Talk:Tanker

Outstanding Issues with this Page

This page is going to require group effort to finish, but it will be quite useful when done. If you take care of an item below, you can strike the item through in the list, using the <del> and </del> tags, or I will do it at some point. Thank you. --Iritscen 18:18, 11 March 2008 (CET)

1. The colors listed under Varieties are made up; will someone list the correct colors there? (Don't look at me, I'm colorblind!) - done

2. The purpose of listing colors is to list under each color the differences in that version of the character. If someone has the stats on each version, please post them (starting HP, damage done, etc.). As far as I know, each color has its own stats, right? - we're not going to track stats, at least not for now; they fluctuate too much

3. We need a thorough listing of moves. I don't know if there are official move names for the moves that do not have their names called out when performed. The names provided for the moves on this page are ripped off from OniShots, although I proposed different names in parentheses in some cases, usually based upon official wrestling parlance. Each move should also have details such as damage done, interruptability status, and keys to press to use that attack when playing as that character.

4. Should we have pics illustrating each move? Can we use the ones from OniShots (probably we would need their permission)?

5. Do all versions of this character have the same moves available to them? If not, we need to note that under the appropriate color section.

Iritscen 18:18, 11 March 2008 (CET)

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Thanks for the more constructive cleanup template, but I'd reformulate it a bit, since to "finish" a wiki page is a contradiction in terms.

I don't think a thorough overview of Oni's Tankers from a game developer's point of view will be "quite useful" to any potential readers.

If anything, it'd be redundant of the Manual section and of the already available gameplay database. Also, it'd be unreadably complex.

Point is, if you want to describe the characters' characteristics accurately, there's much more to variety than a Tanker's "color"...

1. I'm colorblind too, but seriously, don't you believe in the color-picking-and-analyzing tool of your favorite drawing program? Huh...
2. Stats differ a lot within a specific "version" and are being affected by the Anniversary Edition. To document them now is a bad idea.
3. Technically, Tankers inherit a lot of moves from Comguys, even though the AI don't use them much or at all: Gameplay/Combat moves
   Therefore I think mini-overviews are redundant and pretty much pointless. I would rather spend time on the global database (thumbs etc).
   All the moves are actually named in the MELE profiles, but those names are often generic, and won't add much to the interest of this page.
   Exhaustive detail from the binaries would totally drown the rest of the material, and BTW it wouldn't even be reliable because of the Edition.
4. The global database has stimulated (without much success) the creation of standardized GIFs of the moves. Thumbs would be nice too.
   As for the permissions, it's not like you have asked the permission to all the folks from DeviantArt before featuring their Oni art here, right?
5. Tankers actually have a very interesting development background. All 3 ONCC use the same TRAC but there are 6 different MELE profiles.
   The extra 3 MELE are the relicts of early experimentation (along with the tanker_casual ONCV etc) but are actually used by Tankers in Oni.
   A thorough overview of the 6 MELE profiles would be sick, and in any case it has nothing to do on a "public interest" page about Tankers.

There, hope this helps. And thanks again for the template, it's really a whole lot better.

geyser 21:05, 11 March 2008 (CET)

Oh, and you still have this unexplicable affinity for capitals everywhere... Who do you think you are, a German or something? ^_^

geyser 21:05, 11 March 2008 (CET)

"unexplicable affinity for capitals "o_^ So what??

And about the fourth point: we (Iritscen and me) can still try to get permissions (from DA folks) by sending them emails... But the GIFs are already on an Oni webspace. (Harry's, right?) Aren't they already for free community use?

Paradox-01 22:34, 11 March 2008 (CET)

Capitals Are Evil. They make the headers and links look unnatural. I hate them I hate them. Aaaaaaargh.

Screw the permissions, guys. I'll tell you when you steal something important and worth asking about.

geyser 23:01, 11 March 2008 (CET)

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"I don't think a thorough overview of Oni's Tankers from a game developer's point of view will be "quite useful" to any potential readers."

