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Do you have trouble remembering the difference between Deathbringer the Adorable and Fluffy the Terrible?

Do you have trouble recognizing when you've written a Zero-Context Example?

Not sure if you really have a Badass Bookworm or just a guy who likes to read?

Well, this is the thread for you. We're here to help you will all the finer points of example writing. If you have any questions, we can answer them. Don't be afraid. We don't bite. We all just want to make the wiki a better place for everyone.


Useful Tips:

  • Make sure that the example makes sense to both people who don't know the work AND don't know the trope.
    • Wrong: The Mentor: Kevin is this to Bob in the first episode.
    • Right: The Mentor: Kevin takes Bob under his wing in the first episode and teaches him the ropes of being a were-chinchilla.
  • Never just put the trope title and leave it at that.
    • Wrong: Badass Adorable
    • Right: Badass Adorable: Xavier, the group's cute little mascot, defeats three raging elephants with both hands tied behind his back using only an uncooked spaghetti noodle.
  • When is normally far less important than How.
    • Wrong: Big Bad: Of the first season.
    • Right: Big Bad: The heroes have to defeat the Mushroom Man lest the entirety of Candy Land's caramel supply be turned into fungus.
  • A character name is not an explanation.


Other Resources:


For best results, please include why you think an example is iffy in your first post.

Also, many oft-misused tropes/topics have their own threads, such as Surprisingly Realistic Outcome (here) and Fan-Preferred Couple (here). Tropers are better able to give feedback on examples you bring up to specific threads. We don't discuss Complete Monster or Magnificent Bastard examples; please don't bring them up.

Edited by SeptimusHeap on Jul 17th 2025 at 8:59:01 PM

Twiddler (On A Trope Odyssey)
#9476: Aug 5th 2019 at 3:42:40 PM

[up][up] That's much more clear.

It's definitely not an inverted trope. Looking at Playing with a Trope, it might count as a conversed trope. So maybe something like this?:


[up] Hard to say, going only off the context you've provided. I wouldn't call 'spite' an evil motivation.

Edited by Twiddler on Aug 5th 2019 at 3:52:47 AM

SkyCat32 The Draftsman of Doom (Five Year Plan) Relationship Status: TV Tropes ruined my love life
The Draftsman of Doom
#9477: Aug 5th 2019 at 4:00:41 PM

I thought that spite meant doing something bad to someone just because you want to hurt them.

Twiddler (On A Trope Odyssey)
#9478: Aug 5th 2019 at 4:09:17 PM

[up] It's not necessarily about doing bad things, and it's not necessarily to hurt someone. It may be to annoy or frustrate them.

Can you give more context on Hans' motivation in this scene?

Edited by Twiddler on Aug 5th 2019 at 4:11:16 AM

SkyCat32 The Draftsman of Doom (Five Year Plan) Relationship Status: TV Tropes ruined my love life
The Draftsman of Doom
#9479: Aug 5th 2019 at 4:27:30 PM

Die Hard: Downplayed. Hans Gruber initially has his men shoot rockets at an armoured police vehicle in order to both neutralize the SWAT team and to intimidate John McClane into staying out of the former's way, prompting the latter to say that Hans has proven his point. However, frustrated by John's interference in his attempted robbery, Hans mockingly says that he will take John's request to leave the vehicle alone under advisement, before telling his men to shoot the vehicle again, solely to upset John. This prompts the latter to use improvised explosives to neutralize the two men under Hans' command.

Overall, Hans is motivated by greed. It's just this one act of cruelty that is motivated by a desire to inflict psychological harm on John.

Edited by SkyCat32 on Aug 5th 2019 at 7:29:39 AM

Gofastmike Since: Mar, 2017
#9480: Aug 5th 2019 at 5:38:40 PM

[up]x4 Not sure. They're not talking about the trope directly, they're talking about something entirely different that just so happens to invoke said trope. Maybe another angle would help?

  • Breaking the Fourth Wall:
    • (Irrelevant)
    • (Irrelevant)
    • During the events mentioned in Title Drop below, Fisher pretty much dares the players to make Mike's suggestion (a movie that shares its name with the game) a reality.
    • (Irrelevant)

Twiddler (On A Trope Odyssey)
#9481: Aug 5th 2019 at 5:43:26 PM

[up][up] Hm… I wouldn't call a desire for revenge For the Evulz, and it sounds like that's a strong factor here. If say, John was just some guy he didn't know and had no reason to care about, and he did this just to hurt him, that would be a much stronger case for For the Evulz.

