User talk:Nescientist/Archive01: Difference between revisions

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::::I'll try to draft something up at some point to see if it's even worth doing.
::::I'll try to draft something up at some point to see if it's even worth doing.
::::I'm the sort of person who wants the highest accuracy possible, even at the expense of legibility, though of course a low-accuracy high-legibility article should accompany any particularly arcane article. --[[User:Felthry|Felthry]] ([[User talk:Felthry|talk]]) 19:50, 19 March 2017 (UTC)
::::I'm the sort of person who wants the highest accuracy possible, even at the expense of legibility, though of course a low-accuracy high-legibility article should accompany any particularly arcane article. --[[User:Felthry|Felthry]] ([[User talk:Felthry|talk]]) 19:50, 19 March 2017 (UTC)
== UPC ==
As you have noticed with Stadium Bubblebeam, UPC has '''a ton''' of incorrect information. Please, do not use it as a source. Only use disassemblies from the games, either from github.com/pret or datacrystal. --[[User:Froggy25|Froggy25]] ([[User talk:Froggy25|talk]]) 02:26, 15 April 2017 (UTC)

Revision as of 02:26, 15 April 2017

Welcome to Bulbapedia, Nescientist!
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Thank you, and have a good time editing here!
  Tiddlywinks (talk) 22:59, 19 June 2016 (UTC)  
 

Apology

Sorry for editing your userspace article without your permission. I failed to see your name in the article heading and only realized my mistake when you mentioned that it might be ready for mainspacing. Sorry for the trouble. --Super goku (talk) 14:48, 10 July 2016 (UTC)

Yeah, no worries. I did ask for exactly the source you provided, so I'd rather thank you. Nescientist (talk) 15:33, 10 July 2016 (UTC)

Effect section guidelines

I've actually talked about that with an admin few years ago, then kinda forgot about doing anything with it. Eridanus (talk) 12:04, 1 September 2016 (UTC)

Ah, thanks, good to know. So SnorlaxMonster and I seem to agree on what is most reasonable in that regard. Anyway, our current move articles currently do (generally) not follow that "subsection only when changed" part (as well as some other ideas of the guideline), which has bothered me for a while. Right now, you basically have to read everything to know what you want to know in most cases. But I think especially if someone edits (almost) all move articles anyway (and I think between Tiddlywinks and myself, there's some chance in the near future), it might be a good idea to also adapt (after some kind of discussion/approval). If you have anything to add (or discuss), by all means, please feel free! Nescientist (talk) 13:35, 1 September 2016 (UTC)
I might add some moves' data (and maybe item locations as they're kinda lacking) on Mystery Dungeon spin-offs sometime in the future, once I figure out how moves work (this is not helped by the fact that Gates and Super have moves work differently than in the older games, like how Pursuit went from inflicting status on the user to an actual damaging move). Eridanus (talk) 14:09, 1 September 2016 (UTC)

Meowth Theater

Hey there, just wanted to tell you that the Italian names for the Meowth Theater dungeons are listed here on Pokémon Central Wiki, it would be nice if you could add them on the pages when you create them though they don't say what they are based on. --Raltseye prata med mej 12:09, 6 October 2016 (UTC)

Seems not too hard to find out. Thanks! Nescientist (talk) 12:12, 6 October 2016 (UTC)
Nice, you're welcome. I'll be adding the Spanish and French names in a while as they're not listed at neither Poképédia nor WikiDex. --Raltseye prata med mej 13:26, 6 October 2016 (UTC)

Showdown

When you mention Showdown like this, it sounds ilke it's an accepted source. In the same way as if someone mentioned Serebii in an edit summary, I'd just like to advise you to please avoid doing this, if only because it may give other users the wrong idea. Just find another justification, and that's all you need to communicate. Tiddlywinks (talk) 11:42, 22 October 2016 (UTC)

