Talk:Epoloch system

Unknown Region

Still getting used to the wiki here, but from what I've read on Halo Wiki guidelines a question emerges: When the text says "a planetary system in an unknown region of space", my question is "unknown" to whom? The fans is the only answer I come up with. Infinity was there a couple of times as was the Covenant, so it's not like it not a known location and star system to the Forerunners, Covenant, and the UNSC, but just to the fans. Not singling this article out, I've seen lots of evidence of this style of writing as I get used to Halopedia. Is this something that should be rewritten to be a little more 'in-universe' as the guidelines suggest?

Another example I came across is in reference to UNSC weapons and ammo...plenty of references to "modern" counterparts in which they mean our time and not written as though it's the mid 26th century. If a reference was made to something our armies have now, wouldn't it be written as either "ancient" or "centuries old"? Just want to go with the flow here and some of the entries mess me up a little. ScaleMaster117 (talk) 17:46, 20 June 2013 (EDT)

You're over thinking it a bit much, just go with the flow of things and it'll catch on. You are, however, correct when the word "unknown" was used for the fans or readers. I changed it to "unidentified" since it has not been named by official sources. I doubt it will be since Requiem was destroyed, but you never know. -Killjax (talk | contribs)

The closest thing to a designation it has (other than Epoloch now) is what may perhaps be a UNSC designation for the star seen on the Dawn in the hologram room when Requiem scans the ship at the beginning of Halo 4. The number 43121124 my not be the planet's or star's designation, but it must signify something. I'm hesitant to add it without knowing more. The Dawn must've been deposited in the outer edges of the Epoloch system for it to drift toward Requiem, virtually unpowered, over the course of 4 years. We know from the novels it wouldn't remain in Slipspace without power, and it couldn't go from one star system to the next by drifting...not within 4 years. ScaleMaster117 (talk) 18:47, 20 June 2013 (EDT)

Now were getting somewhere. I know the place you are talking about, and saw the same few numbers listed as well as a few other things. They could be coordinates established on a uncharted system, but that's just my wild guess. I just like to point out though, that the aft-section of the Dawn not only "drifted" towards Requiem, but might of been drawn to the shield world (atleast when it got close enough), as seen on the holo-projection, doesn't seem like a coincidence. -Killjax (talk | contribs)

Shouldn't we simply remove the mention of the region being unknown/unidentified? In this case, it's known to pretty much everyone. And even if it were only known to the Forerunners, it should still be something like "a planet in the Forerunner ecumene". Instead of focusing on the lack of details (such as Requiem being on the extreme boarder of the galaxy or in the Orion Arm or whatever), we should focus on the details we know. "Unidentified" should be kept for pages that would require a name (Persons, ships, planets, etc), we know they exist but they weren't named in any Halo media, so we don't have much of a choice.Imrane-117 (talk) 21:11, 20 June 2013 (EDT)

Oh, totally agree Killjax...you can explicitly see the Dawn's trajectory and you can see how a new trajectory yanks the ship off its course directly toward Requiem on that holographic display. Just saying the Dawn had to have exited Slipspace in the edge of the Epoloch system as it couldn't have gotten farther in 4 years without a translight capability.

Also agree with you Imrane-117. Even a reference to unidentified seems more like its for the fans reading instead of something in-universe. ScaleMaster117 (talk) 21:17, 20 June 2013 (EDT)

The wiki's viewpoint in relation to the universe is something that hasn't been clearly established - we've toyed with the idea of presenting it as an ONI document or something to that effect (see the site background), but beyond that we have no proper (fan-)fictional trappings. I would imagine our perspective occupies a strange limbo between the real-world fandom and an in-universe document - an inevitable result of the limits of our knowledge in relation to the UNSC, for example. It bears a mention, however, that we have two different established perspectives - the aforementioned in-universe viewpoint, used in most articles, and a purely real-world one which is applied in articles about real-world subjects as well as certain sections like Production notes, Trivia, Behind the scenes, and so on. The relevant section in the Manual of Style sums it up quite nicely.

Coming back to the unknowns, Imrane-117 is right on the money. Sometimes we have to resort to labeling subjects as "unidentified" because we simply don't know the name and can't make one up either. However, using the word is also rather pointless - it does not actually tell anything about the subject and as Imrane-117 said, it draws unnecessary focus to what we don't know. Thus we've gradually began to phase out our excess of "unidentified" subjects in favor of actually descriptive titles in the vein of Buck's squad or Truth and Reconciliation's AI wherever possible. The same applies to dead-weight statements like the "unknown region of space" in this article, or the very common "what happened to (the subject) after this is unknown" (which is actually noted as an example of what not to do in the Manual of Style).

You're also right about the modern-day comparison example; if we have comparisons to real-world counterparts, they should obviously say "20th/21st century" or what you said instead of "modern-day" or the like, unless it's a trivia or note section. These things happen a lot and with members from different backgrounds (different wikis have wildly different standards - many are written from a more real-world perspective than ours) not everyone always bothers to read our policies before editing. As with everything in this wiki, we can't fix everything at once and wherever these redundant structures or anachronisms continue to persist, feel free to change them. --Jugus (Talk | Contribs) 08:11, 21 June 2013 (EDT)

That was very helpful, thank you. I don't object to changing things here and there, but I don't want to be "That New Guy" who keeps changing things. I want to learn the standards and practices of this wiki and I have been doing so with just reading random entries for the past few weeks. I'm sure my questions will diminish now that I'm getting used to the place. :) ScaleMaster117 (talk) 10:47, 21 June 2013 (EDT)