's certainly not about being a teenager (though this one is pretty common too). Cheesy speeches, those you usually get. Transformation sequences, stock footage attacks, ten foot wide pink reinforced concrete hearts...

(Being female, however, seems to usually be a part of the package. Starlights aside, I've never run into anything with male characters that has the same sort of feel to it. It's hard to have a unisex term for something when you've only ever seen it in one gender...)

But it's a term that, to people who are familiar to it, instantly tells them significant things about the overall feel of the character. (Even if there is some argument about who is and isn't a magical girl - for instance, I wouldn't consider Sakura one. But I would consider the combat cyborg who is the main character of a certain series to be one, because she has the style.)

I also don't think magical girl really belongs as a sub-category of magic. Aside from arguments that have already been presented... Well, imagine this was the Freedom wiki, and I was making a page for Elenium, a technology origin magical girl I have. Why would I look under magic to find a category for a technology character? I don't think it's good to have something as a subcategory unless it's always a part of that category by inherent nature, such as with lycanthrope. By definition a lycanthrope is a shapeshifter, so it belongs there. Magic is not such an inherent part of magical girls. Discord-chan 22:37, 13 July 2007 (MST)

I totally agree with Discord-chan here. Also, I'd like to point out... my last talk got completely smothered under people talking about their childhoods, so here it is again...

I understand where you are coming from after researching "magical girls" a little more closely. I just think that the verbal terminology is confusing and should be changed so that poeple won't misinterpret it at a glance (like I did). "Magical Girls" are really a manga subgenre, so that is why I suggested a slightly broader category. I know, me personally not being a manga or anime fan, I still would picture a sailor moon type character immediately if you told me it was a female, magic, manga-type, character. I think we really need to make categories as self-explanatory as possible. This is not always possible, but I truly believe it is in this particular case. And, I also don't feel that we need to truly differentiate sailor moon type characters, from Vampire Hunter D characters, from other manga and anime characters on this site. I think it is enough to classify it as simply a Japanese-anime style character for the purposes of this site. Of course, I am not a die-hard fan, but there are things that I am a die-hard fan of, that I am willing to compromise on (and have compromised on), when it comes to these categories. Just my thoughts, and I don't mind either way, but it is something to think about.--Quindorrian 09:07, 14 July 2007 (MST)

That's kind of funny, I thought I was disagreeing with you. `.`

The problem with changing the term is that we already have the right word for the job. "Magical girl" is the term for magical girls. It's the thing that you can enter in wikipedia or google and get information on. Compare to lycanthrope. Someone unfamiliar with the term is not going to be able to guess what it means, but as it is the accepted term for it's subject, finding information is not going to be difficult. And now, like lycanthrope, magical girl has a quick introduction on the category page. I don't think there's a way to make a self-explanatory name that wouldn't be too cumbersome to be useful or no longer mean the same thing. Nor am I convinced that making category names self-explanatory is any real virtue. It's better to use the appropriate term for the subject, because people who care about it will know what it means.

As for a category for "anime style characters", this is simply ludicrous. It's just too broad a category to be useful. I could pick almost any non-CoH specific character category we have and point to an anime containing an example. Putting someone in such a category would do nothing to differentiate them from any other random alien, time traveller, or esper you meet on the street. Which, I believe, is the point of having character categories - to group together characters who have something significant in common. If too many characters in a category don't have anything significant in common, there's something wrong. Discord-chan 11:38, 14 July 2007 (MST)

You are still missing my point. Too broad? How would a non-magical girl fan know/care if it was too broad? The term "magical girls" is too narrow. I state again: Magical girl is a manga subgenre to begin with! How is it ok for it to be a subcategory of manga but a main category on the virtue server? It just doesn't make sense. And, your example of lycanthrope does not make sense, because lycanthrope is accurately subcategorized under shape-shifters. As for alien: can you name any known alien races? Of course not. Therefore, that is as narrow as it can get. Everyone STILL misses my points about male characters. And, most importantly, everyone still misses the point I made about redundancy. Do I need to copy and paste the example again? Ok here it is:

Let me present a scenario to try to better clarify what I am talking about. Let's say that a person wants to create a Yui-Gi-Oh style character and make it a male character... Upon browsing over the categories, he see that there is no category for Japanese anime style characters, so he creates one... Now, the user who has a sailor-moon style character sees this category and decides to add this to her character. After all, this is a perfect descriptor for her character. So, now, she has the following categories under her character: "magical girl", "Japanese anime style character", "female", and "magic". Now, the problem here is that the category "magical girl" is a confusing term to the uninitiated to begin with and easily misunderstood. But, you also have to realize that you have a bunch of redundant categories now. But, categories aren't supposed to be redundant to this level, are they?

Why many people miss this point, is because they want to miss the point. I sense a ton of bias in the arguments made here. What, magical girl deserves to be its own category because... why? People just don't get how categories work. You can't justify keeping magical girl by saying the rules are broken elsewhere. That is a called a logical fallacy. And, people say the rules are broken elsewhere when they are not. This is getting retarded, IMO. I am about to create a new category just to prove my point.--Quindorrian 20:54, 14 July 2007 (MST)

The term I was saying was too broad is "anime style characters". There's no purpose in having a category that covers so many unrelated things. Magical girl is narrow enough to be useful. (While you're at it, if you believe the wikipedia article, the "magical girl" genre was spawned by an American live action show...)

"And, your example of lycanthrope does not make sense, because lycanthrope is accurately subcategorized under shape-shifters." This was the point of my example. Lycanthrope is accurately subcategorized under shape-shifters. Magical girl would not be accurately categorized under magic. (Leaving aside the magical girl combat cyborgs and/or androids... In CoH of all games, it should be easy to imagine some rich inventor using machines to duplicate the abilities shown in her favorite shows...)

I understand your point about male characters, but I don't see it as meaningful unless you can actually produce a male character that fits in the category. Male magic users, yes, but I've never seen any that have the same sort of style.

In your scenario, the answer is to remove the "Japanese anime style character" category, because it is overly broad. The redundancy problem then becomes moot.

"Magical girl" being a confusing term isn't an argument I find credible, simply because so many of the other categories would also be confusing to those unfamiliar with them. "Lycanthrope", as I've said before, is completely opaque to someone who hasn't heard the term. If I hadn't read spoilers for story arcs I haven't reached on any characters, I'd have no idea what a "praetorian" was. I never would have guessed what "multiple species" meant. Not everything can be self-explanatory. But in actual usage, I think most people who want to use a category will know what it means, and most other people won't have any reason to care. But if they do want to know, they can just check the category page, and it tells them. (Well, except for the "praetorian" category page. There you're pretty much out of luck.)

What are these rules you speak of? And yes, I'm quite serious here. I can't find any rules pages on the wiki. This makes saying rules are being broken anywhere somewhat difficult. So I evaluate things based on their organizational usefulness. Category:The_Eclipse_Wing doesn't belong in character categories, because that's not where supergroups go, both by established practice and because having all the supergroups in there would make other character categories hard to find. (There are already noticably more supergroups than there are other character categories.) The other non-basic categories group things together by various interesting traits. I see magical girl as being on the same level as those traits. If there's a problem with magical girl, then I wonder what purpose you see in any of the others, since they all serve the same basic purpose. Discord-chan 10:19, 15 July 2007 (MST)

Very well put, Discord-chan. If "magical girl" is somehow invalid according to these ill-defined and as-yet unlocated rules that Quindorrian hints exist someplace, then, hell, all the "character type" categories other than the basic five archetypes are just as invalid, and should be purged as ruthlessly.

