Writers Guidelines

Thank you for considering becoming a contributor. These guidelines are intended to help you understand how to make your contribution most useful.

What to Contribute

This is a community-based site. We're interested in any contributions that you, an Ars Magica player, think would be useful. These could include:

• Links to interesting Web sites you've found
• Downloadable character sheets, maps, or other play aids
• Ready-made characters, covenants, or creatures
• Original articles about some aspect of Mythic Europe or the Order of Hermes
• Short articles that summarize how a rule works or explain something from the Canon, such as a Hedge Magic tradition or a Tribunal. Please keep in mind our Copyright policy when writing about the canon.
• Original illustrations, maps, and diagrams. We are especially interested in historical maps or original maps of Tribunals (which we could publish without violating copyright).
• Or almost anything else you can think of!

Please take a look at the News page; special requests for needed material will be posted there.

Content Guidelines

Here follow some guidelines, not strict rules, for how to make your pages useful without violating copyright or hurting Atlas Games' business.

• The main point is not to write so much detail that someone could use your page instead of referring to his or her bookshelf.
• Go beyond what's in the Ars Magica books. Add examples, or suggestions on how to use something in play. Explain when a rule works differently in one edition as opposed to another.
• Include lots of links to other pages (either on this site or elsewhere)
• Refer to game rules by page number rather than quoting from them.
• Similarly, refer to fictional places, events, and characters by page reference when possible.
• If you must explain something from the game world, be very brief: one or two sentences.
• For long out-of-print material (ArM3 and earlier) you can write more extensive summaries, but still be sure to only summarize, not replicate.
• Remember that other people can, and probably will, edit the pages you create.
• Avoid writing detailed timelines of fictional events. Timelines of Hermetic history are included in several ArM5 books.

Civility

It is all right to express opinions on this site. We're not trying to be completely objective (that's an unattainable ideal). Be careful to:

1. state opinions as opinions, not as facts;
2. remain respectful toward authors, other people's play styles, and opposing opinions.

Just because you think something is poorly done or a bad idea, does not mean the person who wrote it is an enemy of civilization.

Controversial Topics

Second, the nature of Mythic Europe leads Ars Magica to deal with potentially controversial topics such as the Crusades, witch-burning, anti-Semitism, slavery, medieval attitudes toward gender, and so on.

Please do feel free to write about these topics, but write carefully. Be sure to use the past tense: atrocities committed 800 years ago have little direct bearing on modern events. Remember that a lot of players enjoy Ars Magica for the magic and fantasy, so don't get too hung up on Real History.

Perhaps the best angle is to present the controversial topic in a matter-of-fact way, then go on to explain at length all the fun Story ideas it inspires.

How To Create a Page

There are two situations in which one might want to create a page.

Pages That Don't (Yet) Exist

You might follow a link and reach a page that says

Page 'X' does not exist.

and has two buttons to create the page.

This is normal and will be relatively common in the early stages of the project. It means that someone wanted an article on a given subject, but didn't get around to actually writing that new article. Filling in a blank page like this is a good way to start Contributing to this project.

Pages That Haven't Been Imagined

Less frequently, you may want to create an entirely new page. The way to do this in Pie is to start by creating a link to it. You can't just create a brand new page that's not attached to anything; every page must start as a link on some related page.

1. Before creating a new page, please search to see if the topic already exists under another name.
2. Decide on name for your new page (see below)
3. Edit an existing page to add a link to your new, soon-to-be-created page
4. Follow that link and click on one of the "Create" buttons.

Naming New Pages

In order for other contributors to easily link to your page, please follow our standard naming conventions.

1. Page names should be phrased as singular nouns when possible. For example, Magus instead of "Magi."
2. Use the shortest name you can think of that is unique and unambiguous. This may require some thought. For example, the term "Bonisagus" could refer to either a magus, Bonisagus the Founder, or to House Bonisagus. Don't just name a page "Bonisagus" because that would be ambiguous.
3. Omit leading definite or indefinite articles. For example, use Order of Hermes instead of "The Order of Hermes" or "Order of Hermes, the"
4. If your page is in a language other than English, include the name of the language in parentheses at the end of the title. For example, "Durenmar (Deutsch)" for the German page about Durenmar. (In page names, use the word each language uses to call itself, for example, "Deutsch" and "Français" rather than "German" and "French." Pie supports mulit-byte characters, so you can name and create pages using any alphabet
5. Do not use commas, colons, or other punctuation in page names (Exception: parentheses to specify language).

Organization & Layout

We have a whole page on Writing Guidelines that explain the basics of formatting and organization.

Use topic headings to make your articles readable.

We generally like to include a list of related topics at the bottom of the page, under a heading such as "References" or "Related Topics".

Basic formatting commands appear automatically when you enter Edit mode. The Sandbox has a few more. A much more detailed list is available on the Pie website.