Question about: Dungeonmasters Girlfriend

This is currently defined as the RPG trope, "the player whose character is getting special treatment because of Real Life circumstances." But I know for a long time it was the more general "non-geek in a group of geeks".

Where did that trope go and why was DMG split from it? I suspect it might have become Nerd Nanny, but Nerd Nanny isn't the same trope. NN is "hot chick in a group of geeks". DMG doesn't (didn't) have to be female, or hot, but unlike Nerd Nanny must not be a geek herself.

I've been watching the trope for at about a year and in that time it's been the trope it is now. I'm not sure how or when it changed, but the current trope is what the term means outside of TV Tropes and the only definition I've ever heard for it.

Wayback Machine's earliest version, from April 24, 2009, is what Black Humor remembers. It stayed that at least until the most recent capture, November 8th, 2010.

Nerd Nanny was YKTTW'd in June of 2010, and does not appear to have anything to do with Dungeonmaster's Girlfriend — it's not even mentioned in the YKTTW.

edited 27th May '11 7:04:57 PM by Madrugada

I do know that Black Humour's version is not the definition that I've heard outside of TV tropes. It's not the traditional definition attached to the name. I'm not sure how or why it changed though.

It does appear that it wasn't a big change when it happened though. It was likely someone well meaning who was attempting to bring the trope on the wiki closer to how it's used outside of the wiki.

EDIT: It looks like Fast Eddie did it, probably for the reasons stated above. It's a pre-existing term that means something other than it had been defined as.

edited 27th May '11 7:32:49 PM by shimaspawn

Is there any reason why the original definition vanished altogether, as opposed to a Trope Transplant?

Tag fixed. Mod may want to edit name of thread.

Probably because the term had shifted father and farther from what it's used as in the outside world over the years. I'm sure that when Eddie changed it he thought he was just reverting it back to it's original definition, and he might have been. The Wayback Machine doesn't show us past a certain point.

@shimas: While Eddie may have been well intentioned, he certainly wasn't shifting it back to its original definition; I remember it was defined like that for over a year.

The Wayback Machine bears this out; according to it, DMG had its original definition for all 5 captures it has on record, from April 24th 2009 to November 8th 2010.

No, he's shifting it back to the term's original definition. Not what the site had it as. Everywhere else on the internet, the trope is how it's defined now.

This is another case of a term with a well-established pre-wiki meaning being used for something else unrelated on the wiki. Heck, before there were RP Gs and Dungeonmaster's Girlfriends, there was theatre, and the Director's Girlfriend /Producer's Girlfriend meant exactly the same thing there: an actress who is given a role or special treatment simply because if she doesn't get a part, the director or producer won't get any nookie.

Favoritism because she is doing the Horizontal Rumba with the boss is one of those Older Than Dirt things I am really surprised we don't have a broader trope on that. (This would be a specific subtrope of that with specific methods, lampshading and so on.)

edited 28th May '11 9:32:35 AM by Raso

So, is there any reason not to try and recreate the original TV Tropes definition as something like Normal Guy Among Geeks?

If not, I'll take that to YKTTW. Any other problems with this trope?

Well that's mostly Nerd Nanny. Its written as girl specific but it probably shouldn't be as there are genderflipped examples present.

I said in my OP that it is definitely not Nerd Nanny. Nerd Nanny is "hot girl in a group of geeks", not "non-geek in a group of geeks". A Nerd Nanny might be a geek herself, but must be attractive and female (or, at least, the opposite sex of the geeks; you could only have a male Nerd Nanny in an Estrogen Brigade). A DMG does not have to be either attractive or female but must not be a geek herself.

Let me use Genshiken as an example. Saki and Ohno are both Nerd Nannies, but only Saki is a Dungeonmaster's Girlfriend because Ohno is a geek herself.

That doesn't really fit the term Nerd Nanny though as those are specifically be the Nerd's nanny as in pull them back down to earth when things get too Technobabblely, they have to be Closer to Earth. Nanny = Caretaker. (which is actually a semi-genderneutral term.)

Just a Female Nerd (or Hot Female Nerd) in a group of guy nerds is something different.

There are actually 3 Genshiken potential examples that could be Dungeonmaster's Girlfriend if they actually played a game like what the page covers and invoked the "let me win because I give you B Js" card. Kousaka does not give an inch in video games to anyone even Saki his girlfirend even when she tries to invoke the card he still kicks her ass (he says he does go easy but he is just that good). Others though do go easy in general out of politeness which would be an inversion?.

edited 28th May '11 3:43:57 PM by Raso

Did you not want the tag on the page?

You mean, by linking to the redirect instead of the ptitle? ( assume that's what it is because now the thread title is showing a ptitle and I know I linked to the redirect originally.

The reason I did that is I find ptitles really annoying to link to, and didn't know by not linking to it directly it wouldn't show the tag.

It's linked now. Can we get back to discussing the trope?

Since there were only three wicks, I went ahead and moved the article off the ptitle. Was the "normal amongst geeks" trope ever YKTTWed?

Does anybody know?

I don't know.

I did a search and couldn't find it, aside from the Nerd Nanny.

It doesn't look like it was. I can't find it either.

This is basically nepotism of the leader of whatever is going on for his/her girlfriend/boyfriend at the expense of others.

edited 15th Jan '12 9:38:17 PM by NoirGrimoir

Yes, we're past that. There was another trope that was supposed to be split off of this one and wasn't.