Talk:Assault rifle

The ranged weapon pages are full of useful information and are very well-written for the most part. But the writing style on all the ranged weapon introductory paragraphs is plodding and confusing to a casual reader. They do not offer an instant "Oh, I get it" for a first-time visitor. "Moderately-heavy moderately-slow, blah blah blah with an inverse burst ratio and a hint of ginger" is no way to start things off. It is plodding and confusing, requiring mental gymnastics to even understand. When someone glances at a wiki, the first sentence they see should give them a quick and easily understandable overview. The first sentence has to pop. I added such a sentence yesterday (without removing anything) and found it was immediately removed. OK. Have fun with your wiki. I thought this was a community project where multiple people could contribute. Guess not. Enforced mediocrity is where I part company.

Oh, and if you say something has a "shorter delay" or a "slightly longer range," you might bother to mention compared to what. But what do I know about writing?

I took a look at the introductory paragraphs, and indeed they could be confusing for non-veteran players. However, to say that a weapon is the 'best' weapon at any stage would be quite subjective and is thus best left to the 'Analysis' part below, as such I relocated the sentence there.

A better method would be to state the general purpose of a weapon; in this case, the assault rifle would be said to be a versatile weapon usable in most combat situations.

There is nothing wrong with putting something subjective in the opening sentence, if the end result achieves what an opening sentence should do. Saying it is "a versatile weapon usable in most combat situations" makes it (once again) sound totally generic, just as the current opening sentences do. You seem to be married to the idea that the opening sentence needs to be less-than-maximally helpful for the sake of some standard format you have in mind. The opening sentence should, above all, give the reader the quickest and most informative overview of what the item is, even if it means sacrificing some rule or form. Writing is about communication, not rigidly bound by laws like mathematics. Read the forums -- virtually everyone says this is the best all-around general purpose ranged weapon before end game, not merely another versatile weapon. It is OK to let your (our) readers understand that fact in 20 words or less. And it is a fact. Not that it is the best, that much is opinion. That virtually everyone says it is the best, that much is a fact.

And in general, loosen up a bit. Let other people get involved.