I added to the list so it could be indexed.

I actually agree wholeheartedly. My circle of friends is a 5 man band, with my close nakama as the leader and lancer, myself as the smart guy, the leader's girlfriend as the bruiser, and my girlfriend as, well, the chick, but she doesn't fit the archetype at all. She does fit the Team Mom archetype, and/or the little sister archetype, but definitely not the chick. I'd appreciate a redefining of that archetype, personally, but that's just me.

^ A real life anecdote isn't relevant in changing a trope, because tropes are used with author intent in mind. Probably the reason your girlfriend isn't The Chick is because, well, an author didn't insert her as the Chick. Y'know.

I think The Chick should be the drummer, because the drums provide a beat that keeps the band together. The Big Guy should be bass guitar, as bass players are stereotyped as being big and quiet.

Any member can theoretically combined with another. Katara for Avatar The Last Airbender is both The Lancer and The Chick.

According to the Cut List, it was cut in order to be split into WesternAnimationA-M and WesternAnimationN-Z. However, since the page is locked, nobody can get into it to replace the link.

I thought maybe it should be:

The Hero-Lead Singer/Lead Guitar The Lancer-Lead Guitar/Rhythm Guitar The Smart Guy-Bass Guitar The Big Guy-Drums The Chick-Keyboards

The Hero and Lancer should stay as Singer and Guitarist respectively, as all bands (bar very few) tend to have that dynamic anyway

Personally I think that The Smart Guy or the Chick should be the bassist. The Smart Guy and the Big Guy tend to chum out with each other, kinda like the bassist/drummer dynamic. The bassist also usually comes of as the introverted one, which would fit either the Smart Guy or The Chick fine.

If the Chick isn't the bassist then they should be the Keyboardist, since most bands don't have one, and in bands that do have one it's kind of seen as the odd one out. Keyboards also aren't seen as 'rock' like as the other instruments. In any case, no band should have a member solely dedicated to shaking a Tambourine and Vocal effects.

The bassist tends to be either The Smart Guy or The Chick. Either way, it should be included, since the bass is more a part of the traditional rock band than the keyboard or tambourine/vocal effects.

Never mind. Found a better Trope.

You're absolutely right. I have half a mind to delete any where it's a group of three, four or any one I know where a character obviously doesn't fit. One character shouldn't be listed as two members of the band. There are plenty of times the trope applies but close doesn't cut it. Obviously I'm only familiar with so many examples. Can I get some help or at least input?

A key point to remember is that the Five Man (and Five Bad) Band Tropes are built around roles within a team. This is as opposed to the Four Temperament and Four Girl Ensembles, which focus more on personalities. To that end, Power Trio, as currently devised, is set along a sliding scale of personalities, as opposed to the multi-dimensional Ensemble. Cliques tend to depend on a mix of personality and appearance (which shouldn't be surprising given where they usually operate  ^*

^{AU qualifier optional}

).

Therefore, I'm cool with teams of four so long as one of the following two situations applies:

1. One character is pulling double duty (fulfilling two roles). But they must obviously be doing so. In this case, the same character can not be both The Hero and The Lancer.
2. Each character plays one role with the leftover role is obviously shared by two people. EDIT: There still has to be a single, obvious Hero and, again, that Hero can't share the part of The Lancer. (The other 3 roles are fair game.)

As emphasized in both points, the key word is "obvious." The margin for error in accepting reduced teams should be less than accepting full teams. i.e. The roles have to be there with very little, if any, justification text.

Though it may be prudent to create a separate Trope for that. Four Man Band perhaps? Alternately, we may need a handy guide to converting Four Temperament Ensemble roles to Five Man Band roles (or Five Bad Band roles).

As for "teams" of 2 or 3 or 7+, yeah, mainly needs dropping unless, in the case of the latter, if a subset of 5 fits all 5 roles exactly with one and only one character per role. (In that case, redact the outside members unless they form their own [~5MB~]. On the other hand, a series with multiple Five Man Bands can have two teams share one (at most) member. Bonus points if the shared member fills two different roles between the two teams and neither role is The Hero. Also acceptable IMO are teams that shift their rosters over time while retaining members.

As for the Mother3 3-person+pet example, it may fit better in Five Man Band Concert.

EDIT: Just so you know, I've always held that the five main Tropes for the Band are a requirement for that band. i.e. only The Hero, The Lancer, The Big Guy, The Smart Guy, and The Chick / The Heart can be members of the band proper. There is still room for Sixth Rangers, kids and pets, mentors (Big Sibling or otherwise), and Missions Control, but these are not actual team members.

And, again, the role-based nature of the Bands make it more attractive than Ensembles, which are personality based. Which admittedly does lend more easily to misuse.

EDIT 2: The page itself agrees with me! Take this notice from after the section on "Associated Character Tropes" (emphasis mine):

Or, in Ace Attorney form. (I don't think they can handle italics there.)

@Donaldthe Potholer Thank you for your lengthy option. A good number of the examples I've found in the Five Man Band I don't believe belong there. Are there any that you can find that you think should be removed or are you just saying that most everying is fair game?

You're actually using the discussion page to discuss fixing an article? While I'm glad these pages are finally getting use, this big a change is probably Repair Shop level. We'll need more people in on this than actually read the discussions.

Anyways, the first pass should probably be those that blatantly don't fit. I just went through the first Anime set, and I already counted a bunch of examples with more than one justification, which is a no-no, as well as admissions that people were just getting shoehorned in.

Oh, and good call, Donald. A lot of these people aren't even on a team—and, again, the examples flat out admit that.

@Big T I'm sorry but I guess there's still things I don't know how to do on here. I looked for it and I couldn't find anything called Repair Shop. Also I'm not sure what you're trying to say. Can you use an example and how it applies. I'm finding a lot that don't work but I should probably get other options before cutting the list down.

Go to the forums (by clicking the "Forum" button in the menu on the regular pages). You'll find one forum called Trope Repair Shop.

I wholeheartedly agree; the metaphor fits perfectly.

The Lancer, perhaps?

The YKTTW has been launced as The Face. Is there a specific thread in the forums for asking the mods to edit this page, or will this one do?