Edited by Twiddler on Aug 5th 2019 at 5:46:38 AM

razorrozar7 Migrated to Chloe Jessica! from Chloe Jessica Since: Aug, 2010 Relationship Status: Hooked on a feeling
Migrated to Chloe Jessica!
#9482: Aug 5th 2019 at 5:49:54 PM

[up][up]that's not Breaking the Fourth Wall; that requires the character to explicitly mention that they're in a piece of media. it could be Leaning on the Fourth Wall.

e: also, you should always write your examples as if they're the only example on the page. don't reference other tropes on the page or say "see below" or anything like that.

Edited by razorrozar7 on Aug 5th 2019 at 5:51:25 AM

Migrated to Chloe Jessica!
Gofastmike Since: Mar, 2017
#9483: Aug 5th 2019 at 6:03:24 PM

[up] I have never heard of that rule before.

WhirlRX Since: Jan, 2015
#9484: Aug 5th 2019 at 6:17:02 PM

I don't think its a rule but its bad Formatting since that trope could have been deleted.

Edited by WhirlRX on Aug 5th 2019 at 9:17:17 AM

Gofastmike Since: Mar, 2017
#9485: Aug 5th 2019 at 6:49:54 PM

Well, maybe one of you could try rewriting them? I'm not exactly a pro-level troper.

  • Leaning on the Fourth Wall:
    • (Irrelevant)
    • During the events mentioned in Title Drop below, Fisher pretty much dares the players to make Mike's suggestion (a movie that shares its name with the game) a reality.
  • Title Drop: During a conversation between Mike and Fisher, the former suggest the game's title as the title for an action movie in lieu of "Sunshine and Roses", itself a reference to an aesop Mike had just put out in the preceding sentence.
  • The Movie: Inverted, the game's not based on anything in particular, but during the events mentioned in Title Drop, Fisher indirectly suggests that this may happen to the game at some point in the future.

If it helps, here's the sequence in question:

Mike: Not everything is sunshine and roses, Fisher. If this was a perfect world, it wouldn't need people like me. Frankly, I wouldn't mind a little conflict every now and then, "Sunshine and Roses" wouldn't exactly make a very good title for an action movie. [My Game], perhaps?
Fisher: (A small smile crosses her lips.) Careful there, old man. Someone might just accept that challenge. (Her smile degrades into a smirk, but the joke has still had an effect.)

Couple notes:
  • I don't actually know what the game's going to be called yet, so I put the bracketed name in as a placeholder.
  • Fisher calling me "old" is a jab at me being immortal, not actually elderly. In fact, at the time of this post, I'm actually 23 (give or take a century), while she's around 15.

Edited by Gofastmike on Aug 5th 2019 at 11:25:03 AM

Twiddler (On A Trope Odyssey)
#9486: Aug 5th 2019 at 6:57:02 PM

[up] Is this an unpublished work?

Yinyang107 from the True North (Decatroper) Relationship Status: Tongue-tied
#9488: Aug 5th 2019 at 7:05:14 PM

We don't trope unpublished works.

razorrozar7 Migrated to Chloe Jessica! from Chloe Jessica Since: Aug, 2010 Relationship Status: Hooked on a feeling
Migrated to Chloe Jessica!
#9489: Aug 5th 2019 at 7:07:41 PM

[up]not strictly true; they go on DarthWiki.Unpublished Works,and it's still acceptable to make sure you're using tropes properly, so that the page doesn't need cleaning when the work is published.

Migrated to Chloe Jessica!
Gofastmike Since: Mar, 2017
#9490: Aug 5th 2019 at 7:12:02 PM

[up][up]Well, for the record, I have been. The project's trope page has reached a respectable length, but I had to keep it in Google Docs because some people are insufferable bastards.