You're right, I'm usually more careful. I should've used nothing, or "backed up by". Nescientist (talk) 11:49, 22 October 2016 (UTC)
You shouldn't really need to note Showdown at all. If you want to remember it for yourself or something, perhaps you can make a userpage (or some file on your own computer). Tiddlywinks (talk) 12:06, 22 October 2016 (UTC)
I'm keeping track, that's not the reason I write that in edit summaries. These "backed up by" statements are actually meant for other users. I see no reason not to explain to all Bulbapedia editors what I do, or why I do it in as much detail as possible (and reasonable), so that they at least do have the opportunity to reproduce/understand it, or tell that I've checked Showdown for that particular move/Ability as well and have absolutely no reason to doubt what Bulbapedia currently says. (And most specifically, I guess, that's you.) So I feel I should note that, actually. Nescientist (talk) 12:29, 22 October 2016 (UTC)
But if we don't accept Showdown, *I* don't really care about it. And no one else should either, at least not in making decisions about what's on a page. Those decisions should be made without the "benefit" of Showdown. Either you can back up what you're doing without referencing Showdown, or you shouldn't be making the edit in the first place. Tiddlywinks (talk) 12:39, 22 October 2016 (UTC)
I know Showdown is not an accepted source; it doesn't influence whether I add something to a page. When Showdown contradicts Bulbapedia, I don't just add it to pages. Never have. Explicitly asked for whether I could, but accepted I could not. I leave them as they are.
However, contradictions are issues that should (ideally) be resolved. Had I not checked Showdown, I wouldn't have tested Heat Crash, and VioletPumpkin wouldn't have tested Whirlwind (well, I don't know, but maybe). Why should I withhold information? (And with that, I mean that I've read what Showdown says, not that it's necessarily accurate.) Nescientist (talk) 12:57, 22 October 2016 (UTC)
None of your examples above include any reason why you would need to mention Showdown in an edit summary. If you notice that Showdown says Heat Crash does something we don't say...at that point, there's nothing you need to edit. If you proceed to test Heat Crash and determine that Showdown is right...you still don't need to mention Showdown. "I tested this and discovered that it actually works like this" is perfectly fine, and/or is not helped by adding any mention of Showdown. Tiddlywinks (talk) 13:06, 22 October 2016 (UTC)
I'm not sure if you just don't get it or something. "At that point" is exactly where I want to (or more precisely, should be able to) make public that I've checked Showdown, and that it contradicts. So anyone is able to know, and can potentially maybe even do something about solving the apparent contradiction issue. It doesn't matter whether that's on a user page, a talk page, or an edit summary (i.e., of a sensible, related edit). It just mustn't be on a mainspace page (coz it's unsourced/unconfirmed). Nescientist (talk) 13:23, 22 October 2016 (UTC)
Then you've completely veered away from where this started, making an "affirmative" edit (so to speak) and "citing" Showdown. If there's other support, Showdown doesn't need mentioning.
As for noting where Showdown contradicts something, I don't think I care if you mention Showdown as the source of doubt. But I'm not sure that Showdown (all by itself) contradicting BP would be a reason to make any sort of edit to a mainspace page... If you want to say something on the talk page, though, that's great. (Personally, I'd say that a user page might be better, or at least if you can link to a user page, just so people can find all the contradictions you've discovered together rather than just stumbling upon one or two on different talk pages.) Tiddlywinks (talk) 13:34, 22 October 2016 (UTC)
Well, if you want to, I can abstain from making these affirmatives "no doubt" edits!? It's just that they're explicitly affirming there is not a doubt, not merely not affirming there is a doubt.
Yes, right now, I'm gathering contradictions. As I said to you on your talk page, I will go to talk pages or create a user page with collected contradictions depending on how many there are ("Depending on how much "Showdown-exclusive" info it will be...") . Nescientist (talk) 13:44, 22 October 2016 (UTC)
I'm just gonna make this simple: don't mention Showdown in edit summaries. If you feel you want to at some specific point in the future, feel free to ask on my talk page. We'll see if we can discuss it more, or at worst, perhaps you'll get a better idea of what I mean just by how I answer your different queries. Tiddlywinks (talk) 13:51, 22 October 2016 (UTC)
...And that was just about the single worst decision to make, in my opinion. It may be simple solution, but it is a major restriction (well, it's still very minor in the grand scheme of things, but the most severe policy in regard to the topic at hand), and from what we've discussed here, I don't think it is justified at all. (I don't even know why you think it is.) Don't get me wrong, but I'm not willing to create that much overhead and ask for permission on whether I'm allowed to mention Showdown in an edit summary. Which means I'm gonna have to abstain from mentioning Showdown in edit summaries altogether, despite all arguments I mentioned. Nescientist (talk) 15:35, 22 October 2016 (UTC)

