Commons:Categories for discussion/2024/06/Category:Game tokens

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Category:Game tokens

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Category:Game tokens should be merged into Category:Gaming pieces, some of the subcategories should be renamed accordingly (see below). The distinction between "tokens" and "pieces" is hard to make. The infobox at Category:Game tokens says "game piece". English Wikipedia at en:Game piece (board game) lists "piece" as the main word used (emphasis mine): piece // Or bit, checker, chip, counter, disc, draughtsman, game piece, man, meeple, mover, pawn, player piece, playing piece, singleton, stone, token, unit.. —⁠andrybak (talk) 21:10, 17 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I am also OK with replacing the word "Gaming" with "Game" (as in Category:Game tables) or "Games" (as in Category:Games equipment). Here are the subcategories which should be renamed:
—⁠andrybak (talk) 21:24, 17 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]
If the option with the word "game" is chosen, then Category:Gaming pieces should also be renamed to Category:Game pieces. —⁠andrybak (talk) 21:26, 17 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I appreciate ping (as someone who recently wrote w:game board as well as w:meeple, is a board game fan and is intersted in scholarly board game studies). Now, settng aside the use of words game vs gaming on which at the moment I have no opinion, I'd like to oppose this merge proposal at least when it concerns Category:Board game tokens. Token is a specific type of a gaming piece. The linkd Wikipedia glossary is far from perfect and so is ours (here at Commons) very messy category system, and said glossary lists as synonyms some terms that are more specific (ex. meeple). Anyway, meeples are not tokens, they are a type of pawns or gaming pieces. Looking at Category:Board game tokens, I see only one picture of what I'd recognize at tokens (visible at File:Netrunner - Gateway starter decks.jpg). So I can understand why some folks who may not be familiar with board games could be confused and think this category is bad (we also have an issue here at Commons that many board game components are copyrighted and we don't have many detailed pictures). Thing is, the category is needed but mostly contains wrong images. But see google search for "board game tokens. Now, I need to do more research and create more articles on notable elements of board game accessories (and mechanics), and define them properly (rather than trying to do OR), but if pressed, I would define board game token now as a "secondary" piece used to represent resources or secondary action pieces (i.e. tokens are clearly different from pawns or meeples). If you want more input, I recommend listing this discussion at en:Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Board and table games (I can do it if you don't mind?). PS. Here are some more images of what I'd consider board game tokens, not correctly categorized on Commons yet: File:Board game pieces.jpg (front), File:Components in Wingspan board game.jpg (on the left, possibly right as well), File:Components of board game Everdell.jpg, File:Cluttered forest in board game Everdell.jpg (on the right and left), File:Agricola board game.jpg (on the right, a bit on the left). Now, there is a partial overlap with the concept of resource in board game, and others (some tokens can take the form of coins or cards); and the overlap with w:playmoney is particularly confusing (paper money is a resource but usually not called a token, although coins are called tokens). Oh, and then there are tokens in card games, like MtG. Which, sigh, look just like other MtG cards for the unititiated. Anyway, I believe the concept of board game token is possibly encyclopedic (needs its own wiki article) and certainly deserves a Commons category and wikidata entry. Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 03:27, 18 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I very much welcome the merging of the two categories game tokens and game pieces. I would prefer the term that is used more frequently. Coming from the German language, I had great difficulty finding the English terms. I noticed the confusion in the whole category. There are also special terms such as Meeple (English, but used for Carcassonne in German too) or Pöppel (German). This game pieces are different from other game pieces. (In German: Spielfiguren sind spezieller als Spielsteine. I can't find a good translation.) It would also be good to merge Game and Gaming. All other terms should also be named more precisely. I searched for a long time for the English term for the German word Pöppel and then found Halma pawns. But Halma is a special game and I'm not happy with the term. In the meantime I have also found Game pawns, but this may lead to confusion with Pawns (chess). --XRay 💬 04:49, 18 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Piotrus, what if we renamed everything to "X game components" instead? Even if we take the distinction "pieces vs tokens" you describe at face value, it might not be a very useful one for users. —⁠andrybak (talk) 23:21, 19 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]
