Forum:Spirit battles: Part 2

This forum is a followup to this other forum, as, while that forum determines the style that should be used for the points themselves, this one will determine the exact layout of the information.

This could be just me, but I don't think every little thing about the spirit battles needs to have a reference tied to it, partially because I feel that starts leaning into speculative territory. Obviously, if something's cut and dry, then it should be kept, but I also feel like if we have too many "the increase in [attribute] is very likely a reference to this" statements, then we end up in a situation like this where the water is muddied. Please feel free to argue against my line of thinking if you believe me to be wrong, though, because I don't want to be haphazardly making executive decisions.

Continuing to use our friend Roxas as an example, here is what his table looks like at the time of making this post:

Spirit			Battle parameters							Inspiration
No.	Image	Name	Enemy Fighter(s)	Type	Power	Stage	Rules	Conditions	Music
1,507		Roxas	•Sora (160 HP)		13,800	Hollow Bastion (Dive to the Heart, Roxas)	•Health Recovery •Move Speed ↑ •Attack Power ↑	•Stamina battle •The enemy has increased attack power after a little while •The enemy has increased move speed after a little while •The enemy starts the battle with a Killing Edge	Fragments of Sorrow	Spirit Battle inspiration: The white Sora puppet fighter represents Roxas, the Nobody of Sora who uses a similar gameplay to Sora. The puppet fighter's white costume also resembles Final Form, a Drive Form that Sora obtains after his battle against Roxas in Kingdom Hearts II. The stage's layout represents the Station of Serenity, the location of Sora's battle with Roxas during their first meeting in Kingdom Hearts II, which was initially a cutscene until its later expansion into a fully-fledged boss battle in Kingdom Hearts II Final Mix. The Attack Power ↑ and Move Speed ↑ rules occur at the same time, referencing how Roxas's gameplay is more aggressive than that of Sora's, which allows him to use quick and powerful attacks. The Health Recovery rule references Cure, a magic command in the Kingdom Hearts series which can restore the HP of a user or a party member. Sora starts the battle with a Killing Edge, which will allow him to wield both the Keyblade and the Killing Edge at the same time, each representing Roxas' dual Keyblades, Oathkeeper and Oblivion. Other trivia: This spirit's Weapon Attack & Move Speed ↑↑ ability further references Roxas' aggressive gameplay, which allows him to use a combination of quick and powerful attacks.

With some consolidation of information and removal of what I deem to be speculation, here's what I have in mind:

Spirit			Battle parameters							Inspiration
No.	Image	Name	Enemy Fighter(s)	Type	Power	Stage	Rules	Conditions	Music
1,507		Roxas	•Sora (160 HP)		13,800	Hollow Bastion (Dive to the Heart, Roxas)	•Health Recovery •Move Speed ↑ •Attack Power ↑	•Stamina battle •The enemy has increased attack power after a little while •The enemy has increased move speed after a little while •The enemy starts the battle with a Killing Edge	Fragments of Sorrow	Sora appropriately represents Roxas, as Roxas is Sora's Nobody. Sora starts the battle with a Killing Edge, replicating Roxas's ability to dual-wield Keyblades. Though the white costume shares its color scheme with Roxas's casual outfit in the virtual Twilight Town, it also resembles Final Form, a Drive Form that Sora obtains after his battle against Roxas in Kingdom Hearts II. The stage's layout represents the Station of Serenity, the location of Sora's battle with Roxas during their first meeting in Kingdom Hearts II, which was initially a cutscene until its later expansion into a fully-fledged boss battle in Kingdom Hearts II Final Mix.

Notice that I also removed the "Other trivia" section—this, I believe, is where the bulk of speculation lies. I won't pretend like there aren't some things that may be worth noting down at least somewhere (like, for instance, how Tamagon is one of the spirits you have to use to summon Dr. Eggman, since "Tamagon" is one letter off from the Japanese word for "egg"), but for the most part, I think this section can be removed for most spirit battles. Again, though, do voice your opinion if you feel it necessary this section be kept overall. Do also remember that this is just one example out of well over a thousand different spirits in the game, but I nevertheless hope that it properly conveys what I personally am aiming for.

