Discussion Main / FiveManBand

Dude, the gender requirement was removed months ago. If it's still on the page, I'm not seeing it.

Under The Five Man Band example it under Myth Busters it says Grant's name twice one of these is supposed to say stuntman Tory. I think this has been wrong for a while, I'd edit it myself but I have no access to it.

I feel like it should be mentioned that The Chick does not absolutely have to be female, as long as they are very clearly and consistently The Heart.

Except The Chick does absolutely have to be female.

EDIT: ... and did you mean to reply to this, or were you trying to make a new thread?

So in other words, to be a Five Man Band, there have to be four men and one woman, and the Chick has to be the only woman?

You would think that, but many examples have multiple women.

If the trope is going to strictly use the one woman as chick definition, the rest of the band must be men. Otherwise, the trope's rules aren't met.

Do you guys think that the Always Sunny in Philadelphia gang would fit into this? I mean, they even have an episode where they ascribe themselves into a specific team dynamic, which they declare 'every team' needs- The Brains, The Looks, The Muscle, The Wild-Card, and The Useless Chick.

Under The Five Man Band example it under Myth Busters it says Grant's name twice one of these is supposed to say stuntman Tory.

Never mind. It’s already listed, just not on the main page.

"I can name you plenty of group dynamics that fit Five Man Band to a T while using a male character for this role."

No offend. But since many misused (generally speaking, not your) has too many members and wrong roles (The Hero and Sixth Ranger are most common, but I also saw Team Mom, Team Pet, Team Dad, The Stoic, Token Evil Teammate, etc. Sometime with two or more members shoved into the same spot, sometime with one character taking two or nore roles.), or just a bunch of people in the same work that not really working together at all, I think too many tropers see Five Man Band's "dynamic" when it isn't there.

Why does the "So You Want To" page for Five Man Band have an entire section dedicated to the dynamics between the character if there isn't supposed to be a group dynamic?

I didn't say there is no group dynamic, I said too many people see it when it isn't there (aka shoehorning). Too many examples of five man band aren't even The Team, just five characters from the same story.

...In fact, reply to you make me realized the significant of using The Chick instead of The Heart. This trope isn't just The Team with five characters, it's The Team that's " analogous to the members of a rock band". Changed it to The Heart, and it will be just The Team with five characters. Group dynamic is similar, but that's because any good team has it.

Both of you have valid points, The Chick has pretty much been the token girl now for decennia. As long as the character is female should it fit? I mean Guardians of the Galaxy have Gamorra as the sole female yet she fit's The Lancer much more than the Chick. At the same time Groot fits The Heart more than The Big Guy. Also in that case does The Chick need to be a "girly girl" or can tomboys also fit, on a lot of super sentai pages it's very confusing to read. Maybe we should add clearer guidelines to this specific character to help people find examples? Or we should create a new trope which is unlike The Team called The Modern Five Man Band IF there are enough example to be found for it to fit?

"As long as the character is female should it fit?"

No, see the trope page itself. The Chick is "A peacekeeping role to balance out the other members' aggression, bringing them to a nice or at least manageable medium. The Chick is often considered the heart of the group."

I think one problem is that, somehow people think using different roles is "subversion" of Five-Man Band instead of just being a straight example of The Team. It's like they expect every group of five persons to be Five-Man Band despite the trope is about very specific group composition and not omnipresent trope.

I have read the page, several times. I think I might've worded it in a dumb way which I have a tendency to do. But what my point was, that it seems many examples that aren't on the Five Man Band page itself are wrong and often used for pretty much every sentai and similar group that fits. Often the sole explanation being Sole Female. Which is ridiculous and shows that this is a deeper lying issues and perhapse all "guidelines" to each member of the Five Man Band should have a certain set of rules that they MUST adhere to. Perhapse along with some flexibilities as in Two Girls per team or so? I understand that there already are rules in place, but they can be misinterpreted quite easily.

"Perhapse along with some flexibilities as in Two Girls per team or so?"

But that isn't problem even now. The Chick is the only role that's strictly a female, the other four can be of any gender.

Not entirely true since a Five man band can at max include two females, meaning an all girl team can't be a five man band either. Odd rules, how do you suggest we solve The Chick issue then? Just keep it as it is or?

After sleeping on it, now I think this trope is better off as Just for Fun page.

I mean, it's ultimately The Same, but More Specific of The Team. As framing device, The Team cover everything useful such as team dynamic and such but being more flexible. The only thing that make it stand out from The Team with five persons is that they're analog to rock band, which is purely gimmick and if you belive the troper who strarted this thread, probably not relevant anymore.

