User:BadCatMan/Manual of Style 2

The Manual of Style is a style guide for writing, formatting, and organizing articles on the Forgotten Realms Wiki (hereafter, FRW). It's based on the standard wiki style used at Wikipedia and elsewhere and on practices developed by FRW editors to suit the Forgotten Realms setting and the wiki's policies and goals.

Purpose
While a style guide may seem pretentious or nitpicky and the guidelines unimportant, all good wikis have them. If editors follow the same style, their additions will meld seamlessly. A wiki without a consistent style is messy and inconsistent, making it hard to read and find information and discouraging adding more, while one with a consistent style appears neat and professional, raising its profile. A well-written, well-styled, and properly formatted article is more inviting and enjoyable to read. This guide encourages a consistent, high-quality article style that suits wiki policies.

But this is less a strict checklist and more a set of firm suggestions to improve an article. Pages may vary and editors have different approaches and habits, each with their pros and cons, and putting different ideas into practice is the best way to determine which is better. If you have an idea, feel free to try it out, so long as it doesn't break policies or conflict with the overall wiki style, and another editor may either change it or adopt it. Feel free to discuss ideas with other editors or in the Forum.

In addition to this guide, you should also read many other FRW articles, especially those on similar topics, and look at their code and format to understand how they are written and to use them as a basis for your own.

Our key aims are:
 * Quality writing and formatting
 * Complete referencing, and
 * Entertaining and professional style.

Basic Editing
This section gives some basic instructions for writing and editing wikitext (also called wiki markup and wikicode).

Use the Source Editor
We strongly recommend all editors use the source editor, not the visual editor provided by FANDOM. The source editor displays the wiki source code, allowing a user to see directly how it works and fix problems easily, without creating other problems. It is the most effective way of learning wikicode and applying templates and other features. We also provide common symbols and templates at the bottom of the source editor page that can be inserted at the click of a mouse. The visual editor, meanwhile, displays how the finished page may look, but obscures the code and can cause other problems. A user may try to correct the spelling in a link, but miss correcting the link itself. The visual editor can also add spaces and alter formatting or incorrectly apply templates without the user even trying.

Unfortunately, visual editing is the default on FANDOM, especially for users without accounts. To use the source editor, select 'Edit source' from the drop-down menu beside the 'Edit' button in the page's top-right corner. If the visual editor is already open, select 'Source editing' from its drop-down menu in the top right. If you have a FANDOM account, go to Preferences, to the Editing tab, and set the 'Preferred editor' to 'Source editor'.

Apostrophes, Quotation Marks, and Other Symbols
Use plain, straight apostrophes, as would appear in the source editor or other basic text editors. Curly apostrophes or "smart" quotation marks, which may be copied over from documents or advanced text editors, are treated as different symbols in wiki code. Look closely and compare ‘witch’ and “witch” to 'witch' and "witch". The wrong apostrophes and quotes can produce broken links and lead to duplicate pages being created unnecessarily.

The Forgotten Realms uses many diacritic marks on letters that are unfamiliar in English. For example, the circumflex on the u in Faerûn and the acute on the e in Nouméa Drathchuld. Try to retain these, such by copy-pasting from the book, another article, or a character map program. However, the FRW has redirects for many 'bare' versions, so Faerun will work and 'Faerûn' will be auto-suggested.

When copy-pasting text, make sure that no broken and invisible characters are included, as these may disrupt wiki code. The source editor will display these.

Italic, Bold, and Italic Bold
Italics and bold text are created like so: Note that bold and italic is the two apostrophes of italics plus the three apostrophes of bolding.
 * To make italic text, wrap it with two apostrophes:
 * To make bold text, wrap it with three apostrophes:
 * To make bold and italic text, wrap it with five apostrophes:.

Furthermore, a regular apostrophe as in a quote or possessive can interfere with these. If so, use  (which prevents wikicode working) to cover the actual apostrophe.

Links and Templates
To make a link, wrap it with two square brackets:  makes "remove curse". To apply italics or bolding, place apostrophes outside the square brackets:  makes "remove curse". Try to avoid creating bold links, as the extra color is unsightly.

To have different text appear in a link, insert a vertical line or 'pipe':  makes "lifted his curse". Italics or bolding may go either outside the link or inside the latter piped part, but try not to mix these.

