Lost in Space
We have a couple of articles to cover this, including TV Tropes Will Ruin Your Life, but most importantly, Tropes Are Tools.
Tropes are literally the building blocks of stories. That is, you cannot make a story without using tropes, and there is nothing wrong with this fact. Often, what separates a well received story from a poorly received one is the skillfulness with which it employs tropes.
What TV Tropes offers to the writer is not just a vast smorgasbord of story building blocks, but a way to look at your favorite concepts in perspective with their use in media. For example, let's say you love the Prophecy Twist trope and want to use it in your story. Well, that article offers not just an explanation of the trope, but a vast array of works that use it. You can binge the whole list or sample through it, looking for what makes a Prophecy Twist compelling instead of trite.
That said, not all writers enjoy looking into the guts of storytelling. They feel that stories should grow organically from the imagination, and over-analyzing them can paralyze the writing process or make it too formulaic. That's a totally valid perspective, and ultimately it's up to the individual to decide.
"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"
Grr... <3
Legitimate concern. Say you lived on a world with no other people, and you tried to write a story. You could, but it would have no people tropes in it. You've never met any. I think people tropes make up the majority? Anyway, the odds of you innovating and creating a people story are pretty low. If you tried to innovate, you would probably innovate in a different direction, and push the boundary of storytelling about rocks and lakes.
I guess what I am trying to say is that mathematicians spend their entire lives at universities trying to invent new math. But every now and then, some outsider from the deep wilderness comes out and presents new math that blows the community away.
Studying tropes may help you to create new ones, or it may hinder. Probably both.
Established authors who know about TV Tropes have expressed varied opinions about the site. Whether or not they appreciate the idea of analyzing the building blocks of stories has no bearing on whether their stories are good ones. Jim Butcher loves our Dresden Files pages and uses them as a reference. Tom Siddell of Gunnerkrigg Court has expressed disdain (IIRC, mostly because we tend to pepper our writing with esoteric Wiki Words that require knowledge of our community to understand). Both of them do great work (in my own opinion, of course).
Rich Burlew of The Order of the Stick is indifferent to TV Tropes the website, but in one of his print compilations, talks about teaching himself how to write by, essentially, troping his favorite works—taking them apart mentally, looking at what makes them good, and then applying that to his own work.
If doing that helps your process, great. If not, this might not be the site for you, and that's fine too.
edited 15th Mar '16 2:48:56 PM by HeraldAlberich
The very concept of tropes is not in dispute. What I believe the criticisms boil down to is more the method of cataloging them and what that implies. The idea that a jigsaw puzzle has interchangeable pieces rather than being created whole cloth.
The thing is that tv tropes is more about cataloging the pieces rather than the format or the philosophy, which is how the pieces are put together. In a general sense, attempts to trope the format or philosophy don't really catch on. They lack examples that are catchy and fun.
I've been able to create stories without getting advanced knowledge of the trope database. Of course pop culture has taught many general themes, ideas and techniques to inspire me to create. However, will I be able to create unique things if I've gained so much knowledge, that immediately every idea is labeled as "overdone", "cliche" and "superficial"? Because I recognize how they can be categorized as existing tropes?
To be honest, so far I've already used tons of existing tropes without realizing it. That was quite an eye opener, upon coming to this community, and I'm not sure if this will be a beneficial education. Although at this point I feel like I *need* to research some things to be able to develop a specific plot. But who would agree/disagree?
[subtitles intensify]