This is an encounter for the editing game we're putting together. Visit this forum thread
to join the fun.
Description:
A nefarious-looking person is furiously scribbling in one of the books. They look very dirty and unkempt.
Tropédex says:
Wiki Vandal. A Wiki Vandal vandalizes an article, either by deleting the article entirely and replacing it with some choice words or by intentionally and maliciously inserting random gibberish. Nobody knows why a Wiki Vandal engages in such idiocy, nor is anybody too keen on finding out. Tropers who have fallen from grace may sometimes emerge as Wiki Vandals. I am a velocoraptor, unfortunately. IN SPACE!
Narrative:
Well, it’s clear that you have to do something about this... but what?
Readying your editing scalpel, you hunker down. This is going to be a long day.
Several hours of reverting pages later, you realize that the Wiki Vandal had made dozens of edits. Checking their Recent Edits Page doesn’t help your morale- you’re only halfway down. You wish you could call some help.
Mission Incomplete...
(Go back to the choice screen. This choice is removed, with a note saying, "I think I've seen that this is a bad idea".)
Remembering your lessons, you whip out your Tropédex and search up two of the most important troper gathering spots- the Forums and Ask the Tropers. A couple of beeps later, and you read:
The Forums. Discuss a wide variety of subjects here- from troping, to comic books, to movies, to manga, to the wiki itself. If you’re edit banned, go to Wiki Talk to appeal for your ban to be lifted. The forums are also a good place to ask questions to other tropers.
Ask the Tropers. Submit your queries to the troper hive mind here!
Enlightened, you head over to the forums. Climbing up the steps to the elevated platform, you see a multitude of columns erected over a flat plane. Heading over the column entitled “Wiki Talk,” you look around. Posted around the column are long sheets of paper, “threads,” your instructor told you. From time to time, a troper walks over to a thread and makes a comment.
You take a piece of paper, make a title for your thread, and post it in wiki talk. “Wiki Vandal,” the title reads; directly below, you give links to the Vandal’s recent edits, such that the other tropers can quickly see which pages need to be fixed. Right before you leave for Ask the Tropers, you see people approaching your thread, and then jumping into the links to revert the edits.
In Ask the Tropers, you create a query- “Hey, there’s a wiki vandal,” you write. “Their handle is RandomUsername12345. Can I get some help?”
After posting your query, you leave to revert the vandal’s changes. The work goes quickly- much of the vandalism has been undone already by tropers who saw your notices in the forum and Ask the Tropers.
And, lo and behold, when you arrive back at the forums, you find Fast Eddie himself commenting on your thread. “Edit ban installed,” he says, dragging a chained…thing behind him. You are reminded of Gollum, if only Gollum had Dorito stains plastered across his T-shirt. Fast Eddie presses a button, and a pit opens up in the ground. The Wiki Vandal is cast into the hole, never to bother the tropers again.
Mission Complete!
It’s a fairly obvious edit, and somebody’s bound to notice. Anyways, you have Call of Duty to play.
But-but- could you have done something to help? How many people went to that page and saw nothing but “i suck cocks"?
“Seven,” a voice rasps. You whirl around, to see noting.
“I am the ghost of Aggressive Negotiations,” the voice murmurs. “I was vandalized, and you did nothing to help. My brothers Badass Longcoat and Mad Scientist were likewise spurned by you, and the indexes Universal Tropes and Acceptable Breaks from Reality suffered the same fate. You abandoned us. You shall be punished.”
You wake up in a cold sweat. Your friends find you the next day, muttering “I’msosorryI’msosorryIwasbusyIcouldn’ttaketwosecondstorevertyouI’msosorryI’msosorry.”
GAME OVER.