To call a template, use two curly brackets:  makes. Pipes are also used to separate the parts of the template. In most cases, just copy-and-paste the template from the template page and follow the instructions there.

Citations and References
To make a citation, use a citation template:  makes:

To include page and chapter numbers, include them after pipes with a hyphen for ranges. The first position is for the page, the second for the chapter:  makes:

These should generally not be used on their own, and only in Sources or Further Reading sections in an Appendix. Instead, they should appear in footnote references.

To make a footnote reference, wrap the text in  tags:   to create a superscript numbered link, such as "Grimalkin was a cat belonging to Benelaius, a retired War Wizard. " The   can be anything, but try to keep it brief, clear, and unique to the reference; the initials of the source and a page or chapter number are most common. To reuse this reference, use the first part with the name defined earlier:  to give the same superscript numbered link, "He regularly lay on Benelaius's lap and liked being rubbed behind the ears. " The results are displayed by a   template at the bottom of the page:

To find the desired citation template for a source, begin typing  then the name and wait for auto-complete to suggest it, or else find a link to it on the source's page. They are divided by medium (book, comic, game, etc.), edition (hardcover, mass-market paperback, year, etc.), and disambiguation (explained under Page Name, below). Note that using pages without the correct cite template may produce an error message.

Breaks and Sections
To create paragraph breaks, create two new lines, that is, by tapping the Enter key twice. If there is only one new line, the wikicode will not read it and will show the text as a single block, as if there was no paragraph break. Note also that a single space at the start of a line will cause it to display in a shaded box in a Courier-style font used for displaying code; this is a common error and should be avoided.

To create section breaks and headings, wrap the text with multiple equals signs. As seen on this page,  produces a large, underlined section heading. Three equals signs produces a subsection,, and four will produce a subsubsection,  , as below. (A single equals sign will produce a large section heading equivalent to a page name, so this is avoided.)

Subsubsection

 * This is a subsubsection.

Etiquette
This section discusses some etiquette and makes some suggestions for an improved editing experience for everyone.

Preview Before Publishing
Whichever editor you use, always preview and test before publishing. In the source editor, click 'Show Preview' to make sure everything looks and works correctly before you click 'Save Changes'. In the visual editor, preview is automatic, but not necessarily accurate. Click 'Show changes' at the bottom of the visual editor to see the added and altered wikitext to confirm it is correct and test any links you've made or altered to confirm they go to the intended pages, before clicking 'Save'. Preview settings can be set in your Preferences, under the Editing tab.

Try to do all your work at once before saving, to avoid many small edits filling up logs and page histories and so other editors can tell when you're finished. Regardless, large projects may require multiple sessions and follow-up corrections are common.

Provide Edit Summaries
To explain your changes to fellow and future editors, provide an edit summary. In the source editor, fill in the Summary box. In the visual editor, replace 'Describe what you changed'. You can put anything, but should summarize the work done, list sources used for additions, or give a reason for a particular change.

Avoid Edit Conflicts
To avoid edit conflicts and disrupting others' work, try not to edit a page soon after another editor, in case they have more to add or need to correct an error. An edit conflict can force an editor to make changes or redo their own work. To mark a page you're working on, place the Working template at the top of the page, as, which includes your account name and date. Try to avoid editing a page marked with Working, as the editor may have already addressed an issue or have significant changes being prepared. (Working tags will be removed from abandoned projects.)

If you correct an error or disagree with an interpretation, do not simply change it without giving new evidence or reasoning. This can cause an edit war or argument. Instead, explain the reasoning in the edit summary or open a discussion on the article's Talk page to work out a solution and let other editors contribute.

Check Your Work
Always look over your article and read your work back to check for issues, both before you save and after. In addition, check back on the page in the next day or so, to see how other editors have corrected and improved upon it. You can review these revisions by seeing the page's History, from the drop-down menu next to Edit.

Page Names
When creating a new article, the page name (presented in large font at the top of each page, used for links, searches, and categories) should be the proper name of the subject. However, there are a few things to consider so it is more easily recognized, searched for, linked to, and sorted in categories.