(resetting indent)More or less all I'm saying is this is plainly not working as an abstract discussion. If you want to discuss a specific case, I'll be waiting. If not, that's fine too. Tiddlywinks (talk) 16:20, 22 October 2016 (UTC)

I feel you've clearly done more than that, honestly. I felt the discussion went well as per usual, until you went "don't mention Showdown in edit summaries." (But I still feel you have good intentions, as per usual.) But I really don't want to discuss specific cases. Nescientist (talk) 17:13, 22 October 2016 (UTC)
"Well" is apparently a matter of perspective here. *I'm* not confident what saying "Yeah, okay" instead of "Don't mention Showdown" would have meant--that it wouldn't have ended up with you mentioning it somewhere I've been trying to say it isn't necessary. And I don't like continuing to discuss it abstractly. I'd much rather put it in the concrete terms of an actual case. Frankly, I can't see any case where mentioning Showdown would be useful, therefore I don't really feel my direction is a bad thing. But I was/am willing to be convinced if you can present a specific case that makes it clear. Tiddlywinks (talk) 17:39, 22 October 2016 (UTC)
That I can do/try. This edit summary would better read something like "not including terrains and Knock Off although Showdown (or "another source" in general) suggests those" or similar at the end; that's worth including imo because of what I said in my third edit here, timestamped 12:57. (Yes, it's also suited for a talk or user page, but that's not the point.) This edit summary could have had "UPC, backed up by Showdown" because of what I said in my second edit here, timestamped 12:29 (I believe it didn't change / have no reason to believe it did change in Gen VI or something). (The edit summary you original came here for should have been different for the reason you gave in the very first post.)
And going the "in general" route: there's a difference between guidance and executive decision, or even infantilization. There's also a difference between prohibition except for approved exceptions (whitelisting) and allowance except for forbidden exceptions (blacklisting). Nescientist (talk) 19:28, 22 October 2016 (UTC)
The one on Gust: there's absolutely no reason to include any mention of Showdown. UPC alone is entirely sufficient. Showdown adds nothing and may imply to some that it's a trusted source. If you also want to record things that Showdown verifies continue the same into Gen VI, again, feel free to do that on a user page or something.
If you're doing something else at the same time, like on Power, then I suppose I don't mind if you say at the same time something like "Showdown suggests [whatever], should be investigated". (Basically, I'd be much at ease if somehow it's clear that Showdown by itself cannot be blindly trusted for making such an edit.) I don't honestly think that's the best recourse anyway if you're looking to notify/potentially include other users (the talk page seems a better option to me), but I'm not really going to try to convince you. Tiddlywinks (talk) 19:57, 22 October 2016 (UTC)
Well, if you want to, I can abstain from making these affirmatives "no doubt" edits!
I too always wanted to convey that Showdown cannot/should not be blindly trusted. (And it's not so much that I want to notify others by the edit summaries, but really just be more transparent in what I'm doing etc.) The way I see it, everything is cleared up now (we're even of the same opinion for the most relevant part), and there's not a problem. Thank you. Nescientist (talk) 20:29, 22 October 2016 (UTC)

Mount Lanakila and Blush Mountain

Hey, just for transparency I guess, I'd love to know about your source for the Sun encounter rates at Mount Lanakila and Blush Mountain. (It'd be really neat if it's a new dump or something I just haven't seen and could peruse myself as well.) Thanks! Tiddlywinks (talk) 00:09, 7 December 2016 (UTC)

I feel a bit ashamed. Me not being transparent, sigh. What was the above section all about?
I don't know about your source, but the German Pokéwiki seems to have a different one. For Glühberg and Mount Lanakila here, I made sure they started off with that data and that an admin added it, and that it actually makes sense (adds up to 100 etc.). You might want to get in touch with them maybe, especially because they sometimes added encounter rates for SOS Battles, though I assume (see Talk:SOS Battle) those might just be "base rates". At the very least, you can take a look at what they have when you're sure we have it wrong or not at all (which is what I'm doing a lot these days). Nescientist (talk) 00:41, 7 December 2016 (UTC)
This seems a bit passive aggressive.
I'll leave it there and keep on doing what I can. Thanks. Tiddlywinks (talk) 00:48, 7 December 2016 (UTC)
Huh, why? No, no, no. :( It was not meant like that, honestly. Why do I apparently often come across so harsh?
Maybe I should have separated my answer and my suggestion a little more. I don't know how close your (staff's) connection is to them, but if it's not totally out of reach, I could imagine it would be helpful to ask them. And looking at their pages often is. Nescientist (talk) 01:02, 7 December 2016 (UTC)
I guess I made the wrong connection(s) and didn't understand some of it right. I'm glad to know that, then. Sorry for the misunderstanding, and thanks again. Tiddlywinks (talk) 01:23, 7 December 2016 (UTC)

About Dazzling/Queenly Majesty.

