Forum:Temporary forums/Incarnation naming standards

Where we stand
I don't think an OP is necessary for this thread, as it is a continuation of the discussion which started at Talk:First Morbius before the resurrection of the Forums in their present, ‘Temporary’ form. It's a discussion that should, in an ideal world, always have belonged to the Forums, so let's relocate it there now and do this properly. People who intend to participate in this discussion should ideally read through the backlog at that talk page, but I will proceed to summarise the main points of contention.

The question at hand is establishing standards for the naming of incarnations — principally of Time Lords, but the same logic would obviously apply to characters of other species whose different incarnations are covered in the same spirit, like Malika or Swarm — for characters who go by an ordinary proper name (e.g. Morbius) rather than a title where it's straightforward to treat them like The Doctor (e.g. The Monk).

The current practice, pioneered and championed by myself (among others), is to treat them like the Doctor anyway: e.g. "the First Malika regenerated into the Second Malika". This seems straightforward, unambiguous and intuitive to me. It also broadly matches the credits/production material for Swarm's incarnations, "the Old Swarm" and "the Younger Swarm".

User:NateBumber's proposal is to instead base ourselves on T:ROMANA, a decision initially taken in the specific case of Romana due to established fandom practice, and to use Roman numerals; e.g. Morbius I, Malika I. He argues that the grammatical correctness of a form like "the First Morbius" is debatable at best.

A major edge-case that has seen discussion is the possibility of confusion between Nate's proposal and actual dynastic numbering: Elizabeth X is not the tenth incarnation of Elizabeth I, and the problem gets thornier with Gallifreyan Presidents who actually use Roman numerals, like Pandad IV. I argued that it would be counterintuitive and confusing to have a list of Time Lord Presidents include both "Pandad IV" and "Morbius I" when the Roman numerals mean completely different things in this case. Nate's side objected that the confusion exists either way in the case of President Romana II, whose name is outside the bounds of this discussion; argued that the scenario of having to talk about "the first incarnation of Pandad IV" is thus far purely hypothetical, and will, in any case, certainly remain rare enough that we don't need to base the entire system on it; and proposed some hypothetical avenues to disambiguate, if the case should ever actually come up otherwise, such as using the honourific "of Gallifrey" for the Presidents.

The old discussion had become confused and deadlocked enough that we were down to the proverbial shows of hand, but I'm hoping this new start will be an opportunity to get some new perspectives in. Scrooge MacDuck ⊕ 17:53, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

Discussion
I'm not sure of the specifics about this, but I'm not sure I'm fond of either option: having Talk:The Monk/Archive 1 say that "we should probably strive to use the names given by each individual sources in individually-sourced statement", I feel any naming policy is going against the spirit of Tardis:Valid sources, which tells us not to go further than what a source tells us. Frankly, if we need to talk about the first incarnation of Morbius we see, we should do something like first Morbius, where "first" is not capitalised. Have the descriptor remain merely a descriptor, not a fannish title we conjured up out of nowhere. The "Romana I" naming convention was made up by fans originally, not official sources, and as this Wiki has a lot of influence I do not believe it is in our right to make up names that could shape official stories in the future. 18:26, 18 February 2023 (UTC)
 * Oh, I should make it clear, and that's with an admin hat on, that we will always default to the forms used by actual sources if we have them, no matter what decision we reach here. The question is what naming standards to use as a default when no explicit incarnation names are given. Scrooge MacDuck ⊕ 18:31, 18 February 2023 (UTC)


 * In that case, something like Morbius (The Brain of Morbius) which strictly adheres to what's said in a source. If a source, such as Utopia, has two new incarnations in it, then we should, in-text, say something like "the elderly Master regenerated into a youthful, black haired incarnation", and name the pages Master 1 (Utopia) and Master 2 (Utopia). Not a glamorous solution, but one that does its job of neutrality, and we even do it for characters such as Ninth Doctor 1 (The Tomorrow Windows), The Doctor 1 (Rose), etc. 18:37, 18 February 2023 (UTC)


 * You misunderstand me. I meant that if e.g. sources say "First Morbius", then we should stick with that in this particular case even if we otherwise decide on "Morbius I" as the default form (or vice-versa). Finding a non-dabbed name is often a necessity, and I do not believe that it is an unreasonably speculative route, any more than Fourteenth Doctor and its ilk, in cases where numbering is in fact given to us. I respect the principled stance you're gesturing at (though it doesn't apply to Utopia, since we do have official names for those two jackanapes), but it seems at odd with Wiki practicality and usefulness to our readers. Scrooge MacDuck ⊕ 18:40, 18 February 2023 (UTC)


 * I stand behind my comment there in its entirety. "Pandad IV" is not stated to be a title, it's a violation of T:NO RW to infer it is. As such I remain strongly against treating it as a title in any proposed reworking of incarnation naming standards. I don't much care about the rest of the issue. Najawin ☎  19:26, 18 February 2023 (UTC)


 * I'll admit, Morbius I looks nicer. But, truly, I think sticking with First Morbius is better. And I'm not entirely sure why, but it feels a bit fannish, like impossing a name on the community. But, to be honest, im not entirely sure why First Morbius doesn't feel like that. Cousin Ettolrhc ☎  22:12, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

I'm disappointed that this thread was opened in the way it was, especially since my last messages on Talk:First Morbius were so explicitly framed as personal notes for an overhauled proposal and opening post. As it is, the OP above inaccurately depicts my proposal as centered around concerns which I had explicitly disregarded or intended to rephrase. I don't think I'll have the time this week to write up my version, and in the meanwhile the three week window will tick towards its end; it would be unfair of me to demand that the clock be reset once I finish my draft. I move that this be closed as Unresolved. – n8 (☎) 03:38, 19 February 2023 (UTC)
 * Additionally, going forward it might be a good rule of thumb that opening posts should be written by users who actually support the proposal in question. – n8 (☎) 03:46, 19 February 2023 (UTC)
 * I think this is a reasonable procedural objection. Najawin ☎  04:14, 19 February 2023 (UTC)
 * I've gotta agree with you there n8, I was really quite surprised to see this thread opened not by you, but presumed you'd been contacted? As it appears not, I agree with your call to unresolved until a future thread you actually get to author Cousin Ettolrhc ☎  07:47, 19 February 2023 (UTC)