Template talk:Ability

Request for Comment
So the new ability box for hero pages is relatively complete, at this point (still needs all the valid entries for "ability" and "affects" input). Anyone have anything they'd like to see added to the box, or any changes of any kind, while we are revising it (also, what we should call the new template)?

Examples:


 * I think the BKB icon should link to magic immunity, not Black King Bar. Consider linking the damage type. The Affects field might get large; if it does we can scrunch the Damage field. I vote for naming the template, but it whatever it ends up as, it should definitely not contain the word "skill". I'm not digging the placement of the icons, but I don't have any great suggestions either. Something like this? I'm also not digging the look of the "blocked" icons; they're muddy. Perhaps a single stroke, something like this? --Kroocsiogsi 23:18, 16 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Ohh, I like those suggestions. Thought about linking the damage type, the only problem with that is if we do a blue link, it might look odd, and if we do a black text link, it won't look like a link. Agreed about the positioning of the icons. Talk to Nickoladze about making different icons, he made the first ones. Baloroth 23:23, 16 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Haha, I actually thought about mentioning the blue/black link dilemma myself, and then I thought "No, I'm getting way too technical here, everybody is going to think I'm weird", so I didn't say anything. Yeah, I agree, and I'm not sure what to do about it. Maybe make it grey text? Maybe it will look OK if it's black with an underline? :-p --Kroocsiogsi 23:39, 16 March 2012 (UTC)

Magic immunity/Linken's Sphere icon proposal
I'm not a big fan of the X'ed out icons since they look kinda blurry, so I made some grayed-out versions of the icons that could be used to indicate that the ability isn't blocked instead. An extra benefit to grayed-out icons is that they can be split in half to indicate partial blocking. For instance, Bane's Fiend's Grip disables through Magic Immunity, but it won't deal any damage. There are quite a few partially-blocked abilities in the game so it'd be nice to have the ability to show that.

Thoughts? I'd like to hear what other people think instead of just going and changing it myself. --Pigbuster 20:13, 24 March 2012 (UTC)


 * Weak support. I agree that the icons should be tweaked. I think this proposal is probably an improvement. The ideal icons still elude me. --Kroocsiogsi 20:25, 24 March 2012 (UTC)


 * Agreed with Kroocsiogsi. Those look alright, and the present ones could use some tweaking. We could use those, I don't really have strong feelings one way or another. -Baloroth 20:48, 24 March 2012 (UTC)


 * I have to agree, I think there's a better solution than grayed-out icons, but I still think it's an improvement so I'll get to work on changing them up. Note that I just noticed that the tiny BKB icon has blue edges that shouldn't be there, possibly because the original creator built off of the mana icon to get the right shape. I'll fix that while I'm at it. --Pigbuster 22:05, 24 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Done! --Pigbuster 22:56, 24 March 2012 (UTC)

The "Partially blocked by Linken's/BKB" tooltip doesn't have any translations at the moment. That'll need to be done before other language wikis can start using the partial icons. --Pigbuster 23:04, 24 March 2012 (UTC)

Maybe we should move Linken's Sphere and Black King Bar icons
I think you need to move the icons, because, for sentences in Russian there is too little space and it looks bad!


 * Dragon Slave now looks like this.


 * And this is my version.

--aUSS 10:19, 31 March 2012 (UTC)


 * That might work if you make the background to the icons the same as the bar (the white blocks behind them look out of place). Otherwise, we could possible put the icons into a single column on the far right (it looks like there is room for that). I'll play around with it later if I get the chance. -Baloroth 18:23, 31 March 2012 (UTC)

Item Ability Template
It's been bugging me for a while how items have their abilities described through text alone while heroes keep all the pretty templates to themselves, so I went ahead and made some adjustments for them.

It basically just removes the image and changes the header color. Right now it's just linked from my personal sandbox, since I'd like to hear what people think before making adjustments to such a major template. --Pigbuster 19:35, 17 April 2012 (UTC)