If this become Just for Fun (and thus no longer has on-page example), The Team might become more flourish and (ideally) the examples will be more focus on "How these people work tohether" instead of "How these people fit these role" (which I think is kinda miss the point).

Maybe I will look up old TRS later.

I think the explanation of Overly Sarcastic Productions hits it the nail on the hammer the best. It should be more flexible, also in the end aren't all tropes kind of for fun in someway? It should definitely be 5 people but I don't think the gender should have to matter for any of them. Also can someone please change the tambourine to the bass already, since it is essential for a rock band? while a tambourine is not. The Five Man band is my favorite trope of all time, but damn are there a lot of misconceptions and sloppy shoe horning examples on these pages. I am a firm believe that The Chick should be gender neutral, the trope would see way more examples, but that's just me.

"I think the explanation of Overly Sarcastic Productions hits it the nail on the hammer the best. It should be more flexible"

And we have The Team for that, with only 1100+ backlink (compared to 4800+ of Five-Man Band, which tell me something is wrong).

"also in the end aren't all tropes kind of for fun in someway?"

I guess you have no idea what that Just for Fun namespace mean. As noted, I don't see much that would make Five-Man Band stand out from other The Team with five members. And your suggestion to expand its definition, ignored its origin from band, will make it exactly just The Team with five members. BTW, some of other famous tropes turned into Just for Fun exactly because of that. See Famous Last Words and X Meets Y.

I disagree we do not have the team for that since OSP specificalky went through The Five Man Band trope albeit with a twist on The Chick/The Heart thing.

Also i understand that tropes are ment to help writers apart from just being fun in general. You seem to assume a lot about me, you explain to me what just for fun means then? What sets The FMB apart is not that they're just any team. The team is not specific at all. And as long as the Five characters still fit. So just The Chick being The Heart instead so still the moral center albeit not MUST BE FEMALE. They would still fit. The Team on the other hand could have that specific lineup plus for example a Sole Comic relief character or a Old Veteran or what not. It would not suddenly make The Five Man Band redundant just because it's rules became more flexible. The differenxe in backlinks between The team and The FMB could have to do with popularity.

Then it isn't. Also, the example has The Hero instead of The Leader, so even if all five of them do team up at some point, it would be still wrong.

Now, does it count as The Team? I don't know, the example doesn't mention if they actually work together or not.

I've seen the movie and four of them work together, the elf kind of plays a mysterious protector role at best. After snails dies she's just kind of there. If I remember correctly saw the movie twice but it's been a while ago.

I fear they have no time to change this. I mean it's such an important part of the rock band comparison. Find one rock band without a bass or find me one without a tambourine. Big difference. Thanks for backing me up though. Maybe they'll find this post now that I've replied, one can only hope.

You aren't the only one confused. It appear that TRS thread is grind to halt exactly because they can't decide to replace The Chick with The Heart or not. Which is kind of shame, most of bad examples I saw are 1. has other wrong role (the most common are The Hero and Sixth Ranger, but I also saw Tagalong Kid, Team Dad, Team Pet, Token Evil Teammate, etc.), 2. has more or less than five members (usually stem from previous problem), 3. bad indentation, and the worst of all 4. ZCE. The previous three problem can fix or reworked into The Team with enough information, but when all you have is a list of tropes and names, usually not even mention how they work together, you can't do anything (unless you happen to be a fan of that work too).

That being said "pretty much every other website do it" is irrelevant.

Oh I know the actions of other websites is irrelevant to how TV tropes works. I was just always unsure why TV Tropes uses such a limited definition by comparison, but it makes more sense to me now considering TV Trope's core motives and what is and isn't considered a trope here.

I would rather see we change the name to Five Men One Cup.

More serious, the trope is about "specific" team set up, any variant would be The Team.

Yeah, no. Red Team is the closest, but everyone but The Leader and The Chick is blurry. Grif just isn't The Lancer. Personally, I'd switch Lopez and Simmons if I had to assign them the roles, which is usually a sign they're shoehorns.

Blue Team... well, isn't five people. And even admits characters drift in and out of roles. And Caboose is physically the strongest of the team, but he's not The Big Guy in terms of dynamics.

The Freelancers fail right away because they're... not really a team, honestly. That's like, the entire point of their seasons. And counting them as five people takes some mental gymnastics. Also CT would be The Chick. Actually none of the labels really fit.

Might want to ask here.

