Badass tropes - now on: Action Girl

I was just using that as a placeholder for how extreme a RL example would have to be for an entry, at least IMO. Everyone should know how badass of a pilot The Red Baron was I would think.

It would have to be that extreme or else things like Badass Israeli would list everyone who did something remotely badass which it kinda does already.

edited 19th Apr '15 1:53:38 AM by Memers

I am not convinced by Memers's proposal. It seems like it's trying to use a very different definition for no good reason.

"For a successful technology, reality must take precedence over public relations, for Nature cannot be fooled." - Richard Feynman

What's the difference between mine and Dragon Quest Z's?

It's not clear to me why you are excluding martial arts. And that Badass Politician seems fairly questionable to me.

"For a successful technology, reality must take precedence over public relations, for Nature cannot be fooled." - Richard Feynman

Excluding martial arts? Where? If it was the Bruce Lee thing I said the fact that he created a martial art wasn't really badass enough to really be a RL example on the page itself, the fact that he could kick faster than a camera could record now that I would say yes. A Real Life example of badass really should be extremely so, like Metal Of Honor winning badass or else everyone who has ever done anything of note would be on there, in some cases they already are like that on the page.

As for in fiction a badass person really needs to be awesome, flashy, beats the odds, etc. and the work will show it off in some way. But I do not believe it should always require fighting or any kind of action sequence to be badass. Someone could easily be badass at a children's card game or anything really as long as the work actually portrays it as such but it certainly is almost exclusively in conflicts or competitions though.

But that is just what I believe and it goes along with what most people would consider badass.

edited 19th Apr '15 3:05:14 AM by Memers

I think we're dealing with 3 different meanings here:

• "X can put up a fight". Not a trope per se, it comes into play when "X" is someone we don't expect to be competent in battle. This is what many "Badass subtropes" are about.
• "X can get away with doing ridiculous things like defusing bombs with their teeth, due to Rule of Cool". This meaning is a trope, but I'm not sure if it has any subtropes at all.
• "X is really cool, man!" Aka what a lot of tropers think Badass means, but it really doesn't.

edited 19th Apr '15 6:37:55 AM by Rjinswand

I thought we wanted to discourage snowclones? Having something like Badass Politician is a terrible idea.

^ "Somebody can fight" is a trope. It influences the story and has obvious meaning. Pretty sure your third point is wrong as well: Most people here treat badass as "Able to kick ass." When they think the character is really cool when they do it they put the trope name in bold because they want me to hate them.

edited 19th Apr '15 8:13:20 AM by Arha

Being able to fight should be a trope (contrast Wimp Fight), but a separate one.

I'm on the internet. My arguments are invalid.

I wasn't really arguing about that at the moment, but I think that at least needs to be part of the description for Badass since that's how every page uses it anyway. Not including that much would be pointless.

I think that can be lumped under "though". Speaking of, are we ready to put up a Sandbox.Badass for a description draft?

"For a successful technology, reality must take precedence over public relations, for Nature cannot be fooled." - Richard Feynman

At this point, I think we are.

So, if all goes well, Badass won't be on the Badass Tropes list?

The list is on the badass page so it can't be taken off.

As I understand it all the pages listed on badass should be "X can put up a fight". The "outright insane stunts" definition is overly specific. "X is really cool, man!" is what's it's degraded to.

"X can put up a fight". —> Really? That definition means that Stormtroopers are Badass.

edited 19th Apr '15 8:09:13 PM by crazysamaritan

Link to TRS threads in project mode here.

Yeah, plus I've seen many times outside this site use "badass" in context other than fighting.

I'm on the internet. My arguments are invalid.

So would it be better to create a separate index for the "X can put up a fight" tropes?

As far as I understand, it's a nest of tropes where "X can put up a fight" is used for contrast: i.e. when we don't expect a character of this type to be able to put up a fight, but they are. I don't think "X can put up a fight" is a trope by itself.

Most of the times it's just used as "X is really cool, man!", on this site or outside it.

edited 20th Apr '15 8:36:00 AM by Rjinswand

^ That's making a lot of extra work for ourselves. We'd be turning Badass into something it isn't, making a new trope to replace it and then presumably switching all the old wicks to that definition.

Outside the site it's used like that. On it, not really.

The contrast is inherent in what DQZ said: Badass is an adjective used to describe a character who accomplishes improbable tasks.

Link to TRS threads in project mode here.

Um... what do you think Badass is, and what do you think it isn't?

No, it's different.

One meaning is "X can accomplish tasks that would be considered improbable if done by anyone". Another is "X can put up a fight, while belonging to a character type that isn't associated with being good at fighting".

No, DQZ was pretty clear that it was not improbable for anyone, but improbable for that person. A "counter-proposal" was brought up of an infant freediving. It isn't improbable for an adult to freedive, but it is for an infant.

The same thing applies when the task is combat. A Green Beret beating up an average-sized guy in a bar brawl isn't improbable. The same Green Beret beating up the entire town is.

Link to TRS threads in project mode here.

Okay, now I understand.

But then again, if there's a subtrope for Badass toddlers (for example), it would not only encompass toddlers who can beat up an army of enemy soldiers, but also e.g. toddlers who can prove scientific theorems?

---

As an aside. My recent dealings with Her Heart Will Go On in TRS has led me to a trope called Heartbroken Badass. Which, I've come to think, might not be a trope at all. The trope description explains it as, basically, a Badass who happens to be heartbroken due to Love Interest dying or leaving. The Laconic explains that this Badass needs to be emotionally broken (while, incidentally, potholing a completely unrelated trope). The brief explanation on the Badass page seems to think it's Crusading Widower. The examples are all over the place, listing all "cool" characters who happened to lose their love interests (and have become relatively heartbroken as a result).

edited 20th Apr '15 9:54:12 AM by Rjinswand

Doing math isn't usually considered a badass thing even by adults. Using math in an especially creative and cool way might be.

As for badass soliders, this is part of what makes a badass. Someone goes above and beyond the call of Rule of Cool.

I'm on the internet. My arguments are invalid.

I don't know, the Nobel Prize committee and various academicians would argue with you :) Anyway, the thing is, a toddler doing difficult math is going beyond what's expected of his character type. If that doesn't fit the definition of "badass" you suggested, why? It should be obvious from the definition.

"Cool" is a bit subjective. As for "creative", what could that be?

Let's stick with "though" then.

"For a successful technology, reality must take precedence over public relations, for Nature cannot be fooled." - Richard Feynman

You're said "though" enough times that I guess it's not a typo. Do you mean tough?