Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Wrath of God (Magic: The Gathering)


 * 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   delete.  MBisanz  talk 01:39, 26 June 2009 (UTC)

Wrath of God (Magic: The Gathering)

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Not notable. Individual CCG cards are likely not notable at all, but if this card is, then hundreds of other cards likewise will have to be considered as such. There will never be a full length work such as a book on this card, and no non-Magic publication will ever publish any article with this as the subject. Croctotheface (talk) 05:08, 18 June 2009 (UTC)

Also, a quick note on sources: I'm aware that the article cites a small handful of sources. However, they just establish that Wrath of God can be an important card in certain contexts within the game of Magic. The same could be said of articles on poker hands where the ten of diamonds has a pivotal role. The queen of spades doesn't even gets its own article, despite its relevance to a game like Hearts. This Magic card should not get its own encyclopedia article either. Croctotheface (talk) 05:46, 18 June 2009 (UTC)


 * Delete as has no independent notability outside the game of Magic. The sources just seem to be "Card of the Day" sites, which do not establish independent notability. Although nominator should beware "similar articles don't exist so this shouldn't" or "if we allow this article to exist, we would have to create lots of others" arguments. The point of Wikipedia is for it to be a growing work in progress. Mr_pand [ talk | contributions ] 07:38, 18 June 2009 (UTC)


 * I said neither of those things, for the record. What I did say is that if this card is notable, then there would be no reason that hundreds of other cards wouldn't likewise be notable.  That would not mean that we'd "have to create" those articles.  And my point regarding the ten of diamonds and queen of spades was not "if they don't get articles, neither does this," the point was to provide a parallel case for editors unfamiliar with the game of Magic.  My point was essentially: (1) we wouldn't/shouldn't give the queen of spades an article, and (2) the queen of spades is more notable than Wrath of God, so we shouldn't give Wrath of God an article.  Croctotheface (talk) 08:11, 18 June 2009 (UTC)


 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Game-related deletion discussions.  -- TexasAndroid (talk) 11:58, 18 June 2009 (UTC)
 * Delete Sources have to come from outside the MTG community (they can be general gaming sites talking about the card, but any MTG-related site is a primary source). I would figure there's only one MTG card that could potentially be notable, and that would be "Black Lotus" due to it's game unbalancing, rarity, and current worth, but that's just a guess. --M ASEM  (t) 13:03, 18 June 2009 (UTC)
 * Delete Non-notable outside the realm of MTG - Masem is right to compare it to Black Lotus (which rightfully doesn't have an article). It's a nice piece, and clearly very verifiable, but the general populace just doesn't care, as evidenced by no coverage whatsoever.  I think mtg.wikia.com is the place to go for interested users. ~ Amory ( user  •  talk  •  contribs ) 15:05, 18 June 2009 (UTC)
 *  Weak keep  while many of the sources are primary, some are not. I'd actually recommend a merge into some kind of a list article which lists "notable" MtG cards.  Further, the notion that notability must come from outside the "realm" of the topic is, well, crazy talk.  Should baseball players be required to be written about by sources outside of the realm of baseball?  Come on. WP:N has no such restriction for a reason. Hobit (talk) 17:00, 18 June 2009 (UTC)
 * WP:N requires sourced independent of the topic. Wizards of the Coast are not independent of the game (since they publish it) and thus aren't suitable as the only sources for notability; this would be like if myself, I wrote a freeware program, then posted a bunch of articles on it on my site, and then said it was notable because of that. Now, if there was a general card & game magazine or website that mentioned the card in detail, that's different. In the situation of baseball, it would be improper to use the MLB or the team information to support the article on a baseball player, but using sports journalism as well as another outside that is appropriate. --M ASEM  (t) 17:27, 18 June 2009 (UTC)
 * Some of the sources aren't from WoTC. Hobit (talk) 20:55, 18 June 2009 (UTC)
 * There are two non WoTC. One is simply a promo card database - this is not significant coverage (it's just a data point, much like using IMDB to identify actors and TV shows), so it fails as a secondary source. This leaves the "pojo.com" "Card of the Day" reference.  First, I don't know what to make of this site's reliability; there's no indicator of editorial fact-checking on the site, and I can't find any suggestions that the cited authors or the site maintainers are past reliable sources.  Even ignoring that (which is hard to ignore), the way this site is set up, reviewing a card a day, does not mean there's anything unique about "Wrath of God" as a card as to why it was reviewed - it just was.  It would be one thing if a professional MTG Card reviewer (someone akin to what Roger Ebert would be for movies) reviewed every card, this just happening to be his review, but we're lacking the "professional" credentials here.  The remaining sources are all WOTC, fine in context but not appropriate to establish notability. --M ASEM  (t) 21:56, 18 June 2009 (UTC)
 * Weak delete with merge preferred. I did some serious looking and found a lot of trivial references to this card (including the NYT).  But not enough for it's own page. I think a list of "notable" cards would be good and would meet WP:N, but this doesn't as far as I can tell. Hobit (talk) 01:32, 19 June 2009 (UTC)


 * I'd be OK with a "list of notable cards" article as well. Croctotheface (talk) 02:58, 19 June 2009 (UTC)
 * Just as a comment on a list - I'm not against it, but I would encourage there to be some minimum standard of recognization - more than just being a "card of the day" or the like. A similar metric is used at List of Internet memes which could easily suffer the fate of everyone and their brother adding their favorite memes, but kept in check by having some RS to describe it being a meme.  Similarly, for Magic cards, there needs to be more than just an appearance in a database or some site's card of the day. An explanation of the card's history, or why the card is great to make combos from, published from WotC? Sure, that's fine, I'm sure there's also a few other RS' that can be used to identify potential article sources. But in checking "Wrath of God" on google, I'm not coming up with much, however, I noticed I'm not getting much from WotC. So it may just take some more investigation.  Just make sure that there's a threshold here for inclusion in the list otherwise it will become unmaintainable fast. --M ASEM  (t) 21:02, 22 June 2009 (UTC)


 * Keep, one of the most notable cards in the game. Second choice merge. Stifle (talk) 09:58, 22 June 2009 (UTC)
 * As you can see above, I tend to agree, but I'm having problems finding sources that are reasonable. Do you know of any? Hobit (talk) 12:18, 22 June 2009 (UTC)


 * What do either of you make of the notion that a single consolidated article on, say, 20 or so notable cards, would be a better way to present such information than a questionably sourced standalone article? Croctotheface (talk) 19:05, 22 June 2009 (UTC)
 * As noted above, I'd be happy with such a thing. Frankly, I'd be happy with all 20 having their own page, but I'm not seeing the case for WP:N for this card. Hobit (talk) 20:41, 22 June 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.