UESPWiki talk:Spelling

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Contents 1 References 2 Capitalization of Links 3 A NPC or an NPC? 4 Capitalization of races, classes, etc.

[edit] References

I relied upon several discussions about spelling when compiling this page. For anyone who is interested in reading those discussions, these are the links:

• Oblivion_Talk:Leveled_Items#Leveled_vs._Levelled: Discussion of leveled/levelled specifically, some general UK vs US spelling
• User_talk:Brightone#UK_and_US_spelling_forms: General discussion of UK vs US spelling
• User_talk:Brightone#Using_the_possessive_form: Names such as "Mages Guild" and "Thieves Guild"
• User_talk:Ringtails#Spelling: "wiki" instead of "Wiki"
• Morrowind_talk:Daedra: "Daedra", "Daedroth", and "Daedroths"
• Oblivion_talk:Gottlesfont Priory: The Gottlesfont debate

[edit] Capitalization of Links

A question for experienced editors: When should links to other wiki pages be capitalized and when should they not? For example, if a link to the Spelling page (which itself is capitalized) is used in a sentence, should the link text be Spelling or spelling? I've seen both used in different places and was wondering whether there was a guideline I haven't seen yet. Cheers --Sandgroper 08:23, 12 June 2007 (EDT)

We don't really have a policy, but I would recommend to capitalize it, as it is a link to an article. --Ratwar 18:51, 12 June 2007 (EDT)

Ok, thanks - sounds like this should apply to new links, but isn't necessarily enough of a policy to go changing existing links, if I understand you correctly. --Sandgroper 19:33, 12 June 2007 (EDT)

That sounds about right. --Ratwar 01:45, 13 June 2007 (EDT)

[edit] A NPC or an NPC?

I think it would be good to have a site-wide standard for whether to say "a NPC" or "an NPC". It's definitely a minor issue and not something I feel any editors need to devote time to cleaning up. But there are constantly edits being made switching cases of "a NPC" to "an NPC" and vice versa. I think having some decision on which is preferred would at least allow the site to slowly migrate in that direction, instead of having some pages flip flop back and forth day after day. I can't say I myself have a strong preference, though. Does anyone know if there's an official rule that applies here?

While we're on the subject, there's also the question of how to pluralize "NPC." I know I've looked into similar cases in the past and I found out that to some extent either "NPCs" or "NPC's" is permitted. But I definitely prefer "NPCs" as the plural, and I think that is what's generally been done on the site. So if we're going to add NPC-related rules to the spelling page, I'd propose we also state that "NPCs" should always be used for the plural. --Nephele^Talk 21:16, 1 August 2007 (EDT)

I've always used "an NPC", and looking at some D&D manuals, it appears that they do the same. They also pluralize it as "NPCs", which I can confirm conforms to the Canadian Press Stylebook (some Candian editors consider it to be equivalent to The Bible). I have no idea about common American usage, though, which is what we normally use on this site. --Robin Hood 21:47, 1 August 2007 (EDT)

Well, if D&D manuals aren't official, then I don't know what is ;) Seriously, though, thanks for the info! --Nephele^Talk 22:07, 1 August 2007 (EDT)

I agree - "a NPC" just sounds wrong, and the use of the apostrophe in "NPC's" also seems bulkier than it should be. (Plus, most pluralizations do not use apostrophes, so it seems inconsistant with the English language to use them here.) For what it's worth, Wikipedia's article seems to conform to this standard. So I say "an NPC" and "NPCs" are the correct usages just in general. --TheRealLurlock ^Talk 22:11, 1 August 2007 (EDT)

I have been using "an NPC" and "NPCs" all along, and think are the correct use. --DrPhoton 03:48, 2 August 2007 (EDT)

I've been thinking about it, and as a some-time linguist/some-time editor (but mostly a programmer), I believe I've come up with a reasonable justification for the use of "an NPC" over "a NPC". It has to do with a linguistic concept known as liaison, very commonly seen in French, but not so much in English. The basic idea is inserting or removing letters to make sounds flow better. "Que a il fait?" would technically be correct in French, but absolutely nobody would ever actually write it that way. The correct version would be "Qu'a-t-il fait?", with the "Que a" being combined into a contraction, and the "a il" picking up a "-t-" in the middle just to make the pronunciation flow better.

In English, you see it with the rule always use "an" before a vowel. Well, that's great, except we have "a unicorn", "a ukelele", etc. Why? Because the long "u" sounds like "yu", which starts with a consonant. Thus, you get "a UFO", even though the long form would be "an unidentified flying object". In a similar fashion, you get "an NPC" even though the long form would be "a non-player character", simply to make it sound correct. If you'd like further "proof of concept" (even if not a real proof), Google "an NGO" vs. "a NGO" (with the quotes). You'll find that "an NGO" outnumbers "a NGO" by nearly 6 to 1.