I suppose I should also take this opportunity to reignite discussion on the actual formatting of the information as well: back in 2021, CanvasK created a userpage showcasing potential restructurings of the information in the spirit battle table, with four different variations, including one from myself that I added a few months after his initial upload. I personally think that, at the very least, consolidating the information that is currently on each page and removing much of the unnecessary bloat will fix the readability issues anyway, and there may not even be a need for a discussion on a change in the formatting itself, but I still felt like bringing it up to kill two birds with one stone, even if that page has been mostly dead.

All this to say, feel free to discuss your opinions on the styling, the layout, and, if you so choose, the formatting. This discussion is intended to set the framework for the restructuring of the information on the spirit pages going forward, so do feel free to speak your mind here. Aidan the Gamer 14:32, July 21, 2025 (EDT)

I think regardless of which format we end up going with, including collapsable text (such as with your proposal and with Canvas's addition to MariusM) would certainly help make the page easier to read. Even with a shortening of the inspiration tab, that much information can definitely be distracting. Crazy456Rhino (talk) 15:02, July 21, 2025 (EDT)

Re: CanvasK's formatting page, your proposal is absolutely the best of the lot, and I agree that having the inspiration section be collapsible is a necessary ingredient in that success. Even with these sections trimmed down, the baseline readability of the page will still take a huge hit if everything is visible at all times.

This could be me overthinking things, but I might change the name of this section from "Inspiration", too. At least to me, it feels presumptuous; even agreeing that we should avoid the problem user's meanderings, there will inevitably be some speculation here and there (particularly for stages, which are too major not to acknowledge but may not always make an immediately obvious reference) - and having that under a section with so definitive a name as "inspiration" feels like a misnomer. I could see "Origin" working a bit better while being in line with the rest of the wiki.

One more thing - I see the logic behind putting these sections in bulleted lists, but I don't know if I agree with their implementation in the end. Could they not just be written passages with a line-break or two where necessary? The bulletpoints take up a little extra space and shift the text to the right in a way that kinda bothers me, and since we're going for brevity with this new rewrite, ideally there shouldn't be much of a need to make the information more digestible by breaking it into smaller points. Just my two cents. Nymbare and his talk 18:29, July 21, 2025 (EDT)

Personally, I'd find it a tiny bit overlapping if two sections denoting different things, even if in different tables, had similar titles—note that the tables showing the spirits' information outside of battles has a section for their "origin game"—so my counterproposal would be, if it absolutely must be renamed, to relabel it something like "References" (even if there may also be a separate header for a references list via the <ref> tag), though I personally don't find an issue with "Inspiration" as is.

As for the bulleted list, I have to admit that I find things a bit more readable when the information is more easily separated out, and bulleted points help with that. Granted, yes, it does become an issue when things are being individually covered point by point like a checklist, which is why much of my counterargument to the problem user's formatting was to combine like with like, but I think that much of the readability issues stem from the sheer amount of content that is available to read. Saving space by simply making line-breaks instead of new bullets is a good idea, though. Aidan the Gamer 18:50, July 21, 2025 (EDT)

I'd say your layout looks the best in my opinion. I agree that not everything needs to be a reference, and to support your plan to remove the "X stat increase is a reference to Y" points, I feel as that can fall under the umbrella of speculation, and while there may be some truth to it in some cases, this specific example with Roxas of the Attack and Move ↑ referencing his aggressive playstyle in my opinion falls under speculation. I'm in favor of removing the "other trivia" supsection since, in addition to your concerns with speculation, is subject to most of the bloat which bloated trivia sections are a recurring phenomenon on this very wiki, and most of the time it can just be condensed into the main point.

Also for Nymbare's points, I guess I don't have much of an opinion on whether to separate the points using either a line break or bullet point. For the name, having it as an "Origin" section not only overlaps with the origin game section, it could be just me but I feel "Inspiration" gets the point across better on what this section is actually supposed to be. Ultimate Toad, the Toad Warrior. (I'm the best!) 21:45, July 29, 2025 (EDT)