Web Animation / JoCat

"You're welcome."

Joseph Catalanetto, aka JoCat, is an animator, graphic designer, and illustrator whose primary output is on YouTube. He was part of HIJEK, and frequently collabs with Whimseyshrimp and Jet Man Jay while streaming; the channel was the primary output place for HIJEK prior to the 2010s. He was also a guest player on The Unexpectables in 2019 for their Tracadia Arc.

JoCat is most known for his comedic "guides" on Monster Hunter, Dungeons & Dragons, and Final Fantasy XIV called A Crap Guide, which are narrated by "JoCrap", a persona/original character of JoCat's. JoCrap is both Caustic Critic and a master of Accentuating the Negative... even if there's nothing negative to say. JoCrap teaches the player how to play the games, but does so in the most condescending way possible.

JoCat also streams on Twitch, and occasionally posts edited versions of certain streams on his main channel, initially called "J-Overly Edited", they're now referred to as "Stream Highlights". He also does "Character Creator Critique"s, in which he picks apart different character creators in various games, and he has a video essay on Klonoa 2. He has also ran two different tabletop campaigns set in a shared setting: Belkinus Necro Hunt and The Golden Cay, with a third one, Heart of Elynthi, currently running.

On December 18th, 2023, JoCat declared he was going on an indefinite hiatus due to sustained harassment.

His channel can be found here.

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Welcome to A Crap Guide to Tropes. *jaunty music plays*

• Added Alliterative Appeal:
  • In the Crap Guide to Barbarian, he describes the Barbarian's rage as "A Ferocious Frenzy of Force that Foes will Fear For all their Fannies".
  • JoCat also has a series titled "Character Creator Critique", where he... well, critiques video games' character creator options.
  • In the "Melee DPS" guide to Final Fantasy XIV, JoCrap starts the video with a long alliterative sentence about melee classes using multiple words that start with the letter "P". He eventually starts putting a lot of emphasis on each "P" sound, and by the end of the sentence, he's resorted to making spitting noises.
    JoCrap: And you bet your precious patoot the progress preventors will be promptly pounded, because this potent projector of pain will be peppering those peasties until your pack is paved with enough resulting pellets that every peddler will pray to be pampered by a more-palatable pacifist. (makes several "P"-like spitting sounds with his mouth)
• The All-Solving Hammer:
  • According to JoCrap, Wizards only need Fireballs, Warlocks are Eldritch Blast dispensers on legs, Paladins should just disregard spellcasting and SMITE! everything.
    Zee Bashew: (scoring a test) You answered "Fireball" for every question.
    JoCrap: What's your point, person within Fireball distance?
  • In Monster Hunter, Insect Glaive users obviously should avoid doing anything that isn't jumping like a spaz and spinning around in the air, because that's clearly the best way to contribute.
• Alter-Ego Acting: JoCat frequently makes it clear that his crass and aggressive JoCrap character is in fact a character, separate from JoCat's regular self. Occasionally in the D&D guides, he depicts both representations of himself as conflicting people.
• Amazon Chaser: He has a notable tendency to be interested in women fitting this, though he later clarified that he likes girls of all shapes and sizes.
• The Artifact: Even after A Crap Guide to Monster Hunter ended and the series started branching out into other games, JoCrap's look remained the same, decked out in ridiculous Hunter gear and worshiping his Sword and Shield. The only time it's ever changed is the Crap Guides to FFXIV, in which JoCrap's head is replaced with a Fat Chocobo mask for the in-game footage.
• Ascended Extra: JoCat's cute goblins first appeared back in the Crap Guide to Barbarian, before getting a verse in Races, later a dedicated episode, and eventually a series of animated shorts titled Gobboventures and their own real-life plush dolls.
• Armor-Piercing Question: Played for laughs in his generalised DPS guide when JoCrap asks, out of two samurai with equal raw damage, who does the most damage between the one who waits for the boss to come back into range and one who spams Enpi for one damage while it is out of range.
  JoCrap: Who is dealing more damage?
  Audience Member: It's just one dama-
  JoCrap: Who is dealing more damage?
  Audience Member: Not every situation is going to be that clo-
  JoCrap: WHO IS DEALING MORE DAMAGE?
• Author Appeal:
  • In the "Races" rap, he describes the tall, muscular Goliaths and Half-Orcs as the pinnacle of beauty.
  • Discussed in the video "So I Wanna Talk About How It Took Me 300 Hours To Like FFXIV". Hearing that there are more tall, muscular women in the game appeals to JoCat, but doesn't convince him. But once Jo hears that you can make your Player Character into a cat-boy, he's instantly sold.
• Awesome, but Impractical:
  • He summarizes the Charge Blade of Monster Hunter as this, being able to do a lot of stuff, but being so impractically complicated that his "explanation" of it is a completely unintelligible mess.
  • Also of Monster Hunter, on the Great Sword:
  "You're going to stand your ground like the Great Wall of China: mostly ineffective but too much of a visual marvel to be torn down."
• Bait-and-Switch Comment: In the Dungeon Master video, JoCrap asks (hypothetically) if one needs a vast amount of presentation — miniatures, costumes, mood lighting, etc. — in order to have a good session of D&D. He answers that of course you do, and you'd better fork over the money or else your game is going to suck.
• Big "SHUT UP!":
  • In the video on sword and shield in Monster Hunter, JoCrap says that sword and shield deals more damage than anything else. To prove this point, JoCrap shows a sword and shield with an attack of 99,999. When someone points out that JoCrap clearly edited that picture, JoCrap yells at them to shut up.
