Discuss TV Tropes itself, such as observations you've made about the site/forum/wiki.
NOTE: Keep it civil; try not to get into any Flame Bait-y territory, per the forum rules
(in particular, drama importation and popcorn posting are not allowed, and this thread is for discussion about the site and not the users). In addition, while discussing the Edit Banned thread is not prohibited on its own, discussing and/or alluding to specific ban/suspension cases is not permitted.
One thing I've noticed is that for all how the page for They Might Be Giants claims them to be the unofficial official band of this wiki, there's relatively few people on this site who seem to ever reference them.
Edited by GastonRabbit on Oct 13th 2024 at 12:59:03 PM
So going back to the topic of reading past EB cases, I'll admit that it's a common hobby of mine whenever I'm not occupied with TLP work. This is because I find it interesting to read what got people banned in the past, what their reactions were to their situations, and what stories they tell. I never read EB for the "lol factor" though because even I find that rude and unnecessary gravedancing. Rather, I read EB for general analysis.
I read EB so that I know what happens to tropers who get reported in ATT or just in general.
Works That Require Cleanup of Complaining | Troper Wall
Oh I do that to to remain up-to-date on current cases as well. That way, I can look back on them for reference from a retrospective point of view.
BTW, if you're curious what my first forum post on my current account is, well... it's an EB post
. I'll let it speak for itself but, tl:dr, it was a pretty idiotic move on my part and I deeply apologize and regret what I did.
It's OK. The important thing is, you have been and are a very good contributor and that's what's important right now. I've actually been in situations IRL before myself that I've accidentally fucked up with things I've said that I intended as help—I get it.
Anyway, related to the conversation about Nice Hat and dewicking tropes with large wick counts, I was on hiatus during some of the time Some Anvils Need to Be Dropped got dewicked, but I remember that having a large number of wicks.
Edited by themayorofsimpleton on Aug 14th 2022 at 9:24:32 AM
Works That Require Cleanup of Complaining | Troper WallThe situation with Nice Hat makes me think the "there would be just too much to clean" arguments no longer hold water.
TroperWall / WikiMagic CleanupBigger Bad had a lot of wicks (for its time) too. I think some of that cleanup happened after the thread was closed actually.
Edited by themayorofsimpleton on Aug 14th 2022 at 9:37:13 AM
Works That Require Cleanup of Complaining | Troper WallWell, it depends on the trope. 10k takes a while but is doable. I still think Berserk Button isn't worth doing anything major even if the majority decides to rename. It grew 1k in wicks a month after the TRS was closed so it's at 30k wicks.
Big Bad also gets misused a lot and it's most wicked trope on the site at 60k. Since it was deeply ingrained in site culture, doing anything major to it was off the table.
Nice Hat isn't a trope in the first place so getting rid of it isn't a big deal.
Macron's notes![]()
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Well, perhaps dewicking Incredibly Lame Pun isn't as unthinkable as was previously thought considering the progress that's being made with Nice Hat, the latter of which had a five-digit wick count when its TRS thread was made, while the former has a four-digit wick count.
Speaking of which, I admit that Incredibly Lame Pun sinkholes are kind of a pet peeve of mine (I don't know if it would count as a Pet-Peeve Trope since it's a redirect and not a trope), especially because it's been several years since it was turned into a redirect.
Edit: Oh, right, and not too long ago Completely Missing The Point, another Pothole Magnet, was dewicked after previously having over a thousand wicks (due to the TRS thread that renamed it to Comically Missing the Point leaving behind unfinished business), so there's that.
Edited by GastonRabbit on Aug 14th 2022 at 9:04:59 AM
I got a rock for Halloween.Well, You Gotta Have Blue Hair had almost 9000+ wicks and people finished it in about a month in a half so it's doable if enough people are interested. There's smaller projects that are collecting dust in the TRS so I guess some tropes get lucky.
Edited by MacronNotes on Aug 14th 2022 at 10:05:22 AM
Macron's notesI can't help but notice that a lot of people join the forum just to promote their fanfiction because the "Promote your fanfic" thread is plagued with new accounts unable to post links.
