The Great Fate Character Retagging Project

I assume the decision is to go with real names. I agree with this decision because frankly the Japanese don't seem to use the class names that often and it makes looking it up hard sometimes.

If people are concerned about spoilers I can create a survey to see how problematic it might be.

AFAICT saber_bride from Fate/extra didn't wear the leotard version that the ascended version of her in FGO has. So I propose this version (and probably the rest to simplify matters) should be identified as nero_claudius_(bride).

Just as a reminder, the spreadsheet had all the rename proposals, the idea is to take that thing and then toss it through a little code to generate the (massive) BUR.
If anyone has comments wrt the naming scheme, please mention it.

albert said:

I assume the decision is to go with real names. I agree with this decision because frankly the Japanese don't seem to use the class names that often and it makes looking it up hard sometimes.

There was no decision. We didn't even discuss it properly. What was discussed and partially agreed on is removing some implications to make searching more flexible. Another point was to make an umbrella tag for Saber (Artoria) variants, because there is just so many of them.
Also, Japanese do use class names more often than true names for characters from F/SN, F/E and other parts of the franchise that became popular before F/GO. You can see this by checking pixiv tags.

Using true names for all fate_(series) servants is both unnecessary and goes against few of Danbooru policies.
Unnecessary because our current tagging works fine already, there is no real need to change character names.

One policy it messes up is spoilers. Danbooru treats spoilers very seriously, like any respectable website should. Spoilers have no expiration date, they are always relevant because there will always be people not familiar with the series/franchise or its parts.
And we don't even deal with something old in this case. Original Fate/Stay Night is still getting new adaptations even now. The first Heaven's Feel movie will premiere in cinemas this autumn. This will also bring more attention to original visual novel and its previous adaptations.

Another issue is that this mass renaming goes against out approach to character names. More common/well known character names are usually preferred, see topic #14130 and forum #134711. Which normally mean names used during the course of VN/novel/game where character originally appeared.
For example, Saber from Fate/Extra is mostly known as Red Saber (Aka Saber), or Saber Extra. Btw, Fate/Extra is also getting an anime adaptation in 2018.

Anyhow, before making any changes we should, at the very least, wait for input from other admins.
@Hillside_Moose, @NWF_Renim, can you please voice your opinion on the issue? I didn't tag Type-kun because he usually doesn't participate in such topics, but his opinion is also welcome.

I'm summoning @Type-kun as well, just to be fair.

I still prefer the original debut names, for several reasons: Danbooru internal consistency, consideration for the original fans that only really remember them by their code name ("Saber" instead of "Artoria"), and stopping shit like artoria_pendragon_(heroine_x)_(fate) when the game clearly refers to her as Mysterious Heroine X.

I suggest that ishtar_(fate/grand_order) and ereshkigal_(fate/grand_order) should not imply toosaka_rin, it should be separated. Jeanne's different forms should also be separated and not an implication of ruler_(fate/apocrypha).

MyrMindservant said:

For example, Saber from Fate/Extra is mostly known as Red Saber (Aka Saber), or Saber Extra. Btw, Fate/Extra is also getting an anime adaptation in 2018.

Saber from Fate/Extra is referred to as "Saber Extra" or "Nero", I've never seen anyone refer her as "Saber" because that is Artoria Pendragon.

Hillside_Moose said:

I'm summoning @Type-kun as well, just to be fair.

To be honest, I didn't even try to keep up with Type-moon character madness that started with FGO. I'll try to make time tomorrow and take a closer look, though.

I'll have to spend some time catching up on this thread, so I may change my stance later. My current stance on class vs. real name is for cases like Saber where a master catchall tag is needed, that we should use real names for the master level tag. As far as the sub-tags go, I don't particularly have a strong feeling one way or the other if we retain our more traditional naming conventions or if we force consistency in naming to match the master tag.

From what I've seen, class naming doesn't seem important for series like FGO and Fate/Apocrypha. Characters originating from those should definitely be using their real names in most cases.

