The Great Fate Character Retagging Project

mj1234 said:

You raised some good points. I too believe Yuudachi Kai Ni deserves a separate tag.

No, he raised a very solid point why the Swimsuit version are simply blowing up the character tags and even worse, cosplay tags. You have such a big jungle of tags that you struggle to tag them all or even wrong.

Yuudachi is a very good example of how it should go: Have a general tag handle it. Here it is the remodel_(kantai_collection) tag and even the cosplay tags don't get too shitty: "yuudachi_(remodel)_(kantai_collection)_(cosplay)".
This would it look like if we are to create this tag. Now imagine this for every KanColle girl and then you have so many splitted tags that it's hard to navigate through.

The Fate issue could easily be solved with a "character_name swimsuit/bikini" search...

Chiera said:

No, he raised a very solid point why the Swimsuit version are simply blowing up the character tags and even worse, cosplay tags. You have such a big jungle of tags that you struggle to tag them all or even wrong.

Yuudachi is a very good example of how it should go: Have a general tag handle it. Here it is the remodel_(kantai_collection) tag and even the cosplay tags don't get too shitty: "yuudachi_(remodel)_(kantai_collection)_(cosplay)".
This would it look like if we are to create this tag. Now imagine this for every KanColle girl and then you have so many splitted tags that it's hard to navigate through.

The Fate issue could easily be solved with a "character_name swimsuit/bikini" search...

What would your solution be if somebody wanted to look up Yuudachi's base form without filtering her remodel because they want to see both forms in one picture?

mj1234 said:

What would your solution be if somebody wanted to look up Yuudachi's base form without filtering her remodel because they want to see both forms in one picture?

Do we need a solution? That problem is far more desirable than the mess we currently have.

Chiera said:

No, he raised a very solid point why the Swimsuit version are simply blowing up the character tags and even worse, cosplay tags. You have such a big jungle of tags that you struggle to tag them all or even wrong.

Yuudachi is a very good example of how it should go: Have a general tag handle it. Here it is the remodel_(kantai_collection) tag and even the cosplay tags don't get too shitty: "yuudachi_(remodel)_(kantai_collection)_(cosplay)".
This would it look like if we are to create this tag. Now imagine this for every KanColle girl and then you have so many splitted tags that it's hard to navigate through.

The Fate issue could easily be solved with a "character_name swimsuit/bikini" search...

Except each swimsuit servant represents three different appearances, usually paired with their own idiosyncrasies (sukeban uniform Raikou is a swimsuit servant and yet there's no visible swimsuit, a character wearing a Medjed blanket is likely to be referencing swimsuit Nitocris even though the person underneath is not even visible, swimsuit Fran is just wearing bandages on the last form), and being official designs they are consistently used by fanartists. What if somebody wants to look at something other than tenga bikini Nero?

Kancolle has it easy because all it needs is the remodel tag and seasonals haven't gotten as much fanart or variation within the concept itself either.

Moreover, given the swimsuit variants (and in fact almost all variants) have differences in personalities (Mordred doesn't even like summer Mordred!) and can run around independently of each other, it's easy to argue they are separate characters altogether.

Is the parenthetical overload ridiculous? Yes. It's also necessary, because Fate is a mess of proportions unseen in any other franchise I know of and needs all the searching assist it can get.
Hell, even then, we don't even distinguish between different ascension outfits (in Servants where that's warranted) even though they are basically the same concept as remodel_(kantai_collection), because who the fuck wants to keep track of all those variations.

So "astolfo" is the 3rd-biggest missed search (218).

Might want to reach consensus.

Kikimaru said:

So "astolfo" is the 3rd-biggest missed search (218).

Might want to reach consensus.

And its wiki, which is displayed automatically in a search if there's no posts attached to a tag (such as the case here), links directly to the correct character tag.

Chiera said:

The Fate issue could easily be solved with a "character_name swimsuit/bikini" search...

It could, it honestly sounds to me like there are users that are trying to work around the limited searching parameters for basic users by doing that.

James-Sarrowtail said:

It could, it honestly sounds to me like there are users that are trying to work around the limited searching parameters for basic users by doing that.

It'd be naive to think that's the case. Both sides of the argument have users from multiple levels who posted in this very thread.