  • In "A Crap Guide to D&D: Dungeon Master", JoCrap gets fed up when none of his players will listen to him as the DM, so JoCrap rejects all of their actions and then kills them all by having the Big Bad drop a mountain on top of them. Matt Mercer shows up in the middle of this rage to tell JoCrap to listen to his players and calm down, but JoCrap just yells at Mercer that nobody cares.
• Big, Stupid Doodoo-Head: According to JoCrap, if you play a paladin without using a sword and shield, then "you're wrong and I hate you and you're a big smelly doodoo head".
• Bilingual Bonus: The Japanese in the Divination segment of A Crap Guide to D&D: Wizard, when put into Google Translate, translates to "I wrote this in Google Translate, so it may be wrong."
• Bittersweet Ending: His final public upload was the end of his campaign to support Gendered Intelligence, a transgender rights group, by clearing The Omega Protocol (Ultimate) in Final Fantasy XIV. JoCat and friends cleared the fight which was (at the time) the hardest content that XIV had to offer, taking 1,573 tries and over a year of attempts, starting in December 2022 and finally clearing it in January 2024. After the fight was over, JoCat got his weapon reward with an enormous crowd of supporters cheering for him. He ended the video by thanking the people who watched his content for being a positive impact in his life, but insisted he "need[ed] this step away" for a while. The last shot was during a presentation that JoCat gave at the LA Tech School of Design in March 2018, where someone suggested that he should make YouTube videos.
• Boring, but Practical:
  • Openly mocks the common "Human Fighter" phenomenon of D&D in A Crap Guide, calling it the most bland possible option. The "character" he dreams up for it is literally named "John Fighter-Man" whose description is The Generic Guy. However, JoCrap does this while also pointing out just how annoyingly good the class is, both in terms of combat and being insanely newbie-friendly.
  • In "A Crap Guide to DPS," two samurai can't attack the dragon after it goes out of melee range. One samurai is standing around waiting to get back in range while the second is using their weaker ranged attack. JoCat states that it may be Scratch Damage at best, but it's better than no damage at all.
• Breakout Character: In regards to the rest of HIJEK. Joseph hit one million subscribers in April 2022. Eric and Ian had yet to hit one thousand in that same timeframe, and Heather and Kate didn't have channels at all.
• Brick Joke:
  • Instead of the typical opening gag or overview, Crap Guide to Fighter begins with a verse of Musical Exposition to the tune of the Spider-Man theme. Instead of the usual outro, a second verse is sung.
  • In "A Crap Guide to D&D: Bard," JoCrap claims that if you don't follow every stereotype of the class, Matthew Mercer will jump through your window and throw foam noodles at you. When Matt Mercer cameos in the DM video, he's carrying a bunch of foam noodles in his arms, which JoCrap slaps out of Mercer's hands.
  • In "A Crap Guide to D&D: Dungeon Master", JoCrap as a DM tells one group bickering about an ambush plan "I'll give you 6 minutes and 44 seconds; if you don't come to an agreement on a plan I'm feeding your minis to the Wigglers." He hits his Rage Breaking Point exactly 6 minutes and 44 seconds after that line.
  • In "A Crap Guide to D&D: Sorcerer," JoCrap spins "The Wheel of Wild Magic" to demonstrate the random effects of the class's "Wild Magic Surge" ability, before leaving it because it wasn't stopping fast enough. It finally stops at the end of the video, turning JoCrap into a potted plant in the process.
  • In "A Crap Guide to D&D: Druid" JoCrap mentions how terrifying Druid gets later in the game and then a Fire-Breathing seagull with a minigun attached to its back with a scorpion tail appears on screen the same chimera appears later in the Alignment video when talking about Good/Evil alignments.
  • A subtle one — in the first edition of "A Crap Guide to D&D: Barbarian", JoCrap snarks at Intelligence being a Dump Stat, which is why his is "the number that comes after 3." In the revised edition of the video, this specific joke was cut, but gets referenced in an earlier line with JoCrap saying he's gained "a whopping one additional point in my Intelligence since [the first edition]", showing his stat rise from 4 to 5.
• Bunny-Ears Lawyer: JoCrap accurately knows D&D, Final Fantasy XIV, and Monster Hunter. He demonstrates this by giving some good advice about how to play a class effectively in videos on each respective game, despite all three games playing very differently from each other. It's just he makes weird metaphors and insults the viewer while he does it, frequently going off on tangents and implying that the viewer is a moron for not knowing everything he talks about already.
• Call-Back: In "A Crap Guide to D&D: Bard," JoCrap claims that if you don't follow every stereotype of the class, Matthew Mercer will jump through your window and throw foam noodles at you. When Matt Mercer cameos in the DM video, he's carrying a bunch of foam noodles, which JoCrap slaps out of Mercer's hands.
• The Cameo:
  • "A Crap Guide To D&D: Rogue" has Puffin Forest make a brief appearance questioning why JoCrap is acting like an Ineffectual Loner.
  • "A Crap Guide To D&D: Dungeon Master" features several other YouTubers as players at JoCrap's table. These include (in order of appearance) Takahata101, Connor McKinley, Gaijin Goombah, Chris Zito, and Monty Glu from The Unexpectables, Octopimp, Yaroshien, Brachyzoid, Boo Rad13y, Sir Malervik, Caitlinc37, Terrance Drye, Zee Bashew, Abserd, Felix Irnich, Dingo Doodles, Red and Blue from Overly Sarcastic Productions, Davvy Chappy, XP to Level 3, Tulok the Barbrarian, JessJackdaw, Reba Derps, Cami-Cat, Stuart from The Loading Crew, and Matthew Mercer from Critical Role.