Most Recent or Common Name
If the subject was renamed in later lore, use the latest known name. For example, the city of Heliogabalus was renamed Helgabal, so it is detailed on the Helgabal page. Make sure any necessary redirects, such as Heliogabalus, are made.

If the subject is much more commonly known by a different name than their proper name, then consider using the more common name. For example, Elminster, not Elminster Aumar, and mind flayer, not illithid. Again, redirects will still be needed under the full name, such as illithid and Elminster Aumar.

Use Lower Case
The names of common creatures, items, and most classes, spells, and magic items should be written in lower case, just as they would appear in a sentence in an article, novel, or D&D sourcebook, which favour lower-case names for classes, spells, and magic items. Proper nouns are capitalized as normal. For example, human, moon elf, longsword, enlarge or reduce person, and ioun stone, but Wong Fei's ioun stone and Congenio Ioun.

Note that only the first letter of a page name is case-insensitive (that is, it's treated as lower- or upper-case), so Human goes to the same page, but Enlarge or Reduce Person does not. Also note that auto-completed wiki links default to an upper-case first letter, so these need to be reverted.

Skip Opening "The"
Avoid using the definite article "The" at the start of the page name, unless it is specifically part of the name in the source text. For example, the Scarlet Sheath tavern and the House of Good Spirits guildhall don't need it, but The Fish House and The Mysterious Harpers do.

However, if "the" is an essential part of the name and is needed make a page name sensible or not just a basic word, then it may be retained, for example, the Vast and the Hand.

Naming the Unnamable
If no proper name is known, then you may invent one. Make this simple, descriptive, and lower case, as it would appear in a sentence, so that it's not mistaken for a proper name. It can be based on descriptions or nicknames in the source or something to clarify it from others. For example, the second battle of Shadowdale, unnamed bandit leader, kittenlord, and one who waits. If a name is unknown and constructed, this should be explained in the article's Appendix. Do consider if an article for an unnamed topic even needs to be made, as it may not be notable enough.

Disambiguation
When two or more pages would have the same name, disambiguation is the process of deciding how to distinguish them. First, check if one has a more complete or up-to-date name it should be called instead. If not, give the name to the most well-known or most commonly linked-to page. The other page should be named with a brief description of what it is in brackets. For example, darkvision (the ability, and most common), Darkvision (novel) (the book), and darkvision (spell) (you get the idea).

If there are only two such pages, use a otheruses4 or distinguish template at the top of the page to clarify which is which and link between them. If there are three, use either two other uses or otheruses. Finally, create a disambiguation page like darkvision (disambiguation) to list the different page names and meanings, followed by the disambig notice.

Disambiguation may also be done for pages with similar, but not identical, names and even when pages have better names to go by. In this case, use the templates and make a disambiguation page, but do not rename the pages. For example, see Helm (disambiguation).

The disambiguating term should be short, specific, a basic noun, and in-universe. For example, Snake (ninja) (his occupation, ninja) rather than Snake (character) (an out-of-universe term) or Snake (Aru) (the place Snake is found, which may be unfamiliar or confusing). Some situations may necessarily break this rule, such as Athosar and Athosar (Loudwater), two identically named human clerics of Lathander distinguishable only by location.

Layout
This section covers how templates, text, and topics are arranged on a page for consistency and ease of finding information.

Infoboxes
At the top of the page (but below disambiguating and other top-of-the-page notices) is the infobox, a sidebar presenting basic information (e.g., a character's title, race, and home), statistics (a town's population or an item's value and weight), and some crunchy information (levels of characters, magic items, and spells), allowing the wiki to present important crunch while keeping it out of the main text. It also displays a page name (in title case, where important words are capitalized, and without need for disambiguation) and a key image at the top of the page.

Look through Category:Infoboxes for a suitable infobox; they are widely applicable but tailored to specific types of article. The most common are Person for characters (non-player!); Location for regions, realms, and settlements; Building for businesses, castles, and built structures; Creature for races and monsters in general; {tl|Item}} for tools, weapons, and magic items; and Class for classes of various kinds in each edition. Copy the infobox wikicode from the template page and paste it at the top of your article, then start filling out the entries according to the infobox's instructions. They don't all need to be filled, and should only be filled when the information is known. You may delete entries you won't use, but consider leaving some present for later users to expand on or copy. References should always be included.