KyteM said:

Except each swimsuit servant represents three different appearances, usually paired with their own idiosyncrasies (sukeban uniform Raikou is a swimsuit servant and yet there's no visible swimsuit, a character wearing a Medjed blanket is likely to be referencing swimsuit Nitocris even though the person underneath is not even visible, swimsuit Fran is just wearing bandages on the last form), and being official designs they are consistently used by fanartists. What if somebody wants to look at something other than tenga bikini Nero?

Kancolle has it easy because all it needs is the remodel tag and seasonals haven't gotten as much fanart or variation within the concept itself either.

Moreover, given the swimsuit variants (and in fact almost all variants) have differences in personalities (Mordred doesn't even like summer Mordred!) and can run around independently of each other, it's easy to argue they are separate characters altogether.

Is the parenthetical overload ridiculous? Yes. It's also necessary, because Fate is a mess of proportions unseen in any other franchise I know of and needs all the searching assist it can get.
Hell, even then, we don't even distinguish between different ascension outfits (in Servants where that's warranted) even though they are basically the same concept as remodel_(kantai_collection), because who the fuck wants to keep track of all those variations.

I think I can say it straight out that I have no idea of the Fate series.
But this series is de factor the biggest crap to tag.

Anyway, you don't get the point. There is always a tag that is describing the swimsuit form of a character, too. Fran wears bandages, then search for bandages fran. Nitocris has a blanket, so nitocris blanket (I intentionally made it shorts, don't know how the characters are actually named due to the 678 versions of them).
The point is not the swimsuit tag, that was an example. The point is that you will find a tag combination that gives you most likely the correct result (assuming the uploader tagged it appropriately).

About the personalities: They are canonically the same character, right? Because the same character has different traits in their swimsuit form, we need a new character tag? Then what's about characters that have a split personality or change their point of view or appearance drastically during a show? Do they get a new tag then? I believe not, that seems Fate exclusive. Sabrina_(pokemon) is a perfect example how it should be done.

Basically, the swimsuits version are still the same characters, but with a different appearance and maybe personality, is that right?
If yes, then we should approach Fate like Pokémon...

@mj1234 The solution is the dual persona tag.
Yuudachi_(kantai_collection) dual_persona has both the remodel and the other version.

Chiera said:

Basically, the swimsuits version are still the same characters, but with a different appearance and maybe personality, is that right?
If yes, then we should approach Fate like Pokémon...

Yeah, I don't think that any character with summer alternates happen to have any exceptions (but given so many of them for 2016 alone, I can't be sure of that) outside of things that are part of the gameplay (namely the change of class that come with them), so would be correct in saying that.

Chiera said:

I think I can say it straight out that I have no idea of the Fate series.
But this series is de factor the biggest crap to tag.

Anyway, you don't get the point. There is always a tag that is describing the swimsuit form of a character, too. Fran wears bandages, then search for bandages fran. Nitocris has a blanket, so nitocris blanket (I intentionally made it shorts, don't know how the characters are actually named due to the 678 versions of them).
The point is not the swimsuit tag, that was an example. The point is that you will find a tag combination that gives you most likely the correct result (assuming the uploader tagged it appropriately).

About the personalities: They are canonically the same character, right? Because the same character has different traits in their swimsuit form, we need a new character tag? Then what's about characters that have a split personality or change their point of view or appearance drastically during a show? Do they get a new tag then? I believe not, that seems Fate exclusive. Sabrina_(pokemon) is a perfect example how it should be done.

Basically, the swimsuits version are still the same characters, but with a different appearance and maybe personality, is that right?
If yes, then we should approach Fate like Pokémon...

@mj1234 The solution is the dual persona tag.
Yuudachi_(kantai_collection) dual_persona has both the remodel and the other version.

By that logic, we should merge matou_sakura and dark_sakura. After all, the latter is just matou_sakura dark_persona. Same with saber_alter, for that matter. In the source story they are literally the same character, merely changed by circumstance. (One can stretch that argument to apply to Shirou and Emiya, but that's just nitpicking)
child_gilgamesh is just gilgamesh younger, lord_el-melloi_ii is just waver_velvet older, except people always forget to tag them as such because a character tag already exists.
Maybe we should merge those too. Too bad if you wanna look for Prisma Illya's Kid Gil, that's three tags already.