  • In the Spooky Slice video, which is a full version of a Monster Mash parody that was used in "A Crap Guide to FFXIV: Melee DPS" for the Reaper class, the voice of Zenos was Luke Allen-Gale. Otherwise known as the actual english voice actor for Zenos.
• Canis Latinicus: JoCrap's villain in "A Crap Guide to DM" is named Evilus Maximus. Immediately lampshaded by Blue, who calls it "a bit too on the nose" and theorizes that JoCrap ripped of the Pope's title of Pontifex Maximus.
• Cargo Cult: JoCrap's religion could best be described as "aggressive Sword and Shield proselytizing."
• Cargo Ship: JoCat describes JoCrap's sexuality as S&S-Sexual, for Sword and Shield. At one point, JoCrap can be seen sleeping in the same bed as a sword and shield.invoked
• Cast Full of Gay: Two tweets by JoCat establish that a large amount of the characters in A Crap Guide to D&D are LGBT: Felicia (Bard) is pansexual, Sasha (Paladin) is a lesbian, Hutrax and John (Wizard and Fighter) are gay, Chad (Sorcerer) is transgender, Rogmesh (Ranger) is bisexual, Ricmo (Druid) is non-binary, and Busmic and Yathyra (Warlock and Monk) are asexual.
• Caustic Critic: JoCrap insults classes, races, playstyles, and basically everything associated with Dungeons & Dragons at some point. Unless it's about the sword and shield, which is flawless in every way. Instead, he's criticizing you for not using it.
• Character Alignment: Devoted a whole episode to explaining the differences between them. For instance, JoCrap uses the example of a Lawful character promising not to fuck your mom; a Lawful Good character will keep the promise because it's the right thing to do, a Lawful Neutral character will keep the promise because they keep their promises even at personal expense, and a Lawful Evil character will keep the promise but fuck your dad instead because you didn't say anything about them not fucking your dad.invoked
• Combat Medic: Pushes this playstyle for Healers in FFXIV because the basic design of the game means that everyone has to output some damage. If there's nobody to heal, you should be contributing to the fight by making it end faster, and helping to kill enemies means you're keeping the party alive by reducing sources of damage.
• Connected All Along: When the Elf Paladin is properly introduced after appearing in other A Crap Guide to D&D episodes, her name is stated to be "Sasha Stoutbough", revealing that she's related to earlier-profiled Elf character Gadiel Stoutbough the Cleric. A later behind-the-scenes video makes it clear that Sasha is Gadiel's older sister.
• Continuity Nod: During's JoCat's Let's Play of Hollow Knight, when asked about making more Crap Guides he responded with "No. I'm going to start a series where I make different sandwiches." On April Fool's Day of the next year, he posted a video of him eating a sandwich.
• Cool and Unusual Punishment:
  • In "Crap Guide to D&D: Character Sheet", JoCrap explains that if the player casts more spells in a day than they have spell slots, the DM is allowed to eat their dice.
  • In "Crap Guide to D&D: Ranger", JoCrap tries to get away with just saying "Just play a Fighter with a bow, it's way better!" After the intro theme, we see that JoCat erased JoCrap's arm to get him to do the video properly.
    JoCrap: Alright fine, I'll talk about the class.
• Couch Gag: Each time he finishes covering a specific topic in Crap Guides, an item representing it gets added to each subsequent intro.
• Crossover:
  • Zee Bashew makes a cameo in "A Crap Guide To D&D: Wizard". A later episode of the Animated Spellbook confirms that the cameo was canon to that series, as Bashew had to be revived from the Fireball JoCrap threw at him.
  • Has a massive one with assorted Art and D&D channels in "A Crap Guide to D&D [5th Edition] - Dungeon Master". Most notable among these cameos is Matt Mercer As Himself.
  • JoCrap featured heavily in one of NCHProductions's Monster Hunter: World animation shorts, having a complete mental breakdown over the Iceborne expansion indirectly nerfing his beloved Sword and Shield by expanding the ability to use the Slinger without sheathing the weapon first to all weapon types.
• Dark and Troubled Past: Crap Guide to Rogue starts off with the Rogue's recounting of his, and is lampshaded by the person listening.
• Dissimile: According to JoCrap, the Wizard is the most powerful class, as long as you ignore any other classes that are stronger. Which are all of them.
• Dynamic Entry: The A Crap Guide To D&D - Monk episode begins with JoCrap pulling one of these on JoCat. As JoCat sits at his desk while drawing on a tablet, JoCrap enters with a flying kick that knocks JoCat out of his chair.
• Early-Installment Weirdness: JoCrap's character in the Monster Hunter Crap Guides was less loud and a little more abrasive, constantly making jabs at how most weapons made you like anime protagonists where later Crap Guides would embrace this. As well, his character was less muscular than his later takes.
• Easter Egg: A still of JoCrap shrugging (deemed the "JoShrug") shows up in every Crap Guide to D&D video.
• Earn Your Fun: Discussed in the video "So I Wanna Talk About How It Took Me 300 Hours To Like FFXIV". The gist of the video is not that it takes three hundred hours to get good at the game, but that JoCat realized that he was intentionally making the experience worse for himself by skipping cutscenes, doing only sidequests, and generally not wanting to interact with the world of the game. Once he started exploring Eorzea more diligently, he got much better owing to being more emotionally invested.
• Evolving Credits: The openings of A Crap Guide episodes do this.
  • Monster Hunter slowly piles up every weapon in the game around the campfire.
  • Dungeons and Dragons has small figurines or some other objects to represent topics that JoCrap has already covered. At the end of each episode, a figurine is added on that video's subject. "Goblins" adds a shelf with a goblin plushie, "Alignments" an alignment chart nailed to the wall, and Character Sheets a character sheet next to the Goblin plushie. "Dungeon Master" didn't feature anything new, but it instead had all of the figures turned towards JoCrap.
