Board Thread:The Panopticon/@comment-1293767-20151029072618/@comment-5918438-20160108031518

Bwburke94 wrote:
 * Or the following statements are all true:
 * Rule B1: The episodes follow each other directly in broadcast, within the same series.
 * Rule B2: At least one person involved with production in a non-actor capacity has stated the episodes are a multi-part story.
 * Rule B3: A community discussion within the wiki has determined the episodes are a multi-part story. (Discussions closed prior to 31 December 2015 do not count for the purposes of this rule.)

I can't stand behind that, I'm afraid. The only reason some users want a community discussion clause is so that things can be arranged the way they want. You will note, if you sift through inclusion debates, that none of them challenge the very nature of the four little rules themselves. Instead, inclusion debates are necessary to find out whether or not a story fits the rules. Almost always, those discussions are because rule #4, which relates to intent, often will need discussion.

Hey. Listen. The point of clear rules is not to have these discussions. Tell me, which of the three rules of T:STORY COUNT actually requires that discussion? I think the only discussion to be had is now, at this policy's infancy.

But the debate isn't about A Good Man Goes to War or Utopia, because those not only fall short of the rules proposed entirely, but, as I've pointed out, will cause chaos. If we look to the narrative of a story and say it's a two-parter, or make the qualifier in any way relating to cliffhangers, then we open to the door for it allllll being rediscussed. Over. And over. And over.

If we have a rule that something can be a two-parter if the community just decides so, on no real basis, these discussions will never end. Story numbering will never rest, and we will never reach any conclusion. And when somebody starts a discussion, and admin wouldn't be able to just say "no, it breaks rule 3." We'd have to allow that discussion to happen, and we'd have to allow users to discuss every Doctor Who episode on the merits of whether or not they belong to multi-part stories.

From an administrative point of view, this is simply not a possibility. Either we have clear rules, or we do away with numbering altogether. If the community can't decide on a system, the story number variable in the infobox goes. Numbering on the episode list goes.

We cannot have a policy on this matter which would allow for our entire numbering system to be changed based on vague production team statements every few months. Either this discussion closes with the consensus "we do not state, on any TV story page, nor on any page which lists TV story, what its story number is", or it closes with a clear set of rules which we can follow with little discussion necessary.

Now I personally really do think that my proposal works 100% of the time. Look again at my list. Every undisputed two-parter is on that list. That is because my three rules encompass every two-parted released before 2015.

I think the main discussion to be had at this point, besides that of whether or not we should count stories at all, if the case of series 9. The series 9 finale, specifically. I have proposed some modifications to my original three rules to allow for this unusual new case. To my knowledge, making "guest character" "guest character and/or unique setting" would not do anything bad for previous series, and would not be too much of a stretch. "Unique setting" here means a setting which did not appear at least in both the story preceding and succeeding those two stories. Lots of two-parters take place in the same location. Heaven Sent is unique in that there aren't very many guest characters at all. If we count Clara Oswald as a guest character in both HS and HB, then we don't need to extend the guest character clause at all. But if that doesn't make sense, then, in this unique case, the two stories do not feature a guest character in common but do feature a unique setting in common. Under that language, Heaven Sent and Hell Bent could potentially be considered a two-part story.

We still have the issue of production blocks, though. If HS/HB is to be considered a two-parter, it will be the only case of a multi-part story not all being produced in one block. But it does have the unique qualification of being produced with each episodes in its own individual block (no other stories sharing a block with this story), and with a maximum of one episode in between production of the two. Of course, HS and HB have really different settings over all, and totally different casts, so it makes sense that the production manager would put them separately. If we do count such a unique case as a two-parter, then the case of: would count as well under the production block rule, obviously only if both share the same director, have guest character(s)( or unique setting) in common, and were broadcast in the direct order in which they were produced, with no episodes broadcast in between them.
 * Block: Part One
 * Block: Standalone
 * Block: Part Two

So here are some examples of similar cases that would not count: and With this modification in place, if parts are in separate production blocks, they must be alone in those blocks, and only have one episode in between them at most.
 * Block: Part One
 * Block: 2 episodes
 * Block: Part Two
 * Block: Part One
 * Block: Part Two and Standalone/Part Three