Trope Pantheon Story thread

That's why I had to mention that there's something very wrong with the alternate world, kind of similar to the Shin Megami Tensei verse, something goes really wrong that YHVH got replaced with a sinister deity with similar name (or whatever it is). It is like that world is seeking "The one justice that takes priority over all justice" If they hear Robin Hood's creed before, they will absolutely deny that, they think there HAS to be a justice above all justice, that must be obeyed and overrode all other justices. And they claim they have found it, it's the 'audience expectation' that they worship as the one justice that overrode all other justices. They claim that the ideologies CAN be made compatible and combined into ONE main justice that becomes the basis of all justices.

On the surface, that justice seemed... simple enough. Fight for everlasting peace, hope and goodness, side with the innocents (humanity), vanquish evil instead of being their victim or helping them, make sure good deeds are rewarded, let no evil deeds go unpunished. But this implications has a dark side. For instance, let's say there's someone who has done goofed, manipulated by the bad guys to cause collateral damage. It doesn't matter if they have a good heart or regretful for their actions... "No matter how you sugarcoat it, murder is murder, and must be punished.", and thus there won't be any forgiveness for even being an accessory of evil, that justice decreed that you must avoid being an accessory of evil, if there's no other way around it... then give evil a middle finger by killing yourself with honor, if evil messes with your corpse or your afterlife rest, then it's totally their fault.

You can go ahead and tell your opinion about 'the justice above all justices' (it can be whether that makes sense, or it's a complete bullcrap) or that one thing about "No matter how you sugarcoat it..."

edited 16th May '16 7:24:21 AM by ChrisX

Forgot to delete that bit ending the final battle. The bit about Madoka isn't being the hero. Its about the Sisterhood getting Revenge for YVHV's deeds against them (screw crap like forgiveness).

I really want Revenge to be a running part of Reformation. The Sisterhood's revenge, some form of revenge on GUAL as a whole for The Gentaro arc, Lol Ranger getting revenge for what YVHV did to a friend. Lastly, YVHV being killed (mirroring his canon Deader than Dead state) by the GUAG being an ultimate act of Revenge against Lucifer for Great Upheaval (on top of everything else done to him in retaliation in earlier arcs) by stealing his big aspiration.

The word "justice" is starting to loose any meaning at this rate.

You know, I am starting to think about this called "audience expectation", and I am starting to think that you are starting to think you are driving own agenda. Because I feel like "audience expectation" isn't actually about "justice", it's about "not being a huge moron or acting like jackasses". Because let's think about this from another angle, and let's take BB for example. We all know about Litchi, but how about another female what many people don't seem to like that much: Tsubaki Izayoi. Yeah, the girl who is driven For Great Justice. One of big factors to this is her desire to kill Ragna. Of course there are other reasons, but are there actually people who want Tsubaki to kill Ragna? This is why I feel like Faction B will end up being the biggest hyprocrites because at some point even the fans would get sick of their bullshit. You know, Take That, Audience! taken to levels where I would call it "meta-mockery".

Yeah, revenge. Totally the most paragon of lawful virtues. At this point Eiki will be Surrounded by Idiots.

edited 16th May '16 8:15:02 AM by TPPR10

At this point, I am fairly convinced that Magnum is the only one who consider YHVH The Scrappy.

I can't claim to be a SMT expert, but discussions I've seen about the series indicates that YHVH is more of a Love to Hate type of guy than some kind of scrappy.

In fact, he might border into Jerkass Woobie in some regards. He sees everyone below him as pawns. The problem is that he has no one he can see as an equal due of him being Top God.

Tppr@ YHVH is like Aizen then? Atleast to me.

Eldrake@ I think RJ thinks he a scrappy too considering the times he wanted him to be Killed off.

Ah yes, Tsubaki. Trust me, I know she has suffered much from this expectation craze. Heck, in Japan she has a huge Hatedom to the point there are circles that makes it their policy to not talk about her, and her high placement in popularity poll was solely because of Asami Imai, fan favorite VA, is voicing her. Granted, you are right that it's mostly because Die for Our Ship.