  • Final Fantasy had items related to the classes appear near JoCrap, such as a shield resting against a tree after discussing the "tank" classes.
• Extreme Omnisexual: Present and accounted for in the "Bard" video, though humorously throughout the A Crap Guide series, the Bard only ever has eyes for and actively pursues the Paladin.
• Freeze-Frame Bonus:
  • During the Bard episode of A Crap Guide to D&D, when Matthew Mercer is throwing pool noodles at the unnamed player, pausing on the very last frame of the scene will result in being treated to this disclaimer:
    Disclaimer: Matt Mercer will not actually throw foam noodles at you for not playing a stereotypical D&D character because he doesn't judge the way you have fun and is genuinely a swell guy. He may throw foam noodles at you for other reasons however so you should still watch your back.
  • During the Wizard episode of A Crap Guide to D&D pausing on the line "Mr-I-actually-believe-wizard-memes-are-as-funny-in-the-game-as-they-are-on-social-media" shows a wall of text calling out a Facebook group who had been sharing his videos without crediting him properly. As revealed in a later stream, the group were eventually shut down.
  • The last frame of the Character Sheet episode is a picture of Jo looking down at his computer, being vastly overshadowed by his wackier online persona.
  • In "A Crap Guide to D&D: Dungeon Master", JoCrap rolls his d20 before he apologizes for losing his temper. A zoom-in to the dice shows that he got a nat 20, which explains why his apology is accepted.
• Full-Frontal Assault: Mentioned in both the 'Crap Guide to Barbarians' and 'Crap Guide to Monks', with the Monk being drawn Toplessness from the Back and her opponents being uncomfortable and wondering if they should hit the naked Dragonborn woman or not.
• Fun with Acronyms: Introduced in A Crap Guide to Final Fantasy - DPS and mentioned again in the Melee DPS video, JoCrap insists that all players of the game learn their ABCs, Always Be Casting, to optimize their gameplay.
• Funny Background Event:
  • Throughout the intros and outros to the D&D Crap Guides, JoCrap sits at a table with an increasing amount of figurines of characters based on the classes he covered. Through this, we end up getting an amusing subplot between Felicia (the tiefling bard) and Sasha (the elf paladin) that otherwise avoids any attention:
    • In "Crap Guide to Paladin", as Sasha is first introduced, an image of Felicia fawning over her gradually slides in. Once Sasha is placed on the table, Felicia (placed on the other end of it) can be seen with heart eyes pointed towards her direction.
    • In "Crap Guide to Ranger", Felicia's figure is suddenly placed next to Sasha in the intro. In the outro, Felicia is tipped over and placed directly under Sasha.
    • In "Crap Guide to Warlock", a very brief shot during the Eldritch Blast montage shows that the two got married (and then consequently hit with Eldritch Blast).
    • Finally, in "Crap Guide to Dungeon Master", they're holding hands in the intro.
  • Red and Blue from Overly Sarcastic Productions make a cameo in the Crap Guide to being a Dungeon Master. While Blue is talking, Red is playing with action figures of Matrix and Megabyte from ReBoot, making them fight each other.
• Fun With Blenders: In "A Crap Guide to Healers," made before the Endwalker expansion of Final Fantasy XIV went live, JoCrap jokes that Sage nouliths are made by tossing carbuncles into a blender.
  "Rest in peace, Carby."
  • Somewhat substantiated after EW's release, when Alphinaud said the following after his class change: "If I intend to master these sage's armaments, that will mean learning to imbue them with the same aether that I poured into Moonstone and Obsidian. […] For me, it will help to think of the nouliths as allies in battle—simply a new form of the energy which went into manifesting my Carbuncle companions." This prompted the appropriate reaction from JoCat on stream: [1]
• Gender Flip: JoCat has made several drawings of a genderbent version of his avatar named JoCatherine. He also later did a larger picture of several genderbent D&D YouTubers playing together, including JessJackdaw (who later came out as trans, making him a subversion), Puffin Forest, the Animated Spellbook and Dingo Doodles.
• The Generic Guy: Exaggerated for the Fighter: He's named John Fighter-Man, is a human, uses a sword, has almost no personality, etc. He was given a bit of development when Jo made Pride Month drawings revealing him as gay and showing him in a relationship with Hutrax, the wizard.
• Grand Finale:
  • "A Crap Guide to Monster Hunter: Sword and Shield" is the last video on Monster Hunter weapons. JoCrap spends the entire time driving a Bias Steamroller, talking about how the sword-and-shield combo is the best weapon in the game and you should never use anything else. This includes making wildly untrue claims about it, including that it has an attack power of 99,999 (which JoCrap edited into the footage).
  • "A Crap Guide to D&D: Dungeon Master" is presented as the last episode in the series for D&D videos. While still funny and silly, it takes a somber tone towards the end, along with JoCat offering his thanks to everyone who liked the series.
• Gratuitous Japanese: In a Crap Guide to Ranged DPS, JoCrap is interrupted by someone with a southern accent and barely has enough time to gasp, "Masaka...!" before being shot.
• HA HA HA—No: In his Crap Guide for Healers, he tells the viewer that even as a healer in Final Fantasy XIV, they still have to do as much damage as they do healing. A virgin healer whines that it's called a healer and that's all they're supposed to do.
  Virgin "Healer": Meh, it's called a healer, and healers are supposed to heal, right?
  JoCat: Ha ha ha ha ha ha. WRONG.