Well, this is the kind of thing we need to hash out, then, because I didn't plan for this to be a technical page, but I did want it to have a comprehensive layman's description of the enemy. Once we decide on what the scope of this page should be, I will proceed to making pages for the other enemies/allies.

"If anything, it'd be redundant of the Manual section and of the already available gameplay database. Also, it'd be unreadably complex."

It's true that the Manual page already gives the colors (oops, I'll be fixing "purple" soon now that I see that it's red), as well as info on the moves they use and a brief bio. But that's just one source of information on that enemy type, and I think that the Manual is not 100% correct in some cases (am I right?). The gameplay database (you're referring to the "Combat moves" page, right?) is already unreadably complex for a newcomer. I'd like to take the TAN*** elements in this tables and turn them into plain English on the Tanker page. Isn't that useful?

"Stats differ a lot within a specific "version" and are being affected by the Anniversary Edition. To document them now is a bad idea."

Ah, I didn't realize there was variance within versions. Okay, maybe that's not a good idea.

"I would rather spend time on the global database (thumbs etc)."

Perhaps I will, perhaps I will.

"All the moves are actually named in the MELE profiles, but those names are often generic"

Unless I'm mistaken, I don't see a comprehensive list of melee profiles or a list of all move names anywhere on the wiki. I will have to look into the binaries myself then, to see the names. I would like to know what they are before I agree that they're not useful to this page.

"The global database has stimulated (without much success) the creation of standardized GIFs of the moves. Thumbs would be nice too."

I like this idea. I was thinking of doing "official" in-game mug shots of each character, for use on their pages, by adopting the greenscreen technique we worked out on the forum with SektorZ. I would just cycle through the characters with shapeshifter, without moving, so all the angles are perfectly consistent. That way we can have a GIF with proper transparency, showing a front shot of each character and maybe a side shot. It wouldn't be much extra work to do animated GIFs of all the available moves using the tables in "Combat moves" as a guide. But we would need to agree on certain elements as a standard, like dimensions of GIF (more or less), and playing speed. I noticed that the animated GIFs we have so far are all in slow-mo.

"As for the permissions, it's not like you have asked the permission to all the folks from DeviantArt before featuring their Oni art here, right?"

I didn't take any art from DA. Perhaps someone else did, and I took it from them, but I didn't take any art from DA myself. My fan art source was mainly Oni Central, via Harry.

"Tankers actually have a very interesting development background. All 3 ONCC use the same TRAC but there are 6 different MELE profiles."

Wow, I don't even know what to do with that information, but that's interesting. It doesn't affect my attempt to document Tanker moves, does it?

"Capitals Are Evil."

Better now? --Iritscen 15:37, 12 March 2008 (CET)

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This is getting overly verbose, but heck, that's just what you get for encouraging talk pages ^_^

Capitals - yes, thanks. DA - indeed that was Dox, not you; I was referring to you guys collectively.

The 6-fold MELE variety interferes with the 3 color variants more than for any other enemy type.

(for all the others you can say there's a specific MELE "supposed" to go with every enemy color)

GIFs were pretty much standardized when the combat move database project started back on OCF:

http://oni.bungie.org/forums/index.php?threadid=61

Slowmo is only apparent. The actual GIFs are real-time, but the playback speed seems to fluctuate a lot.

As for the work it represents: there must be a reason why we're not even close to a complete set of GIFs...

Point is, it's a clearly defined initiative, but it also comes across as an awful waste of modder time ^_^

As for the in-game mugshots, there'd be extra work required because of different/random character height.

You may be better off taking those shots in 3D apps like Blender, even though you can't "shapeshift"...

Actually (and we're going off-topic) I don't see the point of those mugshots: poor quality, little use to anyone.

(we're already using those as status indicators on the onimia forums, but I don't think we need them)

It's much better to show the characters in full, like those early renders did. Showing armor variants and such.

(if by mug shot you mean the full figure of every character, then I agree, except for the standardization)

An ASCII dump of technique names can be found here: http://ssg.oni2.net/subfold/text/oni_bina_melee_part_2.txt

Generally speaking, I would make a common list of the extra TRAM specified by the Tanker TRAC, without MELE.