Images may be displayed in all infoboxes in the  entry, using , File:Image.jpg , or simply. The infobox allows a larger image width than default thumbnails, i.e., 270 pixels, so try to upload an image larger than this. As this is the first thing a reader will see, try to display a relevant, recent, or eye-catching image that best illustrates the subject. If no suitable image exists, then it is not necessary to include one. After the image is the  entry; use this to describe the image or indicate the relevant part, especially if there are several characters or complex events or if it is a map and the location is hard to find. A caption is not necessary if the image is very self-explanatory.

Some pages may include two infoboxes, such as Organization to detail an order of knights and Class to detail a special class unique to its members.

Don't Bury the Lead
The lead (or lede) is the introductory sentence or paragraph of an article. It quickly tells a reader what the article is about to help them decide whether to keep reading. Try to interest the reader in it, but keep it short and to the point. It should give the basic who, what, where, when, how, and why of the topic.

An effective lead should give the name or names of the subject in bold and in standard sentence case at the start of the sentence or as close to it as possible, together with any titles. If the topic has multiple names, they can all be bolded, but try to space them out for clarity. Note that a topic with no proper name may require a different phrasing to explain it. The name should be followed by what it is, where it is found in the setting, and when it existed. Finally, it should give a brief explanation of its significance, if any. For long articles, the lead may even include a short summary. A lead should be written in complete and standard sentences and should be referenced as normal.

For example, let's look at Susztam Mar-Shinn:
 * Susztam Mar-Shinn was a drow illusionist and shadow adept. He was the Head Student of the Inverted Tower and a user of the Shadow Weave in Szith Morcane in the late 14 century.

First, it says who the article is about (usually the same as the page name). It is bolded for emphasis. Second, it says what he is: race, classes, and title/occupation. Third, it gives context: where he lives (both the building and settlement) and when he is in this role (the date range). Fourth, it gives why he is important, namely he's a practitioner of the Shadow Weave.

The when also subtly indicates the era and edition(s) of D&D and the Forgotten Realms the article pertains to. Saying "mid–14 century DR" covers 1 or early 2 editions; "mid-to-late 14 century DR" covers 1, 2, and 3 editions; "late 14 century DR" covers late 2 and 3 editions"; and "late 15 century DR" covers 4 and 5 editions; while other centuries indicate historical characters and sources set in earlier times. As a rule of thumb, consider that "early" covers the first 33 years of a century, "mid-" the 33 to 66 years, and "late" the final 33 years. If the date is ambiguous or you wish to narrow it further then consider "in the 9 century DR" or "in the 800s DR" or "in the 1360s DR", but avoid a specific year—few characters are relevant for only one year or less.

Section Breaks
Use section headings to break up walls of text and focus on specific aspects, such as Description, History, or Abilities. This makes it easier to arrange and focus an article and find specific information. Each of the infobox templates and "Help:Writing an article about…" pages gives a set of commonly used section headings. These should be consistent from page to page, but their order is flexible. For example, you may put History first to give context to later sections, or put History last, to avoid spoiling something, or put "Relationships" first to introduce the other people in the history. Think about how the article should be organized and the story you want to tell about the topic.

Subsections may also be included to break long sections into particular subjects and new sections may be created for specific issues. Unused sections should be removed. Sections may also be avoided in very short articles.

Use title case, not sentence case, in the section heading. That is, capitalize the first and major words and leave the minor words in lower case.

Note that we use Description within an article to describe how something looks, and Appearances for appearances in fiction in the Appendix, so avoid using Appearance to describe the subject of an article.

Appendix
End the article with Appendix sections. These give real-world information and background, footnotes, sources, appearances in fiction, external links to other sites, galleries of images not shown in the main article, and navigation templates for finding similar pages.

Again, the infobox templates and "Help:Writing an article about…" pages will give standard Appendix sections for each kind of article. A common example is as follows: ==Appendix==

Adventures

 * Tomb of Annihilation

Categories
The Category: entries at the bottom of each page sort the page into categories according to what it is, where it is found, key descriptions and crunch, etc. so it can be found by searching a specific category. For example, include Category:Bakers on a page about a baker, cake maker, or pastry chef, and someone seeking bakers in the Realms can look there to find them. Note that this is distinct from Category:Cooks (general cooks and chefs) and Category:Bakeries (shops where bread, cakes, and pastries are made).