So that's my reasoning for why "an NPC" is the correct way to go, take it or leave it. --Robin Hood 11:30, 2 August 2007 (EDT)

I think we're all in agreement here, but I agree as well--"NPCs" and "an NPC" is the way to go. Apostrophes almost always imply possession, so that's out. "A NPC" would be correct if everyone said "non-player character" in their head whenever they read "NPC," but as far as I can tell that's not the case. Besides, we wouldn't want to make the D&D gods angry, now would we ;). --Eshe 12:42, 2 August 2007 (EDT)

While we're on the subject of NPC's, I believe that "NPCs" should indeed be spelled "NPC's." The English rule is that you use apostrophes to pluralize acronyms (CD's, DVD's, etc.). --The5thAvocado 22:04, 2 September 2008 (EDT)

(outdent)All sources I remember state that "s" should be added to pluralize an acronym, except when the acronym uses internal punctuation or the acronym's last letter is an "S". --GuildKnight^Talk2me 22:50, 2 September 2008 (EDT)

As I understand it, 's is the older standard, where s on its own is now more commonly used. When using the s on its own, the rule of thumb is to still use an apostrophe if it will help avoid confusion: "I got straight As on my report card" vs. "A's are the best mark you can get" (since "As" would easily be seen to be a word in this instance). --Robin Hood (Talk • E-mail • Contribs) 23:51, 2 September 2008 (EDT)

No, no no! An apostrophe is never used to indicate a plural! NPCs is the plural, NPC's is possessive, as in "The NPC's inventory". Ditto DVD. "I own several hundred DVDs" vs "This DVD's cover has a crack". ^{—The preceding unsigned comment was added by Rpeh (talk • contribs) on 01:04, 3 September 2008.}

Maybe not here, but a quick Google search will turn up several sites indicating that the use of 's in things like numbers and initialisms was at one point considered correct and is now falling out of favour. I remember being taught to write "1970's" (probably in the 1970s), but now "1970s" is considered preferable...same thing goes with acronyms. It's included in Wikipedia's article (what isn't?), though apparently whoever wrote that section didn't cite their info properly. --Robin Hood (Talk • E-mail • Contribs) 10:40, 3 September 2008 (EDT)

[edit] Capitalization of races, classes, etc.

Do we have a policy on the capitalization of words like "orc", "necromancer", etc? The manual capitalizes race, but in a quick search, I couldn't find anywhere that it even mentioned a specific class. (PS, good luck coming up with a rule for this: in English, we capitalize words like "Asian", "English", etc., but we don't capitalize "human". Go figure!) --Robin Hood 19:40, 21 February 2008 (EST)

Nope, I don't think we've made a real decision on this one. And I know I tend to use both. If the context is one where the word is being used as a proper noun, I capitalize (e.g., when it's clearly a reference to the game's defined use of the word); if the context is more generic, then I frequently use lower case because I think only proper nouns should be capitalized. But trying to draw that line is often tricky and I'd bet it doesn't make sense to many readers.

Which leads to two questions: do people think we need to have a policy on capitalizing races and classes? And if so, any ideas what the policy should be? I don't have any strong preferences about either one ;) --Nephele^Talk 01:49, 22 February 2008 (EST)

Speaking as a qualified linguist (not that this should have any bearing...), I believe Nephele's usage accurately reflects common practice. I don't think there is any real need to codify a policy, unless there is a significant variety in different editors' usage.

It does get a bit tricky with the various races in Tamriel - as Robin Hood notes, we tend to capitalise nationalities but not races, but do you count 'nord' as a nationality or a race? I personally would view them as 'nationalities' - after all, Nords, Redguards, Bretons, and Imperials are just different 'breeds' of human, and Dunmer, Altmer, Bosmer, and Orsimer (Orcs) are different 'breeds' of elf. In fact, the only race name I could imagine not being capitalised is 'orc', but I'm not sure I know why it seems reasonable to do so.

As far as classes are concerned, I think the only situation in which they should be capitalised is if they are presented as titles (e.g. Bob the Necromancer, Tim the Enchanter, Salmo the Baker) - you don't tend to capitalise professions, and classes are basically the same thing.

Ultimately, given the general policy on this site, if it's capitalised in the games, then it should be capitalised on this site. --Gaebrial 03:18, 22 February 2008 (EST)