Marvel Database
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Marvel Database

These Article Guidelines explain what kind of content that should be added in each of the prearranged sections of an article. The Marvel Database provides the tools necessary for the creation of articles for the following:

  • In-story elements (both entirely fictional and adapted from real life)
    • Characters
    • Teams
    • Organizations
    • Locations
    • Vehicles
    • Items
    • Races and Species
    • Realities
  • Published material
    • Single comic book issues
    • Comic book volumes
    • Comic book storylines
    • Comic book events
    • Animated series
    • Live-action series
    • Movies
    • Video games
  • Marvel Comics staff members
  • Disambiguation pages

For the full list of templates, see Templates. For further information on which guidelines to take into account when adding information to an article, please see Manual of Style

Article Creation

The requirements for the creation of an article can be found under the Article Notability Policy.

The first step when creating an article, is to make use of the appropriate template depending on the article's topic. A template automatically generates and organizes the different elements that should be present in an article. For example, pages for characters must make use of the character template, and so on.

When creating an article, please take into account that the purpose of the wiki is to provide its readers with as much information as possible. While it's not expected that every contributor takes this ambition to heart, at the very least be sure to add the minimal amount of information necessary to give readers a satisfactory understanding of the article's subject. In the case of articles for in-story elements, pay notice to the History section and don't spare important details. Only filling out a page's infobox when creating it is not enough. Articles that don't meet these requisites will be considered stubs, and will most likely be deleted once noticed.

Article Naming

Every article in the Marvel Database must must be created with a name that adheres to the Naming Conventions, where the full extent of these guidelines are detailed. The following are only basic elements to take into account for the naming of articles:

  • Use title case, in which all words are capitalized, with the exception of certain subsets like articles, short prepositions and conjunctions.
  • Since Marvel makes use of the concept of alternate realities, the Marvel Database covers many different versions of a given character or group that exist in other realities. Because of this, the articles for characters, teams and organizations should always include between parenthesis the numeric designation of the universe they belong to (e.g. the article for the Avengers is Avengers (Earth-616), "Earth-616" being the numeric designation for the Prime Marvel Universe).
  • The only type of pages pertaining to an individual or group that don't feature a reality designation in their title are disambiguation pages since these articles serve as a hub which lists a character's different counterparts from different universes.
  • Article titles for items, vehicles, races and locations don't require reality designations since all versions from different universes of either of these are grouped in the same article.
  • Character articles should always be named after the character's real name if possible, avoiding diminutives (e.g. the article for the Iron Man of the Prime Marvel Universe is Anthony Stark (Earth-616), not "Tony Stark (Earth-616)")
  • Comic volumes should be named based on the title displayed in the indicia of their respective issues.
  • Avoid including "The" in the title of articles.

Article Layout

For a full explanation of every single available field present in the various templates used in the wiki, please see Help:Template Fields.

Infobox

The infobox represents a summary of information about the subject of an article, containing a set of attribute–value pairs. The infobox is where the most basic and specific information about a subject is displayed along with an image. Articles for in-story elements show an image of their up-to-date appearance, comic articles display the main cover of the publication, and movie articles display the final theatrical poster, for instance. In the case of a character, the infobox will show information that includes their real name, affiliations, weight and height, creators and first appearance. References in the infobox shouldn't be neglected, unless the information is explicitly stated in the history section. Elements such as a character's real name, aliases and physical characteristics should be referenced regardless. Avoid red links for better readability.

Overview

The overview section is a general summary of an article's subject meant for lengthy articles. For the guidelines on the writing of this section, please see the Overview Guidelines.

History

The History is the most important section of articles for in-story elements. It's a concise summary in chronological order of the most important events in the history of an article's subject. When adding information to a History section, be mindful to keep the amount of detail consistent with the rest of the article. This section must be filled using only canonical information without speculation.

When writing about any given event in a History section, it should be taken into consideration whether this event had an impact in the overall history of a subject that was a participant on it, as well as the subject's inherent importance to the world they inhabit. For instance, the article for a character who has starred a monthly series for over fifty years can't include an account of every single event they've gone through. On the other hand, any given antagonist will have more sporadic appearances, so a confrontation between two characters of each of these types might only be worth to mention in the latter's article.

It is greatly discouraged to go into overly-detailed accounts, especially in the articles for characters with a decades-old publication history. Conversely, a page about a character with only a handful of appearances can include more detail about an event they were involved with than an article for a more prominent character can. Avoid adding information that is superfluous to the overall point of the piece of information that is being added. For instance, it's unnecessary to relay every single step in a confrontation between two characters, since in most instances it will only be relevant the fact that they clashed and the outcome of the battle. The specifics of a story should be only delved into in the synopsis in the article for the piece of media where this story unfolded.

It is also necessary to write about events from a perspective limited to the scope in which it affected the subject whose history is being written. Information that doesn't directly pertain to the subject should only be added if they're contextual details that help the understanding of the text.

History sections should also be written with hindsight. If a turn of events that is revealed at a certain point of a character's history recontextualizes information from the past, don't relay this new information at the point of the chronology when it's revealed to the audience, but rather as part of the information from the past it affects. For example, if a character who dies is later revealed to have survived, don't relay that they died and then backtrack to explain they survived, simply provide the information that they survived right away, and establish that their death was apparent all along.

Personality

The Personality section is limited to Character articles. It should provide a summary of a character's mental characteristics, like their behavior, way of thinking and temperament.