They're not. They'd be absolutely perfect if Groot were female, as he's definitely The Heart, Gamora is a classic Lancer, and Drax is The Big Guy.

Seriously, they fit the roles perfectly... except Groot isn't female.

The Heart is not one of the Five Man Band roles. The Guardians are a textbook FMB. Gamora's status as the moral compass of the group comes up repeatedly; she is the one pushing to secure the orb for the protection of the galaxy, but the group doesn't actually do it until the Leader agrees.

This is yet another instance of why insisting the FMB has to have "the chick"; the Got G (at least, the original 5 members) clearly form a *textbook* Five-Man-Band, with Quill as the Leader, Gamora as the Lancer, Drax as the Big Guy, Rocket as the Smart Guy, and Groot as the Heart- but nooo, we have to be all sexist about it and declare, for no good reason, that the Heart has to be female.

The current definition on Tv tropes requires 4 people, and one female. Not four men and a female. Weirdly enough, this allows all female teams to qualify as a five man band, which doesn't fit the spirit of this trope. Nor so all female examples for the 70s rock band analogy the definition uses.

Belated, but this. If the Smart Guy doesn't have to be a guy and the Big Guy doesn't have to be big or a guy, why does The Chick have to be a girl with absolutely no exceptions or leeway allowed?

yeah, that part is strange. someone should fix it.

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.

Or make The Chick the truly versatile band member: rhythm guitarist and keyboardist, and a second lead vocalist.

Hmm, you're probably right. From [1]

"Folks, please stop proposing changes to the trope definition in this thread. That's not what it's for. We'll never get it cleaned up if we keep changing the definition.

This is not a universal or even near-universal trope. It's a trope that's a child of its time (primarily the 50's, 60's, and early 70's), and It (sic) is, frankly, very rarely used straight anymore. That's why The Chick must be female, and why she must be The Heart of the group. She doesn't have to be absolutely useless otherwise, but she is not expected, by the other team members, to be as useful physically or intellectually as the men. Yes, that's sexist. But that's what it is.

The purpose of the wiki isn't to whitewash tropes by redefining them to eliminate unpleasant aspects; it's to catalog what they are (or were, when they were in widespread use)."

Sorry, that can't be (entirely) true for four reasons:

1. Older Than Cable TV says the first example was from 1972.
2. The original Star Wars trilogy, the wiki's favourite all-time example, is late 70s/early 80s. Also, do you consider Leia to be weaker than Luke, Han, Chewie, Threepio and Artoo?
3. Just look around, there are plenty of more recent examples of this trope (some of them match the gender ratios, others don't). However...
4. Currently, The Chick must be female, and there must be at most one other female on the team, and she must be the emotional centre of the team. But there's no requirement for her to be weaker than the other members, and as I said, she need not be the only female character.

I mean, if a group of characters that operated as a team had, say, six members and only two fit the Five-Man Band roles, I'm fine with it being a non-Five-Man Band The Team. If a group fits perfectly except for the gender requirements...I'm not so sure.

I have doubts about making two separate tropes, however. Maybe just use the broadened definition for Five-Man Band and mention the more specific definition.

Finally, I see The Team as more a supertrope of Five-Man Band than a dumping ground for shoehorned examples of the latter (not all of which even operate as a team), even if those are functionally the same thing.

You can ask here.

I think the edit-locking is less because shoehorns (or else we'd lock the subpages) and more because, since every medium has its own subpage, there's no reason for anyone to edit this unless they're making a change to the definition.

If you want to suggest an edit, please go to the Edit Requests thread in the Forum.

But all of the subpages ARE locked.

Regardless, I'll do as you suggest and check out the forums.

Huh, so they are. I had no idea. Learn something new every day.

A smart guy is important for the dynamic. I feel like a kid would fit into the chick role more than excluding a smart guy role. Besides, that would eliminate all groups where everyone is the same age. And if a kid happens to be the smartest guy on the team then there is no problem.

I seem to remember that an older version of this page had that slot with the option of using either a Smart Guy as contrasted with big and not intellectual, or a Fast Guy as contrasted with powerful but slow. I feel like the elimination of the "fast guy" option eliminates a number of valid five man bands. It also creates shoehorn situations.

For example, the Outlaw Star example lists Giliiam as their "smart guy". with Suzuka hanging on as a "sixth ranger"... and that seems entirely wrong. Suzuka belongs in the core group, but obviously doesn't count as an "intellectual". Still, she and Asha can be contrasted by their emphasis on sheer strength vs. a speed and training based style. Gilliam, meanwhile, doesn't even belong in the band.

