Talk: Alys Harroway

Inserting lots of text straight from the novella

The first two paragraphs are surely fine as that's pretty much what has already been written on Maegor's own page, only buffed up a bit and put into Alys's point of view. Also maybe instead of undoing entire edits, why didn't you edit it down to what you find to be more respectable?

Better now or is it still just lots of text straight from the novella? Queen Alys Harroway's champion (talk) 20:56, 14 November 2017 (UTC)

It is not other people's responsibility to fix blatant copyright issues.

Your edits here and elsewhere are still problematic. Whether copied or not, they are too long. Parapharasing doesn't mean "copy and paste then change a few words"; it means actually rewriting, and usually in a shorter way. For example,

Following these executions, Maegor was approached by Queen Tyanna, who claimed the king had been deceived. She informed the king that the stillborn boy had not been of his seed, but the result of one of Alys's many affairs. She claimed that Alys, after seeing the old, embittered, and childless Queen Ceryse Hightower return to court, feared the same fate awaited her unless she gave the king a healthy son. According to Tyanna, Alys had asked her father, Lord Lucas Harroway, Maegor's Hand, for aid, and so, on the nights that Maegor was sharing a bed with his two other queens, Lucas sent men of confirmed fertility to Alys's chambers. When Maegor refused to believe these claims, Tyanna provided a list of twenty names as proof. The men were tortured in secret so Alys and her father would not be aware, and all but two confessed to their crimes.

is too long, is not written like an encyclopedia (what Wikipedia calls "tone"; "old, embittered, and childless", for example), and doesn't really have anything more useful than the previous

Tyanna of the Tower convinced Maegor that Alys—desperate for a child—had asked her father to find lovers for her. Maegor had Alys, her bed maids, Grand Maester Desmond who assisted with the birth, her father and every other member of House Harroway, and dozens of alleged lovers executed.

Perhaps the above could be extended to

Tyanna of the Tower convinced Maegor that Alys—afraid of remaining childless like Ceryse—had asked her father to find lovers for her. All but two of dozens of alleged lovers confessed under torture. Maegor had them, Alys, her bed maids, Grand Maester Desmond who assisted with the birth, her father and every other member of House Harroway executed.

but my point is that too much detail is a bad thing, whether violating copyright or not. TMWNN (talk) 07:12, 16 November 2017 (UTC)

Another example: Consider how I rewrote the article on Aegon Targaryen (son of Aenys I). Most detail of the Battle Beneath the Gods Eye belongs in that article; I left in the Aegon article what applies directly to him, or illustrates something about his personal character, such as his inexperience leading to the mistake of not fighting the enemy armies one at a time, for example. I also restored back mention of how the Great Houses would not publicly support Aegon (which Rhaenys Targaryen removed) because that explains why he marched in the first place despite having fewer soldiers than Maegor. Also see how I heavily tightened how Aegon died. TMWNN (talk) 07:43, 16 November 2017 (UTC)

With all due respect, I did not remove the mention of Alyssa's communication with four great houses about declaring for Aegon. I rewrote it. --Rhaenys Targaryen (talk) 10:02, 16 November 2017 (UTC)

You added what was less important (the four houses' names; "Great Houses" would have been sufficient, or—as I originally wrote—give a couple of examples and say "Great Houses" for the others)), and deleted what was more important, what said Great Houses wanted.

To put another way, there was no need to add "in an attempt to convince them to declare for Aegon"; why else would his side be communicating with them? But why would the Great Houses communicate with Aegon? What did they want? And what did what they wanted cause Aegon to do—in this case try to fight—when the odds were against him given his smaller forces and lack of experience? That's what your edit removed and which I restored, while removing a lot of other less-important detail and wording.

Your and my subsequent back-and-forth led to a better article. On second thought I agree with you that it is worthwhile to briefly mention in the Aegon article that Alyssa declared that he was the rightful king. As I said I didn't think identifying all four Great Houses that Aegon was writing to was necessary, but there isn't anything wrong with doing so; a list of eight probably would be excessive, though. TMWNN (talk) 13:07, 16 November 2017 (UTC)

I don't see anything wrong with identifying the all four Great Houses with whom Alyssa (not Aegon himself) was in secret communication. I agree that listing eight (or more) would be excessive. Additionally, I replaced the term "publicly support" with "declare" as I felt "publicly support" could suggest that the four houses in question were willing to secretly give aid to the prince, instead of remaining neutral. But if others feel that that interpretation is not suggested by the wording, it can remain as it is now.

Personally, I would suggest restoring that Alyssa's presence at Maegor's wedding sparked rumors about having abandoned Aegon's cause. Rumors that Aegon's own mother had abandoned his cause reflect Aegon's situation, after all.

(It would be best to move further discussion to Aegon's talkpage :) ) --Rhaenys Targaryen (talk) 13:18, 16 November 2017 (UTC)

Your edits here and elsewhere are still problematic. Is being just a tad bit disingenuous, I have only added large pieces of text to two pages, here (Alys Harroway) and at Ceryse Hightower. Also created Rupert Falwell's page and some major editing over at the Kingsguard. I am mostly a nitpicker, editing little things here and there when coming upon them. So I thank you for your time, but I'm going to leave the large-scale adding of text with other people from now on, not my cup of tea. Have a good day. Queen Alys Harroway's champion (talk) 18:14, 17 November 2017 (UTC)