Thread:Tescotime/@comment-5754239-20190606154837/@comment-5754239-20191004214111

Visual mode is an in-between editor that lets you edit some of the elements of the page, but doesn't let you directly touch the underlying wikitext that generates those elements. Some elements generated by the page can break if the visual editor is used on them since the editor doesn't know how to let you edit the element without showing you how the wikitext works.

Source mode does get at the underlying wikitext, and while can require a little bit of pseudo-programming, it's ultimately the better mode IMO. For templates like the rip template, I exclusively use the source editor to make changes to it because editing it with the visual editor can be really complicated.