How many tropes are required to be on an index?

I’m assuming there needs to be at least 5 tropes per index. How many is the actual minimum?

First and foremost, there needs to be a genuine reason for the index to exist: it needs to offer some form of categorization that serves a useful purpose. If you can't find at least five tropes for it, it's probably not useful, but ideally there should be quite a bit more.

Ok, because I was going to separate Reptiles and Amphibians into their own indexes after I created 2 or 3 new amphibian tropes, rather than having Reptile and Amphibian Tropes serving for both types of animals. I was also planning on creating two categories for Mammal Tropes: Livestock Tropes and Marsupial and Monotreme Tropes. For livestock, we have enough tropes about them that they could get their own index, but for the marsupials and monotremes, we have three tropes about kangaroos and one about a platypus, so I was going to create a trope about koalas being adorable (similar time Pandaing To The Audience) which would result in a total of five tropes.

Edited by Troper3 on Sep 27th 2020 at 3:57:09 AM

You're missing the point. We don't need to categorize things that finely. Broader indexes are more generally useful than narrower ones. Also, do not make tropes just to fit an index.

I feel like we're going to have to lock you out of TLP soon. You aren't getting this.

Well, we have Corvid Tropes and Dolphins, Dolphins Everywhere. I’m sorry if you think you need to lock me out. I wasn’t going to create tropes just for an index either. I’m actually creating tropes based on how they are used.

Edited by Troper3 on Sep 27th 2020 at 4:09:34 AM

When you say you "need to make a trope to fill an index", that is exactly backwards from how it's supposed to work. This arbitrary splitting of indices and tropes is also a red flag.

Well, I was already going to launch tropes about giant amphibians, grumpy toads, and cute koalas anyways; adding them to different indexes would just be a bonus. As for the Livestock Tropes, we have enough tropes (specifically 17) about livestock animals that it would make sense to put them in their own index and as a super-trope to Equine and Equestrian Tropes

Edited by Troper3 on Sep 27th 2020 at 4:52:40 AM

Agree.

Urgh. "Animal + property" is Not a Trope. It's chairs at best.

I get that. I learned with Pugnacious Penguin that a subversion alone is not worthy of being its own trope. However, for animals that are normally depicted as good/bad with a pattern as to why (koalas and toads in this case), wouldn’t it make sense?

Edited by Troper3 on Sep 27th 2020 at 5:13:04 AM

How about just Animal Stereotypes? This way examples consist of at least the animal and the stereotype it expresses instead of just, "In X work, there's a lazy panda."

Edited by Fighteer on Sep 27th 2020 at 7:22:50 AM

What is the difference between the Animal Stereotypes article and specific tropes about the other animals (including pleasant/scary animal tropes)? It’s not like an article about koalas would just be koala trivia and a list of works that feature koalas. It would work in a similar way to Pandaing To The Audience.

Edited by Troper3 on Sep 27th 2020 at 5:26:11 AM

Prevalence. If something occurs enough in fiction, its worth its own page, if not it can just go into the Animal Stereotypes page.

Incorrect. The answer is "significance and context".

When a trope perfectly encapsulates the context of its use, such that examples cannot add any interesting information besides "trope is used", it is too narrow.

Okay, but I’m sure that we could find a lot of examples of works with cute koalas. For the grumpy toads, probably not so much.

(Note that this comment was written before Fighteer replied)

Edited by Troper3 on Sep 27th 2020 at 5:30:35 AM

We can also find lots of examples of works with feet, or shirts, or clouds. Yet these are not tropes.

Edited by Fighteer on Sep 27th 2020 at 7:36:47 AM

True. Significance is also, well, significant.

Edited by antenna_ears on Sep 27th 2020 at 4:35:24 AM

Like I just said, it wouldn’t just be about works featuring koalas, it would be about works with cute koalas. The title wouldn’t be “Everything’s Better With Koalas”.

Edit: The trope is the narrative purpose behind the inclusion of the thing. If a koala is included in a work, it is not a trope until you identify why that koala is included. What purpose does it serve?

Is it because koalas are cute and so we want to make the audience go "dawww"? That's Cuteness Proximity.

Is it because koalas are associated with Australia? That's a trope about cultural pandering that I would need to look up.

Is it out of a mistaken belief that koalas are adorable little fuzzy-wuzzies instead of wild animals? That's yet another trope.

"Koala" is not a trope. "Cute koala" is just the arbitrary juxtaposition of two properties without any inherent meaning.

Edited by Fighteer on Sep 27th 2020 at 7:38:04 AM

The third option.

Edited by Troper3 on Sep 27th 2020 at 5:38:30 AM

Land Down Under pertains toward Australia. I find that Koalas are a very stereotypically Australian thing, along with kangaroos and wallabys.

We have a trope about wild animals being mistaken for being adorable and cute. It encompasses all such uses, and should be used in this case.

Thanks. If koalas are included in a work to show that it's in Australia, then the applicable trope is Land Down Under.

Edited by Fighteer on Sep 27th 2020 at 7:39:51 AM

Killer Rabbit, thats the name of the cute but dangerous trope.

Edited by antenna_ears on Sep 27th 2020 at 4:41:16 AM

You said “that’s yet another trope”. It wasn’t really because they’re wild animals being mistaken for cute creatures. It’s because of them being cute. If it belongs in Cuteness Proximity, then how come pandas have their own page? You are not being very clear.

Edited by Troper3 on Sep 27th 2020 at 5:42:04 AM

I was actually thinking of Carnivore Confusion and What Measure Is a Non-Cute?. In other words, the common idea that the cuter an animal is, the more likely it is to be friendly.

I also strongly disagree with pandas having their own page, if that wasn't clear enough.

Edited by Fighteer on Sep 27th 2020 at 7:42:22 AM