Try to include a full category tree at the bottom of the page. It's difficult to get a grasp on all possible categories, so browse the categories and look at similar pages and "Help:Writing an article about…" pages to find possible categories, copy-paste them, and adapt as needed. For example, Baerzlus Anagathiir has the following, covering class, occupation, race, sex, membership, and locations:

A good order is to go from specific to general and to group by kind.

Check to see if category pages exist or are needed before making new ones. New categories can be created when needed, but should be general enough to cover multiple possibilities and specific enough to be useful. For example, a 'Pastry chefs' category will be created when there are enough pastry chefs on the wiki to warrant one.

Writing Style
All article text should have a high-quality academic or encyclopedic style with a detached yet entertaining tone, using an in-universe and past-tense point-of-view for all in-universe subjects and an out-of-universe and mixed past- and present-tense points-of-view for all real-world subjects.

Points of View
An in-universe article covers the fictional lore of the Forgotten Realms or another setting and the D&D game, also known as "fluff" (as opposed to the "crunch" of rules and statistics). This includes characters, creatures, places and regions, events and history, spells, items, and even the descriptive aspects of classes. An in-universe article must treat this fictional lore as if it was real and should not mention crunch, novels, sourcebooks, and so on.

An out-of-universe or real-world article covers real-world information related to the Forgotten Realms or another setting and the D&D game. This includes sourcebooks, novels, comics, magazines, games, video games, film and television, and so on, as well as the series and ranges they are part of. It also covers real people, the game designers, writers, artists, and others responsible for their creation, and the companies that publish them. Other topics that can be treated as out-of-universe include key aspects of game crunch and pages covering Living Forgotten Realms and RPGA campaigns and publishing events.

On in-universe articles, out-of-universe information is covered in the Appendix section at the end of the article.

In-universe Point-of-View for In-universe Topics
Everything that exists in the Forgotten Realms and other D&D settings must be written about from an in-universe point-of-view, that is, from the point-of-view of someone on the planet Toril. This maintains immersion and focus and encourages a more fleshed-out article. Mentions of sources, editions, and D&D rules are forbidden, as these break the reader's suspension of disbelief, reminding them that they are not reading about a world, but about a book or game. For example, not "Ildilyntra Starym is a character in Elminster in Myth Drannor who…" but "Ildilyntra Starym was the former matriarch of the Starym clan of Cormanthyr" and not "Impiltur is a kingdom is the Forgotten Realms setting" but "Impiltur was a wealthy kingdom on the Easting Reach." In addition, not "The fireball did 3d6 fire damage to those in range" but "The fireball burned all it struck." To handle differences in editions, refer instead to the timeline: not "In 3 edition, the fireball could be cast…" but "After the Year of Wild Magic, 1372 DR, the fireball could be cast…" These maintain suspension of disbelief and allow for more interesting descriptions.

Past tense for in-universe articles

 * All in-universe articles must be written in past tense, as per our past-tense policy to handle the Realms' evolving and uncertain timeline. In short, this is a narrative tense as used in most novels (particularly Forgotten Realms novels) and it does not mean anything is destroyed. For example, "Elminster slayed the dragon and flew to Cormyr." and "Ravens Bluff was a city in the Vast."
 * Apply the normal rules of grammar and tense. For example, for events that took place for a period of time but ceased at some point, use the past perfect continuous tense, e.g., "Smuggling had been occurring but the city guard stopped it in 1375 DR." Do not use a conditional future tense with "would", as in "Elminster would slay the dragon and would fly to Cormyr." as this sounds strange, suggesting these things were planned but did not necessarily occur. Avoid this except where appropriate for discussion, e.g., "Elminster would have slayed the dragon, but it was immune to his magic." (conditional perfect tense, indicating intent but not completion) or "They would go on to defeat the witch." (past tense of will, indicating events in the relative future).
 * Past tense should also be used for real-world and general topics for consistency, e.g., "The rapier was a sword." and "Mathematics was a field of study."
 * Present tense may be used in chronologies on years pages, following conventions in sourcebooks and Wikipedia. For example, from −286 DR, "The Xothol arcane college is closed." and "Wulgreth of Netheril settles in the ruins of Karse." Present tense may be considered for real-world perspectives, such as when information is lacking or the writer is forced to suggest or speculate, e.g., "The outcome of this battle is unknown" or "This may be due to the Time of Troubles." but this should be used only when vital and qualified with a note.

