emblemology | Posting Guidelines - Read this before posting!

Hello, and welcome to Fire Emblem Academy! We aim to be an easily searchable archive of quality Fire Emblem meta, compiled by the people and for the people. To those ends, membership, posting, and even tag creation are presently unmoderated. In return, I ask that you please carefully read and follow these instructions.

General Guidelines

- How do I submit content?

Make a post with the following format:

[Subject line:] Author Name - Title
[Body:]
Author: The person who wrote the piece in question.
Link: A link to the piece. For the time being, we will not host articles themselves. This is to encourage keeping all discussion in one place (on the original post) and also to guide readers to the current discussion, which is often as valuable as the piece itself.
Abstract: A few sentences summarizing the piece. This should enable anyone skimming through the archives to quickly understand what this post is about and whether it is relevant to their interests. In the unlikely event that your post includes detailed or graphic descriptions of sexual assault, violence, or self-harm, you must mention this at the end of your abstract. Other strong content advisories would be tasteful and quite welcome, but are not required. You must warn for spoilers outside of the world(s) you've tagged the post with. (Eg, if I tag my post as an Elibe post, and I mention both Ninian's heritage and Black Knight's identity, I must warn for the Black Knight reveal, but it is not necessary to warn for Ninian's heritage. Posts tagged with "world: cross-series" must warn for spoilers, so that people who haven't played every single entry can read it.) Abstracts themselves must be free of spoilers within reason.
See Also: This field is optional. If your piece is directly related to another work (eg, if it's on the same topic, or inspired your post, or is a necessary resource to understand your post, or your post is a response, or something of that nature) please mention them here and link to the Emblemology listing (if possible) and/or the original post. This may also be used as an recommendation field -- "if you liked this meta, you may also be interested in x, y, z." However, please be professional and minimize recommendations to posts immediately relevant to yours.

For those of you who don't like typing in HTML tags, here is something to copypaste so that the bolds show up nicely.

If you do not have a Dreamwidth account, you may submit your post through an ambassador.

From here on, when a distinction must be made, "post" refers to a post made in

emblemology, while "linked post" refers to the actual article that it links to.

Tagging is vital. As

emblemology expands, the tags will become the primary way that people search the archive. A post lacking tags is essentially invisible once it is no longer new.

Please see this post for an explanation of our tags. A complete listing of the current tags can be found here.

The moderators may add some tags to your post if they feel that they're markedly relevant. Let the moderators know if you'd rather this not happen.

Here are some example posts, complete with tags: [1], [2], [3]

Submissions FAQ

- Can I submit someone else's work?

Yes, as long as you check in with the author of the piece and make sure they're okay with it. We don't require proof of this, but posts will be taken down at the author's request.

- I used someone else's idea in my write-up. Is that okay?

Yes, as long as your post somehow improves upon existing posts on the subject and you give credit where it is due.

Regarding credit and sourcing... this isn't real-world academia and we do not police citations to nearly the same extent, but crediting ideas is a crucial part of the community etiquette. If you don't know the originator of an idea but you know it isn't yours, It is better to say "I forgot who said this, but I heard someone say..." than to leave that out.

- What are comments used for?/What are cross-reference comments?

If your post is a direct response to some other article listed in

emblemology, please comment on that article with the subject line "Cross-Reference," and leave a link to your own

emblemology post in the comment with a brief description of why your post is immediately relevant. (You should probably leave cross-reference comments on articles mentioned in your "See Also".)

This system is in place to keep connections between articles up-to-date without requiring the original article poster to work for it or in any way "authorize" any responses.

All discussion comments should be left at the linked post, not on the

emblemology post, unless the linked post does not allow commenting. If this is the case, it is suggested but not required that you note this in your post (so people know where to find the discussion/how many cross-references there may actually be) and leave a comment on your own post with the title "Cross-References Go Here" to allow cross-referencees to reply to it and "float" their listings.

- Can I repost old articles that are already listed on emblemology?

Yes, as long as it hasn't been posted to

emblemology within the last three months. Also, when pimping old posts, do not tag the pimp post, so that anyone searching by tags will still only see one copy.

- Do you take essays in languages other than English?

emblemology was created to serve the English-speaking community. Submissions in other languages are also permitted, though authors should be aware that most members will not be able to engage with them.

The body of the post should be formatted similarly, but may be in the language of the linked post. The tags must be in English.

- What should I share/not share with Fire Emblem Academy?

First of all, all submissions must be publicly accessible. We aim to be an archive, and anyone browsing should be able to access the content submitted. Similarly, when you make a post to

emblemology, make sure it's set to display to Everyone (Public) and not just Members.

In general, you should ask yourself:
- Does this contribute to our understanding of some aspect of Fire Emblem?
- Will others with an interest in my topic find this post useful or intriguing?
- Will this post encourage discussion/further examination of the games or fandom trends?
If the answer is "yes" to any of these questions, we are interested in your post.

