Tropes that occur when people just make things up on the fly or can't access their normal resources to do the job. Compare Index of Solutions.
Tropes:
- All-Natural Fire Extinguisher: A person has to put out a fire and resorts to doing so by urinating on the flames.
- Banging Pots and Pans
- Battle Baton
- Bedsheet Ladder: Tying bed sheets together to make a ladder that can be used to climb out a window.
- Blind Jump
- Brandishment Bluff
- Carcass Sleeping Bag
- Cardboard Box of Unemployment: A person who got fired has to carry their belongings in a cardboard box.
- Cheap Costume
- Cigar-Fuse Lighting
- Closest Thing We Got
- Combat Cue Stick
- Couldn't Find a Lighter
- Couldn't Find a Pen: Cutting yourself to draw or write stuff using your blood.
- Crafted from Animals
- Crappy Homemade Gift
- Cutlery Escape Aid
- Dynamite Candle
- Everything Is an Instrument
- Food Slap
- Gas-Cylinder Rocket
- Headgear Headstone
- Homemade Flamethrower
- Implausible Boarding Skills
- Improbable Weapon User: Someone uses an unorthodox object as a weapon.
- Improv
- Holding the Floor
- Line-of-Sight Alias: Making up an alias on the spot by looking around and forming a fake name based on the surroundings you observe.
- Throwing Out the Script
- Improvisational Ingenuity
- Heart Is an Awesome Power
- Indy Ploy: Making up a plan as you go along rather than having a plan ready.
- MacGyvering: Making devices and tools out of whatever you can find.
- Scavenged Punk
- Xanatos Speed Chess
- Plan B Resolution: The day is saved by Plan B, when they didn't think they needed it.
- Improvised Bandage
- Impromptu Fortress
- Improvised Imprisonment
- Improv Fu
- Improvised Armour
- Improvised Clothes: Making clothes out of whatever you can find.
- Bankruptcy Barrel: Wearing a barrel in lieu of clothes.
- Curtain Clothing: Making clothes from curtains.
- Eggshell Clothing: A hatched bird wears the eggshells as clothes.
- Garden Garment: Someone wears plants as clothes.
- Hand-or-Object Underwear: A naked person deliberately covers their shame by placing their hands over their private parts or holding objects over their private parts.
- Improvised Diaper: Using whatever can be found to diaper an infant when diapers aren't available.
- Modesty Bedsheet: A character wraps a sheet around their bodies to preserve their modesty.
- Modesty Towel: A character wraps a towel around their bodies if interrupted in the middle of bathing.
- Nemean Skinning: Skinning an animal so their hide can be used to make clothes.
- Seashell Bra: A woman wears seashells over her breasts.
- Skeletons in the Coat Closet
- Improvised Cross
- Improvised Golems
- Improvised Jet Pack
- Improvised Lightning Rod
- Improvised Lockpick
- Improvised Parachute: Using whatever can be used to slow down your descent and avoid a fatal plummet.
- Parachute Petticoat: A female character uses her skirt as a parachute.
- Parasol Parachute: Using an umbrella as a parachute.
- Improvised Platform
- Improvised Sail
- Improvised Scattershot
- Improvised Screwdriver
- Improvised Training
- Improvised Umbrella
- Improvised Weapon
- Abnormal Ammo: Using whatever can be found as projectiles.
- Ballistic Bone
- Edible Ammunition: Using food to fuel weaponry.
- Aerosol Flamethrower
- Anchors Away
- Art Attacker
- Bad with the Bone: Using a bone as a weapon.
- Ball Cannon
- Booze Flamethrower
- Boulder Bludgeon
- Broomstick Quarterstaff
- Cane Fu: Using a cane as a weapon.
- Chain Pain
- Chairman of the Brawl
- Clothing Combat
- Crowbar Combatant
- Deadly Disc
- Death Dealer
- Deus Ax Machina
- Door Fu
- Dung Fu
- Edible Bludgeon
- Fire Hose Cannon
- Fork Fencing
- Frying Pan of Doom: Beating people with a frying pan.
- Gardening-Variety Weapon
- Grievous Bottley Harm
- Grievous Harm with a Body
- Handbag of Hurt
- Hooks and Crooks
- I Know Madden Kombat
- Improvised Catapult
- Instrument of Murder
- Instant Chucks
- Jettison Jetpack Attack
- Killer Yoyo
- Lethal Letter Opener
- Molotov Cocktail
- Musical Assassin
- Nail 'Em
- Paper Fan of Doom
- Parasol of Pain
- The Pen Is Mightier
- Pipe Pain
- Pistol-Whipping
- Powerful Pick
- Rescue Equipment Attack
- Rings of Death
- Rod And Reel Repurposed
- Rolling Pin of Doom
- Shamu Fu: Using a fish as a weapon.
- Sheath Strike
- Shoe Slap
- Sinister Shiv
- Sock It to Them
- Solar-Powered Magnifying Glass
- Tae Kwon Door
- Telephone Polearm
- This Banana is Armed
- Throw the Book at Them
- 2xFore
- Use Your Head
- Weaponized Camera
- Weapons of Their Trade
- Wrench Whack
- Abnormal Ammo: Using whatever can be found as projectiles.
- Improvised Zipline
- Jar Potty: Relieving yourself in the first empty container you can find when you can't make it to a toilet in time.
- Last-Minute Baby Naming: Waiting until the baby is born to give them a name.
- Leaf Boat
- Mock Meal
- Money Slap
- Mundane Utility: A superpower or gadget is used for a mundane purpose.
- Martial Arts and Crafts
- Martial Arts for Mundane Purposes
- Power Perversion Potential: A superpower is used for a perverted purpose (e.g. using X-ray vision to look through people's clothes, using invisibility to get away with voyeurism).
- Power Profit Potential: A superpower is used to make money (e.g. using transmutation to turn things into gold, matter replication to make items to sell).
- Opportunistic Bastard
- Poor Man's Porn: A person is desperate enough for sexual release that they pleasure themselves to material that isn't intended as pornography but happens to contain at least remotely suggestive content. Alternatively, they have specific preferences that can't be found in conventional porn, so they make do with material that just happens to include stuff that involves their particular kink.
- Reed Snorkel
- Rip Tailoring
- Saw It in a Movie Once: Trying something just because you saw it done in a movie.
- Sewing Needle Sword: A very small character uses a sewing needle as an improvised sword.
- Stepping-Stone Sword: Scaling a wall by sticking bladed weapons into it and using them as platforms to ascend.
- Theme Park Landscape
- Time for Plan B
- Toilet Paper Substitute: A person using the bathroom doesn't have any toilet paper with them, so they resort to using something else to wipe themselves.
- Trampoline Tummy: Jumping on a person's stomach to use it as a trampoline.
- Unconventional Food Usage: Food is used for a purpose other than eating it.
- Underwear Flag: Using underwear (usually but not always someone else's) as a flag.
- Unintentional Backup Plan
- Vacuum Mouth
- Weaponized Ball
- Weapon Tombstone
- Within Arm's Reach: Being able to find a weapon during a brutal and near-fatal attack that you can use to fight back and win.