Neutral third-person point-of-view

 * Articles should also be written from the third-person point-of-view, that is, referring to participants by name or group and grammatical personal pronouns, not by referring to oneself (the first-person point-of-view, with "I", "we", etc.) or addressing the audience (the second-person point-of-view, with "you"). For example, "Alusair defeated her foe" and "She returned to Cormyr" and "The Purple Dragons followed her." This is not an adventure module or sourcebook; there is no need to address readers, players, dungeon masters, or anyone directly. This provides a neutral perspective.
 * If no participant is known, such as in descriptions of spells and effects or in actions by non-specific persons, then use the neutral point-of-view that does not refer to anyone. For example, "This was done to…" or "The spell harmed all enemies…" A hypothetical person may be supposed for describing complex effects, such as "For example, if an adventurer fell into the trap, she would be teleported to…" Do not default to a masculine pronoun, but use a variety of examples.

Out-of-universe point-of-view for real-world topics

 * Naturally, real-world topics should be written about with an out-of-universe point-of-view, as normal. This includes articles about real people, books and other sources, and notes and backgrounds in the appendices of in-universe articles. (An exception is the Earth article, which is the fictional Earth of D&D and fourth-wall-breaking articles and fiction in the Forgotten Realms, not the real Earth we live on, we hope.)

Past and present tenses for out-of-universe articles

 * Past and present tenses should be used as normal for articles about real-world subjects, such as books, games, and real people, with present tense for sources still in existence and people who are still alive and past tense for things that still exist or were done in the past, and for people who have passed away. For example, "Ed Greenwood is the creator of the Forgotten Realms setting", "Ed Greenwood wrote Spellfire in 1988", and "Spellfire is a novel by Ed Greenwood published in 1988." while "Jim Holloway was an artist for many sourcebooks."

Tone
We encourage editors to be both sage and storyteller and to write for everybody, no matter their knowledge of D&D, their place in the world, or their proficiency with English, while remaining true to the Forgotten Realms setting.

Encyclopedic tone

 * The tone of the writing should be academic or encyclopedic and clear to all readers. Present information in a straightforward and honest way, and leave out personal opinions and excessive embellishments. It's not necessary to describe how evil a villain is, it's enough just to say that he eats puppies. Nevertheless, this is D&D, not Wikipedia, and it's fine to describe a villain as evil or a set of events in dramatic terms when appropriate.

Old-fashioned tone

 * As the Forgotten Realms is a world of pseudohistorical fantasy, avoid strictly modern terminology that would be jarring to the reader's immersion. Try to describe a concept rather than using a modern label. You may use older words and concepts that would be avoided in modern communication, provided the meaning is still clear. Of course, this does not mean a "ye olde" cod-medieval style should be adopted, unless appearing in quotes from the source, or that a lot of unfamiliar in-universe terms should be used. It is also not a license to insert old derogatory terms, nor modern political or social terms.

Entertaining tone

 * Despite the above, the writing doesn't have to be dull. To entertain and reward the reader, you may include brief dramatic descriptions of events, clever and humorous turns of phrase, and witty remarks, provided they do not break the standard style or limit the usefulness of the article. But avoid simple references to real-world topics, other fictional works, and internet memes, as these break immersion and are also lazy.

Avoid crunch

 * The FRW is a lore-focused wiki, while including a lot of the rules information of each D&D edition may be copyright infringing, so "crunch" should be avoided. Instead of mentioning a mechanical effect, describe what that would be in-universe. If giving the level, say if it is low, moderate, or high. That said, the FRW does list some basic crunch for comparison and organization purposes: with classes, levels, and alignments in infoboxes and +1 and similar ratings on magical items in text, but this is the limit.