Powers and Abilities

The Powers and Abilities section is limited to Character articles. It's separated into four subheadings:

  • Powers: A character's capabilities that are supernatural in comparison to an average human. For example, while in-story, the abilities that a mutant develops are innate and part of their biology, they are considered powers.
  • Abilities: A character's inherent talents and learned skills which are not entirely out of the ordinary. For instance, a character might be a super-genius in ways only feasible in fiction, but if they're genetically a normal human, their super-intelligence should be listed as an ability.
  • Strength level: It's an account of a character's muscular strength, whether it's superhuman or not.
  • Weaknesses: A specific and noteworthy set of vulnerabilities a character possesses which can affect their performance, and they are usually directly linked to the character's powers.

Paraphernalia

The Paraphernalia section is present in Character, Team and Organization articles, it's split in the following subheadings:

  • Equipment: A collection of particular items at a character's disposal, which may serve the purpose to help them perform tasks, like gadgets.
  • Weapons: The tools at a character's disposal meant to be used offensively.
  • Transportation: The ways of traveling around for a character, usually reserved for special means of transportation like custom vehicles.

Appearances

The Appearances section consists of a list in which the elements featured in a published material have to be written down in chronological order (including both appearances and mentions). The Appearances list is divided in the following:

  • Featured Characters: The protagonist(s) of the story. They are the main focus, and usually the character(s) from whose point of view the story unravels.
  • Supporting Characters: Secondary characters whose actions have an effect on either the story's main plot or sub-plots. They help push the story forward.
  • Antagonists: Characters who enter in conflict with the protagonist, and oppose their goals.
  • Other Characters: Characters that play a minor role in the story. They appear, but don't affect the narrative in a significant way. This section is also used to list characters, teams and organizations who are only mentioned or referenced.
  • Races and Species: Any species or race that makes an appearance should be added in this section. They should not be listed anywhere else unless they are an antagonist or supporting character where no member of said race is identified by name.
  • Locations: A list of the different places in which the story takes place, or which are mentioned in it.
  • Items: Any of the objects with an established importance which appear or are mentioned in the story.
  • Vehicles: Any vehicle of importance which appears or is mentioned in the story.

How to add appearances:

  • Appearances have to be catalogued in a bulleted list. Use sub bullets to list below the subsets of a main element (e.g. members of a team and places within locations)
  • The basic format to add the appearance category of an element to a page is the following:
    • * {{a|[[ARTICLE NAME|LINK TEXT]]}}
  • Make use of specific tags to denote something about the way a given subject appears in the published material.
    • Use these tags by replacing the "a" in "{{a|"
    • To make use of more than one tag, place the additional tags after the link.
    • e.g. {{1st|[[Steven Rogers (Earth-616)|Steve Rogers]]}} {{Flashback}} {{Origin}}
    • For a list of the available appearance tags, see Appearance Tags.

A few things to keep in mind:

  • The Featured/Supporting/Other Characters and Antagonists roles are assigned on a issue-by-issue basis (or story-by-story if an issue features multiple stories).
  • A character that appears in a story as a guest star should be listed under Supporting Characters.
  • An antagonist is a character that opposes the protagonist, even if they're a superhero or supervillain. Similarly, it's possible for a supervillain to be a supporting character, or even the protagonist of a story.
  • Characters who only make cameos should always be listed in Other Characters.
  • Characters that appear exclusively in recapitulatory flashbacks should be listed in Other Characters.
  • Characters who are only mentioned in a story should only be listed in Other Characters.
  • Minor appearances consists of when the subject appears in the story but isn't actually present (they might appear in an illusion, a photograph, in a recording (audio or video, does not include a live-feed), in a statue modelled after their likeness, comatose or as a corpse, for example).
  • If a story features a team but some of its members don't appear and are instead only mentioned, these characters should be listed in Other Characters instead of being nested under the team they belong to.
  • Mentions are not necessary to be listed if the character makes some kind of appearance, be it major or minor.
  • Be sure to make appropriate use of the appearances tags, especially when categorizing minor appearances. The default "a" appearance tag categorizes a given appearance as major, so appropriate use of minor appearances tags is important to properly categorize an appearance as minor.

Summary/Synopsis/Plot/Story

This section should provide a rundown of all major events that happen in the material covered by the article. Summaries need to be comprehensive and accurate, but not excessively laconic, nor overly long. A summary should provide the reader a similar understanding of the story's key points as a person who has read/watched/played it on their own. In the case of stories which are a continuation of another, summaries should be written in a way that it's accessible to understand the continuing narrative without having to read the synopses for previous issues. Summaries have to be written in present tense, using an in-universe perspective, and avoiding the use of first person.

And alternative to balancing between writing a short and a long synopsis is to do both. Split the summary into two subheadings, "Brief Summary" and "Detailed Summary," and write below each of these sections the corresponding type of summary. The brief summary can be a simple overview of the story; a paragraph or two laying out the basic facts of the narrative.

Cast

This section provides a list of all major actors of a movie, a series' episode or a video game. In the case of articles for content yet to be released, it's necessary to provide a reference for the addition of an actor.

Notes and Trivia

These sections are used to add technical information about the subject of an article. Unlike the rest of an article, these sections don't require to use an in-universe perspective; they are available to add any information about fictional subjects in which is necessary to treat them as such, behind-the-scenes and making-of material, technical aspects of a publication, etc.

See Also

In this section related topics not alreadt linked in the article should be listed. Links to related topics not already linked in article

Links and References

This section consists of a bulleted list of general references sorted by date of publication, explanatory and citation footnotes, links to other Marvel wikis that specialize in or focus on subjects we do not, links to other unofficial sources, e.g. fan sites, etc.

See Also

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