Nowhere, it is a major shoehorn and would be deleted.

Well, whatever the issue with sexism is, the trope is indeed way overused for works where it doesn't apply. Especially problematic for recent works because they tend to use modifications of the classic setup rather than the setup proper.

I have to agree: why, exactly, is a group of 5 characters, one of whom is a male character who balances out the other characters' aggression, bringing them out to a manageable medium, and serves as The Heart of the team, disqualified from being a Five-Man Band simply because exactly ONE of those roles is inexplicably restricted by gender?

That's bizarrely sexist. Men exist who fill this role within teams, just as women exist who serve as The Leader - and THAT trope certainly doesn't say "This character is played by a man. A male. Otherwise, the Five-Man Band trope DOES NOT APPLY." - even though ORIGINALLY, certainly all examples of The Hero were male across most of Western society.

This gender restriction is ridiculous, and should be removed from the description.

Our ex-administrator did say that the original form of the trope didn't allow for a different gender.

Can our understanding of tropes not change over time? When a trope is "misused" in such a vast number of cases, would it not make sense to re-evaluate how we define it? Isn't the point of a wiki that its content is determined by contributor consensus, not simply the word of one individual from some bygone era?

Sometimes, staff fiat happens. Authoritarian micromanagement is bad but we do at times give orders.

It'd be a discussion for the forum, anyway.

I'm fascinated to know how simply declaring that everyone defining a trope differently than one particular moderator is wrong for no other reason than "because somebody in the past said so" is anything other than authoritarian micromanagement, but I've moved to the forums as requested.

Judging by the use so far, these pages would be more aptly titled "Dismissal" than "Discussion". Orders make sense when issued relating to conduct, inappropriate content, and site-wide administrative rules. They do not make sense when used to enforce an obsolete trope definition.

I'm reading the page for The Brave Little Toaster and Blanky is listed as The Chick even though he's a boy and the Five-Man Band page says The Chick HAS to be female or it's not a five man band. So then that either means that the Five Man Band trope has to be removed from the Brave Little Toaster's page because it's not accurate, Blanky's role has to be changed from The Chick to something more applicable (The Heart or Tagalong Kid), or the fifth role in the Five Man Band trope needs to be changed to be able to cover different combinations of Five Man Bands.

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.

Does this debate, as well as the fact that "Tambourine and Vocal effects" isn't really a musical role, not just present an argument for getting rid of the musical analogy altogether?

There is an administrative fiat in force that sets the existence of these analogies.

Eh, I think its own page makes more sense than merging it elsewhere. You could propose it in the forum thread though.

Seems like a question for its TRS.

Actually, the trope that we are presenting here only works with The Chick. Male examples do not fall under this trope. Maybe tropes derived from this one, but not the original.

What I'm saying is that perhaps its time we redefined the concept of the five-man band because as gender roles continue to be redefined in both society and fiction, it may no longer be appropriate to constantly refer to the heart of the five man band as "the chick." That's the argument I'm making

The site owner has insisted that the trope here should only cover the "The Chick as a woman" version, despite many people trying to convince him otherwise. As far as I know, the original trope was exactly like that. So I don't see a point in arguing this further.

In other words you don't want to admit that I have a valid point.

I am not seeing it. "the original trope was exactly like that." seems pretty plain to me.

Wow. That was rude. Too many of this kind of thump will bring a suspension. Please keep it civil. Thumped.

Ronin6401, knock it off. Discuss the topic, not the person.

I would appreciate a less personal tone, thanks.

Anyhow, the limitation is forced by administrative decision, so continuing to discuss it here isn't likely to lead to anything.

I think the gender ratio has not to be that specific. Many modern works actually have the Five-Man Bands without the "correct" gender ratio. Why should there not more than two female members? Tropes change over the time. And the Five-Man Band stereotype has also changed. For example, various harem series have either only one male or no males at all in the FMB, but the girls fit in the five tropes (of course, when they have five members) I don't think that the gender ratio is that important.

The gender ratio is important. The people who own this site have always insisted upon it.

Personally, I agree with Ronin, in that the Five-Man-Band concept works just fine with a male character playing the conscience of the team. Nowadays there are still this trope.

I'm not saying that Men can be classed as The Chick, because a glance at the trope for the chick would show that the chick MUST be female. But just because your gooey conscience isn't a girl, doesn't mean it's not a Five Man Band.

The fifth member should be The Heart. Maybe with a nod to how the old shows used to give this role to their token chick so that she actually had a reason to be there.