Read Pokemon Ultimate EmeraldQuestion related to all of this: which TRS change was everyone the happiest to see? For me it was (as mentioned) Some Anvils Need to Be Dropped, which prior to getting redirected was in my opinion a never ending drama, misuse, and problem magnet that I wasn’t sad to see go. Anyone else have a TRS change they liked?
Works That Require Cleanup of Complaining | Troper Wall
One case was Ear Worm, which was made IUEO because out-of-universe examples were usually ZCEs, while writing in-universe examples is much simpler because it's a matter of saying a character has a song stuck in their head.
And Manly Facial Hair was made to replace Badass Beard and Badass Mustache. I did so much of the wick cleaning for those that my phone automatically suggests the names now.
The Five-Man Band changes, oh god that thread was a long time coming and took ages of not only discussing on the thread but also convincing the mods to even let us do it in the first place because there was a weird insistence at the time that all FMB needed was "better cleanup" even if the cleanup was stalled because people couldn't figure out the gender rule. The thread opened on the basis of tackling the indentation problems but immediately people rebelled against the mods' rule that we don't change the subject and got some real changes made to the trope that has been a thorn in my side for years at that point.
So yeah, suffice to say that thread is one of the best TRS threads I've ever participated in lmao
A dishonorable mention goes to Five Bad Band though since that damn trope is still refusing to die since people just moved it verbatim to Five-Man Band, the evil roles still in tact, it's one of the most upsetting "cleanup" results I've ever had to deal with since it's everywhere.
Edited by WarJay77 on Aug 14th 2022 at 2:13:40 PM
Working on: Author Appeal | Sandbox | Troper WallI never really understood why Five-Man Band has that "badge of honor" reputation in the first place. With other stuff like Complete Monster and Magnificent Bastard, I can see why those get misused (people love to gush about particularly awesome villains, or in the case of the former make an unpopular character sound worse). But I don't see what the fuss is about with having a specific number of men and women in your cast.
It's not the number, it's the roles. Leader, Lancer, Smart Guy, Big Guy, and Chick (or is it heart now, I can never remember) all sound cool so it's cool to have them.
Edited by BackSet1 on Aug 14th 2022 at 2:45:07 PM
Read Pokemon Ultimate EmeraldI mean, the roles got axed as part of the TRS. The tropes are still around (and FWIW, The Heart was never a valid replacement at the time since The Chick was one of the requirements), but Five-Man Band is a much broader Trope in Aggregate now for the general prevalence of "five-person teams", so any distinct five-person team with a clearly defined dynamic counts.
Working on: Author Appeal | Sandbox | Troper WallI didn't know that Five Bad Band examples were being moved to Five-Man Band, but I do recall it being pointed out in a TRS thread (I think the one for Five-Man Band) that someone unilaterally changed The Psycho Rangers' description to include the roles for Five Bad Band, which I ended up removing.
Edit; Huh, no, it was actually Rust Beard who removed that part. I might have been confusing that edit with an edit I actually did make removing Five Bad Band wicks from the page.
Edited by GastonRabbit on Aug 14th 2022 at 3:08:28 AM
I got a rock for Halloween.It's more that people like fitting characters into role systems in general. Same thing with Four-Temperament Ensemble, Character Alignment, assigning Hogwarts houses to non-Harry Potter characters, etc.
TBH I feel like the other character ensemble tropes also need to be TRS'd. Most of them are in terrible shape.
Working on: Author Appeal | Sandbox | Troper WallI just cleaned up 11 wicks pointing to a non-existent trope page, Snark.
There was talk in this thread ages ago over using this site in their own writing - I prefer coming up with ideas through other sources, then checking this site later to see if there's any tropes that fit those ideas. To me, the other way around of using this site as like a puzzle box to put a story together doesn't really lead to good storytelling.

Circus of Fear does bullet points. I always found that odd, but very helpful and readable. I think I like that better than the usual paragraphs, personally.
Very good kitty