Have a question about how the TVTropes wiki works? No one knows this community better than the people in it, so ask away! Ask the Tropers is the page you come to when you have a question burning in your brain and the support pages didn't help.
It's not for everything, though. For a list of all the resources for your questions, click here. You can also go to this Directory thread
for ongoing cleanup projects.
To be honest, I don't get the distinction between these tropes myself. I remember that a while ago, there was an attempt in the Trope Repair Shop to change the distinction to one based on unusual controls vs. unusual ability effects.
it kind of seems to me that Mechanically Unusual Class revolves around characters with weird gameplay styles while Mechanically Unusual Fighter revolves around characters with weird control schemes
i don't know much about the MOBA genre but i at least know that PC ones revolve around using the mouse for both movement and attacking. so i would think the Unusual Class probably revolves around an underused game mechanic (like status effect spamming) while the Unusual Fighter probably revolves around controlling the character entirely with the keyboard instead of the mouse, or something similarly out of left field.
weaponizing Dungeon Fighter Online elitism since 2018
^ One MOBA example I can think of is from Dota 2.
The Invoker would be a Mechanically Unusual Fighter, since using his spells is very different from other heroes: your three basic spells are "reagents" which only give minor stat boosts when used, but these reagents can then be used to invoke different spells, depending on what the three most recently-used ones are. However, these spells' effects are not particularly unusual.
The Techies, on the other hand, would be more like a Mechanically Unusual Class. They're a Trap Master character, specializing in laying minefields, but being very weak in direct combat. Using their abilities is standard point-and-click stuff, but their playstyle is still very different from anyone else's.
^^ That's a good distinction, but that's not how the tropes are being used currently. Really, it seems like Fighter is being used for action games while Class is being used for strategy games, which is a very murky definition with action-focused genre hybrids.
This seems like it should be taken to TRS.
Edited by MurlocAggroB
Does the MOBA folder belong on Mechanically Unusual Class or Mechanically Unusual Fighter? It's on class currently, but MOBAs are more about individual characters than they are customizable roles. However, they are generally closer to action RPGs in mechanics. There's a lot of grey area between these tropes, and I'm not sure what's better.
For that matter, where should The Binding of Isaac characters go? It has specific characters that function like traditional classes.