Talk:Tarkir
Timeline Naming
This has been a topic of conversation on the Discord but I felt it should be discussed here as well. It would be useful to have more consistent naming on Tarkir's timelines across the wiki. I sometimes get confused trying to understand which timeline is being talked about because the terms can change sentence to sentence in the same article. Looking through the wiki, I can see them referred to as:
Khans of Tarkir: alternate/Khans/old/original/previous timeline
Dragons of Tarkir: altered/alternate/Dragons/modern/new/prime timeline
I'm pretty against the term "alternate timeline" being used for either, since it has been used for both and can be easily confused: is the new timeline alternate because it separated from the original timeline? Or is the old one alternate because it's no longer the prime timeline? I think it makes more sense to save "alternate timeline" for things like Planar Chaos. That said, the first Planeswalker's Guide for Tarkir: Dragonstorm does briefly refer to the Khans timeline as an "alternate present." Here are some of the suggested pairs and my thoughts:
Khans & Dragons or Clan & Dragonlord: While straightforward, I think this is a bad choice, as the plane once again has khans and no longer has dragonlords, and the original set is over a decade old. Before long, I can easily imagine people thinking of the current timeline as the "khans" timeline.
Alternate and [not mentioned]: This seems to be Wizards' general position, referring simply to things as they are and mentioning "in the alternate timeline, xyz happened." Though this seems to be the most "accurate," it can get a bit confusing when describing events that led to the current timeline, but my main issue is that "alternate" is used in the community and across the wiki to refer to the current timeline 9 times out of 10, so this phrasing is more likely to confuse readers.
Original & New: This was previously my go-to pair as I consider it the most intuitive for readers, but there doesn't seem to be consensus so I'd like to get more discussion before going forward.
Happy to hear others' thoughts, seems there's no perfect answer here yet. RudleyDudley (talk) 07:03, 5 March 2025 (UTC)