What to do about Trails/Eiyuu Densetsu character/game tags?

I think game and character tags for the Eiyuu Densetsu/Trails franchise are very inconsistently applied, with rules that don't make very much sense.

Let's take Sen no Kiseki/Trails of Cold Steel's Emma Millstein as an example. In the Sen/Cold Steel arc alone, she has four distinct appearances for each of the four titles, but a large number of posts featuring Emma either default to sen_no_kiseki_i or just sen_no_kiseki, regardless of whether that depiction of her was in the first game at all. There's also a lot of art for Emma (along with plenty of other characters in the franchise's very expansive cast) that depict her in alternate costumes not seen ingame, and plenty of those posts will tag specific games too. On top of that, Sora no Kiseki/Trails in the Sky has no tags denoting individual games in the trilogy, so characters that appear only in the second or third game (or that have appearances unique to those games) are necessarily assigned to a blanket Sora no Kiseki tag. To make matters worse, Trails is a franchise reliant on past events and characters being referenced and making appearances, so what if Estelle Bright is depicted in her Cold Steel 4 costume alongside other characters from Cold Steel 4? Do you tag sora_no_kiseki even though that's clearly not the game being referenced? It's all very messy, and doubly so when spoilers are an important consideration.

I've thought about solutions to this quandary, and the best I can come up with is a combination of using individual character tags for individual characters on a per-game appearance (such as emma_millstein_(sen_no_kiseki_i and emma_millstein_(sen_no_kiseki_ii as implications to emma_millstein and used in different cases), and an effort to omit game tags for characters based on their first appearance alone unless the depiction is not seen in any games (such as not tagging sora_no_kiseki with every image that has Joshua Bright in it unless there are no context clues to tie the image to a specific game). This would, unfortunately, make it difficult to properly tag images if you're not a Trails nut like I am, which is what led me to make this post. Is there a more elegant solution to this problem? Is this even a problem at all and I'm making a big deal of nothing?

Archas said:

Let's take Sen no Kiseki/Trails of Cold Steel's Emma Millstein as an example. In the Sen/Cold Steel arc alone, she has four distinct appearances for each of the four titles, but a large number of posts featuring Emma either default to sen_no_kiseki_i or just sen_no_kiseki, regardless of whether that depiction of her was in the first game at all. There's also a lot of art for Emma (along with plenty of other characters in the franchise's very expansive cast) that depict her in alternate costumes not seen ingame, and plenty of those posts will tag specific games too. On top of that, Sora no Kiseki/Trails in the Sky has no tags denoting individual games in the trilogy, so characters that appear only in the second or third game (or that have appearances unique to those games) are necessarily assigned to a blanket Sora no Kiseki tag. To make matters worse, Trails is a franchise reliant on past events and characters being referenced and making appearances, so what if Estelle Bright is depicted in her Cold Steel 4 costume alongside other characters from Cold Steel 4? Do you tag sora_no_kiseki even though that's clearly not the game being referenced? It's all very messy, and doubly so when spoilers are an important consideration.

The issue you're running into here is related to twofold:
1. you're dealing with uploaders who are not explicitly familiar with Sen no Kiseki, and so they default to the first game a character has appeared in as opposed to considering whether or not the art is actually depicting how they appear in that game. I have personal experience with this issue in the form of Dragon Ball tagging, as many users absentmindedly tag Dragon Ball Z on Android 18 posts, completely unaware that she appears in Super with the same general appearance, clothes withstanding. This isn't so much a rule than it is a guideline, as a character is supposed to have a main copytag associated with them (whether it be the general series tag, the more specific series tag, or a specific entry in that series) and then you add additional copytags for different appearances (ex. using Son Goku, tagging Dragon Ball GT with his GT look).
2. you're dealing with taggers who either believed Sora no Kiseki didn't need additional copytags or were ignorant to the potential need for them, so tags for the individual games were never made - even though over the years people have wondered why that is (forum #93371, forum #283435). Frankly, you could just argue for their creation and just... make them! There's literally nothing stopping you, especially if you believe making those additional tags would make it more searchable.

I've thought about solutions to this quandary, and the best I can come up with is a combination of using individual character tags for individual characters on a per-game appearance (such as emma_millstein_(sen_no_kiseki_i and emma_millstein_(sen_no_kiseki_ii as implications to emma_millstein and used in different cases), and an effort to omit game tags for characters based on their first appearance alone unless the depiction is not seen in any games (such as not tagging sora_no_kiseki with every image that has Joshua Bright in it unless there are no context clues to tie the image to a specific game). This would, unfortunately, make it difficult to properly tag images if you're not a Trails nut like I am, which is what led me to make this post. Is there a more elegant solution to this problem? Is this even a problem at all and I'm making a big deal of nothing?

An effort to omit game tags can only really be done if the tagger is aware of what clothing options are in the game in question, and rather than doing individual character tags (which would automatically be rejected in the presence of the individual copytags), you can just include example images in the character wikis (ex. Son Goku), which can then be pointed to. Really, just increasing on-site accessibility of info via wikis alone makes things simpler.

These are certainly valid points and ones I'd already been pondering. I had considered expanding character wikis for exactly the reason you stated; unfortunately, there's a lot of characters, my time is limited, and I haven't even played the three latest games to be localized yet, so spoilers are definitely still a concern for me. You're right that that alone would make a significant impact, but I figured I'd ask for additional input in the meantime.

I suppose, at the end of the day, tagging should be intuitive, and the most intuitive means to do so for a franchise one is not intimately familiar with is to make robust wiki entries as references.

Ideally just tag the game where that design debuted, if nothing otherwise indicates a scene from a sequel game

Different character tags per game is most definitely overkill for this series. That kind of thing is mostly just done for official alts on like gacha spinoffs

and I still support splitting Sky but it will take some gardening for sure

also best way to avoid spoilers e.g. Kuro is to just blacklist kuro no kiseki (series) entirely. I try to add spoilers tag when necessary but I see some others not care as much

For specifically Sen no Kiseki, (each of the characters have so many different distinct appearances), I think sticking it to that game's specific title would be more succinct (like Rean's Ogre Form in IV). If there's an alternative costume (the swimsuits or the outfits they just wear once and never again), I think sticking the Sen no Kiseki general tag would be sufficient.

Regarding Estelle Bright and Joshua Bright, I think since their outfits are very distinct based on what game they're featured in, I think the same logic would follow.
Unfortunately to tag every outfit depending on the game could technically lead to spoiler territory since the Trails Series is so plot/character driven. (For example Joshua_Bright_Sora_no_Kiseki_SC or who 'C' is behind the mask)

I have considered expanding the character wikis, myself, since I noticed that they were pretty bare; but I'm not entirely sure how much information would be needed to make them... more 'whole' if you get what I mean. I wouldn't want half of someone's wiki to be a formatted as a spoiler.

I think the only way to really remedy this tagging quandary for people who aren't into the Trails series would be gardening as people who do know the series. I support splitting Sky though, since Cold Steel each as its own entry. The only issue I would see about splitting Sky is concerning the Sky FC remake that is releasing soon, if they change anything design wise in the remake.