- Why was my post deleted?

The following are grounds for instant removal, except on April Fool's Day:
- The linked post was egregiously off-topic and do not concern any aspect of Fire Emblem and its fan activities whatsoever. Three of these offenses will lead to a ban.
- The post/linked post was "obviously" made by a spambot/troll. Instant ban. If you are actually a real human with good intentions, feel free to appeal.
- Flagrant plagiarism. This comes with a ban, too.
- The original author of the linked post asked for it to be removed. This will not be penalized unless the author had previously made it clear that their work was not to be shared, or a member repeatedly encounters this issue, in which case the member will be asked to limit their posts to their own work.

Members who post the following will be notified of their infraction and the post will be immediately removed:
- The linked post included detailed or graphic descriptions of sexual assault, violence, or self-harm and did not note this fact in the abstract.
- The post contained a significant spoiler.
Please note that the policy is immediate deletion only because of the immediate potential consequences upon the

emblemology community, and is not meant to punish the submitter, nor reflect of the value of the work itself. Members are highly encouraged to resubmit with corrections. Three of these offenses result in a ban.

Members who post the following will be notified of their infraction, and the post will be removed 24 hours later if not corrected:
- The linked post contained spoilers outside of what was warned for and permitted for its tags.
- The post contained a spoiler of lesser consequence than those covered above.
- The linked post attacked individuals or groups in the fandom.
A second offense of this nature, not corrected within 24 hours, will result in a ban. Four offenses, no matter how quickly corrected, will result in a ban.

Members who post the following will be notified of their infraction and advised to correct the post in question. Posts will not be removed based on these grounds, but repeated infractions may result in a temporary ban depending on the severity of the offense.
- The linked post contains spoilers for a world not tagged in the post.
- The post is not formatted correctly.
- The linked post is unusually difficult to read, whether this is due to formatting or excessive language errors.
- The post is the 20th (or later) post made by the same member within a day.

- What counts as a spoiler?

Unfortunately, this is difficult to quantify. I would generally describe a spoiler as language that reveals a surprising plot-important aspect of the games to the reader, usually about something that a player wouldn't discover for themselves within the first few hours of play or by reading the back of the box. It is not a spoiler to remark that FE10 begins with an uprising in Daein despite letting you know how FE9 ends, since this is common knowledge to the point that it's part of the advertising for the game. However, it is a spoiler to relate the details of the drama of Ike's parents.

It is also not a spoiler to refer to something mundane that is technically revealed late in the game; for example, that Eliwood gets a horse when he promotes, or that you eventually get L'Arachel to join you in FE8. That is not to say that stating that playable characters are playable is always permissible -- for example, the last potential playable character in FE10.

I recognize that analytical articles naturally involve a great deal of spoilers, often making a late-game revelation the focus of their study. Therefore it is always permitted to inadvertently suggest that something happens or isn't what it seems ("This post is about the mid-game plot twist in FE4 and how it affects the psychology of the younger cast.") so long as the phrasing gives little more information than the fact that some mysterious twist exists. Writers should aim to identify their subject while spoiling as little as possible.

So long as it is clear that post writers make an effort to keep their fellow fans from being spoiled, lenience will definitely be exercised with respect to any penalties involved.

- What is meta?

Meta is a term used in fandom, particularly LiveJournal-based fandom, to describe a discussion of fanworks of all kinds, fan work in relation to the source text, fanfiction characters and their motivation and psychology, fan behavior, or fandom itself.

Meta or a meta essay can also be a fan-authored piece of non-fiction writing that discusses any of the above topics.

- From the fanlore wiki

It is worth noting that we take an interest in pieces that are not strictly meta -- for example, pieces useful for reference purposes. The breakdown in the explanation of tags may be of some use in seeing what we house.

Guidelines for users of the archive are much simpler. They can be found in the community profile as well as under the following cut.

Guidelines for Users of the Archive
- Do not leave discussion comments on the emblemology post itself unless you are unable to leave a comment at the linked article. This rule is in place for two reasons: 1) to consolidate all discussion in one place where all readers will see it (the original article), and 2) to allow users of the archive to easily spot when a post has an article posted as a response (since this is what comments are used for within this community).
- Be nice.
That's more or less it. There isn't much to say about using the archive. :)

Tips and tricks:

You can find a complete listing of all tags here, with an explanation of what they mean here if you're not sure what they mean.

You can filter by multiple tags using this format:
http://emblemology.dreamwidth.org/tag/nameoftag1,nameoftag2?mode=and
Here's a sample search for theories about Anna's mental state (of which there are presently none).

Or, if you want to include entries from multiple tags all at once, you can do this:
http://emblemology.dreamwidth.org/tag/nameoftag1,nameoftag2
Here's a sample search for all kinds of posts except those that are exclusively persuasive.

If you read an article and like it, check the article's comments for discussion (which is often full of good stuff), as well as the emblemology post for cross-references in the comments.