(so, yes, basically putting the TAN*** column in plain English; not sure you need the key symbols and such)

As for the article's scope, I'd prefer a more in-universe depiction of the Tankers, with little or no tedious stuff.

An overly objective overview of Oni's content bears no added value and is a total waste of everyone's time.

I think the in-game characteristics of the Tankers deserve a little TRAM list and a few pics/screenshots.

The rest of the content would be more casual and less trivial at the same time (background info, trivia).

geyser 02:47, 13 March 2008 (CET)

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The main thing I have to respond on is that I appreciate what you're saying about the purpose of the Tanker page. I agree that it would be nice to have an "in-world" page, one that focuses on the character within Oni's world, not his melee AI and techniques. But I also wanted to clearly document techniques and stats as a more technical kind of reference article. I now see that the appropriate place for that would be Gameplay/Combat_moves/Tanker. Written out like Konoko's page, but with a clear explanation of the key presses for each combo, and perhaps (eventually) with animated GIFs illustrating each move so the user can identify what it is we're talking about. K's page itself would of course have to be fixed up this way. I get the impression that no one ever considered her page finished.

"Slowmo is only apparent. The actual GIFs are real-time, but the playback speed seems to fluctuate a lot."

I have this problem all the time: I set the GIF's speed in ImageReady, but it plays back much slower. I wondered if the slow-mo was intentional, because it does work better that way. You have the time to see the move in more detail than when you see it in-game.

"As for the work it represents: there must be a reason why we're not even close to a complete set of GIFs...

Point is, it's a clearly defined initiative, but it also comes across as an awful waste of modder time ^_^"

Yeah, it wouldn't be fast, converting video to GIFs takes time, but I could record all the actual video in an hour or two and chip away at making GIFs over a longer period.

"(if by mug shot you mean the full figure of every character, then I agree, except for the standardization)"

Excuse me, I didn't mean to say mug shot. I have no idea why I said that. I meant full body shots, front and side. So, good, we're in agreement.

"An ASCII dump of technique names can be found here: http://ssg.oni2.net/subfold/text/oni_bina_melee_part_2.txt"

Thank you, that's very helpful. I notice that we still have text files and hex code screenshots that are not in the wiki, but are being linked to. It would be nice to "localize" those at some point, wouldn't it, so all the info is contained in the wiki itself?

"Generally speaking, I would make a common list of the extra TRAM specified by the Tanker TRAC, without MELE.

(so, yes, basically putting the TAN*** column in plain English; not sure you need the key symbols and such)"

In other words, not worrying about variations in what melee AI uses which of the Tanker moves, but just listing all Tanker moves? That is a good point. We can always worry about specifying moves by AI version later if we have that much free time on our hands that we don't know what to do with. --Iritscen 18:57, 13 March 2008 (CET)

You have the time to see the move in more detail than when you see it in-game. Looks like "carousel" is underrated ^_^

I meant full body shots, front and side. Why doncha do yourself a favor: screw the side views and just use THESE ^_^

if we have that much free time on our hands that we don't know what to do with. Now that one just isn't gonna happen.

Yeah, it wouldn't be fast, converting video to GIFs takes time That's why I absolutely do not advise you to do any of this...

I now see that the appropriate place for that would be Gameplay/Combat_moves/Tanker Well, yes and no, and rather no.

GIFs are a bitch, let's face it. Nifty feature, but a virtual time sink for both modders and wiki editors (you, me, them, everybody).

And without the GIFs, the current tables are good enough (a parallel overview is ideal when it comes to inherited animations).

K's page itself would of course have to be fixed up this way. Truth is, I'd rather scrap it. Enough of the procrastination...

It would be nice to "localize" those at some point, wouldn't it "The answer to this is, quite simply, 'maybe'..." (C) Ask A Ninja

It is certainly possible for the wiki to effectively replace Oni Stuff, Oni Central and oni2.net accounts... Given Enough Time(TM).

But the point would have to be made why polishing publicly irrelevant aspects of the wiki is a sensible thing to do (at any time).