@Andrybak I am unsure what is the difference between Category:Games equipment which we already have as a parent category here, and Category:Games compontents, except that in widely understood board (tabletop) games, we don't talk about "equipment". Stuff like Category:Dice towers, which is an unofficial add-on/aid to make playing the game easier/nicer, would be usually called a game accessory (Category:Games accessories doe not exist; another type of board/tabletop game accessory would be Category:Playmats I just created recently, as well as Category:Game tables which we had for a while), whereas stuff that is actually used to play the game (included in the game box and required by the rules), would be a component. I have never heard of "board game equipment". (Side note: while standardizing "gaming"/"game", which I support, note we also use in categories the plural word "games"... we should probably consider changing it to "game" too). So anyway, I am totally fine with having a parent category "X game components" ("board game compontents"), but I am unsure whether we should rename Category:Games equipment? Now, with egards to Category:Gaming pieces, I am unsure if it should be kept or not, but Category:Board game pieces makes sense as one of several categories under Category:Board game components. For example, Category:Game boards (currently child to only Category:Board games) would be a board game component, but not a piece. However, I want to note that going by the definition of piece from the mentioned "en:Glossary of board games", the tokens as I understand them are not pieces. That glossary (unreferenced and not very reliable...) seems to understand the concept of the piece as a pawn/meeple or such - a controllable piece that is the focus of the game. But for me, tokens, in most games, mean resources. In all honesty, this is pretty complicated and we need to create a taxonomy / hierarchy of (board) game components (a task not faciliated by the fact that there are synonyms and contradictions in terminolgy, and clashes between common English and gaming jargon). https://boardgamegeek.com/wiki/page/Glossary for example does not have an entry for either "piece" or "token", or "compontent", despite using those terms in definitions... ("equipment" is almost never used). They have an entry on "bits" which seems to correspond to our concept of equipment/components ("The assorted components used to play a game."), but IMHO it is not the term that is very often used. At least their entry on "accessory" corresponds to what I described above ("Accessories are items that are used in games, but do not add rules or change game play. "). Sigh. Now, I rambled a lot and frankly I don't think I am helping that much; the problem is that we need to agree on terminology/hierarchy. For now, here's an actionable suggestion: under Category:Board games, I'd like to see a Category:Board game components as well as Board game accessories. The first groups everything that can be found in a game box, the latter is for extras (playmats, dicetowers, board game tables, etc.). Category:Board game bits and should redirect to Category:Board game components. Category:Board game equipment is ambigious and might include both components and accessories I guess, so I'd either not create it at all or use it as parent for components and accessories. Under components I'd have Category:Game boards, Category:Board game pieces (Category:Board game pawns would be here, with a child of Category:Meeples), Category:Board game tokens, Category:Dice, Category:Cards, and so on. I acknowledge we may need to do some more work on piece vs token, but I'd like to find those terms defined somewhere before we merge/rename them. PS. If we understand piece as synonym to component, we may also ignore creating this category. Category:Monopoly gaming pieces, for example, includes things I'd not call pieces (it has cards, tokens, dice...). I'd rename this category to Category:Components of Monopoly. Note that Category:Chess pieces refers explicitly to figurines. en:Chess pieces states that "A chess piece, or chessman, is a game piece that is..." without defining what a "game piece" is (no article on that yet...). Our Category:Chess pieces is a child to Category:Chess equpment and Category:Gaming pieces, sigh. I am not familiar enough with chess to be sure they prefer to use the term equipment over accessories (for stuff like Category:Chess clocks), but of course the term "chess piece" is common. But from the board game category perspective, chess pieces would belong to Category:Board game components, and probably to Category:Board game pieces... . And obviusly, they are not "tokens". Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 03:34, 20 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Leaning Support. As the above shows, if there is a clear distinction, it is not understood or acted on by many Commons uploaders and categorizers (what a surprise). I think the distinction could still be maintained in sub-cats. Why not rename to Category:Gaming pieces and tokens, if you can work out how to rename a Commons category, which I've never managed? Johnbod (talk) 14:00, 18 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Re: the distinction could still be maintained in sub-cats. @Johnbod, do you mean a category tree like this:
? —⁠andrybak (talk) 23:26, 19 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Something like that, but you haven't used Category:Gaming pieces and tokens. I suppose there are various possibilities, about which I won't have strong views myself - I'm content to leave that to experts. Johnbod (talk) 16:42, 21 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]
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