Needs Help: Full Contact Magic

Hey all. This is my first TRS thread, so bear with me.

I just read Full-Contact Magic, and holy hell do people completely ignore the entire description. I can clean up the examples myself, but I want to know if it's okay to put a little thing that says "oi, this is not about Kung-Fu Wizard or Magic Knight. Make sure your example doesn't go under one of those first."

May be name confusion. Full-contact seems to indicate that there's, well, contact, when contact is what makes it another trope. That is, name indicates contact between the practitioner and the target.

Suggestion:Rename, clean up examples and incorrect wicks, let it run wild and free to be the trope it was meant to be.

Can you do a check to see how widespread the misuse is?

A dozen on the page itself. Not sure about others.

Honestly, I see more of a resemblance between this and Supernatural Martial Arts, rather than either Magic Knight or Kung-Fu Wizard.

I checked out only 9 of the crosswick. It's already starting to shape up fairly badly. Only found one correct use.

Among the rest, either it difficult to determine misuse thanks to potholing, linking with no description or not enough of a description of the character to know.

The rest indicated using magic as well as fighting, so I counted those as misuse.

The current count is 4 undetermined, 4 misuse, 1 correct.

I'll continue checking. The problem may not be as bad as it's looking right now.

edited 8th Aug '12 8:51:24 AM by Doxiedame

Sorry for the double post. It's not really getting any better. The number of correct uses is still at one.

This definitely needs some love. Seeing how widespread misuse is, I stand by my earlier suggestion of rename and cleaning up wicks.

^ When you are checking related pages for correct/incorrect use, please copy and paste the exact context a given link appears in so that other people can debate or double-check your work.

edited 8th Aug '12 10:34:40 AM by Stratadrake

After looking through Supernatural Martial Arts, Kung-Fu Wizard, and Full-Contact Magic I feel like these might need a more generic supertrope. Even though all of these tropes are different conceptually. They will often be aesthetically indistinguishable. How do you tell the diffences between a mage that is casting spells while he is flipping around, one who learned the magic while flipping, and one where flipping is part of casting the magic.

The more I look at Supernatural Martial Arts and Full-Contact Magic the more I think that these need to be rolled together. There are just too many shows that use both of these or where it's debatable which one it falls into (Avatar, Naruto, Fullmetal Alchemist, Dragonball) even if we do come up with clear and distinct definitions for both, preventing cross pollination and misuse is going to be a losing battle.

edited 8th Aug '12 1:22:03 PM by margibso

I think a merge of those two might be a good idea.

As for the two other related tropes, Magic Knight or Kung-Fu Wizard, I think those are about someone knowing both magic and martial arts. Normally such a thing would count as just X + Y, which isn't a meaningful trope, but in this case, it's about two types of proficiencies that are often diametrically opposed, in that you know either one or the other, but not both.

Supernatural Martial Arts and Full-Contact Magic are both about a combined school of combat, which integrates magic and physical prowess into one, single discipline.

I would propose rolling Full-Contact Magic into Supernatural Martial Arts and then changing the definition of Supernatural Martial Arts to mean any form of martial arts that in itself is magical or has supernatural powers, a lot of the wicks are using it like this already. I think this would cover Full-Contact Magic since its definition is magic that is cast by dodging, punching, and kicking. Basically a magical martial art. You could still have a sub trope though for magical powers gained through the mental and physical discipline that comes from studying a martial art like the tibetan monk who can heal wounds and resist the elements.

edited 8th Aug '12 2:52:08 PM by margibso

I think there is a sufficient difference to warrant separate pages. Supernatural martial arts is "being so good at Kung-fu that you can break reality." Full Contact Magic is "magic that happens to involve moving a lot." These are different things.

So, Supernatural Martial Arts is a form of Charles Atlas Superpower?

Should we then move all examples involving magic from Supernatural Martial Arts to Full-Contact Magic?

Presumably, yes.

The key is where the stuff originates. If it's magic that invokes movement, it's this. If it's movement that produces magic, then it's another trope.

Exactly. The question is the origin of the magic. To me:

• Supernatural Martial Arts: Training the body creates or enhances magical powers. Those who have not trained their body cannot use the powers. The strength of the power increases with the fitness and precision of the body.
• Full-Contact Magic: Magical powers require movement to function. There's not as much emphasis on training the body—-it's just that the magic user moves a lot.

I think this means Full-Contact Magic is a supertrope of Supernatural Martial Arts. Magic that requires precise and trained movement is under the umbrella of magic that requires movement.

Also, Full-Contact Magic definitely needs a rename. As an above troper said, Full Contact implies contact, and a lot of the examples are ranged attacks. Kinetic Magic? Mobile Magic? Emphatic Magic?

edited 24th Sep '12 7:20:49 AM by larynxist

How about Movement Makes Magic?

"Movement" alone sounds like it could include finger-waggling, which doesn't seem to fit this trope.

That said, just about any of the suggestions so far are an improvement.

Maybe something like Acrobatic Magic? Or is that too far in the opposite direction?

edited 24th Sep '12 12:36:18 PM by Xtifr

Maybe look at it like this:

• With Supernatural Martial Arts, you can fight with physical motions, then enhance them with supernatural power. (eg. you practice a regular sword slash enough and it upgrades to a sword slash that cuts time or something)
• With Full-Contact Magic, you can fight with supernatural power, then enhance it with physical motions. (eg. you start off knowing how to make a fireball shoot from your hand, then you learn how to physically throw it for more speed and control)

edited 27th Sep '12 4:59:54 PM by Prime32

I think I like those descriptions better, at least as a starting point. "Full-Contact" is still a silly thing to call it, though.

Athletic Magic?

Athletic sounds good.

"Athletic" is a definite improvement over my suggestion of "Acrobatic"! :)

edited 28th Sep '12 11:28:01 PM by Xtifr

x5

Seconding those descriptions.