Of course, the Site Owners probably have a good reason, or they're approaching the Band from another angle.

They are approaching it from the "original archetype describes a team with The Chick as a female role".

We do have a YKTTW going for a supertrope, though. Here if anybody wants to contribute.

I have to agree that insisting on specific gender roles seems unnecessarily restrictive. I mean, a lot of the entries on this page aren't even five people, but the Chick must be female?

Those are also misuse. It should be five and only five.

Also, folks, we've had this discussion many times. I very much do not think that pushing it another time will convince them.

I wholeheartedly agree; the metaphor fits perfectly.

Agreed, specially as this page is being referenced in Nobody Loves the Bassist...

Fourthed! Let it be done, I say.

Fifthed. I believe persoanlly the Smart Guy can alternate between Keyboard and Bass.

If The Hero is Lead Guitar as well as Lead Vocals, then The Lancer is usually Bassist.

Let's not engage in Godwin's Law here, please.

Now, you are right about "reworking the trope" but "reworking a trope" can mean both "changing the trope" or "removing bad examples". We are doing that here - the linked post explains a bit on why the trope is in its particular shape.

That cleanup is already being done here for the record.

Honestly, you are simply wrong. The original trope has only female chicks. The trope you mention is a different item.

To address your first point, you may request corrections and additions in this thread.

Even if The Chick does have to be female, I feel like they CAN be replaced by The Heart, who does not have to be female.

We could and maybe should, especially with the missing supertrope (Five Man Band as known before without fixed genders) aspect - but to be fair to our article, websnark sees it from a different viewpoint. His conclusion goes along the lines the TV tropes article is "an accurate entry, describing a recurring trope in several media. But it’s not a blueprint for what a successful superhero team comic needs." - And since we aim for the former more than the latter, since it will always be a trope even if badly executed, the point does not really hit home for our purposes.

Agreed that the main point of the article the OP linked to does not entirely apply, but the article's secondary point—and the OP's primary one—certainly does: we could DEFINITELY stand to make this page less sexist.

I love this trope. Hell, I live it. That being said, this page is certainly broken. The Chick need not be female, plain and simple. This should be a forward thinking place, seeing as here we identify the very basic storytelling trends of our very existence. Sexism need not apply.

Except that now The Chick is now officially Always Female. That being an official edit from Fast Eddie himself. Whatever this place "should" be need not apply.

I completely agree.

If we want to have the Five-Man Band actually be this (very specific IMHO) trope, then we need to have something gender-neutral to fit similar emotional functions, at the very least.

At this point, we technically can't have a group of all-women up there, either, or a group where there are two women and three guys. Or three women and two guys. Or four women and a guy.

This is a really frustrating change to the trope. It's become way too specific, and especially in the case of The Chick, far too literal. I understand the issues with everybody putting any group of five characters they could stretch to fit in, but specifying gender for these tropes really limits them.

This forum discussion was what disqualified the Bleach examples.

Probably because (other than The Chick,) the other pages are still unlocked.

According to another post, they've now allowed an additional female to join one of the other roles, but no more than that.

Calling a group of people as good is just as controversial and flamebait-worthy as calling them evil.

It's not that so much as that this is a very specific trope which invokes a very specific meaning in a story and there basically aren't real-life groups that would fit.

Agreed. That's bothering me too. Seems like it should be more about character dynamics than what's between your legs.

My thoughts exactly. With this edit, to me it almost feels like a Five-Man Band with a male The Chick should be given their own trope. (Please note that I'm saying that allowing a male The Chick again would probably be the better solution, I'm not advocating to create a new page to contain any Five-Man Band with a male The Chick).

I'm certain that whoever changed it so the Chick must a woman has clearly forgotten that Tropes Are Flexible.

And about Gender-Inverted Trope.

I find it more awkward when it's an all Female group yet one is still designated The Chick (Like Sailor Moon) but of course it is still accurate.

Has anyone ever written a complete inversion, with 4 girls and 1 guy?

I suggest a couple of things:

(1) Make the following edit to The Chick (final version below):

I suggest the following edit to the locked article.

The Chick — (vocal effects, tambourine) A peacekeeping role to balance out the other members' aggression, bringing them to a nice or at least manageable medium. The Chick is often considered the heart of the group. This role is played by a woman or girl. Someone female. Otherwise, it is not a Five-Man Band. If a male fills this role, you instead have a Power Stable. Or The Team.

