Board Thread:Official Events/@comment-25090894-20141116222943/@comment-1824272-20141121192520

Moving to General Discussion because this is not an Acepedia Event.

So I don't know if you guys know this, but I've been following this thread for quite some time now. I've had a sense of pride seeing the members create a squadron here to meet up more often in Infinity than I can provide for through Acepedia Events (one of which I'm hoping to schedule for the middle of December, so stay tuned for that!).

I wanted to see just how far you guys would take this before I stepped in and said anything. No, I'm not shutting you down, I promise. But MyNamesFurii did personally ask me on my wall for permission to create an article for you guys or begin endorsing events and the like. And I think this may require a bit of backstory before I can get to my decision.

The thing is, this is the first time in the past year a group of Acepedia editors banded together to create a squadron. When I initially joined Acepedia as an administrator in November 2013 (I missed my one-year anniversary a couple of weeks ago D:), the wikia (as decided by Protostealth, I, and a couple of other members) had just banned squadrons, because they were treated as fan art. It was a necessary thing to do back then, unfortunately, because we were littered with tons of squadron pages and templates and the like. There are still some I have to delete somewhere, I'm sure.

I've said this statement a dozen times since taking on the administrator position a year ago, and I'll continue saying it as many times as necessary. Acepedia is, first and foremost, an information hub for Ace Combat games. That should never change. But then there's a community here, a community of players who can interact in an Ace Combat game that has multiplayer. And squadrons, such as what I will now christen and refer to as the "Acepedia 1st Air Force Unit, 1st Infinity Squadron" codename "Cygnus Squadron", have been banned for a year.

So now what do I do, as the administrator in this position? Easy. I lift the ban. This is a community, and we have to treat it as such. But I'm not entirely sure that I can take it further than that, and allow you guys to make articles or make this an Acepedia Event thing. Some members of this site would not want to join a squadron, or maybe even they want to create their own squadron. So here are the ground rules:
 * Squadrons are once again allowed on Acepedia.
 * Squadrons are forbidden from forcing a monopoly. If a member of Cygnus Squadron wants to split off and create his own Infinity squadron, or if any other Acepedia member wants to create their own squadron, no one else from Cygnus can threaten or force anything. Such behavior should be reported, and will be at my discretion to deal with.
 * Squadrons cannot make unfair rules for someone to join. For example, you can't ask for 10,000 edits or something crazy like that.
 * Administrators cannot join a squadron. This would just lead to favoritism.
 * Squadrons will not be endorsed by or included into Acepedia Events. This is a big one I need you guys to understand. Acepedia Events are site-wide events for everyone to participate in. It would be unfair if an Acepedia Event was restricted to a squadron, because, like the administrator rule, that would just lead to favoritism. You can have your own events yourselves, but they won't be included as part of the site's events or Acepedia Emblems.
 * Squadrons cannot upload anything like a custom emblem. The files hosted on Acepedia are still going to be restricted to official ones. However, you are permitted to use any official emblem from the selection we've been given, and you are allowed to upload screenshots of gameplay since they're just that: screenshots.
 * Squadrons are still treated as fan art in the main namespace (articles like Ace Combat Infinity), which means they are still banned from having articles. You cannot create articles for your squadron, and you cannot edit articles like F/A-18F Super Hornet to say that Cygnus Squadron is using them.
 * However, since squadrons are still treated as fan art on articles, that means you guys can edit your squadron into your user page. For example, if I joined Cygnus, I could go to my userpage and say something like "I've been a member of Cygnus for X years, and I've participated in Y events." Also, use the UserCharacter template! It makes a Character template on your page, but it removes the real-world info and doesn't add the Character category for those from Ace Combat. Perfect for showing off your role in Cygnus? :D

I know this was a long reply, but I felt it was necessary, and I hope I've cleared some stuff up. If there's anything that still needs to be asked/said/modified, please please please say something. I'd really love for squadrons to return to the wikia, and the passion I'm seeing in you guys is something I haven't personally seen since I led a guild years ago. Trust me, I'm enjoying seeing this thread. It's about time. :D

I will say, though, that if you're going to use a squadron nickname (personally, I wouldn't enforce one, but that's up to you guys), I wouldn't use a tournament nickname. Probably use something that everyone can access, such as the "Sortie 10 times in X" or "Sortie 100 times in X" nicknames? Just a suggestion; I'm not forcing anything here. :P