• Heel Realization: JoCrap has one in the DM video when he realizes that he was wrong to scream at his players and invoke Rocks Fall, Everyone Dies. He even owns up to the fact that he just wants the game to go well.
• Hypocritical Humor:
  • In A Crap Guide to D&D: Dungeon Master, JoCrap tells Red and Blue to stop comparing his totally original campaign to tropes and historical events, or he'll sic the Light-grey Walkers on them.
  • In A Crap Guide to D&D: Cleric, he claims that anyone who considers the Cleric a designated healer either never played the game or think sword and shield is a viable weapon in Monster Hunter... before realizing that's exactly what he does.
• Immediate Self-Contradiction:
  • In the Crap Guide to Rangers, after explaining that they don't actually need to use a "ranged weapon", JoCrap then proceeds to discuss the class' exclusive abilities, all of which are described as powerful and based on ranged arrows. This gets rhetorically pointed out:
    Person: But Joseph, you said you don't need to use a ranged weapon to be effective as a ranger! Those all sound like ranged weapon-exclusive spells!
    JoCrap: That may be true, however... (long Beat as he realizes his mistake) ...anyways...
  • In his first Baldur's Gate III stream, a Mind Flayer calls him thrall and gives him orders.
    JoCat: I am no...
    [mouses over the Mind Flayer to see that it's level 6]
    JoCat: I am a thrall, nevermind.
• Infantilization Retaliation: A Crap Guide to D&D [5th Edition] - Goblins ends with JoCrap poking the gobbo while cooing at him and getting bitten, then attacked, for his troubles.
  JoCrap: ...an innocent little cutie pie that was just minding its own business and just wanted a widdle bit of love. ^3^ Isn't that right, you sweety potato- ^3^ (gets bit) OW SON OF A BITCH
• In Touch with His Feminine Side: JoCat's avatar usually has a yellow bow in his hair, and he's also very emotional and open with his personality. He also once did an entire stream where he showed off several girly outfits, including dresses and traditionally feminine clothing.
• It Makes Sense in Context: Whenever he ends a stream, he pings everyone in the HIJEK server, attaching an in-joke from said stream.
• Jerkass Has a Point: Downplayed. While JoCrap invoking Rocks Fall, Everyone Dies on his players in the Crap Guide to Dungeon Master video was uncalled for, many of the players weren't listening to him, weren't picking up on his story-beats (or even deliberately ignored them), or were trying to get him to allow them to powergame, so at least some of his anger is justified. JoCat admits as much to JoCrap that he may have a point about being angry, but then wonders if JoCrap has ever thought about the game that the players want to play instead of trying to railroad them.
• Knightly Sword and Shield: The weapon for JoCrap, to the point where JoCrap believes that a paladin who doesn't use a sword and shield is "a big smelly doodoo head". In a separate video, JoCrap is seen sleeping in bed with a sword and shield. He also spends the last Monster Hunter video on the sword and shield, where he gives it endless praise. Finally, the reason he says that the Paladin is the best tank class in Final Fantasy XIV is because it can use a sword and shield. invoked
• Later-Installment Weirdness: Starting with the end of "So I Wanna Talk About How It Took Me 300 Hours To Like FFXIV", JoCat's normal avatar is changed to add cat ears and a cute yellow bow on his left ear, mimicking his FFXIV character Victor Quibbles.
• Limerick: Crap Guide to Cleric begins with two, and Races uses the rhyme scheme for a few verses.
• Lost Episode: Several 5e D&D classes all had Crap Guide entries that were re-done for different reasons.
  • Barbarian was re-done because it was "poopy-doopy", and made a lot of mistakes in how the class works. Interestingly, the original Barbarian video is still up; the rest have been hidden or taken down.
  • Cleric was re-done because JoCat made a number of untrue assumptions about the power of the class, basically assuming they were like healers in MMOs and not the divine spellcasting nightmares they actually are and have been since 3rd Edition. JoCat corrected it by having JoCrap point out how wildly overpowered that Clerics can get. In the updated Cleric video's intro, JoCrap says that "some say they're not strong, and those people are wrong" while punching JoCat repeatedly in the face.
  • Warlock was redone because it was "weak and unfulfilling".
• Low-Tier Letdowninvoked: JoCrap describes rangers as low-tier scrappies in D&D, painting them as someone who is a blend of a fighter, druid, and rogue, but without any of the effectiveness of those classes and balanced around overly specific conditions.
• Master of All:
  • JoCrap paints 5e Bards this way, saying that they can do anything well and that you should never need to play anything else.
  • JoCrap loves the sword and shield combination, saying that one should never need to use anything else in either Monster Hunter or Dungeons & Dragons. However, he shows clear favoritism for the weapon pairing by editing pictures and making wildly untrue claims about it.
• Mean Character, Nice Actor: JoCat is nothing like JoCrap. Whereas JoCrap is a Caustic Critic who is loud and brash, JoCat is soft-spoken, rather kind, and cordial when he plays or livestreams a game. Perhaps best exemplified at the beginning of the episode on Character Alignment, in which JoCat goes out of his way to point out the disclaimer at the beginning of the video that his videos are all in good fun. (Though it's also because the topic of alignment is Flame Bait among longtime D&D players.)invoked
• Meaningful Name: Averted for most of the Crap Guide characters, who have names you'd expect from D&D characters. However, the Fighter is named John Fighterman, highlighting the generic nature of the class, and the Monk is named Yathyra Kixit (pronounced "kicks it", one of her methods of dealing with problems).
