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Author: Westrim

May 19th 2014 at 1:33:51 AM

Dang, I'm not very clear on what any of you three are saying.

Dan's comment from the 17th is pretty accurate though, except I emphasize the ''at that time'' nature of the threat numbers, and say that the differences between those two scenarios is irrelevant for this trope. There's plenty of tropes for bandits, guards, nebulous evils, and random monsters. There are also several for the number of protagonists dealing with the thread versus the numbers of the threat.

What's ''important'' is the numbers are imbalanced in favor of the protagonists. What's ''unique'' and makes chairs inapplicable is the cohesiveness of the protagonists backing up their numerical advantage, whether it's because they manipulated the situation to give them that advantage, they're better balanced than the enemy, they're more attractive, or some other factor that combines with that numerical advantage to give them victory. There's lots of variation in how they back up their numbers, which is why most examples say what the variation is, which appears to be getting misread by some as not fitting the trope.