Well, I got your message and I just wanted to apologize for the trouble as well as say that I've gotten what you told me.IM-T-MAN2 (talk) 19:08, 13 December 2016 (UTC)

Quick Claw

Hey, you seem to be better at reading the disassembly than me, so I'm asking you to try this instead. Can you work out the probability of Quick Claw activating in Generation II? I think it's related to this section, but I'm confused where the variables that the random number is being compared to are coming from, which is what I would need to know to determine the probability. --SnorlaxMonster 17:27, 8 February 2017 (UTC)

Hm, those are always a hassle, and I'm still learning, so maybe you're better off asking Froggy25 for more sophisticated/reliable information.
Anyway, I believe the c value is this 60, which is loaded in GetOpponentItem here. The e value seems to be whatever is popped here, and it's really hard to track down where it was originally pushed, but I believe it might have been here at some point (and maybe dynamically at other locations in a similar manner); anyway, it would make sense for it to be that same 60 as well (the player's held Quick Claw parameter).
That would amount to ~24% chance of activation. Also note that UPC (also) say it is 15/64 (although I believe it is 60/255, not 60/254, and they say GS not C). Nescientist (talk) 15:35, 9 February 2017 (UTC)
Pushing/popping moves things to/from the stack. The stack is a last-in, first-out structure; if you push 1, then 2, then 3, your first pop is 3, then 2, then 1. A push instruction just says "take the value from this variable (bc, de, whatever) and put it on the stack", and a pop instruction says "take the current value from the top of the stack and store it in this variable (bc, de, whatever)". That is, it doesn't in any way remember "They pushed 'bc' before, but they're popping 'de' now, so that's something different". There's only ONE, "dumb" stack.
FYI, as far as I know, most of the time, pushing and popping should pretty much exclusively be a way for a function to preserve variables, since CPUs only have a limited number of available registers; when another function is called, it may very well need to use registers that the caller wasn't finished with, so they get stored on the stack so that the caller can restore those values after the called function returns. That is, you usually shouldn't have to look far to see where a popped value was pushed, and/or you don't usually have to worry about if it was pushed by a called function. Specifically, in the crystal disassembly, you were right about where you said 'e' was popped in, above, but it was only pushed a couple lines before that, not far away. Tiddlywinks (talk) 15:59, 9 February 2017 (UTC)
I know what a stack is, I just thought they used different ones. But yeah, in that case, e is the player's held item's 60 (from GetUserItem) and c the opponent's (GetOpponentItem). Nescientist (talk) 16:12, 9 February 2017 (UTC)

Damage article

Hello, I checked around and could not find where you got permission to make the changes to that article. If you want to mainspace something from your userspace, you have to ask a staff member for approval to move it. As for my opinion, technical aspects of the franchise is not something I have knowledge or interests in, so I can't have a say. Thank you.--ForceFire 05:06, 27 February 2017 (UTC)

Hm, this comes as a surprise, actually. This is something I've worked on for a long time, with an enormous amount of effort, discussion, sourcing, and (at least sometimes) coordination, with Tiddlywinks in particular. If that doesn't constitute as "permission", and if you feel that indeed (more) permission was required, then I apologize. (But then I should also mention that this change involved updating formula images on the Archives, and if you rollback what I did on bp, you'd have to rollback on the Archives as well.)
As far as I'm concerned, although the change in bytes looks horrific, it was merely a rearrangement and corrections of the page itself (that just has been prepared in my userspace rather than the editor), and not a move, actual "merge", or a BIG big change really. (I even did not touch anything on "type effectiveness" out there, which should be the most "controversial" part.) Nescientist (talk) 05:41, 27 February 2017 (UTC)
You still need to ask for permission to move the final product, countless prior discussions does not mean you have permission. Regardless of it being an update of the page, you still need permission to move it (not merge, there's a very specific way to merge pages, which only admins can do). Also, I'm not an admin at the archives, so I don't have the power to revert an upload.--ForceFire 05:53, 27 February 2017 (UTC)
I know that this (generally) is the case for page moves or merges, but what I want to say is that this was neither. Basically, what I did is prepare an edit (a moderately large one, but still an ordinary rearrange/correct edit) publicly in a userpage (and extensively discussed etc.), and then merged it in to preserve edit histories for everyone (by preserving concurrent edits on both ends, which should be usual procedure for a (pseudo-)merge like this, admin or ordinary editor). It still surprises me (I thought I had almost done too much). Nescientist (talk) 06:16, 27 February 2017 (UTC)