Seriously, though, I'm trying to figure out just why Quindorrian seems so obsessed with this -- it's almost as if he's taken personal offense somehow at the concept. Everyone else seems to have shaken out into either "cool" or "eh, don't agree, but it's not a big deal". Only Q here is going at it like a dog worrying a bone. Why? --LooneyToons 15:32, 15 July 2007 (MST)

I must say, inferring that people are retarded, claiming an unproveable bias and then going on to wax vituperous about logical fallacies broke my irony meter rather quickly.

This is not a fricking taxonomy paper, and a real taxonomist will tell you how laughable the stance is. This is a reference document. Terms should be weighted first and foremost by whether or not they are meaningful. People who recognise a term should be going through their characters and double-checking things about them, much like how Fox Lee has, to her credit, gone through and added the 'Avatar' category to numerous characters who are, in fact, Avatars, leaving some grey areas and I expect, contacting the owners of those characters.

The fact is, you, who admit to know little on the subject, don't understand something, and are trying to argue with those who do. The tag's not meant for you. I don't really 'get' Golden Age heroes - why the hell would I want to wade in and tell people the term is meaningless because we already have a 'hero' category? - Ninja Talen, censured.

This page is a lot of tl;dr. Leave the freakin' category alone. The last thing we need is more Wikipedia wars over "notability". --Meagen 17:13, 15 July 2007 (MST)

Quick note to Quindorrian: I want to point out that your problem with the name of the category being misleading is somewhat misplaced, given that you use "lycanthrope" as an example. Consider: "Lycanthrope" technically refers only to werewolves, yet the term has - to those who use it commonly, such as fantasy writers - become known to refer to all sorts of zoanthropes/therianthropes. This is exactly like the term "magical girl" - it has a greater meaning to those who are specifically interested in it than to these who aren't. Just because some users don't know the specific meaning because they're unfamiliar with the parent media (I am loathe to call anime a "genre", because it really isn't), doesn't mean that it's not acceptable as a category.

Consider that "Catgirl" also has specific meanings which entail more than just "female" and "feline", includes males as well as females despite implying only one gender, and is a story trope originating in anime. If "Magical Girl" is too specific, why not protest "Catgirl" too?

Also, Re: Discord-chan: "The Eclipse Wing" was in the "Character Categories" category 'cus I mistakenly thought that's where Supergroups were supposed to go. Somebody bitched about it on one of my other supergriup categories, so I took it down - didn't realise it was still on Eclipse Wing too. --Fox Lee 19:35, 15 July 2007 (MST)

If nothing else, could we rename this to the Japanese terminology in order to remove the confusion which sparked this whole debate? Anyone who knows whot the phrase "Magical girl" is supposed to mean will probably also recognise "Mahou Shojou" or whatever the appropriate term for the genre in the original language is, but noone is likely to accidentally mistake "Shoujo" for something appropriate to put their snarky teenage wizardess into without at least having to try to read the description. -JusticeZero

Justice, this is exactly what I am suggesting! Everyone seems to have missed the point of what I was trying to say, but this is exactly it. While I understand the need to not be overly critical, you also don't want the terminology to be confusing for any new users who are trying to categorize their character. Even if you feel that the category is valid, surely you have to see the point about confusing terminology? And, one more thing I wish to say to Discord Chan is that when I speak of the term being confusing, I mean that it can be misinterpretted to mean something else by the uninitiated. The term "lycanthrope" cannot be confused to mean something different. But, "magical girl" can. That is what I mean by confusing. --Quindorrian 15:50, 19 July 2007 (MST)

Ur... "I want to point out that your problem with the name of the category being misleading is somewhat misplaced, given that you use "lycanthrope" as an example. Consider: "Lycanthrope" technically refers only to werewolves, yet the term has - to those who use it commonly, such as fantasy writers - become known to refer to all sorts of zoanthropes/therianthropes. This is exactly like the term "magical girl" - it has a greater meaning to those who are specifically interested in it than to these who aren't. Just because some users don't know the specific meaning because they're unfamiliar with the parent media (I am loathe to call anime a "genre", because it really isn't), doesn't mean that it's not acceptable as a category." --Fox Lee 16:36, 19 July 2007 (MST)