 * An interesting idea. It would be nice if the template also listed what other items it didn't stack with (for example, Vlad's doesn't stack with Basilius) in some consistent fashion other than just listing it in the description (not that that doesn't work, I'm just wondering if there is a more elegant way to handle it). Also, I'm not a huge fan of the color, TBH. Baloroth 20:17, 17 April 2012 (UTC)
 * I just copied over the color that was used for Template:SkillboxMinimal. I think it's a good idea to distinguish item abilities from hero abilities in such a way, though the color could alway be changed to something else if there's a consensus. --Pigbuster 20:31, 17 April 2012 (UTC)
 * Also, notes are still a thing for item abilities, so you can use those for specifying what doesn't stack and such, as I just added in. --Pigbuster 20:38, 17 April 2012 (UTC)
 * I like it, although I would prefer the item's image to be in there. Maybe get rid of the orange and use the agility green or intelligence blue, as we're using strength red EVERYWHERE right now. - Nickoladze 07:17, 18 April 2012 (UTC)
 * I figured an image is unneeded since this template would be used on item pages, which already have infoboxes displaying the items' images. Also, I think the main reason strength red is so prevalent is that it's kinda the "main" color of Dota, what with it's logo being that color and all. That said, I tried out int blue and agi green and was pleasantly surprised! I think I prefer blue but they're both rather nice, and maybe green would be more sensible since most carries are agility, and carries need items, ergo, green for the item abilities. That's probably looking way too hard into it, though. :P --Pigbuster 07:37, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

I do like those colors. Maybe one for active abilities and one for passive? Just a thought. Be nice to be able to distinguish them visually some way (since there isn't the image-effects we have for hero abilities). Not really needed, of course, since it says it in the abilitybox, just might be a nice touch. Baloroth 14:48, 18 April 2012 (UTC)
 * I'd prefer we use just one of the colors for all item abilities, because then we could use the other color for something else; NPC abilities, for instance. If there are no other objections, I'd like to implement these adjustments into the actual template and get to work on adding them to the pages. I'd probably just go with the off-yellow I used before and make a topic in general wiki discussion for the color adjustments, since that seems like a wider style-related discussion. --Pigbuster 17:10, 18 April 2012 (UTC)
 * Functionality added. --Pigbuster 20:00, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

bkbtext/linkentext
I would like to remove or, even better, repurpose these variables. Tooltips are useful for informing users what a particular symbol means, and the text "Blocked by Magic Immunity/Linken's Sphere" for the tooltip is just fine. However, I do not like hiding valuable information inside of those tooltips. It's much better to have information about magic immunity out in the open rather than making the user mouse over an image to get at it, especially since we can't count on the users to actually know that they can get information that way. I've determined before that the best way to do this is to just make the first note for the ability be about its magic immunity properties, but after the Aghanim's upgrade adjustment, I'm wondering if we could do the same thing for magic immunity/linken's information and just put it right inside the ability box:

This would only be for abilities that actually warrant having that information. For most abilities, which are either fully blocked or not, the solitary icon in the header would work fine. --Pigbuster 23:24, 21 April 2012 (UTC)
 * Yeah, I supposed adding a section below the Aghanim's line for partial BKB blockage would be fine. That's the only time it's needed. I've been meaning to start this huge project to centralize all the ability data onto one template, I'll work it into that template once I get that done. Any other suggestions for the template while I'm at it? - Nickoladze 00:14, 22 April 2012 (UTC)
 * Making the damagetype a link would be nice. I could actually do that now but I haven't gotten around to it. Also, for abilities that disable, a way to indicate what kind of disable it is (stun, silence, entangle, etc.) Honestly, is pretty decent, I'm interested in what your ideas for a new template are. --Pigbuster 01:07, 22 April 2012 (UTC)

New Symbols for purgeable abilities
So I was going to (re)start testing all of the buffing/de-buffing abilities tonight to see which were purgeable after realizing I didn't have to use Diffusal Blade with it's annoying limited charges to do so. I was thinking we could add a mini-icon for Template:Symbol like the BKB/UAM/Linkens ones to indicate if it can be purged or not and add the appropriate code to the ability template, but I'd need someone to make up some icons for it (either the icon for the Satyr_Camp or possibly Brewmaster's Dispel Magic, I was thinking) like the existing ones.

Also, let me know if anyone has any objections to adding this to the ability template in the first place. -Baloroth 20:06, 30 August 2012 (UTC)
 * I think I still have the file for the icons I made hanging around, I could see about making one. I'm probably going to use diffusal blade because every other icon so far has used an item. I have to update all of the icons with the redone item images, actually. --Pigbuster 08:29, 11 September 2012 (UTC)

Move Notes below Ability for Mobile Readers
I have been reading the wiki quite a bit lately on my tablet, and I find it's extremely difficult to read the notes next to abilities (really, any of the side-bar notes) on a mobile device.

To see what I mean, try shrinking your browser window and notice how the ability box stays a fixed size and the notes squeeze into a tight narrow column with at most 3 words per line.

I propose moving the notes box under the abilities box. It will be more in line with the flow of the page, and it will allow people with smaller screens to read the notes.--Amouravski 18:37, 10 February 2013 (UTC)