• Memetic Badass: invokedJoCrap will never let you down when it comes to endlessly praising the Sword and Shield as the mightiest, most broken weapon in the game. Never mind those internet tier lists or obviously edited stat screens. It is the best and can do everything.^note S&S is Monster Hunter's noob-friendly Jack of All Stats weapon. It really can do everything, it's just not nearly as good at specifics as the rest of the roster's more specialized weapons.
• Mix-and-Match Weapon: The dual-wield chainsaw shotgun laser earrings with detachable missile launchers and drink dispensers.^note Ooh and they have built-in cup holders, look at that.
• Motor Mouth: JoCrap talks very very fast. He even lampshades it at one point, saying that he invented talking really fast on YouTube. Those other shows like Zero Punctuation are lies.
• Musical Episode:
  • The video on the many races of D&D is done entirely as a rap.
  • Briefly lapsed into in the Crap Guide to Wizards, where he quickly summarizes the various Schools of Magic.
• Musical Gag: The updated Barbarian video has a heavy metal riff playing in the background whenever the Barbarian goes into their Rage status. The same metal riff plays over the ending card, with JoCrap's head wiggling twice as fast as normal to make it appear as if he's headbanging to the song.
• Naked People Are Funny/Signature Headgear: Jocat's animation avatar in a stripped-down Monster Hunter in a Wriggler mask. In-game in the Final Fantasy XIV Guides, he uses a similarly-stripped Hyur in a Chocobo mask.
• Official Couple: In celebration of pride month, JoCat made a bunch of drawings of the Crap Guide characters with their lovers: Chad Magical (Sorcerer) and Rogmesh Wildhorn (Ranger); Felicia Gritasto (Bard) and Sasha Stoutbough (Paladin) and finally John Fighterman (guess) and Hutrax (Wizard).
• Off the Rails: JoCrap's demonstration of a Dungeon Master's role quickly goes off the rails when his players either ignore him, go bother some random NPC, complain about his worldbuilding, or just one-shot the Big Bad.
• Once per Episode: Every single D&D episode uses the exact same picture of JoCrap shrugging at some point.
• Only Sane Man: Matthew Mercer tells JoCrap that the best thing to do when he's having problems as a DM is to talk to the players. JoCrap ignores this advice, saying that "nobody cares".
• O.O.C. Is Serious Business: In "A Crap Guide to D&D: Dungeon Master", he says his Signing-Off Catchphrase of "you're welcome!" as always, but the tone is quite angry. The main theme starts to play, but it's much slower and somber. JoCrap then drops the Caustic Critic attitude and says he's sorry to his players, even admitting how his "aggressive" attitude is because he just wants to run the best campaign he can and make the game as fun as possible. This causes all the players to give JoCrap another chance and return to the table after seeing JoCrap's attitude change.
• Our Goblins Are Different: Discussed in the Crap Guide to Goblins. While JoCrap admits you could just use them as Cannon Fodder or Surprisingly Elite Cannon Fodder, you can customize goblins beyond that as dangerous menaces, adorable little scamps, or oddly sexy monster girls that make you question if you have a new fetish or if it was there all along.
• Overshadowed by Awesome: In the "Magic DPS" video, Black Mage is portrayed as this compared to the other magical DPS jobs in Final Fantasy XIV. Summoner can summon smaller copies of Primals that can deal damage but can also heal while Red Mage trades larger damaging spells for physical attacks and an instant cast which would allow you to resurrect your fallen allies in a jiff. All of this is compared to Black Mage, who is a gas-guzzler who can only really get the most of its damage while standing still in leylines while guzzling down Ethers to restore you MP.
  JoCrap: Suck it, Black Mage!
• Painful Rhyme: In the video on character sheets, JoCrap says initiative is when your DM says "clickity clackity, you're about to get attackity". In the same video, on the subject of spellcasting, JoCrap says "sit the shit back dit, ya git" while he explains how spells work.
• Parody Assistance:
  • Matthew Mercer appeared in JoCrap's video on Dungeon Masters, as the Dungeon Master of Critical Role. Mercer tells JoCrap that he needs to talk to his players, but JoCrap tells Mercer that "nobody cares" and ignores him.
  • His video on "The Spooky Slice", a parody of "The Monster Mash", features a line from Zenos of Final Fantasy XIV. Said line is voiced by Luke Allen-Gale, the English voice actor for Zenos in the game.
• Planet of Hats: Has a bit of a beef with it, joking in the Bard video that playing a D&D class makes you contractually obligated to make your character as stereotypical as possible (hence his bard being a flirty comic relief) and in "Races" that you really shouldn't think about making your character "fit" their race too much.
• Pint-Sized Powerhouse: Debbie Sprucenails, the character representing Barbarians in D&D, is a dwarf girl and depicted as the most violent and aggressive of all the classes.
• Pull a Rabbit out of My Hat: In "A Crap Guide to Magic DPS", JoCrap performs the classic magic trick for the audience, though takes it a step further by not just pulling a rabbit out of a hat, but a loporrit.
• Punctuated Pounding: In a Crap Guide to Ranged DPS, as JoCrap begins talking about the Dancer, he starts slapping a random person in the face when he talks about wanting something that, "lives [slap] up [slap] to your [slap] standards [slap]!"
• Queer Colors: Chad Magical (Sorcerer) is transgender, and his outfit consist entirely of the colors pink, blue, and white, which are the colors of the transgender pride flag.
• Rage Against the Author:
  • In the Crap Guide to Monk, JoCat is assaulted from behind by JoCrap with a flying kick for taking too long to start the video.
  • Inverted in the Crap Guide to Dungeon Master. After JoCrap causes a Rocks Fall, Everyone Dies scenario on his players, the players all leave the table because they're fed up with him. JoCat then enters the scene to tell JoCrap that the players are just as much a part of the experience as the DM.