Shockingly, however... there are none who wants Tsubaki (Yayoi, by the way. Izayoi is just her alternate form and it's just one name) to kill Ragna, I'm sorry. From how I see it, Ragna is one of the type of characters who became the Audience's Pet. He's a poor guy going through bad things while developing on his own, and woe betide those who even look at him funny or oppose him. Ever wonder why it's Jin who gets the blame in the first games before Tsubaki enters? The same can be said to Noel and also Makoto. So you're right in that case. Basically, anything Ragna does get considered as 'justice' (or as I coin it, 'audience justice'), while those who oppose them or do not please the audience, they're never called justice, the only way Tsubaki's For Great Justice is ever to be accepted is if she points her blade to Terumi or Relius, not Ragna. This is why Bang is also a figure who fights For Great Justice, but he's a lot more welcome: He's a Memetic Badass in the eyes of the audience, and while he did aim for Ragna (which got resolved more positively later), he also aims for Terumi and Relius and evil in general.

You say that the expectation is like "Not being a moron or act like jackass." With no offense in mind, I've seen people call Tsubaki being a moron for sticking with her For Great Justice creeds solely because she won't stop egging and hating on poor Ragna. So in another way, 'being a moron' would eventually also lose meaning. It's why What An Idiot is a YMMV trope. Does anyone remember Kaname Ohgi? Sometimes I think he's an even bigger example for this whole 'betray expectation'.

However, that IS one thing that MCW is trying to show: Justice, karma, morality, goodness (and maybe Badassery)... sometimes, they become just a pretty word to cover up about driving one's own agenda at expense of others to the point they lose meaning. From what I observed, the expectations kind of works like that. 'Not being a huge moron or acting like a jackasses' is enough for the audience to call it 'justice' that makes the character good, they don't care about emotional states. As long as they serve what the audience wants, they don't want to give a damn. The eventual moral of the story is exactly what you have mentioned via Robin Hood: Justice and morality take many forms, and it is wrong to find 'the one justice to rule them all', there is no such thing, you cannot just force your beliefs to others, no matter how righteous or awesome it may sound. Yes, that includes the simple morality scale of 'protect mankind, side with hope, crush evil.'

But now that you say it... I'm open to change this from a Civil War story to merely a normal 'trip to another world' story. It's another possibility, but what do you think? Hopefully with less Unfortunate Implications

edited 16th May '16 4:35:54 PM by ChrisX

Law civil war: Madoka is taking the spotlight again? Yaaaaaaawn. Get another Butt-Monkey FFS

You know, i'm more interested in following the tournament. What the fuck are we going to do with the stories?

Law is widely considered the scrappy faction in smt heavily because they always do the worse acts in every game to the point where a setting thats SUPPOSED to be Grey-and-Gray Morality instead becomes Black-and-Gray Morality.

They're an extremely poorly written take on Order Versus Chaos.

Heck, Final is being heralded as an Author's Saving Throw in regards to law with the twist regarding their head being just plain evil explaining the faction's misdeeds (Neutral Evil posing as Lawful Evil corrupting the concept of law).

When the authors throw their own character under the bus, you know there was past poor writting involved (i.e law was being very poorly written).

Anyways, feel free to axe the stuff in the Tyrant's fall. We can always come up with something better.

edited 16th May '16 4:09:18 PM by magnum12

Magnum, as much as I understand your enthusiasm with SMT, I think you might want to take a breather about this. You know, this is like what I was doing to Terumi. I backed down while still disliking him. When you say 'make something better', please be aware that people might want you to just drop the whole 'kill SMT!YHVH in the worst way possible'. If you think it's what the others think... well... one word to remind you.

Penguin.

edited 16th May '16 4:37:07 PM by ChrisX

Agreed.

Do have some stuff to bring foward regarding the tournament arc. Best to take a page out of Sun Tzu and think stuff in advance before we get an issue.

1. I know the structure is like a moba, but which one is going to be our template. Will it be LOL, Heroes Of The Storm, or will it be a composite of many?

