Template talk:Spoiler

Question
Does this template have to be used every time a spoiler is used? Just that I've seen that Gboyers added it to the Characters in GTA San Andreas article, yet other pages with spoilers have not got it. Plus, the article gives information about characters from a game four years old. Just seems unnecessary. A-Dust 20:22, 15 December 2008 (UTC)


 * There are two points here. Firstly, a list of characters shouldn't say who dies and reveal major plot events. People won't expect it to, so I've put the spoiler warning as a "contrary to what you might think, this DOES contain spoilers". However, other articles are expected to be spoilers, like Plot in GTA IV, and I'm not sure whether a spoiler tag should be there or not. Mission articles do not need spoiler tags at all, unless maybe if they have a major plot spoiler in it. With Jimmy Pegorino, I was experimenting with a new 2-section layout for characters - basic info, then plot-related stuff. I honestly don't believe that EVERY article containing spoilers should be marked with a spoiler tag - that is silly. But marking sections with spoiler tags is more logical - eg "read the rest, but this particular bit has info you might not want to know, your choice". What do you think? Gboyers talk 00:32, 16 December 2008 (UTC)


 * I think that the right place for a spoiler template is where you won't expect to see a spoiler. Another possible place is where you might expect to see a spoiler but it's not obvious exactly where (a long page with a single paragraph of spoilers?). If we marked EVERY spoiler than EVERY page would have a spoiler warning, so in that sense the spoiler warning is the one on the main page. The other thing is pages that are FULL of spoilers (eg. GTA IV Endings). If you're deliberately reading that page you expect spoilers, but a link could send you there by mistake (as Gboyers explained to me earlier). I think that if the first line of an article is a spoiler (as was the case with Karen), the we definentley need a spoiler warning, but if you get a warning (apart from the title) that this isn't the page you're after (I can't think of an example right now, but I know they exist, so maybe the first sentence can contain the word ending, but have no other detail?) then we don't need one. Now, I typed that as it came to my head, so does it all make sense to you? Biggest GTA Fan EverTalk 23:58, 15 December 2008 (UTC)