• Rage Breaking Point: In "A Crap Guide to D&D: Dungeon Master", JoCrap gets fed up when none of his players will listen to him as the DM, so JoCrap rejects all of their actions and then kills them all by having the Big Bad drop a mountain on top of them. Matt Mercer shows up in the middle of this rage to tell JoCrap to listen to his players and calm down, but JoCrap just tells Mercer to shut up.
• Random Effect Spell: A portion of the Crap Guide to Sorcerers is devoted to exploring D&D's Wild Magic, depicted as a wheel of spells which ends up going for a while after JoCrap spins it too hard. By the episode's end, the wheel finally stops and turns him into a potted plant. (Which is indeed a real potential outcome of Wild Magic in 5e). The episode ends with the still-planted JoCrap just staring at the screen instead of moving his head.
• Ridiculously Average Guy: The Fighter character is "John Fighterman", a middle-aged, grizzled white human man. The "Fighter" episode also pokes fun at the fact that the class is a generic fantasy hero.
• Rocks Fall, Everyone Dies: In "A Crap Guide to D&D: Dungeon Master", JoCrap gets fed up when none of his players will listen to him as the DM, so JoCrap rejects all of their actions and then kills them all by having the Big Bad drop a mountain on top of them. This causes all of his players to leave the table.
• Rule Zero: Played for Drama. After JoCrap causes a Rocks Fall, Everyone Dies scenario on his players in "A Crap Guide to D&D: Dungeon Master", the players all leave the table. JoCat then enters the scene to tell JoCrap that the players are just as much a part of the experience as a DM, and that if you ignore what your players want as the DM, the game won't be any fun.
• Running Gag:
  • The Bard's evolving relationship with the Paladin.
  • Praising the Knightly Sword and Shield as the only real weapon anyone should ever use.
  • Fireball being the only spell a Wizard should ever cast.
• Screw This, I'm Outta Here: In "A Crap Guide to D&D: Dungeon Master", JoCrap yells at all of his players and invokes Rocks Fall, Everyone Dies. After he's done ranting, everyone else is silent for a beat, then walks away from the table while talking amongst themselves about how bad JoCrap is as a DM.
• Self-Deprecation: Describes his entire YouTube page in a color-coded section of groups of pointing out his content isn't exactly original... while stating everything he's ever done is original.
• Sentimental Drunk: In Drunk Mario Party, JoCat turns into one of these when he's hammered, repeatedly talking about how much he loves his viewers and crying about his past mistakes in a drunken stupor.
• Sexy Dimorphism: JoCat has this as his Pet-Peeve Trope, as it's often a negative point on Character Creator Critique videos.invoked
• Shout-Out:
  • The Fighter video starts and ends with a variation of the iconic Spider-Man (1967) theme, then mocks people who play as human fighters instead of Kobold Paladins who pray to asteroids before they they crush an unfortunate man's cabbage cart.
  • In the Druid video, JoCrap calls a bear "Yogi", and says that pretending to be a bear is the perfect comeback for a bear, because "they'll never see it coming", complete with a replica of Joker's Phantom Thief mask.
  • In the Wizard video, JoCrap says that you should use Fireball and only Fireball. He then starts repeating "Just Fireball," taking on the appearance of Monika from Doki Doki Literature Club!, complete with a "Just Fireball" text box in the style of that game's text.
  • The Wizard video also features Alphys from Undertale, waving her arms while explaining things to the Wizard.
  • The song that plays out the Wizard video has Aang putting Sokka through pain, Spider-Man's Spider-Sense, the Memetic Mutation Bowsette, one of the Exodia cards and Dickbutt.
  • The Artificer video features Al in a picture beside the goblin character. Later, explaining the Alchemist subclass, he invokes the infamous image of Nina and her dog.
  • In the Alignment video, JoCrap calls himself "such a Slytherin" for being so cunning.
  • In the Character Sheet video, he refers to the stat box as "this Tower of Pimps"
  • "A Crap Guide to Wizard" has a Virgin vs. Chad comparison of the Virgin Wizard to the Chad Sorcerer, and Character Sheets of the Virgin Alignment to the Chad Personality Traits.
  • In the Crap Guide to Tanks in Final Fantasy XIV, JoCrap chastises the viewer by saying "That's what I thought you'd say, ya dumb fuckin' horse!"
  • JoCrap describes the Dark Knight in Final Fantasy XIV as "being able to do your best Guts impersonation".
  • Earlier in the episode, he asks the viewer if they know how to "find a static in their FC to prog uwu"^note finding a dedicated team in their Free Company to progress through the Ultima Weapon Ultimate boss fight, the word "static" is punctuated by a drawing of the superhero.
  • In the "Melee DPS" video for Final Fantasy XIV, JoCrap encourages anyone playing as a Reaper to "do the Spooky Slice", set to the tune of "Monster Mash" by Bobby "Boris" Pickett and the Crypt-Kickers.
    • The same video, the Ninja is showcased by the character Tac from the Kirby games. As well, the attacks "Fuma Shuriken", "Katon", "Hyoton", "Huton" as "tmnt", "Lina Inverse", "ice age" and "flash".
  • In the "Ranged DPS" video for Final Fantasy XIV, the Bard song buffs are represented by various anime theme songs: "Tank!", "Database", "Butterfly", "Bloody Stream" and "99".
  • In the "Magical DPS" video, JoCrap sings the various abilities of the Blue Mage to the tune of "Yakko's World." Also in the video, when talking about bosses not moving out of his obvious cast circle, considering it to be like throwing stones in a glass house, it's drawn like a skit from Zero Punctuation.
