Welcome to the Eberron Wiki! We're a small place with a small number of editors and lots of info to cover, so thank you for stopping in and giving us a hand. While we don't yet have a large comprehensive set of policies and guidelines like larger wikis such as Wikipedia, please be mindful of the following guidance. Additional policies may be found at Policies.
Policies[]
No Plagiarism and Copyright Infringement[]
We at the Eberron Wiki believe this wiki constitutes Fair Use under US copyright law, and try to follow the Fan Content Policy provided by Wizards of the Coast. This wiki is not approved/endorsed by Wizards. Portions of the materials used are property of Wizards of the Coast, ©Wizards of the Coast LLC. As such, do not copy material from sourcebooks and use original language when writing articles. Verbatim copying of sourcebooks is expressly forbidden by the Fan Content policy, considered copyright infringement, and poor form to do anyway, since most sourcebooks are not encyclopedic in tone. We reserve the right to indefinitely ban users found responsible for multiple cases of directly copying material from sourcebooks. If you find a case of articles containing directly copied material and can't fix it immediately, please tag the article with {{Plagiarism}} so others can be made aware and fix the problem as soon as possible.
Canon[]
This wiki considers all Eberron sourcebooks from all editions to be canon, as well as web and magazine articles published by Wizards of the Coast. When contradictions arise between sourcebooks, the most recent information takes priority, but lack of mentions in subsequent editions is not considered to be a contradiction.
However, there are many additional sources of information out there, including Keith Baker's commentary (known as "kanon"), novels, adventures, and tie-in games such as Dungeons & Dragons Online. Including information from these additional sources is welcome on the wiki, but they are not considered canonical. For instance, many novels use their status as non-canon to make significant changes or additions to the setting that the regular sourcebooks shy away from doing. Articles or sections using/citing such sources should be tagged using {{Canon}} (which has additional options for the type of material covered).
Reference Everything[]
All information added to the Eberron Wiki should have a reference or citation, so a reader can check the source to confirm or learn more. This should be done with a footnoted reference using <ref></ref> tags and the appropriate citation templates, and including a page number. These should be applied on a specific basis, to each paragraph or sentence as appropriate, even individual words where a distinction between sources is necessary.
A reference at the bottom of the page is not sufficient, as the unreferenced text may merge multiple sources and unsourced or false statements. If a page is not referenced, it may be tagged as {{Unreferenced}} and if text is not references, it may be tagged with {{fact}} or {{cn}} for "citation needed". Unsourced pages and text may be deleted.
Point-of-View[]
When writing articles on the Eberron Wiki, please use an in-universe perspective on the topic. For instance, when writing about changelings, write about them as one of the many peoples of the world of Eberron, not a mechanical race for Dungeons and Dragons. Referring directly to books, rules, options, and so on should be avoided. If you need to use a real-world POV, such as pointing out a contradiction in lore or spelling, please do so as a footnote or in the Appendix section of the article. Articles about real-world subjects, such as Eberron sourcebooks or real-world people such as Keith Baker should still use real-world POV.
As this wiki has not had a formal POV policy until now, many older articles use a variety of different POVs and will need to be brought in line with this policy. Assuming the content given does not violate other policies such as Focus on Lore, please try and preserve what you can.
Use Present Tense in 998 YK[]
If you are joining us from our friends at the Forgotten Realms Wiki, you may be used to their policy of always using narrative past tense to avoid having to update articles when the setting advances in time or jumps around. However, the Eberron Wiki does not have a similar policy, owing to Eberron materials consistently using 998 YK as the starting point across all editions. As such, if a character, creature, item, or place exists as of 998 YK, use present tense when describing it. Past tense should only be used for past events in the setting's timeline, deceased characters or creatures, or on other occasions when past tense would normally make sense.
Focus on Lore, Not Crunch[]
The Eberron Wiki's focus is on setting lore, not game mechanics, also known as crunch. For example, the changeling article should focus on providing information about changeling lore, appearance, and history, not fleshing out what a changeling's mechanical features are in 3.5 or 5th edition. Infoboxes may contain basic mechanical information such as a character's class and level, but the focus should be on descriptive text, not mechanical information. In addition, mechanical information copied verbatim or taken from non-SRD sources also falls under our No Plagiarism policy (above) and will be removed upon discovery.
Proposing Additional Policies[]
If you wish to propose additional policies or guidelines for the wiki, please use the Talk page of this article and begin with the heading Proposed Policy: (Name of Policy). If the policy has a sufficient amount of consensus after two weeks, the policy will be added to the Policy category or this page by an administrator.