Avoid personal opinion

 * Do not include personal views in articles, both in in-universe content and particularly in real-world discussion. The FRW is edition-neutral and accepts all eras of the setting equally, regardless of individual personal feeling, and is not intended for reviews and commentary. Nevertheless, if it is necessary to speculate, discuss fan reactions, or cover a controversial matter, then write about real-world matters in a detached and neutral way, while maintaining balance and fairness with a focus on facts and the Forgotten Realms. You may link to important reviews and discussions as examples, but try to balance opposing views and clarify who said what. Cover multiple fan theories, not just your own. Remember this is the work of real people and not everyone has the same views and tastes.

Spelling & Grammar
Write complete sentences with correct spelling, good grammar, and natural phrasing, while avoiding slang, abbreviations, obscure terms without explanation, and unfamiliar idioms. This keeps the text clear, comprehensible, and readable. Read your work back to yourself and consider if others will understand it, including those for whom English is not a first language. That said, do not be discouraged if English is not your first language or not your strong point—the FRW welcomes editors from many different language backgrounds and they are on hand to correct each other's work. The following is intended to help with advanced English usage.

US English spelling and grammar

 * Use US English spelling and grammar throughout, because the Forgotten Realms and Dungeons & Dragons are owned and produced by American companies who use US English in their works. For example, "color" not "colour", "gray" not "grey", and "recognize" not "recognise", and the grammatical distinction between "that" and "which". However, if a subject uses a non-standard US spelling, then it should be retained, such as Grey Jungle.
 * Being based on many fantasy languages, the Realms have many strange spellings, so please ensure your spellings of the names of characters, locations, and other things are correct. This includes diacritic letters like the û ('u' with a circumflex) appearing in Faerûn and Selûne and é ('e' with an acute accent) in "Oloré". These are included in edit tools in the source editor or may be copy-pasted from the source, but redirects exist so links will work with plain letters.

Avoid common misspellings

 * Please use the following standard US English spellings:
 * "worshiper", "worshiping", and "worshiped", not "worshipper", "worshipping", and "worshipped");
 * 'z' spellings for words such as "organization", "organized", and "organizing", not "organisation", "organised", and "organising"; and
 * "rogue", not "rouge", of course.

Use good punctuation

 * Please adopt the proper use of hyphens and dashes:
 * The hyphen, -, is short and joins words together as compound modifiers, which jointly modifier another word (e.g., a light-green sack is a light green color, while a light green sack is a sack that is green and light in weight) and combine words into single units (such as hyphenated names). Think of it as a hug, bringing things together. It can be entered via the keyboard.
 * The en dash, –, is longer and indicates relations (e.g., the Waterdeep–Neverwinter alliance or the Greenwood–Grubb novel) and ranges (e.g., pages 10–13, the years 1357–1359 DR). Think of it as a handshake, made in partnership. It can be entered via the wiki's edit tools, Microsoft Character Map, or typed out with – . Citation templates will automatically convert a hyphen to an en dash.
 * The em dash, —, is longest and indicates parenthetical breaks (e.g., "The three adventurers—named Grin, Richard, and Wu-Wei—ventured into the tower") and interruptions (e.g., "So, as I was sayi— aargh!". Think of it as touching with a ten-foot pole, to avoid getting any closer. It can be entered via the wiki's edit tools, Microsoft Character Map, or typed out with &mdash;.
 * The minus sign, −, is higher and indicates subtraction and negatives of values. On the wiki, it is primarily used in years, e.g., "in the Year of Confusion, −120 DR". However, for ease of searching and linking, the FRW uses hyphens in year page names and links, e.g., -120 DR. The minus sign may be entered via the wiki's edit tools and Microsoft Character Map, and templates like Yearlink and will convert and display the minus sign automatically when a hyphen is used.

US and SI units of measurement

 * As with spelling and grammar, use US customary units of measurement, that is, the use of feet and pounds rather than meters and kilograms. In practice, these will be the same values appearing in sourcebooks and so on. However, if a subject uses a metric or non-standard unit of measurement, then it should be retained,
 * However, for convenience of non-US readers, the FRW provides SI metric conversions to measurements in US customary units. These appear in parentheses after the measurement, for example, "5 feet (1.5 meters)". The SI, SIrange, and SIAdj templates may be used to automatically convert many different kinds of units in both short and long formats.
 * In infoboxes and tables where space is limited, use short forms of units, e.g. 20 lb (9 kg). In the main text of the article, use long forms of units,, e.g. 20 pounds (9 kilograms), for ease of reading and clarity.
 * If not using the templates for conversion, use the same number of significant figures. That is, 20 pounds has one significant figure, '2', so the conversion is limited to one significant figure '9' for fair approximation and we have '9 kilograms' and not ' 9.07185 kilograms'. Regardless, use your best judgement: 5 feet and 1 meter have the same significant figures, but 1 meter is only 3.28 feet, so 1.5 meters is more accurate.