2. Will talents see use?

3. I know attacks and ultimates are in but what about traits?

We may have to look at cross verse compatibilty issues with these questions. Using Valzy as an example for questions 2 and 3 and assuming yes. Tppr would be really helpful at this point.

4. Would a unique evility work like a trait? For example, Adsorption works by taking 20% of a defeated enemies stats (includes mooks and creeps) and adding them to his own for the rest of the battle. For Heroes Of The Storm fans, think Nazeebo's Death Ritual talent but replace hp and mana gain with boosts to attack, defense, and speed.

5. How do common evilities interact? Would they work as talents?

6. I'm guessing Overload Skills would count as an ultimate.

Penguin is the kind of man who'd remove the locks from the Sonichu page, triple The Scrappy page and merge it with the quadrupled Complete Monster stage.

I've changed my mind about killing YHVH. However, I do believe he shouldn't be the Overdeity of Law anymore. The games themselves have now established he's not the creator of law, or even lawful-he's a Neutral Evil being who plays both sides, and is obsessed with Despotism Justifies the Means. A Humiliation Conga should be in stall for YHVH, forcing him to realize he's just another villain.

That being said, I'm wondering how we should work Eiki Shiki. The GUAL shouldn't be Lawful Evil by another name, but it shouldn't be Lawful Good by another name. The motives, and general mindset of the GUAL should be Lawful Neutral on average. It should be fine with the noblest of heroes and vilest of villains so long as they all follow the purpose of putting order and stability above personal interests and desire. The reverse should be true with GUAC. That way, they truly prove themselves independent from the Black-and-White Morality Cosmos and Melkor spout.

It should look something like this:

• GUAL Alignments:
  • The Law Before Good side of Lawful Good
  • Lawful Neutral in general, though "Authority First and Foremost" and "Equality Under Law" are more tempted to be in the GUAE/G camp
  • Type 1 and 2 Lawful Evil, though Type 2 might feel more at home in the GUAE
• GUAC Alignments:
  • The Freedom Before Goodness side of Chaotic Good, though Freedom Before Goodness would sympathize
  • Chaotic Neutral in general, though Type 2 and 3 would feel strongest here
  • Type 1 and 5 Chaotic Evil would feel more at home here

edited 16th May '16 8:21:26 PM by RJ-19-CLOVIS-93

I'll support the conga line. Combine irony, karma, and comedy and we're golden.

We should have plenty of all 3 types of lawful alignments running around somewhere.

Now, now, let's not get carried away here...

Veto on YHVH going through that.

What, him losing his position of Overdeity of Law? Because as I've pointed out countless times, not only has he proven to be a bad example of Law, but by now it's clear that he's straight out Neutral Evil, not the real Great Will and can be replaced

edited 17th May '16 2:58:56 AM by RJ-19-CLOVIS-93

The humiliation thing.

You know, i might weite a sgort story about Nefarian at some point. Maybe when i get bored

Any ideas for that? I have one but i can't tell it right now. (College and stuff)

@Clovis: The conga stuff. I mean, I think there are other ways to go on with the story and ultimate triumph of goodness without humiliations. I know I would LOVE to see Terumi getting humiliated in public... but it would sound petty... and petty is his game.

Okay, in regards to Operation Red Love, there are few things I can recall from it:

• The whole story more or less starts with struggle with Shogo Makishima and Terumi Yuuki, as the former finds YQ interesting and could use them as pawns where as YQ is more or less Terumi's personal pet project. Not really a big war between GUAC and GUAE, just two people trying to control one group.
• There was something with Lucy what I can't remember the big details. I think there was one thing where someone tries to separate 1st and 3rd World Yunos from themselves, but it ends up working on Lucy.
• There is one big subplot where Terumi is trying to reactivate Ragnarok as a big f you to Main House and Scahrlachrot is key to it. Meanwhile, Zenia, Clarice and Elsa are trying to save Scahrlachrot. I also once suggested that Terumi is keeping Weiss at knife point so that Scahrlachrot has to listen.
• Sort of a final battle with newly recovered Yuno, Kotonoha and Sekai on one side and Tsukuyomi and Nu on other side, while Clarice, Zenia and Elsa try to deal with Scharlachrot, Ragnarok and Weiss.

