Basic Trope: Monsters that eat other monsters.
- Straight: Necrophages are creatures that eat vampires.
- Exaggerated:
- There is also a monster that eat necrophages, and monster that eats that, and so on and so forth.
- Necrophages eat Planet Eaters.
- There's a creature that eats werewolves, another that eats vampires, another that eats zombies, etc etc etc.
- Downplayed:
- Necrophages parasitize vampires, but are only irritating.
- Necrophages are a vampire subspecies rather than being a separate one designed to eat vampires.
- Necrophages mostly fight vampires for territory but they will eat them if they slay one.
- Justified:
- Necrophages were artificially designed to hunt down and eat vampires.
- Necrophages serve the Balance Between Good and Evil... in the favor of good.
- Necrophages eat vampires because they're competitors for their other food source: humans. As such necrophages, despite being undead, have evolved to be able to digest vampire flesh and bones.
- Inverted:
- Subverted: There are rumours of a necrophage in the area, but it turns out to be just a particularly deformed and depraved vampire.
- Double Subverted: Who is promptly vivisected by an actual necrophage, which immediately chows down.
- Parodied: The necrophages are described to Krong the Conqueror. He thinks they sound delicious.
- Zig Zagged: Necrophages are known for eating vampires, but that's just because they're one of the few creatures strong enough to overpower them; necrophages are willing to eat basically anything that moves.
- Averted: Vampires are not eaten or suggested to be eaten by any weird species.
- Enforced: The writers had put themselves into a hole due to entering a Post-Script Season, and needed a new set of villains.
- Lampshaded: "Well damn. Call it karma."
- Implied: Vampires mention "the supreme predator of the dark" in hushed tones. It isn't clear if it is a myth, a very powerful monster hunter, a cannibal vampire, or there really is some other monster out there eating vampires.
- Invoked: A Hunter of His Own Kind becomes a necrophage in order to destroy his "kin" more efficiently.
- Exploited: A vampire hunter tames a necrophage so that it can be set loose on unsuspecting targets.
- Defied: "Vampires eating vampires? That’s stupid. The undead do not provide any nutrition."
- Discussed: "Please tell me you're not one of those vampire-eating abominations."
- Conversed: "You think they wouldn't care about humans, would you? I mean, it's not like wolves eat grass..."
- Deconstructed: It turns out that necrophages are extremely rare for fundamental trophic levels that make hunting other apex predators not a good strategy. They suffer not only Crippling Overspecialization of preying upon a much smaller population of vampires, but vampires are inherently risky for even them to hunt given their intelligence and ability to fight back. Even if they stand no chance of surviving they will almost certainly wound them.
- Reconstructed: Because vampires are inherently fewer in numbers than humans, necrophages have evolved into being able to hunt, eat and digest other undead such as ghouls and zombies but can also eat carrion in times of need and, unlike vampires, eating twice a year is enough for them. They're also incapable of reproduction, thus their numbers never grow much in comparison to other undead.
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