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keyblade333 Since: Sep, 2013
13th Oct, 2021 11:12:03 AM

The only character who could qualify as a Lethal Chef is Alphen because of his love of spices, but that gets Played for Laughs like twice, and none of the characters are explicitly stated to be bad at cooking.

Shionne is the only character with somewhat poor skills but she isn't a Lethal Chef.

Muramasa got.
NubianSatyress Since: Mar, 2016
13th Oct, 2021 11:35:49 AM

I think that it could be possible to write a "Subverted" example. As keyblade said, Shionne, Alphen and Dohalim are initially set up as being some variety of a Lethal Chef, but the cooking mechanics in the game don't really support that being the case. Certain characters are good at cooking certain meals, and this is always treated as them making something amazing, regardless of how "poor" their cooking experience supposedly is.

nrjxll Since: Nov, 2010
13th Oct, 2021 11:45:38 AM

That said, the stated premise of the example that this marks a break from a series trend isn't actually true: Tales of Berseria also does not have a Lethal Chef either narratively or in game-mechanical terms. (And, IIRC, Tales of Zestiria doesn't have one specifically, although it's still possible for any given character to mess up a meal.) The subpage actually notes as much, too.

PeppermintTwist Since: Jun, 2015
13th Oct, 2021 12:01:52 PM

I also said in my reply to you that, though I haven't been looking at the character page due to not wanting spoilers, the "Related" button on Lethal Chef shows it's been added to the character page for the game by someone else. I suggested that you copy and paste the examples as written by other people from the character page onto the Video Games subpage of Lethal Chef. I legitimately don't see why this is an unworkable solution. It would change the wording you have issue with, and using pre-existing examples from another person should provide you the context you need to update it without having played the game yourself.

And I think Shionne's shown as having enough cooking disasters that she's lethal when she's not making the most basic food imaginable. One of the "chatting" animations that plays between her and Alphen has her making some black goop in a bowl that he recoils at the taste of. And in the sidequest where you acquire the Vitamin Smoothie, her idea of a "smoothie" is just pureed lettuce.

keyblade333 Since: Sep, 2013
13th Oct, 2021 01:15:09 PM

I agree that Shionne isn't a good cook but the game never portrays her cooking as something you eat and feel like sickly about, which is commonly used for the trope. Cordon Bleugh Chef works better for her because she can cook basic stuff, but when she tries to go more advanced things it goes poorly like with the Pancake sidequest. At best I think she's a Downplayed Trope example.

That is why the only character who is close to Lethal Chef based on the story would be Alphen, but again that gets played up like once because he put too much seasoning, which is covered by Unaffected by Spice

Personally I don't think this a huge issue. The series has flip-flopped on the cooking gag so it isn't really super consistent, but usually there is a character who makes mediocre food. Like Natalia from Tales of the Abyss would be a valid example of a Lethal Chef because she actually sucks at it at first and almost causes a fire.

Muramasa got.
PeppermintTwist Since: Jun, 2015
13th Oct, 2021 01:24:13 PM

Doesn't Cordon Bleugh Chef require a level of experimentation, though? Like, the way I'm interpreting her character, her thing is that she doesn't know how to vary her cooking and that she can really only work with one ingredient at the time. (Hence making a smoothie with only lettuce.)

That said, re: Unaffected by Spice, the page for Fire-Breathing Diner does state that extremely spicy food is within the domain of a Lethal Chef, though clearly there's some debate here, as some people here are saying he definitely counts while others are thinking he's just, well, unaffected.

Downplayed could work, though. I intend to leave editing the example from here to other people, though.

nrjxll Since: Nov, 2010
13th Oct, 2021 01:54:06 PM

Honestly, the distinction between Lethal Chef and Cordon Bleugh Chef has often seemed very blurred to me. More than a few Tales bad chefs are listed as both.

PeppermintTwist Since: Jun, 2015
13th Oct, 2021 02:11:38 PM

Like Raine herself, the page image! Canonically part of the reason she's so bad is because she keeps wanting to try ingredients that do not belong in what she makes—usually lemons.

CompletelyNormalGuy (Oldest One in the Book)
13th Oct, 2021 04:42:52 PM

Okay, since I have confirmation that only Alphen is a lethal chef, I'll edit the example to reflect that (and get rid of all the Weasel Words)

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