Edited by Gofastmike on Aug 5th 2019 at 10:21:31 AM

WarJay77 It's NaNo, Bay-beeee! (10,238/50,000) from My Writing Cave (Troper Knight) Relationship Status: Armed with the Power of Love
It's NaNo, Bay-beeee! (10,238/50,000)
#9491: Aug 5th 2019 at 7:23:24 PM

[up] I'm unclear on what you mean by that. Are you afraid of people trolling, or people changing your work?

Working on: Author Appeal | Sandbox | Troper Wall
Gofastmike Since: Mar, 2017
#9492: Aug 5th 2019 at 7:30:59 PM

A little of both, actually. Plus, anyone with the right amount of legal knowledge could easily claim the whole thing as their own, and I'd have to go through a giant pile of red tape to get my project back.

Edited by Gofastmike on Aug 5th 2019 at 10:31:32 AM

WarJay77 It's NaNo, Bay-beeee! (10,238/50,000) from My Writing Cave (Troper Knight) Relationship Status: Armed with the Power of Love
It's NaNo, Bay-beeee! (10,238/50,000)
#9493: Aug 5th 2019 at 7:32:17 PM
Ferot_Dreadnaught Since: Mar, 2015
#9494: Aug 5th 2019 at 7:42:00 PM

From Deconstruction Fic:

Unless anyone objects, I'm moving these to Fix Fic because it fixes a complain as opposed to deconstructing anything.

Gofastmike Since: Mar, 2017
#9495: Aug 5th 2019 at 7:46:03 PM

Two things:

WarJay77 It's NaNo, Bay-beeee! (10,238/50,000) from My Writing Cave (Troper Knight) Relationship Status: Armed with the Power of Love
It's NaNo, Bay-beeee! (10,238/50,000)
#9496: Aug 5th 2019 at 7:51:37 PM

We weren't discussing legal status, just the page itself and why it doesn't matter if someone edits your work, but yes, let's get back on topic.

Working on: Author Appeal | Sandbox | Troper Wall
sgamer82 Since: Jan, 2001
#9497: Aug 5th 2019 at 7:57:36 PM

Giving my Kindhearted Cat Lover entry from earlier a slight rewrite:

  • Roujoteki Shoujo Hinata-chan: Hinata is a kind and considerate girl, well like by her fellow kindergartners and whose mother has to actively forbid her from helping out on her own birthday. However she inverts the "cat lover" part of the trope, as demonstrated by the fact that her initial reaction to seeing some cats in her kindergarten class is to bodily hurl them out of it. This irrational hatred is shown to be a holdover from her life pre-Reincarnation, in which she regarded cats more as garden pests and even forbade her grandson from keeping one as a pet. None of this stops cats from loving her, as the chapter which highlights Hinata's loathing of cats ends with one sneaking in during naptime and curling up next to her.

Also, would this be a valid Fish out of Temporal Water entry? I could see it not being an example, as there's no direct time travel involved, but it's one of those situations that fits the spirit of the trope, if not the letter.

  • Roujoteki Shoujo Hinata-chan: Chapter eight features Hinata being taken to the city by her brother Haruto to go see a movie. Hinata is six years old, but retains memories of a past life that ended at eighty-eight. The last time she can remember going to the movies was sixty years ago, and it shows as she's completely unprepared for the modern day conveniences like using cards instead of tickets to ride a train, escalators and toilets that are automatic, and 3D movies. The whole experience stresses her out until she rediscovers a beach she remembered that hasn't changed at all.

I recently created the page for this series, but I'm trying to curb my enthusiasm to trope it to make sure I get the right ones.

Edited by sgamer82 on Aug 5th 2019 at 9:20:44 AM

Gofastmike Since: Mar, 2017
#9498: Aug 5th 2019 at 8:02:50 PM

[up][up]I'm not entirely resistant to other people changing it (otherwise I wouldn't be here), I just don't want some Insufferable bastard to derail the whole thing.

Twiddler (On A Trope Odyssey)
#9499: Aug 5th 2019 at 9:25:54 PM

[up] Are you concerned about other people trying to copyright the work itself (a game?), or the trope page?

Gofastmike Since: Mar, 2017
#9500: Aug 5th 2019 at 9:38:39 PM

The game. I'm pretty sure you can't copyright a trope page without running afoul of either TVT's CC license, Privacy Policy, or some other rule-set.


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