(2) Since the Power Stable article explicitly states that it's not restricted to wrestling examples, there ought to be folders or subpages created with examples from music and other genres.

Fair enough. In that case, they may fit under The Team, and the individual characters can certainly be listed under their individual tropes, but it is not an example of a Five-Man Band.

You can request an edit to a locked page here. I've done so for you; it should be fixed soon.

Here's something I've noticed—- if the Chick is Always Female, why is Pops from regular show listed as an example?

He shouldn't be. That combined with the role doubling in the FMB entry on Regular Show's page means that I'll ask for it to be removed.

I agree with your issue with the Chick, although the Leader part is a bit fuzzy. I guess it is possible for the main protagonist to not be a leader, but being put in another role doesn't imply demotion if it might seem that way, but it does imply that. I think changing "The Leader" back to "The Hero" would do no harm.

That's fair, perhaps it would be best to list the general trope as "The Leader/The Hero," and specify depending on the example.

... She Ra? I don't know if they fit the Five Man band but if I recall correctly, they did have a Token Male (Bow).

Intresting.

Perhaps Sailor Moon briefly, between Jupiter and Vensus's introductions.

No, Tuxedo Mask was The Sixth Ranger, never The Chick. That's going to be the problem with most female Five Man Bands; the random guy will almost always be The Sixth Ranger while a girl will be The Chick.

1) Post here when you have an edit request for a locked page.
2) Please write up fully what you want done — it isn't clear what you mean at the moment.
3) If it's to do with The Chick being a girl, you'll have to convince Eddie to make the change.

Unfortunately that is a quite confusing thread - how can you find over there, if this suggestion has alrady been brought up and/or turned down? Because I think as well, that the change from the clear cut "Chick does not need to be female" to the opposite without any explanation is really messing things up.

If The Big Guy need be neither physically large nor male, then The Chick need not be physically female. Either the names are based on roles, or they are literal descriptions—setting different rules for each one is inconsistent.

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?

You could use the "send report (on this article)" feature or Ask The Tropers to get the mods' attention.

This is about a group with a mandatory female in the role as described. There is another five person group in YKTTW development that may have this Face you speak of.

I kind of support The Face being added as an alternative to The Chick, especially since a lot of series are using a Smart ''Girl'' instead of a Smart ''Guy''.

^^ Link to said YKTTW?

@Fast Eddie

When did you last read the description or the examples? The description out-right says "Not always female." The idea of The Chick being the mandatory female was abandoned a long time ago.

I agree with abk0100. I don't care what the page says now, the role described of the chick has been played by male characters countless times. The old description was better.

Yes a Male can be a Chick. And I've noticed that most examples that lack The Chick have the 5th simply being a Tagalong Kid. Meaning there is always one who's less of a fighter and liable to be a Damsel in Distress.

We have an unfortunate situation where the Moderator is the ONLY person viewing the trope the way he personally does.

In either case, if this trope is now to be so specific in contrast to how flexible it used to be. We need a supertrope about team dynamics. Really, a supertrope to describe and collect tropes about team dynamics and specific roles connected to a position in such a dynamic, Including when there's no real team dynamic.

As it is, one of the most widely known tropes has gone from something to include all sorts of various teams where you can recognize this sort of pattern, to a very specific occurence of this pattern down to the gender segregation.

So what do i call it now when i have A Leader, a Lancer, a Big Guy, a Smart Guy and a male The Heart.

Used to be i could have all the four first ones and a sixth ranger and call it a band, but if that's no longer the case, we need somewhere to put all the other, quite similar patterns (to use the music band metaphor, all the cases where i have no tambourine but have a bassist and a flute player).

Traditional, pre gunpowder armies' infantries consisted of spearmen and swordsmen, for the most part. Spearmen would take cavalry off their horses most of the time, and swordsmen would move in to kill the rider while he was struggling to get to his feet. Since the swordsman got the kill and the spearman ruined a perfectly good horse (and that's how the generals would see it more often than not), the swordsman was the hero, which is yet another reason Heroes Prefer Swords.

Lastly, "Lancer" sounds better than spearman, pikeman, or anticavalry unit. The idea is that The Lancer could have been the primary protagonist, but that's just not how it is. It's the Hero's story, not the Lancer's.

Here. I've requested it be added to the index.

The Lancer, perhaps?

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  ^*

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):

Note: Variations occur where the core five are different or overlap. Don't take the title too literally — it's the roles more than the numbers that matter.

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.

Never mind. Found a better Trope.

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.

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

I added to the list so it could be indexed.