Regarding your Nightmare edit comment

Note that "---" in general means accuracy bypass, but 100% should remain since that's how it is in III and onwards. --FIQ (talk) 17:16, 7 March 2017 (UTC)

I meant something like "100%", which is the format we do for other modified moves. It may make sense here, even more so as you cannot observe that "100%" in-game anyway (although that's what it still is technically), but I'm also ok with it being in the prose only. Nescientist (talk) 17:37, 7 March 2017 (UTC)

Mathematical formulae

Hello! Since you have shown interest in this area in the past, I thought I might consult with you about an idea I had for an article. Mostly, I think it would be a good idea to bring together the various information on formulae in the games, especially the earlier ones for which more information is known (due to the disassemblies). Additionally, it would probably be nice to be able to explain the exact algorithm used in each case, including the order in which operations are applied (this affects how rounding works, for example) and how working values are stored (especially quotients) since this can affect accuracy of results. See this section for a look at what got me thinking this might be a good idea.

This is too big a project to do on my own, so I want to gauge community interest and see if someone knowledgeable about the game mechanics might be able to help out. --Felthry (talk) 19:06, 17 March 2017 (UTC)

I guess I'm certainly one of the firmest supporters of more community crowdsourcing efforts, and if it's within my area of expertise, I'm likely willing to contribute there. Especially when someone is asking who is also been giving.
My problem right now is that I can't really envision what you're aiming at. Would it be a game mechanic article (in the spirit of Character encoding in Generation I) with headings such as "Division", or one with headings such as "Experience", or something else? Would it be something you're being linked to, basically detail subpages? What would be the benefit of that article, what information would it have that Experience etc. wouldn't have? Or wouldn't it be intended for mainspace, be more like a manual on technicalities, or like some sort of code inspection hub?
And then there's my "In general" opinion piece nobody has asked for: when there's formulae involved, the two goals of "accuracy" and "simplicity" may often conflict. I always try to find a decent compromise, one that's at least "not inaccurate" but "understandable". I think technobabble never really makes sense, especially when it's about a children's game after all. Actually, I think this is a problem Wikipedia has (or had) with math-heavy articles: they describe concepts accurately, but at the cost that only mathematicians understand them. Nescientist (talk) 10:28, 18 March 2017 (UTC)
I was thinking something like Character encoding in Generation I, to use your example. I mostly thought of this while trying to make some sense of the code; I found there didn't seem to be any sort of resources on the game's detailed mechanics and computational algorithms anywhere on the internet and that is something I would like to have. "code inspection hub" sounds like about what I'd want, but a manual on technicalities is probably more encyclopaedic. --Felthry (talk) 16:07, 18 March 2017 (UTC)
I still can't grasp it. Roughly like Spading for math/code details only? Maybe try to draft it, then I might understand it better?
(If you intend it for mainspace, that's really hard for me to imagine as an independent article, but if it's for userspace, or Appendix, then it might be a good idea.)
I'm not interested in learning everything about assembly just to technobabble about it, but otherwise, if it's useful, generally, I could definitely (at least!) try to support you along the way? Nescientist (talk) 17:42, 18 March 2017 (UTC)
I'll try to draft something up at some point to see if it's even worth doing.
I'm the sort of person who wants the highest accuracy possible, even at the expense of legibility, though of course a low-accuracy high-legibility article should accompany any particularly arcane article. --Felthry (talk) 19:50, 19 March 2017 (UTC)

UPC

As you have noticed with Stadium Bubblebeam, UPC has a ton of incorrect information. Please, do not use it as a source. Only use disassemblies from the games, either from github.com/pret or datacrystal. --Froggy25 (talk) 02:26, 15 April 2017 (UTC)