KyteM said:

Check the numbers:
Tamamo: 495
Nero: 354 (In less than a month!) (Now I wanna see tag growth statistics...)
Scach: 345
Mordred: 169
Kiyo: 145
Alter: 143
Nito: 138
Martha: 112
Seiba: 99
Fran: 74
Raikou: 62
Nobu: 50

I don't think any Kancolle character has had nearly as much artwork done for their seasonals, so they never warranted a tag, but they did get the remodel_(kantai_collection) to differentiate appearances.

A gen tag would be ok, I suppose, but the tag deffo has to be there given the volume of posts. And if it's there it makes sense to make it a chartag to keep them visually close because frankly otherwise everyone forgets to look at the gentags for this stuff. dangerous_beast had that problem.

As an aside, Touhou gets those cookie characters tagged even though they're, say, Reimu with tits or such with the differentiation being entirely on non-apparent knowledge, and the tag volume is like half of the swimsuit girls.

At this point it's a waste of time to look for a precedent for decisions like this especially when we're in a vastly different situation than the only examples. Most of these decisions were more arbitrary than we'd like to think, so ignoring them and picking the option that's best for us is the right way to go. Adding more swimsuit tags only adds to the problem. We aren't required to make a new tag for every unique outfit with a couple hundred posts (and we frankly don't).

As for the spoilers, word of mouth from communities that respect spoilers is a huge way for anime fans to cut through mountains of shows they wouldn't enjoy, so starting this franchise completely unspoiled is fairly common. The question is if we want to ignore these people to make tagging more simple. Personally I don't want people to associate this website with random spoilers. I also don't want to set a precedent like this on how to handle tricky spoilers.

So the argument against having true names is the idea that a different site is tagging those characters using the old system?

Let's have a random walk through pixiv. We're going to go to the daily ranking list for today and check the tags for the first fate (series) image that we see. OK, we see Frankenstein's Monster in second place who's tagged as berserker of black on danbooru. Checking it now, we can see that it is tagged as frankenstein and frankenstein (fate), but no berserker of black. OK, so artists aren't using the class names as tags.

But hey, you know what? That is just one image, let's check out another one. So on the same artist's catalog, there is a Mordred image who's tagged as saber of red on danbooru. Checking it now, it's tagged as mordred and mordred (fate) but it has no saber of red tag. Hmm… Interesting. It seems like more evidence that contradicts the original argument.

But hey, you know what? This artist might be the only one who is using true names, might be just one person. Let's check a submission from a different artist. All right, so under the related images section and skipping the characters we have already talked about, there's an image featuring both Oda Nobunaga & Okita Souji who are tagged as demon archer and sakura saber on danbooru, respectively. This image is tagged as demon archer, sakura saber, oda nobunaga, and okita souji. So the tags are still revealing true names, just that it has to specify itself as using characters from the fate (series). So that could just be easily solved by using _(fate) at the end of the tag.

The next image features a few different characters, but we'll be focusing on the most prominent: Nero Claudius Ceasar Augustus Germanicus and Artoria Pendragon who would be tagged on danbooru as saber extra and saber. In this image they are tagged with saber, nero claudius, red saber, and artoria. So if we're going to follow pixiv with their more popular monikers, then why aren't we using red saber instead of saber extra?

In any case, there is no legitimate justification to keep class names for some characters and true names for others. It's making tagging characters more complicated than it should be. At this point, we're just ignoring the developments that the franchise has made in the past decade.

Let's put FSN aside, since it's the outlier here.

Can you truthfully say the majority of characters are recognizable by class names? Apocrypha characters are primarily known by their given names, both due to FGO and Apo itself not really bothering to hide them, and Koha-ace is obscure as hell. Extra is half-half, but the most recent and relevant-to-western-audiences work, Extella, revealed class and name first thing, including FSN spoilers (save for Emiya). Charlemagne for Extella Link straight up skips the class name altogether. FGO is FGO. Prototype Fragments is fairly obscure, not ported to the west and the primary means of identifying them in the west is FGO.

That last point is quite important, I feel. This is a site that imports japanese images for the consumption of western fanbases, why would we follow what the japanese fandom uses for their naming? The idea is for the actual site audience, which is primarily english-speaking (because the site itself is in english), to easily find the character identifiers without being steeped into the culture.

