Something for Its Not Porn Its An Index. Is this too vague to be a trope? I saw it mentioned on scans_daily and wondered.

People like the underdog and The Woobie, it's true. But there's also a delight that comes in watching someone who knows what they are doing. A plan that doesn't fall to pieces. A rescue that goes off without a hitch. Someone demonstrating their skills and flexibility. Maybe they were clumsy and unskilled at some point, but right now? The characters know what they are doing and they are doing it well.

Competence Porn is when part of a work's appeal comes from characters and organizations that don't panic when things go wrong, but rise to the occasion.

Unfortunately, it does tend to lend itself to the creation of Mary Sues. When competence gets too exaggerated, the audience's love for the characters drops, no matter what awesome act they're doing. These characters tend to be Bad Ass.

• As reported on scans_daily, John Rogers was surprised by how much people loved the briefing scenes on his show Leverage.
  For we writers, it was always X pages of pipe we tried to make as entertaining as possible and move past to get into the plot. For the audience, watching competent people banter and plan was a big part of the appeal. "Competence porn" as we started calling it.
• Jon Stewart and Jon Oliver geeked out about the Navy SEA Ls who took out some pirates who were holding a ship hostage near Somalia.
• One of the reasons why Timothy Zahn's Star Wars Expanded Universe novels are held in high regard is that his Imperials, along with not being starkly evil, are skilled.