Text Style
While the FRW is not too stringent on style, there are a few basic rules taken from common styles and Dungeons & Dragons publications, adopted for consistency and to fix common issues. For more, please see the most recent D&D sourcebooks and Wikipedia's Manual of Style. If in doubt, follow the style used in the source where possible.

Book titles in italics, article titles in quotes

 * Titles of books, both in-universe and real-world, are written with italics, such as Book of the Black and Powers & Pantheons. Titles of individual short stories, poems, chapters, sections, articles, both in-universe and real-world, are written with quotation marks, such as "The Night Tymora Sneezed" and "The Warlock King", while series of these are written in italics.

Lower case for common nouns

 * When appearing in sentences, the words for creatures, items, and most classes, spells, and magic items should be written in lower case, as common nouns, as they would appear in D&D sourcebooks. For example, dwarf, strongheart halfling, invisible stalker, battleaxe, and cleric. Note that automatically completed links are generated with capitalized initial letters (which are case-insensitive), so try to manually convert these to lower case.

Upper case for proper nouns

 * As normal for proper nouns, the names of most characters, locations, nationalities, ethnicities, organizations, events, faiths, important items, and so on, are capitalized. For example, Filia Churlgo, the Way of the Dragon, the Tashalan people, and the Knights of Ilmater. Mixtures of both proper and common nouns use both, e.g., Purple Dragon knight.

Title case in section, table, and infobox headings

 * Text in titles, section headings, the labels of tables, and the tops of infoboxes (given in the  entry) should be written in title case, that is, capitalizing all nouns and major words, while leaving prepositions in lower case. For example, A Glimpse into the Abyss (a book title), "Ancient History" (a section heading), and "Explosive Cascade" at the top of the infobox on the explosive cascade page.

Spells and magic item names in italics

 * Similarly, after the style of D&D sourcebooks, spells and common magic items are written in lower case with italics, not including any proper nouns that may be a part of their names, for example, magic missile, Otto's irresistible dance, and cloak of resistance. Note that common items like holy symbol or spellbook may become magic items, but are not generally magical, so they are written in plain text.
 * Note that some storied magic items, especially artifacts, have multiple names, some in italics and some not, and some capitalized, such as Ilbratha, the Mistress of Battles, so follow the style used in the sourcebook. If the item appears only in a video game, which may not follow this style, use italics and convert to lower case as appropriate.

Use italics for non-English text and for emphasis

 * To distinguish text from languages other than English, both real and fictional, write them in italics. You may do this for Latin phrases and abbreviations, like e.g., circa, and et cetera; for Elven words and quotations, aegiskeryn or "Ai armiel telere maenen hir."; and so on. You may also use italics for emphasis by adding stress to a key word, but do this sparingly and avoid them if italics are used heavily in neighboring text.

Straight quotation marks

 * Use straight quotation marks, as 'here' and "here", not the curly or smart quotation marks that may be copied over from documents or advanced text editors, as seen ‘here’ and “here” (look closely to see the difference). While curly quotation marks do not cause issue in regular text, they can break links if they are used in them and they cannot be used to create italics and bolding in wiki code.

Single vs. double quotation marks

 * Use single quotes to name things, for example, "aegiskeryn, Elven for 'shield guardian'". Use double quotation marks to presented quoted text within paragraphs, such as "Fairin Icemantle said they "run in waist-high riot across the land".

Place superscripts after punctuation

 * Superscripts (small text raised to the upper part of the line) for both references and footnotes, as created with  tags, should be placed after any punctuation. For example, "here,[1]" and "here;[1][2]" and also "here.[note 1]". This ensures the punctuation remains clearly connected to the sentence, as a long row of superscripts can push it very far away from the text it belongs to.