E: Mysterious Heroine X is an exceptional case and policy shouldn't be based around her. I proposed artoria_pendragon_(heroine_x) for consistency, but if people prefer mysterious_heroine_x that's not an issue, as long as it doesn't affect overall decisions.

Since there's no sign of opposition left, then it's safe to assume that having true name tags is OK? Well, I can roll with that.

Yes, also with separate tags for different forms/outfits etc.

mj1234 said:

Yes, also with separate tags for different forms/outfits etc.

But why?
One normally tries to reduce the amount of characters if it's still the very same character (topic #14435 where I and also Renim argues that this tag is uneccessary..).
Just find fitting tags, but keep char tags as low as possible..?

Chiera said:

But why?
One normally tries to reduce the amount of characters if it's still the very same character (topic #14435 where I and also Renim argues that this tag is uneccessary..).
Just find fitting tags, but keep char tags as low as possible..?

There will be so many different forms, personalities and outfits for other characters because of F/GO in the near future. Ishtar is tagged as Toosaka Rin when they're clearly not the same person because they're both different beings with separate personalities etc. I suppose we could give these characters the same treatment as Saber with an umbrella tag. Actually that would be a great idea. If people want to look up their different forms with one one tag, they could use the umbrella tag.

ckretaznman said:

Since there's no sign of opposition left

Lmao good one

Chiera said:

But why?
One normally tries to reduce the amount of characters if it's still the very same character (topic #14435 where I and also Renim argues that this tag is uneccessary..).
Just find fitting tags, but keep char tags as low as possible..?

If we're willing to ignore the friggin spoiler policy to make tagging more simple I don't see the issue in reducing the number of character tags. To my knowledge these things are supposed to be covered by gentags

willsolvit said:

If we're willing to ignore the friggin spoiler policy to make tagging more simple I don't see the issue in reducing the number of character tags. To my knowledge these things are supposed to be covered by gentags

About that spoiler policy... ckretaznman wrote an excellent argument to why it's not a good policy and why it should not apply to Fate. You are free to refute his argument but since you and others haven't done it yet, it's fair to assume there is no sign of opposition left. Regarding reducing the number of characters tags, that is not possible and I encourage you and others to read the entire thread because if we actually reduce the number of character tags for Fate characters, we'll get another mess which was similar to the Saber catastrophe earlier. Right now, an umbrella tag that combines all other character tags is the most logical choice because this will allow people to look up everything at once with an umbrella tag or through the character's different forms with different character tags.

I think Archer should be left as is, but besides that, is anything else really that big of a spoiler? Not too familiar with the Fate-verse (so I could be wrong), but my feeling is that should be the lone exception and the rest are fair to alias.

+1 to the umbrella tag for Sakura/Rin clones, however I think the spoiler rule should be applied cautiously and not completely discarded.

EB said:

I think Archer should be left as is, but besides that, is anything else really that big of a spoiler? Not too familiar with the Fate-verse (so I could be wrong), but my feeling is that should be the lone exception and the rest are fair to alias.

Often, a character's weapons or noble phantasms are closely tied to their identity. Berserker or Rider are the perfect example here, and knowing their identity would greatly ruin the enjoyement of their reveal in Fate/Stay Night. Berserker (Fate/Zero) is a huge spoiler too.

This applies for most F/SN and F/Z characters, really. While Caster's identity is not tied to any plot-related spoilers too heavily, it'd still be a serious letdown to know who it is if you're in the middle of reading the VN and you search for pictures of her on danbooru. lancer (fate/zero) only reveals his identity after a whole deal of trouble from his master, and does so as a courtesy to Saber. Hell, even rider (fate/zero) does not use his widely known name at all and if you are not familiar with his Eastern name you'll only realize who he is after a couple of episodes, when it finally clicks.

I think this is not a problem for Fate/Grand Order character, so I'd be for naming those characters after their real personas, and leaving the ones from the actual VNs and anime/manga under their class name.

I've created a survey to gauge what popular opinion is but I believe the policy going forward will be to use true names.

albert said:

I've created a survey to gauge what popular opinion is but I believe the policy going forward will be to use true names.

I voted already, but I think that's probably right. (Voted to use true names in all copyrights, don't care about spoilers since it's been so long)