Topic: Animal tail implication BUR

The bulk update request #2591 is pending approval.

create implication cat_tail (6426) -> animal_tail (2127)
create implication dog_tail (819) -> animal_tail (2127)
create implication dragon_tail (1485) -> animal_tail (2127)
create implication fox_tail (4620) -> animal_tail (2127)
create implication horse_tail (1368) -> animal_tail (2127)
create implication lizard_tail (841) -> animal_tail (2127)
create implication monkey_tail (314) -> animal_tail (2127)
create implication mouse_tail (1809) -> animal_tail (2127)
create implication raccoon_tail (668) -> animal_tail (2127)
create implication rat_tail (2867) -> animal_tail (2127)
create implication scorpion_tail (620) -> animal_tail (2127)
create implication shark_tail (5537) -> animal_tail (2127)
create implication squirrel_tail (1102) -> animal_tail (2127)
create implication tiger_tail (138) -> animal_tail (2127)
create implication wolf_tail (1435) -> animal_tail (2127)
create implication scorpion_tail (620) -> animal_tail (2127)
create implication fish_tail (3160) -> animal_tail (2127)
create implication skunk_tail (1239) -> animal_tail (2127)
create implication beaver_tail (384) -> animal_tail (2127)

Reason: Same as the fake_tail tag, animal_tail needs specific tails implicated to it

Is this necessary? The tail tag is invalid and I don't see animal_tail being any more useful. As it is, these <animal>_tail tags are completely misused, as they're only supposed to be for humanoids and not anthros/ferals, yet that's what they're used on by a significant amount.

fox_tail wiki says:
Characters that appear almost entirely human, but have a tail like a fox. Usually paired with fox ears.

• This tag is generally not applicable to anthro characters.

At least I think animal_tail should be aliased to tail, but I'd strongly think the others should as well if they can't be cleaned up.

I think the tailed_humanoid tag could be a good replacement for animal_tail, much less ambiguous but currently hasn't got much use.

It could probably even have subtags like fox_tailed_humanoid instead of fox_tail? Kinda seems redundant to fox_humanoid though..

faucet said:
I think the tailed_humanoid tag could be a good replacement for animal_tail, much less ambiguous but currently hasn't got much use.

It could probably even have subtags like fox_tailed_humanoid?

I think fox_humanoid is enough for a fox humanoid with a tail. While aliasing animal_tail to tailed_humanoid might be alright on paper, the amount of misuse these tags currently have and will have in the future would cause even more humanoid mistags than already happens, and that's not something I'd look forward to.

watsit said:
Is this necessary? The tail tag is invalid and I don't see animal_tail being any more useful. As it is, these <animal>_tail tags are completely misused, as they're only supposed to be for humanoids and not anthros/ferals, yet that's what they're used on by a significant amount.
At least I think animal_tail should be aliased to tail, but I'd strongly think the others should as well if they can't be cleaned up.

Though the wiki does say that these tags are primarily used for humanoids, I believe they also have use with hybrid non-humanoid characters, like a dog with a scorpion tail, but that's a whole other discussion that might not be worth having. I agree with you that the ambiguity will continue to cause problems in the future.

watsit said:
I think fox_humanoid is enough for a fox humanoid with a tail. While aliasing animal_tail to tailed_humanoid might be alright on paper, the amount of misuse these tags currently have and will have in the future would cause even more humanoid mistags than already happens, and that's not something I'd look forward to.

I fully agree with this... so do we just let these tags sit alone? Maybe a tag group is needed? I'm obviously not too experienced with things like this D:

yeoldenut said:
Though the wiki does say that these tags are primarily used for humanoids, I believe they also have use with hybrid non-humanoid characters, like a dog with a scorpion tail, but that's a whole other discussion that might not be worth having. I agree with you that the ambiguity will continue to cause problems in the future.

There was a discussion a while back about the various tail types, and one of the issues brought up is certain animals can have very similar if not identical looking tails, where if you're looking at just the tail you may not be able to tell what it is (e.g. a cow tail and lion tail can look the same, in certain situations). Especially in art, where anatomical accuracy is usually not high priority.

I think all of these could easily be replaced with, for example, fox_humanoid + tail. The problem? tail is still invalid, of course. I think it’s likely these tags have cropped up because tail itself is invalid, and so one cannot simply search fox_humanoid + tail - instead you need a fox_tail tag to find fox-tailed humanoids.

Therefore, I think simply revalidating tail would be preferable to trying to wrangle this total mess of oft-mistagged humanoid tail tags.

Now that tail is valid again, thoughts on this?

watsit said:
Is this necessary? The tail tag is invalid and I don't see animal_tail being any more useful. As it is, these <animal>_tail tags are completely misused, as they're only supposed to be for humanoids and not anthros/ferals, yet that's what they're used on by a significant amount.
At least I think animal_tail should be aliased to tail, but I'd strongly think the others should as well if they can't be cleaned up.

gattonero2001 said:
Now that tail is valid again, thoughts on this?

Partially the same opinion as Watsit, I think animal_tail is unnecessary and should be aliased to tail.

Is there any tail that isn't animal? I can only think of hard-to-visually-identify tentacles
If there is a tail that isn't animal, there should be a tag for that specific one, like non_animal_tail

scaliespe, forever ago said:
I think all of these could easily be replaced with, for example, fox_humanoid + tail. The problem? tail is still invalid, of course. I think it’s likely these tags have cropped up because tail itself is invalid, and so one cannot simply search fox_humanoid + tail - instead you need a fox_tail tag to find fox-tailed humanoids.

Therefore, I think simply revalidating tail would be preferable to trying to wrangle this total mess of oft-mistagged humanoid tail tags.

Hey, it’s me from the past. Hi, me.

As past me pointed out, it’s quite possible that these tags only really saw use due to the lack of a proper tail tag. Now, tail + (species) will probably suffice. I liked the idea of being able to tag the tail type on a chimera or something where the tail actually belongs to a different species than the rest of the body… but keeping that tag straight just sounds impossible.

I also deliberately left these tags out of my recent tail implication BURs because I’m leaning towards them just being aliased to tail.

On the other hand, we could try to alias them to more descriptive tail types. As Watsit noted, some of these may look nearly identical in some cases, like cow_tail and lion_tail. Those could both be aliased to tail_tuft instead, as that’s their defining characteristic. Some other potential aliases:

Lizard_tail, dragon_tail: tapering_tail or thick_tail
Cat_tail, monkey_tail, mouse_tail, rat_tail, tiger_tail: skinny_tail
Fox_tail, wolf_tail, squirrel_tail, skunk_tail: fluffy_tail
Shark_tail, fish_tail: tail_fin
Dolphin_tail, cetacean_tail (NOT whale_tail… that’s something completely different): flukes
Dog_tail: just nuke it, there are way too many shapes and sizes of dog tails

Some of these, however, are extremely specific, and can probably be left as-is simply due to the lack of any suitable replacement. I’m looking specifically at scorpion_tail and beaver_tail. Scorpion tail in particular seems to be an especially common choice for chimeras, so that could probably be kept.