Are swimsuits, perhaps, less "alternate"-y than other garbs? Is some bride-themed bondage outfit enough to warrant a new tag for saber_bride? Apparently somebody four years ago thought yes, and we didn't even have the different personality excuse back then. Five years before that, somebody thought an alternate costume for Seiba in a fighting game was different enough for a saber_lily tag. Should we merge those too?
It's April Fool's, take a Seiba, give her a baseball cap, baseball bat and short shorts. Bam, mysterious_heroine_x is born.
Those are (were) all the same character, with just as much difference between them and their originals as a swimsuit variant. Merge'em all, I say!

Except no I don't 'cause that'd be stupid.

Where is the line? Who draws the line? Why are we pretending Fate works like other franchises? Why are we trying to make exceptions, when exceptions were the root of all tagging evil?

The reason why every single FGO character has its own tag is a matter of consistency, an easy to understand rule anybody can apply, because otherwise ad-hoc rules are created and everything gets shot to hell. FGO had that problem early on, too, until an ad-hoc standard was adopted and everybody started using *_(fate/grand_order) (except me because I'm a rebel and also because of a problem I'll detail below)
We used to have launcher_(fate/extra_ccc) and lancer_of_black until I asked to merge them into karna_(fate), because, unsurprisingly, "Fate" was the common point between the two. Altera has a similar problem, with altera_(fate/grand_order) and altera_(fate/extella). And these were literally the same character, just across different installments of the franchise.

I don't particularly care for the swimsuit tags in specific, I care because nuking those will break the hardline "all or nothing" policy that so far in my experience been the only successful policy in dealing with the mess that are Fate characters. "Does it have a separate entry in the FGO database: Y/N" is an easy rule that people can understand and apply even if they don't visit the forums to learn the idiosyncrasies of the system. Tags are a parenthetical hell so people can figure out at a glance which one is the right one, and so you can do neat stuff like *_(swimsuit_*)_(fate). Wildcards are criminally underused in danbooru, and that's partly because the tagging scheme sucks.
And FGO names are parenthetical hells already, anyways. Stupid jeanne alter santa lily.

Perhaps, just perhaps, tagging Fate posts is a pain in the ass not because there's four different character tags, but because there's four damn characters with the same stupid face.

Wanna merge tags? Sure.
Merge them all. I'm sure users can figure it out. Lancer Alter is just saber older dark_persona, after all.

You know what would actually, truly, provably (as in, it can be proved) make tagging easier? If all versions started the same way. We have autocomplete, we can type "nitoc" and get nitocris_(fate/grand_order) and nitocris_(swimsuit_assassin)_(fate) on demand.
And maybe then Astolfo would stop being in the top missed searches. astolfo_(fate) is easier to remember than rider_of_black.

E: This got super rambly. Sorry.

Guys, the Swimsuit Servants aren't just the same Servant with different personalities, some of them actually react to meeting their default version. That's what KyteM meant by "Mordred doesn't even like summer Mordred". Even in the official Comic a la Carte—and I already said this on page 4—has a scene where Swimsuit Tamato, Mordred, and Martha meet their original selves as well as an entire conversation between Caster Liz and Brave Liz. We even see Caster Liz saying how her "other me is weird".

So, to me, that makes it VERY CLEAR that these variants are meant to be different characters. And that makes perfect sense because, if you read the Fate series lore, you'll find out that Servants are actually clones of the figures that are being summoned. When you summon someone from the Throne of Heroes, you are actually making a clone of that someone, and when that dies clone dies, the original receives the knowledge (but not the memories) of what the clone did in what is merely described as "similar to reading a book". The exception is Artoria is FSN because of her special circumstances, yet ironically she's the one with the most clones in the entire franchise.
So in theory you can have, say, two identical Medusas running around at the same time, though I think the Holy Grail has some mechanism to prevent this in normal situations. I don't know the entire lore.

Also, for the sake of future cross reference:
topic #14287 - Swimsuit Nero implication requests

ckretaznman said:

But saber_alter is referred to as Artoria Pendragon Alter in the game, so under your logic shouldn't we tag her as such? There are also other characters who are Artoria Alters that are not specifically of the Saber class who are referred to with their full names. Keeping saber_alter, demon_archer, etc. while having tags for cu_chulainn_alter_(fate/grand_order), emiya_alter, artoria_pendragon_(lancer_alter), and other true names creates a lot of inconsistencies and confusion.