Note that those txt files are big lists or pending spreadsheets, and would have to be wikified should they become "articles"...

I don't know anyone masochistic/desperate/enthusiastic enough to commit to such a thing. And after all, oni2.net is ours too.

As for images hotlinked from oni2.net, archiving tools always include them in the package when taking a snapshot of the wiki.

More specifically, on the subject of hex screenshots, another crazy idea of mine was to replace them with templated tables...

But even though I used to object to ssg uploading hex shots, that ship has sailed... What counts is that OBD is functional now.

Rationalization makes sense when there's a blatant mess to deal with, a mess that stands in the way of everyday public use...

Conversely, when an initiative amounts to moving the proverbial furniture instead of contributing quality content, I'm rather wary.

"If you're having trouble thinking of ways to make yourself useful, I'll give you some suggestions." (C) Calvin & Hobbes.

Like, BSL. We definitely ought to be offering a solid reference to Oni scripters, Edition or no Edition. But ATM we aren't.

geyser 03:01, 15 March 2008 (CET)

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"why doncha do yourself a favor: screw the side views and just use THESE"

Oh, good grief, how long were you going to wait to tell about those? I love how you keep things to yourself. "Oh, those high-res dream images? I've had those for years." :-#

Also, I think I will take your advice and focus my efforts on areas other than making animated GIFs for the moves.

"the current tables are good enough"

The current tables are not in anything that resembles English (or Russian, or any other human language). I thought you already agreed with the notion that those could be written out in layman's terms (here's what enemy X can do, here's how each move is performed).

"another crazy idea of mine was to replace them with templated tables"

I remember reading about that... from your words, I guess you aren't planning to go forward with that. Oh well, it seems like it would be a lot of work....

And yeah, I hope to get into the BSL stuff soon. But I do think working on the character pages such as Tanker would also be making myself useful. --Iritscen 15:00, 17 March 2008 (CET)

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• It seems fair enough to me to assume knowledge of public resources like OniStuff or the official Oni page...

When and if I am wrong to assume so, it may take some time for me to realize the trouble you guys are in :)

• The current tables are optimal for English and Russian speakers alike. As for a verbose paraphrase thereof,

you can give it a try, but you'll wish you were doing something else by the time you're finished with Tankers.

• HexRow is just an example of a systematic rationalization that doesn't change a damn thing for anyone...

It's not all that hard to carry out the change, but it's quite tedious and procrastinatory when you think of it.

• Since we're doing the Devil's work anyway, I'd use my skills to empower creativity rather than fandom.

No one actually needs an online encyclopedia that merely replicates Oni's content over and over. IMO.

geyser 01:46, 18 March 2008 (CET)

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Well, I can't disagree with anything in your post directly above (darn!), so I'll just say that I will be focusing on contributing in parallel to BSL and Tanker, both over time, then moving onto other enemy pages after Tanker if that one isn't too arduous. Re your last sentence, I suppose you could argue that the wiki should be empowering creativity and all that, but I think the wiki's focus has been so much on that (mainly in the way of technical documentation that informs modding) that we've neglected the more basic content that newbies would want, like actually just saying, "Here's the enemies and what they look like and how they fight". Granted, there may not be many newbies this far into the life of the game, but I always thought OniGalore was intended to be an all-purpose repository of knowledge about Oni, in which case the basic stuff is sorely neglected. You'd have to go search for FAQs on other sites to answer those questions. --Iritscen 17:49, 18 March 2008 (CET)

Have a look at the new manual section. Hope it helps. --geyser 03:57, 19 March 2008 (CET)

Wow, nice, geyser. What this indicates to me, and let's see if you agree, is that there is no more need for a page dedicated to Tankers, another dedicated to Ninjas, etc., in any general way. So we could delete the Tanker page. BUT, I still see usefulness in writing subpages under "Combat moves" that list moves and key comboes that trigger them. I think that's the only info missing now, aside from stats, which for now are impractical to document. I would like to move the (draft of a) moves list on "Tanker" to a subpage of "Combat moves", so let's leave this page up for now. --Iritscen 14:58, 19 March 2008 (CET)