I do remember that when talking with Toony, she does want to write the story herself, even off this side. Just something to consider. But if we were to write our own version, aside of points above, I do feel like there are some things I would like to add:

• Yuno would try to struggle herself to try to get her true feelings back, even if Bernkastel has fucked with her. Especially with Ato-ko's little talk with her. She is sort of like "Unwitting Instigator of Salvation". Though she's not mad. Heck, she might even follow the new YS to GUAC.
• Possible minimal involvement from large groups. Like with SLS, the only person who would actually get involved with it would be Ooi.
• Maybe a stinger of someone trying to call Yandere-chan. Because why not.

Also, I sort of have a joke ending for ROL: Eiki being so annoyed by everything what has happened from both sides, that she calls it quits on the whole thing, deciding to just bring down whole concept of GUAL.

The more I think about it, the more I think that perhaps the Morality Civil War can be revamped into something else. The core is still similar: Something that touches on the meta, whereas some characters get discriminated/hunted down (we'll use Litchi, and maybe Tsubaki for example).. However, it no longer goes into a Civil War or sorts.

Instead, we are using the Fantastic Caste System instead.

Basically, the deities are rated based on 'audience-pleasing' tiers: How much they can please the audience. Mostly, however, this boils down into 'agreeing to what the audience wants or expects' or 'be as Badass as possible, rack up Crowning Moment Of Awesome as many as possible'. Failure to do so and you're designated as the bottom tier, you get nothing, get abused on daily basis, your POV will not be heard, common people will see you negatively, mostly, etc. Be on the graces of the audience, then you're on top tier, you get all the privileges, all your words will be heard, you get hailed as a badass wherever you go, you are granted the Omniscient Morality License, that means you can be a jackass as much as you want, but your actions will be considered 'for the greater good', you get coverages here and there etc.

However this doesn't mean the top tier ones are all classist a-holes (Especially some like Cap). Some will notice something is wrong and work on solving things, while some gets forcibly Drunk with Power and really enjoys their Omniscient Morality License. The good guys will then discover that the Drunk with Power stuff comes from another world where the whole caste system went on full force. And again, it's because Terumi was mucking things up.

I hope this alternative means less Idiot Ball or Conflict Ball thrown around. What do you think?

edited 18th May '16 4:35:03 AM by ChrisX

Oh boy, this might be a long one.

Okay remember in the main thread I once said that "Anyone can be a Base Breaker no matter in what way, shape or form". This is what I mean; you really cannot get a One Hundred Percent Adoration Rating on any character. That is not even going into stuff like Vocal Minority. Like is Popplio ugly? Underappreciated? Are you neutral to it? Or are you sick of people arguing over it? Like for a personal opinion, I dislike Dante in Devil May Cry 3. Because I feel like he is trying to be awesome 24/7 without any substance. He only really achieves badassery in certain points due of dramatic tension. Otherwise he is actually really boring. And that probably isn't only example. Like how about Azrael in BlazBlue? I personally think he is badass with substance to back it up, but people would argue against it. Or how some people would think that Sol Badguy seems like a borderline Boring Invincible Hero. Basically a World of Badass can at one point get boring if everything is badass.

And since a lot of this has been about clear-cut Good Vs. Evil, in this Fantastic Caste System, what about the villains and those more neutral in all of this? Because there are times when the villains are more appealing to the fans than the good guys. Was it by being just that much of a badass, Magnificent Bastard, having better ideals than the good guys etc. In this Fantastic Caste System, would it be hypocritical to ignore the villains? And that is not getting into how conflicting villains can be to the fans. For example, Cinder. To summarise, in Season 3 (and partly 2), everything basically went all according to keikaku. However, some fans think that everything went too well, with her having basically no opposition to try to work around. Heck, one thing what would have thrown a wrench into the plans (i.e. one of her minions Mercury decided to go against her order to not be seen in public) was basically discarded in the next episode (he did decide not to hide, but everything still went as planned). Hell, the only reason why Cinder lost was due of poorly foreshadowed element what everyone dismissed when it was brought up in episode 1. Heck, speaking of RWBY, a lot of people hate Season 2 finale because even though it is full of badassery, it is mainly from people NOT Team RWBY, causing Spotlight-Stealing Squad to happen.

