Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/List of magical weapons (2nd nomination)


 * The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review).  No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was   keep. While problems with indiscriminate inclusion do exist, good arguments have been made for why this article is superior to a category: it serves as a more detailed directory as well as a merge/redirect target for insufficiently notable magical weapon articles. ~ mazca  talk 22:28, 5 November 2009 (UTC)

List of magical weapons
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Indiscriminate list of various fantasy weapons with no clear guidelines on inclusion, nor is there any indication of notability of the weapons themselves. \ Backslash Forwardslash / (talk) 10:38, 28 October 2009 (UTC)
 * Comment - my original concept for this list was for a navigation page to existing articles on magical weapons. There have been a number of mergers and deletions since then, showing that individual weapons are less notable than I had originally thought. If all these blimming anime and RPG swords are stripped away, it might work with the inclusion guideline of "weapons from mythology and folklore". Otherwise I don't mind whether or not the article is deleted. Marasmusine (talk) 11:05, 28 October 2009 (UTC)
 * Weak keep This list may have a lot of other problems, but "indiscriminate" isn't one of them. Just as not all brooks are babbling, the words indiscriminate and list don't automatically go together.  An indiscriminate list would be nothing more than a list of blue-links, with no other content other than that the fact that they are grouped together under one title.  We see plenty of those around here.   On the other hand, if the editors have added a sentence of explanation about each entry, that's how one "discriminates" between one entry and the next.  The problems that this one does have, of course, are that it isn't very well sourced to reliable and verifiable locations.  It could easily be sourced beyond six cites.  It isn't.  So while I do applaud the various persons for trying to make this more than the classic indiscriminate list, there's no excuse for a lack of sourcing. Mandsford (talk) 16:05, 28 October 2009 (UTC)
 * Delete better severed by a category, easier to maintain and patrol. Either that or inclusion criteria needs to be way tighter, magical weapons is just far to broad a description.  There are thousands of possible entries for this list. Ridernyc (talk) 16:14, 28 October 2009 (UTC)
 * Delete in accordance with Ridernyc's sound reasoning; sever it from the encyclopedia. -- Orange Mike  &#x007C;   Talk  16:42, 28 October 2009 (UTC)
 * Comment Also want to point out that this information is endlessly repeated in other articles List of Middle-earth weapons and armour, List of Dragonlance artifacts, Magic sword. Ridernyc (talk) 17:07, 28 October 2009 (UTC)
 * Comment The sections on folklore and mythology seem interesting, valuable, and well-constrained. It's the popular-culture sections that are the problem. If everything from "In novels" down was deleted I think it would be a decent list. Gruntler (talk) 19:12, 28 October 2009 (UTC)
 * Keep the list is not indiscriminate, for it discriminates in 3 ways: the  artifact, the notable work, and the significant use. Indiscriminate would be including every appearance whatsoever in any fictional work, however non-notable the work. That is not the case here. When notable cultural artifacts, or particular distinctive human activities, are used as significant elements in notable fiction and other notable cultural phenomena, then a discussion of them is encyclopedic. All that is necessary is to show that the activity or artifact is used in a significant way, and this can be appropriately referenced to the work directly. These references are needed, but they can be supplied. Any of the items that are not significant can be removed after discussion of the talk page of the article.   I do not see the problem with WP:V, for the items are attributable--if it is challenged that the artifact is not  in the work mentioned, that does have to be demonstrated. It is not necessary that the specific  use of the object in the specific  fiction be notable--if it were, there would be a separate article for each of the uses, an absurdity I hope nobody is going to advocate.   That the information is separately in the other articles is not a problem either--bringing together significant aspects is a function of an encyclopedia   DGG ( talk ) 02:29, 30 October 2009 (UTC)
 * Keep: It seems the entries in this article were all picked for very specific reasons. Great care has been taken to limit entries to very specif mythologies that are well-established on Wikipedia and each 'weapon' given is of a subset that can link directly to one of them. There are some very, very common historical objects of lore in here such as Excalibur... so I really don't know what better list it would fit in. Just because it lists articles to things unknown to many like Asian folklore. Legacy by notability of parent (mythical figure in this case) is usually the sort of thing lists are for. Not that this is a very original idea for an article, but this has been researched top-to-bottom. If you still want to try to go past that, Pandora's box might be opened if substantial objects important to the beliefs of these faiths and folklore are deletion out of their organization, as I doubt many would want or agree that anglo-saxon religious figures and symbols are befitting of list and category and basically singled out. Keep it simple, better to not accidentally start some kind of faith war. If the articles contained meet basic notability and other general Wiki guidelines, there is no reason for deletions. I could also easily make a case to there being a reader and user demographic among the public that would be served well from this. Sorry to ramble! ♪ daTheisen(talk) 22:31, 30 October 2009 (UTC)
 * Keep The article organizes the information in ways a category cannot. Lack of criteria for improvement is a reason for improvement, not deletion.  And since the items listed are bluelinked, that is asserting notability for them. Edward321 (talk) 15:29, 31 October 2009 (UTC)
 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.