Sorry for not being clear about this before, but I think Saber Alter and Saber Lily should be exceptions to the true name rule (and maybe Saber Bride too, but I'm less sure about this one). Partly because there's literally no other character to conflict with, and I think these names were used in popularity polls that used true names for other Servants. I'll need to look up again to be sure though.

Now we finally got to the main thing that has been bugging me the whole time about Fate, but there was simply no satisfying explanation given.
I have not the intention to counter what you have said, I just want to understand why we are doing it the way we do.

So I think I can approach this with a different point of view now.

remove implication artoria_pendragon_(swimsuit_archer) -> saber
remove implication santa_alter -> saber_alter
mass update artoria_pendragon_(swimsuit_rider_alter)_(fate)_(cosplay) -> artoria_pendragon_(swimsuit_rider_alter)_(cosplay)
mass update artoria_pendragon_(swimsuit_rider_alter)_(fate) -> artoria_pendragon_(swimsuit_rider_alter)
create implication artoria_pendragon_(swimsuit_rider_alter) -> artoria_pendragon_(all)

Link to request

As discussed above, variant Servants with little to no difference from their default versions (Swimsuits, Brave Eli) are shown in an official comic to exist at the same time as their normal versions. Therefore, they are technically different characters.

There's no point in having a Fate parser in Swimsuit Rider Alter's tag as the name "Artoria Pendragon" only exists in the Fate series.

After this, do a separate request for:
create implication artoria_pendragon_(swimsuit_archer) -> artoria_pendragon_(all)
create implication santa_alter -> artoria_pendragon_(all)

As the form doesn't allow me to make it due to an indirect implication currently existing.

The bulk update request #1323 has been approved.

Are comic anthologies really the best sources of canon?

WakuWaku said:

Are comic anthologies really the best sources of canon?

Definitely not. I must have to ask why subtle differences in personality in the story is placed to such high importance when this is an image-based website and they look exactly the same. There would have to be a reason that makes sense from a tagging standpoint, which to be fair KyteM gave. Though I don't see why we can't merge away the inconvenient tags. Saber bride for example doesn't cause nearly as much trouble as the swimsuit tags and if it did merging it away would be fairly easy.

While the game tries to refraim from reusing characters in the main story (although Mordred did appear in both London and Camelot with different levels of knowledge and character development), it does acknowledge servants as beings that have variants, with My Room lines commenting on their alternate selves (Kid Gil hiding from big Gil otherwise they'd start fighting, for example, or swimsuit Mordred talking about regular flavor) or, in the case of the particularly comedic Halloween 2016 event, have Caster Elizabeth and Lancer Elizabeth meet, argue and then inexplicably fuse into Elizabeth Brave. (She even has the Double Summon skill in her profile). So the comic anthologies aren't the only source of canon for that particular element.

E: oh yeah IIRC in Seiba's interlude Seiba and the protag converse about the latter's meeting of her Alter self in Fuyuki. Seiba explains how Servants can split off into different variants and to please consider that Alter as a different existence from herself. (And then there's the whole Lion King deal)

WakuWaku said:

Are comic anthologies really the best sources of canon?

Comic antho is more like fanwork to me. However, aside servants meeting their counterpart in different classes in comic anthology, it is canon that they are different people who can meet each other. The canon comes from the dialogue in My Room, like how mordred_(suimsuit_rider)_(fate) make comments about saber_of_red if both comes to the same Chaldea. ryougi_shiki even has two versions of her in FGO however the tag is merged in danbooru.

My comment was aimed more at G-SANtos citing Comic a la Carte multiple times in this thread as his basis for changes. I get how the variants work.
Though I don't agree with removing the implication from the Saber Alter variants (or any variants) just because "technically they're a different character" unless there will be another catchall tag. Otherwise I think someone searching saber_alter should be getting Santa/Swimsuit in their search.

Let's say a visitor comes to Danbooru searching for pics of Saber, and discovers her real name is Artoria Pendragon. What is their reaction, and what happens to our website?

Let's say a different visitor makes an account to upload pics of various Fate characters, and runs into a spaghetti mess of Fate tags. What is their reaction, and what happens to our website?

I would bet the second person is much more likely to quit Danbooru or harbor negative feelings or cause trouble on our website than the first person is.