Basically, what I am trying to say is that tryong to turn this tale as Take That, Audience! is not as simple as you would hope. Since anyone reading it would be "We don't act like that! Right?".

On unrelated note about the tournament, we don't really have any true "gameplay" set-up.

I'm not sure if this would turn into a complete Take That, Audience!, but perhaps more like a gentle knock on how some people edit things in TV Tropes. As in... is it right to value people based on how many bigass CMOA you can edit on them? And what happens when they turn against the audience's favorite? Is it that only those who do what the audience says will be venerated? Are we audiences really becoming some sort of Bad Boss to the characters? (Heck this could be used as a Character Development for the 'Expectation Avatar', he gets called as a Bad Boss, then he gets a Heel Realization...)

You can take a look at Code Geass, if you want another example. Lelouch was hailed as the great guy who can do no wrong, any wrongs he does, he'll be painted as some sort of hurting Woobie. Could be true, yeah. Also he's widely accepted as The Chessmaster and Magnificent Bastard. From that, the fan perception on other characters now revolve on how much they support and love Lelouch:

• Suzaku Kururugi throughout the 1st season and the 2nd season's 1st half is considered an annoying asshole. Sure, he DID came off as a hypocrite ruled by his emotions, but I think that it was because he was opposing Lelouch. Once he became Zero and then pretty much goes on Lelouch's side, he's considered awesome and better. So basically, Suzaku was hated because he was against poor dear Lelouch.
• Rolo Lamperouge. When he was introduced, he was considered an ass that makes Lelouch's suffer. But then, in the end of his life, he sacrificed himself from Lelouch, granting him Alas, Poor Villain death, mourned by the fandom, and it rescues him from The Scrappy heap. It makes me wonder... what if Rolo's sacrifice was not for Lelouch, would the reaction stay the same?
• Nina Einstein was known as Anime's biggest Scrappies, but she was rescued the moment she has some regrets.... and helps Lelouch... So the message is, "Join Lelouch and ye shall be forgiven"? I know she has her own personal remorse, but if she didn't join Lelouch, I'm starting to think people will still gun her down.
• And the biggest one? Kaname Ohgi. In the first season, he's considered a sane man and Ensemble Dark Horse. In the second season? Controversial thing happens and he replaces Nina as the show's biggest scrappy. Why do I get the feeling that this happens because he turns against Lelouch when it was known that multiple times, he dumped the Japanese for his own interests (finale of Season 1), and the information came from Schneizel, who the fan perceived as Obviously Evil and shouldn't be trusted? So the message is "Worship Lelouch, our boy, and you'll be loved for life"?

These are quite proofs that I think the fanbase needs some gentle knock in the forehead (please take notice on the 'gentle' part. I really wouldn't want to sound like a Strawman, no matter how difficult the path is). Are we being fair that we judge other characters based on their treatment of our chosen golden boy? Perhaps judging a character based on their own merits than their involvement to what we consider cool should be an option?

Indeed we cannot get a One Hundred Percent Adoration Rating. However, sometimes, a Broken Base with a particularly high 'negative' side would cause an extreme edition of Poe's Law. The negative side will be considered the default personality for people to use. I think you can draw an example yourself from that. I have one example in mind, but I think people already know. In your example of Dante, sure, I appreciate your opinion that you don't like his DMC 3 form. However, from the look of it, the mass seems to believe that badassery alone will make people awesome: This is the majority's opinion. While it would be a Broken Base one way or another, it won't be 50-50, it will be about 90-10 in favor of 'Badass is Awesome and Likable'.

This is just my observation, though, but seriously, I'm glad you attacked me like this. I really need things to attack my thought.

edited 18th May '16 6:51:37 AM by ChrisX

It's too bad emww don't have extreme Lawful Knight Templar deities here.

I feel like the whole damn Civil War is becoming too meta for my tastes. I'm saying that we should scrap the whole thing before it gets any more confusing, but that's just me.