Oh well... So do me a favor, and ask anyone who has never heard the term "magical girl" (which is FAR more people than you think), what they think it means. I am willing to bet STACKS of money that they will think it means "a girl who is magic". Most people that have heard the term lycanthrope would either not know what it means at all, or would accurately tell you what it means. Don't believe me? Test it yourself. Take a survey. Ask people. I aleady did a mini survey, and guess what? 20 out of 20 people I asked had no clue what "magical girls" referred too, but 7 out of 20 had an idea what lycanthrope referred too. And, that is just from asking friends, relatives, and coworkers. I still say that the term is confusing. Some of my arguments got completely ignored, but that is ok. In actuality, it may never create a problem since this wiki site is not a widespread phenomenon. So, I am probably getting way too overzealous about this. Now, if you'll excuse me, I am heading to my local Blockbuster Video, Walmart, and Target stores to tell them that they need to add a category to their shelves for magical girls. It is just way too difficult to find the latest Sailor Moon video under that shelf labeled "anime".

(Deleted by user. No point.) --Talen Lee 07:26, 20 July 2007 (MST)

Okay, a summary of a distillation of a compression of Quindorrian's argument: "I don't want to expand my definitions; I want you to come down to my level of ignorance!" --LooneyToons 10:08, 20 July 2007 (MST)

Well I don't know if its that ba... well, OK, the discussion is, but, um, yeah.

Seriously, though. This category (and many others) are NOT FOR LAYMEN. If the term "Magical Girl" holds no meaning for you (and you honestly get no value out of the definition offered up by Megajoule) then I would suggest, rather than getting it changed... don't USE it. It's designed for a niche of characters that are defined within this subset. And six pages of *ahem* discourse is unlikely to make anyone shoehorn the category elsewhere. The same could be said for Saiy-jin, Kitsune, Djinn, Brownies, or any other relatively obscure character type. It exists for those who know what it's about, as another method of grouping. But it's not REQUIRED. No category is, really, except for the basics.

Now, that said, we should quit wasting our time belaboring the semantics of this particular category, and go dress up our character backgrounds instead!!! *phhphht!!* -- Soul Train

Deciding that the term magical girl is for the advanced players and all the stupid people should just pretend we dont see it, is really silly. The argument that it is confusing to us stupid people is THE POINT of the argument. To say that the people who dont understand it should just not use it is like saying people who drive badly shouldnt drive, well duh. But this is a place for all the players and not just the ones will brilliant insight into the the emotional and deeper meanings of sailor moon. It would be nice to have a world were we can just say you dont get it, so dont use it, but it is not a solution. This is a page set up ( and im thanfull it is) for people who play City of Heroes and city of Villians on the virtue server. Not for a Abbot and Costello like argument. Woefull

• Sigh* Now, where did I go calling people 'stupid'? "Layman" != "stupid". Soul Train

Quote: "Okay, a summary of a distillation of a compression of Quindorrian's argument: "I don't want to expand my definitions; I want you to come down to my level of ignorance!" --LooneyToons 10:08, 20 July 2007 (MST)"

A summary of your statement: "I and several others are elitist, and you are not in the club". Point taken.--Quindorrian 12:08, 20 July 2007 (MST)

Are we still arguing about this? Why?

Look, the category is useful and understood by those to whom it applies, and explained (to the best of my ability) on the category page for everyone else. What more do we need, and why do you even care?

The fact that you know (apparently) nothing about anime beyond "big eyes and short skirts" does not make you stupid. The fact that I know nothing about metal beyond "big hair and screaming guitars" does not make me stupid. What it means is that some of us have little or no context for this discussion, and those who do not understand what this category is about (still, even now) should probably just walk away. --Megajoule 12:17, 20 July 2007 (MST)