Forum:Adding an "Inspiration" column to Spirit Battle tables

Apologies if this is out-of-line. This came up in a proposal for something entirely different, and while I was a little hesitant, I figured it would probably be better as its own proposal rather than as a hidden discussion on an only-tangentially-related proposal page.

This topic came about because the only non-duplicate information on the "In Spirit battles" section of a fighter page (which the consensus seems to be isn't pulling its weight) is the part saying which characters they represent. That made me think that we could include something similar to that on the proper Spirit articles - except we didn't need to stop at merely who the fighters represent. Here's an example:

These sections could also let us provide more general notes on individual Spirit battles - which could be useful, as sometimes not all of the rules and conditions are listed on the ingame spirit battle screen. Ahemtoday (talk) 17:22, July 31, 2019 (EDT)
 * Oppose this is a wiki oriented around Smash; things like that belong in the trivia section. Also, SmashWiki is not a strategy guide. Cookies CnC Signature.png Creme  17:45, July 31, 2019 (EDT)
 * Support Wouldn't the inspiration column pretty much work like the trivia selection though? It's pretty much just a renamed version of it. Maybe it should be called Trivia instead of Inspiration though. An Adventurer draws near! (talk) 09:51, September 25, 2019 (EDT)
 * Partial oppose I oppose everything except the example with Yoshi's colors in the Eevee battle; we already have stuff like that for minion fighters, but not for the main fighters (e.g. Hero's Comrades spirit battle, where we have, for example, that Robin represents Veronica, but since Ike is the main fighter, we don't have that he represents Hendrik). Also, this would only be needed for spirits that don't have the name of the character they represent in it or for Spirits with only 1 enemy fighter. Awesomelink234, the Super Cool Gamer  Leave a message if needed 15:33, September 14, 2019 (EDT)
 * Well, the thing about that is - it seems like the consensus is that those sections on the fighter pages should be removed. So the only information there that can't be found anywhere else is what the minions represent. I figured, while we were moving the section, we may as well increase the scope and talk about the inspiration behind it - so the section wouldn't necessarily need to talk just about who the puppet fighters are supposed to be, it could also talk about what the rules and conditions are meant to represent. Ahemtoday (talk) 11:06, September 18, 2019 (EDT)
 * To be honest, I fully support this—if not on the fighter pages, then on the "List of spirits" pages. We're a wiki, and it's kind of our job to explain the details and references in Smash, isn't it? The Spirit sections feel very barren right now with it all just being raw statistics, and I'd like to see more full-fledged explanations since it'd be useful info. (For instance, the Dark Matter spirit battle is a direct recreation of Kirby's Dream Land 2s final boss, which is an important detail that's glossed over in our current format.) This isn't pedantic trivia or a strategy guide; it's useful information to understanding what's going on in each battle. ~ Serena Strawberry'  (talk) 22:34, September 18, 2019 (EDT)
 * I fully support as well. We're a wiki, and you really can't find Spirit Battle origins anywhere on the internet where's it's accurate, and it's been almost a year since Ultimate came out. We'll need a lot of knowledge on these games but I think we can manage it. It'll be real slow getting all of them though. SandwitchZebra (talk) 21:25, November 1, 2019 (EDT)

While I participated in completing that column, I still oppose it: It's purely speculative and it's going to lead to contributors endlessly arguing back and forth about it with nothing but their own opinion to back up their claims. I think the known inspirations only (known throught official statements) should be listed as trivia points. Plus it also clutters the list. YoshiRyu (talk) 12:13, November 29, 2019 (EST)
 * If contributors are arguing back and forth about speculative inspiration, then that's something that could be taken to the talk page and settled by other contributors agreeing/disagreeing with their arguments, similar to how "alternate costume inspirations" are currently handled. --PeabodySam (talk) 12:45, November 29, 2019 (EST)
 * I hear you, but a wiki is supposed to be informative and not speculative. The "inspiration" column is unsourced, and even if the contributors (who probably aren't nemerous enough to be representative of the whole Smash community anyway) reach a concensus, the "information" will still not be guaranteed to be true. I would argue that the "alternate costume inspirations" is a mistake too for the same reason. YoshiRyu (talk) 13:17, November 29, 2019 (EST)
 * A good majority of these references aren't really speculative; it's kind of easy to identify what the battle is talking about. Cookies CnC Signature.png Creme  13:41, November 29, 2019 (EST)
 * I can see what you mean, especially with regards to alternate costumes (because people tend to draw unfounded connections just to say something is a reference), but in the case of spirit battles inspirations I don't think it's that bad. There hasn't really been much disagreement over the conclusions drawn because they mostly rely on official, easily-accessible information, and it's preferable in my eyes to detail the inspirations behind them rather than leaving out major details like this. If it leads to in-fighting in the future, I might change my mind, but it seems to be moving without issue so far. I guess the question is ultimately whether we should document unofficial info if it's important enough to note, which is an on-going issue with wikis in general. ~ Serena Strawberry  (talk) 14:04, November 29, 2019 (EST)

I support this. Maybe SuperSmashTurtles could help out. 174.55.24.64 23:14, September 18, 2019 (EDT)

full support! Thomasgamer4000 still has no DLC 12:26, October 7, 2019 (EDT)

I support the addition of source inspiration to spirit battles. God/Sakurai knows I didn't understand half of them. Mega Mario Man (talk) 20:12, October 18, 2019 (EDT)
 * I'll be starting on this soon, but for now I created a Sandbox entry to demonstrate what it would look like. Any comments on this before I properly implement it? ~ Serena Strawberry  (talk) 21:09, November 8, 2019 (EST)
 * I see no problem with this.  Serpent King  13:19, December 3, 2019 (EST)