• Signing-Off Catchphrase: At the end of each Crap Guide video, JoCrap says "And now you know how to (do something related to a game). You're welcome." This is followed by the same jaunty music from the intro.
• Sitcom Arch-Nemesis: Bashew from the Animated Spellbook has beef with JoCrap after Jo burned down Bashew's sanctum in the Crap Guide to Wizard. And then burned down his backup sanctum in Luskan. Bashew takes any chance he has to crap on JoCrap in his videos.
• Stone Wall: Discussed in the Final Fantasy XIV videos on tank classes. JoCrap says that the best way to play a tank is to stand still and never move, to the point that the rest of the party should spend most of their fights staring at the monster's ass.
• Suddenly Shouting: In A Crap Guide to the Paladin, JoCrap starts the video with a poem that ends with a lot more oomph.
  Do you want to tank? Do you want to fight?
  Do you want a class that will instill fright?
  Take up some plate and keep the goblins in sight
  'Cause you want to make sure they catch this Paladin SMITE!
• Take That!:
  • JoCrap describes D&D as "Everybody breaking the rules more than an episode of Yu-Gi-Oh!."
  • He once described JoJo's Bizarre Adventure: Stardust Crusaders as "that silly anime nobody likes".
  • JoCrap says that being a good DM is about applying information instead of memorizing information, "unlike the American education system".
• Terrible Pick-Up Lines: To illustrate the Wizard's generally lacking charisma, Hutrax is shown very awkwardly flirting with John Fighterman, most likely delivering one of these. This being John Fighterman, he doesn't seem to pick up on it.
• This Is for Emphasis, Bitch!: At the end of his Final Fantasy XIV - Tanks video, while casting "Passage of Arms" as a Paladin.
  JoCrap: Try and get behind this wall of holiness, bitch!
• Toilet Humor:
  • Invoked in Crap Guide to Monk, thanks to a Bilingual Bonus and "not knowing how to make the ki section funnier", he translates "ki" as "poop".
  • In the Crap Guide to Dungeon Master, JoCrap says that if you're the DM and somebody farts, you have to describe the smell.
• Too Awesome to Use: Defied in "A Crap Guide to DPS." JoCat tells viewers that OGCDs (off-global cooldowns) should never be held for this reason, since they'll come back quickly by the time you need them again.
  "So use your goddamn free damage buttons. IT'S FREE DAMAGE!"
• Totem Pole Trench: In A Crap Guide to Final Fantasy XIV - Tanks, JoCrap describes the Gunbreaker as "three DPS in a trenchcoat", showcased by the symbols of two Machinists and a Samurai overlaying the figure.
• To the Tune of...: In his Crap Guide for Healers, he does a song to the tune of "Drunken Sailor" when describing what healers should do when the party is at full health.
  What do you do when your party's full health? (x2)
  Or even halfway up and standing?
  DPS THE BAD GUYS!
  No I don't pay your sub...
  But when the fight takes too long it starts to rub
  All up on everybody's nerves
  and when you hit endgame it serves you right
  when the boss will wipe the party
  'cause you couldn't beat enrage
• Underestimating Badassery: JoCrap highlights how Clerics (at least in 5e) are much more versatile (and arguably game-breaking) than their reputation as designated healers implies.^note As detailed in Lost Episode, this is something Jo himself was guilty of while he made the first version of the episode, with the present version being made after he realized his mistake.
• The Unfavorite: The Blue Mage is described as this in A Crap Guide to Magic DPS due to being a "Limited Job" that can't join parties for relevant content due to its unique Power Copying gimmick. JoCrap describes the Blue Mage as "the youngest who went down a weird career path and isn't invited to family outings."
• Unfortunate Implications: Discussed. JoCrap remarks how unintentionally traumatic it is for Summoners to create avatars of the Primals for their attacks, the same monsters that have killed thousands of people over the years and one of which nearly destroyed the entire world.
• The Unintelligible: In his Crap Guide to Charge Blade, JoCrap layers multiple recordings of himself speaking in an attempt to cover all of the complex weapon's ins and outs. This, combined with the slightly accelerated pace at which he speaks, makes it almost impossible to make sense of what he is saying (aside from when he says "So Tasty" and "WHERE'S MY DRAGONATOR?" louder than the other recordings). ^note  The first two layers are legitimate guides, the third was an addressing of some controversy on his Switch Axe video, and the fourth was him reading off the "Gorilla warfare" copypasta
• Video Game Cruelty Potential: In his "A Crap Guide to Healers" video, he shows this off by having his white mage "Rescue" another white mage into the pit of death in Suzaku's arena.
• Wall of Blather: In the Crap Guide to Dungeon Master, the DM starts spouting off a long list of exposition, which causes the characters to get annoyed. Reading some of this blather shows it's part of the script to Bee Movie.
• Wholesome Crossdresser: JoCat (or his collaborators) frequently draws himself in dresses and/or with a bow in his hair. JoCrap is slightly less wholesome, but he can still rock drag.
• Will They or Won't They?: Throughout the Crap Guide to D&D, the Bard and the Paladin are often shown flirting with each other to mixed success, and almost have a moment where they finally tie the knot. That is, if the Warlock didn't hit Eldritch Blast in the middle of their ceremony.
• You All Meet in an Inn: He made the animatic for Runesmith's The Seekers Guide To Twisted Taverns, where new options for meeting at an inn are presented. In the video, the presented options are a tavern on a train, a tavern that's underwater, and a tavern populated by friendly ghosts and spirits (including a ghostly band to help bards give a good performance).

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"And now you know how to play a troper. You're welcome."
*jaunty music plays*

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